Politics

Read about the latest political news, views and analysis

Wednesday

The Spectator

The Boris distraction

Boris Johnson should not be forgiven for his handling of lockdown. He needlessly criminalised everyday behaviour when voluntary guidelines would have sufficed. Nannies were prosecuted for delivering birthday cards to children; friends were apprehended for meeting up in the park. Meanwhile, the officials who had created these rules flouted them regularly. Johnson wrongly denied that his staff were having parties. But compared with everything else that went wrong during that period, his false denial is trivial. It is surprising, then, that the House of Commons seems obsessed by it, rather than by the collapse of the democratic apparatus during lockdown, or the fact that the government was allowed to deploy emergency powers long after the crisis had passed.

Steerpike

Is Alastair Campbell a conspiracy theorist?

The king of spin is at it again. Fresh from bailing out his boss Gary Lineker from another self-imposed Twitter mess, Alastair Campbell is now laying the mantle of 'defender of the BBC' to pick up another instead: Boris Johnson lockdown truther. Campbell, a former director of communications in No. 10 no less, must be having difficulty filling the days as he has taken to responding to viral anti-Tory tweets including this gem earlier: Does anyone actually believe that Johnson nearly died of Covid? To which Campbell replied 'No' – implying that Johnson's experience in April 2020 was greatly overblown.

Freddy Gray

The overlapping lives of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump

Often spoken of in the same breath, Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are not in fact all that similar. Both men inspire devotion among their followers. Both men are egotists, born privileged in New York. Both have weaknesses when it comes to the opposite sex. But Johnson is more of an introvert than Trump and less interested in money. Boris is a voracious reader who writes his own books. Donald might, like the satirical horror novelist Garth Marenghi, be one of the few people who has written more books than he’s read.  Still, it is curious how, since the rabble-rousing year of 2016, the lives of Johnson and Trump have overlapped.

Mark Galeotti

After his trip to Moscow, Xi Jinping still holds all the cards

After his arrival in Moscow on Monday, President Xi Jinping said that China is ready, along with Russia, ‘to stand guard over the world order based on international law’. This statement came closer than ever before to articulating his view that a normative struggle is going on between a western-dominated order, and one more suited to Beijing’s interests. As he departed yesterday, he went further: ‘Right now there are changes, the likes of which we haven’t seen for 100 years. And we are the ones driving these changes together.’ Having positioned himself as a potential peacemaker, Xi clearly believes the war in Ukraine presents him with a win-win situation ­­­– or even a win-win-win one.

Owen Matthews

The mild-mannered economist who could end Erdogan’s rule

In modern Turkey, as in ancient Byzantium, the factions and passions of the stadium crowds are a key bellwether of the people’s true mood. Last month the terraces of Istanbul’s Sukru Saracoglu stadium – home to the Fenerbahce team of which Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been a proud member for 25 years – echoed with chants of ‘Erdogan, resign’ and ‘Lies! Lies! Lies!’. The same weekend, the home crowd of another major Istanbul club, Besiktas, had filled the pitch with a heartbreaking, minutes-long hail of soft toys thrown from the stands in memory of the thousands of children who lost their lives in the devastating earthquake of 6 February.

Steerpike

Watch: Steve Baker blasts Boris as ‘a pound shop Farage’

It's all getting a bit spicy in Westminster. Barely an hour after Boris Johnson and Liz Truss announced that they would not vote for Rishi Sunak's Windsor Framework, out came serial rebel turned ultimate loyalist Steve Baker to savage their decision. The Northern Ireland minister launched an astonishing attack on the former Tory premiers saying that both are 'better than this.' And turning his guns specifically on Johnson, Baker said that: He has got a choice. He can be remembered for the great acts of statecraft that he achieved or he can risk looking like a pound shop Nigel Farage and I hope he chooses to be remembered as a statesman. Ouch.

Ian Williams

ChatCCP: how will China cope with AI?

The Chinese Communist party faces a conundrum: it wants to lead the world in artificial intelligence and yet it is terrified of anything with a mind of its own. Chinese regulators have reportedly told domestic tech companies not to offer their users ChatGPT, the Microsoft-funded chatbot that can provide seemingly well-researched answers to pretty much any question you can think to ask it. China Daily, a CCP mouthpiece, has admitted that the technology has already gone ‘viral’ in China. The paper said that AI could give ‘a helping hand to the US government in its spread of disinformation and its manipulation of global narratives for its own geopolitical interests’.

