Politics

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

Friday

3 Mar 2023

Is Humza Yousaf’s campaign starting to sink?

The SNP leadership has turned into open civil war. Alex Salmond has shafted the frontrunner Humza Yousaf who tried to shaft Kate Forbes, who was, in turn, shafted by Nicola Sturgeon. No wonder long-suffering deputy First Minister, John Swinney, has resigned. Swinney’s departure came on the day Salmond torpedoed Yousaf, Sturgeon’s chosen successor, by claiming he had skipped Holyrood’s landmark gay marriage vote in 2014 due to ‘religious pressure’. Yousaf says his ‘recollection is different’, but his position is now untenable. His account is contradicted by the minister who was in charge of the 2014 equal marriage vote, Alex Neil, and now the then first minister, Salmond. It is all

Patrick O’Flynn

Theresa May is the true villain in this latest Tory Brexit war

The blond bombshell has criticised Sunak’s new Windsor Framework as not passing the Brexit test of taking back control. He’s made clear that he believes abandoning the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill is a terrible idea and says he will find it very hard to vote for his successor’s measure. In return, Sunak loyalists are muttering about it being Johnson’s mess – i.e. the original disastrous protocol that he agreed and then oversold at the tail end of 2019 – that their man has been clearing up. In fact, they both have good reason to feel chippy – but not with each other. For the true villain of the piece has

James Heale

Four things we learnt from the Boris Partygate probe

Today the privileges committee has published its initial report into whether Boris Johnson lied to the House of Commons about Partygate. This inquiry does not look at whether gatherings in lockdown happened or not – we know they did. Rather, it is going to investigate whether Johnson was aware such gatherings were taking place and, if he did, whether he ‘knowingly’ lied to the House of Commons when he told MPs that ‘the rules were followed at all times’. It also focuses on why the then prime minister did not correct the record at the earliest opportunity when it became clear that the Covid rules had not been followed at

David Abulafia

Captain Cook’s Aboriginal spears belong in Cambridge, not Australia

On the eve of the First World War, Trinity College, Cambridge deposited four spears collected by Captain Cook during his first encounter with native Australians in the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology of Cambridge University. There they could be seen and studied by any visitor to Cambridge, rather than being hidden away in a cabinet of curiosities in the Wren Library at Trinity. Now, more than 250 years after Cook’s visit to Australia, they are to be returned to Sydney and to members of the tribe that originally made them. After they arrived in what became known as Botany Bay, Cook’s men confiscated about 40 of these rods from members

Katy Balls

Sue Gray defects

14 min listen

Cindy Yu speaks to Katy Balls and Fraser Nelson about Sue Gray’s new role as Keir Starmer’s chief of staff and what happened on the Tory MP’s away day in Windsor.

Isabel Hardman

Why have we become numb to the failing social care sector?

Helen Whately, the care minister, gave a moving speech this week. It was personal and emotional, but it won’t get much attention. Whately told a health conference organised by the Nuffield Trust about the final months of her grandmother’s life. Her grandmother had reached the age of 100 and was living independently, enjoying walks in the countryside, a spot of gardening and reading, she told the audience. But then, she had a fall, and while Whately said she would spare the conference the details of what happened next, there was a period of five months in which the centenarian was stuck in hospital. She was ‘occasional receiving treatment, but mostly

Gus Carter

The madness of the lockdown trials

I think we can now admit that Covid sent us all a little loopy. Matt Hancock certainly seems it, handing over more than 100,000 highly sensitive texts to a hostile journalist. Today’s revelations show Hancock telling colleagues ‘we are going to have to get heavy with the police’. While everyone gets excited about the lockdown files, there are still plenty of lockdown trials going before the courts. Which, even if a gratuitous breach, seems a little pointless now. Rules are being enforced that are no longer in place. Rules that, the Daily Telegraph reports, weren’t based purely on ‘the science’. Mr Hylton’s is a sad tale of what happens when

