Steerpike

Justin Trudeau's snap election has just gone from bad to worse. The incumbent Canadian Prime Minister decided last month to call a snap election to improve his parliamentary standing.  It was a contest no-one wanted (or expected) and the move seems to have backfired spectacularly. Hectored by anti-vaxxers, lambasted for his Covid record and lampooned as 'UnCanadian' for calling a contest in a pandemic, Trudeau is hoping to preserve his current number of seats, let alone dream of increasing it. Now just hours before the polls are due to open, a fresh photo has emerged of the hereditary premier grinning in blackface.

It is four days since the US, UK and Australia announced their historic security pact in the Asia-Pacific but there are few signs of anger abating from the usual suspects.  The deal will let Australia build nuclear-powered submarines for the first time, using technology provided by America. Cyber ability and undersea technologies will also be shared in the pact, which focuses on military capability, separating it from the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance which also includes New Zealand and Canada. But while the move has delighted Anglophiles overseas and supporters of CANZUK here in Britain, not all are so happy with news of the historic defence pact.

The Tory party has had a difficult relationship with China in recent years. David Cameron and George Osborne's 'Golden era' of Sino-UK diplomacy foundered on the rock of Beijing's actions in Hong Kong and Xinjiang while Boris Johnson's backbenchers have consistently urged a tougher line on tech companies like Huawei.  The G7 summit in June illustrated the predicament facing ministers: maintaining pressure on President Xi over human rights violations while securing Chinese backing for global action on climate change. Tensions on Westminster's green benches have played out behind the scenes in Whitehall too. Some urging a tougher line on China talk of being 'brought back into line' by No. 10 if they are perceived to go 'too far.

Fear has been the watchword of Westminster this week, as nervy ministers check to see whether they have survived the cull. Their civil servants meanwhile have had no such troubles, able to wait in their Whitehall offices to comfort, console or congratulate their political masters and listen to yet more interminable farewell speeches from those unceremoniously axed. One departure that has cheered some mandarins was Michael Gove's switch from the Cabinet Office to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

There were many fine speeches made in last month's emergency debate on Afghanistan. Peers and MPs queued up to deliver their musings on the Taliban takeover, in spite of twenty years of blood and treasure. From rising stars to extinct volcanos, backwoodsmen to bootlickers, the tributes poured fourth with liberal mentions aplenty of Vietnam and betrayal. But such speech-making is thirsty work it seems. For while the bars of the House of Commons remained closed on the day of the debate, no such restrictions existed in the Lords where peers and MPs could freely wander in throughout the afternoon's oratorical marathon.

After six hours of speculation, most in SW1 seem ready to re-shuffle off their mortal coil. As the hacks and hangers-on picks over who's up and who's down, attention has focused on the newly-appointed Culture Secretary. Former nurse and part-time novelist Nadine Dorries succeeds Oliver Dowden in the post, having served two years in the health department in which capacity she made headlines for being the first MP to test positive for Covid. Dorries is an interesting choice for the role sometimes known as the 'Minister for fun.' Elected in 2005 she is considered to be on the right of the party: a proto-Brexiteer who advocated sexual abstinence for girls in sex education and reductions in the abortion time limits. Her appearance on I'm a Celebrity...

Oh dear. It was less than a week ago that Nicola Sturgeon mixed up two of her SNP backbenchers in the Holyrood chamber and gave pre-emptive answers to their questions, thus appearing to be clairvoyant. Now the same thing has happened again today.Asked by one of her MSPs for an update on the establishment of a Covid-19 inquiry, the First Minister gave an answer solely on education and reducing risk of outbreaks in schools. Baffled parliamentarians heard the following exchange:  Question: Thank you very much Presiding Officer. Can the First Minister provide an update on the work being conducted to establish an independent public inquiry into the handling of the coronavirus pandemic in Scotland?

In the heady days of 2017, all seemed rosy for left-wing news website like the Canary. Founded in 2015 to 'diversify the media' the hyper-partisan outfit rode the wave of Corbynism to its height just after Theresa May's snap election. Its editor Kerry-Anne Mendoza appeared on Newsnight; revenues hit £250,000 while staff boasted of 3.5 million unique users. Fast forward just four years and a very different picture emerges. After Corbyn's electoral humiliation and the election of Keir Starmer in response, the Canary has lost its privileged perch among sections of the Labour party.

Labour conferences have been fractious affairs in recent years. Tensions between various factions have often spilled over onto the conference floor, with the Corbyn era being particularly notable for the divides between Labour’s membership and parliamentary party. A particular low point was Luciana Berger being required to have a police bodyguard at the 2018 conference after threats were made against her. New leader Keir Starmer is keen to show such acrimony is a thing of the past. This year’s Brighton jamboree is set to begin in a fortnight’s time and is being billed as the Labour leader’s first big in-person test to an audience of the faithful.

From Covid to COP, tax hikes to triple locks, Boris Johnson's problems are piling up. But now it seems the noble lordships in the Upper House could be about to give him another headache too: a looming crunch clash on the issue of assisted suicide. The House of Lords – where the average age of membership is 70 – will shortly be debating a private members' bill by Baroness Meacher, the president of the Dignity in Dying campaign. Meacher's bill would allow terminally ill patients in their last six months of life to end their own lives with the permission of two doctors and a judge. The legislation had its first reading back in May and will shortly be having its second now that Parliament has returned.