I wouldn’t be surprised if this Gordon Brown snippet gets deployed ad nauseam between now and the next election: “[Brown] described Labour as the party of ‘prosperity not austerity'” If so, it’s worth noting that it’s a phrase that Ed Miliband used in several speeches last year (e.g. here, here and here). But, whoever its
Yesterday was all Labour, Tories, Labour, Tories. So, today, enter the Lib Dems. Nick Clegg has an article in this morning’s Times which, to be fair, is actually quite noteworthy. His main point? That the Lib Dems are a party in their own right, and will not be engaging in “under-the-counter deals” with the Big
After the platitudes in David Cameron’s speech yesterday, comes the bluntness of Ken Clarke in today’s Sunday Telegraph. Interviewed by the paper, the shadow business secretary says that it would be a “folly” to rule out tax rises: “It is something that every Conservative tries to avoid but I didn’t avoid it when I was
First she loved him. Then she hated him. Then she seemed lukewarm towards him. And, today, she’s gone back to hating him more than ever. Yes, Polly Toynbee’s latest column is another marker stone in her oscillating relationship with Gordon Brown, and it doesn’t contain any minced words: “Cancel new year, put back the clocks
Woah, hang on there. A Labour and Conservative coalition in the event of a hung Parliament? Crazy talk, surely? But that’s what Martin Kettle devotes his column to in today’s Guardian. It’s only unthinkable, he writes, “until you start thinking about it.” Hm. So rather than dismissing the prospect out of hand, I thought I’d register one particular complaint against
As we’re still in that period of the year for looking back as well as forward, I thought I’d share with CoffeeHousers a political timeline I put together. It’s not everything which happened in the political year, mind – but rather the important events in the debate over spending cuts. This debate has, at very least, been
Clear your diary, invite the relatives over, and huddle around a computer: Gordon Brown will be delivering his New Year’s message – via podcast, on the Downing St website – this evening. Just in case you’ve got other things to be doing, this article in the Telegraph gives you a good taste of what to expect. In
Oh, Darling, what hast thou done? There are few more pertinent, or more damning, examples of what the government’s soak-the-rich policies could mean for the country than the news that JP Morgan is having second thoughts about developing a £1.5 billion European HQ in Canary Wharf. Of course, the bank may still go ahead with
As I say in the intro to my selection of the decade’s “overlooked” books for The Daily Beast, this kind of list is a tricky little customer. Not only will you omit some title which really, really oughta be in there – but just what makes a book overlooked in the first place? Do you include a
If you’re looking ahead to 2010, it’s a safe bet that Iran is going to be an even bigger issue than it was this year. The violence currently rocking the country is an echo of June’s presidential election, and a reminder, too, of the continuing internal pressure that the Iranian regime faces. The question
Make a note, CoffeeHousers: Labour won’t be fighting a class war against the Tories, after all. That’s what Ed Balls tells us in this morning’s Times – so it must be true, mustn’t it? Erm, well, perhaps not. This is how the Schools Secretary continues: “‘David Cameron’s and George Osborne’s vulnerability is not their schools
The Guardian’s interview with David Willetts is a decent preview of the Tories’ forthcoming green paper on family policy, and is neatly summarised by Jonathan Isaby here. Although I have my doubts about some Tory thinking in this area, there are a few encouraging ideas in there – such as relationship guidance schemes modelled on those provided by
A hefty one-two punch in the continuing “Have Gordon and Peter fallen out?” story, this morning. The Telegraph has quotes suggesting that Mandelson is “upset” and feels “disposed of” by Brown. And Sue Cameron of the FT details a specific rift between the pair, ending with the observation: “I hear Lord M is not happy,
So there we have it. There will be televised election debates between the three main party leaders during the next election campaign, after all. The first will be on ITV, then there’ll be one each on Sky and the BBC. Talk about good TV for political anoraks. Like Tim Montgomerie and Mike Smithson, I suspect
It’s the most straightforward dividing line the Tories could draw: “Tories good, Labour bad”. But it’s still striking to see it deployed quite so bluntly as in George Osborne’s Telegraph article this morning. His point is that four more years of Labour will lead us to ruin, whereas a Conservative government would pull us out
According to a YouGov poll in tomorrow’s People (reported by the paper’s political editor, Nigel Nelson, on Twitter): “1% more people would rather have G.Brown than D.Cameron round for Christmas dinner.” There’s better news elsewhere in the poll for the Tories: the gap between them and Labour is back in double digits. It’s the Tories
Sounds like the Tories are going to go policy-heavy in the New Year. According to this morning’s Times, Team Cameron are going to publish a “draft election manifesto” around 4 January, which will – as James revealed in his political column this week – set up a “policy-a-day blitz” throughout the rest of the month.
Ok, so identifying the heroes of the New Labour era may not sit well with CoffeeHousers – but I’d still recommend you read through the latest Bagehot column in the Economist, which does just that. It identifies five figures from the past 12 years who have “done the state and country some serious and lasting
Well, Nick Clegg’s reponse to the Labour chief whip’s Christmas card made me smile: “Both myself and Nick Brown have good reason to be embarrassed. I posed for pictures in ridiculous fancy dress 20 years ago – and he is an MP for the Labour Party.” Hat-tip for the picture: the FT’s Jim Pickard
Expenses, expenses, expenses. This morning’s Telegraph splashes with the news that the junior culture minister Sion Simon paid over £40,000 in taxpayers’ cash to his sister. How so? Well, he rented a London flat from her between 2004 and 2008, and claimed against it as his “second home”. Problem is, the practice of renting a