Politics

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

Wednesday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The new battle in British politics is how to be most like Obama

James Forsyth says that both Brown and Cameron are mesmerised by the new President, who will be the lodestar of political life in this country. The contest to lay claim to his policies and style has begun — the risk being that our leaders are found sorely wanting by comparison David Cameron and Gordon Brown would not be human if they had not felt a little jealous on Tuesday night. They will never give a speech like Barack Obama or draw a crowd as big as his. To rub salt in the wound, Obama had just achieved — without knowing it — what they have spent their adult lives trying

Tuesday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

All Aboard the Obama Bandwagon!

I had thought that the Scottish Tories suggestion that they would invite Barack Obama to come to Scotland to collect his “Obama tartan” represented the most shameless attempt to hop aboard the Change We Can Believe In Express. But not so! Segolene Royal claims the prize: “Yes, I inspired Barack Obama and his team copied us” He sent a team to Paris to study her “Desire for the Future” site. “He took the idea of ‘win-win’ and the ‘citizen expert’ from us.” [Ms Royal said.] Oddly, this inspirational example seems to have been overlooked by most, nay all, other observers and chroniclers.   [Hat-tip: Ben Smith. Translation from the French

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Britain to go the route of RBS?

Britain is now as likely to go bust as RBS – this is the official verdict of the markets. At the bottom of this post is Bloomberg’s Graph of the Day, which shows how Britain’s dodgiest bank and Europe’s dodgiest government now have the same “credit default swap” rating – the yardstick the markets use to guage whether something’s about to go bust. No wonder, you may say, given that RBS is state-owned. But my point is that this has major implications for our ability to borrow – and borrowing is what both Cameron and Brown will be relying on to pay the bills. Spain lost its AAA rating yesterday, and the

Monday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The view from the front bench

Ken Clarke walked back into the chamber to cheers as if he’d just won a by-election, itself an indication of how little we’ve seen from the man who took an MP’s salary for the last 11 years but has seldom been seen around the House. It was his first time, ever, on an opposition front bench and he looked around at the view. Together with Cameron, he flanked Osborne. Clarke hasn’t worked out yet that his job is to make facial expressions of support when Osborne speaks, and to feign disdain at Darling. It’ll take a while to relearn the techniques of active politics. Osborne was on good form. How

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

What does May’s promotion mean for the welfare reform agenda?

For me, this reshuffle is blemished by the puzzling decision to make Theresa May shadow work and pensions secretary. Welfare reform is, by some margin, the toughest task in politics. If Cameron was genuinely planning to go through with it, he’d realise it would be his single most important departmental appointment. You’re talking about liberating millions of people from welfare dependency. You need someone with the knowledge and energy to engage in hand-to-hand combat with the system – as Milburn did on health and Adonis on city academies. It requires the most energetic, most aggressive and determined member of his team. That’s why Chris Grayling was such a good hire. He

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Who’s got Brown?

There’s a scene from Superman: The Movie which sums up the problem with the banking bailout. As the eponymous hero catches Lois Lane falling from a skyscraper, he says ‘Easy miss, I’ve got you’. She replies ‘You got me? Who’s got you?’ So it is with the Gordon Brown and the banks. The bailout plan is intended to insure them against the sorts of losses that will spook their creditors. Don’t forget, the banks have to borrow every penny they lend us. If no one will lend to them, the taxpayer will be forced to. Don’t worry, Brown will say to the banks, I’ve got you. But who has got him? The

Sunday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Ken Clarke is Shadow Business Secretary

So it’s official – Ken Clarke is back in a reshuffle to be announced tomorrow, replacing Alan Duncan as Shadow Business Secretary. Clarke promised to behave over a lunch with Cameron and Osborne yesterday. He apparently told them he does not accept the party line on Lisbon or the EPP, but will shut up about it and not try to change the party line. No moves in the top jobs (i.e. Hague and Gove staying put, as are Fox and Grayling), yet I hear there may be extensive reshuffling in the lower ranks. My initial take: 1. Cameron is taking a large gamble. Clarke has said precisely what he thought

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Gangs of New Labour

The game is up for Brown. Cameron’s lead has doubled to 13 points, and that’s even before he’s got back in his stride.  It’s fairly obvious what’s going to happen next: Brown will cling on, fight, lose then quit. Perhaps he’ll lose by a little, perhaps by a lot, but he’s toast. Then Labour’s fighting really begins. For my News of the World column I look at the jostling that’s already taking place inside Labour. It has a long and proud history of tearing itself apart after losing power – and already you can see MPs getting into groups. Harriet Harman is playing the class war card, and I suspect

Saturday

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The Spectator’s Notes | 17 January 2009

Charles Moore’s reflections on the week Watching the BBC’s excellent dramatisation of Anne Frank’s diary last week, I was struck by the family relationships depicted. They reminded me strongly of another family. Otto Frank, Anne’s father, was the dominant and admired figure in the household. He ran a small business supplying pectin for jam-making, but his intelligence fitted him for greater things which circumstances prevented. He had two daughters, and no sons, and was very ambitious for his younger, livelier daughter, Anne. His wife, Edith, was much more withdrawn, and Anne felt that her mother did not understand her. Anne, though she loved her family, had the self-absorption of the

Matthew Parris Matthew Parris

Another Voice | 17 January 2009

The gay lobby should rejoice at the Pope’s argument that God makes us the way we are I have been puzzling during the winter holidays over Pope Benedict XVI’s Christmas message. You may remember that it was interpreted as an attack on homosexuality, provoking the usual outrage. Most people, it seems, saw the response. Few bothered to study the message itself. I have done so. Not only (as Roman Catholic spokesmen protested at the time) does the Pope never in fact mention homosexuality, it is far from clear he meant his remarks to be interpreted in any such light. Study the remarks themselves, for they present a picture troubling in

