Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Monday

Jeremy Vine

My Boris Johnson story

With four minutes to go, Boris Johnson ran in. I was already concerned – maybe more concerned than Boris. It was an awards ceremony at the Hilton, Park Lane. The room was packed with financial people in bow ties. It was a couple of years before Johnson became Mayor of London. At this point he was a backbench Conservative MP and newspaper columnist. Right now he was due to make a funny speech. In four minutes. There I was, at 9.26pm, sitting with a table-load of London bankers, trying to answer their questions. 'Will Boris actually arrive?' 'Is he normally this late?' 'Has he got lost?' I answered them all as best I could: (a) I’m sorry (b) I don’t know (c) I don’t see Boris Johnson that often You see, I explained, I am only here to hand out the awards for...

Sunday

Matthew Hancock

Matt Hancock: why I’m backing Boris

The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, dropped out of the leadership race last week and had been mulling whether to support Michael Gove (odds: 25/1) or Boris Johnson (1/5). In the end, he went for Boris. In an article in The Times, he says more. Here's an edited extract. Central to my outlook is that we need to be optimistic about our country, take an optimistic view of human nature, and get this country moving forward with energy and vim. Because I care about people’s chances in life, I also care deeply about the best way to stop Jeremy Corbyn becoming prime minister. Boris has run a disciplined campaign and is almost certainly going to be our next prime minister.

Katy Balls

Leadership hopefuls turn on one another in Channel 4 debate

The first televised Tory leadership debate drew as much attention for who wasn't there as who was. After Boris Johnson decided to avoid the Channel 4 leadership debate on the grounds that voters had had enough blue-on-blue action (and perhaps also that as the Tory leadership frontrunner he has little to gain and much to lose from such an event), the broadcaster decided to effectively empty-chair him – putting up a lectern where he would have been. It then fell to Johnson's leadership rivals Jeremy Hunt, Sajid Javid, Dominic Raab, Rory Stewart and Michael Gove to provide the substance of the 90-minute programme. It kicked off with enough blue-on-blue attacks for the Johnson campaign to have some cover over their decision to give it a miss.

Steerpike

Jeremy Hunt’s pledge for the elderly

When you consider that Theresa May's unwise decision to campaign for a 'dementia tax' almost single-handedly cost her the general election in 2017, you would think that the current Tory leadership candidates would be very careful about alienating older voters ahead of any upcoming membership vote. Jeremy Hunt, though, seemed to take the opposite tack following the television leadership debate tonight. While the Foreign Secretary tried to make the point that more should be done to protect the oldest in our society as they approach their final days, in practice, he seemed instead to call for a cull of anyone with a bus pass. In a social media banner advertising his policies, Hunt quoted himself saying that: 'Every older person should die with dignity and respect.

Steerpike

Blue on blue warfare at the Tory leadership debate

It's the first of the Tory leadership television debates tonight, as the candidates vying to be the next prime minister (minus Boris, who chose not take part) spar over Brexit and their suitability to lead the country in the next stage of the negotiations. And while it might seem like not that long ago that the candidates were talking about a 'clean' campaign pledge, it didn't take long for blue on blue warfare to break out on live television. One of the first to go on the attack was Home Secretary Sajid Javid. Asked by host Krishnan Guru-Murthy if he would consider suspending parliament through prorogation to allow a no-deal Brexit, Javid gave an impassioned speech in defence of British parliamentary democracy.

Matthew Taylor

Sunday shows round-up: I am prepared to leave without a deal, says Jeremy Hunt

Jeremy Hunt - EU will be 'willing to renegotiate' Brexit deal The Foreign Secretary joined Andrew Marr this morning, days after coming second in round one of the ongoing Conservative leadership contest. With a good chance of reaching the final round, Hunt asserted that, unlike frontrunner Boris Johnson, he would be able to persuade other European leaders to amend Theresa May's Withdrawal Agreement to remove the controversial backstop arrangement for Northern Ireland: AM: Have you got any evidence at all that anybody is prepared to [reopen the negotiations]? JH: When you talk to European leaders, as I do, they want to solve this problem.

