All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was photographed on his flight to the US earlier this week next to a hat bearing the slogan ‘total victory.’ Those two words somewhat obscure reality: Israel is yet to fully outline what would constitute victory in the currently three-front war (against Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the
Elon Musk is the richest person in the world but it’s clear that money can’t always buy happiness. The X/ Twitter owner spoke movingly of his family, in particular his eldest surviving child, during an emotional interview with Jordan Peterson. ‘My son Xavier is dead, killed by the woke mind virus’, the father-of-12 lamented. ‘The
Nobody said much about it before the election, but the new government inherits a ghastly financial problem with the higher education system. Rising costs, stagnant tuition fees, and a big drop in foreign student enrolments have left several universities tottering like ivory Jenga towers. We probably have too many universities This week we got an inkling of
James Cleverly has become the first candidate to declare in the Conservative leadership contest. Announcing the news tonight in an op-ed for the Telegraph, the shadow home secretary made the pitch that he ‘can unite the Conservatives and overturn Starmer’s loveless landslide’. He says: We need to rediscover confidence that our core values are shared
In the end, the great two-child benefit cap revolt proved to be somewhat underwhelming. The measure was always likely to fail given Labour’s mammoth majority of 172, with the government winning the vote by 363 votes to 103. Only seven of Keir Starmer’s MPs defied the entreaties of the Labour whips to vote in favour
It’s a red letter day for Nigel Farage. The former Ukip leader entered parliament this month at the eighth attempt of trying and today delivered his maiden speech to fellow MPs. In an address that mixed wit and wisdom, Farage observed the custom of paying tribute to a member’s predecessor by saying of Giles Watling
To the House of Commons, where today Reform’s Nigel Farage made his maiden speech after returning from Milwaukee’s RNC. Attempting a number of times to gain access to the Commons, Farage was successful on his eighth shot this election – and this afternoon’s speech shows he’s wasting no time getting down to business. In his
We know that the NHS is broken: Wes Streeting announced that it was now the official policy of this government when he entered the Department of Health and Social Care. Today he had a chance to elaborate on just what exactly he thought was broken – and of course to point the finger at who
Back to the BBC, which these days is better at being in the news than making it. The six-figure salary list for 2023-24 has been published and with it come some quite interesting revelations. Top earner Gary Lineker received £1.35 million, while Radio 2 presenter Zoe Ball isn’t too far behind on £950,000. Big names
After President Biden announced he would be standing down on Sunday evening, it’s been all go in the White House. But while speculation about the next Democrat nominee continues, there is a separate side plot that Mr S is rather interested in – involving Biden’s son. Robert Hunter Biden has spent a fair amount of
Joe Biden did the honourable thing. It took dire polls and home truths from donors and allies, but the President finally admitted that his political race is over. Biden was trailing Donald Trump in the swing states – in some cases with a wide margin – and was showing little sign of being able to
Seven Labour MPs had the whip suspended after voting against the two-child benefit cap, but this is a small taste of what awaits Labour. In her first major, Liz Kendall has set herself a target of hitting an 80 per cent employment rate – bolder than anything the Tories ever shot for. It is higher
Liz Kendall wants Britain to get back to work. The Work and Pensions Secretary has unveiled a target for the country to reach an 80 per cent employment rate. But hold on: that ‘ambition’, as the government is calling it, is completely unrealistic. Labour’s plan to reverse the dire labour market and drive up Britain’s employment
Remember that $230 million ‘humanitarian pier’ that the Americans moored off the coast of Gaza? It was announced with great fanfare in Joe Biden’s State of the Union address in March. But earlier this month, the White House quietly mothballed the project. It had not been built to withstand inclement weather, you see, so sections
Three weeks into the new Labour government and it is already becoming clear where some of its weaknesses lie – none more so than Ed Miliband’s promise to decarbonise the electricity grid, save consumers money and boost the economy with many thousands of ‘well-paid green jobs’. Today the Royal Academy of Engineering weighs in with
Another day, another drama – only this time it’s not MPs in the spotlight. Now politician-turned-pundit Nadine Dorries has taken aim at journalist Emily Maitlis and her ‘cosy “centrist” podcast’ The News Agents. In a scathing attack laid out in the fine pages of the Daily Mail, Dorries slams Maitlis’s ‘neurotic’ perspective of politics, her obsession
To Scotland, where First Minister John Swinney appears to be trying to make a career for himself as a spin doctor. The leader of the Nats has a new tactic to win back support for his beleaguered party – convince voters that, contrary to their daily experiences, his party has actually been, er, ‘formidable’ over
