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Politics

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

Friday

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Chris Packham in fresh BBC bias drama

BBC star Chris Packham has been no stranger to controversy in recent years. The Springwatch presenter has faced repeated accusations of bias, having retweeted Angela Rayner’s tirade against ‘sickening’ Tories, described those involved in hunting and shooting as ‘the nasty brigade’ and actively campaigned against the killing of ‘pest’ birds in the UK. But now the broadcaster appears to have turned his guns on the wrong target after starring in an advert singing the praises of a left-wing news website, Double Down News. Packham opens the promotional clip with an apparent dig at his own employers the BBC by claiming: It’s becoming, sadly, increasingly difficult to find integrity, honesty and

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Why the Tories mustn’t give in to the Nimbys

A 15-point YouGov poll lead and last week’s election performance suggests that things look good for the Tories in England. But some results are still causing concern in Tory ranks. In Cambridgeshire, the party lost control of the county council; in Oxfordshire, the Tory council leader lost his seat; and the Conservatives had their majority on Surrey County Council slashed. Some Tories are quick to point the finger at proposed developments for these losses, as I say in the Times today. They argue that a radical shake-up of the planning system, such as the one the government is proposing, will make this problem far worse. They fear this could put parliamentary seats across the

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Galloway’s party to stand in Batley and Spen

If a week is a long time in politics, it’s an age for George Galloway. Last Thursday, he was standing for the Scottish parliament under the banner of a party calling itself All for Unity. It commanded a princely 0.9 per cent of the vote Scotland-wide, suggesting the word ‘All’ was doing some heavy-lifting. Before Holyrood had even gathered to swear in its latest crop of MSPs, Galloway announced his Workers party GB would be standing in the forthcoming Batley and Spen by-election. During the Holyrood campaign, list candidate Galloway declared he would be giving his constituency vote to the Conservatives, prompting some to remark that ‘Gorgeous George’ had travelled

Cindy Yu Cindy Yu

Will the India variant delay the roadmap?

13 min listen

Cases of the Indian coronavirus variant have more than doubled in the last week, and Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccines minister, this morning said that jabs could be deployed in areas with higher case loads to contain its spread. Will the variant delay the 21 June unlocking? Cindy Yu speaks to James Forsyth and Katy Balls. Listen to the podcast Cindy mentions about healthcare in Brexit Britain.

Jake Wallis Simons Jake Wallis Simons

Revealed: How Israel tricked Hamas

I received a message from a trusted contact in Israel yesterday telling me that no ground offensive was planned in Gaza. This was despite the fact that heavy armour and infantry reservists were massing on the border. I decided to hold the story and break it in the morning. Within hours, however, the official Israeli army Twitter account had suggested to the world that ground troops had gone into action. ‘IDF (Israel Defence Force) air and ground troops are currently attacking in the Gaza Strip,’ it said. Nobody noted the careful ambiguity. Within minutes, the news had spread across the world. ‘Israel goes in,’ screamed the MailOnline, the world’s biggest

Joanna Rossiter Joanna Rossiter

Batley Grammar and the dilemma for trainee teachers

Should a teacher show a picture of the prophet Mohammed in the classroom? In the wake of the ugly scenes recently at Batley Grammar school when one teacher did just that, there are few questions more relevant to the work of a teacher right now. But when one trainee student at Manchester Metropolitan university contacted his course leader to ask whether they would support someone who did show such an image in class, the response was not the one he expected. The university’s reaction was telling: it did not initially respond to the trainee’s email request for advice. Instead it contacted him a month later saying he must attend a

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Howard Beckett calls for Priti Patel to be deported

Oh dear. Labour has been forced to suspend a leadership candidate for the Unite trade union from the party after he demanded that Home Secretary Priti Patel be deported. Left winger Howard Becket is in the running to replace the incumbent Len McCluskey but somewhat overstepped over the mark on Twitter yesterday in his attempts to prove his socialist credentials. Responding to a Home Office attempt to deport two asylum seekers in Glasgow, Beckett wrote: ‘Priti Patel should be deported, not refugees. She can go along with anyone else who supports institutional racism. She is disgusting.’ Beckett, who is currently the union’s assistant general secretary and a member of Labour’s National Executive Committee subsequently issued a grovelling

James Kirkup James Kirkup

The shamelessness of David Cameron

I’m almost starting to admire David Cameron. Almost. There is something that borders on the impressive about the former prime minister’s dedication to the destruction of his own reputation. He may have been a casually idle premier, but he’s really rolled up his sleeves and got stuck into the job of trashing his own name. How many times did he use the private jets of his collapsed finance firm to travel between his houses? Can’t remember. How much did said collapsed financial contraption pay him for services including pestering senior civil servants with texts signed ‘Love, DC’? Not saying, but it was much more than the mere £150k he got

Henry Hill

The problem with ‘Devo-max’

A common failing of pro-Union politicians down the years has been the stubborn belief that there exists somewhere a tidy ‘solution’ to the problem of separatist nationalism. With new polling showing that ‘devo-max’ would comfortably win a three-way referendum, it appears to be silly season once again. The history of unionism’s efforts to engineer decisive solutions to the challenges of separatism is an unhappy one. Devolution was meant to be it, after all. As Labour’s manifesto said in 1997:  ‘A sovereign Westminster Parliament will devolve power to Scotland and Wales. The Union will be strengthened and the threat of separatism removed.’ Talk about ‘not understanding how the United Kingdom works’.

Katy Balls Katy Balls

The Katy Searle Edition

30 min listen

Katy Searle is the Executive Editor of Politics at BBC News. She is known for overseeing numerous blockbuster political moments, including the infamous kitchen interviews with Ed Miliband and David Cameron, where the Labour leader showed off his two kitchens. On the podcast, she talks to Katy Balls about leaving school at 16, working with Rod Liddle on the Today programme and what it’s like to produce interviews with prime ministers.

