Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Wednesday

Rupert Darwall

Labour’s reckless net zero promise

On the face of it, the Labour party conference commitment to bring forward Britain’s net zero greenhouse gas emission target to 2030 is nothing short of reckless. ‘We need zero emissions,’ the economist Paul Johnson and member of the Committee on Climate Change tweeted. ‘Getting there by 2050 is tough and expensive but feasible and consistent with avoiding most damaging climate change. Aiming for zero emissions by 2030 is almost certainly impossible, hugely disruptive and risks undermining consensus.’ The GMB, the union representing what remains of Britain’s industrial workers, warned that it could lead to widespread job losses. The GMB is right. Accelerated decarbonisation is a formula for rapid de-industrialisation.

Steerpike

Watch: Geoffrey Cox slams MPs – ‘This Parliament is a disgrace’

Geoffrey Cox is not a happy bunny. The Attorney General has just blasted MPs, telling them that Parliament is a 'disgrace'. Here's what he had to say in the Commons: 'This Parliament has declined three times to pass a withdrawal agreement. Then we now have a wide number of this house setting its face against leaving at all. And when this government draws the only logical inference from that position, which is that it must leave therefore without a deal at all. It still sets its face, denying the electorate its say in how this matter should be resolved. This parliament is a dead parliament. It should no longer sit. It has no moral right to sit on these green benches... ' Mr S. finds it difficult to disagree.

Steven Fielding

Is this the beginning of the end for Jeremy Corbyn?

Did Labour’s conference help or hinder Jeremy Corbyn’s chances of becoming prime minister? For some, Corbyn ended up stronger than ever. There will be a review of the post of deputy leader, one likely to see the authority of Tom Watson, his severest internal critic, greatly diminished. Corbyn also won a critical vote on Brexit which endorsed his position of neutrality going into a general election. The conference also passed a raft of policies that confirm support in the party for Corbyn’s desire to dramatically extend state intervention in the cause of promoting economic growth, greater equality and tackling climate change.

Ross Clark

Jeremy Corbyn would destroy the market for specialist medicines

Amid Labour’s jubilation over the Supreme Court decision yesterday it would have been easy to miss Jeremy Corbyn’s latest attack on the market economy. But it shouldn’t go unremarked because what Corbyn proposed would seriously damage the pharmaceuticals industry – either meaning that taxpayers would have to bear the enormous costs of developing drugs, or would mean fewer drugs being developed at all. Corbyn cited the case of nine year old cystic fibrosis sufferer Luis Walker, who is being denied the medicine, Orkambi, because the drugs manufacturer is refusing to sell it to the NHS at an affordable cost.

Tuesday

Mark Lehain

Even teachers are turning against Labour

At first, I assumed it would be a one off. I’m chatting about nothing in particular with a friend at a teacher conference when, having checked that no one else was in earshot, she blurted out: 'Look, don’t tell anyone, but I don’t think I can vote Labour any more. Their education stuff… it’s just crazy. It’ll take us back to the bad old days. I might even have to vote Tory.' Like a priest in a confessional, I assured her that I would of course not breathe a word to anyone about her sin of Tory-thinking. We chatted some more, both regretting Labour’s takeover by Bad Ideas and Bad People, and that was that. It felt as though it had been a cathartic experience for her, and I assumed nothing more would come of it.

The Supreme Court

The Supreme Court: why Boris Johnson’s prorogation of Parliament was unlawful

Below is a summary judgment released by the Supreme Court, explaining why the Court ruled that Boris Johnson's prorogation of Parliament was unlawful and void.  We have before us two appeals, one from the High Court of England and Wales and one from the Inner House of the Court of Session in Scotland. It is important, once again, to emphasise that these cases are not about when and on what terms the United Kingdom is to leave the European Union. They are only about whether the advice given by the Prime Minister to Her Majesty the Queen on 27th or 28th August, that Parliament should be prorogued from a date between 9th and 12th September until 14th October, was lawful and the legal consequences if it was not.

Isabel Hardman

Corbyn takes aim at Labour’s favourite bogeymen in conference speech

Jeremy Corbyn has just delivered one of his better party conference speeches. It wasn't just because it was much shorter than the average political address, but also because it made clear that Labour knows what it wants to do when it gets into power. There were a lot of policies in there. Some had popped up in other speeches this week, like the plan for free personal care. Others were new and very significant indeed, like the plan to take on pharmaceutical companies. This is Labour's 'Medicines for Many' programme which will make government funding for medical research conditional on the drugs being offered at an affordable price to the NHS, and set up a state generic drugs manufacturer of patent medicines so they can be supplied at a much lower cost to the health service.

