James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
From our UK edition
The most important line in George Osborne’s speech was this one: “It’s very difficult to justify taxing people on low income to pay for the child benefit of those earning so much more than them.” Logically, this argument applies equally to all other universal benefits. Why should someone on £12,000 a year be paying tax
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George Osborne’s announcement that child benefit will be taken away from any family with a higher rate taxpayer in it to help fund welfare reform shows how far Cameron and Osborne were prepared to go to keep Iain Duncan-Smith on board. During the campaign and in the Budget, Cameron and Osborne had strongly implied that
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There’s an intriguing pre-conference story in the Mail on Sunday today. The paper reports that: “Ken Clarke faces a whispering campaign by allies of David Cameron and George Osborne to move him from Justice Minister because of his ‘disastrous’ views on law and order, it was claimed last night. Conservative MPs say Mr Cameron and
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I’ve re-read it several times now and I’m still not sure whether Francis Maude was joking or not when he told The Times that Danny Alexander ‘is obviously a bit to the right of me’. It is the kind of thing that the dry-witted Maude might say as a joke. But equally there’s no signal
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The Tory conference in Birmingham is the last big political event before the cuts come. After the 20th, every time a senior Tory appears in public for the next few years they will be about why this or that is being cut. As the row over defence shows, these questions will come from right across
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The Conservatives are planning to chip away at the lower middle-class voter and release his inner Tory Two inconvenient truths will put the dampeners on what could have been a celebratory Conservative party conference in Birmingham next week. First, there is a champagne ban for the third year running. There are to be no pictures
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The election of a new Labour leader means that proper politics has resumed. David Cameron now knows who he needs to beat to win the next election. As I argue in the magazine this week (subscribers), if the Tories are to secure a majority in 2015, they’ll need to do better among those in households
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Amongst BBC political staff, there’s mounting concern about the plans for a strike during Tory conference. One of them said to me at Labour conference that they just didn’t know what to do, they had been put in an impossible position by the decision to call the strike on such politically important days. These journalists
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The list for the shadow Cabinet elections shows that no David Miliband supporter who was going to stand for the shadow Cabinet has decided not to run following Ed Miliband’s victory. It’ll be intriguing to see what the party balance of the shadow Cabinet is following these elections. There is an expectation that Yvette Cooper
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After one of the many sections in Ed Balls’ speech on the economy, there was a telling moment as Ed Miliband clapped half-heartedly with a thoughtful look on his face. One could almost see him trying to work out with whether he agreed enough with what Balls was saying to make him shadow Chancellor. There
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The day after the leader’s speech is always a slightly flat time at a party conference. But Manchester today feels particularly flat. Everyone knows that the two big political stories are happening down in London: David Miliband’s expected announcement that he is not standing for the shadow Cabinet and the Fox flap. One of the
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Ed Miliband did what he needed to do. In his speech he needed to show that he was not some demented left-winger, that he was not a tool of the unions and that he appreciates the need for cuts. He did the first bit with his tone. It is very hard to depict someone as
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How to reduce the deficit is the ground on which the Tories want to take on Ed Miliband. The whole Tory war machine has been mobilised to try and use today’s IMF report which calls the Osborne deficit reduction plan ‘appropriately ambitious’ to flush out Ed Miliband’s position on the deficit. The deficit is the
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There is a feeling on the right that with the election of Ed Miliband it is back to the good old days. The thinking goes that Labour have elected a lefty as leader and it is time “to do ‘em over just like we did back in the day”. But this is overly-simplistic. First of
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There’s an odd mood in Manchester at the moment. The leadership election result has discombobulated the Labour establishment. In some circles, there is irritation that union votes delivered the leadership to Ed Miliband against the wishes of the MPs and party members. Others worry that this has all come too soon for Ed Miliband, that
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We spend a lot of time criticising politicians so it behoves us to praise one when they behave with as much dignity as David Miliband has today. He has lost the Labour leadership election by the narrowest of margins and despite winning among both party members and MPs, but there has not been even a
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As soon as the first round result popped up the screen, an expert on the Labour electoral college turned to me and said ‘Ed has won’. David was not far enough ahead on first preferences to win. But it was also clear that David was likely to win MPs and members — that Ed was
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David Cameron’s interview in the Telegraph this morning is striking for three reasons. First, despite the interview appearing on the day of the Labour leadership declaration, there’s no attempt to bring the hammer down on the new Labour leader. All we get is some framing on the deficit. Next, as Paul Goodman notes, it is
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The Spectator/KPMG conference explored investment opportunities in today’s uncertain geopolitical climate We live in an age of uncertainty. The predictable threats of the Cold War have been replaced with more nebulous dangers: great power politics might be stable but across large parts of the world instability rules. The Spectator’s ‘Global Risk and Opportunity’ conference in
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Even leaderless and without fresh ideas, Labour has surged in the polls. Think what the party might be able to do with someone – anyone – in charge The Labour leadership contest has been easy to mock. It has set brother against brother, lasted for months and shown that the party has no heir to