Politics

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

Wednesday

3 May 2023

Sue Gray, Simon Case and a tale of two appointments

When Boris Johnson appointed Simon Case to the Cabinet Office, he believed that the youngest cabinet secretary in a century (just 41 when he accepted the role) would be more malleable than his more experienced rivals. Case was appointed in September 2020, when Dominic Cummings was, in effect, running No. 10 and had big ideas about rewiring Whitehall. ‘Simon was picked to be Dom’s stooge,’ says one former Johnson aide. ‘His role was to let Dom be Dom.’ One person who appears to be finding an upside to Sue Gray’s woes is Simon Case Conversely, when Keir Starmer asked Sue Gray to be his chief of staff, the idea was that

Isabel Hardman

PMQs was all about the local elections

Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer were both present for Prime Minister’s Questions, but the session was largely Why You Should Vote For This Party In The Local Elections Tomorrow. Backbenchers on both sides used the half hour to air their grievances with local councils led by their rivals, or praise the important work of authorities where their own party had power. Both party leaders framed their exchanges around their own local messaging, too, but what was interesting was that Starmer chose to lead on home ownership and housebuilding. The Labour leader used housing as the latest example of things Sunak likes to pretend are going absolutely fine even when they

Steerpike

Which Tory MP will be the next ‘presentician’?

These days it’s hard to turn your telly and not find a politician gurning back at you. But while once MPs both past and present were wheeled out only as guests – hapless prey before a fearless interviewer – now they’re more likely to be running the show. A veritable smorgasbord of Tory MPs currently host or have previously hosted such shows on GB News including Jacob Rees-Mogg, Dehenna Davison, Esther McVey, Philip Davies and Lee Anderson. TalkTV meanwhile have ‘Friday night with Nadine Dorries’ while her fellow parliamentarians Bim Afolami and Labour’s Tan Dhesi as talking heads on Talk’s flagship late night show. And even Jake Berry has been

Matthew Lesh

George Osborne’s smoking ban is deluded

Former Chancellor George Osborne has become the latest British politician to call for a smoking ban. The architect of the sugar tax wants the UK to follow the lead of New Zealand, which will prohibit anyone born after 2008 from purchasing cigarettes. ‘You basically phase it out. Of course you’re going to have lots of problems with illegal smoking, but you have lots of problems with other illegal activities,’ Osborne said. ‘It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try and ban them and police them and make it less readily available. I thought that was a compelling public health intervention.’ You have to admire his flawless logic. Prohibition has proven so successful

Iain Macwhirter

Trans activists will regret picking on Joanna Cherry

Another feminist getting no-platformed in Scotland is hardly news. Poets, writers, students, academics, comedians and, of course, film-makers have become inured to being cancelled north of the border if they stray from the dogma that trans women are women. Normally this kind of thing happens in the shadows, without publicity. People just find, like the poet Jenny Lindsay, that their livelihood disappears. Cancellation is the standard operating procedure for the handful of trans activists who seem to have a stranglehold on Scottish cultural life and education institutions. But this time they took on someone willing to fight back. The SNP MP for Edinburgh Central, Joanna Cherry, refused to go quietly when the Stand Comedy Club, which was

Hardeep Singh

Does Britain have a problem with ‘Sikh extremism’?

Terror threats from Islamist and far-right terrorists are depressingly familiar to Brits, but other faiths are not immune from the plague of extremists who might seek to harm others. A recent report by Colin Bloom, the government’s faith engagement advisor, touched on lesser-known ideologies like ‘Buddhist nationalism’ and ‘Hindu nationalism’. It also raised concerns about ‘Sikh extremism’. But how much of a problem is this particular form of radicalism in Britain? ‘Small pockets of Sikh communities’ in Britain are involved with ‘subversive, sectarian and discriminatory activities,’ according to the report. The numbers here are small. According to the 2021 census, there are 524,000 Sikhs in England and Wales, which equates