Steerpike

Tories see red over Gray

Some good news at last for Damian Green. Theresa May’s onetime deputy has had a difficult few weeks what with his unsuccessful selection bid in Ashfield followed by the news that his nemesis Sue Gray is off to run Keir Starmer’s office. But Mr S hears that Green last night had a bit of good luck: the team he captained triumphed at the Tory away day pub quiz, thanks in no small part to the efforts of one Michael Gove. The brightest minds in the parliamentary party were grilled on subjects from ‘great Conservative election wins’ to ‘great Labour scandals’, ‘Lib Dem failures’ to the ‘zeitgeist tape (for those who’ve

Kevin Toolis

Stormont isn’t worth saving

It is a question all good cardiologists must ask themselves every day: when do you stop trying to resuscitate the patient on the operating table? The same question could be asked of Stormont, Northern Ireland’s ever crisis ridden legislature: when do we stop bothering? In the latest round of life-saving treatment, His Majesty the King, Rishi Sunak and EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen assembled at Windsor to proclaim a new dawn and the remaking of the Northern Ireland Protocol. And, hopefully, another end to the latest Stormont boycott. The deal unveiled this week will, we’re told, ensure the uninterrupted flow of Scottish seed potatoes and Asda sausages to

Steerpike

Five things we’ve learned on day three of Hancock’s lockdown files

Ping! It’s day three of the ‘Lockdown Files’ and a whole new tranche of former Health Secretary Matt Hancock’s WhastApp messages has just landed. Mr Steerpike has taken a look at what the Telegraph released last night: A worried Hancock told Cabinet Secretary Simon Case that the police needed to get a grip on mandating lockdown restrictions. Somewhat concerningly, the head of the civil service asked Hancock ‘who actually is delivering enforcement?’ In an attempt at humour, the Cabinet Secretary said he found imagining ‘the faces of people coming out of first class and into a Premier Inn shoe box’ funny. Hancock said they were ‘giving big families all the suites and

Katy Balls

What next for women in tech?

30 min listen

Women make up half of the workforce in the UK. Yet when it comes to high-skilled, high-income jobs in tech, just 26 per cent of the workforce are women and 77 per cent of tech leaders are men. Jobs in tech filter into almost every sector and women from all walks of life are discovering they don’t need a maths or tech background to retrain and reinvent themselves. Over the last five years the UK’s tech sector has seen massive proliferation and investment, but given this level of growth, where are all the women? The government’s approach to bridging the gap has focused on teaching in schools. While evidently, the

Thursday

2 Mar 2023

Steerpike

How long can Simon Case cling on?

It’s not been a great day for the Civil Service. First it’s announced that Partygate prober Sue Gray has been offered the role of Chief of Staff for the Leader of the Opposition. And now the Telegraph has released WhatsApps that show Simon Case, the Cabinet Secretary, mocking those affected by the government’s lockdown policies. Talk about classy, eh? As Britain began a forced quarantine for returning holidaymakers in February 2021, Case messaged Matt Hancock to ask ‘Any idea how many people we locked up in hotels yesterday?’ After the Health Secretary replied ‘None but 149 chose to enter the country and are now in quarantine hotels due to their

John McTernan

Hiring Sue Gray is a shrewd move by Keir Starmer

Offering Sue Gray a job as his chief of staff is one of the most consequential decisions Keir Starmer is ever going to make in his political career. For a senior politician, your chief, together with your communications director, and your campaign director, are force multipliers. They represent you in meetings and briefings you can’t attend, know your mind, report your views and relay – and enforce – your decisions. Importantly, they can tell others what you think and want – thus releasing valuable time. It is an intense relationship, but one that can last for an entire administration: consider that the two senior figures who were with Tony Blair

Stephen Daisley

Why is an Israeli politician calling for a village to be ‘wiped out’?

