Isabel Hardman

Isabel Hardman

Isabel Hardman is assistant editor of The Spectator and author of Why We Get the Wrong Politicians. She also presents Radio 4’s Week in Westminster.

Tuesday

Isabel Hardman

The Whitehall watershed moment

From our UK edition

Those pushing for reform of the civil service have been heartened still further today by the number of interventions from politicians of other parties on the need for change. Yesterday they saw Tony Blair's quotes in the Times about the problems with the service as a game-changer, and they are also pleased that former Labour ministers John Healey and Digby Jones have criticised the Whitehall machine. So why is this a watershed moment? Whitehall sources feel these quotes from opposition politicians show that there is now a unique situation where all three parties are either in government or have recently left government. These fresh memories of dealing with the civil service now means there is a cross-party consensus that change is needed.

Isabel Hardman

Collective responsibility and the Leveson report

From our UK edition

Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood has signed off on an agreed breach of collective responsibility in the boundaries vote, but what does that mean for the way the government works from now on? The Prime Minister's official spokesman argued this afternoon that this did not in any way set a precedent for the way the two coalition parties vote on other policies. He added: 'The Cabinet Secretary was consulted. It has been formally agreed but only in this specific instance. Having consulted the Cabinet Secretary, they recorded their agreement to set aside collective responsibility on this occasion. The rules with regard to this allow for the setting aside on very specific issues of collective responsibility where, as in this case, the two party leaders have agreed that.

Isabel Hardman

Tory MPs warn Cameron of ‘mañana moment’ for EU speech

From our UK edition

Number 10 has got quite the job to do over the next few days if it is to get backbenchers ready for David Cameron's EU speech on Friday. Tory MPs are now obviously in a high state of excitement, but their expectations will inevitably be disappointed to some degree. Some are already expressing fears about this, including the MP leading calls in parliament for a referendum. John Baron, who chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group for an EU referendum, tells me that he is worried the 'mood music' in Europe isn't quite as positive about renegotiation as the Prime Minister might hope. He says: 'The chance of repatriating powers, I think they are slim: but I wish him well.

Monday

Isabel Hardman

Peers get ready to kill the boundaries bill

From our UK edition

Peers will vote shortly on an amendment to the Electoral Registration and Administration Bill which could kill the boundary changes. Coffee House understands that there is no government whip on the issue, and the Lib Dems are being told to support the amendment from Labour's Lord Hart which will delay the changes until 2018. A senior party source says: 'They will be expected to vote for the amendment in line with the public position set out by Nick Clegg.' The amendment will then move back to the Commons. The government's attempts, reported over the weekend, to push the reforms through using minority parties have run aground after both the DUP and SNP said they would vote against the changes. There are also at least two Conservative MPs who will vote against: Glyn Davies and Philip Davies.

Isabel Hardman

Lib Dems and Labour to push for changes to benefits uprating bill

From our UK edition

Round two of the row over rises in benefit payments is on the way, with Lib Dems and opposition parties tabling a series of amendments to the government's legislation. I have learned that Lib Dem Andrew George has already laid his proposals for changing the welfare uprating bill, which will return to the House of Commons for the report stage and third reading next Monday. George's amendments are backed by four other Lib Dem MPs: and two of them were neither rebels nor abstainers at last week's second reading vote. While Charles Kennedy and John Leech abstained and rebelled respectively on the second reading, Dan Rogerson was loyal, and Alan Reid was absent.

Isabel Hardman

Ministers hope pension reforms will calm concerns about stay-at-home mothers

From our UK edition

Today's pensions announcement contains an attempt by strategists to reassure those who worry that the government is abandoning the family. One of the gripes from the Tory backbenches about the mid-term review was that it provided precious little confidence that the tax break for married couples that they hope for will be forthcoming, with simply a promise that the Lib Dems could abstain in a vote on the matter. It was all very well announcing new childcare measures, MPs such as Tim Loughton complained, but what about those women who wanted to stay at home with their children? But the briefings ahead of today's announcement have carefully sought to underline that stay-at-home mothers will be among those who will benefit.

Isabel Hardman

Home Office won’t produce estimate of number of Romanian and Bulgarian migrants

From our UK edition

Eric Pickles says he's waiting for figures on how many Romanians and Bulgarians are expected to come to the UK when transitional controls on their freedom of movement expire on 31 December 2013. The problem is that the Home Office isn't producing those figures, arguing that such an estimate would be impossible. I've spoken to a Home Office source, who told me: 'There are no Home Office figures in terms of a projection of the numbers because there's not really very much point in guess work about this because it really is just guess work. Instead, our view is that we should be focusing on the factors that are bringing Europeans here to Britain and cutting out abuses of freedom of movement such as sham marriages, and looking at access to benefits and public services.

