Politics

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

Sunday

Michael Simmons Michael Simmons

Can we trust our economic data anymore?

Britain’s economic outlook may have been skewed by bad data – and it could be costing billions. Wage data pored over by the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is set to be revised in the coming weeks – and the implications could be serious. The nine economists who decide the country’s interest rates – currently at 4.5 per cent – have consistently said they want to see pay rises slow before they can be sure that the inflationary shock brought about by Covid has worked its way out of the system fully. But wage growth remains strong. Private sector wages have gone from below 5 per cent in

Druin Burch

MPs deserve more than a £2,500 pay rise

It looks set to be a happy April for MPs who are in line for a 2.8 per cent pay rise, lifting their salaries to £93,904. Your reaction to that figure likely depends on how much you earn. So does mine – and since I’m about to argue that MPs are underpaid, it’s only fair I give a sense of my own finances. I’ll stay schtum about my books and biotech startup, but I’ll admit – no boasting intended – that this piece will net me, after tax, somewhere in the mid to high two figures. Can it be right that we pay our MPs significantly less than hospital consultants? As

Theo Hobson Theo Hobson

Are Brits really abandoning their Christian faith?

Many Brits who were raised as Christians have abandoned their faith, according to a report by the Pew Research Centre. The survey found that 38 per cent of those brought up as Christians are ‘religiously unaffiliated’, while 4 per cent had converted to other religions. The verdict on religion seems gloomy. But I have a slight quibble with this finding: were these people really raised as Christians? Or did they just glance in its direction now and then as children? The average British agnostic has a similar story to Richard Dawkins Consider the evolution of Richard Dawkins. He would have us believe that he thought his way out of the

Eugene Finkel

Why the Ukraine peace plans are doomed to fail

The US and Britain are busy with their plans to stop the war in Ukraine. President Trump is pressuring Kyiv to freeze the war, keeping the Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine under Moscow’s control. In Trump’s vision, Ukraine will neither join Nato nor receive US security guarantees and will have to rely on economic cooperation with Washington as its main source of protection. At the London summit of European leaders, the British PM Sir Keir Starmer unveiled a different peace proposal, which also implies continued Russian control over occupied areas. In exchange, Ukraine is promised military support and security guarantees. Both plans are doomed to fail. The issues policymakers in Washington, London and

Chris Reiter and Will Wilkes

Can German cars survive Donald Trump?

In 2003, Donald Trump took delivery of a Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, a $450,000 German supercar that blended precision engineering with Formula 1 bravado. Photographed grinning over its bodywork in Manhattan, he looked every bit the unabashed playboy flaunting a new toy. Two decades on, he’s threatening to hammer the very firm that built it – and Germany’s car industry as a whole – with a 25 per cent tariff on European auto imports. Germany’s post-Cold War boom was built on a single assumption: that ever-deeper globalisation was here to stay. As we explore in our book Broken Republik and its German sibling Totally Kaputt?, the country’s carmakers made an all-in

Saturday

Patrick West

Why are police targeting a school WhatsApp group?

The heavy-handed conduct of the police these days often provokes accusations of ‘Orwellian’ behaviour – and with good reason. There has been a litany of reports in recent years of people being investigated and cautioned for remarks, often made in private, that have been adjudged ‘offensive’ or ‘hurtful’. In the eyes of many, we now have a de facto thought police in this country, with their disproportionate response to people’s sentiments and words indeed warranting comparisons to Nineteen Eighty-Four. Hertfordshire Police sent six uniformed officers to arrest a couple after their child’s school objected to their emails The latest news, that Hertfordshire Police sent six uniformed officers to arrest a

William Atkinson

Amanda Spielman’s peerage is richly deserved

Amanda Spielman, former Ofsted chief inspector, is set to become a Conservative peer. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch is elevating Spielman – who served as head of Ofsted between 2017 and 2023 – to the House of Lords for her outstanding record in improving school standards. Spielman’s peerage is richly deserved. She helped ensure that Tory education reforms, which saw the share of children in Good or Outstanding schools rise from 66 per cent to 86 per cent between 2010 and 2018, were maintained. Throughout her tenure, Spielman’s enduring focus was on the curriculum. Too often, as she outlined early in her time at Ofsted, teachers were leaving pupils ‘with a hollowed

