Is Cameron about to lose his first Tory Cabinet Minister? Today is decision day for Liam Fox and David Cameron. This morning, the interim report on Fox’s conduct in his friendship with Adam Werritty lands on the PM’s desk; at 2.30pm it is Defence Questions in the Commons. That puts tremendous pressure on both men. Cameron can only allow Fox to go to the House if he is confident that there is no resignation offence flagged up in the report…
Does the government need to change the question? I had planned to write a review of the conference season for today’s piece but perhaps the only thing worthy of note that’s not already been endlessly commented on is that the Lib Dems were much more disciplined this year; they didn’t fall out or whinge excessively about losing the AV vote – they’re learning how to act as a party of government. Instead, the most noteworthy events of the last three…
Will he ever again lead the Tory right? One saving grace for Ed Miliband’s leadership prospects is the lack of any obviously better alternative. Strangely enough, both other party leaders are in much the same position. Clegg’s ratings remain poor though may now have turned the corner but any potential replacement is at least as compromised by policy and / or personal matters. Cameron too has remarkably little to worry about in terms of possible rivals for his job. Osborne…
How will the 1+ woman rule work in practice? One of the more significant events to have taken place at Labour’s recent conference was its adoption of the Refounding Labour proposals. Amongst these were the scrapping of Shadow Cabinet elections and the introduction of a rule that at least one of Labour’s leader and deputy must be a woman, championed by its current deputy, Harriet Harman. I’ve not been able to find the precise wording of how this would actually…
One year in, has he an election-winning strategy? The opening of Labour’s conference today marks the first anniversary of Ed Miliband’s surprise election victory. That year has had its share of ups and downs – solid and continuing leads in most polls published, healthy gains in the local elections, avoiding blame for Labour’s debacle in Scotland or the AV result for example. He’s also consolidated his own position as leader and looks well set to lead Labour through to the…
Would autonomy stop them being seen as the English party? The 2010 general election demonstrated more dramatically than ever before the extent to which Scotland has become a different country politically. While the Conservatives made gain after gain in Wales and England, north of the border not only was there precisely no change in seats but the Conservatives actually went backwards in vote share. The proposal by the contender for the leadership of the Scottish Conservatives, Murdo Fraser MSP, to…
Does the Libyan operation change the terms of debate? Making cuts is always difficult for a government: voters lose out. When cuts are targeted, some groups suffer substantially in relative terms; when they are more or less across the board, everyone ends up with less, or at least less than they thought they’d have. The only real antidote to that difficulty is winning the argument that the cuts are both fair and necessary. Getting that right is hard at the…
Could a risk-based National Insurance system ever work? Government health drives are always dangerous things politically, as they tend to deliver unpopular information to people who know the truth of it but dislike having to admit their failings to themselves and so blame the messenger. That the message is frequently accompanied by tax increases doesn’t really help either. The reports about obesity published in The Lancet yesterday and widely covered in the media fit very much into that mould, advocating…