Read about the latest UK political news, views and analysis.
…here are some of the posts made over the weekend on spectator.co.uk: James Forsyth on who Putin is and the retreating Gordon Brown Americano on why Obama shouldn’t choose a foreign policy expert as VP nominee and how McCain has found another gear.
Here are Eric Pickles’s answers to the questions posed by Coffee Housers: Victoria Street “Devolving power downwards from Westminster doesn’t mean that the blame can always be devolved downwards. Are you prepared for the inevitable slew of critical media that is an inevitable result of letting go the reins? Can you resist the temptation to intervene? Can you take the pressure of Labour and Liberal Democrat authorities demanding central government action to pay for their local mistakes?” If we are truly to be the Party of real localism, we must trust local councillors to determine what is right for local communities and be confident that those communities will hold them
The death of John MacDougall, Labour MP for Glenrothes since 2001, will trigger yet another nightmare for Gordon Brown. No other word will do. Glenrothes in Fife is on the PM’s very doorstep and – after Glasgow East – looks distinctly vulnerable. In the 2005 general election, Mr MacDougall polled 19,395 votes, well ahead of the SNP’s John Beare on 8,731. But Labour’s majority of 10,664 accounted for only 28.5 per cent of the vote. In Glasgow East, Labour’s 2005 majority was larger in absolute terms – 13,507 – but accounted for more than 43 per cent of the turnout. In other words, Glenrothes looks like an even juicier target for
Irwin Stelzer reviews the week in politics There are several ways one might look at Gordon Brown’s leaked plan to send £150 to each of the seven-plus million families receiving child benefit. The first, and kindest, is as an attempt to ease the coming winter’s budget strain on what Sir Brian Bender, permanent secretary at the Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, during a first-class train ride from Leeds to London, too loudly dubbed ‘ordinary people’ — not the needy, the more numerous ‘ordinary’. The second is as a straight-out election bribe, part of the ‘fight-back’ that the Prime Minister is planning for the autumn. Why he imagines that this
It’s been a week since we asked CoffeeHousers to put forward their questions for Eric Pickles. We’ve since picked out the best five, which have now been put to the shadow communities secretary. He’ll get back to us in a couple of days. The CoffeeHousers whose questions were chosen can e-mail me on phoskin @ spectator.co.uk to claim their t-shirt and 180th Anniversary issue of the magazine. Anyway, here are the questions: Victoria Street “Devolving power downwards from Westminster doesn’t mean that the blame can always be devolved downwards. Are you prepared for the inevitable slew of critical media that is an inevitable result of letting go the reins? Can
We’ve introduced a new feature to Coffee House – the Sunday Essay. Each Sunday, we’ll post an essay by one of our readers, on any political, cultural or sporting topic. The first of these essays appeared a couple of days ago – you can read it here. If you’d like your writing to be considered, just e-mail an article of between 500 and 1500 words to me at phoskin @ spectator.co.uk – the Coffee House team will pick out the best submission each week, and post it on the website the following Sunday. It doesn’t matter whether you’re an MP, a member of the policy wonk world, or have nothing
A great post by Mary Dejevsky over at Open House, questioning just what David Miliband has been doing during the conflict between Russia and Georgia. Yes, our Foreign Secretary has issued a statement on the issue, but some of his colleagues – such as Des Browne and Jim Murphy – have been far more prominent on the airwaves. And Miliband’s French counterpart has even gone over to Georgia, to witness the situation first-hand. I’ve been assured that Brown and Miliband have been in “direct discussion” over the Georgia crisis. But, still, it’s hard not to conclude that the Labour leadership struggle lies behind our Foreign Secretary’s no-show. Maybe he’s been blocked by the
Iain Martin writes an important piece over at Three Line Whip, in which he reveals that the Cameroons may be turning against Eric Pickles. According to Martin, their beef with the shadow communities secretary is that he took too much of the credit for the Crewe and Nantwich success, and that he’s been “grandstanding” ever since. That opinion may even be shared by David Cameron. Here’s the bottom line: “One Tory sage says Pickles may still become the Conservatives’ chairman yet if he can get over this rough patch, but then his mood darkens: ‘The problem is that when David (Cameron) has made up his mind about someone he rarely alters it.
