Michael White's Blog, page 9
May 3, 2016
Look away from London for your May election action
The media are fixated on the mayoral mudfight, but let’s focus on the important ballots going on elsewhere in the UK
Fed up with seeing the 2016 local and devolved elections through the narrow prism of a squalid mudfight to become London mayor? Or through the point-scoring manoeuvres of the UK and Scottish governments who need each other to help keep Labour down? Me too.
So let’s look at the bigger picture, where voting will also take place in 124 English councils, including 32 of the 36 metropolitan boroughs and where police and crime commissioners (remember them?) will be up for election in 40 authorities in England and Wales. Let’s hope for a higher turnout than the 10-20% achieved when the first batch of commissioners was elected in chilly November 2012. Here’s a handy overview.
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April 27, 2016
Doctors' strike: it's time to calm down
The escalation to an all-out strike won’t force the government to capitulate but carries obvious risks
The junior doctors’ dispute in England is a bit like the Brexit campaign, a conflict which wiser heads on both sides might best have avoided. It is now moving into dangerous territory where ever harsher words are being exchanged, words that will linger damagingly when the battle is over.
After Barack Obama’s intervention in the EU referendum the Brexiteers’ best remaining card is the widespread belief that voting to leave would be Britain’s best option for stemming the recent migration surge which puts pressure on jobs and services. It is a dangerous card to play, as more scrupulous Leave campaigners know. But desperate folk sometimes resort to desperate measures.
Continue reading...April 26, 2016
Philip Green: Blair gave him a knighthood, Cameron gave him a job
Politicians are in thrall to retailer, despite the foul-mouthed rants and the fact he milked BHS until it was on its knees
Fair-minded Guardian readers who understand that not all rich people are tax dodging, undeserving parasites (they’re not) will have known for over a decade that Phil “king of the shops” Green, the dealmaker at the centre of this week’s BHS scandal, is a bit of a market trader, despite the private education and the cutlery canteen full of silver spoons from mum and dad.
Why so? Because when, in 2003, then Guardian City reporter, Ian Griffiths – a qualified accountant – published a challenging analysis of the great man’s finances, he unleashed a foul-mouthed tirade against the reporter and the paper which is still worth reading. You’ll especially love the bit about the then financial editor, Paul Murphy, being unable to read English “because he’s a fucking Irishman”.
Continue reading...April 21, 2016
Can John Whittingdale avoid the scotch and the revolver much longer?
Alastair Campbell has an oft-quoted “golden rule” about political scandals. If they stay in the headlines for more than a week the MP or minister who features in them is doomed. Or is it more than 10 days? Or even 12? Actually Campbell now says he never said it, which is a shame because the remark contains a kernel of truth. Sooner or later No 10 has to cut its losses if it can’t get closure. John Whittingdale? Nine days into the British government’s first online dating uproar, it’s too soon to say. Every case is different.
But has Campbell’s golden non-rule been abandoned since his team lost power in 2010? The coalition government certainly changed all sorts of things, not least ministerial willingness to disagree in public (as the current referendum demonstrates) and the reluctance of the prime minister to reshuffle his talent pool.
David Laws came back. So did Mandelson (twice) and long ago, Cecil Parkinson, damaged goods and after a decent interval
Related: John Whittingdale visited lapdancing club as part of MPs' inquiry
Continue reading...April 20, 2016
High stakes in EU referendum compel US intervention
It’s usually a good idea to steer clear of another country’s vote, but sometimes a leader may feel they have to take the risk
Faced with the chance to lead Wednesday’s edition with an exclusive article by eight former US treasury secretaries warning of the perils of Brexit, the Times did what you’d expect of the more partisan Daily Mail. It chose to splash on “We meddle in affairs of others, admits EU chief”. So did the Mail, Fleet Street’s top page-one spine-chiller.
It was a reference to the admission by Jean-Claude Juncker, the EU commission president and former PM/finance minister of tax-shy Luxembourg, that Brussels has interfered too much with the daily lives of Europe’s citizens. The Guardian also led its referendum coverage on inside pages with Juncker’s belated acknowledgment.
