Isabel Hardman is assistant editor of The Spectator and author of Why We Get the Wrong Politicians. She also presents Radio 4’s Week in Westminster.
Has Anas Sarwar got what it takes to woo Scottish Labour’s lost voters? I joined the recently-elected leader of the party while on the campaign trail in Glasgow and you can read my interview with him in this week’s magazine. His analysis is that Labour was in danger of becoming part of the past for
When the Scottish parliament was set up by Tony Blair in 1999, it seemed as if Labour would govern Holyrood for the foreseeable future. The Scottish Tories were a contradiction in terms. Devolution was sold as a device that would kill nationalism ‘stone dead’. Suffice to say, this plan did not quite work. The Scottish
Dandelions are one of the cheeriest wild flowers. They are loved by children for their ‘clock’ seed heads, are entirely edible for humans and are a source of food for many insects and birds. And yet many gardeners go to great lengths to get rid of them. This year’s daffodils may have faded, but dandelions
12 min listen
A poll last night gave the Tories a 17-point lead in Hartlepool. Tomorrow’s by-election in the red wall seat is to be one of the first barometers of Keir Starmer’s leadership so far. How serious would a Labour loss be? Isabel Hardman speaks to Fraser Nelson and James Forsyth.
Campaigning in the Hartlepool by-election is reaching its feverish final hours as the Labour party tries to hold onto the seat. There has been sufficient talk of the party losing the constituency for such a result not to come as a shock if it does happen. Indeed, many in the party are already talking as
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar is being advised by a key figure behind ex-Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson’s political brand, Coffee House can reveal. Eddie Barnes, a former spinner for Davidson when she led the party, has been helping Scottish Labour during the Holyrood campaign with messaging and voter strategy. He helped craft Davidson’s cheery,
18 min listen
One of the key aspects of the imminent G7 summit will be the return of face-to-face meetings between politicians. What will be on the agenda, and can the rest of us hope to follow suit and leave Zoom behind? Fraser Nelson talks to James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman.
Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross has barely been seen in public without his chaperone, Ruth Davidson. She has accompanied him around the Holyrood elections campaign trail with such devotion that it’s unclear who is standing for election and who is the actual party leader. The pair are campaigning in Edinburgh today and have sent out
Labour’s Liz Kendall is today calling for the government to treat social care in the same way as it treats physical infrastructure. In a speech this afternoon, the shadow care minister said that ‘in the century of ageing, social care is as much a part of our economic infrastructure as the roads and the railways’.
Matt Hancock was in a rather sassy mood when he took tonight’s coronavirus briefing. It was obvious that he was not going to get as much attention for his announcement that the government has secured another 60 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine for an autumn booster programme, and he came armed with a strategy
13 min listen
Arlene Foster has stepped down as leader of the Democratic Unionist Party. What’s next for the party? Isabel Hardman speaks to James Forsyth and Katy Balls.
Boris Johnson did not have a good Prime Minister’s Questions. It was never going to be a comfortable session, given the multiple rows about the funding of the Downing Street flat revamp and his reported comments about letting bodies ‘pile up’. But the way the Prime Minister approached it ensured both that the story will
14 min listen
Reports today suggest that the Conservative Party initially covered the costs of the Downing Street refurbishment. Will Conservative members, and the public at large, care? Katy Balls speaks to James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman.
One of the reasons the row isn’t fading about Tory sleaze allegations and the Prime Minister’s conduct is that there are so many different facets to it. Each row has its own faction within the Conservative party and indeed within No. 10, and so far there is scant evidence that any of these factions are
11 min listen
Simon Case dodged questions from MPs about his lockdown leak inquiry at a select committee appearance this afternoon, and refused to go into details about how Boris Johnson paid for the refurbishment of his Downing Street flat, saying the PM would make the ‘relevant declarations’. Why did Case stonewall the committee? Katy Balls speaks to
This afternoon’s urgent question on allegations of Tory sleaze could have been a rather explosive affair. Instead, it was used by members of all parties to produce a series of rather rubbish slogans for the local and devolved assembly elections next month. The Conservatives wanted to deflect attention from their problems by complaining about a
Bluebell season is beginning. In the next few weeks, woodland floors will have a fine blue mist hovering above them. This flowering season is so sensuous: there’s the sound of bees buzzing in and out of the flowers, the smell of their blooms, the cool spring breeze in the woods where they grow, and that
How could the subpostmaster scandal, in which hundreds of small business owners had their lives ruined after being wrongly accused of taking money from the Post Office, have gone on for so long? The subpostmasters were sucked into a nightmare when the Post Office installed a new accounting system called Horizon to replace old manual
Downing Street has hit back in its war with Dominic Cummings, after the former aide published an explosive blog post about leaks and ‘possibly illegal’ plans to renovate the Prime Minister’s flat using donations. A No. 10 spokesperson this evening said: ‘This government is entirely focused on fighting coronavirus, delivering vaccines and building back better.’
Michael Gove’s trip to Israel to study the country’s ‘green pass’ system isn’t diminishing the impression among Conservative MPs that the UK government has already made up its mind on vaccine passports. A number who I have spoken to are taking the lack of communication from their party whips as a sign that the policy
