Uk politics

Tuesday

James Forsyth

Are the Brexit talks bordering on collapse?

From our UK edition

The question of the Irish border has almost collapsed the Brexit talks once, remember Mrs May’s first abortive December trip to Brussels, and it is threatening to do so again. A leaked copy of the EU’s proposed legal text of the phase one agreement that was finally reached in December says that if other options cannot be made to work Northern Ireland would be considered part of the customs territory of the EU. Given the UK’s plan is to leave the customs union, this would—in effect—create an internal economic border within the UK. It is doubtful whether this would be acceptable to any UK government, but it is particularly unacceptable to a British Prime Minister who relies on the support of the Democratic Unionist Party. So, what happens now?

Steerpike

Watch: Max Mosley’s disastrous Channel 4 interview – ‘that probably is racist’

From our UK edition

Oh dear. This week the Daily Mail published the findings of an investigation into the 'racist and thuggish' past of ex-Formula One boss Max Mosley. The paper asked whether Mosley – who donated more than £500,000 to Tom Watson, lied at his orgy privacy trial. Under oath at the High Court, Mosley denied a leaflet allegedly published by him on 'coloured immigrants' existed. However, the Mail claims to have tracked it down in a historical archive. The pamphlet says 'coloured immigrants' spread 'tuberculosis, VD and other terrible diseases like leprosy'. It says they should be sent 'home' because 'coloured immigration threatens your children's health'. Mosley denies the claims and appeared on Channel 4 news to try and defend himself.

Isabel Hardman

Labour’s slow running-down of the media

From our UK edition

Yesterday, after Jeremy Corbyn's speech on Brexit, he moved on from press questions about the substance of his policy change to seeking non-media questions. It was presumably to show that Labour is more interested in the real questions of real people rather than the biased agenda of the press. That real question ended up being 'please will you hurry up and be our Prime Minister?' Corbynites would argue that even a question as pointless as this is better than the mocking tone that journalists take as they try to claim, on the basis of whispered gossip, that this is a result of some kind of Shadow Cabinet falling out. Why not focus on the real issues, they argue. But the problem is that politicians are the least able to gauge what a legitimate press question is.

Steerpike

Michael Gove takes a swipe at Barnier

From our UK edition

Here we go. Although Theresa May and her government are meant to be on a Brussels charm offensive ahead of next month's crunch EU council meeting, Michael Gove couldn't resist a dig at the other side today. The Defra minister – who has recast himself as an eco-warrior in recent months – took issue with a meeting between Donald Tusk and Michel Barnier on Brexit. The problem? The pair used plastic bottles – a strict no-no in May's green Cabinet. https://twitter.com/michaelgove/status/968453874758582272 It seems the reasons to diverge grow every day...

Steerpike

Watch: John Bercow gives the Chancellor a ticking off – ‘stick to your abacus!’

From our UK edition

Oh dear. It's no secret that there is little love lost between the Conservatives and the Speaker. John Bercow rarely misses an opportunity to discipline his former comrades in the Chamber. Today was no exception. During Treasury questions, Philip Hammond found himself in the firing line. Bercow interrupted Liz Truss as she responded to a question from Labour. Taking objection with her reply – which appeared to consist of her listing Labour council spending failures – the Speaker but her response short. When the Chancellor pulled a face, Bercow saw red – and told Spreadsheet Phil he ought to stick to his abacus: 'If the Chancellor is confused about it he really is uninformed, I say 'stick to your abacus, man'.' http://www.youtube.com/watch?

Alex Massie

Are we tired of Brexit yet?

From our UK edition

If you wish to understand this government you might begin with Robert Conquest’s third law of politics. Namely, that 'The simplest way to explain the behaviour of any bureaucratic organisation is to assume that it is controlled by a cabal of its enemies'. This is certainly a more plausible hypothesis than any obviously available alternative. Indeed, there are times when you begin to think this government’s mission must be to persuade us that, contrary to the evidence hitherto presented, a government led by Jeremy Corbyn might be no bad thing. Or, at any rate, no worse than the government we have now.  Take Liam Fox and Boris Johnson, for instance, notionally two of Brexit’s 'Big Four' though increasingly, like Arsenal, relegated to sixth place.

