John Connolly

There’s only one day to go until the Peterborough by-election, which decides who will replace the former Labour MP Fiona Onasanya, and yet it’s still all to play for in this marginal seat. Under normal circumstances, with the last Labour MP found guilty of perverting the course of justice and thrown out by her constituents, you would expect the Conservatives (who only lost by around 600 votes in the 2017 general election) to be favourites to win. But the recent rise of the Brexit party in the local and European elections means that conventional wisdom no longer applies. The Brexit party are currently frontrunners in the race and some bookies have stopped taking bets on their candidate, Mike Greene, becoming the party’s first Westminster MP.

'We’re going to give this everything we’ve got until 10 o'clock on Thursday.’ There's only two days to go until the Peterborough by-election, and it's fair to say that Brexit party candidate Mike Greene is determined to win. In his campaign headquarters in Peterborough, the businessman, Secret Millionaire and former Tory supporter revealed he hadn't placed a bet on himself like Nigel Farage (his Mum told him to never bet against the bookies), but is 'confident', though not complacent, that the Brexit party can win here this week. Peterborough has always been a tightly contested marginal seat that has either voted for Labour or the Tories since the second world war.

Last night, there was shock across Westminster as a new poll by YouGov asking people how they would vote in the next general election showed that the Lib Dems were the most popular party in the UK. Of those asked, 24 per cent said they would vote for the Remain party, followed by 22 per cent for Nigel Farage's Brexit party, and 19 per cent opting for the Conservatives and Labour respectively. In a blog post introducing the poll, YouGov's political research manager, Chris Curtis, said that it was only the second time in 19 years that either Labour or the Conservatives were not in first place in a YouGov survey. The last time this occurred was in 2010, at the height of Nick Clegg's popularity following the general election debates.

If all political careers end in failure, as Enoch Powell once said, how can you possibly explain the remarkable resurrection of Vince Cable last night? The Lib Dem leader, who has announced that he will be stepping down on 23 July, achieved a historic result for his party, securing 20.3 per cent of the UK national vote in the European elections and sending 15 MEPs to Brussels – five more than Labour and second only to the Brexit Party. In a sign of the party's wide support across the country, the Lib Dems managed to win the most votes in Stockport, (which has voted for Labour in general elections since 1987) and received more votes than the Conservative party in Windsor and Maidenhead, Theresa May's constituency. It is a remarkable turnaround of fortunes.

Theresa May has announced that she will be stepping down as Prime Minister on 7 June. In a statement outside 10 Downing Street,  May said that although it was a 'deep regret' that she had not been able to deliver Brexit, she had failed three times and: 'So I am today announcing that I will resign as leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party on Friday 7 June, so that a successor can be chosen.' She continued that: 'I have kept Her Majesty the Queen fully informed of my intentions and I will continue to serve as her Prime Minister until the process has concluded.' The announcement follows a meeting the Prime Minister had with Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 committee of backbench Tory MPs, where he was expected to call for her to stand down.

Fiona Onasanya, the former Labour politician convicted of perverting the course of justice, has been ousted as the MP for Peterborough, after the required number of constituents signed a recall petition to remove her from office. A by-election will now be fought in the constituency on 6 June. For Onasanya to be removed 6,967 people had to sign the recall petition – ten per cent of all eligible voters in the constituency. In the end that threshold was passed by a considerable margin, with 19,261 people heading to the ten 'signing places' across the constituency to call for her to go. This is the first time that this mechanism has been used to remove an MP since the laws were introduced in 2016.

On Friday, in an inconspicuous metal finishing factory on an industrial estate in Coventry, Nigel Farage officially launched his new Brexit Party, and set out its strategy ahead of the European Parliament elections on 23 May. The message of the day was clear: the people, especially Leave voters, have been let down by the Westminster establishment, and voting for the Brexit party is the best way to show that you are angry, and willing to do something about it. Kitted out in his customary Union Flag socks, Farage hit out at the way the Brexit negotiations had been conducted so far, describing it as a ‘wilful betrayal of the greatest democratic exercise in the history of this nation’.

