Politics

Ed Miliband had a bit of swagger about him at PMQs today. In a sign of how the two leaders fortunes have reversed, it is now Miliband who appears to be relishing their exchanges.  From the off, Cameron was in a peevish mood. Miliband secured a fairly comfortable points victory. His ‘Cabinet of comedians’ line was a definite hit and Nadine Dorries keeps presenting him with new material. But Cameron will be relieved that Miliband is landing any knock-out blow on him; there was nothing said today that will stick long in the memory. Interestingly, the Tory whips had planted a question which allowed Cameron to open the session by

The humiliation of Chloe Smith at the hands of Jeremy Paxman last night was likened by one twitterati to watching a cat playing with a mouse before devouring it.   Of course, Smith was hung out to dry by Osborne&Co. But I want to address another, as yet unremarked upon factor: the age gap between Paxman and Smith. Paxman is 62; Smith is 30. In the words of Robin Day, politicians are ‘here today, gone tomorrow’. The result is that as the years go by, politicians get younger and political interviewers get older. In the days when the political class was a generation or two older than the interviewing class,

Nearly a decade ago, a book called He’s Just Not That Into You became what is termed a ‘publishing sensation. I don’t know if this attempt to explain men to women was persuasive or not (the odds seem against it being so) but its title seemed pertinent to yesterday’s launch of the Unionist campaign to preserve the United Kingdom in a more-or-less recognisable form. Why? Because of the man who wasn’t there. David Cameron didn’t attend the Better Together event held at Napier University. This was not a surprise but his absence was still telling. Perhaps the Prime Minister has been persuaded his presence in Scotland is more liable to

This morning’s borrowing figures from the Office for National Statistics are a blow for George Osborne, showing public sector borrowing up £2.7bn on the same time last year. The stats show the government borrowed £17.9bn in May, while the 2011-12 deficit is now £127.6bn, up £3.2bn. Labour have seized on the figures, saying it’s the ‘nail in the coffin of David Cameron and George Osborne’s failed economic plan’. It’s worth remembering, though, that Labour would be borrowing even more in this Parliament than the Coalition is, with the Institute for Fiscal Studies estimating that under Labour, borrowing would be closer to £76bn in 2016-17 than the £26bn forecast in the

This morning at our Schools Revolution conference, Michael Gove came under sustained attack from academies architect Lord Adonis and Neil O’Brien from Policy Exchange, who pointed to a slowing-down in the number of primary sponsored academies being set up. O’Brien pointed out that the majority – around 80% – of academies set up under Gove are actually failing schools converting to academy status rather than new schools with a sponsor. Adonis told the audience that Gove’s success on academies was illusory’ because of the decline in the number of sponsored academies. But I hear that Gove is going to directly address these criticisms in his speech this afternoon. I understand