Melanie McDonagh

Jeremy Corbyn is right about Iran and the tanker attacks

Jeremy Corbyn’s right about Iran, isn’t he? On the attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, he tweeted (and don’t you just wish politicians could use a more considered medium?): 'Britain should act to ease tensions in the Gulf, not fuel a military escalation that began with US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear agreement. Without credible evidence about the tanker attacks, the government’s rhetoric will only increase the threat of war.' What, precisely, is wrong about that? What exactly about it caused the Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, to call him 'pathetic' and 'predictable'? Hunt himself didn’t exactly follow the US party line in announcing Iran was to blame for the attacks initially.

Katy Balls

How Rory Stewart derailed his Cabinet colleagues’ campaigns

When Rory Stewart first announced his intention to enter the race to be the UK's next prime minister, he was seen by colleagues as having little to no chance of making it far in the leadership contest. Yet as the Parliamentary contest goes into its second week, Stewart is one of six contenders left standing and has today won a ministerial endorsement in the form of Tobias Ellwood. The Defence Minister had been backing Matt Hancock but after the Health Secretary bowed out on Friday, he will now back Stewart – praising the DfID Secretary's enthusiasm. This could become a recurring theme – Michael Gove, Sajid Javid and Jeremy Hunt had all hoped to pick up many of Hancock's supporters to help them in the next round yet a chunk are now considering backing Stewart instead.

Saturday

Ben Sixsmith

Nish Kumar is Jo Brand’s most obnoxious defender

We are all aware that Jo Brand saying battery acid would be a more appropriate liquid than milkshakes to throw at people was a joke. It was a bad joke, but it was a joke. We are all aware that the chances of a Radio 4 listener hearing the joke and being inspired to hurl battery acid at a right-wing politician are slim to none. It remains such a morbid and mean-spirited jest that it should not be made, let alone by people whose jokes are being funded by the taxpayer, but it is foolish to classify it as incitement. What rankles is the pungent hypocrisy of Brand's liberal and left-wing defenders. If the joke had been by a right-wing Twitter troll of Jess Phillips or Jeremy Corbyn the demands to deplatform them would have been ear-splitting.

Charles Day

Will Britain really have a debt to the EU after Brexit?

If a lawyer advises you to pay money which you do not owe, and you do so, then you can sue that lawyer to compensate you for the loss. That’s because the lawyer owes his client a duty to not give wrong advice. Does a politician or a journalist owe that duty? Can we sue them if their advice is wrong? We need to know an answer to this as a nation, because far too many people who should know better, are wrongly advising the British people that they owe a 'debt' to the EU. The people who use the word are not using it metaphorically, indeed how could they, we’ve been a net contributor to the club for years – there’s no moral debt. These people, like the MP Chris Bryant, often describe it as a 'legal debt', presumably to make it sound more believable.

Friday

Katy Balls

The Layla Moran Edition

29 min listen

Layla Moran tells Katy Balls about her childhood as a diplomat's daughter, the social life of an MP, and getting arrested at Lib Dem conference.Presented by Katy Balls.

Matthew Lesh

Why the next Tory leader should listen to Philip Hammond

Philip Hammond is up to one last trick before bowing out – and it’s a good one. The Chancellor has called on each of the Tory leadership candidates to commit to ensuring Britain’s debt falls as a share of national income every year. Hammond reportedly asked in a letter to leadership candidates: 'If we do not commit to getting our debt down after a nine-year run of uninterrupted economic growth, how can we demonstrate a dividing line between the fiscal responsibility of our party and the reckless promises of John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn?' Playing Labour-lite – promising just a little less spending than socialists Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell – is not only fiscally irresponsible but provides political cover for their reckless plans.

Anand Menon & Alan Wager

Three things the next Tory leader needs to know about Brexit

And then there were six. The Conservative leadership contest already feels interminable – and, let’s face it, it’s been going since the day after the 2017 election. And yet it’s only this week that the candidates have formally thrown their hats in the ring. We’ve already been treated to bucketloads of ambitious claims, bold rhetoric, and appeals to the power of positive thinking. We’ve had precious little, however, that even begins to respond to the key questions raised by the largest single issue confronting us. So in an attempt to be helpful, we thought we’d address those still in the race and list these Brexit questions in the hope that someone – anyone – in the running to be our next prime minister might have some answers.

