‘Arguably the greatest peacetime Prime Minister in British History’ D.Read- Peel and the Victorians 1987 The current Coalition government in the United Kingdom and its policies are always being compared to what has gone previously. Some commentators use history to make unfavourable comparisons and to suggest that the current administration is just a continuation of Conservative governments of the past. Others mainly on the right however, use the past to provide examples of regimes [...]
In the space of a little under two years Nick Clegg has gone from the immense popularity of ‘Cleggmania’, where at one point he was the most popular political leader in Britain since Winston Churchill, to being reviled by a substantial number of people, especially among the chattering classes. The cause of this dramatic change of fortune is the sense of betrayal felt by some that in 2010 after the General Election he took the [...]
It has been a tough few weeks for the Lib Dems. Then again, when hasn’t it been tough for the Coalition’s junior partners? The departure of big-hitter Chris Huhne from the Cabinet and a devastating ‘Poll of Polls’ are the last things the party needs. Of course, it hasn’t really been easy going at any time since the General Election; what with last year’s devastating local election and AV Referendum results. As someone who grew [...]
In recent months there has been a lot of talk about a period of industrial strife to equal or surpass any since the winter of discontent in 1978/79. This has mainly been caused by public sector union anger over proposed changes to their pensions, and has led to some days of disruption due to strikes. The government, their advisors and even the Labour peer (Lord Hutton) they asked to look into the problem of funding [...]
One of Labour’s favourite lines of attack on the present government is that it consists of predominantly middle-aged, relatively rich white men, and therefore they have little or no real understanding of reality. While it is undoubtedly true that the Coalition government does contain an unrepresentatively large number of rich and privileged individuals, this argument – when deployed by Labour – is entirely hypocritical, because almost all of the higher echelons of that Party share [...]
So, Chris Huhne finally resigned as Energy Secretary on Friday. It has been a long time coming. It was made clear – by the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, among others – that it would be impossible for a Minister of the Crown to continue in office whilst subject to criminal charges. The announcement of the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, brings his ministerial career to a conclusion. The fact that he enters [...]
“‘Life is so unfair and its all the government’s fault, along with big business and bourgeois opression”. Do you think the idea has crossed the mind of the Occupy protesters that perhaps if they had spent the last few months in the Job Centre or handing out CVs then life wouldn’t be quite so unfair? I walk past the site of Occupy Nottingham every day and it makes me angry. Looking out over their sea [...]
Wow. This is a new experience for me. A unique experience in fact. I’m in a state of near-shock. Readers will, I hope, forgive the ponderous preamble to this article but I am about to write four words that I never thought I would use in my life – four words that took on a brief life of their own (approximately between April 2010, at the time of the first ever prime-ministerial TV debates, and [...]
In recent weeks politics has been dominated by the debate around Scottish independence. Very rarely is there a news bulletin or newspaper without someone pronouncing on the issue. Last year the major constitutional question – apart from the referendum on the Alternative Vote – was on offering more powers to the Welsh Assembly, and for the last decade nobody in Britain has been able to escape from the issue of devolution in Northern Ireland. The [...]
Given the year that his party has had, it’s likely that all Ed Balls wanted for Christmas is for something to go right for Labour. Perhaps old St. Nick had still not forgiven the Shadow Chancellor for his Nazi costume wearing antics because he did not find a Lib-Lab coalition in his stocking – his plea to form one being firmly rebuffed. This olive branch of political peace even failed to expose any cracks within [...]