Politics

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

Saturday

Josh Barrie

Why Russell Norman was a restaurant genius

Polpo, Russell Norman’s celebrated and original Italian restaurant in Soho, was in full flow when I visited for the first time: busy, loud, glasses full and meatballs rolling. I had returned to London after some years away in my early twenties, and had little money. Polpo welcomed diners with its buoyancy and affordability. It was a good restaurant for everyone. Importantly, it was one that we could afford. There is much to say about Norman, a pioneering and visionary restaurateur who died suddenly at the age of 57 on Thursday. I’ll leave the more personal and intimate conversation to those who knew him well. What I want to say is

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

Will Farage return to haunt the Tories?

The rise of Ukip and the highway to Brexit was greatly smoothed by the widespread perception that British governments had lost control of immigration. For many years, we purists in matters of nation-state independence struggled to articulate a stand-alone ‘sovereigntist’ argument that would catch fire with the wider public. But then Tony Blair threw open the UK labour market to millions of workers from the A8 EU accession countries, without even taking advantage of the transitional controls offered to existing member states by Brussels. As enormous numbers of Poles, Slovakians and others came to Britain to compete for working class jobs, suddenly we were in business. It is often forgotten

Natasha Feroze

Should Sunak reduce immigration?

23 min listen

Figures out this week put net migration at 672,000 in the year to June 2023. Should the government cut the number of work visas, to immediately reduce this figure, or should it accept that high levels of immigration are needed to sustain the economy? Natasha Feroze speaks to Fraser Nelson and Kate Andrews.

Jim Lawley

Why are the Spanish so loyal to the EU?

An upright Englishman, some years after marrying into a Spanish family, finally breaks his cardinal rule. In a moment of sudden daring at an extended family lunch, he challenges the totem of the Spanish renaissance: the Euro. The stunned silence that follows this blasphemy is filled by one of his in-laws: ‘Aha! Just what I expected… I know exactly what you are… You’re an euroescéptico!’ ‘Eh-oo-ro-es-THEP-ti-co’, she repeats slowly, each of the seven syllables a hammer blow to the poor Englishman’s standing. As this scene from the novel Spanish Practices suggests, the Spanish people’s faith in the European Union is often as blind as it is widespread – not a breath of criticism is permitted.

Mark Galeotti Mark Galeotti

Sanctions against Russia haven’t failed

One of Russia’s toxic TV presenters recently cackled that Western sanctions ‘have only helped Russia wean itself off dependence on foreign imports and given a boost to our own producers’. At a time when Russia’s third quarter growth has actually exceeded expectations, hitting 5.5 per cent, it is worth noting what sanctions can and cannot do. The bottom line is that sanctions have not failed – but were never going to be the silver bullet solution to Kremlin aggression some claimed at the start. As in so many aspects of the West’s response to the 2022 Ukraine invasion, unrealistic early boosterism has led to subsequent, and arguably equally unrealistic, despondency.

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

The EU has only itself to blame for Geert Wilders

On the same day that the Dutch went to the polls my teenage daughter went to Strasbourg on a school trip. Once in the EU parliament she and her classmates were given a guided tour by a French MEP; she was charming, by all account, a member of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats. My daughter’s class had their photo taken as a memento of the visit and underneath it was captioned: ‘Europe is important because, together, we can protect our way of life’.   Her class outing was part of an initiative organised by Together.eu, whose slogan is ‘For democracy’. Their mission statement explains that they are ‘dedicated

Friday

Jawad Iqbal

What does Geert Wilders’s win mean for Dutch Muslims?

Muslims in the Netherlands have reacted with an understandable mixture of trepidation and anger to the electoral triumph of the far-right, anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders. Should they be afraid? ‘I don’t know if Muslims are still safe in the Netherlands,’ Habib El Kaddouri, a spokesman for Dutch Moroccans, dramatically informed the news agency ANP. On the face of it, who can blame Muslims for worrying about what Wilders’ unexpected — and frankly stunning — victory might mean for their future prospects. After all, Wilders is no friend of Muslims or Islam. No mosques, Korans or headscarves is the political clarion call of his Freedom Party (PVV). It is unashamedly anti-Islam: ‘We

Max Jeffery Max Jeffery

What happened in Dublin?

11 min listen

There were riots in Dublin last night. Looters smashed shops, and burnt police cars in a night of unrest in the capital of Ireland. What provoked the angry crowd, and should the police have done a better job at stopping them? Max Jeffery speaks to Katy Balls and Pat Leahy, political editor of the Irish Times.

Julie Bindel

Who is Sandi Toksvig to lecture ‘radical feminists’ like me?

Another day, another virtue signaller standing by their ‘trans siblings’ and taking a pop at feminists. Sandi Toksvig, she of the unfunny Radio 4 shows more recently known for her involvement in the Women’s Equality Party (WEP) – has denounced feminists who are ‘anti trans’. ‘I am so distressed by people who call themselves “radical feminist” that are anti-trans. I could weep. I don’t get it. It’s beyond me,’ she told a journalist this week. Toksvig went on to insist that she has been an activist all of her life. But is that really the case? While Toksvig has recently made a name for herself by going to war with

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

New Zealand’s smoking ban u-turn is bad news for Rishi Sunak

New Zealand’s new coalition government has announced that it will scrap Jacinda Ardern’s plan to usher in a generational smoking ban. The scheme would have steadily lifted the legal age for buying cigarettes from 2027, effectively stopping anyone born after 2008 from purchasing them.  The right-leaning parties now in power – the National party, the libertarian ACT party, and centrist New Zealand First – aren’t even going to give such a strange experiment a chance. No doubt they want to avoid the myriad problems the policy will conjure up in future, including burdens on businesses one day having to ID people in their 50s and 60s. But what the U-turn

