Politics

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

Friday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Preparing for the US Presidential election

One thing British politics has yet to rise up to is how possible it is that Barack Obama might lose next year. All the pollsters have his approval rating in negative territory, Gallup has him down by ten, and the American economy looks likely to deteriorate between now and November 2012. But the big thing in Obama’s favour is the weakness of the Republican field. Bill Kristol’s cry of pain about the quality on show in last night’s primary debate sums up Republican establishment worries that none of the candidates cut it. We can now expect another push to get a new candidate into the race. Chris Christie, the governor

David Blackburn

From the archives: On liberal wars

David Cameron’s speech to the United Nations yesterday was, among other things, a defence of liberal intervention. It reminded numerous observers of Tony Blair’s famous speech in Chicago in, the setting for the so-called Chicago Doctrine that guided his foreign policy thereafter. The Spectator said surprisingly little about Blair’s speech, perhaps because it wrote the following 5 days before the speech was made on 22 April 1999. End this liberal war, The Spectator, 17 April 1999 We can now see how liberals start wars, and wage them. First, they notice on television that people are being ill-treated or murdered. The victims have to be European, for then President Clinton and

The Spectator

The week that was | 23 September 2011

A selection of posts from the past seven days at spectator.co.uk Reporting from the frontline in Birmingham, James Forsyth felt the Lib Dems shouldn’t get complacent, despite Nick Clegg being on fine form. Fraser Nelson asked whether it was time to leave the EU. David Blackburn described how the ghost of Maastricht is haunting today’s frontbench and wondered if a minister could make a good ‘account director’. Jonathan Jones delved into the archives to bring us the article that ended Dominic Lawson’s career. In his journalistic debut, city financier ‘Bounderby’ explained what we can learn from the American QE debate. Clarissa Tan warned London not to get distracted from a Chinese

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Is Osborne ready for the next crisis?

There is a strange pre-Lehman feeling in the air right now: the idea that something awful is going to happen, but no one knows what or when. This is laden with political ramifications. The problem for the Tories last time was not that George Osborne had been caught aboard HMS Deripaska. The greater problem was that a crash had arrived and the Shadow Chancellor had nothing to say. Brown, at least, seemed to have an agenda, and the Tory poll lead was reduced to one vulnerable point. I admire Osborne, but he can do far better in making the case for the government’s economic strategy. If there is a second

David Blackburn

The colour purple | 23 September 2011

A group of Labour figures have contributed to The Purple Book, which some modernisers hope will deter the apparent move to the left and dilute New Labour’s twin obsessions with the City and the public sector. There’ll be more on the book at the forthcoming Labour conference, but here is a discussion about it on today’s Daily Politics.   

David Blackburn

Exorcising the devil…

Ed Miliband is busy trying to shift both his party and the centre ground to the left. To that end, he announced his support for the Palestinian bid for statehood, which, as Martin Bright notes, was an attempt to distance himself from the legacy of Blair, and to a lesser extent Brown, by supporting a definitively left-wing cause. The British Opposition’s view on Palestinian statehood is utterly immaterial to the Middle East peace process, so the announcement was merely a presentational ruse, a reminder that Miliband is unlikely to talk about substance until Liam Byrne has published the party’s policy review later this year. By chance, Liam Byrne has written an article

David Blackburn

New blow to European integration

A spectacular row has broken out in Europe. Bulgaria and Romania have been denied access to the Schengen area after Finland and the Netherlands vetoed their inclusion. The Romanians pre-empted the decision over the weekend by banning Dutch flower imports on the grounds that they harboured dangerous bacteria. This decision won’t disrupt the continuity of European life because Bulgaria and Romania already have access to the single market; so, in this case, the Schengen rules would mainly pertain to customs checks rather than freedom of movement. But this is of enormous symbolic importance because it rejects Jean Monnet’s mission of ever closer union. The Dutch and Finnish governments are under

David Blackburn

Ed of many colours

Philip Collins has an essential column in this morning’s Times (£), as a prelude to the Labour party conference. His theme is the many colours of Ed Miliband: he has been Red Ed, Blue Ed, Purple Ed, Green Ed and doubtless there will soon be Yellow Ed. Miliband has to be just one colour. Collins writes: ‘Take a bit of green, a bit of red, a bit of blue, a bit of yellow and a bit of purple, mix them all up in a big splodge and what do you get? You get Brown.’ The spectre of Brown evidently looms large in the minds of men like Collins, for whom the

David Blackburn

Corporatism, comms and civil servants

David Cameron renewed his calls for global action for growth last night and it seems that the work begins at home. The Times reports (£) that 50 of Britain’s largest companies will be given direct access to ministers and officials. Corporate bodies will be designated an “account director”, who, despite what that title might suggest, is a cabinet minister rather than a junior advertising exec. The scheme is not yet finalised, but it seems that the labour will be divided thus: ‘Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, will act as what officials are calling “an account director” to Britain’s oil and gas giants Shell, BP and BG. David Willetts, the Universities and

Thursday

Jonathan Jones

From the archives: Ridley was right

                                      In July 1990, Nicholas Ridley told Dominic Lawson that monetary union was “all a German racket designed to take over the whole of Europe”. He was immediately forced to resign from the Cabinet. In this week’s magazine, which hits newsstands today, Lawson says that Nicholas Ridley was right (subscribers click here). Here, in full, is the article that ended his career: Saying the unsayable about the Germans, Dominic Lawson, 14 July 1990 It is said, or it ought to have been said, that every Conservative Cabinet minister dreams of dictating a leader to