Continue reading...April 19, 2016
Celebrity injunction: 'public interest' is nowhere in sight | Michael White
Driving force to lift ban seems to be salacious curiosity and wanton cruelty
When a friend asked me what I thought of the “celebrity threesome” story which has been making so much money for overpaid lawyers I confessed that I didn’t even know who it was supposed to be about and hadn’t tried to find out. So my pal told me. BORING!! Everyone knows about it in the US, Scotland, Sweden and China, goes the outraged cry. Yes, but do they care?
It’s obvious from erudite graphs of online traffic and explosions of indignation at the “gagged” end of Fleet Street that not everyone shares my lack of enthusiasm. Twitter has made harmless fun of the high court injunction against publishing names, since lifted by the appeal court from Wednesday at 1pm, unless the supreme court takes up the case.
Related: 'Celebrity threesome' injunction should be lifted, say appeal judges
Continue reading...April 18, 2016
Why the housing bill could give the Lords another victory
This badly-drafted and timed bill won’t address sky-high rents or house prices – expect peers to win concessions
As ministers braced themselves for this week’s spate of Lords defeats on their half-baked housing and planning bill I happened to be inspecting a half-built block of flats in west London with friends who are contemplating downsizing.
Lucky them, you may murmur, if you are struggling with sky-high rents in the private sector or trying to put together a mortgage deposit in a race against seemingly endless price rises.
Continue reading...April 14, 2016
Corbyn's tepid stance on EU may be best way to persuade UK to remain
Labour leader’s heart’s not really in the stay campaign, insiders suggest, even if his head is. But same goes for most voters
On the EU referendum front there is good news and bad news again – more good than bad by a whisker. Thus, Jeremy Corbyn is finally bestirring himself to say that the “warts and all” EU remains a crucial pillar of the international order for good socialists.
Advance publicity suggested Jez’s speech was going to be more of a penny-whistle toot than a trumpet call, but Andy Sparrow’s live blog of the event made it sound stronger.
Related: Corbyn's EU referendum speech verdict: rambling but also rather special
Related: Bank of England warns Brexit could do serious harm to UK economy
Continue reading...April 13, 2016
Battle between Zac Goldsmith and Sadiq Khan has an ugly subtext
London mayoral candidates have big ideas but as the accusations and recriminations fly, this election could get nasty
Another day, another Old Etonian. Did we imagine it would still be like this at the top of politics when the country was being led by clever grammar school boys and girls a generation ago? But cheer up. The bookies’ odds and the polling data suggest this particular Etonian is set for a hiding when Londoners vote for a new mayor on 5 May. Are they right? There’s an ugly subtext to this campaign.
Don’t stop reading because you’re fed up with reading about London. I’m fed up with it too and haven’t previously written about this contest, the biggest directly elected mandate in Britain, even though it’s just three weeks away. Like it or not, London is the main engine of UK economic growth until someone comes up with a better idea. Inevitably, the result is also important to Jeremy Corbyn’s standing.
Related: London mayor race: Zac Goldsmith's support for Babar Ahmad
Related: Zac Goldsmith’s fight to be London mayor: ‘I’m up against someone who poses a real danger’
Continue reading...April 12, 2016
William Hague is right: real leaders are not like the rest of us
The financial regularity of politicians’ private lives is no sure guide of what sort of leaders they are
Who’s been spiking ex-foreign secretaries’ drinks? On the very day that failed party leader William Hague pops up with a useful perspective on politicians’ tax affairs, David Miliband, another former Foreign Office chief (and failed would-be leader), warns against a Brexit vote that would amount to “political unilateral disarmament”.
Milband’s Guardian article on “Brexit arson” is such a statement of the blindingly obvious that I beg my many Brexit friends and followers not to read it here. It might only unsettle their sincerely, if vaguely, held religious belief that it will be all right on 23 June, the night that shameless Boris Johnson has called “independence day”. Even in his most self-deluding moments Brexit Boris must know that’s nonsense.
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