Uk politics

Tuesday

Mats Persson

Finessing the coalition’s EU referendum lock

From our UK edition

The Coalition Government’s proposal for a 'referendum lock' on future transfers of powers to the EU has already been branded “worthless” by some Tory backbenchers . It’s easy to share their frustration at the Coalition’s lack of interest in EU reform so far. After all, the Government has chosen to opt in to the European Investigation Order; signed up for new EU financial supervisors; and chosen not to challenge the UK’s participation in the eurozone bailout (making British taxpayers potentially liable for up to £8 billion in loans to eurozone governments). However, the referendum lock is still significant. New crises, situations and politicians’ egos will always drive the need for another treaty and further integration.

Peter Hoskin

A worrying – but not disastrous – poll for the government

From our UK edition

This morning's Times/Populus poll (£) will have supporters of the coalition grimacing into their cornflakes. The headline finding is bad enough, if rather familiar, with Labour closing the gap between themselves and the Tories to only two points. But what follows is worse. According to the poll, around three-quarters of voters reject the government's deficit reduction strategy – preferring, instead, what are loosely the approaches advocated by Labour and the unions. And, what's more, economic pessmism is arrowing upwards. The number of respondents who think "the country as a whole will fare badly," has risen by 13 percentage points since June. The number who think "me and my family will do badly" has gone up by 6 points.

Monday

James Forsyth

Are the Labour leadership polls telling the whole story?

From our UK edition

This weekend’s YouGov poll showing Ed Miliband ahead in the Labour leadership contest is the talk of Westminster today. One David Miliband backer told me that he thought it was flawed as it assumed that MPs' second preferences would split evenly between the two brothers when David had the advantage. I was told that nearly all Andy Burnham’s parliamentary backers would put David second, that most of Balls’ would do the same and that Ed Miliband could only rely on Diane Abbott’s parliamentary backers' second preferences. But Ed Miliband’s supporters dispute this. They believe that they are making progress everywhere.

Peter Hoskin

Osborne and Cooper’s knockabout

From our UK edition

Far more heat than light generated by this afternoon's urgent question on welfare spending – but a telling spectacle nonetheless. The question had been put forward by a dissenting Lib Dem voice, Bob Russell, and it was up to George Osborne to answer it. He did so with sweeping observations, and attacks on Labour, rather than specifics. And so we never really got into the small print of those £4 billion extra benefit cuts, but Osborne did wonder why Labour have never apologised for "leaving the country with the worst public finances in its history." It was knockabout stuff.   This is not to say that Osborne was ineffective. In party political terms, he had a message – and he pushed it as far as he could.

David Blackburn

The coalition’s inept EU referendum lock

From our UK edition

At least this government is honest. ‘There will be,’ Europe Minister David Lidington says, ‘no referendum on the transfer of competence or power from the UK to the EU during this Parliament’. The government will ensure that there are no more EU power transfer treaties; but, as Douglas Carswell, Tim Montgomerie, and Bill Cash all note, the Lisbon Treaty is self-ratifying. The EU has already picked the coalition’s lock and garnered new powers for itself – notably the extension of the EU arrest warrant. The EU could be an economic superblock with the muscle to influence the globe strategically and culturally. But its current political operation is unnecessary and deplorably un-democratic.

Peter Hoskin

Harman tries to bind Labour and the unions even closer

From our UK edition

Progressive coalition. Those two words haven't been tied together too frequently since Gordon Brown scrambled for survival in the aftermath of the election. But Harriet Harman invoked them in her speech to the TUC today, and she wasn't talking about a union between Labour and the Lib Dems: "We are witnessing an emerging political movement amongst progressives in Britain – beginning to see that the Tory/Lib Dem government has no mandate. They are seeing the difference between what they thought they voted for and what they ended up with. The Labour movement is their vehicle for progressive change.

Peter Hoskin

The coalition faces its most important battle of the next five years

From our UK edition

Strolling through central Birmingham yesterday, I came across one of those brewery advertisements from the early part of the last century. "Unspoilt by progress," it boasted – a slogan that popped into my head when I heard the unions' various interventions this morning. As Iain Dale suggests, there is something very 1970s about what Crow, Barber, Serwotka & Co. are saying today. The coalition will need to meet much of the unions' belligerence with some fire of its own. David outlined some ways it can do that earlier. But, to my mind, there is one charge that demands a particularly ferocious counterattack.

