Opinion

“Is Labour’s Brexit dilemma being misunderstood?”, Professor John Curtice wrote ahead of the crucial 2017 by-elections in Copeland and Stoke. The feeling at the time was that areas such as Stoke epitomised what the typical Labour voter wanted. Some 69 per cent of the party’s stronghold seat voted to Leave the European Union in 2016, which by default surely made them a party of “working-class leavers”. As it turned out UKIP party leader Paul Nuttall was defeated by the Labour...

It’s a matter of faith among Brexit supporters that failing to obey the consultative referendum on EU membership is an assault on democracy. MPs who actively campaign to stay in the EU are betraying that democracy. Almost every day a Brexiteer or sympathetic news outlet rages against the ‘anti-democratic’ Remain supporters who want a second vote. Putting the questionable nature of the 2016 vote aside, the UK does indeed have a major democracy problem. It’s called first-past-the-post. Voting rights have...

Scotland is about to be governed by a Prime Minister elected by 160,000 Tory members, of which only 9,000 are based in Scotland, from a party that hasn’t won a major election in Scotland in 64 years, to deliver a Brexit that 62 per cent of Scotland’s voters rejected.

The prospect of Boris Johnson running the country looks like an all too inevitable possibility following the first round of votes cast yesterday. Bookies now price Johnson at 1/5 to win the leadership race after he scooped 114 votes out of a potential 313, with Jeremy Hunt (43 votes), Michael Gove (37 votes) and Dominic Raab (27 votes) a long way behind. A lot can still happen between now and the final membership vote that will ultimately install the next...

The BBC has come under fire this week for its decision to axe free TV licenses for over-75s. Hundreds of thousands of people have signed a “Save Our Free TV Licence” petition demanding the broadcasting corporation reverses its decision, with Piers Morgan, David Davis and Matt Hancock among the high-profile names backing the campaign. The irony that Tory MPs are among the people most vehemently opposing the move has not escaped everyone. When the agreement that the BBC should fund...

The Withdrawal Agreement is not going to get through Parliament and the UK needs more time to sort out a Brexit deal, Mark Harper announced today in a rare display of realism. Alongside Rory Stewart he is one of the few Conservative leadership candidates campaigning on hard-truths in his bid to become the next Prime Minister, but he stands to be punished as a result. The favourites for the job have advocated proroguing parliament to deliver Brexit as well as...

The bloated corpse of Theresa May’s premiership is finally floating down the Thames and the political minnows are circling. It will be a leadership race unprecedented in modern times as the Tories compete to see who’s the most buzz-wordy, who can fake compassion for the poor and whose Brexit plan is most like the Siege of Khartoum. In the 100 metre stumble to Downing Street, Esther McVey was one of the first out the gate. McVey was astounded when the...

Last night a thought struck me as I walked past The Shard on my way home. Parked outside the Shangri-La Hotel – where suites cost £10,000 a night – were a posse of Bentleys – which cost in excess of £150,000 – and other such beamers which stood proudly in a huddle while their respective drivers waited patiently for their passengers. Such shows of exuberant fortune no longer constitute wealth in this day an age – this is mega money,...

It’s hardly as eloquent as e=mc2, but the formula for winning the next general election could be relatively simple for Labour. With results in from last night’s by-election there’s plenty of reasons to be cheerful in the Labour camp. The Conservatives suffered their worst loss in a Peterborough election since 1886 and dropped to third in a constituency they held until 2017. Labour managed to hold on to the seat despite many predicting they would be ousted, with Union activist...