Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Friday

Steerpike

Watch: Alastair Campbell’s Newsnight meltdown

Oh dear. It seems that the king of spin's onetime winning touch has deserted him. The omnipresent Alastair Campbell popped up again on Newsnight to continue his latest 'forever war' – this time the never-ending crusade against Brexit. Campbell was up against Alex Phillips, the former MEP, and managed in the space of just seven minutes to patronise both her and the host Victoria Derbyshire in an astonishingly ill-judged performance. Following a barrage of Campbell's huffing and puffing, Phillips remarked on the irony of how 'It’s very rich a man who essentially was part of telling lies to invade a country to accuse me of dishonesty.

Theo Davies-Lewis

The brutal downfall of Plaid Cymru’s Adam Price

The mantra was simple: ‘Yes Wales Can’, as Adam Price declared after ousting Leanne Wood in a brutal leadership contest in 2018. Wood had been unable to halt the ruthless coup launched by Y Mab Darogan, the son of prophecy, as Price was known to his followers. Plaid Cymru has been in Labour’s shadow in Wales for close to a century. Yet Price was deemed to have the intellect, oratorical flair and media savvy to launch a nationalist turnaround to replicate the fortunes of the SNP. At times, if paraphrasing Obama was any evidence, Price indulged the intoxicating legend that surrounded him. It was bound to end in tears.

Freddy Gray

What do Donald Trump’s children want?

39 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by filmmaker, Alex Holder who had access to Trump’s inner circle when making the documentary Unprecedented. On the podcast, they discuss Trump's supporter base, his relationship with his children and why Ivanka is the favourite.

David Shipley

How prisons teach inmates that crime pays

John Major is wrong when he suggests only violent offenders should be automatically locked up – and as a non-violent ex-offender I should know. But focusing on the number of prisoners in Britain is a distraction from the real issue: reoffending. British prisons churn out prisoners who simply go on to commit more crime. Given what goes on behind bars, it's little surprise. A functioning, effective prison system should teach inmates to respect rules and behave in a proper manner so that they are more likely to be productive and law-abiding members of society on release. Many prisoners, however, learn a different lesson in jail: that breaking rules pays off.

Natasha Feroze

What will boost growth?

11 min listen

The UK economy grew by 0.1 per cent in the first quarter of this year. Jeremy Hunt said that the government needed to 'stay focused on competitive taxes, labour supply and productivity.' Is that enough to improve growth? Natasha Feroze speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews.

Steerpike

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby hit with speeding fine

Justin Welby is a busy man: the Archbishop of Canterbury took centre stage at the King's coronation on Saturday. Then, on Wednesday, he was holding forth in the Lords on Suella Braverman’s boats bill. But does Welby's busy diary mean he sometimes forgets to slow down? Mr Steerpike only asks because the Archbishop is back in the headlines: this time for being caught speeding. Welby was slapped with three points on his licence and ordered to pay £510 for driving in his VW Golf at 25mph in a 20mph zone. The incident took place last October on London's Albert Embankment. Welby admitted being behind the wheel after he was contacted by the Metropolitan Police, the Evening Standard reported.

Iain Macwhirter

Has Humza Yousaf finally solved the SNP’s ferry fiasco?

The scandalous debacle of Scotland’s ferries fiasco has rumbled on for some time. It is almost a decade since Nicola Sturgeon announced the takeover of the Ferguson Marine shipyard by the Clyde Blowers billionaire, Jim McColl. He was the preferred bidder to build two new dual-fuel car ferries for the state owned CalMac island ferry service. They never materialised. The ferries saga has been the longest-running procurement scandal since the SNP entered government in 2007. Now, First Minister Humza Yousaf, who was transport secretary when things started to go wrong in 2018, thinks he has finally hit on a solution: privatising the beleaguered shipyard on the Clyde. But there’s a snag: one of Scotland's largest unions is furious.

Gavin Mortimer

Unrest is growing in Macron’s febrile France

Across Europe the numbers are soaring. In Britain, net migration figures are expected to near one million when the figures are released later this month; in Germany, there have been 101,981 asylum applications so far this year, an increase of 78 per cent on the same period in 2022.   2022 was a record year in France with the arrival of nearly half a million legal migrants. This is on top of those who are in the country illegally. According to the MP for Nice, Eric Ciotti, president of the centre-right Republican party, there could be as many as one million in this category.  Extremism is not only present on both sides, it is rising The crisis in France has become so grave that respected politicians are warning of looming disaster.

Annabel Denham

Forget the EU: Britain’s own red tape is strangling the economy

Ministers are considering scrapping the EU Working Time Directive. The news has been met with predictable howls from the usual suspects. This is the ‘health and safety’ law which limits most people’s working hours to 48 hours a week on average, including overtime. It has long been unpopular with employers, who warn it stifles productivity by preventing people from working longer hours. It has also been blamed for NHS waiting times. Vested interests, regulators and HR managers benefit from regulatory complexity, and are remarkably effective at snuffing out attempts to reduce it Despite this, following reports it might be ditched, one frenzied SNP MP responded that ‘it feels there is no basic human right that is not under threat from this Tory government’.

Thursday

James Heale

Can Kemi brush off the Brexiteers on EU law?

11 min listen

Will Kemi Badenoch, the business and trade secretary, lose her supporters in the ERG, after the government confirmed that it would be going back on its pledge to remove all EU legislation from UK law by the end of 2023? James Heale speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews.