Monday

Isabel Hardman

Rumour about May’s customs union stance excites Remainers

From our UK edition

Could the Conservatives crash out of government in the next few months? That's certainly a prospect that Theresa May's allies want to talk up in order to scare would-be supporters of Anna Soubry's amendment on Britain staying in 'a' customs union after Brexit. We discuss whether making the amendment a confidence issue is really the smartest move on our latest Coffee House Shots podcast - and in today's Evening Standard I report that Remainers really do think the whips would be calling their bluff by adopting this strategy. But I've also picked up an interesting theory doing the rounds among would-be rebels, which is that Theresa May will use her Road to Brexit speech on Friday to announce a concession on the matter of Britain having 'a' customs union arrangement of one sort or another.

Brendan O’Neill

Labour is no longer ‘for the many’

From our UK edition

Jeremy Corbyn’s speech today in which he confirmed that a Labour government would keep Britain in a Customs Union with the EU was about so much more than trade. It was about the future of the Labour party itself. It sent a clear message about what, and more importantly who, Labour is for these days. It confirmed that Labour has finally made its choice between which of its two, quite conflictual support bases it will represent in public life: the better-off ones, the middle-class ones, the Southern ones. This is what Labour’s cosying up to the idea of a Customs Union — which is a betrayal of Brexit, whatever Labourites say to the contrary — really tells us.

Katy Balls

Tory Remainers dial down the rhetoric

From our UK edition

Can Jeremy Corbyn's big Brexit speech be classed as a success? It really depends on who you think it was aimed at. Unsurprisingly the softening of Labour's Brexit stance has been welcomed by the party's Remain-backing membership. On top of that, the Labour leader managed to please big business – for a change. Corbyn's announcement that Labour would back the UK staying in 'a' customs union with the EU post-Brexit has been praised by the Institute of Directiors while the CBI say the policy would 'put jobs and living standards first'. However, sceptics argue that the target audience for the speech was actually the Conservative party.

The Spectator

Full text: Jeremy Corbyn’s Brexit speech | 26 February 2018

From our UK edition

It’s great to be speaking here in Coventry, which has long been at the core of Britain’s industrial heartland and is now set to be our next city of culture. Next month, the government will embark on the second and most crucial phase of negotiations to leave the European Union to set the terms of Britain’s relationship with the EU for the long-term. We are now 20 months on from the referendum that voted to leave and a year on from the triggering of Article 50. But the country is still in the dark about what this divided Conservative government actually wants out of Brexit. They can’t agree amongst themselves about what their priorities are or what future they want for Britain after Brexit. They’ve got no shortage of soundbites and slogans of course.

Steerpike

Barry Gardiner’s words come back to haunt him

From our UK edition

Oh dear. Today Jeremy Corbyn is expected to back 'a' customs union when Britain leaves the EU. To begin Labour's Brexit blitz, Barry Gardiner was sent onto the airwaves to wax lyrical about Labour's new pitch. https://twitter.com/BBCr4today/status/968045054370697217?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw The problem is that of all of Labour's shadow cabinet – other than Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell – it's Gardiner who has been the most critical of the customs union.

Sunday

Steerpike

Tom Tugendhat reignites his feud with the Foreign Secretary

From our UK edition

Here we go again. Within Parliament it's no secret that there is little love lost between Conservative colleagues Boris Johnson and Tom Tugendhat. When Tugendhat suggested that it was 'really, really hard to do cross-cultural humour', the Foreign Secretary responded that jokes can be an ‘effective way of getting your diplomatic message across’. Now Tugendhat has gone in for the attack a second time. In an interview with Buzzfeed, the chair of the Foreign Affairs select committee says that the Foreign office has lost its way...

Katy Balls

How many Conservative MPs would risk Prime Minister Corbyn over Brexit?

From our UK edition

Although Theresa May's Cabinet has finally managed to reach a loose agreement on what they would like to achieve from the upcoming negotiations, the Prime Minister's troubles look set to continue for the foreseeable. With Jeremy Corbyn expected to confirm that his party backs the UK staying in 'a' customs union post-Brexit, there's growing concern in Whitehall that May's government could collapse this year. The most imminent threat comes from the Remain side of her party. The Sunday Times reports that Julian Smith, the chief whip, told May there is a 'very real threat' that Labour could unite with 15 to 20 Tory rebels to defeat the government on their decision to rule out membership of a customs union.

