Politics

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

Friday

Andrew Webster

Whom do you trust more?

So, a ComRes poll for the Daily Politics has Cameron leading Brown on the issue of which party leader would be more honest about spending cuts. It echoes a poll that we conducted a few days ago; the results of which we figured we’d share with CoffeeHousers, before our work experience at the Speccie comes to an end. Basically, we hit the streets of London (avoiding Westminster and all the party hacks), and asked around 350 people: “Who do you trust more, Gordon Brown or David Cameron?” Sure, it may not be as scientific as a YouGov or ComRes poll, but the results are still striking. Cameron polled a comfortable

Peter Hoskin

The extent of Johnson’s loyalty?

Kevin Maguire’s Commons Confidential column in the latest New Statesman contains this intriguing little snippet: “Home Secretary Alan Johnson was a picture of innocence during the plot to oust Brown and replace him with a former postie with the initials A J. Not so his entourage. It has come to the attention of No 10 that one of his team offered a job in Downing Street to a hackette.” After his article for the Indy earlier this week – and his fizzy performance in Manchester yesterday (covered by John Rentoul as part of his AJ4PM series) – you suspect Johnson is being a little more active than the Dear Leader

Daniel Korski

The Lib Dems threaten to go AWOL 

Though Nick Clegg has greater pre-existing international experience than either David Cameron or Gordon Brown (having worked in Brussels), he cannot help but see international affairs through a narrow political lens. Last year it was Israel’s targetting of Hamas, now it is Nato’s Afghan mission. Clegg wants the British troop contribution to ISAF either massively expanded or for the boys to come home. Simple enough. But it is also a sign that the Lib Dems, despite having such foreign policy luminaries like Ming Campbell on their benches, lack depth. It would be great for the number of British troop in Helmand to be expanded. But with almost 9000 troops already

Thursday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The old gray lady on Cameron

Christopher Caldwell’s New York Times Magazine profile of David Cameron has finally been published; Caldwell first interviewed Cameron for it last year. I expect the Tories will see it as an important non-electoral milestone for them, a sign that the American establishment expects Cameron to be the next Prime Minister. The piece is, as you would expect with a Caldwell article, well written and, as it is written for an audience that knows little about Cameron, offers a good overview of the project. Caldwell proposes that there are two types of modernizers. “There are really two strands of modernizers in the Tory party. There are the green-friendly, diversity-oriented, welfare-state-defending ones

Peter Hoskin

Labour prime their anti-Coulson strategy

Some useful insights from PR Week’s David Singleton, who reveals that Labour are planning a concerted effort to paint Andy Coulson as a “sleazeball” ahead of – and perhaps during – the next election campaign.  Here’s a snippet: “One senior Labour source in regular contact with Gordon Brown’s inner circle told PRWeek: ‘Cameron wants to present himself as the man who’s going to clean up politics. That’s going to be difficult if the public think his right-hand man is a complete sleazeball.’   Another Labour insider said that senior party figures had been thrashing out a strategy to target Coulson since the news emerged yesterday. The source said the aim

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Cutting through the jargon

There was a wonderful outbreak of wit and erudition at Parliament this morning. The sketch-writers Simon Hoggart and Matthew Parris appeared before the Public Administration Select Committee to discuss the perils of political jargon. Simon Hoggart kicked off by imagining Churchill’s war-time speeches re-written by a local government wonk. ‘We will fight on the beaches’ turned into ‘an ongoing programme of hostile engagement in littoral sectors.’ The committee chairman, Tony Wright, wondered if his anxiety about jargon was misplaced. ‘Does this drivel matter or does it just irritate us?’ Matthew Parris pointed out that jargon is attractive because it confers an aura of learning and makes idiot politicians sound like

Peter Hoskin

A headache for Cameron and Coulson

So David Cameron has said that Andy Coulson’s job isn’t endangered by the News of the World wire-tapping allegations in this morning’s Guardian, and you can see where the Tory leader is coming from.  After all, there are very few – if any – new revelations about Coulson in the Guardian piece.  We already knew that the Tory communications chief resigned the editorship of the NotW after a phone-hacking scandal involving the royal editor Clive Goodman.  And we already knew that he claimed no knowledge of the hacking but, as editor, he took responsibility for it.  No evidence has yet emerged that Coulson was more implicated than he’s letting on. 

Wednesday

Anjli-Shah

The consequences of Johnson’s cowardice

There was great excitement here in Old Queen Street when Lord Carlile, the Government’s own adviser on anti-terror law, announced that Alan Johnson can and should help poor Gary McKinnon. McKinnon is the computer nerd who hacked into the Pentagon looking for evidence of UFOs, but who is soon to be extradited and tried as a terrorist in America. Lord Carlile – not usually a dovish man – thinks a great injustice is being done (Mckinnon might get 70 years in a ‘supermax’ prison) and has said that the Home Secretary should prevent it. So we called the Home Office to find out when Alan Johnson was planning to act.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Tories must be prepared to launch a reverse march through the institutions

Sir Hugh Orde, the new president of ACPO, has predictably come out against elected police chiefs. Andrew Sparrow  has the key extract from his speech: “If people seriously think some form of elected individual is better placed to oversee policing than the current structure, then I am very interested in the detail of how that is going to work – and happy to have that debate. Every professional bone in my body tells me it is a bad idea that could drive a coach and horses through the current model of accountability and add nothing but confusion. I note that our partners here in the [Association of Police Authorities] are

Peter Hoskin

PMQs live blog | 8 July 2009

Brown’s away at the G8, so it’s a Harman-Hague-Cable match at PMQs today. Stay tuned for live coverage from 1200. 1202: Here we go.  Harman leads with condolences for the servicemen killed in Afghanistan over the past week.  She adds condolences to those killed in the fire in Camberwell.  The first question comes from Malcolm Wicks: would Harman agree that “we need to develop a robust social policy” which deals with the costs of an ageing population.  Harman: “We’ll bring forward a Green Paper which makes sure there is choice in the provision of services … and affordability.” 1205: Stephen Dorrell stick to the same issue, asking why the Government

Sam Brown

Could you stick with Gordon for 3 more years?

