Uk politics

Thursday

Steerpike

David Davis’s Irish problem

It's safe to say this hasn't been a good week for the government with Brexit talks unexpectedly stalling on Monday. But if there were to be one Cabinet minister said to be having the worst time, it would be David Davis. At a select committee appearance on Tuesday, the Brexit secretary came unstuck over the so-called Brexit impact assessment reports. Despite once saying he had commissioned a multitude to make sure there were no nasty surprises that could cause an economic shock, Davis now claims there are no reports and that they would be of no use anyway. This has led many to question whether he is really up to his brief. So, Mr S was intrigued to learn of an apparent diplomatic incident between the Department for Exiting the European Union and the Irish government.

David Butterfield

The Guardian’s tabloid switch is a big mistake

'Since you’re here...we have a small favour to ask’. These words may ring a bell for you – or just sound the spam alarm, coming as they do at the end of any Guardian online piece. For times are hard in Graunville: in recent years, the Guardian has lost tens of millions annually and, as a result, the paper has got out the begging bowl. Now its editor, Katharine Viner, has announced the latest cost-cutting ruse: lopping the paper down – from January next year – to a tabloid format. This is a great shame. Viner claims that the shrinkage would preserve ‘the same amount of journalism’ and went on to justify the change by saying: The role of a newspaper in people’s lives is changing all the time.

Ed West

Christmas markets without armed police are now a thing of the past

I love the Christmas season, so friendly and wholesome and filled with evocative memories – but don't the machine guns and anti-terror bollards seem to go up earlier each year? Look at the touching festive scenes in Manchester, and Edinburgh, and we'll see the police and barriers across the country from Liverpool to Lincoln. It's not quite Bedford Falls is it? I've noticed these 'diversity bollards' popping up everywhere, without a word spoken about it; a few weeks ago I spotted them at Hyde Park Corner opposite the Duke of Wellington's house. How would one explain that to Old Nosey?

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: Labour must clarify its Brexit plan

Another day, another Brexit warning: this time it comes from the head of Standard Chartered, who says that Britain’s imminent departure from the EU is already having a negative impact. Bill Winters said that his bank is already 'preparing for the worst'. The Sun says that the ‘same old commentators’ are repeating themselves constantly with their warnings that ‘Britain’s going to hell in a handcart’ as a result of Brexit. ‘Give it a rest’, the paper urges them. The Sun goes on to concede that yesterday ‘wasn’t a good day for the Government’.

Wednesday

Katy Balls

Boris left alone to fight for divergence at Cabinet

After the DUP took issue with government's handling of the Irish border question on Monday, Theresa May had to return home from her lunch with Jean-Claude Juncker empty-handed. What's more, there's no indication that a solution is in sight anytime soon. The DUP worry that the wording in the draft text – promising regulatory alignment in relation to the Good Friday agreement – could see Northern Ireland treated differently than the rest of the UK – and result in an Irish sea border. Meanwhile, some Brexiteers worry that agreeing regulatory alignment between the UK and Ireland could mean an end to the clean Brexit they envisaged. So, one could be forgiven for thinking Tuesday's Cabinet meeting must have been a tense affair.

Lloyd Evans

Jeremy Corbyn scores six own-goals in a row at PMQs

Ah the joys of political marriages. Theresa May’s pact with the DUP bolstered her at PMQs today, and she delivered her most assured performance since the election. Having an ally who secretly hates you is the ultimate liberation, as David Cameron discovered with the LibDems. May is free to flourish the ultimate get-out clause any time: ‘Them lot made me do it,’ is the best excuse in Westminster. And the DUP are a pretty formidable outfit. Grouped en masse around the microphone they look like a pack of concrete gnomes designed to halt a speeding tank. The Easter Island statues would probably deliver a softer Brexit. Jeremy Corbyn had a huge task today. When the government is teetering, the pressure on the opposition leader is enormous. And what a day this was.

