Uk politics

Saturday

James Forsyth

David Cameron tries to drum up interest in the Police and Crime Commissioner elections

David Cameron spent yesterday campaigning for Conservative Police and Crime Commissioner candidates in Bedfordshire and Leicestershire. The visits, though, received scant national attention: the only coverage I’ve spotted so far is on page 33 of The Times. Talk to ministers and they maintain that the Police and Crime Commissioner elections are more visible out in the country than they are in London, where there’s no contest. They argue that the capital-centric nature of the media explains why the press keep writing the elections off as a damp squib. There is, I suspect, some truth to this charge. But an average turnout of only 20 percent would still not be impressive.

Friday

James Forsyth

Can Labour avoid another Bradford West?

There’s no such thing as a safe seat in a by-election as Bradford West demonstrated. But it would still be a major shock if Labour lost Rotherham, a seat they’ve held since 1933. But the three by-elections coming up after Corby—Middlesborough, Croydon North and, now, Rotherham—will test how much Labour has learnt from the Bradford West experience. In all three seats, Labour has a large majority and no obvious challenger. Respect are already trying to repeat their by-election success, selecting Lee Jasper—the former Ken Livingstone adviser and chair of the London Race and Criminal Justice Consortium—in Croydon North. Respect have already declared that he’ll be ‘targeting‘ black voters. In Middlesborough, the

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Denis MacShane’s defiant resignation statement

After being told he faced a year’s suspension from the House of Commons and immediate suspension from the Labour party, Denis MacShane has announced that he is stepping down as an MP. He released this statement this afternoon: ‘In the light of the Parliamentary Commissioner’s decision supported by the Committee of Standards and Privileges to uphold the BNP complaint about expenses claimed in connection with my parliamentary work in Europe and in combating anti-semitism I have decided for the sake of my wonderful constituency of Rotherham and my beloved Labour Party to resign as an MP by applying for the Chiltern Hundreds or as guided by the House authorities. ‘I

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

How teachers felt forced to ‘cheat’ on GCSE English marking

Ofqual’s final report, published today, on the GCSE English marking row, underlines why the qualifications need an overhaul and makes extremely awkward reading for the teachers who were so upset by their pupils’ results this summer. It concludes that the redesigned English GCSE was ‘flawed’, and that teachers felt under pressure to over-mark coursework to a higher grade than it deserved. The report suggests there was a culture of over-marking which led to other teachers doing the same: ‘While no school that we interviewed considered that it was doing anything untoward in teaching and administering these GCSEs, many expressed concerns that other nearby schools were overstepping the boundaries of acceptable

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Ken ‘clarity’ Clarke says EU budget veto would be ‘absurd’

Wise gamblers could do worse than to place a hefty bet every time Ken Clarke expresses an opinion that he’ll have to clarify it shortly afterwards. The minister without portfolio said at a Policy Exchange event this morning that it would be ‘absurd’ for Britain to go to Brussels intending to veto the EU budget. He said: ‘It’s absolutely ludicrous to go there intending to veto. It’s just absurd. ‘Every one of the 27 member states has a veto. What they’ve got to do is reach a negotiated situation. Of course people have a veto. Any government will veto if it goes too far in one direction or the other.’

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Denis MacShane’s career with Labour is over as he faces suspension over expenses claims

The Committee on Standards and Privileges has recommended this morning that Denis MacShane be suspended as an MP for 12 months after he submitted 19 false expenses invoices worth £12,900 over four financial years. The committee’s report, which you can read in full here, concluded: ‘We accept that Mr MacShane is widely acknowledged for his interest in European affairs, and the funds he claimed could be said to have been used in supporting that interest. Those activities may have contributed to his Parliamentary work, albeit indirectly. He has expressed his regret, and repaid the money wrongly claimed. But this does not excuse his behaviour in knowingly submitting nineteen false invoices

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

The fiscal nimbyism that still terrifies the Tories

If you’re the tax personality of the year, as David Gauke is, the pressure’s on when you give an interview to be as lively as possible. Gauke’s interview with the House magazine today doesn’t disappoint, with the Exchequer Secretary accusing those who oppose the child benefit cuts of ‘fiscal nimbyism’. He says: ‘I think there’s a lot of people who are in favour of reducing the deficit but then when it’s something that affects them there can be a degree of fiscal nimbyism. The reality is that every section of society is having to make a contribution. ‘We can’t pretend that there can be sections of society which we can

