Through a mix of timing, pressure and parliamentary guile, Kemi Badenoch left Labour with nowhere to hide over Peter Mandelson.
Cathartic as the current circus might be, the root of this government’s problems does not lie in something so happily inapplicable to the Right as Peter Mandelson.
L P Hartley once wrote “the past is a foreign country; they do things differently there”. Everyone in politics is trying to express the same, but it might be an idea for all to visit it occasionally and say ‘you know what? We got that wrong’.
Mandelson says Epstein was like ‘dog muck’. The trouble is that he kept rolling in it — and Starmer, despite his promises for higher standards, looked the other way.
Labour likes to boast about falling NHS waiting lists, but the Health Service is actually treating fewer people.
Breaking the doom-loop of depressing political narrative – harnessed and driven by parties’ agendas- to look different, sound different and offer something new, would, in fact, be a welcome change.
ConservativeHome’s round-up of ten of our best articles from the preceding week.
Reform’s recruitment of old Tory names has handed Kemi Badenoch a chance to draw a clear dividing line – if she is willing to be bold with her newest MPs.
Few of the revenants rallying behind Prosper UK’s grave-linen standard need much explaining. Most were backers or beneficiaries of David Cameron’s ‘modernisation’ efforts; they were, almost definitionally, the future. Now they’re not.
The strong suspicion is Starmer bought his ticket to China by his government putting their thumb on the scales on a number of issues where the eventual outcome was of benefit to the Chinese. Moreover will any deal actually be worth what it promises?
As Reform absorbs disgruntled ex-ministers and new groups jockey for influence, Badenoch’s Conservatives remain a party of the right — but one that has yet to find its voice.
Conservatives cannot expect to return to power unless they make peace with the lost Tory tribe that is Reform.
ConservativeHome’s round-up of ten of our best articles from the preceding week.
The Tory Leader has finally surged into first place. That Badenoch had already overtaken Jenrick before his departure will be quietly savoured in LOTO.