Uk politics

Monday

James Forsyth

Ed Miliband rules out a formal coalition with the SNP — but a deal could still be on the cards

From our UK edition

Ed Miliband has today ruled out a formal coalition between Labour and the SNP. Labour hope that this will draw the sting from Tory claims that if you vote Labour, you’ll get SNP and put pressure on Cameron to rule out any deal with Ukip. But, as Nicola Sturgeon has been quick to point out, the SNP weren’t keen on a formal coalition. Rather, what has been talked about is something more akin to a confidence and supply deal with the SNP agreeing to vote for Miliband’s Queen Speech and Budget in return for specific concessions.  This is something that Miliband, for the obvious reason that he might need it in the event of a hung parliament, doesn’t want to rule out. So, expect the Tory attacks to keep on coming.

Sebastian Payne

Nigel Farage is right: he has to win in South Thanet

From our UK edition

Can Nigel Farage survive as leader of Ukip if he doesn’t become an MP? Although he stood in South Thanet ten years ago — and gained a meagre 5 per cent of the vote — he has much bigger hopes for the impending election. But the dangers are also much higher than ever before. As I wrote in the Spectator recently, if Farage doesn't win South Thanet, his position as Ukip leader would become untenable. He admitted to me it ‘could be a car crash’ if he doesn’t become an MP. Farage has publicly admitted today that South Thanet won’t be an easy fight and there is a huge danger if he doesn’t win.

Nick Cohen

Liberal Democrats reveal the great fissure in liberalism

From our UK edition

Someone once said (it may have been me) that while the left looks for traitors the right looks for converts. Only in Britain’s centre ground, however, are converts treated as traitors. Maajid Nawaz is one of the most interesting public figures I know. As a young man growing up on the Essex coast, he received an education in both varieties of modern far-right thinking: the racist and the religious. Racist gangs and Combat 18 were active in his area. He reacted against them, as any boy of spirit would. But his reaction took the form of joining Hizb-ut-Tahrir. Hizb was the marijuana or soft porn of radical Islam in the 1990s.

Isabel Hardman

Labour aims fire at Grant Shapps over second job allegations

From our UK edition

How damaging for the Tories is the row about Grant Shapps’ second job? While it is quite easy to write up the Conservative chairman’s business past in a way that makes him sound like a slightly murky character teaching people how to make a ‘ton of cash’, does the latest story, that Shapps was still running his web marketing business when in Parliament, despite his claims to the contrary, really cut through to voters? The details are as follows: Shapps told LBC three weeks ago that ‘I’ve never had a second job while being an MP, end of story’. But a tape from the summer of 2006 has Michael Green (Shapps) talking about people making a ‘ton of cash’ from his business techniques.

Sunday

James Forsyth

Nick Clegg: The Liberal Democrats are the continuity choice at the election

From our UK edition

The Liberal Democrats sense an opportunity in all this speculation about who the Tories and Labour would do deals with in the event of a hung parliament. They believe that they can position themselves as the responsible party that will keep the country in the centre ground in contrast to the other smaller parties. Today, in his speech to the party’s spring conference, Clegg ruled out joining any coalition that involved the SNP or Ukip. He also tried to use the moment to reinforce voters’ worries about either main party governing on their own. He argued that the Tories would cut needlessly—‘Cows moo. Dogs bark. And Tories cut.

Isabel Hardman

Paddy Ashdown slaps down Tim Farron: ‘Judgement is not his strong suit’

From our UK edition

It seems Tim Farron has rather annoyed his senior Lib Dem colleagues with his quite naked desire to become party leader. After the ambitious MP said that the Lib Dems got 2/10 for the way they'd handled the Coalition, he received a pretty hefty slap down from Lord Ashdown on this morning's Pienaar's Politics on Radio 5Live. The Lib Dem General Election campaign chair didn't bother sending veiled messages to Farron about criticising the party leadership and saying that the Lib Dems are 'dead'. Instead, he just verbally roughed up Farron in the way Farron has been roughing up his own party leadership. 'His well-known ambition would be better served with a little more patience and a little more judgement,' said Ashdown, adding later that 'judgement is not his strong suit'.

