Politics

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

Wednesday

5 Sep 2012

‘Where’s my letter?’ MP demands Cameron reply to Europe demands

One issue that the reshuffle makes no difference to at all is the Conservative party’s Europe problem. If the Prime Minister managed to forget about the pressure from his own party for an EU referendum over the summer, he’s about to be reminded of it. In late June, Tory MP John Baron handed a letter to David Cameron signed by over 100 of his backbench colleagues calling for the government to introduce legislation now for a referendum on European Union membership in the next parliament. He has still not received a response, even though the Prime Minister said he would write back. Last week, Baron pestered Cameron’s office, and this

Lloyd Evans

A ritualised dust-up for PMQs

Broom broom. That was the noise that PMQs made today. Britain’s ebullient car sector is the only sliver of happiness the government can glean from our wimpering, faltering, flat-lining economy. And Cameron brought up the broom-brooms as soon as he possibly could. First he had to deal with Ed Miliband who started the session with one of those casual, chatty questions which are designed to make the PM look like a berk by quoting his words back to his face. ‘After two and half years in government,’ Ed began, ‘the PM returned from his break and said he now realises it’s time to cut through the dither. What did he

Isabel Hardman

Boris refuses to rule out fighting by-election over Heathrow

As James remarked earlier, the Cameron vs Boris subtext of the row over expanding Heathrow is going to run and run. Boris managed to fulfil that prediction almost immediately by announcing on the World at One that he will lead a campaign against a third runway. ‘You bet, you bet I will, yes,’ he said. As well as using a new Borisism, ‘fudgerama’, to describe the way the Prime Minister was handling the issue, Boris did not rule out the possibility that he might resign to trigger a by-election if the government U-turned. Shaun Ley asked: ‘If the opportunity arose, would you be prepared to fight a parliamentary by-election on

James Forsyth

PMQs old game

It was straight back into the old routine at PMQs today. Ed Balls heckled the Prime Minister who shouted back, John Bercow managed to call several of the MPs who irritate the Prime Minister most, and Cameron was, perhaps, slightly ruder to Ed Miliband than he had been intending to be. Miliband’s attack, followed up by several Labour backbenchers, was that no one should believe Cameron’s new initiatives on housing, infrastructure and planning given that the PM’s previous, much heralded initiatives on them have not delivered. The point is debatable. But Cameron responded, as he so often does, with a slew of insults — some clever, some not so. He

Steerpike

Team GB meets Team GQ

In what Bono described to me as ‘the best of the smaller ones’, the stars of Team GB stole the show at last night’s GQ Men of the Year awards. Presented with a special team award by Lord Coe, the A-list crowd were on their feet at the Royal Opera House for the Olympic contingent. Though seemingly dry, high-jump star Greg Rutherford and pommel-horser Louis Smith were amongst the last men standing at the after-party. Cyclist Bradley Wiggins is becoming something of fashion icon, though he might need to work on his people skills. Asked if he would like to meet Liam Gallagher, the cyclist said ‘Nah, I know him

Isabel Hardman

The exciting new sub-committee on the block

Downing Street is very keen to emphasise that the key theme of this reshuffle is ‘implementation’. It’s an exciting word, I know, but the excitement has just ratcheted up a notch with the creation of a new sub-committee called the Growth Implementation Committee. The GIC will sit under the economic affairs committee and will be chaired by the Chancellor (who also chairs the economic affairs committee). His deputy chair will be Vince Cable, which the Business Secretary will probably not appreciate, except when the Chancellor is away and he is able to take over. It will also include some of the faces of the reshuffle: David Laws will be a

Isabel Hardman

Reshuffle row on Heathrow takes off

Though the reshuffle, which continues today, saw very little movement at the top of the government, fans of the changes believe the Prime Minister still managed to remove one large obstacle to growth by taking the two women – Justine Greening and Theresa Villiers – opposed to a third runway at Heathrow out of the Transport department. Tory MPs I spoke to yesterday know that this will be one of the big rows of the autumn, as the commission examining aviation capacity gets to work. Some believe the government should get on with the decision, upset a few MPs whose constituencies are affected (including Vince Cable, who will be more

