All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
“Don’t fall for it, Dave!” implores the front cover of this week’s The Spectator – together with a leader (precis here) urging him to form a minority government rather than enter any pact with the LibDems. It looks like he will not disappoint us. The Telegraph today discloses that: ‘Even if he fails to secure
This is, I’m afraid, a real question and one to which the answer would appear to be no. Today’s text comes courtesy of John Rentoul and his colleague at the Independent on Sunday, Jane Merrick. On the matter of voting reform here’s what David Cameron has to say: JM: Is it true you once said
Oh yes, the Tories are broadcasting more Ready For Government noises this morning. There’s an article in the Telegraph suggesting that David Cameron would choose a minority government ahead of coalition with the Lib Dems. And the Guardian reports that a Tory government would set out a bulkload of spendings cuts in the first six
I have had a number of shocked emails from old friends on the left following my previous post here, which many saw as an endorsement of the Liberal Democrats. In fact, I remain one of the great undecided. This weekend I witnessed some good comrades embracing the party of the workers. Nick Cohen devoted his
A telling passage from Nicholas Watt and Patrick Wintour’s campaign report this morning: “Gordon Brown visited 10 London constituencies [yesterday] eventually leaving a pub in Kilburn by a side door after it was besieged by Tory and Lib Dem activists. He is now running a campaign almost exclusively warning of Tory cuts, and claiming that
ICM for The Guardian and YouGov for the Sun tonight both point towards a hung parliament. ICM has the Tories on 33 down three from the last ICM poll, Labour down one to 28 and the Lib Dems up one to 28 and others up four to 12. YouGov puts the Tories on 34, the
Whatever one thinks of his polices, Nick Clegg has played his hand very well in this campaign. Few would have expected Clegg to make as much use of the leaders’ debates as he has. But now the debates are over, Clegg has to find another way of making an impact if his party is to
Yesterday’s attempted car-bombing in Times Square doesn’t really tell us anything beyond that there are sociapaths willing to blow people up, and that sometimes luck – rather than judgement – foils their bloody plans. But, given the Pakistani Taliban’s claim that they were responsible for the attempt, it does serve as a grim reminder of
For the past few years, the Tory task has been to look like a government-in-waiting. Now, with the election only a matter of days away, David Cameron has dialled that process up to eleven. In interviews with the Sunday Times and Andrew Marr today, the Tory leader concentrates firmly on the nuts and bolts of
Gordon Brown knows he is finished. My prediction is that he will not use his constitutional right to hang on if the Tories are the largest party in a hung parliament. OK, the Labour leader might try to stay in No 10 – for a second, maybe a minute, perhaps even an academic quarter, trying
Before the final leaders’ debate, the studio audience was kept entertained by the screening of an episode of Yes Minister. It was an appropriate choice given that an indecisive result will give the mandarins huge power as they advise the parties on how to make a deal and the palace on who to invite to
So, back to the Labour leadership with Patrick Hennessy’s snappy article on the subject for the Sunday Telegraph. The main sweep of Hennessy’s piece is that Brown is likely to step down quickly in the event of defeat; that Harriet Harman could well fill the caretaker leader role; and that certain Dark Forces are moving
We are, in all likelihood, only days away from a full-blown, out-in-the-open Labour leadership contest. In which case, the odds that Ladbrokes have just fired out are worth a passing glance. Underneath the news that the Tories are now odds-on to form a majority government, they’ve got this list: Next permanent Labour leader David Miliband
Two more polls have just come out, YouGov for the Sunday Times and BPIX for the Mail on Sunday. The two polls both point towards a hung parliament with the Tories as the largest party and both put the Lib Dems in second. YouGov have Tories 35, Lib Dems 28 and Labour 27 and BPIX
The ComRes poll tonight will also cheer the Tories. It has them with a lead of 10 points. The numbers are Tories 38, Labour 28 and the Lib Dems 25. The Tories are up two and the other two main parties are each down one. On a uniform national swing, this would leave the Tories
Even after the Gillian Duffy incident, tonight’s polls either point to a hung parliament or a gossamer Tory majority. So the prospect of a Con-LibDem alliance, being forged next weekend, remains all too real. In the leading article of this week’s Spectator, we urge Cameron to go it alone with a minority government – rather
An ICM poll of Labour Tory marginals for the News of the World has Cameron getting a majority, albeit one of four. (Although, the write-through saYS that the majority of four assumes that every Unionist MP returned from Ulster will back the Tories which is not a given). These marginals polls are expensive and so
