James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
Charles Clarke’s interview in The Independent is good value. He lets rip with his now trademark straight talk, declaring that he’s “frustrated that Labour does not seem to be doing enough to offer real solutions to the major problems of the future, nor be convincing about our capacity to overcome the challenges we face” and
The opening line of Northern Rock’s annual report, out today, deserves to win an award for understatement: “2007 was a difficult and challenging year for Northern Rock”
Last Sunday, The Observer suggested that Douglas Alexander’s political career was effectively over after a falling out with the Prime Minister. This Sunday brings another anti-Alexander briefing with The News of the World reporting that he’s been dubbed ‘worst minister ever’ at DFID and that when the cabinet split up into break out groups, a
Toby Helm’s piece in the Telegraph on the mood in Downing Street is this morning’s must read. Helm reports that it was the Brownite old guard who leaked Stephen Carter’s plan to bring back Tony Blair’s old speechwriter Phil Collins in an attempt to stop it from happening. It also seems that Brown’s paranoia has
Some of the most memorable PMQs of recent times were when John Prescott faced William Hague. The two-men both went at it with vigour and the total contrast in styles made for entertaining viewing. Now, it looks like we’re in for another classic contest because, as Sam Coates reports, Harriet Harman will be standing in
The cover story of the international edition of Time is about “Britain’s mean streets”. The article presents a litany of depressing statistics about children in Britain and why we now have so much violent street crime. One of the reasons we have so much bothersome street crime is the police’s attitude to it. Revealingly, Time
Sam Coates flags up an article in PR Week which says that Stephen Carter is looking for a new speechwriter for Gordon Brown and is considering the position of Deborah Mattinson, Brown’s pollster. It seems that the re-Blairisation of Downing Street has now reached such a point that Carter is approaching Blair’s old speechwriters to
The opening day of Terminal 5 has been a PR disaster for British Airways. 34 flights have been cancelled and passengers can now only board if they do not check in any bags. In its defence BA is claiming that “We always knew the first day would represent a unique challenge because of the size
Do read Steve Richards in The Independent today. He makes an interesting case that Tony Blair’s decision to support the war in Iraq was a result of political pragmatism not moralism. He also suggests that Blair might have thought that backing Iraq would position him perfectly to take Britain into the euro: “At some stage,
Over on Americano, I’ve just posted some thoughts on John McCain’s big speech setting out his foreign policy platform. Plus, there’s fascinating polling data on whether Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are too liberal to be president.
As Tim Montgomerie points out, it is a sad indictment of the Conservative party that the only time it seems to be able to get excited about Iraq is when it is calling for an inquiry into the war. Reading William Hague’s speech yesterday, one couldn’t help but notice the difference from his pre-war contributions,
Pete’s already posted on the thinking benhind Michael Gove’s speech on school reform, but reading it one statistic jumped out at me and struck me as worth noting: “In the whole of Islington in the school year of 2006-7 not a single child took a GCSE in one of those sciences.” The failure of any
For the Kremlinologists among us, Rachel Sylvester’s column on the ideological divisions between the old Brownites and the new recruits in today’s Telegraph is essential reading: “The ‘old Brownites’ – including Ed Balls, Damian McBride and Ian Austin – are Labour tribalists who think the way to victory is through class war. Personally, they are
Many of those who advocate for an early withdrawal from Iraq argue that Iran can be persuaded to play a constructive role there. But all of Iran’s actions suggest that it wishes to keep peace from breaking out in its neighbouring state. As General Petraeus told the BBC today: “The rockets that were launched at
The New York Times has a great tick-tock on the riots in Tibet, it is the best thing I’ve read yet on what has gone on there these past few days. Intriguingly, the police initially backed away from confrontation with the protesters perhaps because of a desire to avoid reminding the world just what kind
Gordon Brown’s new team at Number Ten have received rave reviews. Andrew Rawnsley in The Observer today points out how cabinet ministers who were in despair before Christmas have been given hope by the new Downing Street operation while Fraser has—in these pages—warned the Conservatives not to underestimate the new Brown machine. But this new
The issue of party funding is going to run and run with the parties still nowhere near an agreement on it. In an interview with the Telegraph today, Francis Maude makes an astonishing charge about the opaqueness of trade union funding for Labour: “It’s a racket, there are two unions which declare more members paying
James Forsyth reviews the week in politics What a difference a poll lead makes. If Philip Hammond, the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, had given an interview appearing to rule out tax cuts in a Conservative first term, when the Tories were behind in the polls or only marginally ahead, there would have been
This week’s Time has an important piece on Iran’s role in training, funding and arming the insurgency in Iraq. What one Shiite fighter told Time illustrates just how much Iran is responsible for the levels of violence in Iraq: “Ali’s own training in Iran came in late 2005, when he says he and a group
