All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
The fallout from the return of the Safety of Rwanda Bill has begun – before a single vote has been cast. Lee Anderson has handed in his resignation as deputy chairman of the Conservative party, alongside his fellow deputy Brendan Clarke-Smith. The two red wall MPs, who won their seats in the 2019 election, had
Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith have just resigned as deputy party chairmen over the government’s Rwanda Bill. Below is their joint resignation letter, in full: Dear Prime Minister, We have already had two pieces of legislation thwarted by a system that does not work in favour of the British people When we were elected in
No. 10’s latest effort to convince Tory rebels to vote for its Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill has collided with that regular ministerial inconvenience, the independence of the judiciary. According to a report in Tuesday’s Times, ministers plan ‘to move 150 judges from the first-tier tribunal to the upper tribunal, the body that
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Freddy Gray speaks to Republican strategist Luke Thompson about Trump’s landslide Iowa win; how much Trump’s legal proceedings will interfere with his campaign and who could be his deputy. The Spectator is hiring! We are looking for a new producer to join our broadcast team working across our suite of podcasts – including this one
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With the Tories reeling from yesterday’s poll in the Telegraph, it is interesting that the party’s official election strategist Isaac Levido was already scheduled to address Tory MPs last night. Levido ran the 2019 election campaign and holds clout with Conservative MPs. What did he have to say? Is the Tory strategy evolving? Also on the
Should it really be any surprise that not all teenagers are on the same page as Greta Thunberg? According to a poll by Survation, 31 per cent of Britons between the ages of 13 and 17 agree with the statement ‘climate change and its effects are being purposefully overexaggerated.’ It does rather restore faith in
Bumping up politicians’ pay seldom goes down well, especially in times of economic hardship. But the news that members of the Scottish parliament are to receive a 6.7 per cent salary hike will not be greeted with much enthusiasm among taxpayers north of the border. The rise takes the annual pay of all 129 MSPs
Over the past few days it has become clear that Donald Trump’s return to the US presidency has gone from being an outlier to an increasing likelihood. His landslide in the Iowa caucus yesterday only confirms this further. As the first term of Joe Biden’s presidency comes to a close, one of his achievements is no
Along with the Oxford University Press Word of the Year – usually something you’d never say yourself – and the Pantone Colour of the Year (seriously, has anyone ever asked for a revolting shade called Peach Fuzz?) there is rather an interesting index of our annual concerns: the Children’s Word of the Year. The exercise
New Zealand has just lost one of its most stylish politicians after shoplifting allegations were made against her by two of the country’s high-end fashion stores. The Iranian-born Golriz Ghahraman, who had just begun her third term as a high-profile Green party MP, today announced she will be standing down from parliament with immediate effect.
Jose Mourinho, who has just been sacked by the Italian club AS Roma, is a once great manager on his last legs. The football his teams play is terrible, the results so-so, and his increasingly erratic behaviour on the touchline altogether disgraceful. Mourinho has gone from fighting for league titles and Champions Leagues to waging war
The Iowa contest tends not to select the Republican nominee. In 2016 Texas Senator Ted Cruz denied Donald Trump his first win by taking home the caucus prize with 28 per cent of the vote. In 2012, Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum just edged out eventual nominee Mitt Romney. In 2008, presidential nominee John McCain didn’t
The next twelve months will be dominated by elections, with polls expected in at least 64 countries. Of these, there are only a few that really matter in geopolitical terms. The US elections of course, especially if won by an isolationist Donald Trump (assuming he is allowed to run). India’s parliamentary elections in April will
The Rwanda Bill today returns to the House of Commons for two days of debate prior to Third Reading tomorrow night. Rishi Sunak’s flagship legislation is now at committee stage – which means that any MP can lay down amendments. Those from Labour and the SNP are unlikely to trouble the government much, given it
Vivek Ramaswamy, the impressive podcast guest who has spent the last few months pretending to be a serious Republican presidential candidate, has just suspended his campaign after winning eight per cent of the vote in the Iowa caucuses. ‘This entire campaign is about speaking the TRUTH,’ he said. ‘We did not achieve our goal tonight.’
