Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Thursday

William Moore

The deluge: Rishi Sunak’s election gamble

53 min listen

It’s a bumper edition of The Edition this week. After Rishi Sunak called a surprise – and perhaps misguided – snap election just a couple of hours after our press deadline, we had to frantically come up with a new digital cover. To take us through a breathless day in Westminster and the fallout of Rishi’s botched announcement, The Spectator’s political editor Katy Balls joins the podcast. (01:35) Next: Our print magazine leads on the electric car bust. Ross Clark runs through all the issues facing electric cars today – from China flooding the market with discounted EVs to Rishi Sunak dropping the unrealistic target of banning new petrol car sales by

Steerpike

Watch: Sunak’s Welsh football blunder

It’s the beginning of a general election campaign, which can only mean one thing: politicians pretending to care about football to connect with the punters.  Rishi Sunak kicked things off, with his first campaign stop at a brewery in Wales this afternoon – a brave choice of venue for a politician many voters think really couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery after his rain-soaked election announcement yesterday.  Keen to pal it up with the assembled Welsh brewers, and no doubt mindful that his election campaign was going to overlap with this year’s Euros, Sunak asked the group if they were looking forward to ‘all the football’.  The prime minister presumably hadn’t

Gavin Mortimer

Why Le Pen is happy to cut ties with the AfD

This evening French television broadcasts a live debate between prime minister Gabriel Attal and Jordan Bardella. The president of the National Rally is on course for a spectacular victory in the European elections on 9 June, but Emmanuel Macron hopes that his Boy Wonder might be able to close the gap tonight with a strong performance. One of Attal’s few lines of attack will be Russia When Macron nominated Attal his PM in January, he was dubbed the ‘anti-Bardella’ choice. His predecessor, the eye-wateringly dull Elisabeth Borne, had by her age and Socialist bent, enabled the 28-year-old Bardella to cultivate an image of the coming man, appealing to the youth

James Heale

Reform’s election launch overshadowed by Farage

It’s been a big morning on the right of British politics. First, net migration figures were published showing 685,000 people arrived in the 12 months between 2022 and 2023. Rishi Sunak then admitted that no flights to Rwanda will take off before polling day on 4 July. This was followed shortly after by Nigel Farage ruling himself out as a candidate in the snap election. Reform UK leader Richard Tice then took to his feet to launch his party’s election campaign. Tice’s party will likely still hurt the Tories There was little that was new on policy or messaging as Tice, Reform deputy leader Ben Habib and ex-Tory cabinet minister

Steerpike

SNP’s Matheson handed suspension and salary cut over iPad scandal

Uh oh. In non-election news north of the border, the Scottish government’s former health secretary Michael Matheson has been handed both a suspension and salary ban after his rather humiliating £11,000 iPad scandal was exposed. As Mr S has written previously, Matheson has been in the doghouse for months after it was revealed he lied about his roaming bill and tried to make the taxpayer cover his costs. And now, it seems, he is finally getting his comeuppance… Holyrood’s standards committee has today called for Matheson to be suspended for 27 days and the cross-party group also wants to see the backbencher’s salary withdrawn for 54 days — a fine that

Iain Macwhirter

This election couldn’t come at a worse time for the SNP

The last time John Swinney was leader of the SNP, 20 years ago, the party went on to return only six MPs in the next general election. Labour returned 41 north of the border. Swinney had resigned the year before, but this was his electoral legacy.  The party has had a traumatic year since the precipitate departure of Nicola Sturgeon Could history be about to repeat itself now he is leader once again? The most recent YouGov poll, conducted after Swinney became leader and First Minister, suggests that Labour has a ten point lead over the SNP in Scotland. If that were maintained on polling day, the nationalists would be reduced from 43 MPs

