James Forsyth reviews the week in politics When a party loses an election, recriminations follow. But when it wins, an argument that is often as vicious breaks out over why it triumphed. This debate matters because, as Winston Smith knew, he who controls the past controls the future. The Tory party is preparing for such
Over the Easter weekend I experienced something rare among columnists: asked for an opinion, I couldn’t think of one. I didn’t know what to think. Ghastly hiatus. Let’s hope this doesn’t happen again soon. Sky News telephoned. There were reports that the Conservative home affairs spokesman, Chris Grayling, had been ‘recorded’ (their word) expressing the
It is all very well saying Asia is replacing Europe as the prime creator of wealth, but is there any evidence that new superpowers like China and India will be able to supply the cultural magnificence which once accompanied European productivity? We take European art for granted. But its profusion and variety, and the thoroughness
Martin Vander Weyer’s Any Other Business Bob Diamond, the generously remunerated American president of Barclays, has been put through his paces so often in this column that we really ought to give him his own treadmill in the Any Other Business penthouse gym. But I make no apology for mentioning him again — and this
Curious choice of words Gordon Brown used to describe himself when firing the starting gun for the general election. ‘I come from an ordinary middle-class family,’ he said. Until recently, ‘ordinary’ was used by Labour politicians as a euphemism for ‘working class’ and was often a way of differentiating themselves from their Conservative opponents who
