Uk politics

Wednesday

Harry Mount

Meghan Markle and the return of American Anglophilia

Prince Harry's imminent wedding to Meghan Markle will reinvigorate the dying special relationship between Britain and America. It is a boost for the fading American regard for the monarchy. In America, the mother country is increasingly the forgotten country – and it has been fading for a century, ever since the First World War. As Sellar and Yeatman put it in 1066 and All That, after the allied victory 'America was thus clearly top nation, and History came to a full stop'. As the increasingly weaker party in the 242-year affair, we cherish the special relationship much more than the dominant partner. That great Anglo-American WH Auden – an exile to New York, born in York – got it right: 'If equal affection cannot be, let the more loving one be me'.

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: Boris is right about the NHS

Boris Johnson was reportedly humiliated in yesterday’s cabinet following his demand for more money for the NHS. If it was the Prime Minister’s intention to embarrass Boris Johnson it was a mistake, says the Times. In its editorial, the paper calls the ministerial discussions ‘an exercise in staged humiliation rather than consensus-building’. The PM may well be thinking that her ability to survive a tumultuous few months now means ‘that she is not only safe but steadily confounding her critics’. Such thinking would also be wrong, the paper argues, pointing out that Boris’s ‘return to trouble-making…reflects deepening frustration with Downing Street on both wings of the party’.

Tuesday

Katy Balls

What the government’s fake news unit tell us about the Brexit negotiations

The UK government has today announced plans to establish a new unit to counter 'fake news'. This will serve as a 'dedicated national security communications unit' which aims to combat 'disinformation by state actors and others'. Announcing the move, the Prime Minister's spokesman said: 'we are living in an era of fake news and competing narratives.' Its creation has led to inevitable jokes, with Tim Farron declaring that the three Brexiteers – Boris, Gove and David Davis – 'should be the first investigations'. Meanwhile, others online have taken the swift government action as an indicator that Russian activity could have played a role during the EU referendum. However, the big Brexit takeaway lies elsewhere.

Isabel Hardman

Can Theresa May really survive all this Cabinet indiscipline?

Theresa May does seem to lose more authority with each week. A reshuffle in which people refuse to move, followed by Cabinet ministers using the media to ask for more money for the NHS and defence. But does this make her more likely to go soon? That the Prime Minister is weak has been priced in since the general election. It means Cabinet ministers feel so confident that they can turn down job moves, send the head of the army out to complain about defence spending, and brief the newspapers about something they haven’t yet said. But the fact that this is so well-acknowledged, and has been for a long time, makes it less likely that May will have to go because people are settling in to the reality of a weak government.

Steerpike

No 10’s SpAd gridlock

Rather than re-energise the Tory party as intended, Theresa May's new year reshuffle just exposed her weaknesses and managed to annoy a lot of Conservative MPs in the process. What's more, Mr S understands there is another undesired consequence. Two weeks on and Downing Street is yet to fill a host of special advisor vacancies. Mr S hears murmur of discontent over the way the process is being handled – with complaints of No 10 control-freakery and attempts to thrust candidates on ministers. One aspect of this is a bid to keep the redundancy payments low – so re-appoint those SpAds who lost their jobs rather than go for external hires. But not everyone is playing ball. 'If the government can't manage a basic task like appointing a few SpAds, what does that tell us?

James Forsyth

Boris is right about NHS funding – but he didn’t get his way today

Cabinet today was not the dramatic showdown over NHS funding that some expected. Boris Johnson was, unsurprisingly given that Theresa May knew what he wanted to say, not called on to speak first. Those Ministers who went before him emphasised that it would be better if these debates took place in private, not public. When it was Boris’s turn to speak, I am told that he slightly pulled his horns in. He made the case for more money for the NHS but he didn’t argue for a specific figure, I understand. Interestingly, and in a sign of how May still views the International Trade Secretary as her bridge to Brexiteers, Liam Fox was called to speak early. Fox, a doctor himself, stressed that these arguments should take place behind closed doors not in the newspapers.

Robert Peston

Is Boris preparing to flounce out of the cabinet?

'Is Boris preparing to flounce out of the cabinet?' Not my question, but that of one of his senior ministerial colleagues. Why could that be? Exhibit A. In this morning’s cabinet, he is hijacking Jeremy Hunt’s update about how hospitals are coping with the winter pressures with a headline grabbing and overtly populist demand for the Treasury to find an additional £5bn a year of health spending – which would be a modest down payment on the £18bn ('£350m a week') he pledged during the EU referendum campaign. Theresa May won’t be amused. Hunt can’t be sure if Johnson is friend or foe. But it is the kind of typical Boris intervention that says to his backbench colleagues 'if she’s too timid as PM, look what I would do'. Exhibit B.

