Uk politics

Friday

Peter Hoskin

The coming battle over Mainstream Conservatism

It’s not just the students who are waging a political struggle. In yesterday’s Times (£), Tim Montgomerie fired up a debate over the future of the Conservative Party that will no doubt simmer through the rest of this Parliament. For those who can’t delve behind the paywall, the argument was broadly this: that a tension is emerging between liberal Conservatism and a more traditional Conservatism. On the side of the Liberal Conservatives are those who want to extend the union with Nick Clegg and his party; a group which may well include the Tory leadership. On the other side are those who want the Tories to go it alone after

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Sifting through the wreckage

The revolution may not be televised, but protests certainly are – and the process magnifies the drama. Since last night, the news broadcasts have all had footage of two thugs trying to smash the windows of the Treasury and, in the process, familiarising themselves with the properties of bombproof glass. The attack on Charles and Camilla’s royal limo is splashed across all this morning’s front pages. The script is so well-rehearsed now that I hesitate to repeat it: the vast majority are peaceful protesters, infiltrated by vandals who soak up the attention. Many of the protesters yesterday looked like they’d get a cab straight back home to their Notting Hill

Thursday

James Forsyth

The divisions laid bare

When The Speaker called a division, the Labour side roared a passionate No while the coalition benches delivered a rather muted Aye. I did not see a single Lib Dem open their mouth at this point. Instead, they sat on their benches looking emotionally exhausted. Even those Lib Dems who have been proved right in their warning about the party’s position on fees—notably, David Laws and Jeremy Browne—appeared downcast.   In the end, the government won but with a much reduced majority. 21 Lib Dems voted against the coalition, as did six Tories. Simon Hughes abstained despite Ed Miliband’s entreaties to come with him into the no lobby.   This

Peter Hoskin

Coalition wins fees vote with a majority of 21

The final tally was 323 in favour of lifting the cap on tuition fees from £3,290 to £9,000 a year, with 302 against. The second vote, on raising the basic cap to £6,000, passed with the same majority. Although we don’t know the divisions yet, we can safely say that it’s the biggest rebellion of this Parliament so far – the lowest government majority until today was 51. UPDATE 1: 28 Lib Dems voted with the government; 21 against; and 8 either didn’t vote or abstained. This is the biggest Lib Dem rebellion since the party was founded. UPDATE 2: Six Tories voted against the government: Andrew Percy (Brigg &

Ed Howker

Exclusive: the fee hike won’t create a market

The fee vote really comes down to two questions. First, will the fee hike proposed by the coalition government actually create an internal market in higher education? Second, what will be the effect on the public finances? There is good reason to be doubtful.   First, the market: the idea, I suppose, is that world-class universities might charge higher fees than second and third tier ones. But, in the last few days, I’ve spoken to several very senior higher-education sources who privately report that universities like Leeds Met, Bolton and Worcester are very seriously considering charging the full £9,000 tuition for their courses once legislation is in place. The government is extremely concerned. As you can imagine, if that

Peter Hoskin

Putting the Lib Dem rebellion into context

A useful guide from Philip Cowley and Mark Stuart: If 11 Liberal Democrat MPs vote against the whip, it will be the largest Lib Dem rebellion so far this Parlaiment. (The current record is 10, on an amendment to the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill in November). If 16 Liberal Democrat MPs vote against the whip, it will be the largest Lib Dem rebellion since the party was founded in 1988-89. If 30 Liberal Democrat MPs vote against the whip (something we doubt very much), it will be the largest rebellion by the Liberal Democrats or any of their predecessor parties since the Maurice Debate of 1918, which saw

Sebastian Payne

Live-blogging the protests

1540: Heading back to Spectator HQ but it’s blocked off. They appear to be kettles in parliament square. The horses appear to be keeping the crowd back. Fence is being thrown around again. 1530: Milbank is full of police vans, they have to put them somewhere. Police are turning away people from Parliament Square. Police are using riot-proof cameras for evidence. 1455: The Met are shouting and trying to get everyone back on the planned route, but the crowd are beyond caring. A bystander pointed out Parliament Square is being used (more likely destroyed) for the first time in months. 1445: A view from a parliamentary researcher: “Life goes on

