All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
The political theatre of David Cameron’s trip to America will have Downing Street drooling. The PM is, today, not only going to become the first world leader to fly aboard Air Force One with Barack Obama, but then they’re also going to take in a game of basketball together. It’s a carefully calibrated blend of
When the Beecroft report’s recommendation of ‘Compensated No Fault Dismissal’ was first leaked back in October, Norman Lamb was one of the strongest Lib Dem voices to speak out against it, describing it as ‘madness’. Back then, he was Nick Clegg’s chief of staff. Now, thanks to Chris Huhne’s resignation and Ed Davey’s promotion, he’s
If you thought Winston Churchill wouldn’t be mentioned until the second sentence of today’s “Obama-Cameron” op-ed in the Washington Post then, by gum, you’re a mug. Of course the old boy makes it into the first line. What else would you expect from a puff piece published on DC’s leading propaganda page? But the White
I was in Washington at the time so did not see the Question Time episode Nick Cohen mentions in his latest post. Those tempted to grant Shirley Williams some kind of “National Treasure” status should be reminded of her appalling views on the alleged “insensitivity” of awarding a kinghthood to Salman Rushdie: Her bad luck,
I wrote about the great man here, but cricket-minded readers should also scamper to Cricinfo to read Ed Smith’s reflection on his former Kent team-mate. This is the telling passage: What a brilliant inversion of the usual myth told by professional sportsmen: that they had unexceptional talent and made it to the top only because
It’s the same for celebrities and policymakers: talking about marriage gets you headlines. Hence why the newspapers have concentrated on Iain DuncanSmith’s remarks today that ‘marriage should be supported and encouraged’ by the state. But there were two other parts of IDS’s speech — and the ‘social justice strategy’ document behind it — that I
Can actors at the National Theatre quote Christopher Hitchens’ destruction of Shirley Williams for her failure to defend freedom of speech against suicide murderers on Question Time, while all the time contorting themselves in athletic dance moves? My somewhat surprising answer is ‘yes they can’. The DV8 dance company’s Can We Talk About This?
Everyone knows about Mitt Romney’s Mormonism — and that his religion might freak voters out — but what about Rick Santorum’s connection to Opus Dei? Santorum is not, he says, a member of ‘the work’. But he is close to it. His parish in Virginia has Opus Dei links, and, as The New Republic reports:
Today’s Independent has an interesting demonstration of the insidious influence of lobbying. This is how it’s done, people: The independence of a Government adviser on red tape appointed by David Cameron has been called into question as details emerge of a possible covert attempt by the tobacco industry to undermine the proposed introduction of plain
Rory Stewart’s article on Afghanistan, published in yesterday’s Evening Standard, makes a succinct case for speeding up the west’s withdrawal from Helmand and the Hindu Kush. As he says, We are not obliged to stay till the last day. Did our mission go wrong because Nato had too few troops; or because it sent too
For years now, Afghanistan policy has been governed by a simple question: Do the unknown costs of leaving Afghanistan trump the known costs of staying in Afghanistan? Until now the answer, at least officially, has always been Yes. But this is not a static question. The known price of remaining in Afghanistan increases all the
Barack Obama’s re-election has been looking more and more likely in recent weeks. His approval rating has risen fairly steadily, economic forecasts have improved and he’s opened a nice lead in head-to-head polling against Mitt Romney, as the Republican primaries have taken their toll on his most likely opponent. But the latest polls show things
Nile Gardiner is always good for a laugh and his latest contribution to the Telegraph is no exception. Apparently David Cameron, visiting the US this week, will rue the day he “snubbed” American conservatives. It is a short-sighted approach with significant long-term risks. David Cameron’s visit to the United States this week is a lost opportunity.