Steerpike

Theresa May’s Burns Night faux pas

Oh dear. On Monday night, the Prime Minister attempted to show her support for the union by throwing a Burns Night supper at No. 10. Although Theresa May gave a short address at the inaugural event, Steerpike understands it fell to David Mundell – the Scottish Secretary – to address the haggis (a 'crispy haggis', served as a starter). Meanwhile, Kristene Hair gave the toast to the laddies. Downing Street has released a list of the guest list for the dinner. https://twitter.com/nickeardleybbc/status/955533585867558913 Alas, there's a problem – or several problems to be more precise. Downing Street spelled at least five of the guests’ names wrong, including three Conservative MPs – Andrew Bowie, David Duguid and Ross Thomson.

Lauren Mcevatt

Should the Tories consider all-women shortlists?

That’s a question I never thought I’d ask. Women shouldn't need to be patronised by creating a special class of system to run for election. But with the announcement of the Conservative Government’s PPS list yesterday I was shocked to note that only 8 out of 43 appointments were women. That’s a mere 18.6 percent of the list. At 21 percent of the Conservative parliamentary party, women are still too under represented, despite the valiant efforts of our Prime Minister and Baroness Jenkin through Women to Win and similar party efforts to encourage more female candidates. To give the Prime Minister credit where it’s due, out of all of the ministerial and whips positions available to MPs - rather than peers - my (admittedly very rough) estimate is that 25.

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: Is the party finally over for Ukip?

Ukip has defied predictions about its death before. Yet even the party’s most ardent supporters would find it hard not to feel gloomy about recent events and the party's downward spiral. Ukip’s leader Henry Bolton clings on, despite losing a vote of no confidence and suffering a raft of resignations among his top team. ‘Is the party finally over for Ukip?’, asks the Daily Telegraph. The paper says that Bolton’s refusal to step down looks like an act of ‘forlorn defiance’, and it seems likely that the party’s leader has lost the trust of members as a result of his relationship with a racist model.

Monday

James Forsyth

Staying in the customs union would be a risky bet for May

There’s renewed speculation in Westminster that Britain might end up staying in the customs union. The CBI is calling for the UK to stay in a customs union with the EU and Labour is expected to move to backing customs union membership soon. The argument goes that because customs union membership does not require free movement, it is compatible with the referendum result. Big exporting businesses tend to like the idea as it would ease most of the bureaucratic problems in moving goods around post-Brexit. But I don’t think Theresa May will go for this idea. If Britain stays in the customs union, then it can’t do comprehensive free trade deals with other countries; all it could do would be services only agreements.

Tom Goodenough

Bolton wanderers: A full list of who has stepped down so far

Ukip's leader Henry Bolton is under mounting pressure to step down following the scandal over his model girlfriend's racist text messages. Bolton – the party's sixth leader in 16 months – lost a vote of no confidence yesterday. He has vowed to stick it out, insisting that he will not resign as party leader. But a raft of resignations makes it look as though the party could soon be having one of its tri-annual leadership contests, with eight resignations in the last 24 hours alone.

Steerpike

Labour Against the Witchhunt welcome Corbynista’s appointment as chair of Disputes Panel

Talk of trigger ballots, deselection and factional manoeuvres is rife in the Labour party after three Momentum candidates were elected on the party's NEC – tipping the balance in favour of the Corbynistas. Since that election, the NEC moved swiftly to vote to oust Ann Black as chair of the Disputes Panel in favour of Christine Shawcroft. The panel is responsibly for deciding whether to investigate sexist, racist, homophobic and anti-semitic abuse - and given that Shawcroft herself was suspended from the party in 2015 (for publicly supporting disgraced Tower Hamlets mayor Lutfur Rahman), many moderates are concerned over her appointment and what it means for Labour's disciplinary procedure going forward.

