Politics

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

Wednesday

John Keiger John Keiger

France has the most to lose from Britain’s turn away from Europe

It was Napoleon who declared that ‘a state has the politics of its geography’. We do well to remember that in taking stock of European international relations as we speculate on a new year and beyond. By Europe is meant the European continent, ‘from the Atlantic to the Urals’, in de Gaulle’s words. Not the 27-member European Union, which Brussels linguistically and imperialistically conflates with the 44 sovereign states that the UN defines as Europe. Of those 44 states, four are still the European great powers, as they have been since at least 1870: Britain, Germany, France, and Russia. They are still the continent’s most populous, wealthiest (except Russia), and

Tuesday

Steerpike Steerpike

The ten most-read Steerpikes of 2021

Farewell then 2021 – what a year it’s been. Twelve months of Covid craziness brought with it ample opportunities to lampoon the great and the not-so-good in British public life, from narcissistic royals to inept Europhiles.  Below is a round-up of Steerpike’s most read articles from 2021, covering some of the year’s biggest moments such as the vaccine procurement wars and the death of Prince Philip to lighter episodes like Prince Harry’s thoughts on freedom of speech.  But while the dilettante Duke and Duchess of Sussex took both bronze and silver medals, gold could only go to the Guardian for its attempted self-immolation over how to cover transgender issues. Mr S

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Remember panic-buying? Here’s what will happen next time

It’s post-Christmas, and there are already murmurs about supermarkets with empty shelves. Just as with the petrol shortage in September and shortages of loo paper at the beginning of the first lockdown, these things can rapidly develop into major crises, purely as a result of panic-buying. Tesco, whose store on the Isle of Wight is reportedly especially empty post-Christmas, denies it has any problem with its supply chain — which had been threatened with disruption thanks to an industrial dispute involving the company’s lorry drivers in early December. People may, on the other hand, have stocked up more than usual in response to fears of a post-Christmas lockdown — a fear which

Steerpike Steerpike

Five howlers from Jenny Harries

It’s just two days to go until the New Year’s Honours List is announced and already speculation is rife as to who the lucky names will be. Tennis teen Emma Raducanu is set to become the youngest MBE recipient ever while outgoing 007 Daniel Craig should get a gong for his many years of fictitious sacrifice on Her Majesty’s secret service. And in light of the ongoing pandemic, it’s no surprise that the list is set to be stuffed full of NHS heroes being recognised for their work, with Chris Whitty among those tipped for a knighthood. The Lancelot of the lancet, if you will. But one name unlikely to be on the list will be that of Dr Jenny

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

Boris’s lockdown gamble could spell big trouble for Labour

Has Boris Johnson just been thrown a lifeline by a devolution settlement that has caused nothing but trouble for UK prime ministers over the past 20 years? The PM’s decision not to impose further restrictions on social mixing before New Year celebrations has been underlined in the public consciousness by the opposite choices of devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Among the UK nations, only in England will people be free to indulge in New Year festivities on anything like a normal basis. In Scotland, in particular, where the occasion customarily eclipses Christmas as the key celebration of the year, there is growing resentment that Nicola Sturgeon has

Debbie Hayton

Stonewall’s annus horribilis

The year 2021 has been an annus horribilis for Stonewall. For much of the last decade, the charity could do no wrong in the eyes of those who mattered. Stonewall’s influence cut straight into the heart of government. As Nikki da Costa, Boris Johnson’s former director of legislative affairs, pointed out: ‘There is no other organisation — no business, or charity, no matter how big — that can pick up the phone to a special adviser sitting outside Boris Johnson’s office and get that person to speak directly to the Prime Minister. But that is the kind of access that Stonewall has’ Through its Diversity Champions Programme, Stonewall advised businesses, police, NHS

Steerpike Steerpike

Labour in limbo over Covid curbs

Wes Streeting has enjoyed something of a dream start since his promotion to shadow health secretary a month ago. Confident at the despatch box and assured on a media round, his performance in the ‘Plan B’ debate had centrist dads of a certain vintage humming ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ once more. But while Labour’s poll lead has shot up in recent weeks, the spectre of Covid has emerged once more to remind Sir Keir’s Starm troopers of the unpredictable perils of pandemic politics. The emergence of Omicron just before Christmas posed a challenge to politicians of all stripes: should we reintroduce restrictions to stop the health service being overwhelmed? Boris Johnson, for