Steerpike

Simon Case’s worst moments at the Covid Inquiry

Amidst all the election drama and hurried campaign launches, it would be easy to forget the public inquiries taking place at present. But fear not, Mr S has gathered together the most notable parts of today’s Covid Inquiry, where Cabinet Secretary Dr Simon Case is making a rather delayed appearance after he was unable to attend last year due to illness. Let’s take a look at what he has said so far… Bad language Today’s hearing had barely started before Case was forced to apologise for the use of some rather, um, robust language highlighted in message exchanges where he had insulted both Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, amongst other

Patrick O’Flynn

Rishi’s Rwanda row back shows he is hopeless at politics

Rwanda removals policy, for so long an anticipated cornerstone of the Tory re-election effort, has today officially become an ‘over the rainbow’ idea wide open to mockery from opposition parties. Not only will the deterrent impact on small boat crossings of the ‘regular drumbeat’ of flights that the Prime Minister promised us not have had time to be measured by polling day, but there won’t actually have been any flights whatsoever. Sunak originally promised flights would be happening by the end of spring Rishi Sunak, who originally promised flights would be happening by the end of spring, confirmed in a series of interviews that the plan actually getting implemented now

Ian O’Doherty

Ireland is rewarding Hamas for 7 October

For once, the Irish government has actually done something it promised. The problem is that it’s precisely the wrong thing, at precisely the wrong time. On Wednesday, Ireland, along with Norway and Spain, committed to recognising a Palestinian state. Ireland will formally ratify this on 28 May. It’s a bizarre and utterly counterproductive move which has the very real potential to plunge the region into even more carnage, but one which many Irish politicians from all parties have been demanding for the last few months. This is a reward for committing the single greatest crime against Jews since the dark days of the Holocaust It’s easy to see why Taoiseach

Isabel Hardman

Sunak hints at why he opted for a snap summer election

There is no good answer to the question of why Rishi Sunak called the general election for 4 July, other than that it comes at a time when things are marginally better than they were and before things could get a lot worse. There is, by the way, no good answer to the question of when would be a good time for the Conservatives to hold the election because they are 21 points behind in the polls and largely hate one another and the responsibility of government.  Sunak wants to make it about his record This morning, Sunak insisted on his broadcast rounds that the answer to ‘why now?’ was

Katy Balls

Has Sunak’s Farage gamble just paid off?

Rishi Sunak’s election gamble has hit a little turbulence less than 24 hours in. Several members of the cabinet voiced concern over the move to call a summer election, while many Tory MPs are seeing red. Then there was the rain that poured as Sunak tried to address the nation – with loud background music playing out from the street. But at least one rather significant part of the Tory strategy appears to be paying off: Reform. One of the arguments those close to Sunak made for opting for July rather than waiting for an autumn election was that it could stave off a Nigel Farage comeback. The idea being

James Johnson

Sunak’s snap election looks like a calamitous error

Until yesterday there was a fair amount of goodwill towards Rishi Sunak amongst his colleagues. Tory parliamentarians would not have been happy with a defeat in an election forced upon the Prime Minister at the end of the year, but they might have understood it. Most MPs felt the PM had been dealt a dire hand by his two predecessors, that he had scored a few good recent wins, and even that he might be able to negate some of the worst damage if his stewardship of the economy and implementation of the Rwanda plan paid off.  Sunak’s rain-splattered announcement changed everything Sunak’s rain-splattered announcement changed everything. By bringing the

Steerpike

Watch: Sunak admits no Rwanda flights will go before election

As election campaigns officially kick off, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is back on the airwaves today just hours after he called a general election. On a wet Wednesday evening, a soaking Sunak called on the British people lend his party their support. The Tories would improve the economy, enhance national security and get tougher on migration, the Prime Minister pledged. And yet when quizzed on his immigration deterrent this morning, the PM’s response didn’t sound all that promising… On BBC Breakfast, the Prime Minister was pressed on stats that showed record levels of illegal crossings to the UK between January to March of this year in a ‘reality check’ that

