Stephen Daisley is a Spectator regular and a columnist for the Scottish Daily Mail
John Bercow’s decision not to stand for re-election will bring some satisfaction to Brexiteers after several miserable weeks. The Speaker has been nakedly partisan, personally spiteful in the chair and done more to resist Brexit than the entire Labour Party put together. Many Tories consider him a jumped-up little twerp with an over-inflated sense of
A general election looms, the outcome could go almost any way and those who normally offer themselves as experts are seized by panic. Parliamentarians, journalists and academics who previously exerted a degree of control over policy, debate and knowledge — or flattered themselves to think they did — worry their grip is being loosened. Behold
In 2014, a young SNP activist called Aidan Kerr caused some consternation when he contended that Scotland was undergoing ‘Ulsterisation’. The nation’s politics, which for the past generation had pitched nationalism against social democracy, was becoming a battle between nationalism and unionism. The casus belli would be identity, not class or income. Kerr’s critics were
Ruth Davidson is set to quit as Scottish Conservative leader. A party source is quoted in the Scottish Sun saying Davidson’s departure will be as a result of the ‘huge pressure’ of new motherhood — she gave birth to a son, Finn, last October — and finding herself ‘at increasing odds with the new leadership in
Gordon Brown has broken his silence again. The former prime minister told the Edinburgh International Book Festival that the Scottish Parliament had ‘failed to deliver a fairer and more prosperous Scotland’ and had instead become a ‘battering ram for constitutional warfare’. What’s that, Lassie? Timmy’s trapped down the well? And creating a Scottish parliament to
Donald Trump’s attempted purchase of Greenland may have fallen through but if he’s still in the market, there’s some prime real estate in the neighbourhood. It’s smaller, yes, but just as cold, almost as sparsely populated and even has its own independence movement agitating for a breakaway. Happily, the president already owns a chunk of
Nicola Sturgeon fancies herself as something of an international stateswoman, jetting off to the United States to boost her profile and touring the capitals of Europe in search of allies against Brexit. She is fond, too, of tweeting her commentary on global affairs, in the hope that others may learn from her example so that,
Try as I might, I just can’t seem to get anyone interested in discriminating against Indians. No one is tearing open packets of imported turmeric and cardamom and dumping their contents on supermarket floors. British academics aren’t severing ties with professors from Delhi University. If pension funds are divesting from Tata Motors and ICICI Bank,
That sound you just heard was the entire Scottish Labour Party — all 12 of them — slapping their foreheads in frustrated unison. In an interview with Iain Dale at the Edinburgh Fringe, John McDonnell confirmed that Labour would not stand in the way of the SNP holding a second referendum on Scottish independence. The
Now it gets messy. Lord Ashcroft’s poll putting support for Scottish independence at 52-48 (the cursed percentages) is the first to register a majority for separation since March 2017. It is, of course, a single poll; we have been here before. But recent polls have shown a gradual uptick in support for secession and if
Does Momentum do requests? If so, any chance they could deselect Yvette Cooper as a priority? Her dull, maudlin tones are bad enough when she’s lamenting a no-deal Brexit, a prospect she has done more than most to aid, but when the subject is the Labour party her funereal strains bear some of the most
The sacking of David Mundell as Scottish Secretary has left Ruth Davidson’s Tories reeling. The response is not tribal or even ideological; Brexiteers and Remainers alike regard his replacement Alister Jack as a good sort. What most are still struggling to fathom is the thinking behind Mundell’s punting. Of course, he is an opponent of
When I was fresh out of university, I applied for a job as a parliamentary aide to Jo Swinson. The MP for East Dunbartonshire was full of promise and more to my political tastes then than the clunky managerialism of new PM Gordon Brown. She rejected me. If nothing else, this shows Swinson has sound
There are little in the way of festivities but today is nonetheless a landmark in Israeli history: Benjamin Netanyahu becomes the country’s longest-serving prime minister, displacing beloved founding leader David Ben-Gurion. Netanyahu has been in charge for 4,876 days, governing for a three-year term in the late 1990s then continuously since 2009. His Israel would
Darren Grimes has won his appeal against a £20,000 fine imposed by the Electoral Commission. Grimes, the 25-year-old who ran the BeLeave campaign group, was accused by the watchdog of breaching expenditure rules during the EU referendum. Following proceedings which saw Grimes crowdfund his legal campaign, Judge Marc Dight has ruled that the fine be
The Democratic Party faces a test of character. Most mainstream institutions have failed such tests in recent years but, in the spirit of Samuel Beckett, let’s try again and fail better this time. The trial confronting the electoral vehicle of American liberalism is whether liberals still have a firm grip on the wheel or the
The Final Showdown, as the Sun/Talkradio’s debate between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt was billed, clarified some important points for Tory members still deciding how to cast their vote. Both candidates ruled out a general election before the UK leaves the EU, though Hunt warned that setting a deadline as Johnson has means we could
Nicola Sturgeon is expert at laying traps for her opponents but this time she may have ensnared herself. During the May 2016 Holyrood elections, the SNP leader and occasional First Minister said a Leave vote in the upcoming EU referendum should be grounds for a second ballot on independence. This, of course, was when Remain
In the run-up to Wednesday night’s Panorama on Labour anti-Semitism, one whistleblower received a lawyer’s letter, the party demanded the BBC director-general ‘suspend and reconsider the planned broadcast’, and Momentum did a pre-emptive hit job on presenter John Ware. Now we know why. Panorama: Is Labour Anti-Semitic? levelled serious charges, chief amongst them that senior
In less turbulent times, the disappearance of the Home Secretary would lead the television news bulletins and clear the next morning’s front pages. Yet Sajid Javid went missing on Monday with barely an eyebrow raised. The former Conservative leadership candidate travelled to Jerusalem and visited the Western Wall, the second-holiest site in Judaism and buttressing