David Blackburn

Cameron’s foreign frustrations

David Cameron’s much trailed speech to the UN is tinged with frustration. He will say, “You can sign every human rights declaration in the world but if you stand by and watch people being slaughtered in their own country, when you could act then what are those signatures really worth? The UN has to show that we can be – not just united in condemnation, but – united in action acting in a way that lives up to the UNs founding principles and meets the needs of people everywhere.” That seems to be a fairly thinly veiled reference to the global community’s indifference to oppression in Syria. The lack of action

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Ed wants to tear it all up

Ed Miliband’s pre-conference interviews in Progress and the New Statesman serve as a reminder of the Labour leader’s desire to move the political centre ground. To the New Statesman he talks repeatedly of changing the current ‘settlement’ both economic and political. I presume by that he means the orthodoxies of the Thatcher-Blair era. Indeed, he tells Progress of one area where he wants to do things differently: ‘…people used to say “it is anti-aspiration to talk about people at the top”, it is not anti-aspiration – it is pro-aspiration. It is pro-aspiration because if you have got banks who are not doing the right thing, if you’ve got people in banks

David Blackburn

Ed’s opportunity

Ed Miliband is the man to rip up the rulebook. He uses the phrase half a dozen times in an interview with the New Statesman. Ever since the phone hacking saga climaxed in July, Miliband has been busy posing as an insurgent against the Establishment; the politician who refused to fawn to Rupert Murdoch. His version of events is utterly specious: he was happily quaffing News International’s champagne at the beginning of the summer. But that is immaterial. Miliband has recognised an opportunity to redefine his faltering leadership. Despite his stern rhetoric, Miliband says very little about policy to the Statesman beyond promises of a VAT cut and a few

David Blackburn

Battling it out over Brown’s legacy

Gordon Brown is back in the news this morning, or rather his legacy of debt is (an issue examined in depth by Pete and Fraser in 2008). The disastrous £12.7 billion NHS computer project is to be scrapped and, more important than that, the Telegraph reports that the care budgets at 60 hospitals are being squeezed by the costs of repaying PFI contracts totalling more than £5.4 billion. Andrew Lansley has taken to the airwaves to explain that Labour left the NHS with an “enormous legacy of debt”; he was keen to point out that no hospitals were built under PFI before 1997, so that there was no doubt where blame should

Wednesday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Lib Dem conference closes

As the Liberal Democrat leadership leaves Birmingham, it is a contented bunch. Their conference has gone as well as could be expected. There were no embarrassing defeats for the leadership and no gaffes by any of their ministers. But conference was yet another reminder of how much of a gap there is between where those around Clegg want to take the party and where the activist base wants to go. When I asked one of Clegg’s allies about this discrepancy, he told me that the important thing to remember was that the membership, who elect the leader, take a different view from the activists. As evidence of this, he cited

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Lib Dems’ long-term assault on Labour

Listening to Nick Clegg’s speech today, there was little doubt which party he’d rather be in coalition with. There were some coded slights at the Tories’ expense—the emphasis on how the Lib Dems had been ‘fighting to keep the NHS safe’ and his commitment that the Human Rights Act was here to stay—but they were nothing compared to the full frontal attacks on Labour. Clegg derided Miliband and Balls as the ‘backroom boys’ before warning the country to ‘never, ever trust Labour with the economy again.’ This line reveals something very important, the Lib Dem leadership believes that the more the economy is in trouble the more important it is

Martin Bright

Political Stepford Wives

At the beginning of the conference season I mused on Twitter that these occasions were very tribal, but that I had never been able to work out what defined the Liberal Democrat tribe. I was bombarded by suggestions. Iain Martin bluntly wrote: “What is the Lib Dem tribe? Answer: A lot smaller than it used to be.” Andrew Boff, the Tory London Assembly member said, naughtily: “It depends on who they are talking to.” Peter Beaumont drew on his experience as a foreign correspondent to paint a horrifying picture: “all sandals and penis gourds”. And Max Wind-Cowie pointed out what Nick Clegg himself recognises as a problem: “Perhaps surprisingly an

Jonathan Jones

How’s Clegg doing?

When Nick Clegg speaks today, he can – as usual – rely on a good deal of support from those in the hall. According to YouGov, current Lib Dem supporters support him by a 2-to-1 margin. That’s stronger approval than Miliband gets from Labour voters, although nowhere near the popularity David Cameron enjoys with his own party: 93 per cent of Tories say the Prime Minister’s doing a good job. Among the population as a whole, though, there’s no doubt Clegg is unpopular. But he does at least appear to have stopped the rot – both in his personal ratings and his party’s. As the graph below shows, the majority

David Blackburn

The Lib Dems warn the Tories over Europe

The Lib Dems have just had a brief Q&A on foreign affairs. Paddy Ashdown and defence minister Nick Harvey gave staunch their support to the Afghan Mission, but confessed to having misgivings. Ashdown described the Bush administration’s strategy as an “absolute model of how not to intervene, both militarily and politically”. This failure, Ashdown said, ensured that a “victor’s peace” is now beyond NATO’s grasp. Harvey admitted that NATO’s political progress in Afghanistan remained “very slow” despite ISAF’s recent military success; this is scarcely surprising given the litany of bombings and assassinations over the course of the summer. The debate touched on the need to forge new trade relationships and