Isabel Hardman

Can anyone stop Boris Johnson becoming prime minister?

Can anyone stop Boris Johnson? It is an inevitability that the former Mayor of London will be in the final two candidates of the Tory leadership contest, and already many members of other campaigns are talking about what he will do as Prime Minister, rather than how their candidate will beat him. Given there has been an ‘anyone but Boris’ operation rumbling on for a number of years now, this seems to be a rather early admission of defeat. It is true that Johnson’s opponents were too confident in their presumption that he wasn’t sufficiently popular in the parliamentary party to guarantee his inclusion in the final two. Yesterday’s result shows his campaign team have managed to reverse any unpopularity dramatically.

Katy Balls

Matt Hancock bows out of the leadership race – where will his supporters go?

Matt Hancock has become the first leadership candidate to bow out of the race following the first secret ballot. In Thursday's vote, Hancock came sixth – winning 20 votes. Announcing his decision, Hancock said he was 'hugely grateful' for the support he had received but had concluded now was not his time as the 'party is understandably looking for a candidate for the unique circumstances we face right now': 'I have therefore decided to withdraw from this contest, and I will look for the best way to advance the values we fought for, of free enterprise, and an open, aspirational, free society, underpinned by an optimistic belief in the value of each individual person.

Freddy Gray

Boris should ignore Lynton Crosby’s debate-ducking advice

There is a reason Boris Johnson is avoiding the TV debates, and his name is Lynton Crosby.  Crosby is running the Johnson leadership campaign — in awkward conjunction, it seems, with Boris’s girlfriend Carrie Symonds. He is a veritable TV debatephobe. He has run the last two Tory general elections, and he ordered David Cameron and Theresa May to shy away from the TV debates.  In Crosby’s view, debate-ducking is the sensible course. He sees no upside. For frontrunners, especially, if the debate goes well, there is no real uptick in support. The only way a TV debate can influence an election is if a candidate has a massive gaffe, a viral FAIL that destroys his or her credibility. So best shunned.

Steerpike

Chuka’s Lib Dem comments come back to haunt him

For the past week they've been exchanging side-glances, passing on compliments, and making excuses to spend time together. Now they've made it official. Yes, late last night Chuka Umunna finally made his move and joined the Lib Dems. In an interview with the Times announcing the new relationship, the former Labour MP revealed that he was 'really grateful to Vince' Cable for keeping the door wide open for him to join, and had been made 'to feel incredibly welcome' by his new party.

Robert Peston

Why the Tory leadership race could now be cut short

Before this Tory leadership election started, the party’s grandees and custodians were telling me party members MUST at all costs be given a choice of candidates to be leader and our next prime minister. Now they tell me Boris Johnson is so far ahead - both among MPs and seemingly among the membership - that it would politically insane to stick to the current timetable of two candidates beating each other up in public, in front of mostly retired white men, for four weeks.

Tom Goodenough

Please can we stop calling Boris ‘Mr Johnson’?

Boris Johnson has undergone a makeover and no, it’s got nothing to do with his tidier hair and vanishing paunch. While Boris's girlfriend Carrie Symonds has been busy transforming his appearance, journalists are now doing their bit to rebrand Boris too. I’m talking of course about Boris becoming Mr Johnson. A ‘request’ from Channel 4’s Louisa Compton is doing the rounds telling reporters to ‘STOP referring to Boris Johnson as just ‘Boris’. She says: ‘He’s a politician - we shouldn’t use first names for politicians - doing so is over-familiar and gives the impression they’re our mates, or much loved comedy characters’.

Stephen Daisley

Jo Brand and the death of comedy

I have celebrated John Bercow, eulogised Martin McGuinness and urged Spectator readers to vote Labour. So I appreciate I’m on thin ice with a defence of Jo Brand, and since the hefty lefty and I are of similar girth, that metaphor could end badly. Yet the news she is being investigated by police over a joke ought to bring even the most phlegmatic conservative to the barricades. Some things are just wrong, even if Brendan O’Neill is against them too.  Appearing as a guest on Radio 4 panel programme Heresy on Tuesday, Brand riffed on the phenomenon of ‘milkshaking’, in which progressives throw chilled beverages over people they disagree with because when they go low, we go high.