Politics Archives

Thursday

17 Feb 2011

It’s time for Britain to go cold turkey

There’s a simple truth underlying opposition to spending cuts: the country is drugged up to the eyeballs in entitlements. Today, IDS, Nick Clegg and David Cameron renewed their assault on welfare dependency – the most obvious and damaging of Britain’s addictions. The Labour party is broadly supportive, but the coalition’s plans were still be met by the predictable criticism that they are regressive. These arguments miss the point. Work is of value; even in good times it must be made to pay. Even if the public finances were in order, reform would be necessary; now that they have collapsed, reform is imperative. Britain cannot afford all those expensive welfare schemes,

Daniel Korski

Hopeless Harriet

Last night, Harriet Harman launched a pre-emptive attack on the coalition’s failure to give 0.7 percent of GNI to overseas aid. Pre-emptive because the government has made no such U-turn – nor is it like to. Much as Tony Blair spoke law-and-order like the Tories, the coalition speaks aid like New Labour – just better. As a result, Labour has nowhere to turn except to warn against “strong voices” in the Tory party who would like to cut DfiD from the Budget. Next Labour will launch a protest against what a mind-reader has told them Tory politicians secretly think. Seriously, though, of course there are such sceptical voices – many

David Blackburn

Cameron fells the forestry consultation

Despite his easy charm, David Cameron is unsentimental. His dismemberment of Caroline Spelman’s sagging forestry policy at yesterday’s PMQs was as ruthless as it was abrupt. The Prime Minister cannot be an enemy of Judy Dench and other doughty dames, so the hapless environment minister had to be shafted. Cameron’s strategic withdrawal did not end there. Several newspapers report that the 12-week consultation will be curtailed by the end of the week, on the simple grounds that the public does not like it. Spelman is expected to pronounce the project dead in the Commons at lunchtime today, and the chamber will ring with the noise of Labour’s braying benches. Ed

Wednesday

16 Feb 2011

David Blackburn

Laws’ return is imminent

Tomorrow’s New Statesman speculates that David Laws is about to return to government. Kevin Maguire reckons that it is significant that Laws is turning down invitations to events after an unidentified date in mid-March. Laws is still awaiting the verdict of the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, but he is expected to be exonerated. Preparing for a return to government, he has been writing sharp columns in defence of the coalition’s economic policy and expanding into future policy areas like the 50p rate and increased spending on the pupil premium. But Laws has also been keeping close to Clegg in recent months, tasked with building a strategy for the next election –

Alex Massie

First Egypt Falls, Is Ireland Next?

Today’s entertainment in the Irish election is generously provided by Ned O’Keeffe who, thoughtfully, warns that the Irish army may be poised to take over the country. The outgoing Cork TD (Fianna Fail naturally) may be on to something. Perhaps there is a pro-coup constituency that, sure, wouldn’t be thinking a military regime would be the worst thing. Couldn’t do as much harm as the last lot, you know. Anyway: According to a report published in today’s Evening Echo, Mr O’Keeffe said “The situation has become so bad that an Army coup is a real possibility.” Blaming Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan for hastening the possibility

Lloyd Evans

The Tories’ secret weapon

Too much time at the barbers. That’s the opposition’s problem. Ed Miliband showed up at PMQS today after a long morning lounging in the chair having his hair coiffed and burnished. His darkly gleaming scalp now looks like the kind of thing toffs scrape their boots on after a morning’s shooting. And that’s precisely what the Prime Minister proceeded to do with him today. With no time for a strategy meeting beforehand Ed had just grabbed a list questions from the last PMQs-but-three. He began by having a go at Cameron on youth unemployment. But we know how Cameron deals with that one. Been a problem for decades, old

David Blackburn

Parliament is not sovereign

Enough is enough. The British Bill of Rights is set to return: a consequence of the government’s running battle with parliament over the European Convention on Human Rights. Recent days have been filled with clues and suggestions of imminent reform: Dominic Grieve, a former advocate of the ECHR, went so far as to assert that Britain may leave the convention. Cameron let slip the news that a Bill Of Rights commission is to be convened at PMQs; at the time he was answering a question about the Supreme Court’s controversial sex offenders’ register decision. There are no details as to what the commission will consider, but Theresa May aired the

James Forsyth

Cameron breaks from the norm at PMQs

PMQs today contained a rare moment: the Prime Minister admitting that he wasn’t happy with government policy. Ed Miliband, who split his questions up this week, asked Cameron if he was happy with his position on forestry and Cameron replied, ‘the short answer to that is no.’ The answer rather drew the sting from the rest of Miliband’s questions on the topic. But it was a rather embarrassing admission for the PM to have to make. Cameron made quite a lot of news at the despatch box this week. He accused Manchester City Council of making “politically driven” cuts, said that more regulations needed to be scrapped and announced

David Blackburn

PMQs live blog | 16 February 2011

VERDICT: It was, comparatively, a quieter session than last week. Miliband was not as effective and missed the bus on the forestry u-turn. His attack on the government’s growth agenda was more spirited (Miliband is better with statistics than jokes). Even so, he concentrated on youth unemployment, which has been a long-term problem in Britain. Therefore, it doesn’t work as a critique of government policy. This is a very difficult time for the government and for Cameron personally; he will be relieved then to have emerged from PMQs largely unscathed. More worrying for Cameron, there was a hangover from last week’s 5 hostile Tory backbench questions, particularly on the issue

Alex Massie

Eck The Comeback Kid?