Steerpike

Three questions Labour still need to answer on Sue Gray

Two months after leaving government, Sue Gray is still causing headaches for ministers. The partygate inquisitor is back in the news following her refusal to cooperate with a Cabinet Office probe into her shock defection to the Starmtroopers as Sir Keir’s chief of staff. Unwilling to answer questions to an official government inquiry? What would the Sue Gray of 2021 make of that… Attention therefore switches to the second investigation being conducted by ACOBA into Gray’s defection. This, Labour says, ought to be the real inquiry because ACOBA is an independent body, exempt from the machinations of those beastly Tories. They are expected to make a recommendation on Gray’s appointment by

Tuesday

2 May 2023

Isabel Hardman

The NHS is still in trouble despite the pay agreement

The decision by the NHS Staff Council to accept the government’s pay offer is not the end of the stand-off between ministers and some healthcare workers, obviously. But it does mark a step away from the general hostility over pay that has marked the autumn and winter months. Unite and the Royal College of Nursing are still threatening more strikes, even though they are on the council of 12 unions representing all NHS workers (save for doctors and dentists) in England. The vote at today’s Council meeting means the pay rise of 5 per cent for 2022/23 and 2023/24 and a one-off payment of at least £1,655 will go to

Cindy Yu

Could Sue Gray-gate backfire on Keir Starmer?

17 min listen

The Cabinet Office has published its written statement into the resignation of Sue Gray, stating that it has given a ‘confidential assessment’ to the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) about whether she broke civil service rules in taking up a job from Keir Starmer while still a senior civil servant. On the episode, Cindy Yu talks to Katy Balls and the UK In A Changing Europe’s Jill Rutter, who is also a former civil servant, about the implications for the civil service if Gray is found to have broken the rules. Produced by Cindy Yu.

Steerpike

Sue Gray disappoints… again

Is that it? After keeping half of SW1 on tenterhooks all day, it seems that Keir Starmer’s favourite gamekeeper-turned-poacher has done it again. Fifteen months ago, it was the partygate inquiry; today it’s the probe into Sue Gray’s spectacular defection to Labour. After much speculation, the government has today published a written statement about the Cabinet Office review into her appointment as Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff. In a terse and pithy notice, the Cabinet Office minister Oliver Dowden wrote that ‘Ms Gray was given the opportunity to make representations as part of this process but chose not to do so.’ Others within government chose not to be so diplomatic,

Joanna Williams

Where was Stella Creasy when other mums were being harassed?

Parliament’s ban on the Chinese-owned video-sharing app TikTok cannot come soon enough. But it’s not just cyber security we need to worry about. Our social media happy MPs clearly need saving from themselves. Matt Hancock might be the parliamentary champion of toe-curling film clips but other MPs are bidding to out-cringe him. Labour’s Stella Creasy filmed her response this weekend to a critic who had moved from bombarding her office with emails, to reporting her to social services for exposing her children to ‘extreme views’. Creasy was quickly cleared but the whole situation left her, understandably, angry – not least when police told the MP she should ‘expect to be

Zoe Strimpel

Ealing’s ‘women-only’ tower block is regressive

Designs for a tower block in Ealing just for women – the first in Britain – have been given the thumbs up by planners. On the surface of it, the scheme, proposed by the Women’s Pioneer Housing association, which was founded in the 1920s by women’s rights campaigners, sounds rather good. It offers a permanent, refuge-style living arrangement for vulnerable and poor women, including victims of domestic violence. Some utopian touches are in the offing too: deeper balconies designed to keep prying eyes away, slightly lower kitchen work surfaces, even ventilation systems suited for menopausal women (presumably the option to open the window wide on the 15th floor will be limited). But scratch

Matthew Lynn

Why Liz Truss fans might come round to Keir Starmer

We might have thought Trussonomics was dead and buried for a generation after its author’s short-lived premiership last autumn. But all of a sudden it has a high-profile, if slightly unexpected, convert: Sir Keir Starmer. In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning, Starmer was sounding a lot like Kwasi Kwarteng last September: We’ve got the highest tax burden since the second world war. What we’ve had from the government is tax rise upon tax rise on tax rise. If they’ve proved one thing, it’s that their high-tax, low-growth economy doesn’t work. The Labour leader is absolutely correct, even if he is a little late to the