Western policymakers are finally making their official statements on the crisis in South Ossetia. Our own Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, has said he “deplores” the Russian attacks on Georgia. George Bush has called Russia’s actions “disproportionate,” and told Vladimir Putin that “this violence is unacceptable”. Whilst the most ominous warning comes from Dick Cheney, who stated that Russian aggression “must not go unanswered”. But for all the pejorative languange, just what can the West do? There are several factors counting against military intervention, whether by NATO forces, or by individual countries, such as the US or the UK. Here are some brief outlines: 1) Fullscale war. The number one fear is that
For much of his time as Chancellor, it’s been hard not to feel sorry for Alistair Darling. He’s been parachuted into what are rocky economic times, and has had to deal with – and often reverse – decisions made during Brown’s Chancellorship. The recent stamp duty fiasco seems different though. It was embarrassing enough that the idea of temporarily suspending stamp duty leaked from the Treasury in the first place (usually a sign of a minister not in control of his department). But the uncertain response of Treasury officials – and Darling himself – has only compounded the situation. How so? Well, potential house-buyers have held back from purchases until
I’ve just got around to watching some of Gordon Brown’s appearance at the Edinburgh Book Festival yesterday (you can see footage here). It wasn’t that bad, actually. If anything, he came across as relaxed, confident and – shock, horror – fairly witty. One can’t help but view it all as a long message to David Miliband. Something like “Look, you ungrateful upstart, I can do ‘Man of the People’; I can do charming. And I’m completely at ease with all your plotting”. But there was more to it than that. He dimissed claims that Britain is broken, and made reference to the general resolve and decency of the British public: “I don’t
William Hague warns David Miliband not to challenge Gordon Brown and offers this priceless spot of advice: “People want normal politicians and David Miliband is more geeky, more like me… David Cameron could wear a baseball cap, whereas Miliband would find it harder to appear normal. I must have a word with him and give him some advice – don’t try to be normal when you aren’t. As I never want to be leader of my party again, I don’t have to try to be normal any more.” [Hat-tip: Coffee House]
Fun quote from William Hague in today’s Times: “People want normal politicians and David Miliband is more geeky, more like me… David Cameron could wear a baseball cap, whereas Miliband would find it harder to appear normal. I must have a word with him and give him some advice – don’t try to be normal when you aren’t. As I never want to be leader of my party again, I don’t have to try to be normal any more.” Hat-tip: Conservative Home
Here are some of the posts made this week on Spectator.co.uk… Eric Pickles wants your questions. Chris Grayling answers your questions. Spectator staff suggest some good summer reads. Kaz Mochlinski previews the Olympic Games. Henrietta Bredin reveals the most ineffectual phrase in current misuse. Matthew D’Ancona claims that al-Qaeda are winning, and says that the Brownites would love David Miliband to team up with Alan Milburn. Peter Hoskin gives his take on the speculation that Milburn would be Chancellor in a Miliband government, and asks whether David Cameron and George Osborne will divorce over marriage. Brian Cullen questions how courageous the British Free Tibet protestors actually are, and suggests that
When Cameron first set about decontaminating the Conservative brand, the emphasis was on turning the Tories into the party of the environment – the Blue ‘n’ Greens, if you like. But with the decontaminaion near enough over – and after the unmitigated disaster that was the Tories’ last environment report – the emphasis has slowly shifted onto other areas. But now green issues look set to return with a vengeance. As Alex Singleton reports over at Three Line Whip, the think tank Policy Exchange have just begun a “programme revisiting environmental policy”. The focus, says Singleton, will be on practical environmentalism – such as how to deal with litter. And you can be sure that what Policy
Nick Clegg can count himself lucky that there’s so much leadership speculation whirling around Gordon Brown – it’s probably deflected attention from his own less-than-stellar performance as Lib Dem leader. How disappointing has it been? Conservative Home’s Poll of Polls has the Lib Dems on 16.6 percent, meaning that, in their words: “Mr Clegg has added just 0.4% to the LibDem rating since Ming was ousted. Approximately 90% of the drop in Labour support has gone to the Conservatives.” And today there’s another poll which will dismay Team Clegg. Lib Dem Voice asked party members to rate the performances of the Lib Dem front-bench team during August. Clegg came out a disappointing fourth; behind Vince Cable,
The ever-readable Daniel Finkelstein wrote an entertaining piece on Comment Central last week, noting the parallels between Richard Nixon and our own beleagured premier, Gordon Brown. And I weighed in with some Brown/Nixon notes of my own. As a footnote to that, I thought I’d flag up that it’s 34 years to the day since Nixon announced his resignation as US President. Ok, ok, it’s unlikely that our Prime Minister will go down the resignation/retirement route. But, as Matt points out in this week’s political column, there’s certainly some pressure on him to do so. Anyway, here’s a chunk of Tricky Dick’s valedictory speech, on 6 August, 1974:
Do take the time to read Michael Gove’s report A Failed Generation: Educational Inequality Under Labour, out today. Many of it findings have peppered his recent articles and speeches (including his speech on Monday, sadly overshadowed by the lads’ mag row). But gathered together as they are here, they amount to the most coherent – and shocking – denunciation of Labour’s record on education. Here are some of the headline statistics: — Last year, over 60 per cent of pupils eligible for free school meals did not gain the 3Rs at Key Stage 2. — 33,909 pupils eligible to receive free school meals did not attain any GCSE grades higher than a D in 2006/07 – 47 per
The best political programme of the 1980s explains school choice – and the opposition to it. As always Yes, Minister and, subsequently, Yes, Prime Minister were on the money: Hat-tip: Cato.
Hugo Rifkind’s got a superb article in the latest issue of the magazine, outlining what Britain’s political scene might look like ten years from now. It’s all a little tongue-in-cheek, but I’ve noted some of his predictions down, for reference. Here they are: — George Osborne will be Prime Minister — Davina McCall will be presenting the Today programme — Boris will be Lord Johnson of Henley — Oil will be at $600 a barrel — Ruth Kelly will have been Labour leader — David Miliband will have been Labour leader — Ed Balls will have been Labour leader — David Davis will have defected to UKIP — Ken Livingstone will be Mayor