Politics

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

Friday

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Starmer admits Runcorn loss ‘disappointing’

It’s been an eventful day – and there are still many more local election results to go. After a long night in Runcorn, and a full recount, Nigel Farage’s Reform party clinched the win in what had been a Labour safe seat by just six votes – securing a fifth parliamentarian and their first female MP. While the Reform lot could hardly contain their glee, the Labour team struggled to disguise their dejection. Now Prime Minister Keir Starmer has made his first statement on the result, admitting to reporters that ‘the results are disappointing’ for the reds. Talk about an understatement… Going on the PM insisted: I could stand here

Matthew Lynn

Will falling interest rates save Rachel Reeves?

There is not much that Chancellor Rachel Reeves can look forward to right now. The Labour party has just been hammered in the local elections. The economy has stagnated, and government borrowing has started to spiral out of control. There is, however, this: the City now expects interest rates to start falling at the fastest pace since the financial crisis a decade and a half ago. There is just one catch: it probably won’t be enough to save Reeves’s failing chancellorship. The Bank of England is widely expected to cut interest rates from 4.5 per cent to 4.25 per cent next week. Even better, the consensus among City forecasters is

James Kirkup James Kirkup

Nigel Farage’s left-wing turn looks like a triumph

Nigel Farage declared earlier this year that ‘economics might be bigger than immigration for us at the next election’. Most people at Westminster didn’t take him particularly seriously. After all, Reform UK is all about immigration, right? Westminster didn’t take Farage seriously. After all, Reform UK is all about immigration, right? When Farage based his local election campaign on an overt pitch to working-class Labour voters by talking about trade unions and reindustrialisation, some parts of the political village were still dismissive. How could a Thatcherite public schoolboy and former City trader ever sell left-wing economics to the electorate? The results of those elections, and the by-election in Runcorn, mean that Reform’s economic

James Heale James Heale

The Labour left turns on Starmer

After defeat, comes the recriminations. The bulk of council seats are still yet to declare but already the blame game within Labour has started after the loss of their Runcorn safe seat. A handful of MPs on the left of the party have started publicly demanding a change of direction by the government. Richard Burgon says ministers ‘must urgently change course’ by ditching disability benefit cuts and introducing a wealth tax. Diane Abbott remarks it has been a ‘disastrous night’ for Keir Starmer; Kim Johnson claims that only ‘bold hopeful policies’ can defeat ‘the far right.’ It is a sentiment echoed by Brian Leishman who reflects that ‘the first ten

John O’Neill and Michael Simmons

Who won the local elections? The election results in maps and charts

There’s been a teal tsunami. Of the 23 councils up for election, Reform took 10 while the Tories lost 15. Reform also gained an MP in Runcorn and two mayoralties, in Greater Lincolnshire and Hull and East Yorkshire. Reform won the Runcorn by-election by just six votes after a recount requested by Labour. It’s the first by-election of this parliament and came about after Mike Amesbury received a suspended prison sentence for punching a man outside a pub. Reform’s candidate, Sarah Pochin, is the new MP – she won 12,645 votes compared with Labour’s 12,639. Here’s the national picture for councils: One Labour campaigner says what she heard on the doorstep

Oscar Edmondson

Local elections: Reform seizes Runcorn in teal tsunami

14 min listen

Votes are being counted across England, but there is a clear early winner from these local elections: Nigel Farage. His party triumphed in the Runcorn and Helsby by-election this morning, overturning a 14,000-odd majority and winning by just six votes! Elsewhere, Andrea Jenkyns triumphed in Lincolnshire; Reform came second in a number of mayoral races; and their 38 per cent vote share in Runcorn matches the best-ever performance that Ukip achieved in a by-election. So far, the story is one of teal triumph – at the expense of the two main parties. Labour are already pointing to the difficulty incumbents often face at local elections, and will claim victory after

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Reform mayor Andrea Jenkyns storms out of Sky interview

Andrea Jenkyns may have won the Greater Lincolnshire mayoral election with over 100,000 votes, but it hasn’t all been plain sailing for the Reform candidate this morning. An interview with Sky News turned sour when Jenkyns was probed about previous comments she’d made about a rival’s South African accent after the other mayoral candidate claimed Jenkyns had been parachuted into the electoral race. Slamming her interviewer as ‘divisive’, the new Greater Lincolnshire mayor then refused to entertain any further questions and stormed off from the camera. The post-election sleep deprivation is kicking in… The interview with Sky News turned sour Her interviewer quizzed her: ‘You accused one candidate, she said

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Did winter fuel payments win Runcorn for Reform?