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Sir Howard Davies makes himself at home in the long grass

The chair of the government’s airports commission was refreshingly honest about the purpose of his review when he appeared on the Today programme this morning. Sir Howard Davies said: ‘I have reflected quite hard on the criticisms about long grass that the Mayor of London and Michael Heseltine say, that this is booted into the long grass. So how can you make best use of your time in the long grass? What I think we can do is do a lot of the preparatory work. I think we can do that so that when a new government comes into office in 2015 when they make a decision it will have

Thursday

Isabel Hardman

The hardcore Tory rebels and their new friends

There is now a hardcore of rebels in the Conservative party who have defied the government on three key votes. The 37 MPs below have rebelled on the EU referendum vote, the House of Lords Reform Bill, and the EU budget. The question for the whips and the Prime Minister now is do they write these MPs off their Christmas card lists as forever-rebels, or do they launch a charm offensive that could melt even the steely heart of Peter Bone? I blogged yesterday about some of the problems that the Conservative leadership is creating for itself in terms of party loyalty, and while Bill Cash is hardly going to

Christopher Howarth

Nick Clegg’s opposition to renegotiation could risk the UK’s EU membership

Nick Clegg this morning fell into the usual ‘all or nothing’ fallacy on Europe. He said: ‘As soon as we start talking about repatriation, we descend into the in-versus-out debate.’ But the Deputy Prime Minister is wrong: the in/out debate is already underway, and rather than seek to defend the unpopular status quo, Nick Clegg should back renegotiation as the best option for those who wish to put the UK’s membership on a stable democratic footing. But instead of attempting to address the causes for the EU’s unpopularity, the inflated budget, democracy deficit and bureaucracy etc. Nick Clegg sought to channel the debate into his own in/out debate where the

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Clegg enrages eurosceptics with ‘false promise’ attack on plan to return powers from Brussels

One of the key challenges for David Cameron this autumn is to address his policy on Europe. A big speech is expected before European leaders meet in December, with some in the Conservative party hoping it will come as soon as next week in order to boost Tory chances in the Corby by-election. But because the Prime Minister is offering definition for his own party on the EU, the other party leaders must do the same. Nick Clegg’s speech today set out where he stands, and he didn’t mince his words. As well as the lines I reported earlier about opting out of law-and-order powers, the Deputy Prime Minister also

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Ministers ward off Tory revolt on crime compensation

The government has just managed to ward off another possible revolt in the House of Commons from Tory MPs. It failed earlier this autumn to get a revision of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme through a delegated legislation committee when four Conservative MPs present refused to support it. The revised scheme will see half of all those seriously injured following a violent crime receiving no compensation at all and nearly 90 per cent of victims receiving less money. So John Redwood, Angie Bray, Jonathan Evans and Bob Blackman threatened to rebel, leading to Justice Minister Helen Grant withdrawing the legislation from the committee. Grant brought the legislation before committee again

James Forsyth James Forsyth

David Cameron needs to detail EU referendum plans soon to avoid future rebellions

‘I thought it would hurt more than it did’ one loyalist minister remarked after last night’s government defeat on the EU budget. The fact that the vote isn’t going to bring the government down or bind its hands is what is consoling Cameron loyalists. They are also pointing out that the Eurosceptic vote split with Jacob Rees-Mogg, Priti Patel and Andrea Leadsom staying on the government side this time. But what should worry Number 10 about this rebellion is its flash mob nature. As Isabel pointed out last night, there wasn’t — unlike with the Lords revolt or the EU referendum vote — months of planning put into this one.

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

What next for the gutter press?