The Sunday Telegraph’s ICM poll has the Tories up three to 36, Labour up one to 29 and the Lib Dems down three to 27. Paddy Hennessy reports that the paper calculates that this would translate to the Tories having 279 seats, Labour 261 and the Lib Dems 78. Nick Clegg has always said that
I wonder how those Labour Ministers who didn’t move against Gordon for ‘the good of the party’ during the various coups feel this morning. They made a calculation last June that if Brown had been toppled in what would have been seen as a Blairite coup it would have taken the party a generation to
The Guardian missed a trick today. It should have endorsed the Conservatives. As a regular reader of that great newspaper, I can diagnose the ailment: it is confusing intentions with outcomes. It wishes for a more progressive society, greater equality and the betterment of the most vulnerable. But it has not quite worked out that
There’s a strange fin de siècle air about Labour this weekend: a new appreciation that the forthcoming election marks either the end of their reign, or – at best – is the start of a different, diluted kind of power. There are still a few signs of life and struggle, sure. I mean, Gordon Brown’s
As a person rather than as a politician, I mean. David has already mentioned Clegg’s taste for Germanic* classical music and now there’s another reason to approve of him. He’s a Beckett fan. If he comes out for cricket and Wodehouse, his party can have my vote… Here he is on Sam: Every time I
Earlier today I took issue with John O’Sullivan’s take on this election but do not let it be said that his views are the only odd ones available at National Review. Here’s Dennis Boyles: I’m sure all good Tories wish Cameron well. But one could argue that a Cameron win might be the worst of
The election is six days away, Labour civil war is seven days away. And Alistair Darling has today delivered a rather nice put-down to Ed Balls for BBC Campaign Straight Talk. Here is his conversation earlier today with Andrew Neil: Andrew Neil: Has Mr Brown given you any indication that you’d stay as Chancellor if
I suspect that newspaper endorsements interest journalists and politicians a heck of a lot more than they do voters. But The Guardian backing the Lib Dems (albeit with a caveat about anti-Tory tactical voting in Labour-Tory marginals) does feel like a significant moment. In a way, the endorsement is not too surprising. Having called on
As so it has come to pass: even the Guardian has abandoned Labour and endorsed the Liberal Democrats. I expect the Independent will do the same and that the Mirror may be the only (London) blatt to support Gordon Brown. Meanwhile and for the first time since 1992 the Times is backing the Tories. Perhaps
Compass, a pressure group on the left of the Labour party, has today endorsed tactical voting after its members backed it overwhelmingly in a poll. The Compass endorsement of tactical vote fits with a pattern where Labour supporters in Lib Dem Tory seats will vote for the Lib Dems to try and keep the Tories
It has been a busy week at Spectator Live, where Gaby Hinsliff has argued that Gordon Brown looks too knackered to carry on and Jo-Anne Nadler interviews William Hague, who wants to be Foreign Secretary. Here is what Spectator.co.uk made of the final televised debate; Fraser Nelson says that Cameron shone, Clegg wobbled and Brown
Today’s Express is reporting that David Cameron has said it would be wrong to set an ‘artificial deadline’ for withdrawal of British troops from Afghanistan, but that he hoped troops would come home during the course of the next Parliament. In many ways this is smart politics. Given that President Obama has said that
Word reaches me of another Brown live mic incident, breaking now. Our Dear Leader has just been at Blidworth Oaks Primary School in Mansfield, talking to eight year olds about NICE and drug rationing – boring the bejesus out of them. The teacher, sensing impending classroom unrest, tried to shut Brown up by thanking him
In the midst of a piece asking where disillusioned Labour supporters will go – apparently UKIP will be a beneficiary – John O’Sullivan writes: That said, the main underlying truth of this campaign — freshened up by this latest development — is that the Tories ought to be winning easily and by a landslide. That
A noteworthy set of observations from Iain Martin over at the Wall Street Journal: “The Labour family is starting to realise that if it is out of power it would need a caretaker leader in place quickly so that it can regroup, rethink and then work out which of the competing contenders has the best
Last October I suggested that if Labour wanted to find a caretaker leader they could do much worse than appoint Alistair Darling to the job. Granted, there were a couple of difficulties with this notion: Darling is Scottish and there is no party of Darling or interest that will swing behind him. Well he can’t
My gosh, these latest Labour posters are open for all kinds of spoofery. But at least they’re positive and colouful – unlike Gordon Brown’s performance in the TV debate last night. Which, really, highlights Labour’s fundamental problem during this campaign. The big set-piece events have been almost relentlessly negative, whilst they’ve left what passes for