Politics Archives

Friday

13 January 2023

Starmer is plotting mischief over the Northern Ireland Protocol

Speaking in Belfast this morning, Keir Starmer offered ‘political cover’ to the Prime Minister over any change to the Northern Ireland Protocol. A new deal with the EU is thought to be imminent – and Labour sees the chance for mischief. Starmer said it is ‘time to put Northern Ireland above a Brexit purity cult’ and that ‘we can find ways to remove the majority of checks’ through new solutions, adding that ‘there are legitimate problems with the Protocol and these must be recognised in any negotiations’. Starmer’s speech is well-timed His comments are a recognition of the Protocol’s relevance over the next few months.

James Heale

Should Sunak unleash Kemi Badenoch?

17 min listen

Rishi Sunak is in Scotland meeting with First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, and said today that he is concerned about new gender laws in Scotland which would allow 16-year-olds to apply for a gender recognition certificate to change their gender. But with Sunak trying to improve relations with Holyrood, should he send Kemi Badenoch, the minister for women and equalities, to fight the fight for him? James Heale speaks to Fraser Nelson and Katy Balls.

Katy Balls

Sunak and Sturgeon are heading for a clash over gender self-ID

Rishi Sunak is keen to distance himself from Liz Truss over Scotland. Shortly before she became prime minister, Truss suggested it was best to ‘ignore’ the ‘attention seeker’ Nicola Sturgeon. But Sunak is adopting a more conciliatory approach towards the SNP leader. The pair enjoyed a working dinner last night in Inverness on Sunak’s first trip to Scotland since becoming Prime Minister. They discussed the NHS, the economy and strikes. While there was a ‘robust’ exchange on independence, the post-match report does not point to a war of words between the pair. Yet cordial relations between them could prove short-lived.

Lucy Dunn

Bed blocking is crippling Scotland’s NHS

The NHS in Scotland is under enormous strain. Three health boards north of the border have stopped non-urgent elective care as the crisis worsens. Urgent treatment and cancer care is being prioritised as patient demand continues to rise past unmanageable levels. The last time we saw this happening was during the pandemic. What’s going so wrong? One of the major issues in Scottish hospitals is bed-blocking: wards are full of patients who can't be discharged. This means there is no room for those who turn up to A&E requiring overnight admission. The shocking part, though, is that many of those patients stuck in hospitals don’t need to be there. On average, there are 1,950 delayed discharges in Scottish hospitals each day.

Gavin Mortimer

Terror has become banal in Macron’s France

The mother of my daughter was at the Gare du Nord on Wednesday morning when a man ran amok with a knife. Six people were stabbed but she was not one of them. I have a friend who wasn’t so fortunate. In July 2016, three members of his family were enjoying the Bastille Day celebrations in Nice when a Tunisian drove a 19-ton lorry along the Promenade des Anglais. They died, along with 83 others, who had the bad luck to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. This has been the fate of the French since 2015: fingers crossed and hope for the best, a philosophy encouraged by the people whose duty it is to protect them. 'Times have changed, and we should learn to live with terrorism,' said the then prime minister, Manuel Valls, the day after the Nice attack.

Alexander Larman

The Royal silence over Prince Harry can’t go on

Even Prince Harry's critics must concede that his memoir Spare has been an enormous success. The book is the UK’s fastest-selling nonfiction book ever: 400,000 copies flew off the shelves on its first day. The Duke of Sussex’s recent blitzkrieg of high-profile publicity opportunities, on both sides of the Atlantic, leaves little doubt that he is, at least for now, the most famous man in the world. Not bad for a self-described ‘spare’. But there is one group of high-profile people whose thoughts are both eagerly sought and, for the time being, withheld: the Royal Family.

Thursday

12 January 2023

Steerpike

Taxpayers still counting the cost of Imran Ahmad Khan

Nowadays, MPs' expenses claims are vetted by IPSA to ensure that the spectre of duck houses and flipped mortgages don't darken Westminster once more. But occasionally the odd claim or two gets approved which seems, er, somewhat incongruous: Zarah Sultana's ring light and Angela Rayner's personalised airpods are just two of the more examples. And, perusing the data today, Mr S stumbled across a similarly shocking claim made by the disgraced former MP Imran Ahmad Khan. Six months ago, Steerpike revealed that Ahmad Khan had billed the taxpayer £3,218 for legal costs after being charged with child sexual assault, for which he was subsequently jailed.

