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Like the Casino decision a warning of the dangers of following the market After yesterday’s sensational news that the betting outsider, Manchester, had won the race for Britain’s new super casino I thought I would look back at the last time when the betting markets got it totally wrong. For next week, no doubt, Lib Dem will be celebrating the first anniversary of the party’s sensational victory over Labour in the Dunfermline by election which took place in the aftermath…

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Who else would want to embarrass Brown over his support for Scotland? On the face of it yesterday’s Mail on Sunday story quoting from a 13 year old article that Gordon Brown had written about his support for Scottish football was just something to chuckle about. But on closer examination it looked more serious than that. For what could be more embarrassing than for Brown’s comments such as his saluting of the Scottish hooligans who tore up the Wembley turf…

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How long will Tony be there? Sometimes the still photograph is much more revealing than the moving image. These are screen grabs that I took from Blair’s interview earlier in the day on BBC’s “The Politics Show”. Together they make a powerful combination. He looked at his most stressed when pressed on the dropping of the Saudi arms case investigation and, of course, when commenting on the handover. If you have got half an hour it is well worth watching….

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What will Dave and Gordon tell their children about their war roles? Earlier in the week when were were discussing the electoral impact of Iraq a couple of people emailed asking that I publish again the photo-composition that was produced for the site a few months ago. Well here it is and it does raise question for both men that are probably not going to go away. Both were supporters of the invasion although Gordon was clearly in a much…

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Did illegal eavesdropping change the course of the Lib Dem election? Just on a year ago this week Simon Hughes was riding high in his bid to become leader of the Liberal Democrats. Mark Oaten had pulled out of the race a few days earlier and the sentiment had moved sharply away from Ming Campbell following his lacklustre performances at Prime Minister’s Questions. In the betting Hughes overtook Ming and became the odds on favourite. An ICM poll in the…

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Are Labour Planning to Get Rid of the County and District Councils? In my last year as a borough councillor, in 2003/4, there was much speculation that Labour would seek to get rid of the County and District councils, and replace them with single-tier Unitary Authorities. Some of the powers of County and District councils would be transferred to the new Unitary authorities. Others would be transferred upwards to elected regional assemblies. Although this never materialised, I now understand that…

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Could the investigation go on until the spring? The main news in the Mail this morning is that that “detectives are now increasingly confident that the ten-month investigation will end in a criminal court case – either over claims that peerages were traded for political donations, or an attempt to conceal evidence.” But what could also dominate the political environment is a suggestion in the paper “that a final report on the case is now unlikely to be submitted to…

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Will there be a West Lothian Question over whether it’s taught in schools The latest move in Gordon Brown’s “Britishness” initiative is that it should be compulsory for schools to teach “core British values alongside cultural diversity”. The problem is that this will only apply in England and as the BBC’s Daily Politics programme reported this morning – it will not apply in Scotland. For while the Education Secretary, Alan Johnson, can lay down policy for schools in England, as…

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