Politics

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

Monday

The Spectator

Just in case you missed them… | 18 October 2010

…here are some posts made on Spectator.co.uk over the weekend: Fraser Nelson wonders what will become of the Home Office in the Spending Review, and highlights the immigration game. James Forsyth sets out what Liam Fox can learn from IDS, and reports that George Osborne is getting behind infrastructure. Peter Hoskin tracks the latest welfare cuts, and watches the universities strike back. David Blackburn speculates as to why the Tories didn’t win a majority, and observes the government protect more spending. Martin Bright says that Ed Miliband has had a good week, but warns that there are another 200 to go. Rod Liddle wonders why James Delingpole has gone politically

Sunday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

What about the Home Office?

The less we hear from Theresa May, the more I worry about the Home Office budget. I’m hearing rumours of her taking a 30 percent cut, which I first dismissed as a piece of expectations management. But now I’m beginning to wonder. We know that defence is settled – about an 8 percent real-terms cut. The NHS, which absorbs a quarter of government spending, will have real-terms increases (something even the left-leaning IPPR doesn’t back). The schools budget has escaped relatively unscathed, we read. So what’s left? Again, there’s so much deliberate misinformation out there that I hesitate to give a rumour round-up. But here goes.   One major victim

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Osborne gets behind infrastructure

One of the most significant things we have seen today is George Osborne’s announcement that Crossrail, Mersey Gateway, the big science project Diamond synchrotron and universal broadband would all go ahead. Osborne has decided that it is worth cutting deeper now in other areas to protect the kind of investments that will make Britain a more attractive place to do business down the line. As I said after the Budget, Osborne’s desire to protect this kind of capital spending is a key part of his plan – along with his reductions in corporation tax – to boost the private sector in Britain as the public sector is downsized. The Crossrail

Martin Bright

Downton Abbey: the new Brideshead

Lots of discussion of ITV’s Downton Abbey on Radio 4’s Broadcasting House and in the Sundays. There is a fascinating piece by Simon Heffer in the Sunday Telegraph extolling its virtues. It turns out that two of his friends are involved: writer Julian Fellowes and actor Hugh Bonneville. He concludes that the acting is excellent and the 1912 setting assiduously accurate. He adds that it is a shame that the series will only run to seven episodes. As I look forward to tonight’s fourth episode, I have to agree with him on all counts.  But there is much more to the success of Downton Abbey than mere technical excellence behind and in

Saturday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

What Fox can learn from IDS

The Ministry of Defence’s -7.5 percent budget settlement is a better deal than it appeared the MoD would get back in the summer. Tim Montgomerie hails it as a triumph for Fox and his full-on campaign against the deeper cuts that the Treasury wanted. But No 10 is keen for it not to been seen like this. They don’t want ministers to think next time round that the way to get a good deal is to kick up a fuss and enlist the papers on your behalf. There is so much anger with Fox in Downing Street, even those who are usually sympatheticto him are exasperated with him at the moment, that

David Blackburn

Why the Tories didn’t win

Courtesy of John Rentoul, Tim Bale, professor of politics at the University of Sussex, offers this appraisal of the 2010 election: ‘For all the talk in opposition of decontaminating the Tory brand, of making the party more tolerant and inclusive and less ‘nasty’, the key task facing Cameron when he took over in late 2005 was reassuring voters that the Conservatives could be trusted on welfare and public services.  All the market research suggested that this was the sine qua non — a necessary if not a sufficient condition — of a return to office. When the global financial crisis hit and Britain’s budget deficit ballooned, however, this task remained

David Blackburn

The government protects yet more spending

This morning’s papers announce that cuts to the defence budget will be considerably less than 10 percent, following an intervention from David Cameron. Liam Fox has fought a valiant rearguard to protect his budget; success has come at significant personal cost.  And that’s not all. The BBC has learnt that the schools budget is to receive a real terms spending increase when the Fairness Premium for the disadvantaged and the Pupil Premium are added to the final reckoning. This is politically interesting: education is the one issue where Labour’s opposition has been coherent. Michael Gove was eviscerated over his incompetent cancellation of the school building project and his free schools