The Spectator

Ignore the motorheads telling us that we all need new cars

The motorheads are at it again. The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), the UK auto manufacturers lobby group, lobbed another rusty torque wrench at the government this morning, announcing that UK new car registrations are down 11.2 per cent year-on-year. The decline is led by a collapse of nearly a third in sales of diesel-engined cars. Inevitably, some blamed the fall on ‘uncertainty caused by Brexit'. The SMMT itself doesn’t take this tack: instead it points the finger at ‘months of confusion and speculation about the government’s air quality plans and its policies towards diesel cars’. Its suggested remedy is no surprise: ‘fleet renewal is the fastest way to improve air quality’, it says.

James Forsyth

Tory Brexiteers are clearly becoming more concerned

Remarkably, Theresa May made it through PMQs today pretty much unscathed. I cannot, though, report that this was because she launched a brilliant counter-attack or came with a way to break through the current Brexit impasse. Rather it was because Jeremy Corbyn’s questions lacked forensic precision. One suspects that if Robin Cook had been at the other despatch box, May would have had a far tougher time. There was a collective parliamentary failure today because, at the end of the 45 minute session of PMQs, we knew no more about the state of the Brexit negotiations than we did when we went in.

Steerpike

Jacob Rees-Mogg: May’s Brexit red lines look ‘a little bit pink’

Theresa May’s Brexit red lines were intended to keep her backbenchers happy, reassuring them that there would be no backsliding on Brexit. The approach worked. But at PMQs today there were signs that some Brexiteer Tory MPs are starting to worry. Jacob Rees-Mogg told the Prime Minister he was concerned her red lines were ‘beginning to look a little bit pink’. He urged her to ‘apply a new coat of paint’ before she next goes to Brussels.

Gavin Mortimer

Social media is the propaganda tool the Nazis could only dream of

Last month, the venture capitalist Roger McNamee drew parallels between the persuasive powers of Facebook and those of Joseph Goebbels. McNamee made a mint from early investment in the social media site but he believes Facebook has since adopted the techniques of Hitler's spin doctor to create a climate of 'fear and anger'. It's not just Facebook, of course, it's the internet in general that has contributed to this new golden age of intolerance. In a recent interview with the Times, Silicon Valley guru Jaron Lanier, the man who coined the phrase 'virtual reality', said the way internet companies monitor our behaviour gives them the power to: '...change people’s character...to corral people into a peer group, political or business or whatever.

Katy Balls

Brexit draft agreement leaks

Theresa May is having a tough week after her plan to agree 'sufficient progress' with Jean Claude-Juncker in time for the crucial EU council meeting was brought to a stop by the DUP. The DUP are now dragging their feet over whether or not they can back or amend the government's 'solution' to the Irish border – a promise of 'regulatory alignment' in relation to areas covered by the Good Friday agreement (and perhaps beyond). Meanwhile, the eurosceptic wing os the party is seeing red over any agreement involving UK-wide regulatory alignment on the basis that it could hinder their vision of a clean Brexit which would allow the country to strike competitive free trade deals with other countries.

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: May should ditch her plan to leave the single market

17.4million people backed Brexit, but only two – at least one of whom campaigned for 'Remain' – decided that leaving the EU should also mean a departure from the single market, the customs union and the European court of justice, says the Guardian. The pair were, of course, Theresa May and her former aide Nick Timothy, who made what the paper describes as ‘fateful national decisions’ based on ‘personal interpretations of the vote’. This was a ‘reckless’ and ‘foolish’ act, says the Guardian, and nowhere is this seen more obviously in the Irish border row which has been spilling out this week.

Tuesday

Tom Goodenough

Could the Manchester Arena bombing have been stopped?

Today's report into the Manchester and London terror attacks makes for devastating reading, spelling out as it does the horrors of the murderous events in which 51 people lost their lives. The details are further daunting for making it clear just how great the threat facing Britain from Islamist terror continues to be. Much of the focus today though has rested on a question: could the attacks have been prevented? The answer is not clear but there are certainly reasons to think that at least one of the attacks could have been stopped. While there is little evidence to suggest that the Westminster Bridge attack could have been thwarted, the same cannot be said for the Manchester Arena attack.