Nick Tyrone

Sunak’s summer election gamble is bound to backfire

The general election we’ve all been waiting for has finally been called. The Prime Minister announced the election date – 4 July – in the pouring rain, his suit jacket becoming drenched as he spoke, all while someone blared ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ outside Downing Street. The whole scene was so on the nose, no satirist would have ever thought of staging it. It should be clear already that Rishi Sunak has made a terrible mistake. Barring a miracle, Sunak is about to lead his party to an historic defeat The PM has clearly been advised that going early with his election announcement is preferable to being seen to ‘do

Nigel Jones

It’s time for Nigel Farage to get off the fence

Rishi Sunak’s snap summer election means that Nigel Farage faces a decisive moment. For months if not years, Farage has held back from taking a role in the heat of the political fray. Instead, he has preferred to be a backseat driver to his ally Richard Tice as leader of the Reform UK party he created. Sunak is banking on Labour – and Reform – being unprepared for the coming fight Farage, as his fans claim, has ‘kept his powder dry’ as honorary president of the party, and restricted himself to commenting on politics as a presenter on GB News. He has, at times, seemingly put more effort into helping

Ellie Wilson

The UK’s archaic court system is not fit for use

When I walked into court on 1 July 2022 to see my rapist Daniel McFarlane receive a sentence for his crimes against me, I expected to feel triumphant. This was my chance for closure. He’d been found guilty and now he would face the consequences. What I hadn’t anticipated, however, was that his defence lawyer Lorenzo Alonzi would use the hearing to launch into a tirade of insults against me – while I had to sit and listen in silence. Alonzi spoke of how my first-class honours degree and masters with distinction were an ‘injustice’ compared to the fate of my abuser. How we were like ‘chalk and cheese’ in

Charles Moore

Cyclists are the Jeremy Corbyns of the road

Three years ago next month, the journalist Andy Webb put in a Freedom of Information request to the BBC. He asked for material which he believes would expose a new cover-up of the BBC’s behaviour over Martin Bashir’s notorious 1995 Panorama interview with Diana, Princess of Wales. The cover-up in question (there was a much earlier one shortly after the interview first aired) took place, he believes, between September and November 2020, and involved the BBC’s decision to release certain documents, while concealing others. Lord Dyson’s investigation of the saga began shortly afterwards. Some documents which Lord Dyson did see, and published with his report, contain in them clues to

Katy Balls

Inside Labour’s fight with the unions

By the end of the year, Britain may be one of the few countries in the democratic world where the right is losing. In America, Donald Trump is the favourite to win. Ahead of next month’s European Parliament elections, momentum is with Germany’s AfD, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally and Austria’s Freedom party. Migration is the most pertinent issue pushing Europe rightwards, but many voters are also turning to insurgent right-wing parties as a rebellion against the cost of net-zero policies. Labour sees an electoral benefit in sticking to its green energy plans to stop voters defecting to the Greens In the UK, the future of green scepticism looks somewhat

The Spectator

A summer election is suicide for the Tories

As soon as Rishi Sunak told the House of Commons that ‘there is going to be a general election in the second half of this year’, nervous Tory MPs spotted a problem: that could mean 4 July, which the Prime Minister has now announced will be the election date. Calling an early election is an admission of defeat – and that, on everything from public finances to public services, the worst is yet to come With every opinion poll pointing to a Labour landslide, it’s unclear what Sunak is trying to gain – unless he has given up hope of victory altogether. Calling an early election is an admission of

Katy Balls

The deluge: Rishi Sunak’s election gamble

‘Only a Conservative government, led by me, will not put our hard-earned economic stability at risk,’ said Rishi Sunak as he announced a general election on the steps of Downing Street in the pouring rain. Upon these words, the Labour anthem ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ boomed out from the street. The din made the rest of his speech nearly inaudible. His suit jacket went from wet to soaking. ‘It’s bizarre,’ said one former minister. ‘How are we supposed to trust No. 10’s judgment when no one in the group even knows what an umbrella is?’  Sunak’s gamble is that while he can’t get a hearing in government, he might