Peter Hoskin

The Lib Dems walk through the fire

Brace yourselves, CoffeeHousers. Today is the day of the tuition fee vote, along with all the froth and fury that will attend it. The government’s motion will most likely pass through the Commons – yes, even without the support of Simon Hughes – but the wider repercussions are, as yet, uncertain. The main question is what the Lib Dems will achieve by walking through the fire, as Nick Clegg puts it. Will they emerge from the other side, a more credible party of government in the public’s eyes? Or will they just get burnt to ashes? At the very least, the yellow bird of liberty is stuttering this morning. As

Wednesday

Daniel Korski

Time for an Afghan Inquiry

The Iraq Inquiry had been conspicuously silent, but now John Chilcot’s team has called Tony Blair to give evidence again. It’s expected that our former PM will make the trip to the Queen Elizabeth II centre early next year. That would push the expected deadline for the inquiry’s work finishing – at the end of this year – into 2011. Few people, however, expect the inquiry to say anything novel or get Tony Blair to say anything different than before. Its well-phrased final report may change policy in the margins – but in the security establishment there is little question of what needs doing. RUSI has published reams of reports

Ted Sumpster

Keeping the financial sector in Britain

The financial services industry in the UK is at a crucial juncture. Our new research report “Not with a Bang but a Whimper” – published tomorrow –  highlights the decline in the UK’s competitiveness as a domicile for this sector, and the increasing likelihood that both companies and workers will take the leap and choose to base themselves elsewhere. Many will see this as a good thing. The economy is still recovering from the financial crisis, the eventual cost to the public purse of the bank bailouts remains unknown, and the yearly round of hated bank bonuses are impending. On the other hand, losing such a significant contributor to GDP,

Peter Hoskin

The Tories keep plugging away at the Big Society

The Big Society never really went away as a theme, but it certainly became a less insistent catchphrase after the general election. The Tories were no doubt stung by the ambiguous response their invitation to government, and felt that the early days of coalition government were not an opportune moment to reheat their central election message. Months went by where the words “big” and “society” barely made any contact at all. That changed with David Cameron’s conference speech, of course. And, since then, the Big Society has been back, loud and proud. Only this week, Philip Hammond was talking about a “Big Society approach” to dealing with the snow. Nick

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Miliband rises from his deathbed

At last Wednesday’s PMQs Cameron kicked Ed Miliband into touch with a debonair swagger. Today anger replaced disdain. The PM’s eye-popping rage is so palpable that some commentators take it for vulnerability or even a hint of self-doubt. Milband has Cameron rattled? Nothing of the sort. Cameron just can’t control himself.   Asked about the Coalition’s higher education policy, he heaped rancid abuse on the opposition leader from a lofty perch. He called him “an opportunist,”  who “posed about social mobility” and was guilty of “rank hypocrisy.” “He saw a big crowd in the Mall,” fumed Cameron, referring to the student protests, “and said, ‘I am their leader I must

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Miliband’s jibes throw Cameron off course

After last week’s PMQs, Ed Miliband needed a clear win today—and he got one. Cameron, who had admittedly just flown back from Afghanistan, didn’t seem on top of the whole tuition fees debate and kept using lines that invited Labour to ridicule the Lib Dems. When Cameron tried to put Miliband down with the line, ‘he sounds like a student politician—and that’s all he’ll ever be’, Miliband shot back that “I was a student politician but I wasn’t hanging around with people who were throwing bread rolls and wrecking restaurants.” It was a good line and threw Cameron off for the final exchange.   The rest of the session was

