Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Friday

Karen Pierce

From the archives: the Dame Karen Pierce Edition

30 min listen

Women with Balls has taken a summer break and will be back in September with a new series. Until then, here’s an episode from the archives, with Dame Karen Pierce, who will shortly complete her term as British Ambassador to the United States. Filmed in 2019, when Dame Karen was the UK’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, she talks to Katy Balls about her career ambitions when she was young, using Lewis Carroll to combat the Russians, and what day to day life is like at the UN.

Katja Hoyer

Olaf Scholz’s immigration quagmire

Shock quickly turned to anger in Germany when a Syrian asylum seeker was arrested for the brutal knife attack in the city of Solingen last weekend. Three people were murdered and eight more injured by a man who had no right to be in Germany.  Politicians from the coalition government reacted with a flurry of statements, demanding anything from tougher knife laws to quicker deportations of illegal migrants. But many voters want to see more than tweaks to the immigration system before they can begin to feel safe again on Germany’s streets. The message to Scholz is clear: if he wants to toughen immigration policy, he’ll have to do it without the

Amber Duke

The Kamala interview was a missed opportunity

CNN was the lucky winner of the first sit-down media interview with Vice President Kamala Harris since she was pushed to the top of the ticket nearly 40 days ago and, well, it didn’t go great.  It was not a particularly long interview. Dana Bash confirmed nothing was cut, but we still got only about 16 minutes of speaking time from Kamala. This was made more obvious by CNN’s decision to stretch the interview like pizza dough to fit an hour broadcast. They opened with a nearly five minute teaser video that came across like an ad for the Harris campaign, with Bash calling the interview a ‘watershed moment’ in

Thursday

Rupert Christiansen

Alt reich: Is Germany’s far right about to go mainstream?

46 min listen

This week: Alt reich. The Spectator’s Lisa Haseldine asks if Germany’s far right is about to go mainstream, ahead of regional elections this weekend. Lisa joined the podcast, alongside the historian Katja Hoyer, to discuss why the AfD are polling so well in parts of Germany, and how comparable this is to other trends across Europe (1:13). Then: why are traditional hobbies being threatened in Britain? Writer Richard Bratby joins the podcast, alongside Chris Bradbury, the drone support officer at the BMFA, to discuss his article in the magazine this week about the challenge red-tape poses to model steam engine and aeroplane enthusiasts (18:47). And finally: how has sound design changed

Andrew Tettenborn

Starmer may regret an outdoor smoking ban

It’s a curious political world. Few who voted Labour last month actually wanted Labour policies, or for that matter had more than the haziest idea what they were. Now the Labour leadership is returning the compliment. It is increasingly obvious that it has neither much idea what electors want, nor any great desire to provide them with it. Withdrawing the winter fuel allowance, going hell-bent for net zero (whatever the consequences), clamping down on our rights online, the list goes on. The government’s proposed extension of the smoking ban, leaked yesterday, is a further case in point. Most British people have strong views about liberty and minding one’s own business The

Annabel Denham

Is it a surprise that Labour want to ban outdoor smoking?

Anyone surprised by leaked documents showing smoking may soon be banned in beer gardens, small parks, outdoor restaurants, open-air spaces at nightclubs and outside football stadiums hasn’t been paying attention.  For a start, the UK has been on the slippery slope towards tobacco prohibition for nearly two decades: Tony Blair banned smoking outdoors, Theresa May set a target of going ‘smoke-free’ by 2030. Rishi Sunak – a man whose opposition to some of the tougher lockdown measures gave a glimmer of hope that liberalism hadn’t been entirely extinguished in the Tory party – attempted to make a generational ban on tobacco sales his legacy. All of this is a death

Katy Balls

How far will Starmer’s smoking ban go?

19 min listen

Keir Starmer has confirmed that the government is looking at plans to revive Sunak’s smoking ban legislation. They may go even further – reports suggest they will seek to extend the current indoor ban for hospitality venues, to outdoor places such as pub gardens. What’s the rationale behind this, and where could it lead? How popular is the measure with the public? And, following Starmer’s speech on Tuesday about the economic problems the nation faces, is this another thing for business to worry about? Patrick Gibbons speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews.