Steerpike

Jeremy Corbyn’s criticism of the customs union

From our UK edition

The Labour shadow cabinet have been out in full force on the airwaves this morning dropping heavy hints that Jeremy Corbyn will use a speech tomorrow to announce that his party backs the UK remaining in 'a' customs union  post-Brexit – which would mean the UK would be unable to strike its own free trade deals. Speaking on the Andrew Marr show, the shadow Brexit secretary said Labour's front bench was 'unanimous' in its backing for striking a new deal with the EU after Brexit that would see the UK leave the customs union but then negotiate a treaty that will 'do the work of the customs union'. Only Corbyn hasn't always been so keen on 'the work of the customs union'.

Saturday

Steerpike

Czech mate: Tory vice-chair’s grovelling apology to Corbyn

From our UK edition

Oh dear. When the Sun reported this month that Jeremy Corbyn met with a Czech spy – posing as a diplomat – during the cold war, the story appeared to raise serious questions over the Labour leader's judgment. A spokesman for the Labour leader admitted he had met a diplomat, but said Corbyn had never knowingly talked to a spy. However, things took a turn for the obscure when former Czech intelligence officer Jan Sarkocy claimed that he met Corbyn and recruited him as an intelligence asset – a claim Labour dismissed as a 'ridiculous smear'. This denial wasn't enough to stop some Tories going on the offensive. Tory vice-chair Ben Bradley tweeted that Corbyn had 'sold British secrets to communist spies'.

Friday

Isabel Hardman

Iain McNicol steps down as Labour General Secretary

From our UK edition

Iain McNicol's departure from the position of Labour General Secretary has been a very long time coming indeed. He wasn't Ed Miliband's first choice for the job, and he certainly wasn't Jeremy Corbyn's favourite person at Labour headquarters, either. After the snap election, Corbynites pushed for a 'purge' that involved ousting McNicol. They failed, then, but today he announced that he was off to 'pursue new projects', which is one of those Westminster formulae for 'booted out'. Corbynite Jennie Formby is being mooted as his successor. In a sense, it's admirable that McNicol managed to stay on for so long, given the constant attempts to get rid of him.

Isabel Hardman

The Tories should run a mile from the Corbyn spy story

From our UK edition

It's fair to say that the Conservatives' attempts to use the allegations about Jeremy Corbyn's links with a Czechoslovakian spy have had mixed results. The high point came when Theresa May managed to produce a joke about blank cheques and Czechs at this week's Prime Minister's Questions, and everything else has been competing to be the low point, from Steve Baker's deeply awful interview on the Daily Politics, to Ben Bradley receiving a letter from Corbyn's lawyers. Perhaps there could have been a slightly less ham-fisted way of engaging with the story. Or perhaps it would be better for the Tory party's dignity, if nothing else, if it left these claims well alone.

Katy Balls

Labour’s Brexit position could be about to evolve into a big problem for the Tories

From our UK edition

Theresa May goes into the weekend safe in the knowledge that she has managed to reach an agreement with her divided ministers on the type of relationship Britain will seek with the EU after Brexit. But given that this unity is over a position of their own creation that Brussels may well say no to (and it's not clear how the Irish border fits into it all), it's safe to say that the Prime Minister's troubles are far from over. With the government thought to be seeking a loose relationship that allows the UK to diverge from EU standard, Donald Tusk has been quick to criticise the reported position as 'pure illusion'. Coming up the track, however, is a problem that could see May's approach over before it even has a chance to succeed.

James Kirkup

Does Seumas Milne hold Brexit’s fate in his hands?

From our UK edition

Could Britain remain in the Customs Union after Brexit? That is the question of the moment, the issue that currently troubles a lot of people in politics and government. It raises another question: who will decide whether we do indeed remain in the Customs Union? Here’s an interesting answer being given, in whispers, around Westminster and Whitehall: Seumas Milne. The theory goes like this: the Tories are split on the CU, so Labour’s position on it will be decisive. If Jeremy Corbyn brings Labour in behind the pro-CU Tories (and the SNP) then there is a comfortable majority for staying in, no matter what either Theresa May, or the DUP might have to say about it. Hence there is a huge interest in Labour’s position, in Brussels and Whitehall and elsewhere.

Brendan O’Neill

The terror of Corbynism

From our UK edition

This week, the Corbynistas bared their teeth. They gave us an insight into the mob-like authoritarianism that lurks behind the facade of their ‘kind’ politics. They insisted Jeremy Corbyn wasn’t a spy for the Stalinists while at the same time exposing their Stalinist tendencies. ‘How dare you lump us in with Stalinists?’, they cried, while in the next breath making manic-eyed videos threatening the press and forming online mobs to punish those who criticise their Dear Leader. The irony has been dark. For the first time, I feel fearful of Corbynism.