Uk politics

Wednesday

Alex Massie

It is not surprising that the polls on Scottish independence are tightening…

There are some pollsters who believe nothing has changed since 2011. All the storm and blast, bluff and bluster about Scottish independence has had no impact at all. The settled will of the Scottish people remains settles: more power for Edinburgh but no to independence. Oddly YouGov’s Peter Kellner is one of these pollsters. Oddly because, as the chart above shows, his own polling organisation’s reports show that the race is, as long expected, tightening. There is a small but definite drift to Yes. True, at its present rate it will not be enough to prevail come September. But it is quite possible that the drift towards a Yes vote

Isabel Hardman

Nick v Nigel: what Cameron should worry about as he watches today’s fight

Even though it’s not unreasonable to predict that both Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage can emerge from tonight’s LBC debate feeling they’ve won (they’re preaching to quite different choirs), it’s still worth remembering that the one who lands a killer blow or smart put down will get the best clip on the 10 o’clock news. David Cameron says he won’t be watching the debate, implying he’s not bothered by this sideshow. Few believe this. But as he does furtively follow the exchanges while pretending to watch one of his favourite box sets, the Prime Minister will see both Farage and Clegg rubbish his renegotiation strategy. The former thinks it is

Tuesday

Jonathan Aitken

Take it from an ex-con — the outrage over prison books is misplaced

When I was doing my time in HMP Standford Hill, a strange pair of heavily perfumed Korans and Bibles were delivered to one inmate, ostensibly to help him with his ‘studies in comparative religion’. As intended, the perfume threw the sniffer dogs off the scent. But a suspicious prison officer found a significant quantity of heroin stuck between the pages of these holy books. This was an example of ‘parcelling it,’ con-speak for getting drugs into jails. So Chris Grayling, the Justice Secretary, has a point now that he is trying to restrict the supply of books into prisons. But not much of a point: such examples are real but

Isabel Hardman

Despite low-key launch, Tory ‘managed migration’ campaign should worry No. 10

Mark Field’s new Conservatives for Managed Migration group hasn’t attracted overwhelming public support from MPs. When it launched this morning, it only had two Tory MPs openly signed up, with Field telling BBC News that ‘I think we have got quite a few supporters’ but refusing to give an exact number. This might be causing No. 10 some satisfaction, although Downing Street sources are insisting that they are ‘relaxed’ about the group. It does, after all, argue that there is a ‘fundamental problem’ with the Conservatives’ net migration target. And there is considerable irritation among the Prime Minister’s advisers that MPs feel the need to set up new groups whenever

Sebastian Payne

Can the government avoid another rail fiasco before 2015?

There’s some exciting train news today, and no, it’s not related to HS2. The Transport Secretary has announced that the franchise for the East Coast Mainline has gone out to tender. Britain’s second busiest railway marked a low point for rail privatisation, when National Express bombed out of the franchise and Labour nationalised the line. Since then it has been under government control and the coalition has delayed throwing it back into the private sector several times. How have each of the operators fared on the line? Since British Rail was privatised in the early 1990s, the ECML has been run by Great North Eastern Railways (1996 to 2007), National

Isabel Hardman

Exclusive: Lib Dems go cold on candidate after ‘Jesus and Mo’ row

The Lib Dems are considering scaling back their fight for Maajid Nawaz to win the Hampstead and Kilburn seat after the row about his ‘Jesus and Mo’ tweet, I have been told. This very marginal seat, which Labour’s Glenda Jackson holds with a majority of just 42, had been one of the Lib Dems’ key target seats. But a very well-placed senior source tells me that after the ‘Jesus and Mo’ row (which Nawaz had an extremely bad-tempered debate about with Mehdi Hasan and Mo Ansar on yesterday’s Newsnight), those involved in the party’s campaigns have privately concluded that the candidate has seriously damaged his chances of winning the seat

Isabel Hardman

Will welfare cap vote be Miliband’s biggest rebellion?

