Politics

Read about the latest UK political news, views and analysis.

Saturday

Emily Rhodes

The Tortoise and the Lib Dems

The Lib Dems have been thoroughly ineffectual in the coalition. So much so that some of us — including Hugo Rifkind in this magazine — have asked why they bother to turn up for work. I wonder whether the Lib Dems press on with the coalition because they can’t face admitting to its failure. They are no better than an unhappy housewife, clinging to a loveless marriage because she believes she is happier trapped in a wretched partnership than on her own. If this is the case, then Nick Clegg would do well to read Elizabeth Jenkins’s 1954 novel The Tortoise and the Hare. Achingly sad, but ultimately uplifting, this

John Simpson

The office of last resort

Beijing There is no mistaking the place. It isn’t just the crowd of men and women sitting on the steps of the small official building; it’s the way they look as individuals. Once you’ve come across a group of petitioners in China, you can always spot them again. They are usually middle-aged or elderly and poor. Their clothes are worn and dusty. They look discouraged, sad, beaten down by life. And yet there’s something else about them — something which says a great deal for the human spirit. They’re defiant. They’ve crossed the intangible barrier which divides the weak of purpose from those who are determined to see their project

James Forsyth James Forsyth

For Boris, the Games could be just a warm-up

It is an odd summer in Westminster. The political big beasts have stayed around because of the Olympics. Government ministers have international schmoozing to do; and in any case, like their senior shadows, they would not want to risk being seen scrambling back from abroad in the event of a national emergency. They are not, however, expecting to be able to score many political points while the Games are in progress. Only one office-holder is making full use of them: Boris Johnson. The Mayor of London has been doing what he does best — directing the emotional energy of a crowd. His performance has reminded me of a conversation I

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Once, Boris, you would have hated this show

In the end, after sniping and carping and moaning for months about how ghastly the Olympics was going to be, I thought the opening ceremony rather wonderful and therefore felt ashamed of myself for having been so aloof. I had not expected such a breadth of vision, nor such beauty, nor indeed the copious room allowed for a certain self-deprecating humour. I wish I’d been there, with the kids. As it was we allowed our six-year-old daughter to stay up to watch the athletes parade around the stadium with their flags and it may well have been the most instructive two hours she has enjoyed in her life. Huw Edwards

Hugo Rifkind Hugo Rifkind

Back in 2005, Blair thought these would be his Olympics

Back in 2006, I broke a great story in the Times about Tony Blair’s tie. Yep, that’s me, always the heavyweight. But it was good stuff. What we’d noticed — me and Simon from the picture desk — was that whenever Blair felt particularly under pressure, he’d pop out the next day in his special Olympic tie. It was a stripy affair, worn by the whole crew when we won the bid in 2005. Obviously, it gave him a lift. To be honest, it was rather like shooting fish in a barrel. This was 2006, remember, so Blair was under pressure all the time. I barely even remember why. ‘Tony Blair

Friday

Douglas Murray

Why is Hezbollah still not on the EU’s list of banned terrorist organisations?

Despite having carried out terrorist attacks for the last thirty years and killed hundreds of people around the world, the terrorist group Hezbollah is, unbelievably, still not on the European Union’s list of banned terrorist organisations. In today’s Wall Street Journal. Daniel Schwammenthal lays out the imperative case for putting them on that list. Officially the EU claims that there is a difference between the terrorist group’s political and military wings.  But that is not so, any more than it is the case for Hamas (which the EU does recognise as a terrorist entity). In his piece Schwammenthal rightly points out the global reach that Hezbollah has had, killing 241

James Forsyth James Forsyth

No sweeteners for Clegg on Lords reform

In recent weeks, Downing Street has been repeatedly told by Tory MPs that if proposals for an elected element in the House of Lords were brought back to the Commons, the next rebellion would be even bigger than the 91 who voted against second reading. Downing Street, as the Telegraph reported this morning, has now accepted that Lords reform will have to be dropped and there is talk of a formal announcement to this effect as early as Monday. But, intriguingly, I understand that David Cameron does not intend to abandon efforts to get the boundary reforms through. This, as Isabel noted this morning, has the potential to cause a

