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At the end of the last Parliament, I was the only MP who had previously been in the Lobby – the elite cartel of political journalists, who rejoice in having a parliamentary pass (I was once the chief political correspondent of the Times). I used to be in the Press Gallery looking down at the
14 min listen
The Conservatives need to choose a new leader, but first they need to agree on the process… Easier said than done. Lucy Dunn talks to Fraser Nelson and Katy Balls about the latest on the upcoming leadership race: what will the race look like, who are the the runners and riders, and how do they
13 min listen
Keir Starmer is coming under pressure to commit to scrapping the two-child benefit cap, introduced in 2017 by the Conservatives. Plaid Cymru, the Greens, Nigel Farage, the SNP, and now some Labour backbenchers are all calling for its removal. Can Starmer hold the line? Elsewhere: in Wales, First Minister Vaughan Gething has resigned after four
As excitable new MPs are escorted around comfy offices in Portcullis House, we ‘departing members’, as we’re known, are guided around small, unglamorous rooms in Richmond House, the scruffier Westminster neighbour, to be told about the winding-up period. I’m the only Labour MP here. I hug one of my favourite Tories and swap loser anecdotes
38 min listen
On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: James Heale analyses the state of the Conservative leadership race (1:09); Svitlana Morenets reports from the site of the Kyiv children’s hospital bombed this week (5:56); Philip Hensher examines the ‘Cool Queer Life’ of Thom Gunn (12:13); Francis Beckett reviews ‘The Assault on the State’ arguing in favour of bureaucracy
59 min listen
Join Fraser Nelson, Katy Balls and Kate Andrews, along with special guest Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, for a live edition of Coffee House Shots recorded earlier this week. A week on from Sir Jacob losing his seat, he declares ‘I can speak freely now’. So, why does he think the Conservatives lost the election? The team
50 min listen
This week: Keir’s reformation. A week on from Labour’s victory in the UK general election, our cover piece looks ahead to the urgent issues facing Keir Starmer. If he acts fast, he can take advantage of having both a large majority and a unified party. The NHS, prisons, planning… the list goes on. But what
For years, there have been very few Sikhs – who make up around one per cent of the population of England and Wales – in the Commons. Labour’s landslide victory has changed that. Among the hundreds of new MPs are a dozen Sikh heritage MPs: more than there’s ever been in parliament’s history. There’s some
The Conservative party is in disarray. What the party does next matters for the whole of Britain and maybe even for all of liberal democracy. For the British centre-Right to follow its American and French counterparts into nativist populism would be a shift of global and historical significance. Such serious times call for serious people. So, naturally, David
Keir Starmer has finally filled the women and equalities brief in his government with Bridget Phillipson and Anneliese Dodds. Phillipson is the minister for women and equalities, along with her role as Secretary of State for Education. Dodds is minister of state for women and equalities, and has also been appointed a minister of state