Steerpike

Watch: Kemi hits back at the ERG

Ding, ding, ding! In the blue corner, it’s Kemi Badenoch, the Trade Secretary and much-fancied leadership contender. And, er, also in the blue corner, is the combined forces of the European Research Group. A war of words has broken out between Badenoch and the Brexiteers over the government's decision not to repeal all retained EU laws. Speaking in the House of Commons this morning, ERG chair Mark Francois lamented that the government had performed 'a massive climbdown on its own bill despite having such strong support from its backbenchers,' adding to Badenoch: 'What on earth are you playing at?' Lindsay Hoyle joined in for good effect, chastising the minister for announcing the decision via a written statement.

Lucy Dunn

NHS waiting lists hit record high

NHS waiting lists are getting longer and the government’s targets are still not being met. New NHS data released today has found that the number of patients on NHS waiting lists has hit a new all-time high of 7.3 million. The government has also failed to meet its target to eliminate 18-month waits by April this year. Although Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said that the government is delivering on his promise to cut waiting lists, it’s clear the Tories have quite a way to go yet. The number of patients waiting longer than 18 months for hospital appointments and procedures has certainly fallen, decreasing from 54,882 in January to 10,737 by April, and by over 90 per cent since September 2021.

Lara Prendergast

Trump’s second act: why he can still win, in spite of everything

47 min listen

This week: Having been found guilty of sexual assault, is Donald Trump still in the running for the White House? In his cover piece, Niall Ferguson says he could still defy gravity. He joins the podcast alongside Jacob Heilbrunn, editor of The National Interest. (01:00)  Also this week: Journalist Andrew Watts interviews the Reverend Canon Dr Jason Bray, the Bishop of St Asaph’s ‘deliverance minister’, or the Anglican priest charged with exorcising evil spirits. They both join the podcast. (17:50).  And finally: Author and journalist Sophia Money-Coutts writes about the British women opting for Danish sperm donors to conceive. She joins us on the show, along with Annemette Arndal Lauritzen, CEO of the European Sperm Bank.  (34:07).

Kate Andrews

Why interest rates continue to rise

The Bank of England has hiked interest rates again, taking the base rate from 4.25 per cent to 4.5 per cent. This is the 12th consecutive rise, voted for 7-2 by the Bank's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). It takes rates to their highest level since 2008. The Bank had hoped it could stop raising interest rates months ago. It would require evidence of ‘persistent pressures’ on prices for them to keep hiking the base rate, the MPC said in February. But since then, we’ve had two more rate rises: one in March, which took the base rate from 4 per cent to 4.25 per cent. And another today. So when will interest rates settle down? The narrative from the Bank is largely unchanged.

Nigel Jones

What’s eating John Major?

Eighty-year old Sir John Major does not appear to be enjoying a peaceful retirement. Judging by his frequent tetchy interventions in public life, the former prime minister is far from a happy bunny. Sir John’s latest outburst was not on his usual hobby horses of the iniquities of Boris Johnson or the horrors of Brexit, but came in a speech – delivered to the liberal Prison Reform Trust at the Old Bailey of all places – that will give comfort to the criminal community. For Major is worried that we are locking up too many people for minor offences. On this topic – as on so many others – Major is out of step with public opinion.

Isabel Hardman

Watch: Speaker loses temper with Kemi Badenoch over EU law u-turn

The Speaker of the House of Commons has just given Kemi Badenoch a furious dressing down over the government's u-turn on repealing retained EU laws. Lindsay Hoyle criticised the minister for using a written ministerial statement to sneak out the admission that the government will only be reviewing or repealing 600 laws by the end of the year, rather than 2,400 as promised by Rishi Sunak in his leadership campaign. When Badenoch came to answer the question, she apologised rather dismissively 'that the method we chose was not to your satisfaction'. Hoyle exploded, insisting 'that is totally not acceptable: who do you think you're speaking to?

Steerpike

‘You are a nasty person’: Trump turns on moderator

Well, that was eventful. Fresh from being found guilty of sexual abuse, Donald Trump rocked up last night at a 70-minute long town hall with CNN in which the former president clashed repeatedly with moderator Kaitlan Collins. In his first appearance on the network since 2016, Trump refused to say whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war, called January 6 a 'beautiful day' and declared he had 'every right' to take classified documents to Mar-a-Lago. When Trump was pressed by Collins as to why he had classified documents at his home in Florida he lashed out, calling her a 'nasty person'. He also turned on E Jean Carroll, who this week was found to have been sexually abused by Trump in a New York department store.

Sasha Lensky

Russians live in fear of Putin’s dreaded draft

On 9 May, Russia’s wet squib this year of a Victory Day, president Putin addressed his beleaguered troops in Ukraine directly. ‘There is nothing more important now than your combat effort,’ he said. ‘The security of the country rests on you today, the future of our statehood and our people depend on you.’ Readers of The Spectator may be interested to learn of the Russian state’s efforts to augment this crucial ‘defensive’ force. One day last week in provincial Russia, I was awoken at 3 a.m. by the ping of a new email from Gosuslugi, a state portal that facilitates public services (e.g. getting a passport or even checking your kids’ grades at school).

Daniel Thorpe

It would be foolish to rule out an Erdogan victory

With only a few days to go until Turkey's election, the opposition continues to lead in most polls. But there is a growing feeling in Turkey that president Erdogan might defy the odds and win again. A striking image of a rally in Istanbul – Erdogan's biggest so far – shows Turkey's leader continues to enjoy popular support. The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) claimed that 1.7 million people showed up at the decommissioned Atatürk airport for the event on Sunday; supporters were bused into the rally from across the country. While independent fact-checkers pointed out that the real number is likely less than half the number claimed, this rally showed that victory for the opposition is far from certain.