Monday

Steerpike Steerpike

Diane Abbott’s Zero Covid crusade

With Christmas over, the turkey consumed and Maughamtide been and gone, the eyes of an anxious nation have turned once more to No.10. Boris Johnson deferred the re-introduction of restrictions last week but met with Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance today to discuss the latest Covid data. Fortunately, current indications are that no such measures will be announced in England at the current time. But while most will celebrate the absence of yet more interminable mask-wearing, social distancing and indoor mixing bans, there are some who crave a Covid curb comeback. Among them include the zealots of the ‘Zero Covid Coalition’, whose activities are partly run out of the taxpayer-funded office of

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Exclusive: No new Covid restrictions until new year at earliest

Last week, the Cabinet decided to wait for a week before imposing any more Covid-19 restrictions for England. I understand that there was a meeting today between Boris Johnson, Sajid Javid, Chris Whitty, UKHSA’s Jenny Harries and others in which they agreed to wait another week and see the results of the booster programme. This means no further measures until at least the new year, and perhaps not even then. The last week of data vindicated the wait-and-see decision taken last Monday as it emerged.. That UK Omicron could be 70 per cent less likely to hospitalise those it infects Cases in South Africa are now falling fast, especially in

Matthew Lynn

What happened to the great Brexit turkey shortage?

Fights breaking out at the checkout counters in Waitrose as angry shoppers battled for the few remaining stocks. Reports of black market birds changing hands for thousands in the posher parts of London. Twitter feeds cluttered with pictures of nut roasts, tofu crowns, and chestnut bakes taking pride of place on the Christmas table, as people desperately tried out the alternatives. You probably noticed the Great Turkey Shortage this year. Christmas went ahead more or less as normal, but of course Brexit meant there weren’t any turkeys available anywhere, just as the farmers had warned. Only a couple of months ago, we were all being told that turkeys would inevitably

Steerpike Steerpike

Lebedev’s Lords’ launch

Evgeny Lebedev is a man of many talents. Since taking up the reins as Evening Standard proprietor in 2009, he’s turned his hand to everything from newspapers and restaurants to philanthropy and property. Theatre buff, elephant lover, a man who collects famous friends like his Francis Bacon paintings: is there anything this Russian renaissance man can’t do?  For during his Gramscian waltz through the institutions of the British establishment, Lebedev became close to Boris Johnson, Mayor of London when he bought the Standard. The pair have enjoyed caviar parties and Italian soirees together, with Johnson famously being spotted dishevelled, alone and without his security detail at an airport after one such bash in

John Ferry John Ferry

Prepare for Sturgeon’s ‘Indyref 2’ stunt

This is the time of year when economists and political scientists make their predictions for the upcoming 12 months. Will we finally see the back of Covid and economic recovery? Will Boris Johnson survive as Prime Minister? In Scotland, the politerati are speculating on what Nicola Sturgeon’s next move on the constitution will be. It seems likely the Scottish government will introduce a bill, without the agreement of Westminster, on a second independence referendum. This is expected to be challenged at the UK Supreme Court. The most likely outcome of that is the referendum bill failing on the grounds that it goes beyond the constitutional powers of the devolved parliament

Rory Stewart

Afghanistan’s troubles can’t only be blamed on the Taliban

In 2001, I spent part of a hard winter in a remote village near Bamiyan in the Afghan central highlands. The Taliban government had just fallen. The village was ringed with landmines. Neighbouring village had been razed to the ground by retreating militia, the roof-beams were charred, the buildings empty, and the survivors had fled to refugee camps in Iran. There was no electricity, no schooling for girls and little for boys. The nearest clinic was three days’ walk away and there were no medicines when you reached it. People made what little cash they had from archaeological looting and child labour. When I returned to the valley, at the