Cindy Yu

SNP: do you attract more flies with honey or vinegar?

12 min listen

Welfare reform is back on the agenda. Today there have been reports of how the Tories plan to reform welfare benefits in this country. What is Mel Stride thinking? Also on the podcast, Rishi Sunak will this evening travel to meet with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. What will they be discussing? Why is it that our prime ministers treat trips north of the border like foreign visits? Cindy Yu speaks to Fraser Nelson and Katy Balls. Produced by Cindy Yu and Oscar Edmondson.

Steerpike

Tory MP urges DWP transparency

Welfare reform is back in Westminster, with both Labour and the Tories now seeking solutions to deal with the 5.2 million on out-of-work benefits – a figure which The Spectator was first to pick up on. The Times today splashed on possible government proposals with Labour's Jon Ashworth now accusing his opposite number Mel Stride of 'stealing' his proposals. In such circumstances, the Department for Work and Pensions could do worse than consider an intriguing proposal put forward by John Penrose MP, the UK's long-time Anti-Corruption Champion. Now confined to the backbenches, Penrose is channelling his reforming zeal into new avenues instead.

The Spectator

Remembering Paul Johnson, 1928–2023

Paul Johnson, the author, journalist and historian, has died at the age of 94. He wrote more than 40 books, edited the New Statesman from 1965 to 1970, and wrote a column for The Spectator from 1981 to 2009. Below are some extracts from his Spectator columns, all of which are available on our archive. On the 20th century ‘Only six weeks to go before the end of the century: time to draw up a list of its political success stories. My criterion is the simple utilitarian one of Jeremy Bentham: who did most to promote the greatest possible happiness of the largest possible number?

Nigel Jones

Rishi Sunak has wasted his first 100 days as Prime Minister

Rishi Sunak has been Prime Minister for nearly 100 days – but what has Sunak done with his victory since moving into No. 10? Sadly, the answer is very little. Despite enjoying a healthy Commons majority inherited from Boris Johnson's landslide election victory, no new legislation has been passed and dubious measures from the old regime, like the Online Safety Bill, have been retained. There has been plenty of talk – not least in the five-point plan unveiled in the PM's first speech of the new year – but not much action. Sunak has been talking big on what he intends to do Back in October when he became PM, Sunak pledged to lead a government with 'integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level'.

William Moore

Who’s afraid of Keir Starmer?

41 min listen

This week: Who's afraid of Keir Starmer? In his cover piece for the magazine, The Spectator's Editor Fraser Nelson says that without a Labour demon to point at the Tories stand little chance in the next election. He joins the podcast alongside journalist Paul Mason, to discuss why Keir Starmer is so hard to vilify (01:10). Also this week: In the magazine, The Spectator's newsletter editor Hannah Tomes exposes the social media campaign targeting young women, such as herself, to freeze and donate their eggs. She joins the podcast alongside Sophia Money-Coutts, host of the Freezing Time podcast, to consider whether it is right to market this as an altruistic undertaking (16:58).

Paul Johnson

Why I believe in God

Paul Johnson, the historian, journalist and author has died at the age of 94. He wrote a column for The Spectator from 1981 to 2009. The piece below is from our 2012 Christmas issue. Rest in peace. My belief in God is not philosophical. It is not rooted in metaphysics or reason. It springs from the heart and the senses. It is practical. Every Sunday I attend the 11 o’clock Mass at the Jesuit church in Farm Street, Mayfair. I have been doing this, intermittently, for decades. For me, Farm Street is the centre of English Catholicism and brings back memories of my boyhood at Stonyhurst, the ancient Jesuit boarding school in Lancashire. The Mass is in Latin, and is sung to music written mainly in the baroque centuries. The sermons are brief and sinewy in the Jesuit manner.

James Heale

Welfare reform is back on the agenda

This week Jonathan Ashworth set out Labour's answer to the 5.2 million on out-of-work benefits – a figure which The Spectator was first to pick up on. Now the Times reports on the government's own plans to help those on out of work benefits back into employment. Since the pandemic, successful disability claims are up by 70 per cent, with the Office for Budget Responsibility suggesting that the cost of long-term sickness benefits will rise to £8.2 billion by 2027. Economic growth is one of Rishi Sunak's five promises; he is said to be concerned about achieving that goal without bringing many of the economically inactive people back into work to solve labour shortages. A range of policies are reportedly on the table.