James Forsyth

Who is behind Nick Boles’ proposed electoral pact?

From our UK edition

Nick Boles proposed electoral pact (£) between the coalition partners would have a clear benefit for the Conservatives, it would make a deal between Labour and the Liberal Democrats after the next election impossible. That is quite a prize for the Conservatives. It would mean that David Cameron would continue as PM as long as the two parties between them held a majority of seats in the Commons. It is less clear what the Liberal Democrats would gain from it. Yes, it would help more of their MPs survive, but it would tie their hands ahead of another hung parliament and massively reduce their ability to claim that they are a distinct political party rather than just an adjunct to the Conservatives.

Sunday

Fraser Nelson

What it is to be British

From our UK edition

What is it about the British and flag waving? I ask after watching last night's superlative BBC Proms, a brilliant end to the best season for years. On HD and wired to the hifi, it was all the better. As the end approached, my Czech mother-in-law asked: if this is Britain's flagship musical event, why are there so many foreign flags? It's hard to explain. Britain has a mutating relationship with flags and nationality. Twenty years ago, the Union flag was used in England matches, then devolution came and the St George's cross made an emphatic comeback. I'm sure I saw a Cornish flag last night, and at least one Saltire, so part of it is regionalisation.

David Blackburn

Benefit reform – one theatre in Cameron’s war

From our UK edition

The Observer has received letters revealing that George Osborne plans to deliver net savings of ‘at least £2.5bn’ from the Employment Support Allowance by limiting the amount of time people can spend claiming it. Here is Osborne’s letter to IDS, Cameron and Clegg: ‘Given the pressure on overall public spending in the coming period, we will need to continue developing further options to reform the benefits as part of the spending review process in order to deliver further savings, greater simplicity and stronger work incentives.

David Blackburn

The government should return the unions’ fire

From our UK edition

The TUC is mustering in Manchester and its leaders are in bellicose mood. Brendan Barber has called for a general strike; Bob Crow, brimming with the satisfaction of having wrecked London’s transport earlier in the week, has called for his members to ‘stand and fight’ the government’s cuts. These statements have a ‘Me and my executive’ air to them, so ludicrous as to be beyond parody. But the message is rousing and clear. Not so the government’s – as Fraser argues today in his News of the World column. The government is caught in an intellectual cul-de-sac. Its sole refrain is that these cuts are Labour’s cuts and they are necessary. At the same time, the government defines the cuts debate in Labour’s terms.

Saturday

David Blackburn

Field caught between reality and fantasy

From our UK edition

Frank Field's been thinking. He will make his report on poverty next week and he hints at its contents in an extensive interview with the Times (£). He is convinced that there is more to social mobility than money and he has some brilliantly simple ideas to alleviate poverty. He advocates creating four or five terms in the school year to shorten the long summer holiday, which he argues disadvantages the poor. 'They have less help at home so they lose out even more in long holidays. They drop behind, they are not being read to or tutored or talked to in the same way as many middle-class children. They have often fallen behind by the beginning of the next school year.The school year is also out of kilter with mums working.

Lucy Parsons

Beating the vested interests

From our UK edition

This is the next of our posts with Reform looking ahead to the Spending Review. Earlier posts were on health, education, the first hundred days, welfare, the Civil Service, international experiences (New Zealand, Canada, Ireland), Hon Ruth Richardson’s recent speech and how to sell the case for cuts.  On Thursday, I took part in a spending review debate in West Bromwich, part of a series the BBC held across England (my colleague Patrick Nolan wrote about his experiences in London and the East here) to discover the public’s views on what should be cut or saved in their local area.

David Blackburn

Battling for the budget rebate

From our UK edition

A plain speaking man, Janusz Lewandowksi. This week, the EU Budget Commissioner said, not without a clear note of pleasure, that 'the rebate for Britain has lost its original justification.' The EU veers between incompetence and arrogance. Baroness Ashton embodies the former, Lewandowski the latter. His statement encapsulated why a majority of Britons want out of this club into which they have never been allowed to enter. Put simply, it was hectoring and counter-factual. Mrs Thatcher negotiated the rebate to balance Britain's net contribution, which was excessive owing to Germany and France's disproportionate profit from the Common Agricultural Policy (the most glorious misnomer).

