Read about the latest political news, views and analysis
19 min listen
This week we’ll hear Charlotte Eagar on how the arrival of the alpha migrants may be the solution to our labour shortage (00:56), Lionel Shriver on her bewilderment about people still having the Covid app (07:09) and finally Tom Ough's brief history of bidets (15:40).
The BBC has had its fair share of reporting controversies in recent years. But transgender issues have been a particularly difficult issue for the Corporation, with one video being lampooned (and then quickly retired) in January for telling children there are ‘over 100 genders.’ One article that caused particularly controversy appeared on the Beeb’s online website back in December 2020. It concerned a ruling by senior judges against children being given access to drugs that would allow them to transition genders. The lengthy piece, written by the then LGBT correspondent Ben Hunte, claimed that the High Court verdict on puberty-blocking drugs could cause young people considering transition to take their own lives.
14 min listen
Joanna Scanlan, an actress best known for her role of Terri in the The Thick of It, had a long and winding road before becoming a star of stage and screen. Born in Cheshire and moved to Wales aged three, she went to two convent schools before an Anglican school where she broke every possible rule she could. On the podcast she talks about her dreams of becoming an actor, working first at the arts council and as a lecturer whilst pursuing her love of acting. In her new film After Love, she plays a woman uncovering the secret life of her late husband, which is out now.
12 min listen
With over two thirds of young people now vaccinated, does the messaging on how to reach the final third need to shift? And are the government putting the cart before the horse by hinting that vaccine passports are more about coercion than safety? And finally are we in for another turbulent exam season? James Forsyth speaks to Katy Balls.
America’s economy has officially recovered to its pre-pandemic levels, as Q2 GDP figures saw an annualised increase of 6.5 per cent. This is a positive update, on the face of it, but that’s more or less where the good news stops. The country’s GDP figures have come in notably below the consensus of what was expected, which was something closer to 8.5 per cent. The news comes just a day after the International Monetary Fund forecast the United States and the UK would lead advanced countries with their rate of economic recovery, revising its estimates for the States upwards to 7.0 per cent this year and 4.9 per cent next year.
‘Deputy succeeds boss’ might not normally feel like a ‘hold the front page’ type headline. But the announcement that Amanda Pritchard is the new head of NHS England – replacing Simon Stevens – reveals a lot about the state of the NHS and the future direction of the health service. Firstly, the process. Despite concerns that the race to succeed Stevens would be politicised, Pritchard’s appointment (which I revealed on Thursday, thanks to a spot of digital and logistical sleuthing) is understood to have been wholly free of political nudging. Some of the credit for this goes to Number 10 health advisors and some to Lord David Prior, NHS England’s chair and a former Conservative MP.
In the last week, the number of people testing positive for Covid has dropped by 36 percent. A fall in cases following the final stage of unlocking was not what most models had predicted. There are several possible causes for this, including people adjusting their behaviour to avoid being pinged. But one significant factor is that schools in England are now out for summer. When schools do return in September, cases will likely rise. But with an ever-greater percentage of the population vaccinated, this shouldn’t cause too many problems. And the end of classroom bubbles means that whole classes will no longer be sent home just because one pupil tests positive. Life will be far less disrupted.
40 min listen
Is there a humane solution to Britain’s migrant crisis?(00:52) Also on the podcast: Why is the WHO so down on e-cigarettes?(16:23) and finally... after a year and a half inside how angry will strangers make us?(27:01) With Douglas Murray; award winning film maker and producer for the Trojan Women project Charlotte Eagar; Christopher Snowdon; Clive Bates the director of The Counterfactual and previous head of ASH; Damian Thompson; and Stuart Prebble creator of the hit TV show Grumpy Old Men.
It's the issue facing all MPs this recess: what do you do for your summer hols? It's not just Covid causing confusion this year, with approved travel lists going from green to amber at a moment's notice – there's also the environmental question to consider. Some MPs are reluctant to cast aspersions on their eco-credentials by jet-setting abroad at a time when constituent homes remain flooded, in this, the year of COP26, when Net Zero (and its associate costs) are all the rage.Indeed for Labour MP Luke Pollard, the floods have served as a 'wake up call'.
Alongside the UK’s latest step in reopening, optimistic forecasts have been rolling in concerning the economy’s timeline for returning to pre-pandemic levels. This morning, we got another positive indication that businesses are resuming normal operations. The latest update on furlough figures shows 1.9 million workers are still on the scheme as of the end of June — the lowest level of people having their wages paid by the state since furlough was first introduced during last year’s spring lockdown. The number of people on the scheme fell by half a million last month, and by roughly three million since March. The continued fall is hardly surprising, as each month since April more economic activity has been permitted.