Ian Williams Ian Williams

Why Vladimir Putin is afraid of sea cucumbers

Vladivostok, the ‘ruler of the East’, is preparing to celebrate the 165th anniversary of its founding. City Day, as they call it in the capital of Russia’s Far East, will see week-long celebrations, including sailing regattas, street performances and an enormous firework display. The naval base, home to Russia’s Pacific Fleet, usually gets in on the act too, commemorating the arrival on 2 July 1860 of the first military vessel to seize control from its Chinese inhabitants. Many of those inhabitants stayed in the Far East, at least at first, though mass deportations to China increased after the Soviets seized power in 1917 – an egregious example of ethnic cleansing,

James Heale James Heale

Michael Heseltine on Thatcher, Boris and Badenoch

30 min listen

An MP for 35 years, Michael Heseltine served as Environment Secretary and then Defence Secretary in Margaret Thatcher’s government. Following his well-publicised resignation in 1986, he returned to government under John Major and was Deputy Prime Minister for the last two years of Major’s premiership. Once seen as a potential successor to Thatcher and Major, he has sat in the Lords since stepping down as an MP in 2001, and in recent years has been an outspoken critic of Brexit. Lord Heseltine sits down with James Heale to discuss his thoughts on the current Labour government, how to fix Britain’s broken economy and why devolution should go further. ‘Deeply depressed’

Matthew Lynn

Give holiday home owners a break

If you have had your eye on a bungalow along the Devon coast, a cottage in the New Forest, or a tastefully painted terrace in one of the sea-facing villages in Norfolk, this could be your moment. Many holiday home owners are choosing to sell up to avoid a hike on council taxes. From next week, local authorities will be allowed to charge double the normal rate for second home owners. Average bills are set to rise from £2,280 to £4,560. This crackdown is likely to be popular. After all, who has sympathy with those who own two homes, when many young people are struggling to get on to the

William Freer

Is Britain braced for the Russian threat from the north?

War in Ukraine, and the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House, is forcing Europeans to prioritise defence. Keir Starmer has slashed Britain’s aid budget to pay for an increase in defence spending to 2.5 per cent of national income by 2027. But how should the UK use that uplift in order to keep itself safe? The challenge posed by the Northern Fleet is – alongside Norway – essentially the UK’s problem to deal with Many of the core assumptions which have underpinned British strategy for decades are being called into question. Amid the discussions centred on what a ‘Nato first’ policy for the UK looks like, there is

Benedict Rogers

The tragedy of Myanmar

Myanmar, or Burma as it used to be known, has experienced far more than its fair share of tragedy over the past 75 years or more. The death and destruction caused by yesterday’s 7.7-magnitude earthquake is the latest in a litany of suffering which this beautiful but benighted South-East Asian nation has endured. I have visited the areas close to the epicentre of the earthquake many times in the past. I have been in Sagaing, Mandalay and the capital, Naypyidaw. The scenes of the devastation there are heartbreaking, because they are scenes of devastation affecting places and people I know well. Roads, bridges and buildings have been destroyed in a

Julie Bindel

Stonewall’s game is up

Stonewall’s boss Simon Blake has vowed to fight for a ban on conversion practices that includes ‘every member of the lesbian, gay, bi and trans community’. The Stonewall CEO told the Guardian: ‘It’s really important that a conversion practices bill covers all practices designed to try to change or correct somebody’s sexual or gender identity.’ Warm words. But why should gay people trust an organisation that destroyed its reputation in the quest to promote transgender rights? Bullying and coercing lesbians or gay men to become heterosexual, in the name of therapy, is a human rights violation and is obviously unacceptable. However, including ‘trans’ in this proposed ban, as Stonewall is

Naomi Firsht

The ‘Hey Duggee’ gender-neutral row is a storm in a teacup

Hey Duggee, the children’s TV show, beloved by preschoolers and parents alike, has come under fire for introducing a gender-neutral raccoon. In the award-winning Cbeebies show, Duggee is a cartoon dog who runs a clubhouse for young animals known as the ‘squirrels’. In each episode, the squirrels earn a badge (and a hug) by learning about something new. In ‘The Sibling Badge’ episode, one squirrel, Roly, finds out he will be gaining a baby brother or sister, prompting Duggee to teach the squirrels all about siblings. In a scene to help explain, the squirrels meet various animals and their siblings. After being introduced, via the voiceover, to ‘Arlo and his siblings’

Friday

Sophia Falkner

Why did I bother getting a job?

