James Johnson was a senior research and strategy adviser to Theresa May between 2016-2019. He is co-founder of
the research company J.L. Partners
Lee Anderson, the recently-appointed Tory party deputy chairman, has sparked a political row with his comments on capital punishment. ‘Nobody has ever committed a crime after being executed. 100 per cent success rate,’ he said in an interview with The Spectator. Rishi Sunak says he disagrees, and is not in favour of the death penalty.
The loss of Wakefield and Tiverton and Honiton has shaken the Conservative party. But governments like Thatcher’s and Cameron’s have suffered mid-term blues before and bounced back to win elections. Is there anything really that different about what is happening now that will stop Boris Johnson making a similar recovery? In my view, the answer
In the last week, I’ve been crisscrossing the United States, meeting with politicians and their advisers ahead of this year’s congressional elections. Almost everyone has asked me about the ongoing Boris Johnson saga. Their most common refrain is surprise: how can the simple act of attending a party prompt a prime minister’s ever-more-likely political demise?
When Dominic Cummings released his WhatsApp messages with Boris Johnson earlier this month, perhaps the most alarming was the one where both men fretted about ‘trends in polls and lots of focus groups over the past 2 weeks’. The texts, dated 27 April 2020, also saw the Prime Minister asking about ‘tonight[‘s] focus group and
A quick read of the polls, and you would be forgiven for thinking we are a nation of lockdown-lovers, clamouring for stricter measures, eager to obey and accept any and all restrictions given to us. An Ipsos-MORI poll over the weekend showed 45 per cent of the public think current measures are not strict enough,
Much has been said about the prospect of no deal over the past few days – the economics, arguments over sovereignty, the views of Conservative MPs, possible long-term gain, and the views of the voters. All will be important to the government’s final decision. Looking only at the voters, the established wisdom seems to be
Once again, question marks surround Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. This is not new. While I was at 10 Downing Street, with the small but significant possibility of a sudden Corbyn departure, we spent some time exploring the electoral impact of who might come next. To work out who might put up the best fight and how best to counter them,