Lucy Dunn

Is Humza Yousaf backing down against Westminster?

The final debate of the SNP leadership contest, which took place last night, came after a weekend of upheaval for the party. The SNP chief executive Peter Murrell resigned on Saturday. His resignation followed that of Murray Foote, the SNP's head of communications, who accused the party of telling him to make false statements to the press. And Ash Regan’s campaign team called for the contest to be restarted after revelations about falling membership numbers (and their cover-up) surfaced nearly a week into voting opening. Viewers (or listeners) were understandably unsure how last night’s debate on Times Radio would proceed, given that the very integrity of the Scottish National party, and some of the candidates’ campaigns, has been under intense scrutiny.

Steerpike

Simon Case hits back at Boris

Hell hath no fury like a mandarin scorned. What with Richard Sharp and Dominic Raab, Simon Case is still living with the legacy of Boris Johnson’s premiership. And the Cabinet Secretary – who endured a torrid two years under Johnson – clearly takes exception to his former boss’s endless claims that Covid rules and guidance was obeyed at all times in No. 10.  The Privileges Committee have today released a final 100-page dossier of material before Johnson’s 2 p.m showdown. And one of the pieces of written evidence is a pithy submission by Case in which he denies that he gave any assurances to the then prime minister that ‘Covid rules were followed at all times’, ‘Covid guidance was adhered to at all times’ and that ‘no parties were held in No. 10’.

Ian Williams

Xi Jinping’s chilling words for Putin

It was perhaps the most intriguing moment of their Moscow summit. As Xi Jinping left the Kremlin last night, he stood face to face with Vladimir Putin and told the Russian leader, ‘Change is coming that hasn’t happened in 100 years and we are driving this change together’. The two men clasped hands, smiling. ‘I agree,’ Putin said, briefly bringing up his free hand to hold Xi’s arm. The Chinese leader then added, ‘Please take care, dear friend’. Both regard western democracies as decadent and in decline and share a culture of grievance and victimhood  Xi then walked down a step and into his limousine. Putin stood awkwardly at the curb side, waving, and very briefly appeared to bow his head as Xi’s cavalcade swept away. He cut a rather lonely figure.

Kate Andrews

Why is inflation going back up?

For the past few months, the debate over inflation in Britain has centred around just how fast the rate might fall. Both the Bank of England and the Office for Budget Responsibility’s most recent forecasts have been very optimistic, showing inflation falling back down to something approaching the Bank’s target of 2 per cent by the end of the year. Despite a slow start to the year, and CPI (core price inflation) remaining in the double digits, virtually everyone has assumed the headline rate was on a one-way track, heading downwards.  This makes this morning’s update a surprise and a blow to the economic consensus, as the Office for National Statistics has reported that CPI rose on the year in February, up from 10.1 per cent to 10.4 percent.

John Ferry

The next SNP leader will double down on economic delusion

Humza Yousaf is the continuity candidate. Kate Forbes is the fresh start candidate and Ash Regan is the Braveheart, director's cut, candidate. As far as character positioning goes, it's quite clear where each potential new first minister of Scotland stands. Digging deeper, clear policy differences have emerged between the three. Yousaf wants to directly challenge the UK government in court over its blocking of gender reform, where as Forbes and Regan would drop the issue. Forbes and Yousaf have intimated they will adopt a gradualist approach to independence, where as Regan insists she will somehow engineer separation talks with the UK government if pro-independence parties win more than 50 per cent of the vote at the next Westminster or Holyrood election.

Coffee House

Full list: which MPs will vote against Sunak’s Brexit deal?

This afternoon MPs will get the chance to register to vote on the 'Stormont brake' aspect of Rishi Sunak's revised Brexit deal, with No. 10 treating this as a vote on the Windsor Framework as a whole. Labour have said that they will back the Conservatives in the voting lobbies so there is no danger of ministers losing the vote. However the government still hopes to keep the rebellion as small as possible. The DUP have now confirmed that all eight of their number will not support Sunak, with James Duddridge becoming the first Tory to add his name to that list.

Patrick O’Flynn

Is it game over for Boris Johnson?

