James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
There was a classic Brown interview exchange in his face the voters session on the Politics Show today: Q: Would you accept the criticism that came from your home secretary on this issue, that maybe you’ve been a little kind of, eye taken off the ball? I think we have cruised a bit on this because we
Labour knows that its class attacks on David Cameron only work when they tie them to a specific issue. So it was almost inevitable that House of Lords reform was going to be wheeled out at some point. There was excitement in Labour circles earlier this year when the Tories voted against removing the voting
With another poll showing the Tories short of the lead they need to be sure of a majority—ICM for the Sunday Telegraph has the Tories on 38, Labour on 31 and the Lib Dems on 21—we are going to hear even more about a hung parliament and the role of the Lib Dems; I can’t
I must admit I am baffled as to why David Cameron has chosen now as the moment to reopen the question of under what circumstances he would move George Osborne from his job as shadow Chancellor. The Times reports that Cameron says in his interview with Sir Trevor McDonald that he has talked to Osborne
James Forsyth reviews the week in politics MPs have a new favourite game: Hung Parliament. To solve this communal Rubik’s Cube you have to work out how a coalition could be put together if no party wins an overall majority — and what concessions would have to be made. But the real fun comes when
If we are going to spend so much time talking about the possibility of a hung parliament, it is worth noting that you don’t actually need 324 MPs to have a majority in the Commons. As John Rentoul reminds us, Sinn Fein MPs do not take their seats as they refuse to recognise the legitimacy
The winner of the education debate on Newsnight was a woman called Lesley from Yorkshire. Her local school is being closed and so she, along with other parents, want to set one up themselves. Her case for why she should be allowed to do this left Ed Balls floundering, wittering on about he sympathised but
PMQ’s today bolstered my view that David Cameron will outperform Gordon Brown in the three TV debates. Cameron is simply more confident about thinking on his feet than Brown. When Ronnie Campbell and chums started suggesting that the generals who had criticised Brown’s record on defence were doing so because they were Tories, Cameron changed
If you want a flavour of what is going to be thrown at the Tories between now and May 6th, read Jonathan Freedland’s column today. Freedland has a fair point about how Michael Ashcroft should pay tax in this country, in my view no one should be eligible for an honour let alone a seat
Tonight’s YouGov poll has the Tory lead down to four points. The Tories have fallen three to 36, Labour is also down—dropping two to 32 while the Lib Dems are up four to twenty. Now, this is only one poll and we might find tomorrow night that it is a statistical blip and that the Tory
After April 6th senior bankers and top hedge funder workers who are based in London will pay a greater proportion of their earnings in income tax and national insurance than their counterparts in any other major financial centre, reports The Wall Street Journal Europe today. This research shows just how damaging Labour’s various soak the
John Bercow was on the Politics Show this morning decrying ‘personal abuse’ in politics. This appears to be another issue on which Bercow’s views have evolved. Back in 2005, in a Tory leadership contest that was relatively free of personal abuse, Bercow, a Ken Clarke supporter, chose to attack Cameron’s candidacy in personal terms, decrying
According to the Mail on Sunday David Cameron, William Hague, Ken Clarke, Michael Gove and Jeremy Hunt will be the faces of the Tory election campaign. Obviously, others will play a role too. For instance, we know that Liam Fox has been charged with going on TV to harry the government. Theresa May is also
Tonight’s YouGov poll has Labour up one and the Tory lead down to five points. There’s also a BPIX survey in the Mail on Sunday which suggests that the Ashcroft operation might only net the Tories an extra 13 seats. While the News of the World reports on a Unite-led campaign to boost the Labour
An ICM poll for the News of the World has the Tories above the psychologically important forty percent mark. After a week that has been dominated by the controversy over Lord Ashcroft’s tax status, the Tories will be delighted to see a poll showing their lead growing; they are nine points ahead in this poll
In a striking move, John Major will tonight accuse Gordon Brown of “using the Armed Forces as a Party Political prop.” This isn’t the first time that Major has been critical of Brown. He was one of the people who, rightly, criticised Brown’s trip to Iraq during the Tory conference in 2007 and just last
Living in a three-way marginal, I get a bunch of election literature. The latest Lib Dem flyer caught my eye because it is the mirror image of the Tories vote yellow get Brown message: ‘In areas like this, the only way to get real change is to vote Liberal Democrat. Voting Conservative could just help
James Forsyth reviews the week in politics The bar of the Brighton Metropole hotel was packed on Saturday night, with the sort of people locals would want to avoid. It was the Tory spring conference, and the journalists and aides were drawn to the bar not only by the prospect of doing a whole conference’s
Iain Martin and Tim Montgomerie are both reporting that the Conservatives have hired YouGov to do polling for them. This might seem like the ultimate Westminster insider story but it will actually have ramifications for the election campaign as a whole. I understand that the Tory deal with YouGov will mean that they will get
Transparency is one area where the Tories are committed to being truly radical. The changes they are already committed to ushering in—publishing government expenditure and contracts online—will create far greater scrutiny of government. In time, this will lead to money being saved. and are unlikely to ever be reversed. Their announcement today on local government