Isabel Hardman

Reshuffle: the full list of jobs

Prime Minister, First Lord of the Treasury and Minister for the Civil Service Rt Hon David Cameron MP Deputy Prime Minister, Lord President of the Council (with special responsibility for political and constitutional reform) Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP Foreign and Commonwealth Office First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs – Rt Hon William Hague MP Senior Minister of State – Rt Hon Baroness Warsi (jointly with the Department for Communities and Local Government) Minister of State – Rt Hon David Lidington MP Minister of State – Rt Hon Hugo Swire MP Minister of State (Trade and Investment) – Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint (jointly with

Sebastian Payne

Revealed: the victims of Osborne’s latest green belt assault

David Cameron’s choice of Nick Boles as the new planning minister sends a clear signal that he is serious about planning reform. The founder of Policy Exchange is a close confidante of the Prime Minister and has been trusted with reforms that have been attempted once and damaged Cameron’s reputation. If the Chancellor is the winner from relaxed development regulations — which will be a core part of his Economic Development Bill next month — then his party stand to be the losers. The Campaign to Protect Rural England is already gearing up for a second battle: ‘If planning restrictions are relaxed, you’re not going to get any increase in the

Tuesday

4 Sep 2012

Alex Massie

Ken Clarke: A Political Giant Mistreated by his Youngers and Lessers – Spectator Blogs

Say this for David Cameron’s autumn reshuffle: it hasn’t unravelled as quickly or spectacularly as George Osborne’s last budget. Hurray for that. But nor has it been deemed a grand success. See Telegraph writers here, here and here for evidence of that. If you want to make a difference – that is, if you wish the general public to sit up and think, By Jove, he’s finally got it – you need to defenestrate an admiral or two. A reshuffle that leaves the Great Offices of State as they were cannot pass that test. Which means, I’m afraid, that only sacking George Osborne would have made this a memorable reshuffle.

Fraser Nelson

Vince Cable’s new Tory minders

I can’t imagine Vince Cable is looking forward to work tomorrow. His new ministerial team, Michael Fallon and Matthew Hancock, are both Tory reformers who are committed to liberalising the economy and taking a torch to red tape. Precisely the type of activity that Cable usually loves to stand athwart, as he did the Beecroft proposals. Quite a few Tories would like him sacked, but David Cameron has decided to have his Business Secretary restrained instead and has sent in the heavies. Fallon is a fairly serious character. Last year, I was at a party where Fallon accosted a Tory government member and asked him what he had done to

Sebastian Payne

Will one of David Cameron’s female stars be our next PM?

The real winners of the reshuffle have been the 2010 intake of Tory MPs. Several star names — including Nick Boles, Matt Hancock and Sajid Javid — have been moved up to junior ministerial posts today. While David Cameron was criticised for removing several females as Secretaries of State, he has attempted to make up for this by appointing four female hopefuls as under secretaries. All of these recruits are members of 2010 intake and look to be interesting members of the reshuffled government. Ladbrokes have gathered the odds for each minister’s chances as future Conservative leader, so here are the four female stars of Cameron’s reshuffle: Liz Truss –

David Blackburn

Briefing: the Christians taking their fight to Europe

Away from the drama of the reshuffle, the European Court of Human Rights is hearing the pleas of four British Christians, who are arguing that UK law inadequately protects their right to manifest their faith under articles 9 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The applicants’ cases are well known. Nadia Eweida, a British Airways employee, was asked to remove or conceal the crucifix that she wore around her neck in line with new uniform prescriptions. She did so on several occasions, but eventually refused and was sent home. She lost her workplace discrimination claims on grounds that she had breached her employer’s regulations without good cause.