The Spectator

Full text: Jeremy Corbyn’s conference speech

This is an extraordinary and precarious moment in our country’s history. The Prime Minister has been found to have acted illegally when he tried to shut down parliament.The highest court in the land has found that Boris Johnson broke the law when he tried to shut down democratic accountability at a crucial moment for our public life. The Prime Minister acted illegally when he tried to shut down opposition to his reckless and disastrous plan to crash out of the European Union without a deal. But he has failed. He will never shut down our democracy or silence the voices of the people. The democracy that Boris Johnson describes as a “rigmarole” will not be stifled and the people will have their say. Tomorrow parliament will return.

Ross Clark

Why the Court’s ruling may help Boris Johnson

In one respect Gina Miller is right. Today’s Supreme Court decision is bigger than Brexit. We are now in a civil war without bullets – between two sides who both claim to be fighting for democracy but who have very different ideas of what it entails. In the one corner are those who believe that democracy is where the electorate vote for something in a plebiscite and then government carries out its instructions; in the other corner are those who believe that democracy is Parliament and the courts acting together in what they see as the best interests of the people. As I have written here before, the correct term for what the latter group advocate, and what was demonstrated in the show of power by the Supreme Court this morning is Kritarchy, rule by judges.

James Kirkup

Brexiteers should cheer the Supreme Court

Ignore, with great respect, the people telling you today that the justices of the Supreme Court have waded into politics, exceeded their mandate and involved themselves in matters that belong to elected officials not the judiciary. Take five minutes to read the Court’s judgement on Boris Johnson’s prorogation of Parliament, where you will find a crystal-clear elucidation of principles that everyone – but perhaps especially those who favour leaving the EU – should celebrate and defend. Before I get to that, it appears to be necessary to point out what the Court has not done and not said. The judges have not ruled that Boris Johnson lied to the Queen, even though many people who really should know better are saying this. David Lammy, for instance: https://twitter.

Nick Cohen

Boris Johnson has made a nonsense of the Conservative party

In a judgment that will ring down the centuries, the Supreme Court unanimously finds that a Conservative prime minister had unlawfully suspended Parliament, and press ganged the Queen into being his accomplice. A Conservative prime minister, I should emphasise: the leader of a party that once lectured us on the need to defend the British constitution and rule of law from socialist extremists. Now it is reduced to being led by a jobbing journo, whose word few have believed since the early 1990s, and a thuggish clique of advisers, of the type who give student politics a bad name. They have driven genuine conservatives from their own party, and possibly millions of voters with them.

Steerpike

Ken Loach: Tom Watson is the biggest threat facing Labour

What's the biggest threat facing the Labour party? The Tories? The Lib Dems? Brexit? All wrong, says pro-Corbyn film director Ken Loach. The Kes filmmaker reckons its the likes of Tom Watson and other Labour MPs failing to line up behind Jeremy that is the thing to worry about right now. Loach told Mr S's favourite paper, the Morning Star, that 'the right inside Labour are the biggest obstacle to a Labour government'. He said: 'The right wing of the Labour party is the biggest threat we face. These are the inheritors of Ramsay MacDonald, Neil Kinnock and Roy Hattersley, Blair and Brown. The right, embodied by Tom Watson, aims to destroy the socialist programme. In the party there is the leadership and a core of socialists backing it.

Isabel Hardman

Corbyn to address Labour conference this afternoon

Time was when the box office attraction at Labour conference was going to be Tom Watson's speech this afternoon. The biggest drama would be activists who planned to walk out in protest at the deputy leader's constant undermining of Jeremy Corbyn. That was before the Supreme Court verdict, of course, and now Corbyn will be speaking at 4pm, having moved his speech forward from tomorrow so that he can head back to Westminster in time for parliament returning. But there's still some internal drama playing out: Labour's press team said Tom Watson would be speaking tomorrow afternoon to close conference, but Watson almost immediately said he wouldn't do this as he also wanted to be back in parliament. 'I'll have to save the speech until the next conference,' he said.