There is little disguising what is surely going to be the prevailing story as council election results pour in from lunchtime onwards: Reform UK has had a very good night, Labour a poor one and the Conservatives a disastrous one. To win a by-election – even by just six votes – in Runcorn, will enliven Reform, especially following the civil war which threatened after Rupert Lowe’s ejection from the party. However, as we found with the SDP in the 1980s, by-election victories can give challenger parties false hope: they will not necessarily save them from a meltdown in a subsequent general election.   But it is a remark from a Labour

Steerpike Steerpike

Farage: ‘Not true’ I have a woman problem

Well, well, well. It’s been a good start to the day so far for Nigel Farage’s Reform party, with the group in the lead on council seat wins, securing victory in the Greater Lincolnshire mayoralty and, to top it all off, coming first place in the Runcorn and Helsby by-election. Now the party has returned its Westminster parliamentarian count to five (after ex-Reform man Rupert Lowe was suspended earlier this year) and hopes to continue making gains across the country throughout the day. Talk about shaking things up, eh? Reform’s Runcorn victory sees the party gain its first female Member of Parliament while ex-Tory politician Andrea Jenkyns swept to victory

Nigel Jones

Has Reform sent the Tories into a death spiral?

The Turquoise typhoon that is Reform UK has swept through the English council and mayoral elections – and winning by just six votes the first by-election of this Parliament in Runcorn and Helsby, hitherto in Labour’s 50 safest seats. As Labour narrowly held off the Reform challenge in closely fought mayoral contests in the West of England, North Tyneside and Doncaster, the main losers of the day were Kemi Badenoch’s Tories, who are on course to lose more than half the council seats they were defending. The Tories are caught in a pincer movement In the Brexit stronghold of greater Lincolnshire, Dame Andrea Jenkyns, a former Tory minister who has defected to Reform,

Steerpike Steerpike

Farage to Kemi: ‘Please stay’

Happy six months anniversary to Kemi Badenoch. Elected leader at the start of November, she today has to watch her party shed councillors at a rate of knots. Coming off the back of the ‘Boris bounce’ in 2021, it was always going to be a hard night for her – but even this will be a tough result for her supporters. Inevitably, Nigel Farage was on hand to stick the knife into his Tory rival. At the Runcorn count, he was asked by Sky’s Jon Craig what was his message to Badenoch. He replied: Kemi Badenoch – please stay. I mean please don’t resign, we want you to stay on

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Reform celebrate Runcorn victory

It was a long, tense night in Runcorn and Helsby as constituents and candidates awaited the results of their parliamentary by-election. Initially Labour looked to have come out on top, before reporters were informed that Reform UK were four points ahead of Sir Keir Starmer’s army. ‘Doubtful’ votes prompted a recount – and almost eight hours after journalists first appeared at the count centre, the final results came in: Nigel Farage’s Reform party won the Labour safe seat from the reds by just six votes. Talk about a knife edge… Not that the result was necessarily surprising to Farage, who had taken to Twitter earlier in the night to proclaim

Jacob Heilbrunn

Is Marco Rubio the next Henry Kissinger?

Tammy Bruce, the State Department spokesperson, was flummoxed. ‘I just heard this from you,’ she responded after a reporter told her at a briefing session that President Trump has appointed Marco Rubio to replace Mike Waltz as his acting National Security Advisor. But this isn’t his final Waltz. Waltz is now headed to the United Nations, where he will fill the ambassador slot which Representative Elise Stefanik coveted but was forced to surrender to ensure the Republicans maintain their slender majority in the House.   Little Marco may play a bigger role in the Trump administration than anyone had anticipated News reports earlier, first from Mark Halperin, had posited that Waltz

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Labour mayor turns on Starmer

Oh dear. It has been a pretty grim night for Sir Keir Starmer’s party. Loyalists have been out spinning desperately, with Science Secretary Peter Kyle given the thankless task of defending the indefensible on the overnight shows. One ray of sunshine which the party is citing is the North Tyneside mayoralty, where Ros Jones narrowly held off Reform’s challenge by barely 400 votes. So it must be a shame for No. 10 then that Jones’ first act as a newly re-elected mayor was to turn her guns on her own party leader. Speaking to the BBC, she declared that ‘national government needs to look and see what people are saying.’

