Fraser Nelson is a Times columnist and a former editor of The Spectator.
Little wonder that Gordon Brown is gravely concerned about the state of British democracy. Labour’s poll rating has this week hit a (new) postwar low — and that was before Thursday’s elections. As the Prime Minister waits in misery for the final results on Sunday he may be tempted to recall the satirical words of
I was at Brown’s press conference today and decided to tackle him on the way he spun the last Budget. Off topic on a momentous day like today, I know, but it was towards the end of the conference and the old rogue may be gone within a month. I may never get another chance
Andy Burnham, that football-mad Liverpool lad, is to be the new boss of the non-communist world’s largest workforce: Health Secretary. He has thus fulfilled the prophesy bestowed on him when he was named The Spectator-Threadneedle’s “minister to watch” in 2006. Burnham was a former health minister (I interviewed him in Richmond House at the time)
So what did Alan Sugar think of Gordon Brown before he was offered a (for a tsar, utterly unnecessary) peerage? My former colleague at The Scotsman, Gerri Peev, has unearthed something that CoffeeHousers may appreciate: This letter appeared in the FT on 19 March 1992, after Brown appeared to accuse City bosses of feeding off
So John Hutton is quitting as Defence Secretary – this was NOT in the script. Lord Mandeson said only an hour ago that “I believe you will find the entire Cabinet following the PM and nobody following James’s lead”. But Hutton, an arch-Blairite who was made to distance himself from James Purnell’s resignation last night,
The reshuffle pieces – however incongrous – may be falling into place. A government source has just told me that Alan Johnson is expected to go to Home and John Denham to Health. With Cooper to the DWP, and Darling and Straw staying put, that would fill all the main holes. But who else can
Brown appears to be running out of Labour MPs whom he can trust not to resign. Word is that Louise Casey is to be ennobled and sent to the Home Office – this with Alan Sugar’s purported role as a peer and minister would mean even more unelected ministers in the government of an unelected
Word is that Darling is staying put – if so, it would be the position of maximum weakness for Brown. It means he has had to abandon his plan to enstool Balls as Chancellor. And there was indeed such a plan – I know, for example, that Purnell was offered education, which suggests Balls was
It looks increasingly likely that this will be a Cabinet of has-beens (i.e. Beckett); clique members (Balls, Cooper, Vadera and – God help us – Alan Sugar); and toadies (Sean Woodward). Cameron’s lot will look like veritable titans compared to this new axis of pygmies being assembled in No10. For the Tories this gets better
I’ve been in Westminster since 6.30am, a time when anyone awake is crying out for coffee and looking like death. But two metres in front of me now stands the biggest smile I have seen all day. Yvette Cooper was careful not to beam as much on camera, but was a ray of sunlight as
I can reveal that James Purnell was offered education, which he turned down, and decided to resign because he couldn’t go on continuing to go out in public and support a PM whom he’d lost faith in months ago. It’s an open secret that Purnell supported David Miliband for the leadership last summer. And, in
I would like to call on the substantial collective wisdom of CoffeeHousers. What changes do we need to make to Britain’s democracy? Once, this would have been a closed debate – with Gordon Brown setting up a “national” committee then telling us what we think. Now, we can gatecrash – and this is what The
No one does it better than The Prince. So I have written up Lord Mandelson’s comments on Simon Mayo’s R5 programme (which I mentioned earlier) as they set a template for all ministers who will try to get through the next five days. They represent a truly audacious attempt to make the following four points…
I was sitting next to Lord Mandelson in Simon Mayo’s R5 studio and witnessed a class act. Poor Hazel, he said, she had all that blowback from her dodgy home flipping expenses “found all the world on her doorstep” and was being pursued by the media. Poor love. She wanted to have done with it.
Word from chipmunk central is that she’s heading for Salford and won’t say more today. To do so, pre-election, may be seen by Labour as treason. But after polling closes, I suspect, it’s open season.
An electric atmosphere in the Commons today. Labour MPs with faces like murder, Tony McNulty skulking in the back where the cameras won’t get him, and Sean Woodward to Brown’s left. To his right, Harman then Straw. A chastened Michael Martin started proceedings with a question from the SNP’s Mike Weir – isn’t the Cabinet
Hazel Blears capacity for detonation is not yet exhausted. Shot one was “YouTube if you want to”, shot two – some argue – was her leaking of Jacqui Smith’s resignation plan. Shot three her resignation right before PMQs, which one senior government source has described to me as a “rank betrayal” coming ahead of the
“It’s like the Masque of the Red Death” Stephen Pound said on Newsnight recently. “The band’s playing, the wine’s being served but half the dancers are dead and are just going through the motions.” And indeed, just yesterday, five more Labour MPs fell. According to the polls, about half of them will lose their seat
I suspect Jacqui Smith has done a Ruth Kelly – she knew she was going, so why wait to be knifed? Why not go at a time of her choosing, and take control? She doesn’t need to make an announcement. She just needed to let it be known that she will resign, and sooner or
The Christmas issue of the Spectator is in the shops now, but if you don’t yet have a copy, here are the contents in full: Features In defence of Blairism – Tony Blair Michael Gove interviews the Archbishop of Canterbury James Forsyth and Fraser Nelson interview David Cameron Mark Clarke, Bercow, Sewel: 2016 was a vintage year for