I don't know about you, but it’s getting rather tiresome for me now. The Boris Johnson saga, that is. Did he knowingly mislead parliament about rule-breaking lockdown parties in Downing Street? Very probably. Though perhaps not certainly, if one places any credence in his argument that nobody in authority definitively told him boozy post-work gatherings in Downing Street offices were prohibited. So on that front everything depends on what standard of proof of deliberate deceit the privileges committee decides to work to. It was a case of cometh the hour, cometh the man. And the hour is now passed If it throws the book at him, will he survive any recall petition or by-election in Uxbridge and South Ruislip, or indeed hold the seat at the general election? I’m guessing yes.

Tuesday

Steerpike

Foreign Office blows £2.5 million on ‘disinformation’ index

'Cuts', 'retrenchment' and 'savings' are very much the buzz words over on King Charles Street. There's lots of talk about 'fierce and draconian' reductions in foreign aid spending with James Cleverly warning that 'money is tight.' So Mr S was surprised to discover that the Foreign Office will spend at least £2.5 million on the controversial 'Global Disinformation Index.' What's that, you might ask? The GDI is a (supposedly) non-partisan, non-profit which aims to provide 'independent, neutral and transparent data and intelligence to advise policymakers and business leaders about how to combat disinformation.' The British-based outfit recently hit the headlines on the other side of the pond after ranking leading American publishers among the 'most risky' sites in the United States.

Steerpike

Boris versus Cummings: Round XII

Quick, nurse, they're at it again! Boris Johnson's evidence to the Privileges Committee today has re-started the longest running war in Westminster, after a temporary cessation of hostilities. Johnson savages his former No. 10 advisor Dominic Cummings in his submission, referencing the Vote Leave guru and his infamous Substack no fewer than ten times during his 52-page submission. Suffice it to say, none of those references are complimentary. Johnson torches his onetime confidante in his testimony, declaring that Cummings 'cannot be treated as a credible witness' as he 'bears an animus towards me'.

Mary Dejevsky

Does it matter if Putin uses a body double?

Was it Vladimir Putin or wasn’t it? ‘Vladimir Putin’ was certainly shown on television being helicoptered into Crimea this week, meeting ‘the people’ and driving himself around reconstruction sites in the devastated city of Mariupol.In the wider world, though, there was widespread scepticism that it was the real Russian President. Clips were posted on social media showing the supposedly different chin-line and puffier cheeks of the latest ‘Putin’, while even the BBC injected a note of doubt into some of its despatches, using words like ‘reportedly’ to qualify his (potential) visit.There have long been rumours that Putin uses a body-double – although it is also possible that his apparently different facial features are because of medical treatment.

Katy Balls

ERG criticises Sunak’s Brexit deal – but could still back it

What scale of rebellion will Rishi Sunak face on his Brexit deal? There had been hopes in Downing Street and the whips’ office that this could be in single figures when the deal is put to a vote tomorrow. However, the DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson has said his party – all eight MPs – will vote against (notably, the Ulster Unionist party today described it as ‘an important stepping stone’), leading to concerns that Tory Brexiteers could follow suit. Today, the European Research Group (ERG) met to discuss its ‘Star Chamber’s’ legal findings – and it doesn’t make for pretty reading for the Prime Minister.

Katy Balls

Who wants Boris back?

18 min listen

Boris Johnson has today made his defence of partygate, before he is questioned by the Privileges Committee tomorrow. He accepts that he misled the House of Commons, but insists he made his statements ‘in good faith’ and that he ‘would never have dreamed’ of doing so intentionally. But who's going to support him now? Katy Balls speaks to Fraser Nelson and Paul Goodman.

Alexander Horne

Does Boris Johnson’s partygate defence stand up to scrutiny?

This morning, Boris Johnson’s response to the accusations against him was published in a substantial dossier to the Privileges Committee. It comes just a day before the unprecedented hearing that is likely to determine his political future. This submission was a long time coming. In its interim report, published on 3 March, the Committee noted that it had first written to Johnson asking for his version of events as long ago as 21 July last year. Spectator books editor Sam Leith – who worked with Johnson in his former role as Daily Telegraph comment editor – suggested that this late submission was very much ‘on brand for the great man’. What do we learn from the 52-page dossier? Well, Johnson accepts that he misled parliament.