Politics

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

Monday

The Spectator

Gordon Brown’s speech

2:40pm: So far, Brown is trying to lay out a third way between equality of outcome and opportunity pitching New Labour as the party of aspiration and community. Brown’s delivery is relaxed and confident and he is managing, just, not to talk in his trademark machine gun blasts. 2:45pm Brown talks about a 10 year plan for education and how every student leaving school at 18 will now have a qualification. Low-income pupils will be financed from 16 through to the end of their university degree. This, says Brown, will be a symbol of a society not divided by class but united by aspiration. Aspiration and talent are clearly the

The Spectator

What Brown’s speech will tell us about his election plans

The word is that Gordon Brown’s speech will not mention when he might go to the country. Indeed, judging by his rather tetchy performance on the Today Programme this morning he appears to regretting letting the speculation reach such a fever pitch. But his address will still give us plenty of clues to his thinking. If it is stuffed with, to borrow a phrase, eye-catching initiatives with which he can be personally associated such as this deep clean of hospitals and a reversal on 24 hour drinking, which he hinted heavily at this morning, then it will suggest that he really is going to go. But if he sets out

The Spectator

The Sun rains on Brown’s parade

The one cloud on the Bournemouth horizon for Gordon Brown this morning is the vigorous campaign that the Sun has launched today for a referendum on the EU treaty formerly known as the constitution. The front page of the paper declares, “Never have so few decided so much for so many.” Inside, the first seven pages are devoted to the issue with the Sun warning that Britain “faces the greatest threat as an independent sovereign state since the dark days of World War II.” There follows a pledge to fight this cause “right up to the next election.” As Tim Montgomerie notes, this campaign might give Brown pause about going

The Spectator

Brown previews his big speech

Today is G-Day, and Gordon is doing the rounds of the broadcasters before his big speech this afternoon. Up against Sky’s Adam Boulton, Brown led off, as he did on Marr yesterday, on the “personalised” NHS – although when Adam mentioned that this very New Labour approach to health reform had been welcomed by Peter Mandelson at a meeting last night, the PM could barely muster a nod of disgusted recognition. On election timing, he was positively sharp in response to Adam’s perfectly legitimate questions: “The first person I shall talk to is The Queen and not Sky TV.” Let’s remember that promise if, by chance, the date is actually

Sunday

The Spectator

More good poll news for Brown

The case for Gordon Brown going to the country in October just keeps getting stronger.  A poll in tomorrow’s Sun puts Labour on 42%–8 points ahead of the Tories, an increase in the lead of 3 points since the start of the month. (The indispensable Conservative Home has details). While the Sunday Times reports that Labour’s internal polling has them up by a massive 14% if the election were to be held now.  I’ve always been sceptical about the likelihood of Brown calling an election so soon as it undercuts one of his key assets, the perception that he is a serious man who is just interested in getting things

The Spectator

The new Labour split

In the conference hotel bar, there is but one subject under heated discussion, and it is, like treason, a matter of dates. The old Blair-Brown conference clash (RIP) has been replaced this year by a rather different sort of division: the Octobrists versus the Mayites, the ‘go now, Gordon’ camp versus the ‘wait and see’ crew. I suspect that this divide within the conference is nowhere more vivid than inside the capacious brain of the PM himself. He is, we know, capable of great resolve, boldness and theatricality: witness his granting of independence to the Bank of England, and his formidably choreographed entrance as Prime Minister. But he also has

The Spectator

Fisking Darling

The Labour Party conference is already turning out to be a stage where a fictional narrative of events is being established and Alistair Darling’s speech was no exception. Here is a small list of correctives.   1) “Record of economic growth not achieved by any other economy” Um, the UK has had the worst growth in the English speaking world since 1997. Most developed countries have grown faster. See theOECD growth tables for proof.   2) “Youth unemployment is down by 90% in Dorset and that is what a Labour government has delivered”. Um, youth unemployment has (scandalously) risen under Labour across the UK (see here).   3) He claimed

The Spectator

Will Brown take the October plunge?

Two moments stood out for me in Gordon’s Andrew Marr interview: when the PM discussed the health service, not only personalised but capable of delivering to patients the “doctor that they want, the GP at the time they want” he was echoing his recent tea-guest, Margaret Thatcher (I want to go to the hospital of my choice, on the day I want, at the time I want.) Not much comfort for public sector workers there. Second, when Marr expertly pressed him on election timing, Brown let slip the extent to which he is now absorbed by this matter. Asked about Callaghan’s famous decision not to go to the country in

The Spectator

What to watch for in Bournemouth

Gordon’s first Labour conference as Prime Minister begins today: it could conceivably be his last. Just as last year’s gathering of the party in Manchester was dominated by Tony Blair’s farewell and the prospects for smooth transition to the Brown regime, the proceedings in Bournemouth will be consumed by a single question and one that will almost certainly not be mentioned on the conference floor: the timing of the election (see Andrew Rawnsley’s typically shrewd analysis of the pros and cons of an early poll in today’s Observer). As absorbing as this question undoubtedly is – will he? won’t he? –  it also pays to listen to what Brown actually

The Spectator

Which Blairite will spill the beans on Brown?

After the censored purity of the Campbell diaries, the Blair era memoirs competition finally looks like becoming a race to the bitchy bottom. Jonathan Powell’s autobiography is to have the splendid title “Great Hatred, Little Room”. I’m told it will focus on Northern Ireland rather than No. 11. But from the second greatest Brown hater in No. 10 (Cherie being the first) it has much potential.