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Tory backbench beats Lib Dems in battle of PM’s priorities

Let’s forget for a minute about the Lib Dems and their dire threats of ‘consequences’ for the failure of the Lords Reform Bill and focus on the Conservative party. David Cameron has failed to convince his party to support the legislation. He said he needed the summer to try to win the rebels round before he tabled a new programme motion for the Bill, and before the summer is even out, he has decided that he can’t do it. This isn’t just about a hardcore of Conservative MPs who are viscerally opposed to Lords reform, though. There are those who would always have opposed it, but many others who might

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Cameron to shelve Lords reform

When the coalition returns from the summer recess, don’t expect a relaxed, post-holiday spirit. David Cameron has failed to convince his backbenchers to support the House of Lords Reform Bill and The Telegraph reports that the Prime Minister will announce that these reforms are to be shelved in the coming days. This triggers that new phase of coalition that Nick Clegg and his colleagues have been warning about: the era of ‘consequences’. Although Conservative ministers have been considering other policies that they could hand to their coalition partners, these will not be enough to appease them: it’s Lords reform or nothing. How this will play out is fascinating: the main

Thursday

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Reshuffle bingo

It’s a strange old world when a Prime Minister backing his own Chancellor is worth reporting. But this afternoon the Prime Minister was asked by Sky News whether he was going to reshuffle George Osborne. Naturally, he answered: ‘George Osborne is doing an excellent job in very difficult circumstances and he has my full support in going on and doing that job. He’s not going anywhere.’ Kay Burley then pressed Cameron on whether this meant Osborne would still be Chancellor at the next election. He replied: ‘Yes.’ Now, this was quite obvious anyway. Osborne’s stock is certainly down amongst Tory MPs, many of whom are still smarting after watching the

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The restless Tory family

Today’s YouGov poll is the latest Boris talking point. For what it is worth, it shows that the idea of Boris as leader reduces the Labour lead from six points to one. It is the first polling evidence we’ve seen that suggests the Tories would do better nationally under Boris. The Boris speculation has now reached such a level that nervous Liberal Democrats are calling up asking whether they should start taking it seriously and sotto voce inquiring as to how the Tories replace their leaders. All of this is, in many ways, hugely premature. Boris isn’t even an MP and there’s a massive difference between Tory backbenchers wondering after

Wednesday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Boris puts the bubbles back into his campaign champagne

After Boris’s re-election as London mayor, his departing aide Guto Harri complained that the dry but effective campaign had rather taken the ‘bubbles out of the champagne’. Well, the Olympics is certainly putting them back in. Boris keeps taking opportunities that no other politician would dare to—the zip wire ride today being the latest, and most dramatic, example. The question is where does all this end, is it all just Olympics hi-jinks that will be forgotten when the flame leaves Stratford or is it just the next stage of the Boris for PM campaign? In my column in the magazine tomorrow, I say that it does seem to be more

Jonathan Jones

The Tea Party claims another scalp

They may have failed to install one of their candidates as the Republican’s presidential nominee, but the Tea Party is having better luck in other elections. Last night, Ted Cruz — backed by Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul — beat Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst 57-43 in the Republican primary for Texas’s senate election in November. Despite being outspent nearly three-to-one, Cruz — who has never run for office before — achieved a remarkable turnaround. In the first round of the primary just nine weeks ago, Dewhurst beat him 45-34 (as neither got more than 50 per cent it went down to last night’s run-off). In the second round,

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Calling in the Olympic ghostbusters