James Forsyth

How George Osborne got the Liberal Democrats to agree to an ‘interesting Budget’

From our UK edition

George Osborne and Ed Balls have just done their pre-Budget interviews with Andrew Marr. The show, though, was dominated by talks of post-election deals rather than the contents of the Budget. Ed Balls said that Labour had ‘no need, no plan, no desire’ to do any kind of deal with the SNP. But, as Andrew Marr kept pointing out to him, he wouldn’t rule it out. While when George Osborne was asked about any kind of arrangement with Ukip, he simply took the opportunity to repeat the claim that ‘voting for Nigel Farage makes Ed Miliband the likely Prime Minister’. It was a pity, though, that more time wasn’t spent on the Budget as I suspect it will be more substantive than expected. One Downing Street source described it to me as ‘interesting’.

Saturday

James Forsyth

A Vince intervention that will please the Tories

From our UK edition

Later today, Vince Cable will launch his traditional conference attack on the Tories. He’ll denounce them for their positions on Europe and immigration. But his pre-conference interview in The Guardian will have, for once, delighted the Tories. For in it, Cable rules out a deal with the SNP. Now, this is a turn-around from Cable. Just last month, he said "We're perfectly happy to work with the SNP. There's no taboo on the SNP.

Friday

Isabel Hardman

Can the Greens win in Bristol West?

From our UK edition

If general elections were won on how swanky a campaign office is, the Greens would beat the Lib Dems hands down in Bristol West. Their candidate Darren Hall works out of a smart, airy office overlooking the harbour in one of the most expensive commercial parts of the city. It’s all thanks to Vivienne Westwood, who has funded the office as part of her support for the Greens, and given Hall was until recently keeping most of his campaign materials in a garage, it’s quite a step up. Indeed, it puts him in far more glamorous quarters than the Lib Dems, who are working in a garage, albeit a converted one with windows and heaters, in much cheaper Bishopston.

Sebastian Payne

Mini Election: Jacob Rees-Mogg on re-election in North East Somerset and being a Tory stereotype

From our UK edition

Is Jacob Rees-Mogg confident about reelection in North East Somerset? For the latest Mini Election video, I visited the West Country to speak to Jacob (and his son Peter) about his efforts to hold onto his marginal seat in the upcoming election. Although he was victorious in 2010 with a comfortable majority of 4,91,  the constituency was held by Labour — albeit under different boundaries — so he has been campaigning almost non-stop for the last few years. Does he think that British elections are generally becoming too American? We also discussed his long-held belief that the Conservative Party needs to have an electoral pact with Ukip and whether it is too late to unite the right. Rees-Mogg is also concerned about political bias from the BBC over the TV debates.

Isabel Hardman

Is Margaret Hodge the ‘tarantula’ good for politics?

From our UK edition

It’s not just on the Health Select Committee that election fever is starting to take hold. The Public Accounts Committee had a party-political row this week too, with accusations that Tory members had blocked plans to question Lord Green over HSBC. There is now a leak inquiry underway about who from the committee told the Guardian that Tory MPs blocked a bid for Green, while those Conservatives insist that they are happy for him to give evidence if he is needed for the inquiry. This sort of jostling on a committee isn’t particularly surprising given the proximity of an election, but while the PAC by tradition doesn’t have the sorts of stormy votes that other select committees have, it has seen some political tensions.

Isabel Hardman

Labour edges towards firmer line on SNP coalition

From our UK edition

If mainstream politicians are a bit confused and downbeat at the moment, Scottish Labour MPs are the most miserable of the lot, facing a savaging in constituencies they never thought would slip out of their party’s hands. But last night Ed Miliband gave them reason to be a bit less miserable, just for a little while anyway. On Free Speech, the Labour leader came much closer to ruling out a Labour-SNP coalition than he has before, saying ‘I am saying it’s nonsense. I absolutely am saying it’s nonsense. It’ not gonna… you know… you just said it’. He also pointed out that the SNP had ruled out a coalition with Labour. Of course, the real chances of a coalition were pretty low, given it would seriously damage both parties involved.

Sebastian Payne

Five things we learnt about compassionate conservatism from Michael Gove’s speech

From our UK edition

Is there a future for compassionate conservatism in Britain? Michael Gove outlined why there are reasons to feel optimistic at a speech at the Legatum Institute last night. The Tory Chief Whip said that many of the ideas promoted by The Good Right project are a core part of the Conservative Party’s mission — but there remains a need to ‘rebalance the debate about what’s best for Britain’. Here are five things you need to know about what Gove said. 1. The Tories need to remember people don’t like them In 2002, Theresa May infamously said that the Conservative Party is viewed by many as the ‘nasty party’.