Iain Macwhirter

Alex Salmond’s revenge against the SNP is far from over 

The former First Minister, Alex Salmond, is to sue Nicola Sturgeon and her former civil servants for ‘misfeasance’. In court documents today he accuses her and her officials of having ‘conducted themselves improperly, in bad faith and beyond their powers with the intention of injuring Mr Salmond’. The surprise is that it has taken him so long.   It is nearly four years since Salmond won his judicial review against the Scottish government over its mishandling of claims of sexual misconduct. Judges in the Court of Session, Scotland’s highest civil court, ruled in January 2019 that the Scottish government’s investigation into the allegations, overseen by the then-permanent secretary, Leslie Evans, had been ‘unlawful’ and

Nicholas Sheppard

New Zealand’s coalition goes to war with Jacinda Ardern’s legacy

New Zealand finally has a government again. It’s been 40 days since Labour was defeated in the country’s election, but the centre-right National party, which won the vote, has struggled to form a coalition. At last, it has thrashed out a deal with the libertarian ACT party, and centrist populist New Zealand First. The coalition is good news, at least, for foreigners seeking to live in New Zealand. Earlier this year, the National Party announced a plan to whack foreign buyers with a 15 per cent tax on houses worth over $2 million (£1.6 million). Now that idea has been ditched – a casualty of the coalition agreement. But New Zealand’s

Svitlana Morenets Svitlana Morenets

Russia’s plan to freeze Ukraine

Winter hasn’t officially started, but Ukraine is already covered in snow. As temperatures dip a few degrees below zero, the nation is grappling with an electricity deficit. Ukrainians have been urged by the national power company to use electricity sparingly during the day and take measures such as switching on the washing machine at night. It’s just a taste of what’s about to come: for Russia, the cold is a weapon – and missile strikes aimed at power stations seek to freeze the nation into surrender. Last winter, even though Ukraine’s air defence systems downed hundreds of Russian missiles and drones, Russian forces managed to successfully strike Ukrainian energy facilities

Steerpike Steerpike

Starmer says the EU anthem best sums up Labour

Join die Labour jubilation! Keir Starmer, the man who is very likely to be our next prime minister, has just been asked on Classic FM to choose a piece of music that sums up Labour and picked ‘Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, the choral Ode to Joy’. Which just happens to be the European Union’s anthem. ‘It has got a sense of destiny and is hugely optimistic,’ Starmer told his radio audience. ‘It’s that sense of moving forward to a better place, [which] is incredibly powerful.’ So a sort of high-brow version of the Blairite D:Ream belter: Things can only get better. Or perhaps a not-so-subtle nod to those Starmer-supporting Remainers who hope

Ross Clark Ross Clark

What good would forcing cyclists to have number plates do?

There was little competition for the oddest and most obscure bill to be announced in the King’s Speech: the proposal to licence London’s pedicabs. On the list of the most pressing issues facing the nation, it doesn’t tend to feature very highly. There must be many people in Britain who have never seen a pedicab, let alone ridden in one or come into conflict with these vehicles, which tend to ply a tiny zone of tourist London around Piccadilly Circus. But could the move to regulate pedicabs evolve into something a little more substantial? During a debate on the pedicab bill in the Lords this week, Lord Hogan-Howe, formerly chief

Andrew McQuillan

The tension simmering beneath the Dublin riots

The situation in Dublin yesterday – in which five people were injured in a knife attack in the heart of the city, resulting in a riot and violent clashes with the police – was to the untrained eye reminiscent of Belfast from days gone by. Speculation about the nationality of the attacker fuelled the scenes of violence which took place last night and that has led to condemnatory tutting. After all, Ireland’s national myth is tied into tales of immigration and welcoming. A riot over immigration in its capital city contradicts the stories Ireland tells the world about itself. The instinct, almost reflex reaction of the establishment, was to deploy

Katy Balls Katy Balls

The Alison McGovern Edition

27 min listen

Alison McGovern sits on Labour’s front bench as the shadow minister for work and pensions but was first elected as an MP in 2010. Growing up in Merseyside, her grandfather was a folk singer who wrote ‘My Liverpool Home’. Her father was a railwayman that campaigned for better working conditions, but it was her mother that sparked her interest in politics. Following a successful career as Labour councillor she went onto win her seat for Wirral South. Alison has led several senior posts for Labour, which began as Gordon Brown’s parliamentary secretary, then Opposition Whip, Shadow Minister for international development, Shadow Education, Shadow Treasury Minister and Shadow DCMS Minister.

Thursday

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

In defence of the latest high migration figures

The debate over migration figures released today seems to be whether or not we’ve reached a new ‘record high’. The Office for National Statistics reports net migration rose 672,000 in the year to June. This would have been a record high if the ONS hadn’t also revised last year’s figures up by a staggering 140,000 to 745,000. This seems, to me, to be a technicality. Either way, the figure is hovering around its highest point in recent history. Net migration has more than doubled since June 2016, when the UK voted to leave the European Union. The numbers really took off after Boris Johnson’s post-Brexit reforms, which created pathways for graduates to

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Have we seen peak migration?

12 min listen

After much Whitehall spin, the official figures are now in. Net migration in the year to June hit 672,000, down from 745,000 in 2022. A total of 1.2 million people arrived to live in the UK, whilst 508,000 moved overseas. The ONS says it’s too early to call this a downward trend, but has migration to the UK peaked?  Katy Balls speaks to James Heale and Kate Andrews.  Produced by Oscar Edmondson.