Last week there was acute concern in government about the country’s re-opening. Would restrictions need to be reimposed when schools return in September? Ministers fretted. But those nerves have now been replaced by cautious optimism. Case numbers have been falling for a week straight and it increasingly looks as if this wave has peaked. No one in Downing Street wants to declare mission accomplished. What will happen to the numbers when people’s fear of being ‘pinged’ by Test and Trace eases and they start to socialise more? Cases need to be falling consistently between now and schools returning. Privately, scientists are stressing risks remain. They warn that there is still a danger of another wave with a bigger peak than this one.
The morass of flooding politics have claimed a fair few scalps over the years. Those with long memories will recall the struggles of former Culture Secretary Chris Smith, whose lacklustre tenure as chair of the Environment Agency was ended ignominiously back in 2014 after flooding in Devon, Cornwall and the Somerset Levels. Now Labour is having to grapple once more with this issue, with a number of constituencies affected by Sunday's floods being held by the party's leading lights. Stella Creasy has been vocal in Walthamstow while Sam Tarry cited the floods as his reason to (belatedly) drop out of the online launch of the controversial Redbridge Palestinian Solidarity Campaign last night.
9 min listen
Fully vaccinated travellers from the EU and US could be allowed to come into the Uk without quarantining, under plans being discussed by the government. Will this help businesses to recover, or is it an unnecessary change that risks seeing a repeat of the fiasco around India's traffic light status back in April? Katy Balls speaks to James Forsyth and Isabel.
As expected, Alex Cole-Hamilton has put himself forward to lead the Scottish Lib Dems, announcing his candidacy with an obligatory walking-and-talking video introducing himself to party members. It’s unclear whether anyone else will stand before the August 20 nominations deadline and it could well be that Cole-Hamilton wins by default. The rules certainly favour that outcome, with only Members of the Scottish Parliament allowed to stand, and the party having only four of those. Cole-Hamilton represents a generational shift from outgoing leader Willie Rennie, an old-fashioned social democrat at a loss to keep up with — or, frankly, understand — the lively array of identity-centric grievances threatening to replace liberalism as the party’s guiding philosophy.
It’s parliamentary recess at present but the work doesn’t stop for MPs. Post bags and inboxes remain piled high, with our long-suffering legislators forced to slog through a backlog of Covid-related constituent issues.Still, the stresses of the job are even greater for those five Tory MPs who have been sanctioned by the Chinese state. Tom Tugendhat, Neil O’Brien, Sir Iain Duncan Smith, Nusrat Ghani and Tim Loughton were among a group of nine UK citizens to face sanctions in March for raising awareness of human rights abuses. The latter three are all members of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) – a group of more than 200 legislators around the world, concerned about China's activities.
Over the past few weeks and months, there has been plenty of focus on the Northern Ireland Brexit Protocol, and the impact it is having on the province. Less attention has been paid, however, to the equally serious problems in Northern Ireland which still need to be solved. It is an uncomfortable truth, but the problem with Northern Ireland is largely in Westminster. The institutionalised neglect over the past few decades has brought the region to where it is now. How do you know Northern Ireland has been neglected? Easy. Look up the time it takes to travel between just about any town in the province to Belfast by public transport. The results will shock you. It is quicker to get to London from Belfast than it is to Londonderry.
Some of the most revealing detail from newly released 1997 government files relate to Welsh constitutional affairs. The Home Office advised against the Queen opening the new Welsh Assembly, for instance, judging the institution to be ‘wholly subordinate’ to Westminster even before the people of Wales had voted for it. Tony Blair and John Prescott even thought the leader of the Assembly should be known as ‘Chief Executive’, unlike the ‘First Minister’ title bestowed in Scotland. It has taken more than two decades, but attitudes to Welsh politics have finally changed, from both the public and politicians in Wales and Westminster.
A common refrain from opponents of the Scottish National party is that ‘the SNP is not Scotland’. But it often seems they haven’t got the message, especially when Nationalist activists take it on themselves to stand guard on the border against the plague-ridden English. This week, the people who may really wish they’d done more to police the borders between themselves and the SNP are none other than grassroots separatists in the ‘Yes movement’. If you missed this story, the long and short of it is that a few years ago the SNP went on a fundraising drive. They secured hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations on the basis that the cash would go into a ring-fenced fighting fund to wage the next independence referendum.
21 min listen
President Biden's chief of staff, Ron Klain, is set to have a large bash for his 60th with a whopping guest list of the rich and powerful, a list he has been compiling since the Clinton administration. But who is the real Ron? A man helping an elderly president or king of the Washington Swamp?Freddy Gray in conversation with Matthew Continetti, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and founding editor of the Washington Free Beacon.
14 min listen
On a visit to Glasgow today, Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove went further than other politicians have in saying that those who refuse the vaccine for non-health reasons are 'selfish'. It looks as if the government will continue pushing through its vaccine certificate plans, but what if it has to rely on Labour votes to get it through? Katy Balls talks to James Forsyth.