Nick Tyrone Nick Tyrone

Reform’s rise seems unstoppable

The Reform party has won the Runcorn and Helsby by-election. It was announced this morning that they had captured the seat by a mere four votes, the closest result in British by-election history. Labour asked for a full recount – after which, it turned out that the Reform party had actually won the by-election by six votes (still making it the closest by-election result in British history). This is a huge result in British politics. Reform has proven that electorally, they are for real. The polls aren’t wrong or soft – people will turn out and vote for them. Nigel Farage’s party is a genuine, massive threat to the British

Eliot Wilson

Mike Waltz’s fall from grace will change little

Oh what a circus, oh what a show. It began on Thursday morning, with stories circulating that the US national security advisor, Michael Waltz, was about to be dropped. This seemed to be confirmed when President Trump spoke at an event for the National Day of Prayer, and reeled off praise for his top team, including Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth and John Ratcliffe, the director of the CIA – but made no mention of Waltz. Waltz’s departure had long been thought likely. While the most vainglorious and locker room chat-like braggadocio in the Signalgate scandal earlier this year had come from Hegseth and Vice President J.D. Vance, Waltz had

Ian Williams Ian Williams

Ian Williams, Philip Patrick, Guy Stagg, Ysenda Maxtone Graham, Mark Mason and Catriona Olding

37 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Ian Williams looks at Chinese influence in the UK (1:39); Philip Patrick interviews Japan’s last ninja (9:35); Guy Stagg reviews Damian Le Bas and explores the myths behind the city of Atlantis (18:23); Ysenda Maxtone Graham reviews an exhibition on school dinners at the Food Museum in Stowmarket (23:38); Mark Mason provides his notes on quizzes, ahead of the Spectator’s garden quiz (28:00); and, swapping Provence to visit family in America, Catriona Olding takes us on a trip up the east coast (31:27).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Damian Thompson Damian Thompson

Conclave: who is likely to succeed Francis?

41 min listen

The papal conclave is due to begin on Wednesday 7 May to elect a successor to Pope Francis. As host Damian Thompson says, Rome – and the entire Church – is in a state of ‘fevered excitement’. While this is to be expected, most commentators agree that this conclave will be one of the most consequential elections for centuries. At stake are both the future direction of the Church and Francis’s legacy – will his work be amended, continued or even rejected? The Pillar’s Luke Coppen joins Damian to try to make sense of the noise, gossip and political intrigue. They discuss the favourites to emerge as the new Pope,

James Heale James Heale

Reform seizes Runcorn in teal tsunami

Less than 10 per cent of council seats have declared thus far. But there already looks to be a clear early winner from these local elections: Nigel Farage. His party triumphed in the Runcorn and Helsby by-election this morning after a long night of drama. Only four votes separated Labour and Reform in the initial count. Just after 6 a.m, the final result came in: Reform on 12,645 votes and Labour on 12,639, a margin of just six. That is the closest by-election result since 1892 and is a testament to the effort that both parties invested. Between 350 to 400 Labour and Reform campaigners were out door-knocking yesterday, resulting

Thursday

Michael Evans

Waltz set to take the blame for Signalgate

Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, is set to lose his job over what came to be called Signalgate. He was the one who set up the ‘Houthi PC small group’ and either he or a member of his staff in error invited Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of the Atlantic magazine, to participate. Goldberg blew the whistle after the raids had taken place. Others in the group included Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, who obliged with all the operational data such as airstrike timings and particular aircraft to be involved, Vice President JD Vance, Marco Rubio, secretary of state, John Ratcliffe, CIA director, and Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence.  Waltz