Peter Hoskin

The Sun gives Clarke a kicking

It may not be The Sun wot won or lost the last election, but its readers did swing heavily from Labour to the Tories and, even, to the Lib Dems. Which is why No.10 will not be untroubled by the paper’s cover today. “Get out of jail free,” it blasts, marking what Tim Montgomerie calls the “beginning [of] a campaign against Ken Clarke’s prisons policy.” And it doesn’t get any kinder inside. Their editorial on the issue ends, “Mr Clarke and Mr Cameron owe Britain an explanation.” It captures a strange split in the government’s approach to crime. When it comes to catching crooks, the coalition is putting forward policies

Peter Hoskin

Labour stumble into tomorrow’s tuition fee vote

Oh look, Alan Johnson has performed a hasty Reverse Cable. Only a few days ago, the Shadow Chancellor suggested that he didn’t believe a graduate tax – Ed Miliband’s chosen policy – could work. Yet, in a wilting Thunderer column (£) for the Times today, he now claims that “there is a very strong case for a graduate tax.” From unworkable to strong, in only four days. Sounds like a disclaimer for Ikea flatpack furniture, not a policy position. In a separate article, the Times characterises this as a minor victory for Ed Miliband – and so, in some respects, it is. He has managed to rein his Chancellor on

Tuesday

James Forsyth

How far our schools have fallen

Comparing GCSE or A-Level results to previous years is a meaningless exercise. Leaving aside all the arguments about whether or not these exams are getting easier, it doesn’t much matter if children today are doing better academically than their peers a generation ago. What does matter is how they are doing in comparison to children in other countries, the people they’ll be competing with in the global marketplace.   Today’s PISA rankings, the OECD’s comparison of education standards, makes for depressing reading on this front. England has fallen from 7th in reading in 2000 to 25th today, from 8th to 27th in maths and 4th to 16th in science. Admittedly,

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Clegg will vote for fees hike

The wait is over. We have just been told that Nick Clegg will definitely vote for the coalition’s policy on tuition fees. Clegg announced this, according to his spokeswoman, at the meeting of the Lib Dem parliamentary party that is currently going on. He told the meeting that to govern is to choose, and that the coalition had to chosen to invest in early years education rather than in scrapping fees.   Clegg’s spokesperson said that he had urged the party to ‘walk through the fire together’ but that he accepted and respected that not every Lib Dem MP would vote with him. We will, apparently, be told this evening

Peter Hoskin

Some framework for the prisons debate

I thought that CoffeeHousers might appreciate a few graphs to steer them around the prisons debate. It’s by no means a complete overview of the issue, but just three of the trends that hover over Ken Clarke’s proposals: 1. Rising prison population, falling crime Well, that’s striking enough. Expect, as any fule know, correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation – which is to say, the fall in crime could be due to something other than the rise in prisoners. Some put it down to improving economic conditions. Others mention deterrents such as CCTV. But those correlations can barely be hardened into a cause, either. So, all rather inconclusive. The Prison Works

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Why we must remember the lessons of the Anglo-Scottish Enlightenment

The Adam Smith Institute kindly asked me to speak at their Christmas reception last night, and yesterday I was mulling what to say. When at The Scotsman ten years ago, I would sometimes visit the great man’s grave in Edinburgh, and be surprised to see only Chinese tourists paying tribute. It was a pretty good sign of how political power would play out. Edinburgh is, with Prague and Stockholm, among the most beautiful cities in Europe; itself a monument to the Enlightenment. And how tragic that students – even Scottish ones – are taught about the E word only in the context of the French Enlightenment. The likes of Rousseau,

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Bercow vs McLoughlin

Iain Dale has news of a remarkable exchange between the Speaker and the Chief Whip last night (see from 22:16:30 in the video above). The coalition were attempting to pass a motion limiting the debate on tuition fees to three hours. Labour was trying to prevent this.   The Labour front bench shouted ‘object’ at the wrong moment so Bercow, with a broad grin on his face, coached them through it. At which point, Patrick McLoughlin heckled, ‘give them an indication, won’t you?’ McLoughlin then goes to leave the Chamber. At which point, Bercow explodes, wagging his finger and ordering the Chief Whip to remain in the Chamber.   This