Isabel Hardman

Could the NHS meltdown lead to another Mid Staffs scandal?

Matilda played with her mother's stethoscopes when she was a child. As a teenager, she pored over anatomy books. She devoted her early twenties to medical school and has been cramming for postgraduate exams well into her thirties. Last summer, she jacked it all in. Being a doctor 'was turning me into a bad person,' she explained to her nonplussed friends.Many medics will recognise Matilda's fear that her job was making her less caring, both to her patients and her family. The meltdown in the NHS is leaving doctors feeling even more burnt out than during the pandemic. The effect this is having on patients is frightening.

Stephen Daisley

Sturgeon’s gender bill poses a problem for the Tories

Ministers will come under increased pressure to block Nicola Sturgeon’s gender legislation with the publication of a new Policy Exchange paper today. This examination of the Gender Recognition Reform Bill concludes it will have serious impacts on the rest of the UK. The Bill removes the safeguards involved in obtaining a gender recognition certificate, the means by which a man can have the law treat him as a woman, and vice versa. It was pushed through the Scottish parliament before Christmas with little time for debate At present, the law requires an applicant to be 18 or older, to have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria by a clinician and to prove they have lived in their preferred ‘gender identity’ for at least two years.

Mark Galeotti

Will Putin’s latest general escalate the war in Ukraine?

So, one granite-faced general has been replaced by another. The announcement that, after just three months in post, General Sergei Surovikin is being succeeded as overall commander of Russia’s war in Ukraine by Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov may sound like appointing a new captain for a hull-breached Titanic. But it is significant in what it says, not just about the war, but Putin’s relationship with his generals. Surovikin becomes one of Gerasimov’s three deputies, in what is being sold not as a demotion but simply a reflection of the need for an ‘increase in the level of leadership’ because of the ‘amplified range of tasks’ and the need for closer cooperation between different military forces. Of course, it is.

Wednesday

11 January 2023

Steerpike

Angela Rayner charms the women’s lobby

Angela Rayner hasn’t always had the best of relationships with Fleet Street’s finest. But there was no sign of discord tonight when she charmed the cream of the parliamentary press gallery at the women’s lobby drinks. The Labour deputy leader remarked how ‘I came in [to parliament] in 2015 when the wheels fell off politics, I had about 18 jobs – I’ve still got about 18 jobs’. She also reflected on the relationship she has with her leader: ‘Keir under-shares, I over-share, always an interesting one to one with me and Keir. We promised each other we wouldn’t disclose what we say in those meetings but we rub along quite nicely’ adding to the inevitable laughs ‘steady on.

Steerpike

Tory MP expects voters to go ape

Four Chancellors, three Prime Ministers, two monarchs and one mini-Budget: it's fair to say 2022 was a crazy year in politics and for the Tories in particular. And at least one Conservative MP has admitted publicly what many of his colleagues are saying privately about their party's prospects at the next election. Jerome Mayhew, the Tory MP for Broadland, told Radio Norfolk last week that: I think we deserve a bit of a kicking as a result of what we've done as a party this year. We haven't covered ourselves in glory in Westminster, you're right, we're on our third Prime Minister in twelve months. No political party is going to come out of that smelling of roses. But we've got to pick ourselves up, which we've done, and we've got Rishi Sunak now as Prime Minister.

Lloyd Evans

Is Starmer about to finally goad Corbynistas into action?

New year, new Labour. Sir Keir deployed his latest strategy at PMQS, contrasting the Tory-run NHS with the glorious record of the Labour administration. When his party were in power, he argued, the NHS was such a triumph that hardly anyone used it. There was no need. Doctors’ appointments were available within days. Cancer referrals took no more than two weeks. Waiting lists were a fraction of their current levels, he went on, (although he quietly admitted that 2.3 million people were usually awaiting treatment when Labour ran the system). Again and again he cited his party’s golden age. Labour, Labour, Labour. Marvellous, outstanding, world class. Sir Keir’s lurch to the right is dangerous because it may goad the dormant Corbynistas into action.