Javid becomes the favourite to succeed Johnson as CON leader
Ladbrokes opening prices And no change in the 43% chance of a 2019 General Election Betfair market from Betdata.io Mike Smithson Follow @MSmithsonPB Tweet
Get ready for Boris’s big day to see CON resignations and the LDs perhaps getting another MP
This is the day that many of those elected at CON MPs have been planning for – making a gesture they hope will undermine in some way their new leader who engineered his campaign to minimise the level of scrutiny he came under. Quite how many and what they do we don’t know but the trigger will be he announcement of the leadership election result with the expected big victory for the man some Tories hope will help them beat…
And so to next week’s Brecon & Radnorshire by-election where new leaders Swinson and Johnson will face their first electoral tests
Number Cruncher Politics Brecon Poll Can PM BoJo win back CON to BREX defectors? One of the extraordinary features of UK politics at the moment is just how much is going on. Not only will this week see the outcomes of two party leader elections but there’ll be a new PM and in just over a week’s time there’ll be the first CON defence in a Westminster by-election since 2016. Inevitably this battle,in Brecon and Radnorshire will be portrayed as…
Jo Swinson wins the LD leadership contest
She takes over with the party on the up It has just been announced that 39 year old Jo Swinson has won the Lib Dem leadership race with 62% of the vote against her former ministerial colleague in the coalition, Ed Davey. She’s the first woman to lead the party and was first elected as an MP at GE2005. She lost her seat, East Dunbartonshire, at GE2015 only to win it back two years later. Her leadership starts at a…
Betting on the next Foreign Secretary
Last weekend I did a piece on who will be the next Chancellor and my central premise was that Boris Johnson would leave Jeremy Hunt at King Charles Street lest he adds another malcontent on the backbenches so dabbling in this market didn’t really interest me as I might end up tying up my money for a long time. The events in the Strait of Hormuz probably ensures Boris Johnson decides to keep Hunt there for continuity reasons alone. However the…
At this critical time reflections on “Cultivating Democracy”
Occasionally I have planted a gorgeous looking plant; it has flowered briefly then died. On digging it up I find the dreaded wine weevil or roots which have made no attempt to spread into the soil and find nutrition. It is a reminder that nourishing the hidden roots is by far a gardener’s most important task. A plant not strong and well anchored will be blown away by the winds, destroyed by frost or succumb to malicious bugs and parasites….
Diss-May. The manifest inadequacy of the outgoing Prime Minister
I come to bury Theresa May. She leaves the highest political office in the land with no achievements to her name. The country is more divided than when she took office. Its economy is faltering. She has found no resolution to Brexit, the task for which she was appointed Prime Minister. She has completely failed. Mrs May might reasonably argue that the task was immense. So it was. She has made it worse. The tragedy is that she understood part,…
Follow the formbook when betting on Boris’s successor and choose an old Etonian
Five of the past 7 male Tory PMs were educated there Within minutes of Boris being declared leader on Tuesday morning expect new betting markets on who will succeed him as CON leader, who’ll be his successor and how long will survive at Number 10. When considering a factor to remember is that the form book shows us that Tories liked to be led by someone who was educated at Eton. Going back to 1955 of the seven men…