So Rachel Reeves confirmed in the Commons today that Labour will back the welfare cap when it comes to a vote. Tory MPs cheered her as she announced this. There is a rebellion brewing on the Labour benches on this, which party sources are saying they remain ‘vigilant’ about. Some claim that this will be the biggest revolt of Miliband’s leadership. If it is, then it will have to surpass the 40 Labour MPs (39 and one teller) who rebelled against their party’s official position on welfare sanctions just over a year ago. The then Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Liam Byrne instructed Labour MPs to abstain on a bill

Isabel Hardman

Nick Clegg’s new running sore

Nick Clegg spent the first 20 minutes of Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions looking a little miserable. A wan smile did flicker across his lips at about 18 minutes in, but it didn’t spread to his eyes or stay very long at all. In fact, he appeared to be doing his best to fit the best ever P.G. Wodehouse description of a man looking like ‘a cat which has just been struck by a half-brick and is expecting another shortly’. Fortunately for Clegg, the other half of the brick didn’t turn up. In fact, when the time came for Harriet Harman to savage the DPM, he appeared quite happy that she’d

Isabel Hardman

Harriet Harman: Labour is making steady progress

‘I don’t think things are going wrong,’ Harriet Harman insisted on the Today programme. ‘I think we’re making steady progress. And if you look at when people actually vote, for example in council elections, then actually around the country we’ve got nearly 2,000 more councillors since Ed Miliband became leader.’ listen to ‘Harman: ‘I don’t think things are going wrong’ with Labour’ on Audioboo Miliband last night admitted on ITV’s The Agenda that 2015 will ‘be a close election’. Harman helped flesh out why when she defended her leader, telling Today that ‘I think that Ed Miliband has absolutely identified that people are feeling a real squeeze on their living

Monday

Isabel Hardman

Cameron continues silver offensive

David Cameron is doing his best to do what the Tories haven’t always been that impressive at: capitalising on the clever political bits in this year’s Budget. He was at a PM direct event in Peacehaven today, driving home the importance of the government’s reforms to pensions to his target voters. But he also had the opportunity to woo them with other policy treats, such as what the Tories might promise on inheritance tax in their next manifesto. ‘Would I like to go further in future?’ he said. ‘Yes, I would. I believe in people being able to pass money down through the generations and pass things on to their

Isabel Hardman

Michael Gove attacks Tristram Hunt for not knowing difference between education and health

Education questions is always interesting in the sense that the main players are quite energetic and keen for debate and there is a genuine divide now between the two main parties (and indeed within the Coalition). But today’s session was interesting in the sense that a grandmother describes a Christmas present they don’t quite understand as ‘interesting’ because Tristram Hunt used his slot to grill the Education Secretary about a health issue. ‘More and more research shows the importance of early years development in a child’s education. The Labour party Sure Start programme was focused on supporting those vital infant years, a policy of prevention rather than cure. We know

Isabel Hardman

Labour’s localist lurch

One of the other things worth noting from this morning’s letter from the ‘members of the progressive community’ who are anxious that Labour isn’t attempting to make a big offer in 2015 is that the alliance of groups and figures from the left and right of the party back decentralisation. The letter calls for: ‘Devolution of state institutions, by giving away power and resources to our nations, regions, cities, localities and, where possible, directly to the people.’ As I explained in my Telegraph column last week, a battle in the shadow cabinet has resulted in a surprise victory for Hilary Benn and Jon Cruddas, who had been pushing for a

Isabel Hardman

Labour thinkers see danger in playing safe

David Cameron’s attack on Labour for “flailing and dithering” over whether to support the government’s pension reforms would seem unfair had the party not struggled to present a clear message over the weekend. It would be unfair to expect a snap judgement on the changes from a responsible opposition party, but the weekend press and the papers this morning suggest that Labour doesn’t even have a neat holding line as it works out how far to extend its support. But what should worry Ed Miliband far more than the attack from Cameron is the increasing anxiety from his own side about Labour’s message. The Guardian’s letter from 19 leading Labour

Sunday

Isabel Hardman

What today’s polls mean for the Tories and Labour

The Labour party’s reaction to today’s opinion polls will tell us a great deal about how well Ed Miliband has really invested in his party. If the backbenchers feel they have a stake in the Labour leader, and as though he is worth fighting for – which Conservative MPs have often not felt about Cameron, leading to them airing their dirty laundry in public – then the panic in the party won’t break out beyond John Mann’s intervention today. The backbencher told Pienaar’s Politics that ‘of course it’s a warning shot and it would be naive to think otherwise. I think the message is that we need to be much

Sebastian Payne

Pension reforms are vital to encourage saving. But what about everyone else?