Lord Leveson will be publishing his recommendations for the future of press regulation very soon, and those on both sides of the debate are getting nervous. The Hacked Off campaign has a letter in today’s Financial Times opposing plans for continued self-regulation of the industry that is signed by 26 professors in journalism, law and politics. The letter attacks proposals by Lord Hunt and Lord Black for self-regulation which would be underpinned by contracts between the regulator and the publisher which would be enforceable through civil law. It says: ‘We do not believe these proposals to be in the best interests of journalists and journalism. The Hunt-Black scheme is an

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Nick Clegg: There is not a cigarette paper between me and the PM on EU budget

The morning after the government’s defeat on the EU budget, Nick Clegg has offered his own advice on the British negotiating position. The Deputy Prime Minister gave a speech to Chatham House in which he said that pushing for a real-terms cut in the budget – which is what 307 MPs including 53 Conservative rebels voted for last night – is ‘unrealistic’. Clegg framed his attack on this negotiating position by focusing on Labour rather than Tory MPs. He said: ‘Yet it was Labour who agreed to the last long-term EU budget settlement, which saw a major jump in EU spending and lost part of the UK’s rebate in exchange

Sebastian Payne

The View from 22 — the fight for press freedom and an EU problem for Cameron

What effect would any form of statutory regulation have on the press in this country? In this week’s cover feature, Nick Cohen writes that if the Leveson Inquiry recommends strong measures to curtail the press, they will not be practical thanks to the constant evolution of the media industry. On this week’s View from 22 podcast, Nick explains the problems of defining who exactly is the press and who are journalists: ‘You can’t say what a newspaper is and you can’t say who a journalist is. When I started in journalism, people used to say it was a trade, not a profession…that was true in theory but false in practice — you

Wednesday

Isabel Hardman

Don’t blame the whips for the EU budget revolt: the problem is higher up

What is striking about this evening’s revolt on the EU budget is that it was organised at lightning speed by the rebel camp. Mark Reckless and Mark Pritchard only tabled their amendment on Monday morning, whereas the rebellion of the 81 over the backbench motion for an EU referendum took weeks of careful planning. This time round, in just three days, the shadow whipping operation managed to stir up 53 MPs prepared to troop through the ‘yes’ lobby in favour of the call for a real-terms cut. The whips themselves are already saying that they know the blame will land on Sir George Young’s head when they believe it wasn’t

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

EU budget: full list of Tory rebels

The Press Association has published its analysis of the division lists, which finds 51 Conservative rebels, along with two tellers. Here is the list of those who voted for a real-terms cut in the EU budget: Steve Baker John Baron Andrew Bingham Brian Binley Andrew Bridgen Aidan Burley Conor Burns Douglas Carswell Bill Cash Christopher Chope James Clappison Tracey Crouch Philip Davies David Davis Nick de Bois Nadine Dorries Richard Drax Zac Goldsmith James Gray Chris Heaton-Harris Gordon Henderson Adam Holloway Stewart Jackson Bernard Jenkin Chris Kelly Edward Leigh Julian Lewis Jack Lopresti Karl McCartney Stephen McPartland Anne Main Nigel Mills David Nuttall Andrew Percy Mark Pritchard Mark Reckless John

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Government suffers humiliating defeat on EU budget

The government has just suffered an embarrassing defeat on the EU budget. The rebel amendment, which called for a cut rather than the real terms freeze David Cameron is proposing, passed by 307 votes to 294. There are, I think, three significant consequences of tonight’s vote. First, it has been yet another reminder that David Cameron can barely control his party when it comes to Europe. We’re waiting for the precise number of Tory rebels tonight but it seems like about 50 MPs defied the whips. This means that if Labour is prepared to join with the Tory rebels, it can overturn the coalition’s majority. This is the second lasting

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

EU budget: Focus on Labour’s chutzpah

The opening exchanges of the Commons debate on the EU budget were, on the whole, rather good for the Prime Minister. They involved Greg Clark making a concerted attack on Labour’s ‘opportunist’ decision to call for a real-terms cut and to support Mark Reckless’ amendment calling for just that. Without irony, Chris Leslie then told the Chamber that Clark was being ‘partisan’ in his speech. This put Clark and the backbenchers sitting behind him on the defensive. The debate became about Labour rather than the government’s own stance on the issue. Loyal MPs including Nadhim Zahawi pressed Leslie on whether he himself would back a veto at the budget summit