Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Tuesday

The Spectator

What’s on today at Labour conference: The Spectator guide | 24 September 2019

There is no love lost between Jeremy Corbyn and Tom Watson, so the Labour leader will have to grin and bear it as his deputy takes to the stage this afternoon. Here is the pick of today's events in Brighton: Labour events:  8:30: Policy Seminar 9:45: Morning Plenary Session: Tackling The Climate Emergency 12:35: Votes 12:45: Break 14:00: Afternoon Plenary Session: Tackling The Climate Emergency Tom Watson MP Speech 16:45: Policy Seminars 17:20: Votes   Fringe events:  10:30: Students Against Climate Change: What Can We Do? Ambassador, Hilton Brighton Metropole 12:00: Diversity in the Law – Room for Improvement?

Monday

James Johnson

Tories should be terrified of John McDonnell

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, I discussed potential candidates in focus groups, played videos to voters, and polled frontbenchers’ perceived attributes. The most consistently effective potential leader? Shadow chancellor, John McDonnell.  This may seem surprising – and as a Conservative it was a painful discovery. But he ‘focus grouped’ remarkably well.

Warren Morgan

Labour’s anti-Semitic followers aren’t welcome in Brighton

When Labour last came to Brighton for its annual conference, I sat in a studio listening to people who had faced abuse because they were Jewish. I heard statements recorded at a fringe event suggesting it was fine to question whether the Holocaust had ever happened. As leader of the city's council, I had to act. I wrote a letter saying Labour would not be welcome back in Brighton if it failed to sort out its issues with anti-Semitism. Two years on, I have been forced out of the party I loved. But Labour's dark problem remains. The backlash against my message was swift and took me by surprise. I had been a member of the party for a quarter of a century. Perhaps I was naïve, but Jeremy Corbyn's vow to root out racism made me feel I was helping.

Martin Vander Weyer

2019 finalists lunch – Scotland & Northern Ireland

Another fine lunch and a particularly fine Edinburgh venue for our encounter with finalists for the Scotland & Northern Ireland region of The Spectator’s Economic Disruptor Awards 2019. We’re in the Register Club, inside the Edinburgh Grand Hotel on St Andrew’s Square – a building which happens to have been the headquarters of Royal Bank of Scotland before its chief executive Fred Goodwin commissioned an extravagant new campus on the city outskirts. Fred’s name will forever be associated with RBS’s 2008 collapse, and guess what: we’re lunching in a handsome room that actually used to be his office.

Isabel Hardman

Fury at Labour conference over Brexit votes

On paper, Labour's conference has managed to unite around the Brexit position set out by the leadership. Delegates this afternoon overwhelmingly approved the NEC statement endorsing Jeremy Corbyn's plan to decide how the party will campaign in a referendum at a special conference after a general election. They then voted down the rebel composite motion which called for the party to campaign unequivocally for Remain from now on. But what happened in the conference hall was chaotic and means the issue is unlikely to feel resolved for a lot of party members. The NEC vote was overwhelming, but the vote on composite 13 was much closer. So close, in fact, that there was a disagreement between those on the stage about which way it had gone.

Steerpike

Watch: the moment Labour almost backed Remain

Labour conference was mired in controversy this afternoon, as the party voted against backing  Remain in a second referendum. While the party's conference ended up passing Jeremy Corbyn's preferred Brexit position, the key vote on whether Labour would back Remain was only dropped after Labour's general secretary and Corbyn ally, Jennie Formby overruled the debate chair. Labour motions at conference are voted on with a show of hands, and at first, the chair of the debate believed that the Remain motion had passed – which would  have been an embarrassing setback for Jeremy Corbyn. Remarkably though, the chair's decision was then contested by Formby, who believed more people had voted against the motion in the hall.

Robert Peston

Boris Johnson would be foolish to underestimate Labour

In the next election, as in the last one, McDonnellism will prove a serious challenge to the Tories. John McDonnell, as chancellor, confirmed that in government, he and Jeremy Corbyn would make a full frontal attack on 40 years of economic and industrial orthodoxy, the precepts that markets know best and that our prosperity depends on trusting the private sector. During the first 30 years, this orthodoxy may have delivered relatively steady income growth for the economy as a whole. But over the full 40 years, we've seen the greatest shift in history between the share of national income that accrues to workers and what is taken by the owners and providers of capital.

