James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
Michael Gove has won on the substance in the judicial reviews of his decisions on Building Schools for the Future. The judge has rejected the claim that Gove acted irrationally and found that he has the authority to make the decisions he did. There will have to be reviews of six of the decisions because
The Davis Straw motion on keeping the ban on prisoner votes has just passed by 234 votes to 22. It is a crushing victory on what was a very good turnout given that both front benches were not voting. The 22 against the motion were a bunch of Liberal Democrats plus the Ulster MP Lady
The resignation last night of Lord Oakeshott, the Liberal Democrat’s Treasury spokesmen in the Lords, over his criticisms of Project Merlin is more important than it might appear. Despite not being a coalition minister, Oakeshott is one of the bigger figures in the Liberal Democrats and is extremely close to Vince Cable, who skis with
One of the more depressing sights in politics at the moment is how Andy Burnham is leading the Labour party back to its comfort zone on education. Burnham, who The Spectator once named minister to watch, seems to have jettisoned all of his Blairite reforming instincts. He now wants to draw as many dividing lines
Bankers make estate agents look popular and so any government deal with bankers that doesn’t involve kicking them is politically tricky. The Treasury, acutely aware of the politics of all this, are very keen to stress that the government ‘played hardball’ with Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and RBS in the Project Merlin talks. The actual deal
Today’s PMQs threatens to be overshadowed by the statement on Project Merlin, the government’s deal with the banks, expected at one o’clock. I suspect that Cameron will try and push away any questions on banks with the line that Miliband should wait for the Chancellor’s statement. But PMQs will still be a far livelier affair
Cambridge University’s decision, leaked to The Guardian’s Nick Watt, to start charging fees of £9,000 a year from 2012 is an irritation for the Liberal Democrats who did not want any university to move to charging the highest fee possible straight away. It also threatens to overshadow Nick Clegg’s efforts to increase the social mix
Tomorrow is the first Osborne Balls Treasury Questions clash. It should be a fiery encounter. There’s little love lost between the two men, they are both aggressive despatch box performers and the two of them know that their clash over the economy is likely to be the major factor in determining the next election result.
The Independent has a remarkable story today which shows just how public money gets wasted. The paper reports that the Department for Energy and Climate Change has employed a firm of headhunters to find it a new chief economist. Tom Peck writes that the headhunters then approached Vicky Pryce about the job. Ms Pryce had
David Cameron’s speech yesterday was one of the most important he has given as Prime Minister. I’d urge you to read the whole text just to see how absurd some of the opportunistic, party political attacks on it have been. As I say in The Mail on Sunday, they’ll be a huge amount of resistance
It appears almost certain that the protests in Egypt are not going to stop until Mubarak leaves office. For that reason, Mubarak’s departure seems a necessary step to an orderly transition. The New York Times ‘ latest report reveals that the Egyptian military and US officials are discussing how Mubarak could visibly leave while remaining
The coalition’s approach to foreign policy is not to have a foreign policy. The coalition’s approach to foreign policy is not to have a foreign policy. There is no Cameron doctrine. As events unfold in Egypt, the government does not even know what it wants to happen. Alistair Burt, the Middle East minister, summed up
Last summer I was showing some 17 year olds around the House of Commons. They were bright and engaged and all wanted to go to university. But as they told me what they were doing for A-Levels my heart sank. They were all doing subjects that were going to put them at a massive disadvantage
I wish I could tell you that the main topic of conversation in Westminster today is Egypt and the future of the Middle East. But it isn’t. It is those Sally Bercow photos. But if it wasn’t the picture of the Speaker’s wife naked but for a sheet that MPs were talking about it would
David Frum is doing a great series on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission report. The report is, obviously, US-centric but its argument that the problem was not with the regulation but the regulators strikes me as highly important: “[W]e do not accept the view that regulators lacked the power to protect the financial system. They
Downing Street have announced that the BBC’s Craig Oliver will be Andy Coulson’s replacement. Oliver, who has been editor of both the Six and Ten o’clock news, will bring a broadcasting perspective to Downing Street. Former BBC colleagues stress that he knows how to tell a story in pictures and, in contrast, to Coulson is
A very different PMQs this week: six questions on foreign affairs and almost total consensus between Cameron and Miliband. Miliband’s office had given No 10 advance warning of the topics they wanted to raise and the two agreed on pretty much everything. Miliband argued that ‘the best route to stability is through democracy.’ Cameron agreed
The wires are buzzing with uncomfirmed report that Mubarak will tonight say on Egyptian TV that he won’t run for re-election in August and will stand down then. Update: The New York Times is now reporting that President Obama has pushed Mubarak to say publicly that he won’t run again. The end game appears to be
If the AV referendum is to take place on the 5th of May, the legislation paving the way for it needs to have passed by the 16th of February. But this bill is currently being held up in the Lords where Labour peers are objecting to the ‘Tory part’ of the bill which reduces the
It is imperative that the coalition keeps its nerves and its composure during the months ahead. 2011 will try the coalition’s fortitude, its deficit reduction plan and its public service reform programme will both come under sustained attack. It is vital that the coalition continues to explain clearly and patiently why it is doing what it