It was an ominous start to the day of Rachel Reeves’s Spring Statement, when she had to rush out messy, last minute changes to Labour’s package of welfare reforms. To unhappy Labour MPs, this confirmed their belief that the policy is Treasury bean-counting masquerading as reform. They’re not wrong. The current trajectory was unsustainable. We were on track to spend £1 in every £4 of income tax on health and disability benefits by 2030, according to the Policy Exchange think tank. Tightening the qualifying criteria for Personal Independence Payments (PIP) and more frequent reassessments are clearly sensible and necessary. But looking at where the government has failed to reform, such

Svitlana Morenets Svitlana Morenets

Trump’s toxic mineral deal for Ukraine

Donald Trump’s latest scheme to exploit Ukraine is gaining momentum. Kyiv has been handed a rewritten, 58-page minerals deal, which obliges Ukraine to repay every cent of US military and humanitarian aid it has received since Russia’s 2022 invasion. Washington is also demanding control over half of Ukraine’s income from its natural resources, including oil and gas. The deal is indefinite: Ukraine cannot break or amend it without US approval. What does Ukraine get in return? Absolutely nothing. Trump is pushing for the deal to be signed next week, but even if Volodymyr Zelensky is forced to agree to the terms, it would be very unlikely to be ratified by

Jawad Iqbal

Why Prevent’s boss had to go

The head of the Prevent counter-terrorism programme, Michael Stewart, is to carry the can for failures exposed by the Southport attack last year. Stewart’s role has been in question for some time, following revelations that Prevent failed to stop Axel Rudakubana murdering three girls at a dance class in Merseyside last July. Rudakubana was first referred to Prevent in 2019, when he was just 13 A ‘Prevent learning review’ after the attack revealed a damning catalogue of basic failures. It found that counterterrorism police missed several chances to stop the killer, and that Prevent ‘prematurely’ dismissed the threat posed by Rudakubana on each of the three occasions he was flagged to

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Is my data safe after 23andMe collapsed?

29 min listen

David Holtzman and David Carvalho from Naoris Protocol delve into the recent bankruptcy of 23andMe, a leading genetic testing company. They explore the implications for data security and privacy, discussing how the sale of 23andMe’s vast genetic database raises concerns about the protection of personal information. 

Tom Bower

The flight of the millionaires will impoverish Britain

Steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal is considering leaving the UK because of the Labour government’s abolition of the ‘non-dom’ tax regime. This confirms that Keir Starmer’s politics of envy is successfully destroying the British economy. Mittal would join tens of thousands of millionaires and billionaires – British and foreign – who have already abandoned Britain to avoid paying even more tax: all of them ranked among the 1 per cent of British residents, contributing 29 per cent of all the taxes raised by HMRC. These tax exiles had been willing to pay fair taxes, but many baulked at Starmer’s decision not only to tax their offshore income but also their foreign-based

Caleb Quinley

Hundreds feared dead in Myanmar earthquake

Hundreds of people are feared dead after a 7.7-magnitude quake struck Myanmar. Tremors from the quake, which had its epicentre near Mandalay, caused devastation across Southeast Asia, including in Bangkok. Over 80 construction workers are missing in the Thai capital after a 30-storey building that was under construction collapsed. Search and rescue teams are scrambling to locate those who are trapped under the rubble. Over 80 construction workers are missing in the Thai capital In Myanmar, a country already facing a brutal civil war that has claimed thousands of lives, buildings have collapsed and hundreds of people are missing. The junta has declared a state of emergency in six regions,