Saturday

The Spectator

Douglas Alexander admits Cameron is asking some of the right questions

                  In a Guardian interview this morning, Douglas Alexander let something interesting slip. Amidst the usual rubbishing of the opposition, Alexander says this about David Cameron: “Over the past 18 months he raised a lot of expectation by asking a lot of questions that people in Britain are asking, but in the past few weeks he has disappointed by failing to answer those questions with credible policies.” What’s interesting about this is that Alexander is essentially admitting that Labour is vulnerable on various issues. The challenge for the Tories is to come up with the kind of policies that can capitalise on these weaknesses. If they can do that, Labour

Hugo Rifkind Hugo Rifkind

To understand Gordon’s ‘Big Tent’, imagine its inhabitants trying to put a tent up

Why does Gordon Brown have a ‘big tent’? Why does Gordon Brown have a ‘big tent’? Why, to be pertinent, does he have a ‘tent’ at all? There must have been leaders, throughout world history, who have ruled calmly and inclusively and by consensus. Yet if we were to group these people together on a Venn diagram, in their own little circle, surely this circle would not interlock extensively with the one representing ‘people who ruled from tents’. Genghis Khan ruled from a tent. Sheltering under felt on the harsh Mongol steppes, did he ever worry about reaching out to the other side? ‘We may disagree on minor matters, such as whether

Tamzin Lightwater

Notting Hill Nobody

Monday Hooray! Labour no longer the Party of Economic Competence!! It’s all over! Or rather, it’s all back on!! Dave looks like a weight has been lifted. Fifteen different pictures of desperate people queuing at banks spread out on the conference table. We want to frame a few of them, as commemoration of The Day Our Luck Finally Turned, but Jed can’t decide which ones he likes best. It’s just so dramatic. Reminds me of the day they had a ‘buy one get one free’ on sacks of stud and youngstock mix at Wibberley Horse and Rider. Though not quite so hysterical. Meanwhile, the silly feud continues. Thatcher’s office on

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

This will not be a Labour conference. It is Gordon’s one-man show

It will be, for Gordon Brown, a sweet irony. For years he has longed to address Labour conference as its leader. Now, when it is finally his turn, he can no longer do so — at least not in the way that he had foreseen. His mission is to stand at the podium in Bournemouth as a national leader, a statesman who has transcended tribalism and soars above party political divides. He no longer wants to be simply chieftain of the tribe gathered in front of him but a kind of father figure encompassing Labour, Tory and everyone else. His aim is also to stage the most choreographed party conference

Matthew Dancona

Hillary’s guru has some tips for Gordon

An interview with Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s chief strategist If Hillary Clinton is sworn in as 44th President of the United States in January 2009, the man sitting opposite me in the bar of the Dorchester will become one of the most powerful people in the world. Mark Penn, pollster extraordinaire, adviser to Tony Blair in the 2005 election, and legendary number-cruncher to Bill Clinton is now chief strategist to the Democrat frontrunner and, it is widely believed, Hillary’s alter ego, the man she calls at 7 a.m. wherever she is in the world. In her memoirs, she calls him ‘brilliant and intense’ and ‘shrewd and insightful’. But it is

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

‘Gordon has not been an effing disaster’

It’s Sunday evening, and John Hutton has just come back from one of his regular weekend in Ypres. The Secretary of State for Business and Enterprise is an enthusiastic first world war amateur historian and is currently writing a play based on one of the stories he’s unearthed. It’s about John Elkington, a British colonel who surrendered without permission in the Somme in chaotic circumstances. He was court-marshalled and cashiered, but was so determined to keep fighting he joined the French Foreign Legion. His bravery eventually earned him a royal pardon. It is the type of diehard martial spirit which many of Mr Hutton’s supporters once fancied they saw in

Jim Murphy

The Spectator is wrong to call for an EU referendum

‘If someone in the UK is calling for a referendum, that is not because the text we have in front of us is a Constitution.’ Not my words. They belong to Giuliano Amato, vice chairman of the Convention that drafted the old Constitutional Treaty. Last week in the Spectator the government was accused of being dishonest regarding the European Reform Treaty (‘Vote for honesty’, 15 September). We are not. We did indeed promise a referendum on the old Constitutional Treaty. But the Reform Treaty is not a Constitution. In June, all 27 leaders of the Member States of the European Union took the same view, declaring ‘the Constitutional concept has

Friday

The Spectator

Labour conference coverage on Coffee House

From Sunday, Coffee House will have extensive coverage of the Labour Conference. Jon Cruddas, who ran such a strong campaign for the Labour deputy leadership, will be writing a conference diary for us; giving us his thoughts on what’s going on in the hall and on the fringe.  We’ll also have reports on all the developments in Bournemouth from Matthew d’Ancona and Fraser Nelson and a review of Gordon’s big speech from Lloyd Evans.

The Spectator

Who should carry the can for the bank run?

If you’re trying to figure out who should be blamed for the whole Northern Rock debacle, do read Martin Vander Weyer’s column today. As Martin argues, Northern Rock is in large part responsible for the mess it got itself into to while the Financial Services Authority also deserves blame for sitting on its hands after it became aware of the potential problem. But the crisis has also demonstrated that the regulatory system that Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling set up in 1997 is not fit for purpose.