Politics

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

Wednesday

Ross Clark Ross Clark

It’s time to crack down on civil service sick days

Are civil servants throwing sickies en masse in protest at being forced to go back into the office to work three days a week? The order to return to the office, made by the previous government, seems to have coincided with a sharp rise in the number of days which staff are taking off sick. At the Home Office, staff took an average of 7.4 days of sickness absence in 2024/25, up from 6.6 days in 2023/24. At the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MCLG), the average absence rate for staff in its core department rose from 5.0 days in 2023 to 5.6 days in 2024. In the

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

Starmer has given control of Britain’s borders to France

Britain’s ‘one in one out’ migrant deal with France takes effect today, and Prime Minister Keir Starmer issued a stark warning to anyone considering making the journey across the Channel. ‘We send a clear message – if you come here illegally on a small boat you will face being sent back to France.’ The ‘one in, one out’ treaty with France hardly takes back control of Britain’s borders In a manner of speaking. The terms of the treaty state that Britain will lodge a request with France for returning a migrant within 14 days of their arrival in Britain. The French will then study the request and, if they agree

Lucy Dunn

The ghost of Sturgeon looms large over the SNP

Nicola Sturgeon may be stepping down as an MSP next year, but that doesn’t mean she’s done with Scottish politics. Instead it seems like her 32-year-old mini-me, Màiri McAllan, is being primed by the former first minister and her allies to become the party’s future leader. The remarkable similarities between the pair suggest Sturgeon sees a little of herself in McAllan, who also signed up to the SNP at the age of 16, went on to study law at the University of Glasgow, and caught the attention of a first minister before her career took off. Although she remains relatively unknown outside SNP and media circles, Sturgeon’s protégée and former special adviser is racking

Tuesday

Steerpike Steerpike

More Brits worried about immigration than health

Another day, another poll. This time YouGov has found that almost six in ten Brits say that immigration is one of the most important issues facing the country – almost double those who rate health as their number one concern, and more than double those worried about crime. Crikey! Fears about immigration have climbed by four percentage points compared to a fortnight ago, to 56 per cent. Healthcare ranked almost equally with immigration in June last year, but since then border control has become more important to Brits. Meanwhile concern about crime has risen three points in the last few weeks – coinciding with Reform’s ‘Lawless Britain’ campaign that has

Steerpike Steerpike

Labour voters: Kyle’s Savile comment was ‘inappropriate’

Back to the Online Safety Act which, since it came into force just over a week ago, has sparked outrage across the country as social media posts showing rioters fighting with police have been suppressed while those referring to sexual attacks have been automatically flagged as pornographic. As the Spectator‘s cover piece noted last week, footage from a protest outside the Britannia Hotel in Leeds, which showed police officers restraining and arresting a protestor, now can’t be easily accessed in Britain. But while opposition leaders like Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage have slammed the legislation, Mr S has been rather intrigued to find out who exactly supports it. More in

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

What France’s fight against Islamism can teach Labour

So far this year France has deported 64 individuals from its database of radical Islamists. More are planned in the coming weeks and months, putting the minister of the interior, Bruno Retailleau, on course to surpass last year’s total of 142. A senior unnamed prefect was quoted in yesterday’s Le Figaro declaring: We are very committed to this issue; it is an ongoing effort by the state, given what is at stake. It is even monitored weekly by the (interior) minister at the central level. Retailleau is supported by his predecessor, Gérald Darmanin, who has been the Minister of Justice since last December. It was Darmanin who last year commissioned

Ian Acheson Ian Acheson

How police chiefs can win back Britain’s trust

Policing and crime commissioners haven’t exactly fired up the public imagination since they were introduced in 2012. PCCs were intended to make police forces more accountable, but you’re more likely to come across one in the headlines for personal misconduct than their crime-fighting zeal. However, there are some signs of change in the air thanks to our crisis of illegal migration. Hampshire and the Isle of Wight’s PCC Donna Jones revealed yesterday that she had been effectively told to ‘shut up for the sake of diversity’ by a new Labour minister after comments she made on the widespread disorder last August following the Southport attack. The government still hides behind

David Shipley

Reform’s trans prisoner policy is a mess

Reform are in the headlines again, this time over confusion about their policy on trans prisoners. Yesterday Vanessa Frake, former prison governor and Reform’s UK justice adviser, said that trans women should not automatically be removed from women’s prisons, preferring an individual risk assessment. Nigel Farage seemed to echo this view, deferring to her experience and saying ‘it’s basically about risk assessment’.  This announcement put the party at odds with the recent Supreme Court ruling on the meaning of ‘sex’. It also put it at odds with reality. There is nothing decent about choosing to prioritise the demands of a very small number of men over the needs and rights

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Ed Davey should stick to his silly stunts – not lecture us on Gaza

Ed Davey’s got this Middle East business figured out. The Liberal Democrat leader has tweeted — because, honestly, what else is there to do as Lib Dem leader other than tweet? — his latest insight into the Gaza war: ‘Now the Hamas terrorists behind the October 7 atrocities are trying to erode support for recognition of a Palestinian state by falsely claiming it would be a victory for them. Hamas do not represent the Palestinian people and have no future in Gaza with a two-state solution.’ I know who we can ask about what the Palestinians really think. Let’s ask…the Palestinians That’s nice, Ed. Now, I’m not suggesting you’re a

Oscar Edmondson

Britain can learn from France on migration

12 min listen

It’s the big day for Starmer’s one-in, one-out migrant deal with France. The scheme, which was agreed during the state visit last month, comes into effect today – but Yvette Cooper and other figures in Whitehall remain suspiciously evasive when it comes to putting a number on returns to France. Immigration is, of course, the problem of highest salience across the country, and made even more pressing by recent riots at migrant hotels, giving far-right opposition parties plenty of ammunition. Polling shows that 40 per cent of Reform supporters would consider voting for Labour next time if the number of small boat arrivals fell. So, will it work? Will it

