Isabel Hardman

Tory rebels are now confident they will win a vote in the Commons this afternoon which will block the government from holding a snap referendum vote without much notice. Coffee House understands that Bernard Jenkin has tabled what is known as a ‘manuscript amendment’ - one made on the day of the debate rather than in advance - to the EU Referendum Bill which will force the government to give four months’ notice of the vote. The rebels I have spoken to say they are ‘highly confident’ this amendment will pass. But they seem less confident of winning on the original amendments on purdah. As I revealed earlier, the Electoral Commission supports the rebels on the question of purdah, and it is not yet clear whether the government or the rebels will triumph.

Will the Tories scrap the Lib Dems’ silliest vanity project, free school meals for infants? The Daily Mail reports today that they might, amid spiralling costs and with the spending review approaching. Nick Clegg announced this daft scheme at his party’s conference in 2013. It sounded ever so wholesome when the Deputy Prime Minister promised a ‘healthy lunch’ for every child in reception and years 1 and 2. But the scheme - which also cost a lot more than intended to implement - was daft because it didn’t improve life for poor children.

Parliament returns from recess on Monday - and so do the Spectator’s free politics emails. The Lunchtime Espresso and the Evening Blend round up all the day’s political developments so that busy politicos don’t miss a thing. They’re pored over by newspaper editors and Cabinet ministers alike, because they’re snappy, fun and not long-winded. The Evening Blend includes a list of the day’s political stories, as well as analysis of what’s happened and what might happen next. We often break exclusive stories in this email too, which means our subscribers are the best-briefed in Westminster, and you get extra gossip and snark from Westminster insiders too.

Labour sources have told Coffee House that they are seriously considering voting against government amendments to the EU referendum, which means ministers still face a defeat in the Commons on Monday. There are sufficient numbers of Tory backbenchers who are still dissatisfied with the amendments, which seek to introduce a narrow definition of purdah, to mean the government cannot command a majority on the issue. Tory MPs have also been annoyed by a ‘dear colleague’ letter from the whips. The letter claims that the effect of a Labour amendment to the Bill - which also tries to introduce purdah for the referendum and would force ministers to win a Commons vote on any exemptions - would be to prevent MPs from campaigning in the referendum.

Will ministers really avoid a defeat on the question of purdah in the EU referendum bill on Monday? They hope that amendments, tabled today (and attached in full here in advance of their publication tomorrow), will stop Conservative MPs flocking to Labour’s new clause that it has tabled to add to the Bill. But Labour sources tell me that they’re still considering voting against the amendment which brings back purdah but with a substantially narrowed scope. And given it only takes a handful of grumpy eurosceptics to vote against to make a defeat, the whips can’t breathe a sigh of relief just yet.

Ukip’s selection procedure for its London Assembly and Mayoral candidates is ‘undemocratic’, the party's own MEP for London has told Coffee House. Gerard Batten has refused to take part in the selection procedure because it is ‘undemocratic’, with the party’s London membership getting no vote on the candidates. He said: ‘If Ukip is a democratic party, then it should allow the London members to select the candidate. Ukip is nothing if not a grassroots party. Activists who are not allowed to vote for a candidate may not feel motivated to campaign for that candidate. Ukip talks a lot about the undemocratic nature of the European Union, so we should practise democracy in our own party.

It’s not entirely surprising that Tony Blair fancied one last chance to plead with his party not to elect Jeremy Corbyn as leader. And it’s not particularly surprising that his piece in today’s Observer is attracting exactly the sort of reaction he expected. But what is surprising is not just the former Prime Minister’s rather sarcastic tone - he says that ‘someone else said to me: “If you’re writing something again, don’t blah on about winning elections; it really offends them.” It would actually be quite funny if it weren’t tragic.’ - but that he’s not really pleading with his party not to elect Jeremy Corbyn at all.

In this week’s Spectator, I profile the 2015 intake of Tory MPs: a bright, pragmatic bunch who don’t like to call themselves Thatcherite. Ministers who have sat in the Commons Chamber and heard maiden speeches from this new bunch have been seriously impressed, with some remarking that they’ve wondered what they’ve done with their own lives after hearing the extraordinary experiences that the new intake have brought with them into the Chamber. Those extraordinary experiences include working as postmen, teachers, doctors, rural auctioneers, and nurses. There are very few political animals who’ve slaved as special advisers before becoming MPs, or whose families are political dynasties.

As well as it being rather amusing that a party officially committed to the abolition of the House of Lords has stuffed a few more of its grandees into the Upper Chamber, it’s worth looking will be wearing the ermine. There seems to have been a bit of a desperate hunt to find people. The MPs who lost their seats or stood down might be fair enough. But some party figures are scratching their heads rather at the appointment of one party member who was a councillor for just four years. Shas Sheehan did also stand as a parliamentary candidate (and lost, twice), but then so have many others in the Lib Dems and they haven’t been made peers.