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Politics | 17 January 2009

David Cameron has long been keen for his shadow Cabinet to exude greater empathy with recession-struck Britain — and he has inadvertently succeeded in one important regard. Most are now fearful of losing their jobs. The coming reshuffle is being spoken of like a vicious redundancy plan that could claim any scalp at random. Frontbenchers anxiously read and decode newspaper stories — particularly for the latest word on Ken Clarke’s potential return and what that might mean. The suspense is agonising. Reshuffle speculation is normally a media game. This time, few shadow ministers have been able to wish each other happy new year without then discussing for whom, precisely, it

The Spectator

A precarious state

It is human nature that some of the most red-blooded capitalists, who during the good times used to froth at the mouth at the thought of any kind of public expenditure, are among those now shouting loudest for help from the taxpayer. The most vociferous criticism of Lord Mandelson’s plan to guarantee loans for small businesses revolves around the assertion that it does not go far enough, promising £20 billion worth of capital compared with a similar, £50 billion scheme proposed by the Conservatives last month. There has been rather less complaint about the principle of bailing out private businesses and what it means for the future of enterprise. We

Friday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Is Brown’s stimulus going to miss its domestic target?

Will Gordon Brown’s stimulus serve only to suck in more immigrants? The Prime Minister should ask himself this as he visits the London Olympic 2012 site – it’s a classic example of the problem. Sure, there have been plenty of jobs created by the construction. But which English borough registered the biggest increase in National Insurance numbers to foreign nationals last year? Newham – where the site is based. A full 21,510 of them (Fig6, pdf) – and this is in a constituency where there are 32,800 working-aged people on benefits. As I argued in the News of the World last October, most of these have been claiming for five years or more.

Thursday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Improve Heathrow before expanding it

If the Tories really didn’t want a third runway at Heathrow they should have called for one. That would have stopped Gordon Brown. He is only going ahead because he thinks it will draw a dividing line between the supposedly pro-business Labour and naïve tree-hugging Tories. And I confess that I started out being in favour of it, so fatuous were the environmental arguments against it. Farting cows produce more greenhouse gas than aircraft (or cars), as does rice production – and do we see Greenpeace activists campaigning outside Aberdeen Angus steakhouses or Chinese restaurants’? But the debacle over Terminal Five brought home to me a more important point. Britain

Wednesday

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Crude but shrewd

Gordon spent Christmas learning the catechism from Peter Mandelson. Today we heard the result. And it sounded robotic. ‘Do nothing’ is his clockwork description of the Tories. ‘Real help’ is the mantra for Labour. The first question at PMQs came from a government stooge asking about loan guarantees. Gordon stood up and re-announced his scheme to underwrite £10 billion worth of business debts. ‘Real help’ he said. Again and again. I lost count after the fifth repetition. Cameron responded by departing from his script. ‘Planted question, copied policy.’ This was his best moment. A powerful point succinctly made and he seemed justifiably pleased that the government has adopted a measure

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Brown fends off Cameron’s attacks – for now

Another good day for Gordon Brown – not because anyone watching PMQs from the gallery would have been inspired (not even Lord Mandelson) but because he has so much to be guilty about and brushed a lot of it off. The highlight of this PMQs was about how the two party leaders use the recession as weapon, both testing the strength of their positions. Cameron started by asking if Brown was wrong to predict an end to boom and bust. As Brown is programmed never to admit error, this question will always leave him looking evasive. He responded, rather oddly, by listing countries he claims are not copying the Tory policy. “No

Tuesday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The truth about interest rates

Now that Brown has copied the Tory proposal to underwrite bank loans, what’s the real picture on interest rates? Since the UK debt crisis started, the Bank of England base rates have become woefully detached from the rates charged to real people. This is powerfully summarised by three graphs from Citi, which I reprint here.. Over last year, BoE base rates fell by three points. Only half of this fall was “passed on” by fixed-rate and variable mortgages, while the cost of borrowing money actually rose for overdrafts, credit cards and personal loans. As the graph shows: The most misery will be felt by those who have unsecured personal loans

Monday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

George W Bush and Immigration

George W Bush seems to agree with me. This isn’t as alarming as it might sound. Here’s some of what the President had to say at his final press conference this morning: I am concerned that, in the wake of the defeat, that the temptation will be to look inward and to say, well, here’s a litmus test you must adhere to. This party will come back. But the party’s message has got to be that different points of view are included in the party. And — take, for example, the immigration debate. That’s obviously a highly contentious issue. And the problem with the outcome of the initial round of

Mark Wallace

A new approach to Euroscepticism

As was reported over the weekend, we at the TaxPayers’ Alliance have teamed up with Global Vision to launch a new, joint campaign on the EU. Given that the issue of Britain’s relationship with the EU has been fought over so many times in the past, what – CoffeeHousers might be justified in asking – is new with this effort? The campaign, which will run up to the European Elections in June, will make a conscious break from the issues and language of Eurosceptic campaigns of the past. All the evidence points to the fact that no matter how accurate the sceptical voices of the last 40 years have been,

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Making debt a real, human issue

Superb poster by the Tories which makes debt into a real, human issue (just as Coffee House urged him to in November) – a picture of a baby with the words “Dad’s nose, Mum’s eyes, Gordon Brown’s debt”. It calculates that a baby born today will owe £17,000 – and there is no exaggeration here. Brown repeatedly claims to have reduced debt, such a whopper that he’s seldom contradicted by interviewers. The truth: in 1996-97 the UK debt was £347bn. By the end of the boom in 2007-08 it had soared to £527bn and is forecast to  hit £1.02 trillion in 2012-13. And this is using Brown’s method: ie, not including the nationalised