Uk politics

On Friday, Ed Miliband pledged to introduce greater competition in our banking market. Last September, he pledged to freeze energy prices for 20 months while our broken energy market is reset to expand competition and consumer choice. Reforming broken markets to increase competition and address the long-term sources of our cost-of-living crisis might seem an unusual theme for Labour to champion. In fact it is an approach that has learnt from a progressive conservative tradition, one that understands the importance of reform to ensure that markets remain open and competitive. Noone understood this idea better than the American President Theodore Roosevelt – a passionate believer in free enterprise, and a tenacious advocate of market reform.

With just 124 days till European election polling day, you’d expect Ukip to be working tirelessly to professionalise the party’s operations and hide away any controversial opinions. They don’t appear to be doing a very good job so far. David Silvester, a Ukip councillor in Henley-on-Thames, has written to his local newspaper explaining how Britain’s recent spates of floods are David Cameron’s fault — because he has angered God with the Same Sex Marriage Bill: ‘The scriptures make it abundantly clear that a Christian nation that abandons its faith and acts contrary to the Gospel (and in naked breach of a coronation oath) will be beset by natural disasters such as storms, disease, pestilence and war.

Nick Clegg has in the past few minutes made clear that unless Lord Rennard apologises for his behaviour towards women in the party, he will not regain the Liberal Democrat whip. A party spokesman said: 'Nick Clegg is of the view that as long as Lord Rennard refuses the very reasonable request from Alistair Webster QC to apologise that it is inappropriate for him to rejoin the Liberal Democrat group in the House of Lords. Nick has communicated this to the Chief Whip and Leader of the House of Lords group. 'In addition, a growing number of party members have come forward to make representations to the party that Lord Rennard's refusal to apologise in itself brings the party into disrepute.

David Cameron addressed the parliamentary Conservative party last night. He took an opportunity to tell MPs to stop writing him public letters, and instead that they should approach him privately and that his 'door is always open'. That opportunity was raised by Brighton Kemptown MP Simon Kirby, who complained about colleagues 'banging on about Europe' (even those who signed the letter are a bit worried about the amount of chat about Europe that it has provoked). But the meeting itself was focused on the party's media strategy (with a presentation from Craig Oliver) and what one present described as 'holistic election strategy'.

Is the improving economy harming Labour’s standing? According to a new Guardian/ICM survey out today, Labour is still ahead of the Conservatives by three points — but the gap is slowly shrinking. Since the last ICM poll in December, Labour’s lead has dropped to just three points, down from an eight point lead in November: Today’s poll also looks at how assured people are feeling about their own financial position and their ‘ability to keep up with the cost of living’. 52 per cent now feel confident about the state of their personal finances — the highest level since October 2010.