James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
There was something entirely predictable about the mortgage on David Cameron’s constituency home getting drawn into the expenses scandal. Even Tory MPs supportive of the line Cameron has taken on this issue have, in private, pointed to it; noting that Cameron himself had found the most politically palatable way to make the system work for
Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo next month is being hyped as a major part of his administration’s outreach to the ‘Muslim world’. One can only hope that it is a better, more realistic speech than the one Obama gave in Berlin last July setting out how trans-Atlantic relations could be improved. In that speech, Obama
Having ruled out in almost Shermanesque terms standing in a leadership contest this side of the election, Harriet Harman is now one of the kingmakers. In an interview with the Guardian magazine, she makes a couple of key points. First, she’s clear that we haven’t reached the end of this crisis yet: “And there’s still
Once the local and European elections results are all out on Monday the eighth, we can expect Gordon Brown to try and launch a fight-back. Two predictable elements to it will be a reshuffle, designed to bind in those who could credibly wield the knife against him, and a constitutional reform package. As Prime Minister,
If today’s Populus poll in The Times is accurate, then Gordon Brown’s will be fighting a last-ditch battle to save his premiership nine days from now. The poll has Labour heading for a 16 percent share of the vote at the European elections behind both the Tories, 30 percent, and UKIP, 19 percent. The Lib
James Forsyth reviews the week in politics The last thing any politician wants to be seen as at the moment is a defender of the political status quo. So this week we have had Alan Johnson’s call for PR and David Cameron’s ‘power to the people’ speech. The Prime Minister is expected to lay out
The Independent’s gossip column reports that Labour is having some trouble recruiting celebrity talent to us annual fundraising dinner: “Party press officers insist that they have a “surprise singing performer” to compound [Eddie Izard’s] credentials. Who could it be? The usual cast of characters (Mick Hucknall, the Bee Gees, Heather Small) refuse to respond to
This story in The Sun today does make you wonder what on earth is going on: “One adult in 12 convicted of the most serious sex assaults on kids walks free from court. The maximum punishment for rape or attempted rape of a child under 13 is life. But new figures show ten people were
Three MPs have announced they are standing down at the next election today; proof that the expenses scandal is getting more deadly for MPs as it goes on. But, in the background, the conversation about whether Brown can survive what Anne McEloy has dubbed the Ides of June is getting louder. Over at the always
The game is afoot. When you talked to Labour people about an attempt to remove Gordon Brown they always used to use say ‘if’. Now they say ‘when’. The view is that June 4th will be grim for all the major parties, but particularly grim for Labour. Oddly, the worse the Tories do, the worse
Today is one of those days that remind you that the international situation is as serious as the economic one and the crisis facing our democracy. No one quite knows what North Korea means by its nuclear tests and declarations that the 1953 armistice is no longer operative. Indeed, no one even really knows who
There is something depressingly predictable about the news that extremist groups are filling the void left by the Pakistani government in terms of accommodating the refugees from the Swat valley. Save the Children estimates that only 20 percent of the roughly 2 million refugees are in government run camps. The Washington Post reports that: ‘Outside
The Sun has been shining on David Cameron recently. The paper’s call for an early election has helped Cameron out considerably and it has generally given him a pretty positive write-up these past few weeks. But today’s editorial on the European elections pointedly does not endorse the Tories: “Labour has surrendered all credibility by betraying
The headline coming out of David Cameron’s speech tomorrow, which The Guardian publishes as an essay tomorrow, will be his rejection of PR. But I’m more interested by how Cameron is again hitting the right notes about broader political reform. Take these two passages: “I believe the central objective of the new politics we need
Until I read Andrew Sparrow’s story in The Guardian today, I’d missed this quote from David Cameron on Andrew Marr: “You know they’ve given power to the judges, on the one hand, and Europe on the other and the whole thing, frankly, is not in my control. That’s what people, I think, are angry about.
As Pete says, it is hard to see Alan Johnson’s article in The Times today as anything other than another flash of leadership leg from him. The tectonic plates do seem to be shifting on the Labour side. There appears to have been a hardening of attitudes, a recognition that their only chance of avoiding
There is a real danger that Iran acquires a nuclear capability before the US-led coalition works out what it is prepared to do to stop it. As David Ignatius writes in the Washington Post today, there isn’t any attractive solution to this problem: “The quiet, deniable covert activities undertaken so far haven’t stopped the Iranian
Patrick Hennessy has an authoritative piece in the Sunday Telegraph about the signs that Gordon Brown is set to recall David Blunkett to the Cabinet. Hennessy reports that Blunkett dined at Chequers with Brown on an evening when Wilf Stevenson, one of Brown’s closest friends and his adviser on ‘engaging with local communities’, was also
The Independent on Sunday reports that Tony Blair has been into Downing Street to advise Gordon Brown. One can only imagine what Blair makes of the mess that the man who spent so long before plotting to take his job is now making of it. But judging by what John Burton, Blair’s constituency agent, writes
The vast majority of Tory MPs do not want John Bercow to be Speaker; I’ve only spoken to one who favours his candidacy. The Tories complain that Labour’s support for Bercow is a plot to appear bi-partisan while actually being crudely political. Today’s Mail on Sunday editorial is a punchy expression of this viewpoint: “It
