Uk politics

Monday

Peter Hoskin

The spotlight turns on Labour

From our UK edition

It's the story which has been simmering throughout the election campaign, and now it has has boiled over onto the front pages: fear and loathing in the Labour ranks.  After rumblings in the Sunday Times yesterday, its sister paper splashes with the headline "Labour in turmoil as pressure on Brown grows".  And, inside, Francis Elliot and Suzy Jagger report on the "jockeying to replace Gordon Brown".  Meanwhile, the front of the Independent speaks of "growing recriminations in senior Labour ranks over a lacklustre campaign that has seen the party relegated to third place in opinion polls."  The spotlight is finally turning, white-hot, on to Labour - after ten days of near exclusive illumination on the Lib Dems.

Sunday

David Blackburn

Labour’s Catch 22

From our UK edition

The sole current political certainty is that Nick Clegg will not prop-up Gordon Brown. Clegg holds Brown personally responsible for 13 years of failure and not even political marriages can be built on enmity.  Labour’s choice is clear: remove Brown to accommodate Clegg. The Sunday Times reports plots are afoot to kill Gordon ‘with dignity’. But euthanasia is messy. Two options are being discussed. First, Brown would be given a year to make a final indelible mark on Britain before shipping himself off to Westminster’s version of Dignitas. I think we can all see the problem with that cunning scheme, and Nick Clegg certainly will.

Fraser Nelson

Why Cameron was right about the regions

From our UK edition

Given that Labour has put out a hilarious plea to discuss “issues” rather than personality (or lack thereof), I would like to rise to this challenge to discuss an excellent point raised by David Cameron on Friday: that the state spending/GDP ratio is far too high in many parts of the UK and needs to be lowered. Stating this utterly uncontroversial fact landed him in a bit of trouble, I suspect because of lack of understanding of the issues. So, in the spirit of Labour’s plea, here are some facts. Cameron told Paxo that: “In Northern Ireland, it is quite clear – and almost every party accepts this – that the size of the state has got too big. We need a bigger private sector.

Daniel Korski

The ex-factor

From our UK edition

One of the interesting features of this election campaign is the near-absence of ex-leaders in national election roles. Tony Blair has been stuck in the Middle East because of the eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano and has, at any rate, been “Gored” by Gordon Brown, who is as keen to have his predecessor canvassing for Labour as Al Gore was to see ex-president Bill Clinton in the 2000 election. The former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has been more active. For the Tories, Michael Howard is standing down and has not been particularly visible. When I saw him recently in Portcullis House, he looked chipper and relaxed – not like a man about to electioneer for all he is worth.

Saturday

Fraser Nelson

Has the Lib Dem bubble burst?

From our UK edition

Is this the end of the LibDem soufflé surge? Tomorrow's News of the World has an Ipsos-Mori poll – conducted the day after the second debate – putting things back to where they were pre-debates: Tories with a six point lead over Labour and the LibDems lagging seven points behind Labour, i.e. 36-30-23. This is broadly where Mori had them in March. The polls are in a state of flux, to be sure. But Ipsos did a full, 1,200 weighted sample, telephone poll. Even on this basis, Cameron would be 42 seats short of a majority. But this is the best news he's had since the first TV debate – and a sign that he might yet pull through with a majority. Yet other polls in tomorrow's Sundays suggest that there is still some rise in the LibDem soufflé.

Peter Hoskin

When the going gets weird, the weird hire an Elvis impersonator

From our UK edition

Really, what's happened to the Labour campaign?  You know things are taking a turn for the worse when you read that Gordon Brown is taking a more high profile role to save his party from a third-place finish.  But then you see that high profile role in action, and, well ... First there was an event which incorporated some deliciously ironic innuendo about the Tories' spending cuts.  The PM lamented the fact that Jeremy Paxman didn't press the Tory leader on claims that there is "too much" public spending in Northern Ireland and the North East, concluding that "there is no part of the United Kingdom that is safe from what the Conservative party would do.

Fraser Nelson

The Tories must sell their most radical policy: the Gove schools plan

From our UK edition

The Spectator’s endorsement of David Cameron started with his ‘free schools’ policy – and we could have ended there. We said that this is, in itself, enough reason to vote Conservative. This week’s Economist has produced one of the best explanations of this policy, and its potential.  This is important because this election campaign shows that, while the public are indeed minded to oust Gordon Brown, they’re not terribly excited by the Tory offering. The Gove schools plan is something which, if properly expressed, cannot fail to capture the imagination. In my limited experience of persuading people why they should vote, I find the schools policy always works.

Peter Hoskin

Tories growing used to a hung parliament in public and in private

From our UK edition

Planting seeds, that's what the Tories are doing – they're planting the seeds of a Lib-Con alliance.  Yes, it's a subtle process, and is couched in terms of denial and defiance.  But it's still going on.  I mean, look at Cameron's interview with Jeremy Paxman past night (video on Spectator Live), where he declined to rule out having Nick Clegg in his Cabinet – although, happily, he was more unequivocal on the subject of Vince Cable.  And then there's Ken Clarke's interview with the Daily Telegraph this morning, in which he says that the Conservative "starting point" for any coalition would be a refusal to compromise on their economic plans.

Friday

Fraser Nelson

No, Gordon, this recession hasn’t been milder than others

From our UK edition

Today’s new economic data gives a handy piece of ammo to the Conservatives.  It is untrue that, as Gordon Brown says, this recession was somehow milder than others. The economy contracted by 6.3 percent this time – it was 3.8 percent in the 1980s recession and just 2.4 percent in the early 1990s recession. I feel confident that the Conservatives will get this point across clearly, next time that Brown boasts that this recession has been somehow milder, thanks to his decision to “intervene” (ie, double our national debt).

