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Wednesday 9 June 2010
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A coalition cabinet meeting in Downing Street last month. Photograph: Phil Hannaford
The Liberal Democrats really are in this together with David Cameron. Yesterday for the first time the Liberal Democrat members of the cabinet held a political cabinet with the Conservatives.
The very fact they had a political, as opposed to government, get-together shows how bound up the two parties now are. It was brief – a longer one will be held shortly – but they discussed how they were going to have to protect themselves from the coming Labour attack on their proposed cuts.
No one is under any illusion they will be doing anything popular. Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, predicted the country is heading for a nightmare.
The thinking at the political cabinet seemed to be to point out that Labour itself was committed to a similar cuts programme, but had not allocated a penny towards achieving this.
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Friday 4 June 2010
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George Osborne and Vince Cable: their relationship will be crucial in deciding success of coalition. Photograph: Steve Back/Rex Features
When a political figure makes a speech at the Cass business school in London it is usually worth taking note. It was at the school in February that George Osborne warned that Britain would face "savage and swingeing" public spending cuts unless an early start was made in tackling Britain's record fiscal deficit.
Osborne's pledge in the prestigious Mais lecture hall to embark on "in-year" public spending cuts established an important general-election dividing line between the Tories, on one hand, and Labour and the Liberal Democrats, on the other. Gordon Brown and Nick Clegg's parties both opposed early cuts.
Vince Cable, the Lib Dem Treasury spokesman at the time, was scathing about Osborne's speech:
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Wednesday 2 June 2010
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Vince Cable, the business secretary, is still the king of Westminster. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian
Business secretary is Britain's most popular politician, comfortably ahead of David Cameron and Nick Clegg
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Simon Hughes will play crucial role in managing anxious grassroots if he becomes Lib Dem deputy leader. Photograph: Jason Bye/Rex Features
A crucial moment in the life of the Lib-Con coalition comes tonight when the Liberal Democrats start the process of electing a new deputy leader after the resignation of Vince Cable. The business secretary announced his resignation last week to concentrate on his ministerial duties.
Simon Hughes, the veteran MP and activist who is supported by a host of Lib Dem grandees, is favourite to win the post. If he wins, Hughes will provide a crucial link between the Lib Dem grassroots, who are uneasy about the coalition, and the leadership, which knows it has to manage the party with care. Andy Beckett has examined these tensions in a piece for G2 today.
Nick Clegg used an interview on BBC Radio 4's Today programme this morning to reassure Lib Dems that they are gaining from the coalition. In his first broadcast interview since the weekend resignation of David Laws, the deputy prime minister said he was confident that a referendum would be held on electoral reform in time for the next general election to be held on the alternative vote system if there is a yes vote.
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Friday 28 May 2010
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Chris Patten believes David Cameron will return to the mainstream centre right in the European parliament. Photograph: Eamonn McCabe
From the Olympian heights of the chancellorship of Oxford university, Lord (Chris) Patten makes public pronouncements with care these days.
So the coalition government will note with interest an intervention this weekend by the former Tory chairman on his favourite subject – Europe.
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Tuesday 25 May 2010
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George Osborne, Nick Clegg, David Cameron and William Hague listen to the Queen's speech today. Photograph: PA
Is this coalition government going to get away without an opposition?
Labour is otherwise engaged between now and September, and although Harriet Harman, the interim leader, will do her level best, this is a caretaker opposition.Some, such as Liam Byrne and Sadiq Khan, will be energetic. But many other leading figures – Alan Johnson, Jack Straw and Alistair Darling – have all said they wish to stand aside from the frontbench, and will struggle to grind through the gears. Lord Mandelson, the former business secretary, is on an extended holiday and has resigned from the shadow cabinet, as he is required to do. Lord Adonis, one of the most intelligent frontline Labour politicians, is writing a book on the coalition talks – surely a brief tome. The new intake of MPs will try to make a mark on standing committees, but they will make little impact.