Isabel Hardman

David Cameron continues with his ‘tantric’ European strategy

From our UK edition

David Cameron told journalists before Christmas that he had a 'tantric' approach to his European policy speech: that it would be all the better when it eventually came. So today he decided to continue tantalising his party and the media by popping up on the Today programme a whole week before he's due to give the speech, and refusing to give details of what that speech will contain. It's an interesting strategy, as speaking so far before the speech won't help the Conservative party remain calm. The next week was always going to be a little frenzied in the run-up to the speech. But here's what we did learn from the Today interview: 1. The Prime Minister is in favour of Britain in Europe. He argued that 'Britain does have a European future', but that this future involves reform.

Sunday

Isabel Hardman

Ed Miliband’s economic lacuna

From our UK edition

Refusing to publish your 2015 manifesto at the start of 2013 is, obviously, a sensible one. However uncomfortable Labour frontbenchers have felt over the past two and a half years about not being able to respond to the jeers of 'well, what would you do then?' from ministers at departmental questions, writing another one of the longest suicide notes in history would have left them in still greater discomfort at the polls. But how do voters know whether to trust you or not when they've only recently booted you out of government? Ed Miliband was trying to explain this tension to James Landale on Marr this morning. Miliband: But, James, I've tried to explain to you why it isn't reasonable for an opposition at this stage of a parliament to set out precisely what will be in the manifesto.

Friday

Isabel Hardman

Leveson Royal Charter plan remains uncharted territory

From our UK edition

Strong words in the Lords today about the media and the government's stance on Leveson, but what are the discussions like between the three parties behind the scenes? Though they started off with some similarly stern words, the cross-party talks on the response to the Leveson report have, all sides agree, been progressing well. Far from the communication breakdown that some envisaged, there has been a relatively pleasant atmosphere. The Lib Dems and Labour, though they disagree with the Conservative line, are both keen to praise Oliver Letwin in particular for the way he is conducting the discussions, and for going away and working on the details discussed in each session.

Isabel Hardman

Lessons from the Lords on Leveson

From our UK edition

Peers are spending today debating the Leveson report. They've been at it for an hour and a half, and will continue debating until 5pm, but the first few speeches have yielded some interesting points to chew on. Labour's Baroness Jones of Whitchurch devoted a great deal of her speech to the damage that the 'dark arts' of the media had done both to private individuals and to celebrities. She described the distress of the victims going through the inquiry, and contrasted it with the response of the government in rejecting calls for statutory underpinning. The terrible treatment of those experiencing terrible bereavement was the reason the Inquiry was set up, and those in favour of statute now say the victims have been betrayed.

Isabel Hardman

How the mid-term review didn’t quite hit the spot

From our UK edition

Bearing in mind that the mid-term review was originally conceived as means of boosting Coalition morale after the collapse of Lords reform, it hasn't done enormously well. With two more very awkward stories stemming from the review hitting the papers today, the exercise has left Downing Street in reactive mode, rather than functioning as the proactive promoter of proalition politics. These are the main problems with the review: 1. In trying to manage headlines about the review, Downing Street inadvertently created a slew of negative coverage by withholding the 'audit' of coalition achievements. The audit turned out to be a very boring and badly applied gloss (Ronseal quality control would have rejected it).

Thursday

Isabel Hardman

MPs: We’re underpaid and worried about Christmas

From our UK edition

Are MPs paid too little? Quite a few of them seem to think so. Parliamentary expenses watchdog IPSA released the results of a survey today which found 69 per cent of MPs think they are underpaid. If that wasn't quite enough to light the touchpaper, Tory MP Andrew Bridgen very bravely appeared on PM this evening to make the following rather provocative comments: 'We work in the constituencies and we work in Westminster. In the city of Westminster average salaries are well over £100,000. We work in both those spheres. Now I know MPs who will say in private that every year they are getting poorer.

Isabel Hardman

Nick Boles is ballsy, but his planning push faces some big blockages

From our UK edition

Nick Boles is to be applauded and rewarded for being so ballsy on housing need. It is heartening to read the minister describing current housing shortage as 'immoral' and a 'threat to social justice'. I could write a long post about why Boles' latest push for more homes (which involves a 'Boles Bung' of money that communities can use for their own benefit in exchange for new local housing developments) is wonderful, and how he should win all sorts of political prizes and promotions if he succeeds, but I've already done that. Instead, it's worth examining the tricky problems which will mean the Planning Minister needs to keep wearing his thick skin in order to get the 250,000 new homes a year that Britain needs built.