‘I think the village of Huwara needs to be wiped out. I think the State of Israel should do it.’ I have read those words and read them again – and again. I have checked various news sources to be sure there was no error in translation or transcription. I have tried to parse the words to construe a meaning other than the one I know in my gut to be true. But it won’t work. The words mean what they say. They are a call for ethnic cleansing. The words were spoken by Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister and leader of Tkuma, a religious nationalist party of the far

Natasha Feroze

Does Boris have a point on the Protocol?

17 min listen

Boris Johnson delivered his first speech since leaving No.10 and told the audience he would not be able to back Rishi Sunak’s Brexit deal. Although the Windsor Framework has largely received a lukewarm reception, does Boris have a point? Also on the podcast, Sue Gray has just resigned from the civil service to become Keir Starmer’s chief of staff. What could this mean politically for both parties? Natasha Feroze speaks to Katy Balls and Sam Lowe, partner at Flint.

Steerpike

Trans row rocks Guardian towers, again

Oh dear. It seems that life in the offices of the world’s wokest paper isn’t all its cracked up to be. For the Guardian’s sister paper – with which it shares an office – has been accused of ‘institutionalised transphobia’ by a disgruntled former writer. James Wong, the Observer’s garden columnist departed last week with a parting shot at his onetime employer. He wrote on Instagram that he left after being reprimanded by an editor for publicly criticising one of his paper’s articles about trans rights: After formally complaining about an article that likened politicians who support trans rights to alleged sex traffickers, the editor ignored my complaint and reprimanded me

Steerpike

Is Sue Gray really a coup for Keir?

Well, there we are then. Less than 24 hours after reports emerged that Sue Gray could be Keir Starmer’s next chief of staff, the lady herself has confirmed the story by resigning from the civil service. The Partygate investigator will however have to wait at least three months before she can start working for Labour, as per government guidelines. And, deliciously, she will also have to get final approval from, er, the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Will he hold the process up? Timings aside, it seems it is a fairly extraordinary decision for a senior civil servant to make. How, frankly, are ministers expected to trust their mandarins if they

William Moore

Is Putin winning?

37 min listen

This week: Is Putin winning? In his cover piece for the magazine, historian and author Peter Frankopan says that Russia is reshaping the world in its favour by cultivating an anti-Western alliance of nations. He is joined by Ukrainian journalist – and author of The Spectator’s Ukraine In Focus newsletter – Svitlana Morenets, to discuss whether this could tip the balance of the war (01:08). Also this week: The Spectator’s assistant online foreign editor Max Jeffery writes a letter from Abu Dhabi, after he visited the International Defence Exhibition. He is joined by author and former member of the ANC Andrew Feinstein, to uncover the covert world of the international arms trade and

James Kirkup

At least Gavin Williamson tried to keep schools open during Covid

Governing means accepting and embracing trade-offs. Almost every public policy choice involves deciding how important one set of people are, or how to balance their interests with others. Covid mitigation measures were a case study in government-as-trade-off. Time and again, ministers had to weigh up public health, NHS capacity, economic and fiscal costs, human freedom and countless other factors. Covid choices were especially stark because they very visibly involved the sickness and death of some of those people. Choices were made to prioritise several interests ahead of those of children. None of those choices were easy or simple and you shouldn’t take seriously anyone who says they were. You should

Katy Balls

Boris Johnson criticises Sunak’s Northern Ireland deal

Boris Johnson has made his first comments on Rishi Sunak’s protocol deal. In a speech at the Global Soft Power Summit in the Queen Elizabeth II Centre, the former prime minister has criticised the agreement – titled the ‘Windsor framework’ – saying he will find it ‘difficult’ to vote for it. Johnson said he had ‘mixed feelings’ about the deal, saying the original Protocol arrangement was ‘all my fault’ but querying whether Sunak’s new deal is all he claims it to be. Johnson’s intervention could lead to others such as fellow former prime minister Liz Truss speaking out Johnson said it was not the UK taking back control: ‘I’m conscious