Steerpike

Nicholas Soames joins the Boles rebellion

On Friday night, Nick Boles set the cat among the pigeons when he tweeted his frustrations at Theresa May's timid government: https://twitter.com/NickBoles/status/954409789152514049 With Boles not a typical rebel, his complaints appear to mirror what many MPs have been saying privately. Now, Nicholas Soames has spoken out. Winston Churchill's grandson has joined Boles in using hashtags to criticise Theresa May. Soames says '#wherestheboldandbravesofaritsdulldulldull' needed to beat the 'Corbini': https://twitter.com/NSoames/status/955386579895373825 Expect more critical MPs to come out of the woodwork in the coming days.

Sunday

Steerpike

Viral Question Time audience member turns out to be a Labour council candidate

Here we go again. The stand out moment of the latest Question Time saw a young woman accuse a Tory minister of purposefully underfunding the NHS in order to  make the argument for privatisation. The exchange left Margot James, a DCMS minister, insisting that she was 'not a liar' and calling out the accusations as false. Since then, the clip of the young woman taking James to task has been widely shared online. Only all is not what it seems. It turns out that the audience member is not your average viewer. In fact, Rebecca Shirazi is a local Labour party candidate. Corbynista Laura Pidcock has been tweeting her praises: https://twitter.com/LauraPidcockMP/status/954345709616103424 So much for playing fair...

Katy Balls

Ukip leader loses ‘no confidence’ vote – and the party’s problems have only begun

Another one bites the dust. Ukip's ruling national executive committee has unanimously backed a vote of no confidence in their leader, Henry Bolton. But Bolton - whose reputation has been battered by the revelations about his 25-year-old ex-girlfriend Jo Marney's text messages - has resolved to stay in post and under Ukip's rules there is no easy way to remove him. Only a vote of the party membership can oust the former Liberal Democrat from his post at the top of Ukip. Bolton has refused to step aside, which means the party will have to conduct a postal ballot of its entire membership, one the financially-straitened party can ill afford to bear.  Should he lose the vote of confidence among the membership, the resulting leadership election could well bankrupt the the party.

Matthew Taylor

Sunday shows round-up: Emmanuel Macron – a bespoke UK deal is possible

During his visit to Britain to discuss defence and the future of Anglo-French border security, the French President Emmanuel Macron gave an interview with Andrew Marr at Sandhurst. Macron told Marr that a bespoke deal for the UK was on the negotiating table, though he insisted that there must be 'no cherry picking', as doing so would dismantle the integrity of the single market: AM: Now you've said in the past you can have Canada, or you can have Norway, but you can't have your own special deal. Is that really fair give how long Britain has been part of the EU? EM: No, it's not a question of fair or unfair... For sure, you will have your own solution. AM: There will be a bespoke special solution for Britain? EM: Sure, but...

Douglas Murray

It’s easy to predict where the Cathy Newman backlash will lead

Last week I wrote in this space about Cathy Newman’s catastrophic interview with the Canadian academic Jordan Peterson. Since then a number of things have happened. One is that millions of people around the world have watched Newman’s undisguisedly partisan interview. The other is that Channel 4 has tried to turn the tables by claiming victimhood. Any fair-minded observer might think that if there was any ‘victim’ in this case then it was Professor Peterson, who accepted an invitation to an interview in which he was then serially misrepresented. It was Peterson who, whenever he said anything got the response ‘So what you’re saying is’, followed by something that he had not said.

Steerpike

Sorry seems to be the hardest word for John McDonnell

Although John McDonnell is supposed to play a key part in Jeremy Corbyn's drive for a kinder, gentler politics, remarks he made about ‘lynching’ Esther McVey, at a Remembrance Sunday event back in 2014, continue to distract from the message. McDonnell's defence is that he was quoting someone else who (he claims) wanted to lynch her – rather than wanting to lynch her himself. This morning on the Andrew Marr show, McDonnell was given the chance to apologise for his comments. Alas, he declined: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFdOzPOtnvc It seems sorry really is the hardest word... Readers can listen for themselves here.

Saturday

Katherine Forster

The north-south divide is growing deeper

As a Yorkshire lass living in London I’m struck by the difference in transport provision between the north and south of the UK. Put simply, they feel like different countries. Taking a train from my home in west London into town, I ride on shiny, modern trains (if they aren’t cancelled that is, or on strike – thanks Southern!). Taking a train from Leeds to my home town of Harrogate, I ride in rolling stock that’s had a hard life; noisy and old. King’s Cross and St Pancras stations seem to me places of architectural wonder. Not so Leeds station. Similarly, I’ve driven from Leeds to Manchester via the bleakly beautiful M62 motorway (the highest in the UK near Saddleworth Moor) more times than I care to remember.