Alex Massie

The stunning modesty of the Supreme Court

'The king hath no prerogative, but that which the law of the land allows him'. So James VI & I was told by the courts in 1611 and so Boris Johnson has, in effect, been told today. There is something weighty, something dignified, about that. The Supreme Court’s ruling this morning, upholding the Court of Session’s earlier ruling on the lawfulness or otherwise of the government’s attempt to prorogue parliament, should be welcomed by everyone, be they a Leaver or a Remainer.  Brexit, and its rights or wrongs, is both at the heart of this case and tangential to it. At the heart because Brexit, the greatest constitutional kerfuffle of our lifetimes, renders these extraordinary times, and extraordinary circumstances justify extraordinary actions.

Steerpike

Watch: John Bercow says Parliament will return tomorrow

Less than two hours ago the Supreme Court released its verdict that Boris Johnson's decision to prorogue parliament was both unlawful and void. In its judgement, the Court decreed that since Parliament was never, legally, prorogued, the House of Commons could return as soon as the Speakers of the Commons and Lords arranged for it to be reconvened. It appears they have wasted no time in responding to the verdict. In a statement outside parliament this afternoon, the verbose Speaker John Bercow announced that he would resume Parliament's business tomorrow at 11.30am, saying: 'I have instructed the House authorities to prepare – not for the recall, the prorogation was unlawful and void – to prepare for the resumption of the business of the House of Commons.

Robert Peston

The Supreme Court has put MPs in charge. What will they do now?

There is no precedent for the Supreme Court finding that a PM acted unlawfully when advising the serving monarch. There is no precedent for the Supreme Court ruling that an order in the Privy Council to prorogue parliament is null and void. There is no precedent at all for the august and magisterial ceremony in parliament that sends MPs and Lords home being ruled by judges as a pointless exercise that should now be viewed as never having taken place. There is no precedent for judges to have ruled that parliament is in effect still sitting, that legislation that had been thought to have been lost is in effect still alive, after MPs and Lords had been told by the PM that their services were not required for five weeks.

Steerpike

Watch: Red Len loses his temper in Sky News interview

Labour members are planning a mass walkout at Tom Watson's conference speech this afternoon. And as for Brexit, it's safe to say Labour remains divided on the issue of whether Britain should stay in or leave the EU. Not so, says Len McCluskey. The Unite boss was asked by Sky News's Beth Rigby about the split over Brexit currently tearing the Labour party apart. It's safe to say he did not take the question well: Rigby: 'Your friend Jon Lansman was really upset about this NEC statement. It's basically a stitch up' McCluskey: 'Don't be trying to cause division where no division exists. Jon Lansman never said that. Stop telling lies. You should be ashamed of yourself.' Oh dear. Another MSM plot to do down the Labour party...

Katy Balls

Corbyn makes the most of Boris Johnson’s misfortune

The Supreme Court ruling has provided Jeremy Corbyn with his most positive outing at Labour conference. On hearing the news that the Prime Minister's prorogation of Parliament was unlawful, Corbyn took to the stage in a dramatic point of order – to rapturous applause. He called on Boris Johnson to 'in the historic words, consider his position'. The Labour leader said the judgment showed the Prime Minister's contempt for Parliament and promised to get in touch with House of Commons Speaker John Bercow immediately so that Parliament could be recalled (although the ruling suggests there is no need as in effect Parliament was never prorogued). Speaking to members and delegates, Corbyn said: 'A Labour government would want to be held to account. We wouldn’t bypass democracy.

Steerpike

Labour party conference 2019, in pictures

There's been an uneasy mood at the Labour party conference in stormy Brighton this week, as the party has split over whether it should back Remain in a second referendum, argued over the abolition of its deputy leader Tom Watson, and fought over who should be the successor to Jeremy Corbyn's throne. But despite all the flux, some things at Labour conference never change. Especially the party's unadulterated passion for Jeremy Corbyn and 'Socialism', displayed throughout the conference venues on posters, books, and of course, themed goods which can be sold to delegates with deep pockets.

Isabel Hardman

Keir Starmer prepares for life after Jeremy Corbyn

If you're a pro-Remain Labour member angry that the conference yesterday voted narrowly – and chaotically – to maintain the party's ambiguity on Brexit, where do you go? A number of shadow cabinet members are hoping they can be the answer to that question. Emily Thornberry has perhaps been the most obvious candidate to take over from Jeremy Corbyn, particularly when dressed as an EU flag, but she's got competition. Last night at a fringe meeting organised by Politico, shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer also made a rather obvious pitch of his own.