Joe Bedell-Brill

The Tories are expected to lose around half their councillors in the upcoming local elections on 4 May. Trevor Phillips interviewed the prime minister on Sky News, asking him whether a general election could take place as early as July. A frustrated and bullish Sunak claimed he did not get distracted by his diminished approval ratings, and repeatedly refused to confirm or deny the possibility of a July general election, telling Phillips: ‘you’re going to try and draw whatever conclusion you want from what I say’.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwdJTVZumvM Conservative defector Dan Poulter: Tories now resemble a ‘nationalist party’ The Conservatives suffered another humiliation this week after MP Dr Dan Poulter quit his party to join Labour.

Conflict in the Middle East entered a new dangerous phase on Saturday night, as Iran launched over 300 drones and missiles against Israel, its first direct military attack against the country after years of shadow warfare. On the BBC this morning, Health Secretary Victoria Atkins told Laura Kuenssberg this was an ‘incredibly significant attack’. She confirmed that British military planes were operating in the region as part of pre-existing missions, although could not clarify whether British planes had taken part in shooting down missiles and drones. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Dowden: UK position on arms sales to Israel ‘has not changed’ Israel and Hamas are expected to hold a new round of ceasefire negotiations in Cairo today, at a time when Israel is under more pressure than ever before to pause the conflict. An IDF strike on an aid convoy which killed seven aid workers, including three Britons, led to Foreign Secretary David Cameron telling Israel that British support was ‘not unconditional’. This week there have been calls for the UK to suspend arms exports to Israel. Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden said this morning on Sky News that the UK has ‘one of the toughest arms export systems’, based on legal advice.

Jeremy Hunt: Russian government creating a ‘smokescreen of propaganda’ On Friday night, a terrorist attack at a large concert in Moscow led to at least 133 deaths. Russian officials vowed revenge and suggested Ukrainian involvement, despite Islamic State claiming responsibility. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips asked Jeremy Hunt how much Russia’s version of events could be believed. The Chancellor said it was always a tragedy when innocent people lost their lives, but that the UK had ‘very little confidence in anything the Russian government says’. He suggested they were creating a ‘smokescreen of propaganda’ to justify their invasion of Ukraine.

Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has been clear that Labour will stick to the same fiscal rules as the Tories if elected, and also that they don’t want to raise taxes. Laura Kuenssberg asked Reeves to confirm that this might mean Labour would be forced to make cuts to some public services. Reeves said that the finances a Labour government will inherit would be ‘the worst since the second world war’, but would not confirm that Labour would make spending cuts. She promised an ‘initial injection of cash’ into public services, and said Labour would do a spending review quickly if elected. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Jeremy Hunt: Budget will be ‘prudent and responsible’ Ahead of Wednesday’s Budget, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt gave an interview on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg in which he tried to manage expectations regarding potential tax cuts. Without mentioning any specific details, he said the ‘most unconservative’ thing he could do would be to lower taxes by borrowing more. However, Hunt did hint there might be some form of cut, arguing that the economies growing fastest globally are those with lower taxes, and suggesting he wanted to ‘show a path in that direction’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmQXXSYhA3Y Will Hunt ‘steal’ Labour’s non-dom tax policy?

Lee Anderson was stripped of the Tory whip yestereday after refusing to apologise for remarks in which he claimed ‘Islamists’ had ‘control of Khan, and… control of London’. Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC, Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden said ‘words matter’, and that Sunak was right to take action. However, Dowden was uncomfortable when asked repeatedly to state whether he himself thought Anderson’s comments were Islamophobic, saying only that ‘they could be taken in that way’. Dowden suggested that Anderson would have kept his job if he had apologised for his comments, and was keen to turn the focus onto concern over a rise in anti-Semitism in the country.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Speaking to Trevor Phillips on Sky News this morning, Illegal Migration Minister Michael Tomlinson joined the foreign secretary in stating that Putin was responsible for the death of his most prominent critic Alexei Navalny. Tomlinson said Navalny’s ‘courage knew no bounds’. Phillips asked what more the UK could do in response to Putin. Tomlinson described the UK’s previous sanctions as ‘robust’. He said it was important to continue supporting Ukraine, and that Foreign Secretary David Cameron was considering the ‘appropriate next steps’. Putin remaining in power will mean ‘more warmongering’ Laura Kuenssberg spoke to Evgenia Kara-Murza, whose husband is also imprisoned in Russia for opposing the Ukraine war.

In an interview with the Times this week, Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove suggested that the country’s broken housing market could cause young people to lose faith in democracy. This morning, Laura Kuenssberg showed Gove a variety of statistics emphasising the worsening of the problem since the Conservatives came to power, and asked him who was responsible. Gove suggested there were ‘a variety of factors that have driven the challenges we face’. He claimed the government was taking action, and promised that Section 21, which allows tenants to be evicted without reason, would be scrapped by the next election.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill made history this week as she became Northern Ireland’s first nationalist first minister. Speaking to David Blevins on Sky News, she described herself as a ‘proud Republican’, but insisted that she ‘wants to be a unifier’. Blevins asked her about her ambitions for Irish unity, pointing out that the UK government has said that there is ‘no realistic prospect of a border poll leading to a united Ireland’, and that Northern Ireland will be part of the UK for decades. O’Neill contested this claim, saying her appointment meant she had a mandate from the public, and described the near future as a ‘decade of opportunity’ for Irish unity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

This week there have been reports of Tory ministers calling for Rishi Sunak to be replaced by Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch, who consistently tops polls on the popularity of cabinet ministers. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips showed Badenoch a graph which gave her a favourability rating of 64 per cent, contrasted with Rishi Sunak on minus twenty-six per cent, and asked her if she was involved in plotting for a leadership change. Badenoch said she was not, and said prime ministers ‘cannot be treated as disposable’, and Tory MPs needed to ‘stop messing around and get behind the leader’. Later on with Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC, Badenoch responded to a focus group that was disaffected with politicians by saying there was too much focus on personality in politics.

