All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
Regular posting to return later today. Meanwhile I was a guest on the latest House of Comments podcast hosted by Mark Thompson and Stuart Sharpe. Labour List’s Alex Smith and I chatted about the Chancellor’s debate, Tony Blair’s (brief) return to Britain, lessons that might or might not be learnt from the Obama campaign and
Welcome to the latest CoffeeHousers’ Wall. For those who haven’t come across the Wall before, it’s a post we put up each Monday, on which – providing your writing isn’t libellous, crammed with swearing, or offensive to common decency – you’ll be able to say whatever you like in the comments section. There is no
A few more points about the PCC adjudication; apologies if you’re getting bored. The first is indisputable: if I had blogged on a website of my own, rather than here, then they would have not got involved. So the upshot is that blogs associated with newspapers will end up not being like blogs at all
Gordon Brown has walked straight into George Osborne’s trap. After bleating that the national insurance tax cut is unaffordable, he has decided to make this a massive election dividing line – claiming that this teeny (1 percent of state spending) tax cut somehow poses a mortal danger to an economic recovery. Please, God, let him
There was a time when Peter Mandelson would let out a few notes and the media would dance to his tune. But this weekend there’s been a Mandelson interview in The Times, a Mandelson interview in The Sunday Times, a Mandelson appearance on Sky News and an Obama campaign-style memo from Mandelson and none have
In lighter moments, Gordon Brown is alleged to imagine that he is John Major and David Cameron is Neil Kinnock. Now, I think the Tories will win outright, but would Cameron resign if Brown’s daydreams became reality? ‘No,’ Cameron tells the Mail on Sunday. Despite the bravado, Cameron must fear a challenge hot on the
Last week, the Tories strengthened their tax-cutting credentials with a smart policy on national insurance. I’m sure you didn’t miss it. But one part of the recent Tory resurgence is, to my mind, being underplayed: they now have a much stronger message on government waste. After all, the NI policy is being funded by cutting
I recently sat down with a European foreign minister to discuss the EU’s enlargement strategy and how it would deal with those applicant countries, like in the Western Balkans, who want to join the Union but whose chances of integration in the next ten years or so are limited. We tried to write down those
With the Tories back up to a ten-point lead in the YouGov/Sunday Times poll, it seems that – as James put it yesterday – the ‘big mo’ is with them. David Cameron is about to survive his third political near-death experience: the first being his leadership campaign and the second the election-that-never-was in 2007. This
The Sunday Times has a story today that gives you a sense of the personal animosities bubbling just below the surface of Labour’s election campaign: “The Sunday Times has learnt that Charlie Whelan, the political director of Unite, the super-union, has been barred from entering Labour headquarters during the campaign. Mandelson is understood to have
The sense that things are moving the Tories way will be further bolstered by YouGov for the Sunday Times which has the Tories ahead by ten points, 39 to 29. As Conservative Home points out, this is the first time this year that Labour have been below 30 with YouGov. It is also the biggest
Euroscepticism is David Cameron and Gene Hunt’s sole shared attribute. But, bequeathed a poisoned chalice at home, the EU is not a future Tory government’s immediate priority. Set-piece battles over rebates, defence procurement and the CAP can be avoided for a time, but skirmishes will be a regular occurrence. And some of these will be bloodbaths. The first
In a campaign, momentum matters. It is, for good or ill, the prism through which the media report things. Reading the papers and listening to the news this weekend, it is evident that it is the Tories who have it. Just contrast, the way in which the Osborne and Mandelson interviews are written up in
There’s a revolt growing in the Surrey East Conservative Association about the candidate imposed upon them by David Cameron – a black businessman called Sam Gyimah. Some locals insist that Sam’s business ventures have been rather, you know, iffy and they were not terribly happy to have “selected” him from a shortlist which contained no
Speaking in a Good Friday homily, with the Pope listening, the Pontiff’s personal preacher, Fr Raniero Cantalamessa, likened the drive by the victims of abuse to seek justice from the Vatican, whose priests committed the sexual crimes, with the persecution of Jews. Victims’ groups and Jewish organisations have said it was inappropriate to liken the
There’s me thinking that Labour wouldn’t go negative with their latest poster, created via an online competition among their supporters. I mean, surely they wouldn’t want to undermine their whizzy, positive, digital energy by picking a design which didn’t present an equally positive Labour vision. But, oh, how they did. Here’s the winning design: Now,
David Cameron said as much in his Today Programme interview, but now we know for sure: we’ve heard everything we’re going to about Tory spending cuts this year. George Osborne confirms the news in an interview with the Guardian today: “In the interview, the shadow chancellor also disclosed, for the first time, that he would
Earlier this week, Coffee House pointed out that the Labour Party National Executive Committee’s decision to exclude local candidates from the Stoke Central candidate short-list might cause trouble. And, lo, trouble it has caused. Similarly unimpressed by the state of Labour democracy, Stoke Labour member Gary Elsby has decided to stand independently and passionately annouced
A few days after President Barack Obama flew to Kabul to look Hamid Karzai in the eye and demand that he combat corruption, drugs, crime and the influence of notorious warlords in his government, President Karzai has blamed foreigners, including UN and EU officials, for “very widespread” fraud during presidential and provincial elections last year.