TfL have today stopped running those Boris Johnson announcements over the tannoys at Underground and national rail stations that were rather getting on commuters’ nerves. But their replacement seems to be trying to undo some of Boris’ good work in trying to scare people away from the centre of London. Last night, Westminster Underground Station played an announcement telling tourists that the city was now ‘really coming alive’ and urging them to make the most of the restaurants, museums and shops that they found around them. The station was relatively quiet at the time, save for a group of men clutching large flags. A TfL spokesperson said today: ‘We have

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

‘Unstoppable’ Boris gets stuck on a zip wire

Oh dear: this morning Boris Johnson was being hailed as ‘unstoppable’ in his bid to be the next Conservative leader. But it turns out Westminster has been far too preoccupied with the boring details of how he can get re-elected in time to take over from David Cameron that we all failed to notice the major obstacle in the Mayor’s route to the Commons: Boris managed to get stuck on a zip wire this afternoon in Victoria Park. Eyewitnesses say that the Mayor was shouting for a ladder or a rope as he swung above the heads of the crowd. Boris knows that this sort of thing always works in

Sebastian Payne

The house price slide continues

Hidden behind today’s gushing Olympic headlines lies more disappointing economic news. Nationwide’s latest House Price Index release today shows that house prices are continuing to fall, with a 0.7 per cent decline in July. As the graph below shows, the fall in prices is a continuation of a trend that began when the country re-entered recession earlier this year: The latest figures put prices down 13 per cent on their 2007 peak and 2.6 per cent lower than this time last year. Last year the average house price was £168,731: now it is £164,389. But if you look at these trends in an international context, Britain’s prices appear relatively resilient.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Cameron’s reshuffle quandary

One can see why the idea of Iain Duncan Smith as Justice Secretary appeals to some in Tory high command, as the Daily Mail reveals this morning. The former leader is one of the few people who could square the party to a policy that treated rehabilitation as the main aim of the penal system. I expect, though, that IDS himself would not be keen on the move. But this story does illustrate one of the biggest problems that Cameron will face with his reshuffle, how to make room at the top. Among Tory ministers, there promises to be very little movement in the higher echelons of government. The Chancellor,

Matt Cavanagh

ONS blunder lets ministers blame falling real incomes on immigration

Yesterday the ONS published a report showing average disposable incomes at their lowest level since 2003. This is difficult news for ministers: as Isabel pointed out, concerns about the cost of living – stagnant wages and rising prices – are one of the main reasons given by voters in recent polls for turning away from the Conservatives. Imagine, then, how pleased ministers must have been when they saw that the ONS had thrown them a lifeline: the chance to blame it all on immigration. The ONS report discusses the effects of wages and prices, and then adds that ‘finally, sustained population growth led to incomes being spread across a greater

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Osborne’s policy gymnastics

It’s been a few weeks at least since George Osborne’s last U-turn, so it must be time for another one, mustn’t it? Today’s launch of the Funding for Lending Scheme is being hailed as another change of course from the Chancellor as it signals the slow death of the National Loan Guarantee Scheme. The Sun’s editorial this morning compared George Osborne to a gymnast, and said he was the ‘master of the U-turn’. The NLGS has only lent £2.5bn of the £20bn that it was allocated so far for small and medium businesses, and the FLS, which allows banks and other financial institutions to borrow at below market rates, is

Tuesday

Douglas Murray

Will tweets soon paralyse the nation?

It is becoming increasingly clear that Twitter might be the greatest threat to civilised life in Britain. Take just 24 hours of news: A 17 year-old has been arrested (and is currently being detained) in Weymouth for sending unpleasant tweets to the nation’s Olympic hero Tom Daley. Rio Ferdinand has been charged by the FA with retweeting a comment which referred to another footballer as a ‘choc-ice’. The Mail reports: ‘The initial ‘choc ice’ remark about Ashley Cole came two days after the Chelsea defender gave evidence on behalf of team-mate John Terry in his race trial concerning Ferdinand’s brother Anton.’ The Prime Minister felt moved to respond to two