Ed miliband

The Budget has, in recent years, been more tears than laughter, more pain than gain. Yet the upturn in Britain’s economic fortunes has put the Chancellor, whose ‘5 and 2’ diet has had a dramatic effect on his waistline, in a buoyant mood. Osborne’s wit – famously sharp in private – shone through in public this afternoon. He began slowly, by teasing Ed Balls. He reminded the chamber of Labour’s dire financial record, which elicited his first laugh: ‘Or, as the Shadow Chancellor put it: “some mistakes were made”.’ Boom-tish. The gag about the slow pace of construction at Ebbsfleet was a groaner (‘more ebb than fleet’); but things looked

Just occasionally in politics, the mask slips and political parties reveal what they really are – rather than what they would like us to believe they are. Today in Edinburgh we experienced one of those moments. Johann Lamont, the Scottish Labour Leader, unveiled her plans for ‘devo plus’ for Scotland – if Scots vote No in September. We expected something technical focusing on the new powers the Scottish Parliament would be gifted by a Labour government at Westminster. Instead, we got something fundamentally red in tooth and claw. Indeed, Lamont could not have taken a harder socialist approach had she grabbed a red flag and waved it from the rooftop

Both coalition parties remain scarred by the political potency of Ed Miliband’s pledge to freeze energy prices. They are determined to do what they can to stop this issue gaining salience again. So, it is telling that Ed Davey and Michael Fallon have both personally signed up to The Big Deal, a new initiative designed to gets consumers cheaper energy bills through bulk buying. Their decision to sign up shows how it is politically imperative to be seen as on the side of the customer rather than the producer when it comes to energy. (It is also testament to how well connected the campaign is in Westminster.) No politician wants

There’s been much hullaballoo this afternoon over a Populus poll that shows a Labour lead of one point. The usual caveats apply (it’s just one poll!); but, nevertheless, this sample adds to the sense that Ed Miliband is in difficulty. There is, incidentally, only 419 days to go until election day. If the Populus poll was disappointing, then this projection compiled by Stephen Fisher of Oxford University could have Miliband reaching for the scotch: ‘Forecast Election Day Seats: Con : 307 Lab : 285 LD  : 31 Con largest party, but short of a majority by 19’ A dismal prospect for Labour; but there are also worries for the Tories because they are

‘You only offer a referendum if you want to ratify your existing policy,’ a Tory veteran told me this morning while discussing Ed Miliband’s recent referendum announcement. The Tory illustrated his point with reference to the Major government’s row over a proposed referendum on the single currency. He said that the pro-European side of the argument ran from a referendum, fearing that the public would say ‘no’ to EMU. His logic was: there isn’t time to change minds during a referendum campaign, so the public backs the status quo. Leaving aside the matter of whether or not this old Tory’s interpretation of those historical events is correct, his logic suggests that Miliband

The Tories have been hoping that their pledge for a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU would split Labour – it was the rationale behind John Baron’s regular pushes for legislation in this parliament for a referendum in the next, which David Cameron eventually satisfied as far as he could with the Wharton Bill. But so far the only dissenting voices on Ed Miliband’s pledge today for an ‘unlikely’ referendum have been the usual suspects on the backbenches such as Graham Stringer and John Mann. That’s hardly a ‘furious backlash’ and more expected and manageable rage – at present, anyway. It will be interesting to see whether there are

Why is Ed Miliband going to rule out a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU in a speech tomorrow? The Labour leader has written in the FT that he would legislate for a new referendum lock which would force an In/Out referendum if there was another transfer of British power to Brussels, which essentially means he supports the current situation under the Coalition. And he says in the piece that the transfer is unlikely in the next Parliament. Which means no referendum. He writes that Labour’s position on Europe… “… is clear and principled: we strongly believe Britain’s future is in the EU. And my priorities for government after

Labour says it is tough on welfare policy. And today, the party launched its tough compulsory jobs guarantee funding pledge by looking tough too. Ed Balls, Ed Miliband and Rachel Reeves would have made a stronger Mr Steerpike quail in these hard-hitting outfits.

