Politics

David Cameron may well have privately resolved that there is no cause for him to step down if Scotland votes for independence in a few months’ time, as per James Chapman’s scoop today. But the problem is that it is not in the Prime Minister’s gift to make that decision. He may well say that he isn’t going to resign, but that would have no effect on the number of letters that would be sent to 1922 Committee chairman Graham Brady demanding a leadership contest. It’s not as though the Tory party will reel from the shock of Scotland leaving, then wait to see what the Prime Minister says and

Mr S would like to share this video with readers. It is the latest campaign ad from the Labour Party. As spoofs go, it’s leaden: puerile personal attacks mixed with divisive class war. It says nothing positive about Labour; it’s aimed squarely at people who would vote Labour in any circumstances. All in all, it’s not very clever, which is strange because Ed Miliband has spent much of the week professing that he has ‘more intellectual self-confidence’ than David Cameron. Labour staffers are certainly a little nonplussed. One party dogsbody lamented to Mr S: ‘How have we got from “I’m cleverer to that video in just 24 hours? It doesn’t

One of the interesting things I learned from a recent Lord Ashcroft poll was the startling fact that three times as many people identify themselves as Labour voters, tribally, as Tories (around 30 per cent versus 10), despite the two parties having roughly similar base support in general elections. This says something about the different way the two groups think; loyalty to the Labour Party runs deep and is emotional, while for Conservative voters the party is pretty much a pragmatic organisation to keep even worse politicians from running the country. I’m not sure which group will suffer more in the long term from the current crisis of party politics;

Easy triumphs soften victors. Cameron demonstrated this truism today as he took two unexpected blows from Ed Miliband at PMQs. The Labour leader led on his new policy of rent controls. Cameron, rather weakly, seemed amenable to the reform but offered no concrete proposals of his own. Miliband struck. ‘That was a pretty quick U-turn, even for him.’ Miliband then asked about the preparations to surrender AstraZeneca, trussed and bound, to Pfizer – with all the attendant risks to jobs and investment. Cameron flushed as red as a rhubarb crumble and accused Miliband of ‘playing politics’ while the government was ‘getting stuck in’ and defending the national interest. What irked

The debate on the Immigration Bill has just begun in the Commons. Many MPs are still trying to decide how to vote on the proposal to render foreign-born terror suspects ‘stateless’. In an attempt to persuade his party to vote with the government, Lib Dem Home Office minister Norman Baker has sent out a ‘dear colleague’ letter to MPs, leaked to Coffee House, in which he says he has amended the legislation to the extent that there is a ‘major shift’ from the Home Secretary. This ‘major shift’ means the Home Secretary must believe the suspect being deprived of their citizenship will be able to secure alternative citizenship from another

Labourites are very pleased with their latest party election broadcast, featuring the ‘un-credible shrinking man’, Nick Clegg, growing smaller and smaller at the Cabinet table as the Tories around him hatch various evil plans to ruin poor people’s lives through the bedroom tax, cuts to the NHS and tuition fees. If you are already inclined to think the Tories are evil and Nick Clegg a bit of a weakling, you’ll enjoy this video. Which suggests that Labour is entirely playing to its base here. It’s not even Ed Miliband’s cost-of-living crisis pitch to hardworking families up and down the country who are a bit cheesed off that their lives don’t