James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
Brown has revelled in the economic crisis. A Prime Minister who was presumed to be a dead man walking found himself in a position where people had to listen to him. the combination of the severity of the situation and the institutional authority of his office revived him. Since September, Brown has played his cards
The 45p gambit is all about politics not raising revenue. Brown knows jolly well that even on a static calculation it only raises two and a bit billion and in reality will bring in far less. However, Brown is hoping that the move will either lure the Tories into vocal opposition, allowing him to paint
The Tories will be desperately tempted to vigorously oppose the new 45p top rate for those earning more than £175,000. But this is just what Brown wants them to do–as Fraser pointed out this measure has far more to do with politics than raising revenue. Brown is hoping to create a situation in which the perception
There is a lot of waste and needles expenditure in Whitehall but it is, frankly, pathetic of Greg Hands to try and make a fuss about Hazel Blears having a couple of Spanish lessons before attending a summit in Spain or Peter Mandelson being taught how to use a Blackberry. The reputation of politicians is
The PBR is being spun like a pre-election budget but today on the Politics Show today Brown came very close to closing the door on the prospect of a 2009 election. Here’s the key quote: “”I am not thinking about that at all. It is almost completely wrong even to consider this. Our undivided attention
I’m unconvinced that a cut in the VAT rate will be that big a political winner for Labour. First VAT is a hidden tax, a lot of the time people don’t realise they are paying it as it is incorporated in the price. Second, sterling’s weakness means that imports are going to become more expensive
Under the headline ‘This would insult Britain, Mr President’, Peter Oborne objects to the idea of making Caroline Kennedy the US Ambassador to the Court of St James. Peter’s grounds are that some of “ her family were long-standing supporters of IRA terrorism during the Irish troubles” and that her grandfather who, was Ambassador to
We can expect to see a lot of Ken Clarke over the next few days; the Tories know that he is still on of their most convincing voices on the economy. His interview in The Times today is helpful to the Tory cause. But it is worth noting that he breaks with the leadership in
As we learnt during the banking crisis, what Robert Peston predicts tends to become reality shortly afterwards. So, his informed speculation on what is in the PBR is well worth reading. This passage is particularly interesting and appears to be the latest shot in the briefing wars, which has reached up to cabinet level, around the Brown-Darling
The more people one speaks to the more one gets the impression that there might be an election early next year. The principal rationale for a poll in 2009 is ignoble: by 2010 the reality of recession will have caught up with Gordon Brown so he needs to go to the country before then. There
In the New Statesman this week, Martin Bright writes that ‘one former cabinet minister who spent a long time at the Treasury told the New Statesman: “Gordon has to get the Obama visit [the G8 summit in April] out of the way then call an election. There really is no other option.” Today on the front page of
This morning’s FT lays out just how bad a state the public finances are in: “Annual public borrowing is set to rocket towards £120bn over the next two years – far higher than City forecasts – forcing Alistair Darling to announce plans for deferred tax rises and public spending curbs when he presents his pre-Budget
The momentum behind the Mandelson dancing story just keeps building. The latest piece is in the People column in today’s Times: Was it a foxtrot, a waltz or a quickstep? Twinkletoed Lord Mandelson pressed his Strictly Come Dancing credentials by sweeping lobby correspondent Sunita Patel off her feet at his Department for Business, Enterprise and
Someone who has followed the Baby P case particularly closely, writes to Coffee House with the following observations: Haringey’s lawyers concluded on 25 July 2007 that the “the threshold for initiating Care Proceedings … was not met” despite medical staff concluding in June that there was “a reasonable probability” that Baby P’s injuries had been
Louise Bagshawe is spot on about this.
There has been a lot of attention on the immense domestic challenges that Obama will face once he has been sworn in, but the foreign policy problems haven’t gone away. Not only is America fighting two wars but Obama is almost going to have work out what to do about Iran which is far along
Over at Open House, Andy McSmith has a tale that casts the Come Dancing martyr in rather a different light. It is well worth a read.
I’m still sceptical about the idea of Brown going to the country in 2009, but Martin Bright lays out one potential, and plausible, route to an ‘09 election in his New Statesman column: It just so happens that, in April, the UK will be taking its turn at the presidency of the G20 group of
A few weeks ago, George Osborne warned that excessive government borrowing would make it harder for the Bank of England to cut interest rates. Labour responded by calling him “out of his depth”. Now, we see from the minutes of the Monetary Policy Committee meeting that the Bank held off from a deeper cut in
The Tories would far rather fight an election in 2010 than early next year. By 2010, reality will have caught up with Gordon Brown. But the best way for the Tories to avoid a poll next year is to talk about it endlessly. Brown Central is aware that they cannot go through another bout of