The combination of the European Court of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights is, I predict, going to give David Cameron an increasing number of headaches in the coming months. As Fraser wrote yesterday, Michael Pinto-Duschinsky’s principled resignation from the coalition’s Commission on the British Bill of Rights has revealed that this
Following his arrest for attacking fellow MPs in the Strangers’ Bar of the House of Commons, Eric Joyce has resigned from the Labour Party and made a personal statement in the House this afternoon:
There are few sights more pitiful, more vexing or more predictable than the sight of teaching unions on the whinge. This time it is the EIS and the other unions representing teachers in Scotland. They are unhappy that the new Curriculum for Excellence – of which, for what little it may be worth I have,
You’d think the American sub-prime crisis would have taught politicians the world over not to try to rig the housing market. But no, David Cameron is back on it today — about how to ‘unblock’ the system so the debt geyser starts to gush again. ‘The problem today is that you have lenders who aren’t
It’s lasted a lot longer than I had thought, this coalition. I gave it a year, assuming that either the AV referendum would do for it entirely or the Lib Dems would tire of playing grown-ups and revert to type. There is certainly plenty of evidence of the latter. Almost every time Lynne Featherstone opens
…here are some posts made on Spectator.co.uk over the weekend: Fraser Nelson says it’s no surprise that Clegg brilliantly outmanoeuvred Cameron on the ECHR. James Forsyth reports on Tory irritation with Vince Cable, and says Nick Clegg’s conference speech was a preview of his 2015 election pitch. Peter Hoskin analyses three main areas of coalition
A week devoted to Mervyn King and his eight-year reign at the Bank of England sounds like pretty turgid stuff. But, already, the series that has started in the Times (£) this morning — building up to an interview with the man himself — is anything but. Here, for instance, is a snippet from one
After several months on the back foot, Boris looks ready to sink Ken’s campaign for good. The cries of hypocrisy have been growing louder and louder since the revelation that Ken has been filtering his six-figure income through a limited company to avoid thousands in tax. Ken has waited two weeks for the story to
If you ever needed reminding that government is a series of swings and roundabouts ensuring that what you gain on one you lose on the other, consider the coalition’s plans for something called the NewBuy Guarantee. This project is designed to assist househunters by providing 95% mortgages for houses costing as much as £500,000. The
News that Nick Clegg has brilliantly outmanoeuvred Cameron over the British Bill of Rights will come as no surprise to CoffeeHousers — we told you so last March. The panel was stuffed full of ECHR enthusiasts, balanced by Tories most of whose competence lay in other legal areas. Perhaps Michael Pinto-Duschinsky, the most clued-up of
Nick Clegg’s speech today was a preview of what the Liberal Democrat argument will be in 2015: coalitions work and we’re the ‘one nation’ party who will ensure that the government is fiscally credible but fair. This strategy is the leadership’s best hope for the next election. But it is reliant on coalition government being
Have you noticed, CoffeeHousers, that our politicians are talking more and more about what they’d do after the next election? This has been happening, really, since last November, when George Osborne extended the forecasting horizon of his Budget to 2017. That had a hint of chicanery about it, ensuring that Osborne continued to meet his
The motion passed by Liberal Democrat conference this morning means that the party is neither supporting nor opposing the Health Bill. The rebels having lost the vote on whether or not to debate their ‘Drop the Bill’ motion, but managed to amend the so-called Shirley Williams’ motion to remove the line calling on their peers
There is a certain poetry to the leaking of Vince Cable’s ‘vision thing’ memo and the departure from Downing Street of Steve Hilton, the very man who is supposed to have been providing the government’s vision all this time. Cable’s message to David Cameron and Nick Clegg was nothing if not forthright: ‘There is still
I’ve been to West Sussex a number of times and on each occasion have been struck by how stupid the local people are. I don’t mean this unkindly — it’s just how it is. Everywhere you go there are small puddles of drool where the local citizens have stood, wreathed in puzzlement over the simplest
Ever since Chris Huhne’s departure from government, Vince Cable has become a more and more aggressive coalition figure. His deliberately provocative interview with The Guardian in which this Keynesian, corporatist lambasts the idea that deregulation is key to growth as “ridiculous and bizarre” has drawn a heated Tory reaction. One source told me earlier that
Lib Dem Spring conference is turning out as the leadership would have wished. The support of Shirley Williams for the Health Bill seems to have been enough to reassure delegates that they should back the bill in its amended form; they’ve already voted to debate the leadership friendly motion tomorrow morning not the ‘Drop the
A military flavour this week, as Patrick Mercer, the Conservative MP for Newark, tells us what’s on his shelves — and on his mind. It should come as no surprise that a former colonel in the Worcester and Sherwood Foresters would rescue the regimental history from the burning British Library. He is also a historical
Recent reports have suggested that David Cameron is interested in swapping Cathy Ashton’s job as the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy for another commission post. But sources close to Number 10 tell me this ain’t happening. Supposedly, Cameron was interested in swapping Ashton’s current role for the post of commissioner for
JEET. That, according to Andrew Grice in the Independent, is the new ‘buzzword’ circling around Libdemville (population: 57 MPs, and a few others). And it stands for the issues that they want to keep mentioning whenever they can: jobs, education, environment and tax. Fair enough. Although it is striking that only one of these issues
Nick Clegg pushed his members to ‘stop lamenting what might have been and start celebrating what is’ in his rally speech to the Liberal Democrat spring conference. He told them ‘now is the time to move on, to stop justifying being in government and start advertising being in government’. The debate over the Health Bill,