Thursday

James Forsyth

Ed speaks some human

From our UK edition

When Ed Miliband ran for the Labour leadership in 2010, his supporters boasted that he spoke human. Tonight, in a question time session with a group of young people broadcast on BBC3, Miliband showed flashes of his ability to connect with an audience. But, overall, it was a patchy performance. Miliband was very good on some subjects and dealt neatly with some left-field questions. However, he still doesn’t have the right answer to the question of whether he would do a deal with the SNP after the election in the event of a hung parliament. He dismissed the ideas as ‘a piece of nonsense from the Tories’. But, in contrast to a grand coalition with the Tories, he didn’t actually rule it out. Predictably, Miliband got asked about drugs.

Isabel Hardman

Tiny revolt in Commons over defence doesn’t mean the trouble’s gone away

From our UK edition

MPs this afternoon backed the motion calling for the government to set defence spending at 2 per cent of GDP - though not in huge numbers. There were 37 votes in favour to 3 votes against, which is hardly a furious uprising. This vote is a backbench vote, and so it is not binding on the government. Nevertheless, there are many good reasons why ministers should obey the demands of those MPs who did turn up - and listen to the concerns of many who did not. James sets out those reasons, as well as ministers’ reluctance to address them, in this week’s magazine. Ministers might think they can ignore the issue based on the poor turnout at today’s vote.

Sebastian Payne

Nigel Farage is on the hunt for Britain’s ‘Reagan Democrats’

From our UK edition

Why does Nigel Farage keep on doing it? Whether it’s immigrants blocking up the M4, ostentatious breastfeeding or today’s controversy over scrapping race discrimination laws, the Ukip leader has a knack of making statements that outrage the political establishment. Sadiq Khan accused Farage of 'breathtaking ignorance' while Ed Miliband and David Cameron took to Twitter to express their disagreement with Farage. .@David_Cameron The people the law doesn't protect are British workers, black or white. Disturbing, though unsurprising, that u don't care. — Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) March 12, 2015 Farage's statement is not the usual fare we've come to expect from political leaders, at least to the metropolitan mindset.

Isabel Hardman

Nigel Farage’s race discrimination comments are a strategic error

From our UK edition

Aside from whether he’s right to argue that we don’t need many racial discrimination laws, why does Nigel Farage think it’s politically a good idea to mull about relaxing them so that firms can take on British staff? The Ukip leader has spent most of today getting rather annoyed at what he says has been misreporting of his remarks to Trevor Phillips, and explaining what it was he said. Here are his original quotes: ‘I think the employer should be much freer to make decisions on who she or he employs. ‘I think the situation that we now have, where an employer is not allowed to choose between a British-born person and somebody from Poland, is a ludicrous state of affairs.

Rory Sutherland

How to make Ukip supporters love green policies

From our UK edition

Few people know this, but hidden within the FedEx logo, between the E and the x, there is a small white arrow, pointing to the right. I feel slightly guilty sharing this with you, since from now until your death you will find it impossible not to notice this device. It is something which once glimpsed cannot be unseen. Perception can be irreversible: when you first see that famous blue/black or white/gold dress it may be fairly arbitrary whether you see it one way or the other, but you cannot unlearn your first impression. The brain resolves the ambiguity by making a snap assumption about the light in which it was photographed; yet once your brain has made this unconscious ‘hunch’, you cannot reverse the judgment. Once you go blue/black you never go back.

Wednesday

Isabel Hardman

Exclusive: the NHS report that Labour tried to block

From our UK edition

It emerged this morning that Labour MPs took the extraordinary step of blocking the publication of the Health Select Committee report into the NHS – because the conclusions backed up government reforms. I have just been handed details of this report, and it’s clear why Labour wanted it suppressed: it contradicts the party’s attack message. Here are the main points: No sweeping privatisations: there has been little increase in private sector providers since 2010. Nor has there been an extension of charges or top-ups during the current parliament, and that these are not planned. Less red tape: a general trend of declining administration costs in the NHS. No evidence that the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership poses a threat to the NHS.

Alex Massie

Yes, Scotland does receive an unfair share of public spending. Probably

From our UK edition

Gulp. But what about England? That's one of the questions to be asked in the aftermath of the latest Scottish spending and revenue figures, published today. The figures do not lie. Even when North Sea oil figures are taken into account - a geographic accident that, while welcome, remains an unearned accident - England (as a whole) subsidises other parts of the United Kingdom. This is a good thing. This is the way it is supposed to be. But - double gulp - shouldn't Scotland be subsidising other parts of the UK too? Identifiable spending per capita in Scotland is a bit higher than in Wales, London and north-eastern England, quite a bit lower than in Northern Ireland, and much higher than in southern and eastern England.