On a call with Joe Biden this weekend, the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated Israel’s demand for security control over Gaza once Hamas has been destroyed, and said that this was incompatible with Palestinian sovereignty. Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg, UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps described Netanyahu’s views as ‘disappointing’, and said that the two-state solution is the only option. However, he described Israel’s government as a ‘rainbow coalition’, and said it was important to distinguish between the view’s of Netanyahu as an individual, and the UK’s support for Israel as a country.  Is the UK preparing for war with Russia?

David Cameron: western strikes on Houthi rebels are ‘a very clear message’ This week the US and UK launched military strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen, following repeated Houthi attacks on Red Sea cargo ships. Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg, David Cameron suggested the strikes sent a message that western countries were prepared to ‘follow our words and warnings with actions’. Kuenssberg questioned whether the strikes would have much impact, given the Houthi rebels’ declaration that they will step up their own attacks. Cameron pointed out that Houthi attacks have been escalating since November, and said military action was the only option.

Does Rishi Sunak believe in Rwanda? An election year has begun, with Rishi Sunak still struggling in the polls and continuing to face great challenges home and abroad. His first appearance of the year on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg didn’t get off to an easy start. Kuenssberg surprised him with leaked documents she said implied he had had major doubts about the efficacy of the Rwanda returns deal, when acting as Chancellor in 2022. Sunak said he hadn’t seen the documents, but brushed off the accusations, claiming it was his job as Chancellor to ask tough questions about any proposal. He told Kuenssberg that his actions on getting returns deals with Albania and Rwanda were proof that he believed in the importance of a deterrent.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Baroness Mone: ‘I can’t see what we’ve done wrong’ Laura Kuenssberg’s show this morning was dominated by her interview with Baroness Michelle Mone and her husband Doug Barrowman, who have admitted their direct involvement with PPE Medpro, a company which was awarded a huge PPE contract during the pandemic, despite years claiming the contrary. The couple said they made £60 million in profit from the deal, and Mone admitted to being a beneficiary of financial trusts where the money is held. There is an ongoing criminal investigation, but Mone suggested they had been made scapegoats while Barrowman even implied a government official had asked for a bribe in exchange for the investigation to be called off. The Baroness claimed all they had done wrong was lie to the press.

Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg after resigning on Wednesday, former immigration minister Robert Jenrick was disparaging in his assessment of the government’s new Rwanda legislation. Explaining his resignation, he said he couldn’t be the minister guiding the bill through parliament. Jenrick implied he had a better understanding of the issue than the Prime Minister, and that a ‘political choice’ had been made to bring forward a bill which wouldn’t do the job. Jenrick claimed that under the proposed legislation, the Rwanda scheme would be bogged down by migrants’ potential legal claims and would not act as an effective deterrent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

Another winter crisis looms for the NHS, meaning a difficult start for the new Health Secretary, Victoria Atkins. Despite Rishi Sunak pledging to reduce the hospital waiting list, it has continued to grow. Atkins told Laura Kuenssberg that more money than ever before was going into the NHS, and the government was using that cash to increase its workforce. She also implied that recent industrial action was partly to blame for the long waiting list, despite seeing a graph that showed a steady increase in its size since 2010.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?

This week the politics shows were focused on the economy, as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt prepares to make his autumn statement next Wednesday. Hunt has signalled he may deliver tax cuts, and has said ‘everything is on the table’. Laura Kuenssberg pointed out that the tax burden is the highest it has ever been, despite the Conservatives being in power for thirteen years, and asked if Hunt regretted that situation. Hunt admitted he’d been forced to make difficult decisions because of the pandemic and subsequent high inflation, and said he believed lower taxes were essential for ‘dynamic, thriving… economies’.

The Home Secretary Suella Braverman caused controversy this week when she wrote an apparently unauthorised article for the Times accusing the police of bias ahead of Armistice Day and the planned pro-Palestine rally. That march went ahead despite the wishes of some members of parliament. The police had to deal with violence from what was described as ‘far-right groups’ who converged on the Cenotaph as well as disorder from some of the pro-Palestine marchers. Trevor Phillips asked Defence Secretary Grant Shapps if Braverman’s actions might have made it harder for the police to maintain peace.

As the conflict in Gaza continues, there is increasing division over the crisis here in the UK. Keir Starmer continues to resist those in his party calling a ceasefire; Home Secretary Suella Braverman has labelled pro-Palestine rallies as ‘hate marches’; and Jewish columnist Lord Finkelstein told Trevor Phillips that he wonders whether it is safe for him or his children in central London. Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden partially agreed with Braverman, telling Laura Kuenssberg there was hateful conduct occurring on the marches. He said he had 'grave concerns' about the pro-Palestine rally planned for Armistice day. https://www.youtube.com/watch?