Thursday

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

The great pretender: Nicola Sturgeon’s independence bluff

31 min listen

In this week’s podcast, we talk to The Spectator‘s editor Fraser Nelson and associate editor Douglas Murray about the challenges facing a freshly re-elected SNP. What next for Nicola Sturgeon – full steam ahead for IndyRef2? Or have neither Scotland or Number 10 the bottle for an all-out battle for independence? [01:02] ‘When you look at the practicalities, the case for independence really does fall. Nicola Sturgeon is selling it in the abstract: “Do you feel Scottish”?’ – Fraser Nelson Meanwhile in matters of social etiquette, the new post-pandemic era looms, complete with new modes of social interactions and conversational topics. In this week’s magazine, Rachel Johnson lays down the

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Can Labour survive the next election?

Keir Starmer is having a torrid time. Today brings another poll showing his personal approval rating falling. The Labour leader is now down to a net score of minus 22. But Starmer’s leadership, or lack of it, is far from being Labour’s biggest problem.  The party’s fundamental issue is that its old electoral coalition has fallen apart in recent years; the 2014 Scottish referendum and the 2016 Brexit referendum detached large sections of the party’s traditional base from it. Starmer’s problem is that the constituent parts of the traditional Labour coalition are moving ever further apart. Many of his metropolitan voters regard Brexity provincials with disdain. If Starmer went all

Julie Bindel

What’s the problem, ladies and gentlemen?

Picture the scene. You’re on a train when the following message comes over the tannoy: ‘Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls.’ Are you offended? One passenger travelling on a London North Eastern Railway (LNER) train was. ‘So as a non-binary person this announcement doesn’t actually apply to me so I won’t listen,’ the commuter wrote. Remarkably, LNER didn’t simply ignore or dismiss this complaint. It apologised: How scared of the trans mob must LNER be to act so swiftly? ‘I’m really sorry to see this, Laurence, our Train Managers should not be using language like this, and I thank you for bringing it to my attention. Please could you let

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Batley Labour frontrunner’s bizarre Netanyahu theory

Following the election of Tracy Brabin last week to the West Yorkshire mayoralty, a by-election is set to be held in the Red Wall constituency of Batley and Spen. The seat in question boasts a Labour majority of just 3,525 votes with local Tories licking their lips at the prospect of another Conservative gain in this 59.6 per cent Leave seat, following the Hartlepool result. With this in mind, Mr S thought he would take a look at some of the names doing the rounds to be Labour’s next candidate. One guide produced by LabourList, the house website of the left intelligentsia, suggests Labour’s leadership is ‘keen’ on Councillor Salma

Andy Cowper

Boris faces a painful choice over social care

If social care reform were any deeper in the long grass of political priorities, it’d probably get mistaken for a hedgerow. It got a one-line reference in the Queen’s Speech this week, which does not even guarantee that the ‘clear plan’ promised by the PM in his first speech in the job will be published this year. Announcing ‘a long-term plan for social care reform this year’ has been a quaint annual government ritual since 2017. The Queen’s Speech also mentioned the need to clear the NHS backlog. Delays for treatment, already widespread before Covid-19 due to a decade of NHS funding increases lagging behind demand, are now the worst since

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‘This is just absolutely pathetic’: Douglas Ross vs Pete Wishart

This morning’s Scottish Affairs select committee session got off to a rocky start when Tory leader Douglas Ross clashed with SNP chairman Pete Wishart. A buoyant Ross, who led his party to its best Holyrood results last week, kicked off by welcoming Scotland secretary Alister Jack and his mandarin Laurence Rockey to the committee but could not resist a swipe at the ‘frankly inept and poor’ Wishart who responded with similar gusto. Ross: Thank you Mr Rockey for joining us today and I have to say at the outset how disappointed people must have been to watch the quite frankly inept and poor chairing of this committee so far by Mr

Andrew Tettenborn

Boris’s animal rights laws could come back to bite him

Boris Johnson wants to beef up animal rights. The new rules will include a ban on importing stuffed heads as hunting trophies, and possibly on fur as well; a mandatory microchip for every cat in the kingdom; no more exports of live animals for slaughter; a ban on keeping primates as pets; and, most bizarre of all, a law requiring government to accept that animals are sentient and feel pain and angst like the rest of us. This looks odd. There was no extensive pressure except from a small fringe for any of these measures. To most traditional conservatives, animal rights conjure up unattractive visions of young men in dirty

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Inflation fears grow

Two months ago The Spectator reported on what was keeping Rishi Sunak awake at night ahead of the Budget: an inflation resurgence that could damage Britain’s economic recovery as it comes out of the pandemic. He deliberately designed his March Budget with inflation in mind, trying to make the UK’s finances ‘Biden-proof’ if inflation or interest rates started to move, and the cost of servicing the country’s debt became remarkably more expensive. At the time, Sunak was a lone voice on the matter. His inflation fears put the decision to raise tax into perspective, but many remained critical of his rather cautious approach. Inflation seemed a strange focus as the conditions

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Why I spoilt my ballot paper

The headline ‘Government to allow people to hug’ one might have expected to hear on early evening news bulletins in January 1661, shortly after Oliver Cromwell was posthumously executed and puritanism began its slow and welcome withdrawal from England. It sounds a little odd in 2021. Below the headline came the inevitable caveats from the medical clerisy. While hugging you should turn your face aside so as to minimise the risk of infecting the person you are embracing. I think people are also enjoined to keep their hands well above the waist — during amorous encounters with people in your ‘bubble’ you are allowed only to ‘get your tops’, as