The unions will do their best, and the TUC general secretary Brendan Barber, judging by his intelligent weekend speech to Progress, will try to prevent the unions mounting a charge of the very light brigade. As Unite is finding in its dispute with British Airways, strikes can cripple a union as much as a company. The Communication Workers' Union does not have many Tory backbenchers willing to side with it over the part-sale of the Royal Mail. Continue reading...
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Monday 24 May 2010
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Chris Mullin is the brains behind the coalition government's plans to cut back on ministerial cars. Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian
Any minister who feels a little frustrated the next time they have to squeeze on to a crowded tube train will want to know who to curse.
Is it David Laws, the Lib Dem chief secretary to the Treasury, who said today that no minister should have a "dedicated car or driver" other than in exceptional circumstances? No. Laws was merely the messenger.
The culprit, who can expect a frosty receptions from ministers the next time he turns up at Westminster, is the unlikely figure of Chris Mullin, the campaigning journalist who briefly served as a minister under Tony Blair.
It was Mullin's hilarious account of his attempts to dispense with the services of his ministerial driver that persuaded David Cameron that the government car service (GCS) was ripe for cuts. Cameron read Mullin's memoirs – A View from the Foothills – last summer and came back convinced the knife could be wielded.
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Friday 21 May 2010
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Lib Dem and Conservative MEPs voted on opposing sides in the European parliament in Strasbourg. Photograph: Vincent Kessler/Reuters
The love affair was great while it lasted. Richard Curtis now has a script for his next upper middle class English rom com and a plaque can be placed in the Downing Street garden to show where Nick and Dave were hitched.
But the Lib-Con coalition is now facing its first tiff. MEPs from the two parties voted on opposing sides in the European parliament this week.
The odd vote in Strasbourg may appear relatively trivial, but this one was pretty important, because it related to the Lisbon treaty – a major source of tension between the Lib Dems and the Tories in recent years.
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Wednesday 19 May 2010
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Theresa May, the new home secretary. Photograph: David Levene
The roar of a dinosaur is unmistakable. Flailing around in an unfamiliar world, the wretched beast lashes out as it struggles to understand how life will no longer be the same.
And so it was this morning on BBC Radio 4's Today programme when the veteran presenter, John Humphrys, showed how the older generation is struggling to come to terms with Britain's new political order.
In an interview with the home secretary, Theresa May, Humphrys expressed astonishment that the Conservatives could be giving ground on manifesto pledges as the price of agreeing a coalition with the Liberal Democrats.
He seized on the Tories' agreement that the future of the Human Rights Act, of which they have been highly critical, would be decided by a commission. Continue reading...
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Wednesday 12 May 2010
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Sir Gus O'Donnell, the cabinet secretay, (right) looks mightily relieved as the Camerons arrive in Downing Street. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/AP
The political world has naturally focused on the images of David and Samantha Cameron arriving in Downing Street and the handshake between the leaders of Britain's first peacetime coalition since the 1930s.
But it's worth taking a moment to consider three people who are mightily relieved by the coalition agreement but who will be overlooked in the excitement:
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Tuesday 11 May 2010
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John Reid is not the only Labour figure who is critical of a deal with the Lib Dems. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA
Twenty four hour news wants instant resolutions, but senior Liberal Democrats are now saying the deal may not be secured today, and any final deal will have to go to a party conference at the weekend. The Queen may be kept on hold.
But the balance is now tilting back to the Liberal Democrats striking a deal with the Conservatives, partly because there is a sense that some Labour negotiators are less keen on a deal than the Conservatives.
Senior Liberal Democrats are also picking up signals that Labour is too divided to strike a deal. John Reid and David Blunkett, the two former home secretaries, speak for more than themselves when they criticise the idea of a deal altogether.
The official line is that the cabinet backed the deal unanimously, but I am not sure that this represents a true account of opinion In a bid to shore up the Labour coalition, Alan Johnson, the current home secretary and Neil Kinnock, the former Labour leader, came out in favour of the deal.
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Friday 7 May 2010
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Gordon Brown arrives back at 10 Downing Street as the country looked set for a hung parliament. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
Can Labour cobble together enough support to form a government?
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