So, George Osborne’s unveiled his new line of attack on the Government – warning that, in light of sterling’s recent plunge, Brown’s addiction to debt could trigger a run on the pound. It’s a prognosis not entirely without basis, but is now the right time to make it, politically? After all, the trends aren’t currently
It’s been a few days now since we asked CoffeeHousers to put forward their questions for Francis Maude. We’ve since picked out the best five, which have now been put to the Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office. He’ll get back to us at the start of next week. Here are the questions: David Lindsay
“Our client whistle-blew the fact that the sexual abuse [of certain children in Haringey] had been ongoing for months and the new management brought in post-Climbie had not acted … We write to ask for a public inquiry into these matters.” As the Independent reveals this morning, those words formed part of a letter that
James Purnell is highly rated by almost every Westminster Villager I chat to – indeed, Fraser’s even tipped him as a potential Labour leader. But there’s always been a sense that the Old Labour wing of the party isn’t quite as impressed as everyone else. I guess there’s something about his welfare agenda/media background/Blairite past that just
The Spectator/Threadneedle Parliamentarian Awards ceremony has just taken place. Here’s a full list of the winners: Newcomer of the Year: Peter Mandelson Inquisitor of the Year: Rt Hon Frank Field Peer of the Year: Baroness Manningham-Buller Speech of the Year: Diane Abbott Resignation of the Year: Rt Hon David Davis Minister to Watch: Rt Hon Ed
As an addendum to James’s post earlier on potential tensions between No.10 and the Treasury, this from Benedict Brogan: “I hear persistent reports that No10 took so long to fix the date for the PBR because it tried with some difficulty to persuade the Chancellor to go for a thumping great tax giveaway. The Treasury
There’s a great deal of rumbling on the Westminster grapevine about George Osborne’s position in the Tory party. The FT set the ball a-rolling yesterday, with an article on the “dinner table” ire aimed at the Shadow Chancellor. It contained a juicy quote from a Tory MP, claiming that Osborne “was a good chancellor for the
Nothing too surprising in Alistair Darling’s interview with the Independent this morning. There’s chat about how the Government’s spend ‘n’ borrow reponse to the downturn is the “responsible” thing to do; how the country will “get though it” all, perhaps by 2010; and how we shouldn’t expect £15 billion worth of tax cuts in the
At last, a date for the release of the Pre-Budget Report – 24 November. According to the Treasury, Alistair Darling will deliver his PBR speech at 1530 that day. You can expect plenty of Coffee House coverage before, during and after the event.
Courtesy of Politics Home, here’s footage of the leader exchanges from PMQs. Click here to read my earlier live blog, and here to read Fraser’s report.
Welcome to Coffee House’s PMQs live blog. There’s plenty there for the opposition leaders to get their teeth stuck into today – from this morning’s unemployment figures to Tony McNulty’s sort-of-admission that taxes will have to go up in the medium term to pay for Brown’s debt addiction. Also worth keeping an ear out for any clues
After they managed to successfully keep the lid on things in Glenrothes, has the Labour expectations management operation sunk back into disrepair? Since the weekend, the figure most readily mooted for the tax cuts expected in the pre-Budget report has been a hefty £15 billion. Sure, that’s been denied by the Treasury – but the number’s stuck nonetheless. Yet according to Larry
As expected, unemployment for the three months to September has risen above the 1.8 million mark. The figures just released by the Office for National Statistics put it at 1.82 million – the highest level for 11 years. The expectation now – as Ken Clarke says – is that it will rise steeply in the
There’s plenty of reaction to the Tory tax plans in today’s papers (usefully summarised by Jonathan Isaby over at ConservativeHome), alongside some punchy articles on tax, debt and spending more generally. Peter Oborne writes on the issues here, as does Simon Heffer here. The Heffer article makes the following central point: “When the economy is
Nick Clegg’s giving a speech tonight in which he outlines the Lib Dem’s approach for dealing with the downturn. You can read the full thing here, but it’s centred around these passages on taxation and borrowing: “How should Britain deliver economic stimulus? We hear talk of tax cuts emerging from Downing Street, but they are
Francis Maude – the Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office, and MP for Horsham – has kindly agreed to a Q&A session with Coffee House. Just post your questions for him in the comments section below. And, on Friday, we’ll pick out the best ten and put them to him. He’ll get back to us with his answers
Today marks the 90th anniversary of Armistice Day and the formal end of World War One. I quote from the climax of Norman Stone’s stunning work, WWI – A Short History: “Meanwhile, as German morale was collapsing, the final crisis was precipitated by another act of desperation. In a weird descant upon the navy-army rivalry
I haven’t seen all the numbers yet – or, indeed, many details at all – so consider the following as very loose, first impressions of the tax cut Cameron’s just announced (details here): What is it? Companies which employ workers who have been jobless for three months will get a cut in the amount of
Today’s Populus poll in the Times – the first to be conducted in the aftermath of the interest rate cut and the Glenrothes byelection – has the Tories on 41 percent (down 4 since early October); Labour on 35 percent (up 5); and the Lib Dems on 16 percent (up 1). That’s Labour’s highest level
The tax wars have entered a rather unedifying stage. Cameron was set to announce the Tory proposal in a press conference at 1000 tomorrow morning. But then Downing Street announced earlier that Brown’s monthly press conference would be at 0930 tomorrow, instead of the usual 1200. Surely that wouldn’t have anything to do with sucking
