James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
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George Osborne and Ed Balls have just done their pre-Budget interviews with Andrew Marr. The show, though, was dominated by talks of post-election deals rather than the contents of the Budget. Ed Balls said that Labour had ‘no need, no plan, no desire’ to do any kind of deal with the SNP. But, as Andrew
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Later today, Vince Cable will launch his traditional conference attack on the Tories. He’ll denounce them for their positions on Europe and immigration. But his pre-conference interview in The Guardian will have, for once, delighted the Tories. For in it, Cable rules out a deal with the SNP. Now, this is a turn-around from Cable.
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When Ed Miliband ran for the Labour leadership in 2010, his supporters boasted that he spoke human. Tonight, in a question time session with a group of young people broadcast on BBC3, Miliband showed flashes of his ability to connect with an audience. But, overall, it was a patchy performance. Miliband was very good on
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At a time when Russian fighter jets are forcing civilian flights into UK airports to be diverted, you would expect defence to be one of the big issues of the election campaign. But it is not. It doesn’t fit into the script that the two main parties want to stick to. The Tories’ long-term economic
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[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/the-death-of-childhood/media.mp3″ title=”James Forsyth and John Bew discuss the lack of foreign policy in the election campaign” startat=928] Listen [/audioplayer]In the 1984 US presidential election, Ronald Reagan came up with an effective way of embarrassing his rival Walter Mondale over defence. ‘There’s a bear in the woods,’ ran his television advert, showing a grizzly bear
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Rather predictably, Ed Miliband went on the TV debates again today at PMQs. Labour believe that Cameron’s refusal to do a head to head debate, despite having previously indicated he would, can be turned into an issue of character. Miliband today labelled Cameron a bully who runs away when someone stands up to him. But
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There is a subtle ideological shift going on in the Tory party. At the top of the party, there is an increasing appetite for a modern form of industrial strategy. As George Osborne argues in an interview in the current Spectator, ‘The Conservative party is at its strongest when it’s not the party that says there
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I understand that David Cameron has ordered a re-write of the Tory manifesto. Jo Johnson and the Number 10 policy unit, which he heads, had written and submitted a first draft of the manifesto to Cameron. But word has come back that Cameron feels that the tone is not right. As I say in my
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The broadcasters have rejected David Cameron’s offer of one seven-way debate before the start of the short campaign. Instead, they are sticking to their plan for two seven-way debates and one head to head between Cameron and Miliband in the short campaign. This means that the debates, certainly in terms of Cameron’s participation, are pretty
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[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/putin-s-empire-building/media.mp3″ title=”James Forsyth and Fraser Nelson discuss Osborne’s election manoeuvres ” startat=839] Listen [/audioplayer]Puccini’s doesn’t seem like George Osborne’s sort of restaurant. It is a pizza-and-pasta place in the safely Labour constituency of Salford and Eccles, Greater Manchester, most notable for the fact that Sir Alex Ferguson once took his whole squad there. (‘Penne
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There are only a couple more sessions of PMQs left before the election and there was a slightly end of term feeling to today’s session. Ed Miliband started by mocking Cameron’s failure to meet his immigration pledge. Cameron responded by reading out a list of Tory achievements, almost daring Bercow to cut him off –
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The Iraqi military’s attempt to retake Tikrit from Islamic State tells us several things about the current politics of the region. First, the Iraqi state is heavily reliant on the Iranians for military assistance. The Iranian Fars News Agency has reported that this assault is being backed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard including the commander
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One of the things that even its critics, such as myself, have to concede that the European Union has been good at is making clear what it has funded. By contrast, in this country there’s little to tell you that the taxpayer has paid for something. But this is changing. The government will tomorrow, as
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All the election forecast models agree, the next election result is going to be remarkably tight. On these models, neither Labour nor the Tories are going to come close to winning a majority. They would both be about 40 seats short. Now, events could intervene to change things. But, as I argue in the magazine
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[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/the-snp-threat-to-westminster/media.mp3″ title=”James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman discuss the not-very-general election” startat=780] Listen [/audioplayer]There’s normally an easy way to tell which party is losing a general election campaign. Whenever one side starts telling you to ignore the national polls and look at what is happening in certain key seats, it is a sure sign that
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Ed Miliband boxed cleverer than David Cameron at PMQs today and came out with a comprehensive points victory. Miliband went, predictably, on the whole issue of second jobs for MPs. Cameron, equally predictably, responded that the Labour proposal wouldn’t deal with MPs being paid Union officials. Miliband then, nimbly, said that he’d be happy to
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TV debates became a little less likely to happen today. The broadcasters have announced that their proposed timetable is for the two seven party debates to come first with the head to head between Cameron and Miliband as the final instalment. This schedule will make the Liberal Democrats even more reluctant to agree to the
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Allegations that Jack Straw and Malcolm Rifkind were involved in the latest ‘cash for access’ scandal is a reminder of the threat that lobbying poses to both the reputation of parliament and politics. In 2011, as Liam Fox was caught up in the Adam Werritty scandal, The Spectator examined how the lobbying industry works and how
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We are alarmingly close to the most serious confrontation between Russia and the United States since the end of the Cold War. A proxy war between Moscow and Washington on Europe’s Eastern border now seems more likely than not. The Americans were always sceptical of the Franco-German attempt to broker a ceasefire in Ukraine. Events
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The more you read about the deal between Greece and the Eurozone, the clearer it becomes how temporary a deal it is. First, the Syrzia-led government has to submit on Monday a list of the reforms that it intends to implement over the next four months before the bailout is extended. Then, negotiations will have