Brendan O’Neill

Emily Thornberry’s political wardrobe malfunction

These days everyone in politics is obsessed with ‘optics’, with making sure they never do or say anything that might look bad to the public. Which makes Emily Thornberry’s European Union outfit all the more extraordinary. Thornberry paraded around Brighton in a blue-and-gold EU dress like some wide-eyed devotee of the cult of Brussels. What the hell was she thinking? It was at the ‘People’s Vote’ march in Brighton to coincide with the Labour conference. (Those quote marks around ‘People’s Vote’ are necessary because of course we already had a people’s vote, in 2016. What these people really want is a second referendum to try to erase the people’s vote in the first referendum.

Isabel Hardman

John McDonnell’s radical conference speech

John McDonnell's speech showed what Labour's aim for this conference – were it going smoothly – is. The party wants to present a domestic policy agenda so radical that it drowns out discussion of Brexit. As the progress of this conference shows, though, that's going to be very difficult. The shadow chancellor announced plenty of attention-grabbing policies: Labour will reduce the average working week to just 32 hours without cutting pay, it will end in-work poverty, restore full trade union rights, introduce free personal care, and even commit to 'reparations' to developing countries for climate change.  He only spoke briefly on Brexit, but even in this short section, he differed from the leadership line by saying once again that he would campaign for Remain.

Christopher Snowdon

Labour should scrap state schools, not private ones

Shadow education secretary Angela Rayner has promised that if Labour wins the next election it will use its first budget to ‘immediately close the tax loopholes used by elite private schools and use that money to improve the lives of all children.’ This slab of red meat went down well with the class warriors at the party’s conference in Brighton, where there were doubtless plenty of teachers in attendance, but it wasn’t enough. Labour conference not only voted to withdraw charitable status from private schools, but to abolish them altogether. This was described, rather euphemistically, as ‘integrating all private schools into the state sector’ by Holly Rigby of the not remotely euphemistic Abolish Eton campaign.

Isabel Hardman

Will Labour conference defy Jeremy Corbyn and back Remain?

Labour conference will this afternoon vote on three different motions on its Brexit position. There are two – one from the NEC, and one from delegates – which endorse the leadership's plan to put this decision off until after the next general election, and then to hold a special one-day conference to decide instead. Then there's an unambiguously pro-Remain motion. It's going to be tight. Those around Jeremy Corbyn are anxious that conference doesn't back the Remain stance, seeing it not just as a debate about policy, but as a move that could seriously undermine the Labour leader's own position.

Stephen Daisley

The truth about David Cameron’s progressive legacy

One of the downsides of all this snarking at David Cameron over Brexit is that the rest of his legacy is getting away relatively snark-free. Fraser Nelson has resumed his valiant campaign to repackage the Cameron years as a well-spring of progressive Toryism, specifically in job creation, the expansion of academies, and shifting the tax burden. This effort has always struck me as iffy. For one thing, shouldn’t conservatives want the credit for economic dynamism, school choice and tax cuts to go to conservatism, rather than concede them as ‘progressive’ outcomes which conservatives have achieved in spite of their unfortunate philosophy? But Fraser isn’t really a conservative.

Ross Clark

The EU has failed again to strike a free trade deal

So once again we learn just how committed the EU is to free trade. A trade deal with the South American bloc Mercosur – comprising Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay – has been under negotiation for 20 years. The icing appeared to be on the cake, the ribbon about to be cut – but at the end of last week it was skewered by Austria’s Parliament voting against it. Without the agreement of all 28 EU member states the deal cannot go ahead. It is reminiscent of what happened to Ceta, the EU’s trade deal with Canada which was about to clear its last hurdle when, in 2016, the regional parliament of Walloonia in Belgium threw a spanner in the works.

