Politics

The Telegraph’s Chris Hope has a very interesting interview with Ukip Treasurer Stuart Wheeler in which he says seven Tory MPs had lunch with him to discuss a possible defection to the party. Wheeler says these talks took place more than a year ago, and since then the excitement about possible defections has clearly died down. Why aren’t Tory MPs interested any more in defections? I’ve spoken in private to most of the MPs who held talks with Wheeler – and some with Nigel Farage too – and most of them say they feel there is still a good chance of their party winning in 2015, and that David Cameron’s

The Yes campaign’s response so far to the story that Standard Life would consider transferring some of its operations to England from Scotland in the event of a ‘Yes’ vote has been to argue that what the company wants is ‘exactly what the Scottish government has proposed’. Some Nats think this is another example of bullying from ‘monied elites’, but so far the official campaign has wisely blamed the ‘No’ campaign for creating uncertainty for businesses. After weeks of arguing about bullying and ‘campaign rhetoric’ from Westminster politicians, perhaps the SNP realises that making the same accusation of a business for setting out contingency plans would be going overboard (but

[audioplayer src=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_27_February_2014_v4.mp3″ title=”Fraser Nelson and Stephen Booth discuss Cameron’s Northern Alliance”] Listen [/audioplayer]For a Prime Minister seen to have no real interest or clout in Europe, David Cameron is doing pretty well – and far better than this morning’s newspapers suggest. He has built around him an alliance of reformers, which I describe in my Spectator cover piece today (and discuss in this week’s podcast). It is what Cameron calls a ‘Northern Alliance’: the Scandinavian states, plus the Dutch and Germans. His friend and conservative leader, Fredrik Reinfeldt of Sweden, is all up for reform. Not a majority, by any means, but what they want – simplification of the EU

Earlier this week David Cameron threatened the Lib Dems with divorce. Today, two of their senior figures offered to kiss and make up. Sir Alan Beith and Sir Bob Russell, bearing their knighthoods like dented old battle-shields, made their overtures at PMQs. Each of these leathery old libertarians seems to have discovered his inner Tory. Sir Alan went first. He invited Cameron to slap down rogue Anglicans who dare to criticise welfare reform. ‘There’s nothing moral about pouring more borrowed money into systems that trap people in poverty,’ he said. Cameron accepted Sir Alan’s invitation for a waltz. Greeting him as ‘a ‘distinguished churchman himself’, the prime minister praised his

‘The cyber-nat activity is disgraceful. They will trash anyone who disagrees with them. Their intention is to make people keep their heads down. Salmond could stop it, but he doesn’t choose to,’ said Alistair Darling, leader of the Better Together campaign, last month. Supporters of Scottish nationalism have dominated the web for the last five years, slinging abuse and hatred at anyone who dares to speak in favour of the Union. They began in the Scottish newspapers’ online comment sections, honed their craft via email and found full voice with the advent of social media. Twitter is the cesspool of choice for the ‘cyber-nat’ community. Last year Ceilidh Watson, a

Ed Miliband again went on climate change and the floods at Prime Minister’s Questions. Miliband believes that Cameron is vulnerable on this subject, that people will notice how Cameron – who used to say ‘Vote Blue, Go Green’ – has now gone cold on this issue. listen to ‘PMQs: Cameron and Miliband on climate change’ on Audioboo