Haters of HS2 rejoice: the project has an even better chance of failing now. Following James’ revelation that the Transport Secretary doesn’t believe the Hybrid Bill will pass through Parliament before the next election, there are several scenarios on how the parties may change their stance on the project. If a cross-party consensus falls apart, HS2 will run into severe difficulties. Nearly all of the possibilities pose a threat to the line actually being built: 1. David Cameron remains Prime Minister James played out this scenario in his blog yesterday, explaining why it matters that HS2 will be a big issue at the next general election. HS2 has always been a difficult sell to Tory

In an interview with The Spectator this week, the Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin admits that HS2 will not have been approved by parliament before the next election. This invites the question, will HS2 become an election issue? Both Ed Balls and Andy Burnham have made forays against HS2 in recent months. But both have been slapped down by Ed Miliband’s office. His allies believe that Labour can’t run on a platform of rebuilding Britain while simultaneously promising to put a stop to the biggest infrastructure project in decades. But one wonders if this Labour position will hold. The Tory election campaign will claim repeatedly that Labour’s sums don’t add up,

We all know what’s wrong with ya-boo politics. Today we saw what’s right with it. Instead of the usual shouting match we had a calm, well-mannered, (and deadly dull,) debate. Miliband devoted all six questions to Ukraine. The party leaders tried to outdo each other in self-importance, bombast and name-dropping. ‘High sentence’ was very much the style. In Miliband’s estimation we face, ‘the biggest crisis on this continent since Kosovo.’ So for him the tangled history of Europe reaches all the way back to the 1990s. His verdict followed. ‘These actions deserve to be condemned unreservedly,’ he said unmelodiously. Cameron blathered about the EU leaders’ summit tomorrow. Miliband agreed that

Sajid Javid isn’t the only observer of Russia’s behaviour over the situation in Ukraine to link Vladimir Putin’s aggression to the situation in Syria. Perhaps the West’s decision not to intervene in that conflict has given Putin the sense that he can do what he wants without any response from other countries. But Javid’s suggestion in a tweet this afternoon that there is a ‘direct link between Miliband’s cynical vote against Syria motion and Russia’s actions on Ukraine. Completely unfit to lead Britain’ goes rather further than that. It also doesn’t fit particularly comfortably with the fact that 30 of Javid’s own Conservative colleagues rebelled on that motion and many

You won’t catch Ed Miliband or David Cameron admitting that their best hope of governing after 2015 is in a coalition or a minority government. But what if their party machines have already decided that this is what’s going to happen anyway? There are secret discussions within the Labour party about scaling back the number of ‘target seats’ (the seats that it will pour the most resources into in order to win – full list here) from the official list of 106 to 80, or even just 60, which means that some in Labour think it is better to aim to be the largest party rather than out-and-out victory. I

[audioplayer src=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_27_February_2014_v4.mp3″ title=”James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman on why the two party political system is dying” startat=1207] Listen [/audioplayer]Two things will make the next general election campaign quite unlike any previous election in this country. The first is that we now have four-party politics right across Britain. In Scotland and Wales, the nationalist parties have been a political force for a generation. But the big change is in England, where Ukip is emerging as a fourth force. Second, the campaign will be haunted by the spectre of another hung parliament. The question of what happens if no party wins an overall majority will be asked time and time again by

Earlier this week David Cameron threatened the Lib Dems with divorce. Today, two of their senior figures offered to kiss and make up. Sir Alan Beith and Sir Bob Russell, bearing their knighthoods like dented old battle-shields, made their overtures at PMQs. Each of these leathery old libertarians seems to have discovered his inner Tory. Sir Alan went first. He invited Cameron to slap down rogue Anglicans who dare to criticise welfare reform. ‘There’s nothing moral about pouring more borrowed money into systems that trap people in poverty,’ he said. Cameron accepted Sir Alan’s invitation for a waltz. Greeting him as ‘a ‘distinguished churchman himself’, the prime minister praised his