Ross Clark is a leader writer and columnist who has written for The Spectator for three decades. His books include Not Zero, The Road to Southend Pier, and Far From EUtopia: Why Europe is failing and Britain could do better
On the face of it, there could hardly be a better example of a turkey voting for Christmas than the news that Jim Ratcliffe has come out and backed the Labour party. Yes, a Brexiteer who owns one of Britain’s six oil refineries really is throwing his weight behind Keir Starmer, a man who wanted
The Conservatives love trying to reduce their estimates for the cost of a Labour government down to a neat per-household figure, which makes it easy for voters to appreciate but comes with the danger that the figure will fall apart on closer examination. That is what happened with Rishi’s Sunak’s claim, made in his ITV
Who on earth at Tory campaign HQ thought it was a good idea to send Lord Cameron into battle to attack Nigel Farage and try to head off the gathering threat from Reform UK? In an interview with the Times today, the Foreign Secretary accused Farage of dog-whistling. He may well be right: it doesn’t
Keir Starmer, it turns out, was a secret Liz Truss fan all along. Launching his party’s manifesto this morning he is going to tell us that growth will be the overriding preoccupation of his government. That, if you remember, is what the Truss premiership was going to be all about: ‘growth, growth, growth.’ How is
There is something a little refreshing about the Green party. In contrast to Rishi Sunak, who has no option but to carry on pretending he has the slightest chance of remaining in Downing Street after 4 July, Green party co-leader Adrian Ramsay admitted at his manifesto launch this morning that his party isn’t looking to
Two years ago, as Chancellor, Rishi Sunak chose to jack up National Insurance contributions. It is a mark of how all over the place this government has been that cutting NI has now emerged as Sunak’s big idea. Fairness to the Conservatives seems to mean the self-employed being excused from a 6 per cent tax
Ed Davey has finally taken a break from fooling around to launch some policies. But one of them, in particular, is not going to please a great number of Lib Dem voters. The Lib Dem manifesto is to propose giving local councils the power to put a 500 per cent council tax surcharge on second
Is Labour really going to help get 80,000 people on the housing ladder over the next five years under its Freedom to Buy scheme, as it is claiming this morning? Given the rather light ambition of this target, I would say it probably has a chance of hitting that target, although it won’t transform the
Remember all those ‘gigafactories’ that were going to decarbonise our road transport and create many thousands of green jobs into the bargain? Now comes yet one more sign that all is not going according to plan. The Automotive Cells Company (ACC), a joint venture between carmakers Stellantis and Mercedes-Benz, and energy company Total Energies, has suspended
There is a very big problem with Jeremy Hunt’s Family Home Tax Guarantee, though which he promises a Conservative government would not increase the number of council tax bands, carry out a council tax revaluation, cut council tax discounts, impose capital gains tax on sales of main homes or increase the level of stamp duty.
It is small wonder that Treasury officials are unhappy about Conservative claims about Labour tax rises being attributed to them. The civil service is supposed to be neutral, and be seen to be neutral. James Bowler, permanent secretary at the Treasury, who wrote to the Labour party expressing concern that certain figures are being attributed
It is perhaps no accident that Rishi Sunak has rushed out his proposal for a cap on migrant workers and their dependants the day after Nigel Farage announced that he was taking over as leader of Reform UK. But you wonder how many votes there really are in a migration cap when Farage is already
No wonder that Nigel Farage has decided that he would rather be leader of Reform UK than merely honorary president, and that he would like another shot at standing as an MP in Clacton. He looks as if he is the only politician – with the possible exception of Ed Davey – who is actually
In spite of his conviction for falsifying business records, Donald Trump is still expected by many to make a remarkable political comeback in November’s US election. Could we see an equally remarkable comeback this side of the Atlantic, too, with Liz Truss returning to the stand for the leadership of the Conservative party? It’s possible
So, we have a little more flesh on the bones of Labour’s energy policy, with the party giving more details of Great British Energy, the state-owned company it wants to set up to invest in wind and solar energy. But there are still gaping holes in Labour’s promise to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030
Zoe Godrich of Swansea might best be described as collateral damage in Britain’s glorious march towards net zero. Three years ago, she had her three-bedroom home fitted with cavity-wall insulation – which the government is out to encourage through its Great British Insulation Scheme. Sadly for her, it has not worked out quite as intended.
Black women are the worst for carbon-intensive travelling habits, according to the Guardian, citing research by the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR). Oh, sorry, I must have misread that. What the Guardian headline actually says is: ‘Wealthy white men are Britain’s largest transport polluters.’ While is poses as scientific inquiry this is really just political activism dressed
The Tories’ ‘Triple Lock Plus’ is a pretty blatant attempt to secure the votes of a demographic group which is more inclined to vote Conservative than any other. That much is clear. The party’s proposal would give pensioners a high personal tax allowance to spare them from having to pay income tax as the state
Of course Labour’s policy of charging VAT on private school fees is all about throwing a bit of red meat to those in the party who are motivated by class envy. Why otherwise expend so much political effort on a policy which in the opinion of the Institute of Fiscal Studies will only raise £1.6
This morning’s retail sales figures are not what Rishi Sunak will have hoped for as he pitches his case for re-election on economic recovery. They are yet more indication that Britain has fallen out of love with shopping. Sales volumes were 2.3 per cent down in April compared with the previous month, while the March