Steerpike

Arron Banks to receive £35,000 in Cadwalladr libel damages

Oh dear. It seems that the always-online Observer writer Carole Cadwalladr has come unstuck in her never-ending war against Aaron Banks. Back in February, the Brexit-backing businessman won a partially-successful appeal of an earlier libel ruling from June 2022 over her TedTalk claims that he had a ‘covert relationship with Russia.’ The Leave.EU donor initially lost his case last summer against Cadwalladr, who won using the public interest defence. High Court judge Mrs Justice Steyn decided it was reasonable for Cadwalladr to believe what she said was in the public interest – even though it caused harm to Banks’ reputation. He then appealed on the judge’s finding that Cadwalladr’s public interest

Lucy Dunn

The Scottish Tories can’t continue to rely on SNP failures

The Scottish National party’s implosion brings good news for the Scottish Conservatives. At the Tories’ party conference in Glasgow, delegates had a spring in their step about their party’s rising chances. Poll results show that the Unionist parties are seeing their support gradually increase, while the SNP’s grip on power looks to be weakening, Meanwhile, support for the Greens, though not especially high to begin with, has halved. Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross was joined in Glasgow at the weekend by an all-star cast from Westminster, including Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, secretary of state for Scotland Alister Jack and levelling up secretary Michael Gove. But while it is clear the

Patrick O’Flynn

What Sue Gray-gate says about Keir Starmer

In British politics the first order effect of any report into a past furore is always about how it impacts current party leaders. So the various early inquiries related to the invasion of Iraq, for example, were not really about honestly learning from mistakes, but about the extent of the damage they would inflict upon Tony Blair. Equally, the public inquiry into the handling of Covid was most eagerly anticipated when it was supposed that Boris Johnson would still be in 10 Downing Street upon its publication, as his opponents looked for a political bomb to blow him up. Now he has gone it rarely gets talked about at all.

Nicholas Sheppard

Is New Zealand that bothered about becoming a republic?

The prime minister of New Zealand, Chris Hipkins, has said he wants his country to end constitutional ties with Britain and become a republic. Speaking just days before he attends the coronation of King Charles, Hipkins said: ‘Ideally, in time, New Zealand will become a fully independent country, will stand on our own two feet in the world, as we by and large do now.’ Hipkins, who replaced Jacinda Ardern as Labour leader in January, told a press conference in Wellington on Monday that while he imagined it would eventually happen, he was not planning any moves for the country to become a republic. ‘I’m on record as being a

Steerpike

Starmer breaks one of his ten pledges. Again.

So, just what exactly does Keir Starmer stand for? In the latest wheeze to distract from the Sue Gray drama and prove that Labour is now a Serious Party of Government, the spin doctors at Labour HQ have opted to ditch the party’s long-standing pledge to abolish tuition fees. As recently as 2021 he was lambasting it as ‘a huge debt for young people that they carry around for a long time’ which is ‘why we rightly committed at the last election to get rid of tuition fees.’ Yet all that has now changed apparently, as the party seeks to embrace a new-found spirit of fiscal probity – an approach

Gavin Mortimer

Marine Le Pen is revelling in the mayhem of Macron

It is almost six years to the day since Marine Le Pen went head to head with Emmanuel Macron in a live television debate that came to be seen as the defining moment of the 2017 French presidential campaign. It did not end well for the leader of the National Front, the party she has since rebranded as the National Rally. Le Pen was ripped apart by her young opponent on the evening of May 3. Macron combined boyish charm with a head for facts, outmanoeuvring Le Pen in every argument and on every subject. It’s increasingly hard to find anyone in France who respects their president. Le Pen was

Mary Dejevsky

Move over Help to Buy – we really need Help to Sell

When I learned that the Prime Minister was thinking of launching a new Help to Buy scheme, my first response was ‘Oh no’. My second response was the same, with the caveat that we are in the last days of campaigning for local council elections, with a general election a year or so down the line, so anything that looks like a political promise now may not actually happen. If it does though, my objections will be the same as when David Cameron and George Osborne launched the first version – except there is now more evidence of Help to Buy’s deleterious effects. ‘Help to Buy Mark I’ mostly assisted