Uk politics

Friday

Peter Hoskin

John Redwood “not sure” whether ministers will vote in 1922 Committee

From our UK edition

John Redwood is interviewed by Andrew Neil on Straight Talk this weekend, and there's a rather eyecatching exchange where the Tory MP claims that he's "not sure" whether ministers will be able to vote in the 1922 Committee, after all: John Redwood: ...as I understand the ballot, the ballot was about whether Ministers should come regularly to the 22 or not, and so I have no problem with that, and if that is the agreement, then fine. Andrew Neil: So are you not clear yet whether Ministers can come along as full members of the 22 Committee? JR: Well, I’m not sure whether they vote in 1922 elections, which is the point you were asserting, and we’ll have to see whether that’s true or not.

Peter Hoskin

The latest expenses battle

From our UK edition

IPSA, IPSA, IPSA.  If there's one thing exercising MPs across all parties at the moment, then it's the new expenses regime in the Commons: the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority.  I won't run through all of their grievances here, mainly because you can find good summaries here, here and here.  But they are already a frustrating mix of seemingly legitimate concerns (about staff wages) and outrageous whining (about not having taxi fares paid for before 11pm)(erm, pay for them yourself). The latest news is that John Bercow is going to intervene, to "ensure the new rules are interpreted reasonably and that MPs are treated courteously.

Peter Hoskin

The Tories still need to do more to sell their school reforms

From our UK edition

It is quite telling that David Cameron's first newspaper article since becoming Prime Minister is for the Daily Mail, and even more telling that its central message is, "you still have a Conservative Prime Minister".  There then follows a series of reassurances about Dave's political motivations ("I believe the state is your servant, never your master. I believe in the common sense and decency of the British people") and about the policies contained in the coalition agreement. One line that jumped out at me, though, is this rather inspid description of the Tories' radical school reform agenda: "We're also giving parents, charities and other organisations the opportunity to set up their own new schools." Hardly inspiring, is it?

Peter Hoskin

A Labour leadership candidate needs to take on Balls over spending – and quick

From our UK edition

A week ago, I wondered whether the Labour leadership contest might produce a "cuts candidate": someone prepared to responsibly debate the fiscal situation as part of their campaign. But, as Danny Finkelstein has noted, none of the candidates so far has even mentioned the deficit, let alone suggested solutions for trimming it. Their wilful silence on the issue is starting to look bizarre, to say the least. The worry, though, is that it will also prove dangerous.  So long as the d-word doesn't get a look in, Ed Balls is blissfully free to do what he does best, and bang on misleadingly about "investment vs cuts".

Thursday

Peter Hoskin

The civil service talks cuts

From our UK edition

Jonathan Baume is fast becoming one of the political celebrities of the LibCon era.  If you recall, he's the union chief who revealed that the senior civil servants had written letters to Labour ministers in concern at spending decisions made close to the election.  And now he's popped up again, with more unflattering comments about the previous administration.  Speaking at his union's annual conference, he said that "new ministers and MPs must begin to display the personal and moral integrity that was so obviously lacking in the previous Parliament, even within the Cabinet."  Hm, I wonder who he could mean.

Peter Hoskin

A curious little episode

From our UK edition

Iain Martin asks a good question about today's 1922 Committee vote: "This is a rather curious little episode. In what other club, society or members-run committee would nonmembers (ministers in this case) get to vote for their being granted full membership against the wishes of the existing members?" N.B. Paul Goodman has done the maths to suggest that a majority of Tory backbenchers voted against Cameron.

Peter Hoskin

Calling Osborne’s bluff

From our UK edition

I've just read through George Osborne's speech to the CBI annual dinner last night, and there's much in there about free markets and tax cuts that will encourage Tory supporters.  But one passsage seemed a little strange to me: "And on the subject of coalitions, let me be absolutely frank. As a member of the negotiating team, we did consider whether we could try to bluff our way into a minority government. But it was David Cameron’s bold vision and Nick Clegg’s great foresight which saw, before anyone else, that that option would be the greatest compromise of all. A weak, unstable government, risking defeat night after night in Parliament.

