Politics

You have probably already heard of The Rest is Politics, which consistently tops the podcast charts. You have certainly already heard of its two hosts, and have a flavour of their temperaments as well as their political views. Alastair Campbell may once have been lost in the shadow of Malcolm Tucker, but every week on the podcast his real self fights its way through. He finds his perfect foil (so we are told) in his co-host, the awkward nerd Rory Stewart.  The Rest is Politics is a strange name. What does it mean? It isn’t a phrase. The pieces begin to fall together once you realise that the company behind

This week was supposed to be Humza Yousaf’s big relaunch for the SNP. His speech on Tuesday was designed to show how he was combining his adopted role as the ‘son of Sturgeon’ with his ability to be his own man. Alas, it was not to be: the arrest of SNP treasurer Colin Beattie completely and utterly derailed the new First Minister’s best-laid plans. Yousaf had wanted to show he recognised that the relationship between the Scottish government and the business community had fallen into a ditch, to make clear it needed a ‘reset’. His willingness to compromise came in his announcement that the deposit return scheme would be delayed, and

Dear Prime Minister, I am writing to resign from your government, following receipt of the report arising from the inquiry conducted by Adam Tolley KC. I called for the inquiry and undertook to resign, if it made any finding of bullying whatsoever. I believe it is important to keep my word. It has been a privilege to serve you as Deputy Prime Minister, Justice Secretary and Lord Chancellor. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work as a minister in a range of roles and departments since 2015, and pay tribute to the many outstanding civil servants with whom I have worked. Whilst I feel duty bound to

When the Rwanda migrant removals programme was torpedoed by a European judge at a hastily-convened hearing one evening last summer, the notion that Britain had ‘taken back control’ of its borders crawled away to die. The anonymous judge at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights issued a controversial ‘Rule 39’ instant order. This blocked the removal of the few failed asylum seekers who had not already been sprung from the proposed inaugural flight via appeals made to British courts in the preceding days. It is likely Sunak himself is genuinely convinced that the current global asylum regime is unsustainable One Tory MP on the cultural right of the party