David Blackburn

A culture of intimidation and a conspiracy to silence

From our UK edition

On the afternoon of 4 June 2009, John Hutton, then Secretary of State for Defence, told the House of Commons: ‘Every one of our servicemen and women has the right to know that we are doing everything possible to ensure that every pound of investment in our equipment programme goes towards the front line and is not wasted in inefficient or weak processes of acquisition. That is why I asked Bernard Gray in December last year to conduct a detailed examination of progress in implementing the MOD’s acquisition change programme, as I hope right hon. and hon. Members will recall. I have to be satisfied that the current programme of change is sufficient to meet the challenges of the new combat environment that we now face. To date, I am not.

James Forsyth

Cameron’s low reward interview with Paxo

From our UK edition

David Cameron is recording his interview with Jeremy Paxman at 5.15 today, it’ll air at 8.30. Cameron didn’t want to do this interview. Originally, Clegg was the only leader to agree to be interviewed by Paxman. But after the first debate, Brown said yes and the Tories decided that Cameron couldn’t be the only party leader not to do it. There is, of course, history between Paxman and Cameron. When Paxo interviewed Cameron during the 2005 leadership contest, Cameron turned the tables on Paxman spectacularly, attacking the whole Paxman school of interviewing. Cameron’s approach in 2005 was previewed by a very funny piece by Michael Gove in The Times which imagined Paxman interviewing Jesus.

Peter Hoskin

The nation’s Cabinet

From our UK edition

Just to flag up an eyecatching poll from PoliticsHome, asking the public to pick the members of their ideal coalition government. Methodology and details here, and the results pasted below.  Two things strike me: i) Alistair Darling once again proves he's popular, which you wouldn't necessarily expect of a Chancellor who has presided over a recession, and ii) Hilary Benn's presence may well show that, so far as Brown's government is concerned, keeping a low profile is a good way to get noticed.

Peter Hoskin

Brown, behind the scenes

From our UK edition

A neat election-time spot from the Guardian's Haroon Siddique, who brings us the above photo of Brown's speaking notes from the TV debate last night.  Turns out - surprise, surprise - that the "two boys squabbling" line was prepared in advance.  As were a few other clunkers that we thankfully didn't hear.  I mean: "You can phone a friend, you can ask the audience, you can go 50-50 with Nick." Really?

Daniel Korski

Next time, do a Bill

From our UK edition

So it’s all down to the next debate. The election will probably be decided in 90 minutes, each segment of 20 seconds for every day of a new five-year mandate. In which case, what is the one thing David Cameron will need to take away from last night’s debate, his “take-home”, as a US analyst might call it, to win decisively and get into the 37, 38, 39 percent range that he needs for the Tories to win a majority? He needs to do a Bill. Clinton, that is. Last night, the Tory leader did far better than in the previous debate. He started a bit slowly, and improved as the debate went one (as opposed to Nick Clegg, who began well and deteriorated as the evening wore on). In the end, I think he won the debate.

Peter Hoskin

GDP grows by 0.2 percent in first quarter of 2010

From our UK edition

Now we know: the official preliminary estimate says that GDP grew by 0.2 percent in the first quarter of the year. So the double dip looks to have been averted (for now) – but not by much. The figure is at the low end of economists' estimates and lower than the growth experienced in the final quarter of 2009. Labour, of course, will spin this as further proof that we can't risk the recovery by voting for those dastardly Tories.  And the Tories will say that it shows just how damaging Gordon Brown has been for our economy.  But I wonder whether voters will choose between the two messages, or come to see a hung parliament as a decent compromise between them.  If it's the latter, then fasten your seatbelts, etc.

Peter Hoskin

The morning after the debate before

From our UK edition

So, like last week: what's changed?  And, like last week, it's probably too early to judge.  The insta-polls may have Cameron and Clegg on level footing, but, really, we need to wait for voting intention polls before coming to any firm conclusions.  As we saw the day after the first debate, they can work in quite surprising ways. My instinct, though, is that things will remain relatively steady.  The Clegg surge of last week was, at root, a cry for change from the electorate – any change.  So it will probably take more than a solid Cameron victory in one TV debate to have voters flooding back to the Tories.  And it will probably take worse than a decent enough performance from Nick Clegg to shoot down the yellow bird of liberty.

Fraser Nelson

Cameron starts to pull the Tory campaign out of the fire

From our UK edition

The headlines will be "score draw", but I’d say Cameron won – and comfortably. I write this as someone who could have happily have sunk a few pins into a voodoo doll of David Cameron earlier on this evening – for taking the Conservatives (and Britain) to this appalling point where he may yet lose the election. But he raised his game, substantially. At best, he spoke with passion and authenticity. This time, he looked like he was fighting for his political life, which (of course) he is. Things are looking up. Here’s my participant-by-participant verdict: Brown Brown was his normal automaton self. He does tend to mangle his words, and his attempts at simplification backfire.

Thursday

James Forsyth

Cameron is much improved – but the Lib Dem bubble hasn’t burst

From our UK edition

It seems that the general election of 2010 will turn on 90 minutes next Thursday. David Cameron was far better tonight than he was last week. This time he managed to bracket Brown and Clegg together and had the moment of the debate when he called Brown out on Labour’s leaflets claiming the Tories would scrap various things that pensioners currently get free. If there was a YouTube moment in the debate, it was that exchange when Brown said he didn’t authorise the leaflets making these claims. The Tory press team then delighted in pointing to a Labour party political broadcast where they had suggested the Tories would take away these things. Nick Clegg came under far more fire than he did in Manchester.