Sunday

Steerpike Steerpike

Tim Farron’s Christmas roast

Christmas is a time for tradition and nowhere embraces it quite like Westminster. If you work in a building that looks like Hogwarts, it’s no surprise that MPs and ministers are keen to celebrate the festive customs, be that spending quality time with your (ever-growing) family like Boris or hanging out the £8 Big Ben decorations on the tree like Liz Truss. But in recent years a new-tradition has developed in SW1. Whereas once the Tory great and good would spend Boxing Day on the traditional hunt, these days another fox-related ritual has been established: the annual mockery of Jolyon Maugham QC. For it was two years ago today that the Babe Ruth

Steerpike Steerpike

Braverman’s brush with the law

Ah student politics: is there anything quite like it? The strange creatures it attracts, the passions it unleashes, the adolescent ambition and the glorious pettiness of it all; so vicious precisely because the stakes are so small. Such an ignoble tradition has spawned many of our lords and masters – Boris Johnson was an unabashed Union hack at Oxford while William Hague was ‘convicted of electoral malpractice’ in one election of the Oxford University Conservative Association (OUCA). And having spent some time recently in the Cambridge University archives, Mr S is delighted to see the route from the common room to the Commons is still alive and well. For perusing copies of

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

What Patrick Vallance doesn’t say about Sage

Does Sage have a pro-lockdown bias? Sir Patrick Valance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, wrote an article in the Times recently presenting Sage as a ruthlessly neutral force speaking ‘scientific truth to power’. He’s refuting the idea of Sage providing a range of gloomy factoids and scenarios which tend to make the case for lockdown. His description is rather different to what Prof Graham Medley, chairman of the Sage modelling committee, told me last weekend: that  ‘we generally model what we are asked to model.’ Asked by whom? I’d still love to know. Anyway, Sir Patrick puts all this to one side and stresses how Sage offers a breadth of advice on Omicron.

Melanie McDonagh Melanie McDonagh

The churches must stay open

Hooray for Cardinal Vincent Nichols, who used the one day of the year when his pronouncements are amplified by the season to ‘sincerely appeal that [the government] do not again consider closing churches and places of worship.’ He said in a BBC interview he believed it had been demonstrated that the airiness of churches meant they are ‘not places where we spread the virus’. Mind you, Catholic churches weren’t as bad as the Church of England This is, of course, entirely sensible. It was nuts for churches to close at the start of lockdown, at least as spaces for prayer if not for communal worship. Pretty well any church is ‘Covid-safe’, in

Tim Marshall

What Putin’s Russia fears most of all

When Vladimir Putin called the collapse of the Soviet Union ‘a major geopolitical disaster of the century’ he wasn’t channelling his inner Marxist-Leninist. Russia’s leader is not interested in remaking the Soviet empire, which finally fell apart 30 years ago today, on Boxing Day 1991. But he does want to roll back the losses of the post Cold War era, expand Russia’s sphere of influence, and build a buffer zone around the homeland. It’s this that explains Russian aggression on the borders of Ukraine. While western observers might like to paint this as mindless sabre-rattling, the reality is that this massing of troops is driven by fear – and the

Saturday

Ian Acheson Ian Acheson

What’s it like spending Christmas behind bars?

It’s customary these days for people to complain that Covid restrictions mean everyday life ‘is like living in a prison.’ Believe me: it isn’t. So let’s spare a charitable thought for those whose rooms have no handles to hang a stocking on and those whose job it is to make Christmas incarceration more bearable for them. This morning, a prison population roughly the size of Scunthorpe spread across a crumbling penal archipelago of over 100 jails will wake up to a day difficult enough for most on their own outside. But for inmates, Christmas Day is made more so by pandemic restrictions, isolation from families and the municipal smell emanating from

Friday

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Has technology helped the Northern Ireland border?

32 min listen

Had Covid-19 not continued to dominate the headlines this year, there’s little doubt that the outcomes of the Brexit deal would have been at the forefront of our policy discussions. Britain has left the EU with a bespoke trade agreement, but it’s far from perfect, as the Northern Ireland Protocol continues to cause problems, especially for trade flow between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. What have digital solutions done so far to get closer to our goal of seamless trade? Has it been enough? What problems are still left to solve and do the realities of Brexit simply mean that we can now never fully escape these new regulatory burdens?