After MPs failed to reach a consensus on the kind of Brexit they wanted for a second time on Monday, the parliamentarians led by Oliver Letwin who are seeking to take control of the Brexit process have changed their strategy. Instead of having another series of indicative votes on Wednesday as originally planned, the backbenchers will instead support a bill, put forward by Yvette Cooper and a cross-party group of MPs, which will attempt to force Theresa May to ask the EU for another Article 50 extension beyond the 12 April. The decision is a significant change in tack for the MPs, who seem to have accepted that at present no Brexit option -- even a Customs Union, which garnered the most support during the last set of indicative votes -- can command a majority in the House of Commons.

The relationship between Tory MPs who want a softer Brexit and local Conservative members has been strained for some time. This morning things came to a head. The backbench MP Nick Boles, who has been campaigning to stop a no-deal Brexit, announced that he was resigning from his local Conservative association. Boles will still remain as the MP for Grantham and Stamford until the next election, and hopes to keep the whip as a Conservative during that time. In a letter to his local party, Boles set out the reasons for his decision to leave.

When seven MPs announced yesterday that they were leaving Labour to form a new centrist faction called The Independent Group, talk soon turned to what impact it could have on the other parties' electoral chances. Corbyn's allies were quick to warn that it could lead to ten years of Tory rule, while Conservative MPs were rumoured to be considering joining. New polling conducted yesterday though by Survation for the Daily Mail suggests that it is Labour who should be most worried by the new party's success. When asked in the survey who they would vote for if there was a general election tomorrow, 8 per cent of the respondents opted for 'A new centrist party opposed to Brexit' if one existed.

If you mention the word ‘Booths’ anywhere south of Knutsford, you will usually be met with a blank expression, followed by someone wondering if you are mispronouncing the name of a nearby pharmacy. But in the north-west the name is associated with a store native to Lancashire, which, uncharacteristically for a supermarket chain, holds a fond place in many people’s hearts. For those not aware of the Booths chain, it is often called the north’s answer to Waitrose. I think the comparison is a tad unflattering to Booths; while Waitrose has rapidly commercialised, Booths has retained its local roots and independent character. It has far fewer stores than other chains and is still very much a family business: the current chairman is Edwin J.

On 14 January Theresa May will resume the uphill task of getting her Brexit agreement with the European Union through the House of Commons. So far, things are not looking good for the PM. Before the Christmas break, over one hundred Tory MPs publicly pledged to vote against her deal, and the ferocious backlash it received from all quarters forced the government to delay the vote in order to avoid an inevitable, and humiliating defeat. One of the hopes in Downing Street was that the Christmas break would give everyone a chance to cool down. MPs returning to their constituencies for the festive period would speak to members of the public who would convince them to get on with Brexit and get behind May's plan.

It’s the question that’s on everyone’s lips this week in Westminster: now that the Brexit negotiations have been finalised by the EU, will Theresa May be able to get her withdrawal agreement through the House of Commons? So far, the numbers are not in her favour. Labour have confirmed they will whip against her deal, as have the SNP and other opposition parties. Meanwhile the DUP have said they will vote against the proposal – rather than just abstain. That means even if Theresa May could count on complete party loyalty in the upcoming meaningful vote, she would still be four votes short of the 320 needed for a majority. Unfortunately for her, there are already plenty of MPs on her side unhappy with the deal and willing to rebel.

Commentators on the left and right have been fiercely arguing for the past few weeks over which political party is more racist: Labour or the Conservatives. Conservatives have pointed out Jeremy Corbyn’s numerous links and associations with anti-Semites, Labour’s refusal to adopt the IHRA definition and Jewish conspiracy theorists on Twitter. In response, prominent left wingers have flung back at them calls by Sayeeda Warsi for an inquiry into Tory Islamophobia and comments by Boris Johnson about women in burqas looking like letter boxes. But what do the public actually think about allegations of racial prejudice within the two main parties, and who do they think is worse?