Isabel Hardman

Boris seizes the reshuffle day

Reshuffles always leave a pile of bruised, vulnerable ex-ministers waiting for someone to come along, pick them up and make them feel loved again. This year, that person is Boris Johnson, who can make good use of those leaving the government as allies within Parliament. This is why he popped up so quickly today to attack the decision to move Justine Greening. He said: ‘There can be only one reason to move her – and that is to expand Heathrow Airport. It is simply mad to build a new runway in the middle of west London. Nearly a third of the victims of aircraft noise in the whole of Europe

James Forsyth

The Downing Street reshuffle

It is not just ministers who are being moved around today: the Downing Street operation is also changing around. Though the people involved in these moves are less well-known than Cabinet ministers, in modern-day government — with its centralization of power in Number 10 — they are almost as important and in some cases more so. Oliver Dowden, who currently links up Number 10 and CCHQ, is becoming deputy Chief of Staff. I’m told that Dowden, widely regarded as one of the most able operators in the Conservative party, will have a particular emphasis on ensuring that domestic policy is driven through the government machine. The move is a recognition

Fraser Nelson

Exclusive: the Tory women rising in the reshuffle.

I understand that Helen Grant and Anna Soubry will soon be made members of the government, as David Cameron tries to make up for sacking three of the five female Cabinet members. Liz Truss, head of the Free Enterprise Group of Tory MPs, is also tipped for promotion. Grant is a former lawyer, a convert to the right. Soubry is a former broadcaster known to us Highlanders as a newsreader in Grampian TV’s North Tonight before retraining as a barrister. It’s difficult to understate how concerned David Cameron is about his standing with female voters. If he dropped Cheryl Gillan, Caroline Spelman and Sayeeda Warsi from the Cabinet he was always

James Forsyth

Exclusive: Nick Herbert is out. Government loses an innovative thinker.

Nick Herbert’s departure deprives the government of one of its most innovative thinkers. Herbert, who had been double hatting between the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice, was the minister who pushed through crime maps and elected Police and Crime Commissioner. He departs, as Steve Hilton did, in frustration at a lack of support for radicalism. One friend of his points out that Number 10 and CCHQ have done ‘close to f all’ to help on Police and Crime Commissioners with the result that the Conservatives have been left with a set of underwhelming candidates. It also didn’t help that Herbert, as Pauline Neville Jones did, had an extremely

Isabel Hardman

Rebel MP: Reshuffle is Cameron’s ‘last chance’ to stand up to Clegg

Party discipline is one of the key themes of David Cameron’s reshuffle today. It is essential to bring Tory MPs, who have started to run riot of late, back into check, which is why Andrew Mitchell is now the chief whip. But I’ve spoken to MPs today who have argued that there is a far wider problem than the lack of an aggressive whipping operation. The strongest criticism comes from Angie Bray, who was sacked as a PPS when she voted against the government at the second reading of the House of Lords Reform Bill. She is miffed that while she had to lose her job to vote against something

Shiraz Maher

Blair should not be cowed by Tutu

Far from being upset about Archbishop Desmond Tutu repeating something he first said nine years ago, Tony Blair should be proud of his achievements in Iraq. This aspect of Blair’s legacy was raised again over the weekend when Tutu pulled out of an event where he was due to share a stage with the former Prime Minister. It is curious that while Tutu refused to associate with Blair he has happily endorsed the ‘Global March to Jerusalem’. Its members include Ahmed Abo Halabiya who is part of the Hamas administration in Gaza. During a speech he told followers: ‘Have no mercy on the Jews, no matter where they are, in

James Forsyth

Morale, communication and party discipline are key to David Cameron’s first reshuffle

Iain Duncan Smith’s decision to stay at DWP means that the reshuffle is not quite as radical as some in Downing Street were hoping it would be. But it still represents some significant shifts. First, party discipline and morale have been prioritised. Andrew Mitchell will lead a more robust Whips office and Grant Shapps will be an energetic chairman, though it is worth remembering that he had made clear in recent weeks he would prefer a department. In policy terms, there appears to be a well-calibrated move to the right. Chris Grayling will argue for rehabilitation from a distinctly Conservative point of view. The departure of Greening and Villiers from