All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
When Gus O’Donnell was running the civil service, he was known by his initials — GOD. It seems to have gone to his head. He says in this week’s House magazine that he’s considering applying to be Governor of the Bank of England, and in the same interview exposes his failure to grasp modern economics
Remarkable story about our top civil servants: they are all using the ‘private company’ loopholes to avoid paying the correct rate of tax, and have been doing so for some time. At least two thousand of the monkeys and that’s before you count the same level of management bureaucrats in the NHS and of course
In today’s English council elections, there’s no doubt that Labour will do better than in 2008 — the last time most of these seats were contested. Experts Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher predict that they’ll improve their ‘national equivalent vote share’ by 13 points compared to four years ago. But how many seats can they
Here, CoffeeHousers, is this week’s episode of The View from 22 podcast. In this episode, Leah McLaren returns to the Spectator a decade on from her infamous cover story attacking British men to explain how she’s now fallen in love with one (0:30). James Forsyth and Neil O’Brien from Policy Exchange examine the Tories’ lack
The Prime Minister’s supporters will hope that this detail in Peter Oborne’s column today is not true: A fresh embarrassment concerns Rebekah Brooks, who providentially retained the text messages she received from the Prime Minister, which I’m told could exceed a dozen a day. These may now be published, a horrible thought. Now “I’m told”
A propos nothing at all except coming across it in a comment over at Slugger O’Toole, here’s a jolly tale of 1960s Irish anarchism: One day in the late 1960s, when we thought we’d heard the chimes of freedom flashing, I drove to Dublin with [John] McGuffin and the American anarchist Jerry Rubin. A mile
As those of us in London face up to the prospect of the none-of-the-above election, it’s worth thinking ahead to 2015 and asking yourself if any of the major parties really deserves your vote. It’s hard to remember a time when things were quite like this. Daniel Finkelstein has a theory that the British electorate
The single funniest thing about the London mayoral election has been watching the Left trying to excuse tax avoidance. After I revealed that his idol, Ken Livingstone, had saved a fortune by channelling six-figure earnings through a personal company, the Guardian’s Dave Hill pleaded that Ken’s previous condemnations of tax-dodgers ‘had been aimed at extremely
Meanwhile, in other defence news Winslow Wheeler says it is time for the cousins to give up on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. It is, as everyone knows, a troubled plane. Quite expensive too: The F-35 will actually cost multiples of the $395.7 billion cited above. That is the current estimate only to acquire it,
The next round of army cuts will be announced next month as the government reduces reconfigures Britain’s military capability yet again. According to a report at the weekend the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders and the Royal Scots Dragood Guards will be two of the casualties heading to the knacker’s yard. Progress, if that is what
I doubt that many CoffeeHousers are planning on voting for the independent candidate for Mayor of London, Siobhan Benita. As Leo McKinstry said in this magazine recently, she’s really the civil service, establishment candidate. But fair play to her for standing for election unlike her mentor Gus O’Donnell, Jeremy Heywood or any other members of
The Dutch government has just banned foreigners from the country’s ‘coffee-shops’ — aka, cannabis cafés. Given how often we’re told that you can’t ban EU members from doing anything, how did they manage it? Basically, it all comes down to residency. If you live there, then you can apply for what’s being called a ‘weed
The American presidential campaign is in one of its few fallow periods just now. Which means it is time for a favourite quadrennial pastime: the Veepstakes! Who will Mitt Romney choose to be his running-mate? Rob Portman of Ohio? Marco Rubio of Florida? Chris Christie of New Jersey? Someone else entirely? Who can tell but
There was a sense of urgency, even emergency, in many countries on May 1 this year. The goings-on in the UK were muted in comparison: France Presidential incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy staged a rally in front of the Eiffel Tower called ‘The Feast of Real Work’, to counter the traditional show of heft by the left.