Friday

Patrick Nolan

What you need to know ahead of the spending review – making the case for cuts

From our UK edition

This is the next of our posts with Reform looking ahead to the Spending Review. Earlier posts were on health, education, the first hundred days, welfare, the Civil Service, international experiences (New Zealand, Canada, Ireland) and Hon Ruth Richardson’s recent speech. Last night the BBC showed 12 major regional television debates examining impending cuts to public sector spending. I spoke at the debates in London and the East of England (held in Ipswich). There were interesting similarities and differences in the two debates and these illustrated some important lessons for the spending review. Both debates showed that there is still work to do to explain to the public, and some commentators, the case for eliminating the deficit in one Parliamentary term.

James Forsyth

Boris for a second term

From our UK edition

Boris’s decision to announce today that he is to run again for Mayor of London is intriguing. Many in government circles expected Boris to wait until London’s settlement in the CSR had been finalised before announcing, his candidacy was the best card he had in the negotiation. So his declaration has sparked speculation that Boris and George Osborne have come to a deal. If Boris wins, and he starts as favourite, then what he does in his second term will be fascinating and the best guide to his future plans. If we see Boris becoming an increasingly national figure and championing causes dear to the right—free enterprise, low taxes and Euro-scepticism — it will suggest that he is at some danger of being decapitated by a Frisbee.

David Blackburn

From the archives – Boris for Mayor

From our UK edition

Boris Johnson has announced his candidacy for a second term as London Mayor. Here is what he wrote for the Spectator on the campaign trail last time round. How, as Mayor, I would help our brave troops, The Spectator, 17 December 2007 Even if the story is exaggerated, the underlying psychology is convincing. It is reliably reported that last month a woman in her thirties was doing her daily laps of the pool in Leatherhead, Surrey, when she became aware of an obstacle. A section of the swimming-pool had been roped off to allow 15 wounded soldiers to receive the therapy needed for their rehabilitation. It is hard to know what went through the young woman’s mind, but she must have grasped that these disfigurements had been incurred in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Peter Hoskin

Same old problems – and solutions – for Royal Mail

From our UK edition

Two years ago, Richard Hooper wrote a report on Royal Mail which recommended part-privatising the service, among other measures. And today, with the official update to that report, we learn that his views have barely changed at all. If anything is different between then and now, it's that the need to modernise Royal Mail has become even more urgent. The number of letters they're sending has plummeted by more than forecast, and their pensions deficit has become even more unsustainable. The rot has quickened – and, yes, it's up to the government to combat it. For their part, the coalition are using Hooper's update to stress just how crucial privatisation is for Royal Mail.

David Blackburn

A miracle! And a good idea

From our UK edition

I’m not sure if the sun will ever rise in the east again: Michael Howard has supported a Ken Clarke prison policy. The Justice Secretary has launched a pilot scheme at HMP Peterborough that uses private bond investment to fund inmate remedial programmes to cut re-offending. The Social Impacts Bond will provide £5million to produce £8million over the course of six years, assuming the scheme is a success. The situation required boldness. For once tabloid melodrama is accurate: reoffending is the scourge of our times and its incidence has risen steadily over the last decade. According to Dame Anne Owers, the former chief inspector of prisons, one cause is that remedial funding did not keep pace with the 27 percent increase in prison numbers between 1997-2007.

Peter Hoskin

BoJo to stand for a second term as London Mayor

From our UK edition

Today, it seems, the uncertainty is going to come an end: Boris Johnson will confirm that he is running for a second term as Mayor of London in May 2012. In truth, though, we probably shouldn't have expected anything else. The timings of the Parliamentary term, and the inavailability of safe seats, always made an early return to Westminster unlikely – even if that's what Boris had wanted. Stir the Olympic Games into the mix, and the lure of City Hall must have been too powerful to resist. As Ben Brogan says, this could be a timely boost for the Tories. The Boris campaign will be launched, to much jubilation, at the Birmingham conference next month.