Absolutely Not The Daily Troll-o-Graph

There are no serious challenges to the party in the long-term, and Labour is flailing under the rule of Sir Keir Starmer Source - Daily Telegraph  Link It is surprising how much attention the Tory leadership contest is getting. Considering that the party has no parliamentary power or mass popular support, and that the long process of choosing a new leader is still in its early stages, the candidates have attracted a remarkable amount of coverage.  After the great Labour landslide of 1997 the Tories were pushed so far out of the public gaze as to be scarcely visible. Nothing much that they said or did seemed to be worthy of more than fleeting consideration.  That historical moment really did look like an extinction event not only for the party but for centre-Right politics itself: Blair’s New Labour had stolen the clothes of the Thatcher revolution and the original forces which had created it had been displaced, possibly forever. So why is the current picture different? Certainly, as is

Labour is offering Brussels concessions for what? A more cordial atmosphere and an annual summit Source - Daily Telegraph  David Frost Link It’s almost like the old days after the Brexit referendum. The Prime Minister and his emissaries go back and forth to Brussels for talks with the EU Commission.  There are warm words in public about the close UK/EU relationship, but behind the scenes there is the familiar disdainful sneering at the UK’s negotiating strategy, the curt dismissal of British expectations, the setting of preconditions on issues of interest to the EU before the UK can hope to talk about anything else. All we need to complete the retro feel is the return of Olly Robbins – and apparently even that is on the cards before too long. One can only fear the worst therefore from Keir Starmer’s plan to “reset” the UK/EU relationship, which seems to have begun in earnest with his visit to Brussels this week.  Labour’s naivety about how international relations are really conducted,

Mario Draghi's economic plan is a barely disguised power grab on behalf of the Brussels elite. Source - Spiked 02/10/24 Link The European Union’s proposed solution to its economic struggles? More centralisation. More interventionism from Brussels. More EU, in other words. That is the key message from Mario Draghi’s report on the future of European competitiveness, published last month. It may present itself as a sober economic analysis, complete with proposed policy solutions. But this report – commissioned by the EU and produced by a former head of the European Central Bank – is best understood as a political manifesto for an ever closer EU, controlled from Brussels. Indeed, Draghi contends that the EU’s economic difficulties stem from what he calls too much ‘fragmentation’ along national lines. He even attributes the cumbersome nature of EU regulations to their ‘national fragmentation’. This, he writes, has led to inconsistencies and differences in how rules like the ‘commendable

 Prime Minister under fire for accepting £107k of gifts – more than any other MP since 2019 Source - Daily Telegraph  Link Sir Keir Starmer should pay tax on the £107,000 of freebies he received as Labour leader, accountants have said. The Prime Minister is under fire for accepting more gifts than any other MP since 2019 – including football tickets, clothes and accommodation.  However, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) “appears to exempt” politicians from paying tax on gifts from donors and political allies despite requiring taxpayers in other sectors to do so, according to accountancy firm Blick Rothenberg. Robert Salter, a director at the company, called for all MPs to be taxed on gifts in the same way as thousands of other workers – meaning Sir Keir would face a tax bill of close to £50,000. He said: “HMRC argues that the gifts given to media personalities or social influencers, which appear to be very similar in many cases to the gifts received by politicians, are liable to income t

Tehran launches ballistic missile onslaught in ‘significant escalation’ of conflict in Middle East Source - Daily Telegraph  Link The US vowed that there will be “severe consequences” for Iran after it launched a ballistic missile attack on Israel in a “significant escalation” of the conflict in the Middle East. Around 200 missiles rained down on Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, according to a senior Israeli official, who said: “Iran has declared war directly on the State of Israel.” Footage showed missiles and explosions lighting up the night sky, arriving thicker and faster than in a previous Iranian strike on Israel in April. Jake Sullivan, the White House national security adviser, said: “We have made clear that there will be consequences, severe consequences, for this attack, and we will work with Israel to make that the case.” It left the Middle East on Tuesday facing the prospect of a direct war between Israel and Iran, something both countries have been at pains to avoid despite simmeri

Prime Minister’s ratings ‘have gone down pretty quickly’, according to Prof Sir John Curtice Source - Daily Telegraph  30/09/24 Link Sir Keir Starmer’s “weak” political antennae are making him more unpopular, Britain’s leading polling guru has said. Prof Sir John Curtice compared the Prime Minister with Rishi Sunak on the strength of his first three months in Downing Street. In an interview with Times Radio, Sir John noted that Sir Keir was “never a popular politician” and his weaknesses had also been evident during his time as leader of the opposition. Sir John said: “He got a bit of a boost having won the election, his ratings went up, surprise, surprise, but they’ve gone down pretty quickly.” Sir Keir has endured a shaky start to his time in power, following a widespread backlash to his decision to strip about 10 million pensioners of winter fuel payments. Last week’s Labour Party conference was also overshadowed by an ongoing row over thousands of pounds in clothes given to Sir Kei