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Liberal Democrat ministers are discovering the Conservative facts of life

The evening before the government was formed, I walked back from the television tent city on College Green to the House of Commons with a man who was about to become a cabinet minister. The evening before the government was formed, I walked back from the television tent city on College Green to the House of Commons with a man who was about to become a cabinet minister. Conversation turned, predictably, to the forthcoming coalition. He argued that one of the major advantages of it for the Conservatives was that it would drag the Liberal Democrats rightwards, tipping the balance in the party in favour of its liberal wing and

Harry Mount

Left out

New Labour Islington is no more – it is now an area for Tory-voting bankers When I grew up in Islington in the 1980s and 90s, there was a reliable election ritual: the bigger the Georgian villa, the more likely the resident barrister was to put up a Labour poster in his sash window. If they weren’t barristers, they were senior Labour politicians. Some were both. The poster in the window in the rambling terraced house in Canonbury belonged to Charlie Falconer, later lord chancellor. Nearby was Malvern Terrace, home to Brenda Dean, later Lady Dean, former general secretary of the print union Sogat. Next door was Margaret Hodge. A

Con Coughlin

Blame the generals

When Dr Liam Fox talks about the ‘ghastly’ inheritance he has been bequeathed by New Labour on the defence budget — which is expected to be butchered further in next week’s spending review, he is not giving us the full roll call of shame. Certainly, there were a succession of clueless Labour defence ministers, who allowed the Ministry of Defence to run up a staggering £36 billion overspend on a variety of contracts. Perhaps some of them believed this financial chicanery was the only way of fighting wars on a peacetime budget, but they must take their share of the blame for the current mess. But so, too, should the

Ian Cowie

Look for the silver lining

Outsourcing firms and insurers may find opportunity in the government’s fiscal crisis It’s an ill wind that blows no good and, counterintuitively, some companies could benefit from next week’s government belt-tightening. Despite fears that spending cuts may stall fragile economic recovery, firms which provide services more cheaply than the public sector may enjoy increased turnover and profits. Outsourcing companies ensure that light bulbs are replaced and loo rolls supplied, among a wide range of other ‘facilities management’ services, without the need to provide expensive final salary-based pensions and other benefits for staff. Whatever you think of the ethics involved, it’s no wonder a report by DeAnne Julius, a former member

Friday

Martin Bright

Ed Miliband has had a good week – only 200 to go

No one would begrudge Ed Miliband the plaudits for his fine first performance at PMQs. He has made a good start and seemed to take David Cameron by surprise. The Labour leader has a small, under-resourced team, which has been devoted much of the last week to preparing him for the task of his first confrontation with the Prime MInister. This is simply not sustainable. The weekly duel, terrifying though it may be, cannot come to dominate his thinking – however good he comes to be at it, He should always bear in mind the figure of William Hague, whose Labour mirror-image he risks becoming.  It has become a tiresome

The Spectator

The week that was | 15 October 2010

Fraser Nelson highlights the Tories defying a profligate EU. James Forsyth watches Ed Miliband start with a bang, and sifts through the political consequences of the tuition fees decision. Peter Hoskin says that reforming incapacity benefit is crucial, and reports on Philip Green’s attempt to bring Arcadia to Whitehall. David Blackburn reports on Alan Johnson’s performance at the dispatch box, and summarises the recommnedations of the Browne review. Martin Bright calls for some humility from Labour. Susan Hill draws the line at a book-signing event. Rod Liddle reveals his headline of the month. Alex Massie outlines the culture war behind the Big Society. Melanie Phillips watches decency fight back. And

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The coalition’s liberal approach to sentencing could be the final straw for the middle class

