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 Thursday 29th July 2010
Did Cameron and Clegg discuss a Lib/Con pact before the election?I'm greatly looking forward to Five Days That Changed Britain, tonight's Nick Robinson documentary on the aftermath of the general election. It includes interviews with all the key players apart from Gordon Brown. Robinson has a fascinating piece in today's Telegraph in which he reveals some of the film's contents, including the revelation that Brown and his team were completely wrong-footted by Cameron's "big, open and comprehensive offer" to the Liberal Democrats on the morning of Friday, May 7. Brown was expecting Cameron to call for his resignation, clearing the way for a Conservative minority government, and thought the offer to the Lib Dems was a political miscalculation. "Brown regarded it as a mistake since it legitimised a deal-making, coalition-building process which Brown believed could only end one way – with a Lib/Lab government," writes Robinson. (To read more, click here.)
Wednesday 28th July 2010
Labour's shameless opportunism on AVIt's shameless even by the standards of New Labour. Shadow Justice Secretary Jack Straw announced on the Today programme this morning that Labour would oppose the Coalition's bill paving the way for a referendum on PR. That's a bit rich, given that a commitment to AV was in the Labour Party's last manifesto and the Party's internal electoral system – the one it's using to select a new leader – is itself AV. As David Cameron says, this is a "descent into complete and utter opportunism": "I know what it is like in opposition. I did almost five years as leader of the opposition. The temptation to jump on the bandwagon and be opportunistic is always there and it should always be resisted." (To read more, click here.)
Tuesday 27th July 2010
How did sleeping in a tent become a high status indicator?I'm just back from the Port Eliot Festival in Cornwall, an annual jamboree for the class John Maynard Keynes described as the "educated bourgeoisie". As my colleague Harry Mount pointed out, there was much to admire at Port Eliot, particularly the gentle curiosity of the Festival-goers. Few audiences are as polite or well-informed as those at literary festivals and I speak as someone who has delivered two-dozen talks on the subject of education this year. What distinguishes Port Eliot from other, similar gatherings is the sheer number of people who camp at the site. I pitched my tent in a field of approximately 500 campers and we were opposite another field containing at least 1,000 more. The majority were couples with young children, creating a refugee camp effect. Wherever you looked there were couples hunched over tiny gas stoves, boiling up saucepans of baked beans and frying sausages as their children scurried about at their feet. What was so striking about them was how homogenous they were. Almost no black or brown faces and, without exception, middle class or above. This was the white, metropolitan elite at play. Indeed, I heard one yummy mummy scold her nine-year-old son for telling another child that his uncle was a Duke. It was the first time I've been camping with my wife and children and I felt as if I'd stumbled across a hitherto unknown subculture. (To read more, click here.)
Tuesday 27th July 2010
Will Ed Balls be Labour's kingmaker?Rather surprisingly, Ed Balls finds himself in quite a good position following the decision of the Unite union to back Ed Miliband. He has no hope of winning the leadership, obviously, but that was probably never a realistic expectation. Rather, his reason for throwing his hat into the ring was in the hope of strengthening his claim on the Shadow Chancellorship. In fact, he's proved surprisingly unpopular, not only with the trade unions (the leaders of the GMB and Unison have also thrown their weight behind Miliband Jr.), but with Labour Party members too. Just 14 local party branches have nominated him compared to 106 endorsing Ed Miliband and 130 brother David. Balls's problem, as he himself said on Saturday, is that the other Ed has emerged as the Brownite faction's best hope of defeating the Blairite front-runner. (To read more, click here.)
Thursday 22nd July 2010
More Balls on Free SchoolsOh dear. Has it really come to this? Following the news that Unison, England's biggest public sector union, has thrown its weight behind Ed Miliband, Ed Balls has launched yet another attack on Free Schools in a desperate attempt to shore up his Labour leadership campaign. He has given an interview in today's Guardian in which he claims Free Schools will lead to social segregation. "I fear there will be a new form of social apartheid – educational apartheid," he says. Apparently, it has escaped him that Britain is already riven by educational apartheid, namely, the division between state schools and private schools. Odd that, considering Balls himself is the product of a fee-paying school. (To read more, click here.)
Wednesday 21st July 2010
The honeymoon is over for the CoalitionAccording to a piece by Peter Kellner on YouGov's website, the honeymoon is over for the Coalition. He deduces this by contrasting the vertiginous decline in the Coalition's approval ratings since it was elected with the much more modest dip in New Labour's approval ratings at a comparable point in 1997. Shortly after Blair was swept to victory, 76% approved of his Government while 13% disapproved. That's a net rating of plus 63. Four months later, the net rating was still plus 54 and after a year it stood at 32. "Apart from a blip in March 1998, the net rating did not fall into single figures until September 1999, more than two years into Blair’s first term," he writes. (To read more, click here.)
Sunday 18th July 2010
Ban the burkaMost liberal minded people will welcome Damian Green's declaration that the coalition has no plans to follow France's lead and ban the burka. "I stand personally on the feeling that telling people what they can and can’t wear, if they’re just walking down the street, is a rather un-British thing to do," he says in today's Telegraph. "We’re a tolerant and mutually respectful society." However, there's a very good reason why liberals should favour a ban, namely, that the burka is both a symbol and a source of the oppression of Muslim women. (To read more, click here.)
Friday 16th July 2010
Inception: A two-star movie at bestAbout ten minutes into Inception, the new film from Christopher Nolan, my heart sank. It was blindingly obvious we were witnessing a dream sequence – only an idiot wouldn't have cottoned on to this – yet Nolan was holding back this "reveal", convinced that when it came it would knock our socks off. Inception concerns the efforts of a burnt-out psych-ops veteran (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his team of misfits to invade the dreams of dangerous, powerful men and find out their secrets. (Mainly at the behest of other dangerous, powerful men.) As such, it consists of virtually nothing but dream sequences. The problem with these, as any fule no, is there's no jeopardy. Who cares if DiCaprio is killed in a dream? All that happens is he wakes up. (To read more, click here.)
Wednesday 14th July 2010
Was class the real dividing line between Blair and Brown?Reading the third extract from Peter Mandelson's memoirs in The Times today, you come away with the impression that it wasn't just ideology that separated Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. It was class. "He's like something out of the mafiosi," Blair told Mandy after a particularly fraught meeting with Brown in 2004. "He’s aggressive, brutal, in order to get what he wants… there is no one to match Gordon for someone who articulates high principles while practising the lowest skulduggery.” Clearly, it wasn't just Brown's agenda that Blair objected to but the savagery with which he tried to enforce it. (To read more, click here.)
Tuesday 13th July 2010
Universities handing out Firsts like confettiAs students all over the country await their degree results they can take some comfort from the fact that universities are now awarding significantly better degrees than they were 15 years ago. This is particularly true of First Class degrees. According to a BBC report this morning, the percentage of students getting Firsts in 1994 was 7%. In 2009 it was 13%, an increase of nearly 100%. What's the explanation? Nicola Dandridge, the chief executive of Universities UK, points to the higher percentage of top A-level grades in the same period and claims that students are now working harder. "That should be praised," she says. (To read more, click here.)
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