Brace yourselves.  According to some great research by David Herdson at Political Betting, Gordon Brown could refrain from holding a general election until 2013.  The loopholes by which he could manage it are a bit arcane and convoluted – so I’d suggest you read Herdson’s post in full – but this snippet gives the idea: “The only statutory requirement to move writs for a general election is under the Meeting of Parliament Act 1694, which allows no less than three years between the dissolution and the writs being issued. In other words, technically, the election doesn’t have to be held until June 2013.” Sure, it’s highly, highly unlikely that Brown

Edie Lush

Crazy car, crazy company: but maybe it’s the future

Edie Lush encounters Riversimple, a car project with a corporate philosophy that’s as unconventional as its technology and an urge to give away its secrets on the internet Riversimple is either completely revolutionary or totally nuts. At a time when electric cars are the big green fashion, Riversimple’s founders have invented a hydrogen-powered car, and they’re giving away the design for free on the internet to anyone who’s interested. They plan to sell no cars (they’ll lease them instead) and to have a corporate structure in which a variety of ‘stakeholders’ have as much say as shareholders. They freely admit they’re not interested in building a money-spinner — but they’re

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Nick Clegg: out of love with the Tories?

The thing that jumps out from Nick Clegg’s speech on families today is how aggressively – if, ultimately, unconvincingly – it sets about attacking the Tories.  Yes, he also criticises Labour – but the attack on the Tories comes first and is more bitter in tone.  Here’s a snippet: “David Cameron’s social policy is focused almost obsessively on marriage, cajoling people to conform to a single view of what a happy couple should look like. The Conservatives want marriage incentives in the tax system. And they may adopt Iain Duncan Smith’s proposals to put in place more legal roadblocks to divorce. This is both bizarre and patronising. Do they really

Alex Massie Alex Massie

John Bercow: Garden Gnome or Trendy Vicar? Or Both?

Via Tom Harris, I see that the new Speaker is contemplating “modernising” the House of Commons by dropping the convention that MPs refer to one another as the “Honourable Member” and “Right Honourable” and so on. If John Bercow thinks this will do anything to help the public understand the supposedly arcane and baffling Westminster world then he’s utterly mistaken. More importantly, it suggests that, in this instance at least, his understanding of the problems afflicting Westminster is sadly shallow and even juvenile. The Scottish Parliament – working on the assumption that any Westminster convention was foegeyish and “out of touch” – decided that there was no need for such

Alex Massie Alex Massie

How to Cut Spending and Frame the Argument

A characteristically interesting column from Rachel Sylvester in The Times today, in which she describes how the Tories are looking to how the Liberal Party in Canada managed to slash public spending a decade ago. As Sylvester describes it, our Canadian friends lopped 20% of their public spending bill and dismissed as many as a fifth of all state employees. In other words, cutting spending can be done, even if it’s never easy and always controversial. But unless you tackle welfare and the NHS then – absent a fundamental rethink of government needs and priorities – it’s unlikely that many of the other measures – charging for museum entry! –

Peter Hoskin

A rebellion stirs

So, what does today hold in store for Gordon Brown?  Howabout another 10p tax rebellion marshalled, as always, by Frank Field?  A bunch of around 30 Labour rebels have prepared an amendment to the Finance Bill, by which the last Budget couldn’t pass into law until everyone who lost out from the 10p tax fiasco has been fully compensated.  It should be debated today, and the rebels have the support of both the Tories and the Lib Dems.  In response, Labour whips have cancelled all foreign trips by ministers and MPs, and are feverishly trying to rally the troops.   If the rebellion succeeds, then it will be hugely embarrassing

Monday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Primaries Are Not the Answer

James makes a droll case for Labour holding an open, national, primary to select the party’s next leader. As I say, it’s an entertaining notion, though it’s not clear that Tory or Lib Dem voters have any real right to choose Gordon Brown’s successor. Still, the idea of primaries seems to be on everyone’s mind lately. All in the name of “reconnecting” politicians and voters. But the argument for primaries basically comes down to one thing: that’s how they do it in the United States. Since much of the British political and media class finds American presidential elections much more exciting and interesting than anything that happens on our own

Daniel Korski

No Brits in Europe’s likely new line-up

With the Swedish EU Presidency beginning, and most diplomats mildly optimistic that the Lisbon treaty will be approved by the Irish in a new referendum, European leaders have turned their attention to filling Europe’s top jobs. But Tony Blair, who looked a shoo-in for the post of President of the European Council (not quite the “President of the EU”), now looks as if he has been dropped. Blair’s main backer, Nicolas Sarkozy, is said to have gone off the idea of bringing his British friend back from the political cold; while Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel, was never keen. Four candidates have emerged in his stead: Luxembourg’s long-serving leader Jean-Claude Juncker,

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Lacking in boldness

David Miliband is right that political parties need to adapt if they are to survive. Membership of all the main parties are down and the number of activists they can call on in shrinking. His John Smith memorial lecture contains some worthwhile ideas on how to open up the Labour party. But, as so often, Miliband has not taken the opportunity to be truly bold. In the speech, Miliband speaks approvingly of open primaries. So, why not use an open primary for the post-election leadership contest? It would be a way of saying that post-defeat, Labour would look out not in. It would also guarantee that the contest attracts national