Today brings another couple of reminders of the coalition’s potential political problem with the middle class. In the Telegraph, Peter Oborne attacks Cameron and Osborne for a “morally disgusting” policy of targeting the middle class for an outsize share of the fiscal pain. While the Mail’s front page screams ‘What does get you locked up?’ as it details how 2,700 criminals who have more than fifty convictions were not sent to prison. Now, this is, obviously, the result of the last government’s sentencing policies. But, as the Mail points out repreatedly, this is a regime that Ken Clarke wants to make more liberal. In other words, even fewer people would

Peter Hoskin

Clegg sweetens the pill with a fairness premium

Only five days to go until the spending review – and after weeks of emphasis on the cuts we’re about to see, the government has today unveiled a new spending commitment. It comes courtesy of Nick Clegg: a new “fairness premium” targeted at the least well-off young people. Lib Dem Voice has full details here, but the basic point is that £7 billion will be spent, across 4 years, on programmes for disadvantaged 2 to 20 year-olds. Much of this will go towards the “pupil premium” that we’ve heard so much about, and which should advance school choice in the most deprived areas. Putting aside his genuine commitment to it,

Thursday

David Blackburn

Labour’s economic credibility goes on tour to Brussels

Bill Cash’s amendment to the EU budget bill may not have been the victory that the signatories to Douglas Carswell’s more incendiary effort hoped for, but it is significant. It is exactly in line with government policy that seeks to cap the EU budget and search for cuts. As Treasury Minister Justine Greening put it in the debate last night: ‘I will not hide from the House the Government’s frustration that some of our partners – and those in EU institutions – do not seem to understand how bizarre it is, when national budgets are under such extraordinary pressure, that the EU should be immune from that.’ The EU Commission

David Blackburn

MacShane suspended

Denis MacShane, the lachrymose MP for Rotherham, has been suspended following the Privilege and Standards Committee’s decision to report him to the Metropolitan Police. MacShane also got into scalding water recently when he castigated a member of IPSA’s staff with what might be termed ‘most unparliamentary language’. MacShane is one of the old guard who had a flagrant disregard for the public purse. But, even so, he has a point when it comes to IPSA. A bad system is no better than one easily exploited. Ben Brogan explains in his Telegraph column: ‘No wonder then that they, along with the MPs who survived the May cull, are frustrated by the

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

The rise of the pensioned-off apparatchik

Has anyone else had enough of John McTernan, appearing on a political discussion programme near you at this very moment? McTernan was Tony Blair’s political organiser, a backroom monkey who, since May this year has decided we should all be able to benefit from his incalculable wisdom. Thin eyed and smug he has been wrong in almost everything he has said so far; wrong about the Labour leadership, the shadow cabinet and indeed the coalition. He is currently being terribly loyal to Ed Miliband having earlier been slighting and patronising. They never tell you the truth, as they see it, these pensioned-off apparatchiks. They tell you instead what a particular

Wednesday

David Blackburn

Boles: the coalition is David Miliband’s natural home

Nick Boles is fast becoming ubiquitous. He wrote an article for this morning’s Guardian, urging Labour’s wounded Blairites to join the coalition, where ‘there is room for everyone inspired by the desire to transform the way that government works and give people more control over their lives.’ He writes: ‘If President Obama can keep Republican Robert Gates as secretary of state for defence, does Britain have to forfeit the remarkable talent of David Miliband? Can the coalition afford to do without the passionate expertise of Andrew Adonis as it completes his quest to connect Britain’s great cities with high-speed rail? Must we try to build the “big society” without the

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Tories defying the profligate European Union

Anyone who thought the new intake of Tory MPs were a bunch of automatons should take a look at the House of Commons order paper today. MPs have been asked to sign away 60 percent more of British taxpayers’ money to Brussels, in defiance of British public opinion. For years, they have done so without qualms. But the Conservatives, who were so rightly outraged at the way Labour whipped through the Lisbon Treaty, are challenging this. In an age of austerity, when we’re cutting child benefit and asking if Britain can afford to be a world-class military power, why should MPs sign off a 60 percent increase in the amount