Simon Jenkins's Blog, page 95

Crisis, what housing crisis? We just need fresh thinking | Simon Jenkins

Here are the most damaging myths about the policy issue that’s on everyone’s lips – and a few brutal realities

Housing is Britain’s top policy issue. It is the “crisis” of our day. London’s mayoral elections, says Labour’s Sadiq Khan, should be a “referendum on the housing crisis”. The migration crisis, the NHS crisis and the poverty crisis all pale before its awesome might. So what is the “solution”?

Related: Sadiq Khan urges Tory rival for London mayor to fight housing bill

Renting aids labo...

Why the west should listen to Putin on Syria | Simon Jenkins

As everyone knows, the only way to stop the slaughter in Syria is for the US and its allies to work with President Assad – and to stop worrying about what looks good

Putin is right. Everyone knows Putin is right, that the only way forward in Syria, if not to eternal slaughter, is via the established government of Bashar al-Assad and his Lebanese and Iranian allies.

That is the realpolitik. That is what pragmatism dictates. In the secure west, foreign policy has long been a branch of domestic po...

With Hinkley Point, squandermania has reached dangerous new heights | Simon Jenkins

George Osborne is signing IOUs for megastructure projects on behalf of future British taxpayers – and yet no one dares call him to account

It is the costliest white elephant in history. No power station, perhaps no building, so expensive has ever been built anywhere. In a modest meadow overlooking the Bristol Channel is to rise a structure that will outstrip in extravagance the Three Gorges dam, St Peter’s Basilica, the Taj Mahal and probably the pyramid of Cheops. It is to be built – you gues...

Pigs to peerages: Lord Ashcroft’s act of revenge shows British politics at its venal worst | Simon Jenkins

Cameron’s use of the House of Lords to reward aides, cronies and donors might leave even Tony Blair astonished. Why not just sell off titles to fund political parties?

Britain has a long tradition of citizens returning home with the loot of empire and expecting glory and high office as a result. When Clive of India did so and was charged with massive corruption, he replied loftily, “I stand astonished at my own moderation.”

Related: Cameron faces fresh questions over knowledge of Ashcroft tax...

Bombing is immoral, stupid and never wins wars. Syria is the latest victim | Simon Jenkins

Despite thousands of innocent deaths, the use of drones has done nothing to halt the Taliban or al-Qaida. If David Cameron must intervene in Syria, ground troops are the only course

The British government will shortly ask parliament to approve its sixth war of overseas intervention in just two decades. The victim will be Syria. Such a war is incoherent. The “enemy” appears to be both sides in a civil war – Islamic State and the Syrian regime.

Related: Russia sends artillery and tanks to Syria...

Why Jeremy Corbyn’s wait-and-see stance on EU membership makes sense | Simon Jenkins

David Cameron has promised fundamental reforms – but until that’s clear the Labour leader has reserved judgment on the referendum. At least this continues debate for a divided electorate

The bizarre Corbyn interregnum at chateau Labour could yet prove salutary. The new leader’s position on the EU referendum is the only one that makes sense – other than Ukip’s. It is a refusal to decide for or against continued British membership of the EU until we know what that really means.

Related: Those wh...

If this is the best Britain can do for refugees, it’s sickening | Simon Jenkins

For someone who trumpeted the ‘big society’, David Cameron knows little of charity on the ground

Britons hate immigrants; Britons need immigrants. History has resolved this paradox through occasional charitable outbursts, when the country’s natural defences are besieged by desperate people seeking shelter. Charity conquers aversion, and the nation has always grown stronger in consequence.

The European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, welcomed the fact today that Europe was currently s...

Cameron justifies the drone strike in Syria: is this his WMD moment? | Simon Jenkins

British Isis fighters are killed in an unprecedented attack. The prime minister’s explanation smacks of Tony Blair’s rationalisation of military action in Iraq

It sounded good, but did it sound right? David Cameron’s Commons explanation of the killing of three Britons in Syria eerily recalled Tony Blair on the Iraq war, that Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction” that posed “an imminent threat” to British national security.

Related: UK forces kill British Isis fighters in targeted dr...

To Farage the opportunist, the EU referendum is his chance for glory | Simon Jenkins

Britain’s membership of the EU is essentially about immigration, according to Ukip, so what better time for Farage to assert that we should go it alone?

The phoenix rises from the ashes. Nigel Farage’s Ukip today became the third army to join the crusade for Britain to leave Europe in the 2017 referendum. Why he should do so is hardly a secret: Farage is a master opportunist. The refugee crisis has plunged Europe into a turmoil of confusion over migration. To Farage, Britain’s membership of th...

Labour has outstanding leaders. It’s a shame that they are all in the regions | Simon Jenkins

There is a clear way for the Labour party to progress; it must open up its primaries to talented regional politicians

Who is really powerful in the British Labour party? Who wins votes, decides policies, commands budgets, doles out jobs? Who knows how to run something?

I tell you the answer.It is people such as Richard Leese, Nick Forbes, Judith Blake, Albert Bore, Julie Dore, Peter Soulsby, Jules Pipe and Robin Wales. You have probably never heard of them, because you think important politics...