Labour isn’t typically known for offering a more hawkish foreign policy platform than the Conservatives, but at the last election there was an exception: Iran. Yvette Cooper and David Lammy have spoken in strong terms about toughening up Britain’s approach to Iran George Robertson, the former defence secretary and Nato secretary general leading the government’s
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At last there is white smoke in the negotiations over the rules for the Tory leadership contest. On Monday, the 1922 committee met and agreed a timetable for the contest to succeed Rishi Sunak as Conservative party leader. The plan is for a new leader to be unveiled 2 November with eligible candidates to throw
During the election campaign, Chancellor Rachel Reeves made bold promises – no increases to Income Tax, National Insurance, or VAT. She also sought to echo the ‘prudence’ mantra of her predecessor as chancellor Gordon Brown, though his tenure was marked by significant spending increases rather than prudent restraint. True to form, over the weekend Reeves
In the two days since Joe Biden dropped his re-election bid and endorsed vice president Kamala Harris as the Democratic party nominee, much attention has been devoted to the mechanics of Biden’s decision, which close advisers or family members may have convinced him to pull out and how the entire episode will shake up the
The Harehills riots and disorder, which started last Thursday in Leeds after social services removed several children from a Romani family, is a fine example of people projecting their biases onto complex social events. We are more likely to find the roots of the Harehills disorders in the politics of Central Europe than on the
It’s Kamala. The result of the last 48 hours, capping off one of the most eventful weeks in American political history, has been to all but confirm Kamala Harris will be the Democratic nominee for president this November. More than half the delegates at the upcoming DNC in Chicago have pledged their support to her,
Ukraine’s cultural autonomy is again under assault by Russia. Vladimir Putin appears to believe that ‘Ukraine and Ukrainian culture independent of “Mother Russia” do not exist’. Travel to the Royal Academy of Arts on Piccadilly, to see the untruth of that statement. The exhibition, In the Eye of the Storm: Modernism in Ukraine, 1900 –
French voters are looking on aghast at the state of their country’s democracy. Faced with stalemate in the French National Assembly since the 7 July elections, acute frustration is building among left and right wing députés. They fear that the election is being stolen from them by the scheming of president Emmanuel Macron’s much depleted centrist bloc.
At last there is white smoke in the negotiations over the rules for the Tory leadership contest. On Monday, the 1922 committee met and agreed a timetable for the contest to succeed Rishi Sunak as Conservative party leader. The plan is for a new leader to be unveiled 2 November with eligible candidates to throw
Kamala Harris just delivered her first public remarks since the Democratic ticket fell apart over the weekend. But this was not the moment to address the mess, or indeed her own candidacy for president – two subjects she avoided. Filling in for Joe Biden at a ceremony honouring the National Collegiate Athletic Association championship teams,
Labour are now making daily pronouncements on the latest policy area where the last government left things in a worse state than it let on. The latest is immigration. Yvette Cooper came to the Commons this afternoon to make a statement on border security. Even though she is now the Home Secretary, she sounded strikingly
In dodging calls from his party to remove the two-child cap, Sir Keir Starmer is making one of his first noteworthy mistakes as Prime Minister. Both John McDonnell, the far-left former shadow chancellor, and Anas Sarwar, the soft-left Scottish Labour leader, have called for the Coalition-era policy to go. The cap limits the payment of
The Democratic party’s new presumptive nominee for president, vice president Kamala Harris, told the nation she was ‘deeply grateful’ for president Joe Biden in her first remarks since he announced his decision yesterday not to stand for reelection and to endorse her in the 2024 presidential election. ‘Joe Biden’s legacy of accomplishment over the past
Dear oh dear. With all that’s happening in the US Democratic party just now, one might have thought it would be near enough impossible for politicians elsewhere to catch the eye of the media. Well, fascinatingly, the Green party has defied all odds. The eco-zealots have found themselves in the spotlight this afternoon after a
If you wanted an idea of where the noisiest opposition to Keir Starmer’s government will come, the list of amendments to the King’s Speech is pretty handy. As I reported last week, there are a lot of amendments on the two-child benefit cap from different groups. The Greens have got one, independent MP Shockat Adam
To Scotland, where the SNP infighting continues. After dozens of nationalist MPs were ditched this month by the electorate, some are already channelling their disappointment at MSP colleagues. It transpires that ex-MP Mhairi Black – who herself announced she was stepping down at this election due to Westminster’s ‘toxic’ culture – has taken aim at