Peter Hoskin

Cameron has won the 1922 Committee vote…

From our UK edition

...by 168 to 118 votes, according to Paul Waugh.  Comfortable, but not comfortable enough to suggest that there won't be a strong core of resentment to this change. UPDATE: This could rumble on. Here's the latest from PoliticsHome: A number of MPs, headed by the previous 1922 secretary Christopher Chope, are planning to challenge the surprisingly close result, and have not ruled out legal action. They point out that: 1. The difference between the winners and losers is more than bridged by members of the government (who they point out are not entitled to vote according to the current rules of the committee). 2.

Peter Hoskin

How the coalition will work

From our UK edition

The full coalition agreement, released this morning, is fascinating enough in itself.  Here we have a step-by-step guide for how two different parties will operate together, what they will do, and, broadly speaking, when they will do it.  And, perhaps to ease the general uncertainty surrounding this type of government, it is considerably clearer than party manifestos tend to be.  One thing you can say, at least, is that this coalition appears keen to make itself more accountable. Skimming through the actual document, there seem to be few surprises, and a good handful of reviews designed to punt difficult policy areas into the long grass.

Peter Hoskin

The Labour leadership contest gets interesting

From our UK edition

Tales of the expected and the unexpected this morning, as two more names enter the Labour leadership fray. The first is the expected one: Andy Burnham, who announces his bid in an article for the Mirror. And the unexpected one is ... Diane Abbott, who revealed her intentions on the Today programme earlier. That thud you heard afterwards was the sound of a thousand jaws hitting the ground in Westminster. Both will, I suspect, do much to improve the contest as a spectator sport. Abbott will have no qualms about attacking the record of the Blair and Brown years. And neither, it seems, will Andy Burnham.

Wednesday

Fraser Nelson

Graham Brady on 1922 and all that

From our UK edition

In tomorrow’s Spectator we have an interview with Graham Brady, tipped to be chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench MPs – which David Cameron has just proposed to abolish in his 4.30pm meeting with MPs today. Technically, he is proposing to dilute its membership by including the payroll vote, thereby making it synonymous with the parliamentary party. So the backbenchers would not have a voice of their own. And Mr Brady’s position would be much less important. Here is an extract from tomorrow’s interview: In the era of Blair-style landslides, the likes and loves of backbench MPs mattered little: the government’s majority was big enough to force through most votes. But the loyalty of Tory MPs to a coalition government is untested.

James Forsyth

The 1922-2010 Committee

From our UK edition

In a move of breath-taking audacity, David Cameron has just announced that there will be a ballot of the parliamentary party to establish whether or not members of the government payroll vote will be able to be full voting members of the 1922 Committee. This may seem like a small technical change but it is of massive importance: it would hugely limit the power of Conservative backbenchers to hold the government to account. When the Conservative party has been in government, the 1922 Committee has been the voice of the backbenchers. It is how they have held Conservative ministers and prime ministers to account. Cameron’s move, if successful, would effectively remove that power from them.

Peter Hoskin

David Lammy: Why Cameron has triumphed

From our UK edition

With Ed Balls and John McDonnell announcing their candidatures for the Labour leadership, it's clear that Labour's soul-searching period has now begun in earnest.  Speaking in front of the cameras just now, Balls reeled of the lines that he's been priming over the past week: "listening ... immigration ... listening ... beyond Blair and Brown," etc.  While McDonnell was keen to separate himself from the other candidates, describing them as the "sons of Blair and the sons of Brown". Both of them might care to read David Lammy's appraisal of where it went wrong for Labour – and where it went right for Cameron – in tomorrow's issue of the Spectator.

James Forsyth

Mind the culture gap

From our UK edition

Danny Finkelstein’s column this morning is one of the most important things to have been written since the coalition was formed. Danny makes the point that the coalition has no ideas infrastructure in place. There’s nowhere for it to go to get new ideas. Think tanks will rush to fill this void. But as Danny notes, there will also have to be a cultural comfort with the other side. That there isn’t at the moment is demonstrated by the look on Tory MPs’ faces when you debate whether Nick Clegg should be invited to address Tory conference. One of the clever things that the coalition agreement has done is to make the main tax cut of this government a Lib Dem one. It is a reminder to the Tory party that the Lib Dems believe in freedom too.

