Alas, poor Humza Yousaf. Scotland’s new First Minister has enjoyed a gilded ride to Bute House but, as he is on the brink of discovering, the buck now rests nowhere else. This might give a less self-confident politician pause for thought, but no-one has ever suggested Yousaf underestimates his own abilities. The contest to succeed […]
Many people are this morning furious with Margaret Ferrier, still the MP for Rutherglen and Hamilton West, and it’s easy to understand why. By travelling from London to Glasgow despite knowing she was infected with Covid-19 she, at least potentially, put other passengers and members of the general public at risk of contracting the virus. […]
No good deed goes unexploited and, at this extraordinary moment in time, the government’s relief schemes designed to keep struggling businesses are no exception to that sorry rule of life. Our old friend Moral Hazard is back in vogue. For an illustration of this we need look no further than the Premier League. England’s top […]
What kind of government does Boris Johnson wish to lead? The Prime Minister has a softness for grand infrastructure projects and likes to think of himself as a quasi-nineteenth century liberal. A builder, not just an entertainer. But he leads a government in which there are plenty of ministers – Priti Patel, Liz Truss, Dominic […]
To say that Scottish Labour faces an existential crisis gravely understates the state of mental and moral confusion in which the party finds itself. Labour’s empire was lost long ago and it has not come to terms with a world transformed, far less begun the task of finding itself a new role. At its simplest, […]
These are heady times for Conservatives. It is as though a great lowness of spirit which had previously been sore afflicting Tory spirits has, seemingly miraculously, been lifted. It is not just the thumping of Jeremy Corbyn and removing the doleful shadow cast by the thought of a Corbyn government which explains this, though of […]
Scottish general elections used to be soporific affairs. In 2001, for instance, just one of the then 72 Scottish constituencies changed hands. In 2005 only five did and, remarkably, in 2010 every single Scottish seat was won by the same party that had taken it at the previous general election. Drama happened elsewhere in the […]
Yet again the ineluctable law of Brexit has asserted itself: a deal is only possible once all other options, save that of no deal at all, have been removed from the table. Winnowing is the order of the day. Brexit must be a choice between black and white even though it is a land of […]
Penrith and the Border suited Rory Stewart and not just because England’s largest constituency has been represented by Scotsmen since 1955. Stewart followed David Maclean in the seat, who in turn succeeded Willie Whitelaw. Being a farming constituency, and a sheep-farming one at that, it suited a parliamentarian with a penchant for the hills and […]
It is August after all; a time for grandiose and cockamamie schemes of dubious good sense and possibility. And so perhaps it is little surprise that this is the moment for a government of national unity to have its moment in the sun. A government of national unity – a GNU – would be quite […]
We need to talk about Nigel I’m afraid, even if you would very much prefer not to. There is, after all, a compelling case to be made that he is the most consequential politician of our time. When Donald Trump talks of Nigel Farage as “Mr Brexit” he is not entirely wrong. No Farage; no Ukip. […]
Even now, at this late stage, and despite everything that has happened these past three years, Brexit retains a limitless capacity to amuse. That entertainment is sardonic, but bitter laughter remains preferable to despair. How else, though, is anyone supposed to react to the latest iteration of Labour’s Brexit preferences? For a long time it […]
At some point in the not too distant future the government is going to have to make a decision on whether to save or destroy Stonehenge. You might think this both a dramatic question and an easy one but, as ever in politics, it is more complicated than that. At issue is whether the government […]
When you’ve split once, splitting again comes more easily. That’s one conclusion to be drawn from the short, ignominious, life of Change UK, the party formerly known as The Independent Group to which most of its parliamentary adherents have returned. There is a whiff of comedy about this as well as a certain measure of […]
That sound you hear is the clattering of tumbrils laden with politicians who long ago exhausted the public’s patience. These elections to the European Parliament are going to be a massacre; a moment when the inadequacies of both traditional parties are all too evident. This is going to be ugly and little good can come […]
There are two ways of playing in these elections to the European Parliament that make sense. You can, like Nigel Farage, be all-in for Brexit and trust that Leavers thoroughly hacked-off with the entire dismal process will use you as a vehicle for sending a message to Theresa May or you can, like the Liberal […]
As recently as last December, Labour peer Andrew Adonis averred that “British politics for the next generation will divide into those who resisted Brexit and those who promoted or appeased it. I will never fully trust or respect anyone who wasn’t in the resistance from the beginning”. That was then, however, and now is not […]
Not for the first time, Diane Abbott has performed some service. Appearing on the Today programme this morning, she confidently told listeners that in the matter of the arrest of Julian Assange, “we all know what this is about”. Ms Abbott, who is projected to serve as Home Secretary if the Labour party forms the […]
Harry Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, never actually said that “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog” but as is so often the case the legend is more appealing than the facts of the matter. Nevertheless, this is the strategy Theresa May, friendless and all alone, has chosen and […]
It is hard to remember it now but once upon a time Theresa May had a vision for the United Kingdom. It was a vision to which Brexit was, if not incidental, then by no means central. May’s ministry would, she said in the summer of 2016, “fight against the burning injustices” that still, even […]
