Isabel Hardman

Today, in a highly unprecedented move, the Labour party actually managed to achieve something. It has just signed a deal with a security firm, OCS, for its autumn conference in Liverpool. This is a huge relief to those in the party with a sense of professionalism, like its General Secretary Iain McNicol, who had feared

All political parties are a mess: coalitions of people with different beliefs, stitched together — like Frankenstein’s monster — into a body that can grunt coherently, and perhaps even achieve something. Most of the time, these bodies lumber about reasonably effectively, if a little clumsily. But every so often, as now, when the political system

Sadiq Khan’s endorsement of Owen Smith is rather handy for the ailing Labour leadership contender, given Khan is one of the few Labour politicians who has actually won something: that something being the largest personal mandate of any politician. This enormous mandate is rather handy when Jeremy Corbyn starts waving his own huge mandate about,

Victoria Derbyshire seemed very anxious as Labour’s two-hour-long hustings between Owen Smith and Jeremy Corbyn wore on this morning to move the debate away from the many internal messes that the party is in (Jewish members not feeling safe any more, online abuse, the chasm between the PLP and the membership: you name it, they

In the past few minutes, the Court of Appeal has ruled in favour of the Labour Party’s block on anyone who joined after 12 January 2016 from voting in the party’s leadership election. This means – until there is an appeal to the Supreme Court – that around 130,000 members, most of whom are believed to

Talking to Labour MP these days is a pretty miserable business, to the extent that many journalists are starting to wonder if they should charge by the hour for counselling. Among their many moans is that there no longer seems to be a centre-left, pro-European force in British politics any more. But when I try

We are still not entirely sure when the Labour leadership contest will end, but in these dusty days of recess, it is certainly keeping everyone nicely busy. Today Owen Smith received a boost from trade union GMB, which decided to endorse his bid to take over from Jeremy Corbyn. Its members voted 60-40 to endorse

Is anyone in Labour getting along? Currently the party is trying to appeal against a High Court decision in favour of its own members, and its own grassroots campaign group Momentum is sending a petition to the party to tell it not to appeal that decision. Today the Deputy Leader and the Leader had a

Theresa May’s plans to limit both the number of special advisers and the way in which they are appointed are rather curious, given how influential and essential her own advisers were when she ran the Home Office. As I explained in the magazine recently, Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill held a great deal of power

Jeremy Corbyn’s attempt to strike a contrast between his beliefs and those of his Labour leadership rival Owen Smith would have rather big implications or medical research in this country. The Labour leader told the launch of his campaign to hold on to his job that pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer shouldn’t take on medical research:

Is the new government under Theresa May going to ditch the target to drive net migration into the tens of thousands? Amber Rudd and Boris Johnson signalled a change of policy from the back-of-a-fag-packet plan yesterday by saying the aim was to ‘bring migration down to sustainable levels’, though Downing Street insisted that this was

In the past few minutes, Angela Eagle has pulled out of the Labour leadership contest, citing insufficient nominations in the race with Owen Smith. ‘I’m withdrawing from this race and supporting Owen with all of my enthusiasm and might,’ she told reporters in Parliament’s Central Lobby. This means that Labour now has its unity candidate

If you wanted evidence to support the repeated assertion from Labour MPs that Jeremy Corbyn cannot continue as Labour leader, today’s Trident debate offered it in cartloads. The vote, which had been promised in 2007 by a Labour defence secretary, is supposed to be about the renewal of the submarines that carry the nuclear warheads.