‘This reform is about treating people as adults’ — according to the Pensions Minister Steve Webb. The announcement of a pensions revolution in this week’s budget took everyone by surprise, leading to the question of whether there has been enough consultation on the changes. Webb said on the Sunday Politics today that evidence elsewhere shows the coalition is doing the right thing: ‘We know from around the world – places like America and Australia – where people already have this kind of freedoms. So we already have some things to judge by. We’re going to spend the next year talking to people working it through, including a three-month consultation. There

Saturday

David Blackburn

#ToryBingo could still benefit the Conservatives

Isabel and Sebastian are right: #ToryBingo is embarrassing. The advert was crass to the point of being idiotic. The use of the word ‘they’ rather than ‘you’ to describe ‘hardworking people’ was sloppy. The episode has taken some of the gloss off an otherwise shiny Budget. It is, emphatically, bad PR. That said; I don’t imagine that the Tories will be too displeased by the furore. #ToryBingo has given a huge amount of exposure to two Budget measures that would otherwise have been buried beneath the pension announcement: the Tories have cut tax on bingo and duty on beer. Neither of those measures is going to turn the next election

Isabel Hardman

Tory Wars: Backbenchers threaten backlash against Shapps backlash

There is a rather furious backlash underway against the backlash that Grant Shapps finds himself in the middle of after his bingo gaffe. Supporters of the Tory Chairman suspect he has been stitched up in some way. I understand that the graphic was emailed out to a number of tweeting MPs who all tweeted it at roughly the same time – Shapps was the first. And as Chairman, he has to take the flak. Others privately suspect that other ministers who are after his job are responsible for briefings such as this one to the Sun that he could lose his job if the Tories take a drubbing in the

Friday

Alex Massie

Ed Miliband’s speech in Scotland: Mr Pooter meets Alan Partridge

Ed Miliband has just given a quite extraordinary speech. I don’t know if it was deliberately banal or merely unfortunately dull. It was certainly stupefyingly boring. The Labour leader gave the impression that Scottish Labour’s spring conference was the very last place on earth he wished to be. I suppose you can’t blame him for that. Even so this perfunctory, cliche-stuffed flannel suggested Miliband’s heart wasn’t really in Perth today. It was a kind of “God, do I really have to go to Scotland?” kind of speech. I’m not sure Alan Partridge Meets Mr Pooter was quite the note Miliband hoped to strike. But when you start referring to Anas Sarwar

Isabel Hardman

How food banks were shunted around government departments

It is well worth reading Paul Waugh’s interview with Iain Duncan Smith in the House Magazine for a number of reasons – not least his hint about docking child benefit in the future. But the Work and Pensions Secretary also makes an interesting comment about food banks: ‘We are not responsible for food banks, that policy area generally is Cabinet Office and so it should remain. I’m happy for people to visit food banks, I don’t have a particular problem with them.’ I’ve written before about why people visit food banks, and why even if we had a very good benefits system that paid people the right amount of money

Sebastian Payne

#ToryBingo: why politicians can’t ignore twitterstorms

The row over Grant Shapps’ bingo poster is an example of what happens when politicians assume that what goes in the Westminster bubble stays there. David Cameron and Paul Dacre may be right that ’too many tweets make a twat’ and Twitter can be a ‘phoney world’. But occasionally, one tweet can move into the real world too. As Isabel reported yesterday, Conservative HQ’s ineffectual response to the misjudged Bingo poster suggests that they hoped the anger could be contained amongst the anti-Conservative brigade, many of whom spend their days tweeting abuse to George Osborne. But the number of spoofs (a selection can be seen above) and the fury within