Katy Balls

David Davis suggests regulatory alignment will apply to whole of the UK

A government minister has just appeared at the despatch box to discuss the state of the EU negotiations. Unfortunately for Theresa May, it wasn't the victorious address No 10 had in mind when they earmarked time in the Chamber for today. Instead, David Davis was summoned to Parliament to answer an urgent question from Labour's Keir Starmer on the state of the EU negotiations ahead of this month's EU council meeting. After May's efforts to agree 'sufficient progress' in Brussels yesterday were torpedoed by concerns from the DUP over concessions on the Irish border, the shadow Brexit secretary accused the government of giving new meaning to the phrase 'coalition of chaos'.

Alex Massie

The Tories are playing a dangerous game with the Union

It is a measure of devolution’s success that politicians, provided they are of sufficient stature, can make waves and news even though they are not members of the House of Commons. In their different ways – and with their very different destinations in mind – both Nicola Sturgeon and Ruth Davidson demonstrate as much. The United Kingdom – for such it just about remains – is better for this.  For some time now, we have been waiting for Davidson to make a Brexit intervention. This morning she obliged.

Ross Clark

Nick Clegg is right: we need a second Brexit referendum

I didn’t think I would ever see myself write this, but I think Nick Clegg is right: we need a second referendum on the EU. I come to this conclusion not because – like some Remainers seem to do – I think 52 per cent of the British population are too thick to make decisions affecting the future of the country and need to be made to vote again so that they can come up with the correct answer. I have come to it because it is the only way that Theresa May and her government are going to survive the next 15 months. As is clear from polls at the weekend there is a lot of public anger, as well as disquiet on the Tory backbenches, at the size of the £40 billion leaving bill.

Stephen Daisley

Now we know just how much Theresa May is willing to give away to secure Brexit

The thing to appreciate about the Conservative and Unionist Party is that the only principle it understands less than Conservatism is Unionism. The Tories have convinced themselves that these concepts mean their perfect opposite, so that Conservatism is a counsel of market dogmatism and social reaction; and Unionism is the English national interest with brief interludes from Glasgow and Belfast, like a constitutional Last Night of the Proms.  The Tories' Unionism has always been more honoured in the breach than the observance. If their handling of the Scottish referendum result was not confirmation enough, their pursuit of a hard Brexit has put it beyond all doubt.

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: How will May sell her fudge pudding to the DUP?

Theresa May’s plan to wrap up an agreement on the first stage of Brexit talks was scuppered at the last minute yesterday. Good, says the Sun. The paper argues that yesterday’s deadline was ‘always going to be a moveable feast’, and that ‘the Prime Minister is right not to agree a deal to meet a made-up deadline’. OK, it’s ‘disappointing’ that the PM will now need to do it ‘all over again later this week’. But the paper says May should remember that there is only one deadline that must be met: March 29th, 2019. Brexit is a process ’that will decide the future of our once-again sovereign country for decades to come’. ‘Let’s not rush it,’ the Sun concludes.

Steerpike

Battle of the Maybots

Unfortunately for Theresa May, her working lunch on Monday with Jean-Claude Juncker didn't work when it came to agreeing 'sufficient progress' with Brussels. However, as the Prime Minister works to solve the negotiations deadlock with the DUP – and subsequently the EU, she can at least find some light relief in the abundance of Maybot sketches now doing the rounds. In a sign that Theresa May is making an impression on Americans, May made a special appearance on Saturday Night Live over the weekend – with Kate McKinnon doing her best Maybot impression: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WMMSmwzOTg Should that one not appeal, Tracey Ullman's Theresa May is also a strong contender for best Maybot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Monday

Robert Peston

To prevent an Irish Sea border, Theresa May will align UK regulations with the EU

So it turns out there is something Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party fears and loathes more than the possibility of a government led by Jeremy Corbyn. They would be prepared to sink Theresa May and her government to prevent even the remotest prospect of a border being introduced in the middle of the Irish Sea between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. Which is why the prime minister has to be quadruply clear that any regulatory alignment she offers to the EU to prevent the re-establishment of a border between Northern Ireland and the Republic has to be alignment that applies clearly and equitably to the whole of the UK and not just to Northern Ireland.