Isabel Hardman

Merkel ally’s referendum warning underlines Cameron’s precarious position

From our UK edition

The major gamble that David Cameron is taking with his strategy on Europe is, as James explains in this week's magazine, that he's relying on signals from Angela Merkel that she is keen to help him with a renegotiation. She has certainly given a few of those in recent months. But today one of her colleagues in the Christian Democrat party undermined some of the confidence that has been building about Merkel's position. Gunther Krichbaum is the chair of the Bundestag's European Affairs Committee, and is leading a two-day cross-party delegation to Britain. He believes a renegotiation would open a 'Pandora's Box', and that Britain should tread carefully: 'There is certainly a risk that [a referendum] could paralyse efforts for a better Europe and deeper integration.

Isabel Hardman

Three problems with Sir Jeremy Heywood’s ‘plebgate’ evidence

From our UK edition

Sir Jeremy Heywood's evidence to MPs on the Andrew Mitchell row didn't go down very well at all this morning. Though a powerful man, the Cabinet Secretary is not well-liked by MPs, and before he appeared some had already named him as a central figure in the fiasco that led to the chief whip resigning. The Public Administration Select Committee hearing did little to improve this perception. Here are the main problems with his evidence: 1. Heywood's investigation was limited. The Cabinet Secretary said he was asked to conduct a 'very specific review' of emails about Mitchell's behaviour from a man claiming to be a constituent of the deputy chief whip to see whether they should change the Prime Minister's view of whether Mitchell should remain in position.

Isabel Hardman

Nick Clegg survives LBC grilling intact

From our UK edition

At 9 o'clock this morning, journalists all over the country were fiddling with their radios excitedly. Nick Clegg was about to start his first LBC phone-in, and they were gleefully waiting for the Deputy Prime Minister to huff and puff his way through half an hour of enraged callers. There was even a live high-definition feed from the studio, so everyone could watch Clegg looking sad. Disappointingly for those lying in wait next to their radios, Clegg actually performed rather well. Sure, those on the phone weren't calling just to say they loved him, but the Deputy Prime Minister wasn't huffing and puffing when he answered their questions about tuition fees, benefit cuts and all the other awkward things the Lib Dems have had to swallow since entering government.

Isabel Hardman

Michael Gove’s plans for profit-making schools

From our UK edition

Coffee House readers won't be surprised by the Independent's report that Michael Gove has been telling friends he has no objections to profit-making schools: he explained his position on the matter at length to Fraser in December. Then, the Education Secretary said he was keen for the one profit-seeking school in this country, IES in Suffolk, to make the case to the public for more profit-seeking schools: 'What I said to them [IES] is the same argument that Andrew Adonis has made: we’ve created the opportunity for you to demonstrate what you can do and win the argument in the public square. You have an organisation that has been criticised, in some cases demonised, now running a state school.

Wednesday

Isabel Hardman

PMQs blows underline importance of Tory NHS rehabilitation mission

From our UK edition

While Ed Miliband wasn't exactly Mr Pugnacious today at PMQs, one of his better blows was when he read out the promise in the Coalition Agreement to 'stop the top-down reorganisations of the NHS' and asked whether that would be on a list of broken promises in the audit of government achievements. Labour always sees the NHS as an easy way to score points now that the government's hard-won credibility has been scuppered by the Health and Social Care Act, and naturally Miliband roused some cheers from his MPs. James argued back in December that it is now impossible to have a mature conversation about the NHS. Indeed, the Tories are now to the health service what Tesco is to nice-looking coffee shops: a combination that arouses suspicion, whether or not it is warranted.

Isabel Hardman

Secret audit of Coalition pledges offers few clues on progress

From our UK edition

Finally, the copper-bottomed, unvarnished Programme for Government Update, aka the Secret Audit, has landed. You can read the full document here, but in summary, it's not immediately very helpful. It is laid out as a point-by-point 'analysis' of how the government is meeting its pledges in the Coalition Agreement, but the wording is such that you can't actually tell whether there are any areas on which it has failed. Reading this document, you'd think everything was pretty hunky-dory with the government as there is no assessment of whether each pledge is completed, underway, or forgotten. This is the assessment of the House of Lords reform pledge: We published a draft Bill and White Paper on House of Lords reform in May 2011.