Did you like the Guardian’s April Fool spoof of the latest Gordon Brown campaign, which featured the Prime Minister trading on his reputation for being a bully? It was quite funny, but I don’t suppose many people were taken in – which is, after all, the point of the April Fool spoof, to take people
Here are some of the posts made on Spectator.co.uk over the past week: Fraser Nelson says the joke’s on Gordon Brown, and explains why Tony Blair’s return is good news for the Tories. James Forsyth thinks the Tories have a clear message on taxation, and watches the Tory campaign sharpen up. Peter Hoskin admires David
The power of ideas is vastly underrated in British politics. It has become fashionable to dismiss them as “ideology” and declare oneself in favour of “what works”. But the idea of what works is, of course, driven by concepts. As Keynes put it: “Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual
It might be Good Friday, but with the election only a little more than a month away politics is continuing pretty much as normal. This morning, we’ve already had more business leaders coming out in support of the Tory position on National Insurance, a combative Bob Crow demanding that John Humphrys apologise for using the
Oh dear. Today’s frontpages form the most eclectic set of damaging headlines for Labour for quite some time. On the front of the Mail and the Times: allegations that the government – specifically, Ed Balls – “interfered” with a report on the Baby P tragedy. On the Independent: a claim that Brown “misled” the public
This is obviously John Rentoul bait but, though one loves the eccentricities of the House of Lords, it remains the case that the US House of Representatives can bring the crazy like no other legislature on earth. Behold, people, Representative Hank Johnson (D) whom the good people of Georgia’s Fourth Congressional District have seen fit
It took a while, but I spotted Labour’s April Fool trick: an attack document on the Tory economic agenda. It looks real at first, but when you go through it the con becomes transparent. APRIL FOOL ONE: “The Conservative Party wants to face two ways at this election, promising extra tax cuts and spending commitments
A new ICM poll for the Guardian has the Tory lead at nine points, 38 to 29. However, both main parties have fallen back since the last ICM poll which had the Tories on 39 and Labour on 31. This new ICM poll has the Lib Dems on 23, up four since the last ICM
Despite what the headline might make you think, this item is not an April Fool. In a web chat with Saga magazine, Brown said: “We made it possible for people to transfer their allowances so…between husband and wife…and that means widows for example can have the full benefit of the husband’s previous allowance, and that
Michael Crick reports that the Sunday Mirror will splash the news that 100 members of the Surrey East Tory association have signed a petition to urge David Cameron to de-select Sam Gyimah. The original selection process was controversial – members complained that the shortlist excluded straight white men. That dissent has never subsided. On Tuesday,
Commuters won’t be alone in celebrating tonight. The High Court’s award of an injunction against the RMT’s planned Strike Action will have champagne corks popping in Downing Street. The Union movement’s sudden renaissance is both embarrassing and dangerous for the government. First, it has shifted the election spotlight back onto Labour. Before the BA strike,
Meanwhile, can there be any doubt that the House of Lords remains, despite everything, the finest legislative body in the world? The people who want to put us through yet more elections must be stopped, if only because stuffing the place with more “real” politicians might deprive us of splendid discussions such as this recent
As declaration day (the rather pompus name that news organisations have come up with for the moment when Gordon Brown actually calls the election) draws nearer, the Tory campaign is sharpening up. This morning’s operation on National Insurance was impressive, enabling the party to get a second set of headlines out of its plan to
Sorry for the unscheduled absence: there’s been no electricity in these parts for the past 36 hours thanks to, one supposes, a combination of snow, gales and lord knows what else. And no electricity means no internet which means it’s like living in the Dark Ages or something. Such are the perils of life in
Most press releases don’t really catch the eye. But when one hits your inbox from The Department of Government Waste, you can’t help but take notice. In it, the Secretary of State for Government Waste, Robin Ewe (geddit?), celebrates 13 years of “waste-maximisation,” and there are links to a departmental website, complete with reports and