I have been very cynical about Jeremy Hunt’s push to be Tory leader. I think he’s been mostly absent in the debates, looking like he’s marking time, and I figured he would mostly be BoJo’s wingman in the final two. It almost seemed partially set up for this, with rumours of Johnson’s whips amongst the […]
Could BoJo get away with a soft Brexit?
In all my wonderings about what Boris Johnson will do when he becomes prime minister, until very recently I hadn’t considered the soft Brexit option at all. I sort of ruled it out, leading to a very narrow set of options for Johnson on Brexit. I will admit that this possibility was opened up to […]
Here’s the real reason that so many on the Right don’t want Rory Stewart in the final two versus Johnson
Despite Boris Johnson’s poor record as Foreign Secretary, having voted for May’s deal, and a number of things we’ll take this opportunity to gloss over here, he is the favourite to be the next Tory leader. Why? Because he’s supposedly able to reach parts of the electorate other Tory MPs can’t get to. Forget about […]
A review of the Channel 4 Tory leadership debate – and why non-Tories really like Rory Stewart
It was a turgid affair, last night’s face off between five of the remaining six candidates for Tory leader (Boris being empty lecturned), with a chippy Krishnan Guru-Murray corralling the thing. I would not have watched the whole programme were I not the massive geek that I am; however, I cannot remember a similar programme […]
Why Boris Johnson as prime minister will be the death of Brexit
One of the great ironies that will be relished by historians in the semi-distant future is how Rory Stewart, the only candidate in the current Tory leadership who had a realistic plan for delivering Brexit, was derided as a Remainer, while they went on to pick Boris Johnson instead, who was the final nail in […]
The leadership contest demonstrates the Tories have lost the plot – for the time being at least
The Conservative Party has been morphing into something else since June 2016, something very different to what they have ever previously been. Amongst other things, they used to know how to win elections. How are they doing on that front these days? Lost their majority at the 2017 general election; lost 1,300 councillors at the […]
The political battle ahead points to Remain v Leave for many years to come
One of the things that makes me smile when I read political commentaries at present is whenever Brexit is framed as being “over with” sometime soon. This is one of the great myths of our current age. It is spread by those who think we can have a second referendum in the next couple of […]
My takeaways from the Peterborough by-election
I want to begin by saying that for those of you gloating about the Brexit Party not winning when they were widely forecast to do so, and that this somehow represents them being vanquished, I’d think again. People tend to think of by-elections as fertile ground for insurgent parties, but they actually reward parties with […]
The lessons from Change UK’s failure
To get this out of the way: I in no way wish to mock the way things have turned out for Change UK. When they all left their respective parties, I had great hopes that they would become a major force in British politics. I still applaud their courage, if not their political and strategic […]
Where the wishes of Remainers and Leavers meet
When Theresa May’s Meaningful Vote was defeated by a record 230 votes in January of this year, one of the more striking images was both Brexiter and Remainer crowds cheering the same result. While it’s true to some extent that one of these groups will end up being wrong about that vote being good for […]