Sunday

Alan West

The Royal Navy’s five new frigates isn’t enough to keep Britain safe

Boris Johnson’s announcement last week that five Type 31e frigates are to be ordered is welcome. But we must not delude ourselves that this will resolve the problem of the lack of frigates in the Royal Navy’s inventory. The Royal Navy currently has thirteen frigates, all of the Type 23 variant. Designed to have a 25-year life, considerable sums have been spent upgrading their capabilities and extending their lives. In 2023, aged 34, they start leaving the navy at the rate of one a year. The first of the five new T31e frigates should start sea trials in 2023, although this seems doubtful. So, in four years' time, instead of having thirteen working frigates, the number will fall to twelve until the new ships enter service after successful sea trials.

Isabel Hardman

Labour shouts down its own message

Labour was supposed to be having only one big row this week at conference - on Brexit. Instead, it's ended up having two: one about how the party will campaign on Britain's future relationship with Europe and the second on Jeremy Corbyn's leadership. Today has not seen a good recovery from the Labour leader after yesterday's attempt to oust Tom Watson. Corbyn appeared to save the day by refusing to allow the motion to go ahead at the NEC meeting, but is much wounded by the fact that the putsch was attempted at all. That there are suspicions one of his own aides, Karie Murphy, was part of this plot, hasn't helped. But far more damaging is the resignation of Andrew Fisher, which I covered this morning.

Katy Balls

Watson-mania hits Labour conference

This year's Labour conference is proving to be a rather sedated affair after a difficult few days for Jeremy Corbyn. Rather than Corbyn-mania taking hold of attendees, attendees report of a flat atmosphere following the high drama of John Lansman's botched attempt to oust Tom Watson as deputy leader. After the first vote failed on Friday night, Jeremy Corbyn intervened to stop plans for a second vote. However, that hasn't stopped internal rows – with infighting becoming the main story of conference so far and rumours growing over Corbyn's exit. There is one politician, however, who is clearly enjoying conference and that's Watson. Watson allies are delighted with how this whole affair has turned out. 'They are the ones who are crumbling,' says a Labour figure of the Corbynistas.

Steerpike

Labour’s new policy: abolish private schools

Here we go. As the debate continues within the Labour party as to which Brexit policy will win the party the most seats at a general election, the mainstream domestic policy agenda is progressing nicely. This evening, Labour delegates approved a motion for a Labour government to seemingly abolish private schools. The motion is to 'integrate' private schools into the state sector. Rather than knock them down, the idea appears to be that a school such as Eton would become part of the state system. However, Mr S's Labour mole says there is a grey area as to the exact details as the motion passed is clumsily worded. Set aside the small matter that private schools educate 15pc of sixthformers (ie, the ones who apply to university) when 7pc is a figure for the whole system.

Robert Peston

Labour conference begins in confusion over Brexit and Tom Watson

Welcome to Labour’s Twilight Zone, its ruling NEC, whose members don’t know whether they have or haven’t approved a draft policy statement in favour of a referendum combined with militant agnosticism on Leave versus Remain. Some members of the NEC said they opposed the policy, because they see it as a backdoor route - orchestrated by Milne, McCluskey and Murphy - to move the party towards becoming a Brexit party all over again. Yesterday the NEC chair Wendy Nichols asked for amendments to the statement. There were too many for a compromise to be found. Another meeting was scheduled for 8am this morning, and then summarily cancelled after 11pm last night.

Katy Balls

Emily Thornberry refuses to sing from same hymn sheet as Corbyn

Although Jeremy Corbyn used his Andrew Marr interview to try to smooth over and move on from internal party rows at Labour conference, his colleagues appear to have other ideas. This morning, Corbyn ally Len McCluskey used a media appearance to say that pro-Remain shadow cabinet ministers must either get on side and sing 'from the same hymn sheet' on Corbyn's Brexit plans – or 'step aside'. He singled out Emily Thornberry for criticism: 'My message to them, to Emily and anyone else, is to support your leader.' However, McCluskey is to be left disappointed. Thornberry used a fringe event this lunchtime to reiterate her view that Labour should campaign on an explicitly pro-Remain footing in an election.