Politics

It has not been a very happy start to the new year for Theresa May, who will have to answer difficult questions in the Commons about the disappearance of a terrorism suspect. Ibrahim Magog has been on the run since Christmas eve when police first realised he had failed to meet the conditions of his overnight residence requirements. Magog has been under investigation for two years and is believed to have trained with al-Shabaab, a Somali terrorist group linked to al-Qaeda. The group has waged a violent campaign in East Africa and has long threatened attacks against the West (although none have actually materialised). What will trouble the Home Secretary

Time was when Ed Miliband had plenty to say about François Hollande. When the new French President celebrated his victory in May, the Labour leader praised Hollande for his ‘determination to help create a Europe of growth and jobs, in a way that is responsible and sustainable’. He added: ‘This new leadership is sorely needed as Europe seeks to escape from austerity. And it matters to Britain.’ Then, Miliband was keen to work together with his new friend Hollande. Just a few months down the line, though, Labour has a bit less to say about how the French president is a shining example of the centre-left showing leadership and hope

Audits of the last year are a blessing to journalists: a postmortem of the gainers and losers of 2012 are a useful means of covering for the fact that there’s next to nothing happening on the political front, nobody’s at work and the only actual news is hinged on that annual festival of recrimination, the New Year’s Honours List. But the lists are good for sparking off debate, at least among the politically interested, and one of them, the Telegraph’s summary of the top five political women of the last year had at least the merit of getting me worked up. To cut to the chase, the women who matter by this

Tristram Hunt paints a bleak picture of the state the Palace of Westminster is in for Spectator readers this week as he draws parallels between the crumbling parliament building in New Delhi and plans to renovate the Mother of Parliaments in London. The Labour MP and historian writes: In SW1, the situation is critical. Forget the obvious signs of decay — the mice; the leaking roofs; the wafts of sewage. Deep in the belly of Charles Barry’s 1830s Gothic wonderland, the infrastructure is in meltdown. The steam and condensate systems are beyond life expectancy. Explosions from the boilers risk the cabling and water pipes. The vertical risers are ridden with

Nick Clegg has made a not-so-startling intervention in the debate about Britain’s relationship with Europe today, warning that Britain must avoid selling itself short in a renegotiation. His interview with the Guardian is a necessary piece of positioning ahead of David Cameron’s Big Europe Speech in mid-January, and this kind of differentiation is something the Tories are more than happy for the Lib Dem leader to continue doing. So in some ways, Clegg warning Cameron not to overdo it on Europe isn’t at all significant. But the Deputy Prime Minister makes an important observation in his interview about Britain’s bargaining power. Describing the creation of the single market and the

They always manage to pull something special out of the hat at Christmas, over at the Guardian. Last year it was that fantastic woman, an editor at The Ecologist, who agonised over what to buy her son for Christmas that was green, ethical, sustainable and non-materialistic, if you remember, when her son Dimitri just wanted a Nintendo DS and a mini car to drive to school in. This time it is George Monbiot’s special Boxing Day tale of how he came to be terrified by some poor people who were a bit rough looking and had tattoos and dirty fingernails. Utterly hilarious stuff from this supposed leftie; Moonbat (Stowe, Brasenose,

As is becoming increasingly clear to David Cameron, the problem with answering calls for an inquiry into a scandal in one industry or another is that at some point that Inquiry will report back with a bunch of recommendations which may or may not be politically expedient to implement. The Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards came up with proposals last week for an electrified ring fence, which the Treasury politely said it would look at, and Vince Cable rather more bluntly said the government should ignore, preferring instead that ministers get a move on with implementing the Vickers proposals, rather than opening up the whole debate again. But the really

The Andrew Mitchell story has always been about class. If all Mitchell was alleged to have said was ‘you supposed to f’ing help us’ there would have been some clucking and some mockery but no serious calls for his resignation. But the word ‘pleb’ and the phrase ‘know your place’ made the charge toxic. This was also what made some in Number 10 so queasy about any kind of robust defence of Mitchell; the Cameroons believe that whenever the conservation is about class the Tories are losing. This class angle is also what enabled the Labour Party to make political hay out of the issue. But the more we find

In spite of the best efforts of its ministers in the Lords, it looks as though the government is going to face a vote on the dreaded boundaries legislation early next year, with the Electoral Registration and Administration Bill returning to the Upper Chamber in January. The big story is that the Lib Dems will be able to kick the reforms away until 2018 using an amendment, but it isn’t just the members of the smaller Coalition party who will be rebelling against government policy. Tory MP Glyn Davies has now come out as an opponent of the reforms, too. On his blog, he writes that he is ‘contemplating voting

Following the passing of his budget, Mario Monti has quit as Italian Prime Minister. At the moment, it remains unclear whether he’ll continue to lead the government until elections next year. Many in the Italian establishment—and, I understand, several European leaders—would dearly love Monti to emerge as the leader of a centrist coalition ahead of the election, though as a Senator for Life he can’t run in the election himself. They view the popular endorsement of Monti’s reforms as the best possible result for the stability of the Eurozone. What seems certain, though, is that the Italian elections will be highly unpredictable. The presence of both a comic and Silvio