Steerpike

Starmer’s special advisers: a complete guide

Keir Starmer wasted no time on entering 10 Downing Street in appointing his cabinet that same day. But taking longer are the junior ministerial posts – some still vacant – and the appointment of special advisers. Such aides often get a bad rep around Westminster, thanks, in part to the mythology of The Thick Of It. But they play a key role in government, with some even wielding more power than the average minister. As is often the case with plum jobs, demand outweighs supply, with too few posts to share around the Starmtroopers. Here are the appointments so far: Sue Gray – Chief of Staff. Keir’s all powerful pick

Katy Balls

How far will Starmer’s smoking ban go?

When Rishi Sunak announced his plan to create a ‘smoke-free generation’ at conference, some of his own MPs were bemused. It wasn’t just the policy but the timing – were the Tory grassroots the right audience? In truth, Sunak had been in a rush to make the announcement because he feared (and some of his advisers had warned) that if he didn’t do it soon, Labour might beat him to it. So there was little surprise when in Keir Starmer’s first King’s Speech, the bill was resurrected. However, now Starmer and his Health Secretary Wes Streeting plan to go further than Sunak planned. The bill was initially designed to phase

Steerpike

Starmer’s ratings hit record low as cronyism row continues

To Downing Street, where it appears the new Prime Minister isn’t having the most pleasant of premierships. Sir Keir Starmer has been in the top job for less than two months – and yet he’s already facing a cronyism row that doesn’t appear to be disappearing. Despite the resignation of Labour donor Ian Corfield from a senior civil service role in the Treasury it appears that, amid all the scrutiny, public goodwill towards the PM is waning. Starmer’s personal approval rating has bombed to record lows while approval for his government is worse than that of previous administrations at the same point. Talk about buyer’s remorse, eh? Pollsters More In

Ross Clark

Is Starmer now a friend of the oil and gas industry?

Keir Starmer’s government appears to have softened its stance on oil and gas. Back in June 2023, the Labour leader told an audience in Edinburgh that there would be no new licences for oil and gas exploration in the North Sea. Instead, a Labour government would pursue green energy all the way, slashing our bills (it promised) and taking us ever faster to the nirvana of net zero. But how the responsibilities of government come to bear. A release from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) this morning indicates some notable shuffling of ground.  Far from cheering a recent Supreme Court ruling which quashed planning permission for a small oil

Steerpike

Starmer snubs No. 10 Thatcher painting

Well, well, well. It seems Sir Keir Starmer wasn’t exaggerating about his ‘change’ agenda. It now transpires that the new Prime Minister has taken it upon himself to redecorate parts of No. 10 – and has reportedly gone so far as to remove a portrait of Margaret Thatcher from Downing Street. Talk about a Labour takeover… The rather curious report comes after Sir Keir’s biographer Tom Baldwin was interviewed in Scotland, at Glasgow’s Aye Write summer book festival. The Gordon Brown-commissioned picture, funded by an anonymous donation that covered its £100,000 price tag, is the first painting of an ex-PM ever to be requested by No. 10 – yet despite

Andrew Tettenborn

The worrying return of non-crime hate incidents

The longer it continues in office, the more reactionary and beholden to vested interests this government turns out to be. So far it has surrendered to the establishment on immigration, on the EU, and on higher education (blocking any awkward notions of making administrators respect free speech). Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, now appears to believe it is the police establishment’s turn to be appeased: witness the reports this week about the recording of non-crime hate incidents, or NCHIs. Until about three years ago, NCHIs were recorded by the police in vast numbers, largely against people who spoke out of turn online, however lawfully, and had a complaint made against

Steerpike

Labour mulls outdoor smoking ban

It looks like there could be bad news again for smokers ahead of the return of parliament in September. Already Starmer’s stubbers have committed to resurrecting the last government’s pledge to ban smoking completely for those born after 2009, as part of a phased roll-out which would see ordinary members of the public ID’d at the shop till well into their 80s.  Now though it seems the new Labour administration wants to go even further. According to the Sun, leaked Whitehall papers show that ministers are considering an assault on the right to smoke outdoors as well, with the government looking to ban smoking entirely in beer gardens, restaurant terraces, shisha bars, children’s

Mary Dejevsky

Is Lord Mandelson cut out for Washington?