The jobs market has turned a corner. Vacancies have fallen again to 934,000, down 49,000 in the last three months of the year, the longest continuous fall on record. Wage growth slowed to 6.5 per cent in cash terms – which will please the Bank of England – but luckily for workers inflation is falling
According to the polls, the Conservative party are heading for a landslide defeat at the next election. The Daily Telegraph this week published a mammoth YouGov survey of 14,000 people which forecasts that the Tories will retain just 169 seats, while Labour will sweep to power with 385 – giving Sir Keir Starmer a 120-seat majority. This
Until now, the person who won the Iowa caucus by the largest margin was Bob Dole back in 1988 – by 12 points. A ray of hope that the Nikki Haley contingent and the Ron DeSantis faction harboured was that even though Trump was likely to win, perhaps he wouldn’t win convincingly. An achievement they understood — history
Nadia Whittome, no longer Britain’s youngest MP but still quite possibly its daftest, has a new bee in her bonnet. Writing on Nottingham’s funkiest website LeftLion, she reveals that she has teamed up with campaign group Art Not Evidence and plans to bring a bill before parliament about rap lyrics (particularly the bleak subgenres of
Labour’s latest proposal for teachers to supervise pupils’ toothbrushing reveals a worrying view of parenting as playing a light-touch, rather than hands-on, role in a child’s upbringing. Only a week ago, the thoroughly sensible and appealing shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson MP delivered a speech that emphasised the need ‘for a two-way street’ in education:
Ecuador was once spared the worst of the narco-warfare and insurgencies that have plagued Latin America. No longer. The storming last week of a TV station in Guayaquil by gun-brandishing thugs showed how no one, and nowhere, is safe from the narco gangs who rule the streets. The latest chaos was unleashed after a major
Tory MPs start the week fretting about their seats after the Telegraph published an MRP poll suggesting Keir Starmer would win a majority of 120 if an election were held tomorrow. So, it was a case of interesting timing that the party’s official election strategist Isaac Levido was already scheduled to address Tory MPs on
Rishi Sunak has updated MPs on the strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen, just as a missile reportedly from the rebel group hit a US-owned cargo ship. The Prime Minister told the Commons that he had come to tell members at the first opportunity and that the action taken by the US and UK on
A tough week for Rishi Sunak just got even more difficult. For Lee Anderson, his own deputy party chairman, has tonight gone public to confirm that he will be voting for the rebel amendments on the Safety of Rwanda Bill on Tuesday. The red wall rottweiler took to Twitter/X after 24 hours of speculation about
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Polling published in the Telegraph has ruffled more than a few feathers in Westminster today. The YouGov survey shows that the Tories are on course to lose half of their MPs – including eleven members of the cabinet – at the next election. Are the Tories heading for another 1997 moment? What should we read into the
One of the world’s most powerful men was trapped in a central London basement this morning. Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, had come down to the lower ground floor of Chatham House to talk to the former chief mandarin of the Foreign Office about artificial intelligence. He had precisely 40 minutes, our host said,
Why are the French so bad at learning foreign languages? Yes, you read that right. This isn’t a lament as to how the British are so terrible at learning foreign languages, a theme so beloved by stand-up comedians, who insinuate that it reflects our outdated superiority complex and ingrained xenophobia. I meant the French. For
This is Sir Ed Davey’s worst week in politics since last week – and it’s still only Monday. The Liberal Democrat leader is enduring a torrid time at present, amid continuing questions about his handling of the Horizon scandal when he was the postal affairs minister. This morning, the Daily Mail went heavy on profiling
After months of steadily climbing in the polls, could this be the moment the bubble bursts for the right-wing party, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD)? Over the weekend, tens of thousands of people gathered in cities across the country to protest against the party and its ideology. Over 25,000 people congregated by the Brandenburg gate in
There must be a slight flaw in the IMF’s crystal ball, causing the future prospects for the German economy to be refracted onto Britain. Remember a year ago when the IMF confidently predicted that the UK economy would suffer the worst performance of any major industrial nation and contract by 0.6 per cent in 2023,
Amidst the endless controversy that surrounds Harry and Meghan, there was at least one topic that seemed to be innocuous enough: the Christian name that they chose to give their now 2-year old daughter. She was named Lilibet, a reference to the childhood nickname Elizabeth II was given by her father George VI. The choice
Grant Shapps this morning made his first major speech as Defence Secretary, in the wake of the US/UK airstrikes on Friday against the Houthis in Yemen. The headline announcement at Lancaster House was confirmation that the UK will send 20,000 troops to join one of Nato’s largest military drills since the Cold War, from Eastern
Has Keir Starmer got himself into yet another pickle about what he really thinks? The Labour leader and his frontbenchers are having to defend a leadership contest pledge he made that he now appears to have junked. They’re obviously used to this, but the latest pledge is on whether parliament should get a vote before