For all the coverage of hacking, pasty tax and the like, the continuing crisis in the eurozone remains the most significant political story. Until it is resolved, it is hard to see how the UK returns to robust economic growth. I suspect that the market reaction to a Hollande victory will be limited as it
And for Honduras too. Ottawa and Tegucicalpa are considering founding a Charter City in Honduras. As Paul Romer – the NYU professor at the head of the Charter City movement – explained in the Globe and Mail yesterday: Honduran congressional support for the RED reflects a clear understanding of the challenges the country faces. Inefficient
We may still be 19 hours away from the polls opening — and more than 48 away from hearing the result — but bookmaker Paddy Power has already paid out £20,000 to punters who bet on Boris. It’s a publicity stunt by the company, but one that’s unlikely to backfire, with the pollsters agreeing that
Political theatre, that’s what Barack Obama delivered in Afghanistan last night. A year on from the death of Osama Bin Laden, and with the US elections fast approaching, here was the President reheating his existing timetable for withdrawal — and offering it up as reassurance for weary Afghans and Americans alike. There were some new
I doubt that many votes will be moved by the split report on hacking of the Culture, Media and Sport select committee. This is not a subject that sets the public’s pulse racing. But all this hacking talk does create political problems for David Cameron. First, it obscures his attempt to talk about other things
Lord knows Heathrow airport is usually a pretty hellish place even on its better days (another reason, incidentally, for starting again on the Thames Estuary and building houses for 150,000 people at Heathrow) but, at the risk of seeming simple this stramash over lengthy queues at LHR’s immigration seems laughably simple to resolve: deploy more
It has been a busy day for Commons committees, and I don’t just mean the education and media select committees either. The John Bercow-chaired House of Commons Commission has released a briefing note outlining some of its recent decisions relating to the running of the House. It covers three areas: ‘Mobile devices for members’ (aka,
Marine Le Pen didn’t achieve quite the shock result in this year’s French presidential election that some thought she might when a few polls showed her ahead of Nicolas Sarkozy. But, even though she didn’t make it through to this weekend’s run-off, the National Front candidate did win 17.9 per cent of the first round
Yep, they’re inescapable, those Lib Dems. Even when the airwaves are dominated by Rupert Murdoch and Tom Watson, they’re there in the background, quietly adding to the day’s pile of political news. We’ve got Ken Livingstone making a pitch for their votes in the London Mayor’s contest, for instance. And we’ve also got Nick Clegg
With apologies to the Beckett Estate… Two tramps appear on stage. They are dressed in white tie and tails and wearing top hats. Their clothes are dirty and shabby; their hats gleam. The stage is bare, apart from a mound of earth and a tree. Which appears to be dead. ACT ONE: David: [gloomy] It’s
The education select committee reported earlier, but it is the report of another select committee that will get all the attention today. The culture, media and sport select committee has just delivered its verdict on the phone hacking scandal, naming names and apportioning blame — or at least in theory it has. In practice, ‘its
And now — the rather wonderful story of the bacon bap which bit Barry Sheerman. The veteran Labour MP bought one at London Victoria station and he did not like it, he was sorely vexed. Using that conduit for the self-obsessed and insane, Twitter, he pronounced it the worst he had ever eaten. And he
From one great Texan to another: Amarillo Slim, giant of poker and peddler of western wisecracks, has died. Now that poker is a mainstream entertainment, you have to do some brain-cudgeling to recall the era when it seemed distant and exotic and even attractively seedy. All that has gone the way of all flesh now
Good teaching matters; that’s something we don’t need to be taught. But how much does it matter? What are its measurable benefits? Today’s education select committee report collects some striking, if pre-existing, research into just those very questions, and it is worth reading for that reason. There is, for example, the IPPR’s suggestion that ‘having
Over the weekend I had some interesting responses to my rather flippant tweet asking if there was a government minister not under pressure at the moment. The consensus seemed to be that William Hague was still looking pretty good, with Michael Gove a close second. No one mentioned Eric Pickles, but it was interesting to
With unionists getting grubbed in Scotland and Labour being driven to near-extinction in vast swathes of the south, a new map of political Britain is emerging. In my latest Telegraph column, I called it ‘Tricolour Britain’ — the SNP at the top, Tories at the bottom and Labour stuck in the middle (with Wales). Policy Exchange
As we enter the final stretch of the campaign for London Mayor, YouGov have a new poll putting Boris four points ahead of Ken. It’s a touch better for the blue team than the 2 point lead YouGov found last week, but not as comfortable as the 8- and 10-point leads shown by ComRes and
I don’t think I’ve ever seen David Cameron as angry as he was for that urgent question on Jeremy Hunt. He had clearly decided that attack was the best form of defence and went for his Labour critics in the most aggressive manner possible. But he did make one important concession in his opening answer
More ‘colourful language’ from Boris Johnson today. Interviewed by the BBC about his reported attempts to secure sponsorship from News International while they were being investigated for phone hacking, he dismissed the claims as ‘f***ing b****cks’. Here, courtesy of Political Scrapbook, is the (censored) video:
The leadership duo of Ed and Ed made an appearance this morning to rev up support for Labour ahead of this week’s elections. Today was all about appealing to those who have felt hard done by the government and want something different, whatever it may be. Miliband concentrated on setting out five ‘priorities’ for next