James Heale

In truth, there was little that was new in Nigel Farage’s speech today. For more than a decade, he has positioned himself as commander of the ‘people’s army’, fearlessly ‘parking our tanks on Labour’s lawn.’ First, it was Ukip, then it was the Brexit party. Now, his chosen vehicle to crush the establishment is Reform. All the greatest hits were played at today’s party rally: taxes are too high, migration is out of control and working class strongholds have effectively been abandoned. His Durham members lapped it up appreciatively, buoyed by a week in which Reform outflanked the government on British Steel. But while the songbook was familiar, Farage offered some new remixes too.

It is a tough life these days being a member of the Welsh Conservatives. The party lost every Westminster seat in July and now have barely a hundred councillors across the country. In December, the fractious parliamentary party voted by nine votes to seven to retain leader Andrew RT Davies; he quit regardless, prompting his replacement by Darren Millar. He looks to be taking his party to a distant fourth place in the newly-expanded Senedd next year, with polls suggesting that the Conservatives will finish ten points behind Reform. Now, today, a fresh blow has hit Millar’s party. Among those who have been charged by the Gambling Commission in last summer’s ‘betgate’ scandal are three senior Welsh Conservatives.

In the end, it was David Davis who said it best. Today’s emergency debate on how to save British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant amounted to a ‘nationalisation in all but name Bill’, with new measures amounting to a ‘reprieve, not a rescue’. Jonathan Reynolds, the Business Secretary, did a decent job of affecting reluctance at the sweeping powers being handed to him to order Chinese owners Jingye to buy the raw materials to keep the plant’s two blast furnaces going. ‘I do not want these powers any minute longer than is necessary, but I do need these powers to rectify and save this situation’, he told the House. But, in the key admission of today’s debate, Reynolds told MPs that nationalisation remains ‘the likely option’ in the long term.

It was not quite at the eleventh hour – but it wasn't too far off. The Sentencing Council has tonight decided to delay the introduction of so-called 'two-tier guidance' after being threatened with emergency legislation to block it by the government. The new guidelines, which had been due to come into force on Tuesday, would have required magistrates and judges to consult a pre-sentence report before deciding whether to imprison someone of an ethnic or religious minority, or a young adult, abuse survivor or pregnant woman. Advocates of the move argued it would fix the disparity in sentencing between ethnicities. But critics claimed it would lead to criminals form minority backgrounds potentially avoiding jail by instead being handed more lenient community sentences.

A historic election defeat leaves the Conservatives crushed, Reform rampant and a left-wing government securely entrenched in power. The similarities between Canada in 1993 and the UK result of 2024 have been much remarked upon. But what is less discussed is the aftermath of that ‘93 result and the ten years it took to finally ‘unite the right’ under the merged Conservative party of Canada in 2003. The man at the centre of those debates was Preston Manning. He founded and led the Reform party from 1987 to 2000, spending the final three years as Leader of the Opposition in parliament. Manning, now 82, is something of an intellectual godfather for Nigel Farage. As far back as 2013, Farage – the-then leader of Ukip – was talking publicly of taking inspiration from Canada.

The English social season has begun, kicking off with Gold Cup day. But this year, there is a new common denominator in the seats of southern England where the middle classes congregate: Liberal Democrat MPs. From the Cheltenham Festival in March right the way through to Goodwood in September, it is Ed Davey’s party which represents the constituencies where Britain’s bourgeoisie are most comfortable. Whether it is the Boat Race in April (Richmond) or the Derby in June (Epsom and Ewell), or even Wimbledon and Henley in July, everywhere Pimm’s is served, a Lib Dem is the local MP. They dominate the Boden Belt. And even Tories despair that the Lib Dems are the real ‘party of the posh’. At this week’s spring conference, the party was in an optimistic mood.