Steerpike Steerpike

Farage clarifies Reform’s female prisons stance

To Reform UK, which is in its third week of its crime crackdown campaign which looks to tackle ‘Lawless Britain’. The party claimed Monday’s press conference was the most significant one yet, with two new recruits unveiled. The first was former MEP Rupert Matthews, who – after 40 years as a member of the Tory party – has switched sides to become Reform’s first police and crime commissioner. He immediately took aim at Labour’s early prison release scheme and claimed jails were full ‘of foreign criminals who should be deported the day they are convicted’. And the second was former prison officer Vanessa Frake, the party’s new justice tsar whose comments

The Spectator

The Spectator and Douglas Murray win defamation claim brought by Mohammed Hijab

The Spectator and Douglas Murray have today won a defamation claim brought by Mohammed Hegab, who ‘lied on significant issues’ in court and gave evidence that ‘overall, is worthless’. The judge rejected Hegab’s claim because the videos he publishes are ‘at least as reputationally damaging to him as the article’ Hegab, a YouTuber who posts under the name Mohammed Hijab, claimed that an article about the Leicester riots published in September 2022 had caused serious harm to his reputation and loss of earnings as a result. Hegab travelled to Leicester in September 2022 after disturbances between local Muslims and Hindus there had begun, and gave a speech to a group of Muslim men,

Ross Clark Ross Clark

The OBR has seen sense on migration. Will Rachel Reeves?

High levels of migration might not always be good for community relations if large numbers of new arrivals descend on one neighbourhood, but at least it helps boost GDP by providing Britain with a source of eager workers whom employers struggle to find in Britain. That sums up the view of some economists, but it has just been thoroughly rejected by one important voice. David Miles, who sits on the committee of the Office for Budgetary Responsibility (OBR), has written today that it is wrongheaded to think that Britain can solve its economic problems by opening its doors to overseas workers. Even a migrant on the average UK wage will

Eliot Wilson

How will the army’s new Gurkhas fight without any guns?

The British Army’s newest formation, the King’s Gurkha Artillery (KGA), has unveiled the cap badge it will wear. This is a huge moment of symbolism for any army unit: the army is a federation of battalions and regiments which attract and inspire fierce loyalty, and it is at that level that British soldiers seek their real collective identity. 117 pages (seriously) of the Army Dress Regulations specify how cap badges are worn. In this case, however, the new badge – the crossed Gurkha khukhuri and a field gun representing the Royal Artillery – is concealing at least as much as it represents. I am absolutely in favour of raising more

Jonathan Sacerdoti

Israel’s plan to occupy Gaza is a last resort

Reports last night from Israeli Channel 12 quoting a senior official in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office have confirmed what has long been rumoured, feared, and for some, awaited: the decision has been made to occupy the Gaza Strip. This is not yet formal policy, pending cabinet approval, but the trajectory is now unmistakable. The prelude has ended. The war is entering a new, graver phase. Western commentary will, as usual, rush to treat this as a moral failure of Israeli restraint, or as the inevitable result of hawkish ideology. Yet that interpretation is not only false, it is profoundly dishonest and the opposite of the truth. The occupation of

James Delingpole James Delingpole

Long live YouTube! It has been good to conspiracists like me

Even though I loathe almost all forms of technology and would happily disinvent the lot (apart, possibly, from airships which are well overdue a revival), I cannot pretend that YouTube has not been good to me. I am pleased to read that it is now the second most-watched service on British televisions, behind only the BBC. All of it, amazingly, is still on YouTube In the antediluvian era that I mainly long for, you couldn’t make your own TV shows unless you were either rich enough to own a TV station or you submitted to the rules, regulations and standards of behaviour commensurate with being employed by that TV station. But now

Monday

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Kate Forbes showed real bravery

There is a certain worldly cynicism aroused by the announcement that a politician is stepping down to spend more time with their family. It was for a long time the refuge of MPs who had earned themselves an entry in the News of the World, the Who’s Who of romeos, rogues and reprobates, for their activities with ladies – or young gentlemen – of the night. Less commonly, it was regarded as an admission that someone could not hack it or was frustrated by their slow progress up the greasy pole. After all, no one wants to quit politics. Contra the cynics, Kate Forbes. Scotland’s deputy first minister will stand down from Holyrood at next May’s elections, having somehow

Theo Hobson Theo Hobson

Bonnie Blue and the menace of ‘para-porn’

There are two proper responses to pornography it: to condemn it, and to ignore it. There are two other responses. One is to use it. It doesn’t bother me too much if some men are enriching internet prostitutes while debasing themselves, as long as everyone shuts up about it. It’s the final possible response to porn that concerns me: giving it air-time. Para-porn takes very different forms. One form of it is the reality show that’s all about casual sex Lots of media activity claims to be reflecting on porn in a thoughtful way, but is actually promoting it. News stories about porn, and documentaries about porn, and interviews with

Tim Shipman

Vance & Farage’s budding bromance

16 min listen

Nigel Farage hosted a press conference today as part of Reform’s summer crime campaign ‘Britain is lawless’. He unveiled the latest Tory defector: Leicestershire’s Police & Crime Commissioner Rupert Matthews. Amidst all the noise of whether crime in the UK is falling or not, plus the impact of migration on crime, is Reform’s messaging cutting through? Would US Vice President agree with Farage’s message that Britain is lawless? Vance is in the UK, staying in the Cotswolds, as part of his summer holiday. Tim Shipman and Lucy Dunn are joined by James Orr, associate professor at Cambridge University, and a friend of Vance’s to talk us through the dynamics between