Though this blog has tried to ignore the fact, there are elections to the Scottish Parliament this year. In just over ten weeks time in fact. I’ve ignored the subject because, frankly, the idea of Iain Gray – he’s the leader of the Labour party in Scotland – becoming First Minister is too depressing to contemplate before the idea is thrust upon us by cruel reality and dastardly necessity. Mr Gray is the fifth person to lead Labour’s Holyrood group since devolution and by some hefty distance the least impressive. This is a low bar to fail to clear but there you have it. For months now it has looked

Tuesday

15 Feb 2011

Matthew Elliott

Why AV will cost £250 million

Today the NO to AV campaign has published research showing that the change to AV will cost the UK an additional £250 million, and – judging by the Yes campaign’s panicky reaction – this charge has hit home. Our estimate represents the additional cost of AV. The government stated the referendum would cost over £90 million – less, admittedly, than if it were not combined with council elections – and the remainder comes from vote counting machines (£130 million) and voter awareness (£26 million). This is, if anything, a conservative estimate. For voter education, we have only set aside 42 pence per person, and we haven’t included the costs of

Alex Massie

Gerry Adams Redefines Terrorism

Gerry Adams, appearing on the Irish radio station Newstalk this afternoon, denounced the proposed Universal Social Charge (ie, tax) as being little more or less than “an act of gross terrorism”. He also complained that Micheal Martin’s suggestion that Adams’s past membership of the IRA might prove a problem for some voters was a “slur”. I suppose this is true since a slur is an insinuation or allegation that is likely to insult someone or damage their reputation. It does not, you will note, mean that the insinuation or allegation is untrue.

David Blackburn

What Andy did next…

Westminster has bent its collective knee in cooing supplication to Larry, Downing Street’s new cat. The slinky feline is already three times more famous than Mrs Bercow – no crude double-entendres please. Meanwhile, Politics Home has been sent a photograph of a van in Smith Square.

Alex Massie

Another Rotten Argument Against Voting Reform

Iain Martin is surely right to suppose that unveiling celebrities and luvvies who support changing the voting system is a good way for the Yes to AV campaign to lose support. But it’s not as if the No campaign is playing a blinder either. Today’s Dreadful Argument for Retaining First Past the Post argues that we simply cannot afford to change the voting system. Apparently it will cost “up to £250 million” to do so. Colour me sceptical. In the first place, there are the costs of the referendum itself (£91m it is claimed) and these might also be considered the cost of retaining FPTP. The best that may be

James Forsyth

The Sun shines on Miliband

When Ed Miliband won the Labour leadership, there was much speculation that he’d be ‘Kinnocked’ by The Sun. His brother David had been the favoured News International candidate and ‘Red Ed’, as The Sun dubbed him, offered a fair few targets. But the paper has been giving the Labour leader a hearing in recent weeks. Ed Miliband has been to The Sun for dinner and today’s he written for the paper, attacking Cameron for breaking his promises on crime — classic Sun territory. Partly this rapprochement is a product of the fact that Labour are ahead in the polls. No paper can take the risk of writing Miliband off as

Alex Massie

An Unfriended Government

Perhaps it’s because it’s a coalition and this novelty is too subtle a thing to be grasped by Fleet Street, but it’s still strange how unpopular this government has become. Not with the public; that was to be expected given the decision to stress nothing but deficits and cuts during the Camerlegg ministry’s first few months in office. But you might have thought its inky friends might have stuck around a little longer. Then again, they can feel the wind shifting too. One consequence of the decision to stress fiscal austerity – perfectly reasonable and even, you may say, necessary – was to confirm, or seem to confirm, one of

Nick Cohen

Cleggy Goes to Hollywood

I once vowed never again to mock celebrities who endorse political campaigns as if they were advertising two-for-the-price-of-one offers in supermarkets. But today’s announcement that the Yes to AV campaign has recruited Helena Bonham Carter and Colin Firth is testing my resolve. It is not that I believe that celebrities should keep away from politics. They have as much right as journalists to express an opinion – indeed, when they argue for artistic freedom or libel reform they are more committed and more knowledgeable than most reporters are. But the Yes campaigners decision to propel Bonham Carter and Firth forward, along with Tony Robinson, Richard Wilson, Eddie Izzard, Stephen Fry,

James Forsyth

Amending the AV bill

Yesterday, the coalition said it would try and overturn all four of the Lords’ amendments to the AV bill. But today it announced that it would accept the one saying that the Isle of Wight should not be combined with anywhere on the mainland. But—and this is where the controversy comes—the Isle of Wight will now be divided into two seats. This is leading to complaints that the Tories are creating an extra seat for themselves as the Isle of Wight is fairly solid Tory territory. The Tories are, reasonably enough, pointing out that these Isle of Wight seats — at about 50,000 each — would be far bigger than

Daniel Korski

Coffee House interview: Mark Sedwill

Diplomats are often seen as stuffy characters from a different century, men who often appear lost in today’s chaotic world. Nobody could be further from that caricature than Mark Sedwill, the former British ambassador in Kabul and outgoing NATO Senior Civilian Representative to Afghanistan. For more than a year, Sedwill has been, first, General Stanley McChrystal’s right-hand and, more recently, the civilian counterpart to General David Petraeus. Since he took up his ambassadorial post in Kabul, after a stint as Deputy High Commissioner in Pakistan, few Britons have had as much influence on NATO’s strategy as him. And there are now rumours that, having impressed several Tory ministers, Sedwill could

David Blackburn

Big society inaction

What a pleasure it was. Last night, I spent forty minutes in Westminster Great Hall – one of London’s few remaining Romanesque buildings, the largest single vaulted wooden ceiling in the world and the judicial setting for the trial of Charles I. Why was I there? Another failure of the big society, of course. I had booked to attend a debate between the think tanks, Res Publica and Progress. Phillip Blond and Francis Maude were talking up the merits of the Big Society or big society (it wasn’t clear which); whilst Tessa Jowell and Stephen Twigg were speaking for the Good Society. I wanted to hear the debate, intrigued to see