On this week’s podcast, Keiran Pedley and Leo Barasi look back at a momentous week in British politics and ask what happens next? Listen to the podcast below Follow this week’s guests: Follow @KeiranPedley Follow @LeoBarasi Tweet
At the start of Francesco Rosi’s 1984 film of Carmen, there is a scene in which the bull, enraged but weakened by the fight, the loss of blood from wounds caused by lances and the many banderillas thrust into its head, is finally despatched by the toreador inserting a sword between the beast’s shoulder blades into the heart. It mirrors the final scene when Jose, maddened by Carmen’s indifference, kills her in the same arena. The scene does not…
Latest surveys are clear – the binary CON-LAB choice much less applicable Given that UK politics has changed dramatically in the last three months to reflect a four party choice surely the time has come to to include in the options the newly elected leader of the Lib Dems, Jo Swinson and the Brexit party leader for life Nigel Farage in “Best PM” polling. Simply sticking to the old CON-LAB leader format is not providing interesting information that could help…
Team Boris will be very pleased with the way the papers are treating his arrival at number 10 and and his new cabinet. They reflect that he has made a massive impact. In one sense he is fortunate that the parliamentary summer holiday starts today day and and MPs won’t be back until early September. It was all designed like this to prevent an early vote of confidence. One of the things about taking over as prime minister is that…
The view of those ready to risk their cash betting on politics is that Johnson’s cabinet appointments suggest that the new PM is aiming for an early general election perhaps this year. GE2019 is now almost an evens chance on the Betfair exchange. He takes over a parliamentary party that is somewhat smaller than TMay inherited when she became leader in 2016. She had a majority and blew it with her decision to call GE2017 which, of course, saw the…
From longstanding PBer Richard Nabavi After five decades of support for the Conservatives, I have now resigned as a party member. Naturally this hasn’t been an easy decision; it has been a pleasure working with my MP Nus Ghani, and before her Charles Hendry, and helping in a small way in various constituencies to achieve six years of sound Conservative-led government under David Cameron, even if the past two years have been increasingly difficult. I shall miss the opportunities…
New YouGov carried out after Johnson win has the LDs the big gainerCon 25% (-)Lab 19% (-2)Lib Dem 23% (+3)Brexit 17% (-2)Green 9% (+1) — Mike Smithson (@MSmithsonPB) July 24, 2019 After all the developments in the past couple of days it is good to have some new polling carried out entirely after the announcement of the results in the Lib Dem and Conservative leadership elections. The numbers are above and will be encouraging to Jo Swinson and very discouraging…
Boris’s election as Tory party leader and Prime Minister is the 8th occasion since WW2 when a new PM has been chosen in between general elections. On 5 of the previous 7 occasions, it was the Tories changing leader (Churchill to Eden, Eden to Macmillan, Macmillan to Douglas-Home, Thatcher to Major and Cameron to May). Only Macmillan and Major went on to win majorities at the subsequent election. On the 2 occasions when Labour made a similar change (Wilson to…