Politics

It’s a year to go until the longest election campaign finally finishes. Ed Miliband thinks he has more intellectual self-confidence than David Cameron, which since his 2013 autumn conference speech where the Labour leader finally found the courage of his convictions. But David Cameron has more confidence about his own party sticking by him for the campaign at least. The Prime Minister has mended some relationships, and others are more cordial and banging the Tory drum simply because they want their party to win next year. But it’s fair to say that for the time being the PM has got the contingent of swing voters amongst his own MPs –

Well, the Ukip constituency association in Newark has certainly considered Nigel Farage’s musings on the success of appointing an unknown local candidate in a pivotal by-election… and completely ignored it. They’ve picked Roger Helmer, who, as Seb says, is not known for his mollifying centre-ground views. His selection as the party’s candidate for the Newark by-election is a gift for CCHQ, which now needs a teaspoon rather than a spade to dig out awkward comments the MEP has made. Perhaps it also suggests that Ukip have decided there’s not much hope of winning so why bother to field a good candidate who the party’s opponents would lay into. Or perhaps

The European election creeps closer and the smart money has switched from Labour to Ukip topping the poll. A Labour win would be spectacular in its own right as it would probably require a doubling of their 2009 vote share. I confess there was an intake of breath in the ComRes office when our ITV News poll results were in showing an 11-point Ukip lead over Labour. But the naysayers were confounded by a second poll released on the same day showing a nine-point Ukip lead. The ramifications of a party with no Westminster MPs topping a popular ballot within a year of a General Election puts us into new territory. What

How the Tory party will react if, as excepted, Ukip pushes the party into third place in the European elections is one of the most discussed topics in UK politics. But overlooked in all this is how Labour will react if Farage’s party beats them on May 22nd. If Ukip come top in the European Elections, as the polls indicate they have a very good chance of doing, Labour will be thrown into a panic. No opposition has ever triumphed at a general election having not won the previous European Elections. A failure in the European Elections would be a big blow to the idea that Ed Miliband is going

Now that Newark is a no-go, Nigel Farage will be turning his thoughts to where he will stand as an MP. He said this week that returning its first MP will be a huge breakthrough for Ukip, so choosing a seat that he can win is vital. After declining to stand in the 15 by-elections that Ukip have contested since 2010, it looks as if Farage will wait until 2015 to run for Parliament. Coffee House understands that, ideally, Farage would like the seat to fit three criteria. Firstly, it needs to be a marginal seat. Secondly, he wants to have some local connection — he feels his lack of

Peter Hain has become a disgrace. Earlier this year it appeared that the Former Northern Ireland Minister was one of the people responsible for the cock-up over letters of amnesty for ‘on-the-run’ terrorists. Now he has gone several steps further. Just last month Hain was just telling everybody who has lost a relative during the Troubles in Northern Ireland and who never saw anyone convicted for the crime that they should just get over it. His line as of last month was that victims of unsolved cases must simply accept that they will never see justice. But now he seems to have decided that he is not merely a cack-handed peacemaker