Is Lord Mandelson being ‘lined up’ as the UK’s next ambassador in Washington? The news that the Labour party’s arch-Blairite and one-time spin-doctor extraordinaire may be in the running for what is seen as the UK’s top diplomatic job has generated an immediate and impassioned reaction, much of it hostile. Some of this is because Mandelson is viewed as the epitome of New Labour. While others are concerned by the political and personal baggage Mandelson would inevitably bring with him.  Some of the very qualities that made him so successful in the UK and in Europe had the opposite effect in the US Now it cannot be excluded that this is no more than a kite-flying

Douglas Murray

Labour’s age of miracles

I am not yet eligible for the winter fuel allowance. Nor am I especially in favour of it, regarding it as one of those times when the government bribes the public with the public’s own money and expects gratitude for doing so. Like anyone who pays taxes, I rather resent a government of any stripe using my earnings to make themselves look good. I’d go so far as to say it irks me. Still, I have watched Labour’s abolition of the scheme with something like awe. I know pensioners who appreciate the couple of hundred quid that the government lobs their way each winter. But last month the Chancellor of

Peter Jones

What ‘rot’ is Keir Starmer talking about?

With the elections over, it might be time to reflect on what Sir Keir Starmer means by ‘rot’ in the ‘foundations of this country’. What foundations are those? Political? In the democracy (‘citizen-power’) invented by the Greeks, men over the age of 18 meeting in assembly took all decisions that our politicians take today and, aged over 30, all decisions in the courts. It lasted for 180 years (508-322 bc), but did not survive, being characterised as ‘the rule of the poor, looting the rich’.  The Romans invented republicanism (‘the people’s property’). The Senate, drawn from the elites, both made the laws and occupied the various official positions – legal,

The Spectator

Is this Rachel Reeves’s idea of a programme for growth?

It is certainly true that the Labour party has been more than a little devious over the tax rises that are to come. After an election campaign in which it insisted it had no plans – and no need – to increase taxes beyond a few measures such as extending VAT on school fees, mysterious holes started appearing in the public finances as soon as the party achieved office. So acute, apparently, is the lack of funds that Sir Keir Starmer felt the need to warn us this week that October’s Budget will be ‘painful’. It is an old trick, which David Cameron and George Osborne also tried to pull

Katy Balls

The Tory leadership contest is wide open

Conservative MPs who hoped for a relaxing summer break have had a nasty shock: their phones have been ringing on repeat. With just 121 MPs in their corner, the Tory leadership candidates are fiercely competing for each one’s backing. ‘They call on bank holidays when I’m with my partner,’ complains one old-timer. ‘I’m trying to relax by the pool – then I get James Cleverly on the line,’ adds another. The decision to opt for a long contest lasting until November was meant to give candidates a break. Kemi Badenoch took one, but was attacked for missing a hustings in the north – she reacted with trademark fury and defended

Charles Moore

Starmer’s specs appeal

No doubt Lord Alli should not have been given a 10 Downing Street pass, but that is true of most who work there. BB (Before Blair), roughly 100 people were in the building. Today, it is 300. The quality of government has deteriorated as the numbers have swelled. At least Lord Alli has been genuinely useful. It is officially declared that he gave Sir Keir Starmer ‘multiple pairs of glasses’ worth £2,485. It was an inspired move. Until about April this year, Sir Keir did not wear spectacles on public occasions. Observers concentrated on his startled and unhappy-looking eyes because they were the only striking thing in his oddly inexpressive