Peter Hoskin

Trouble averted or trouble ahead?

From our UK edition

"The biggest shake up of our democracy since 1832."  That's how Nick Clegg is describing the legislative package that he's announcing today.  And, even if that's pure bravado, there's certainly plenty of encouraging stuff in it.  Scrapping ID cards; restricting the storage of innocent people's DNA; and the government is even set to ask the public which laws they'd like to see repealed.  Sign me up. But it's one omission which is really ruffling Tory feathers today.  There will not, it seems, be an immediate move to supplant or even dilute the European Convention on Human Rights with a British Bill of Rights.  Speaking on Radio 4 this morning, Theresa May stressed that this is still a matter for negotiation within the coalition.

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Is scorched earth politics now a thing of the past?

From our UK edition

Is the new government marching across scorched earth?  They certainly claim so, and now they seem to have the civil service backing them up.  Speaking to the Beeb this afternoon, Jonathan Baume, the leader of a civil service union, said that senior civil servants had written "letters of direction" to Labour ministers in concern at the spending decisions they took in the final months of their government.  As Baume put it: "It's not a decision that is taken very often to ask for such a letter of direction, which is why it is regarded something of a nuclear option. So when it happens it tends to be a big spending decision, where the civil service believes this is not the right thing to do." Good to know, even if only in retrospect.

Daniel Korski

Govern together, campaign apart

From our UK edition

One of the things that critics of the LibCon coalition keep coming back to is the question of what will happen in European, local and other elections. Will the two governing parties stand against each other? And how can they differentiate themselves when they support the same policies? To many, it seems like David Cameron and Nick Clegg are suggesting that we all walk backwards – odd, uncomfortable and unlikely to ensure progress. But why is this so odd? This kind of electioneering happens in many other countries. Take Denmark. There, a Liberal-Conservative government has been in power for almost a decade and across several elections, yet the two governing parties have gone to elections as separate parties, each with their own platform.

Peter Hoskin

Bercow remains Speaker, as Parliament reconvenes

From our UK edition

David Cameron sat alongside Nick Clegg on the government benches, with Harriet Harman two sword-lengths away as leader of the Opposition.  Even though the coalition has been around for a week now, it took the images from the Commons this afternoon to bring home just how extraordinary recent politics has been.  I mean, even the SNP's Angus Robertson got to make a speech now that the Lib Dems aren't a party of opposition.  This, plainly, is going to take some getting used to. They were all witness, today, to the re-election of John Bercow as Speaker.  In the end, it was easy for the Buckingham MP, as the "ayes" heavily outweighed a handful of "nos," and he was duly "dragged" to the Speaker's chair without a formal vote.

Daniel Korski

William Hague sets out the government’s Europe policy

From our UK edition

Those who hate the new Conservative-led government and those who love it seem to be united in one expectation: that Europe policy may be the coalition's downfall. David Lidington, the able new Europe minister, certainly has his work cut out for him. In the latest of the Brussels journal Europe's World, Foreign Secretary William Hague lays out the government's Europe policy, a policy best described as "pragmatic scepticism": "The EU is an institution of enormous importance to the United Kingdom and to British foreign policy.

Peter Hoskin

Osborne’s inflationary problem

From our UK edition

Only a week into his new job, and George Osborne has already had to exchange letters with Mervyn King about inflation.  And here's why: the CPI index hit 3.7 percent in April, up from 3.4 percent in March.  Which is worrying enough when looked at in isolation – but when put alongside headline rates from other countries, it becomes damning.  In China, it's 2.8 percent.  In France, 1.9 percent.  In Germany, 1 percent.  In the Eurozone as a whole, 1.5 percent.  And in the US, 2.3 percent (for March, with the latest figures out tomorrow).  Indeed, thanks in part to quantitative easing and the removal of the VAT cut, inflation in the UK is now well ahead of almost any other major economy you could care to mention.