The Mirror Crack'd

Keir Starmer has just rowed back on yet another Labour pledge, this time the one about removing the charitable status of public and private schools in England and Wales. Add this to the litany of broken commitments and you wonder why they bother making any such proposals at all; unless, of course, it's simply flying a kite to test public opinion? Anyway, Labour now says it would charge private schools 20% VAT within one hundred days of coming to power, as well as ending business rates relief, to raise an estimated £1.7bn. The rationale is, presumably, that removing charitable status could open the way to protracted legal challenges from some of the most powerful institutions in the country, with alumni in every echelon of power. One can understand why, given the scale of the task Labour will be taking on if it wins power - everything, everywhere, all at once, so to speak - they might want to clear the decks of any problematic policies. Now they scent power, a ruthless pragmatism co

Former Labour Chancellor and Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, has always shown a concern for the developing world. When Labour won the general election in 1997 he took the lead on debt relief to Africa. Now he is advocating a radical approach to solving the migrant crisis by proposing a global winfall tax on the world's richest countries. Tory Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, meanwhile, on manoeuvres in the United States today in preparation for a future Leadership challenge, is questioning whether the world's 780 million migrants are legitimate refugees. Rather than doing the boring slog at home she, like her own Leader - and previous ones such as Liz Truss and Boris Johnson - would rather strut the world stage, grandstanding and gladhanding as far from home as possible. So much more glamourous, after all, than ploughing through the bulging departmental red boxes. In contrast, Brown has always appeared (often to his own detriment it must be said) to be a details man, more intere

Honest,   guv Recently, Rishi Sunak talked about having an 'honest conversation' with the British people - and then went on to announce he was 'scrapping' seven environmental policies that weren't even on the government's agenda. Strange sort of honesty! His performance was laughably transparent - this was nothing to do with honesty and everything to do with exploiting a potential electoral wedge issue following the Uxbridge by-election result. I don't know who he thought he was kidding, though. He was, after all, addressing the assembled British press and media corps, hard-nosed, cynical journos to a man and woman. He stood at the podium like an over-eager head boy addressing bored school governors on Founders Day. For their part, they looked like they were eyeing the clock ready to make a dash to the Dog and Duck for the buffet. Don't cry for me, Argentina Is Suella Braverman auditioning for the role of Eva Peron? Now her Met Police firearms officers h

The French President, Emmanuel Macron, came up with his proposal for associate membership of the EU before Brexit was completed but reiterated it during yesterday's conversation with the British Leader of the Opposition, Sir Keir Starmer. This will doubtless be discussed again today when Macron hosts King Charles III on his state visit to France. Macron's proposals envisage the UK potentially being in the 'fourth circle' of EU associate membership, ie "political cooperation without having to be bound to EU law” - the so-called 'EU-lite' option.  The concept of concentric circles is not new, of course. The Italian poet, Dante Alighieri, popularised it in his Divine Comedy in the 14th century. Unfortunately, his vision was of nine descending circles of hell, the fourth of which was the circle of Greed, ruled by Pluto (or Plutus), the demonic deity who appears in the form of a huge golden statue. He it was who gave us the concept of plutocracy. How ironicall

One of my favourite politicians is Labour's Emily Thornberry, Shadow Attorney General for England and Wales and former Shadow Foreign Secretary. She is plain-speaking, down-to-earth and always has a mischievous twinkle. I imagine a few g&ts with her would be hugely entertaining. On last evening's Channel 4 News she was interviewed by Ciaran Jenkins about Sir Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper's controversial visit to The Hague to talk to Europol about possible cooperation in stopping people trafficking across the Channel should Labour come to power. The UK left Europol, the European crime-fighting organisation, at Brexit. The visit was an effort to explore potential ways to break the impasse created by the Tory goverment's reluctance to engage with the EU on the subject, despite recent tentative overtures by Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak. It is unusual for the Leader of the Opposition to embark on a unilateral mission of this kind and it has attracted a lot of media atten

Bull in a China shop  Is China a threat to the UK? Do we need China? With a population touching 1.5 billion it certainly can't be ignored. Chinese investments in the UK amount to £135bn. It's the world's second largest economy and a growing military presence. China is the UK's third or fourth largest trading partner while the UK is the fifteenth or sixteenth of China's. China isn't going away. Get over it. You're nicked! So Daniel Abed Khalife has been recaptured after seventy-five hours on the run from Category B Wandsworth Prison. The 21 year-old has been remanded in custody, apparently to Category A Belmarsh Prison (doubtless to be embraced as a hero by other terrorist suspects held there), for absconding from custody. He arrived at Westminster Magistrates' Court under unprecedented security where the magistrate refused a police request for him to be handcuffed in the dock. Good call. We should be so lucky to see that many police officers on the beat

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) annual conference began in Liverpool today with a rousing address by the new General Secretary, Paul Nowak, himself a proud Scouser (Liverpudlian). Mr Nowak spoke about also being a proud grandson of immigrants and said "the real enemies of the working class don’t arrive in a small boat, they fly in by private jet.” He spoke about gross pay inequality, burgeoning food banks, growing hospital waiting lists and the government's disturbing anti-strike legislation and anti-migrant rhetoric. He reiterated that nothing in the UK seems to work anymore - or not for ordinary working people at least. He spoke about the achievements of unionism in promoting better working conditions, pay and social provisions and went on to highlight the pressing need for more union recruitment. He said that he himself could not deliver this, it was the job of individual unions to increase their membership, but he pledged that the TUC would support them by recruiting and t

The Last Night of the Proms is a national institution. At a time when virtually every other British institution is under pressure, if not actually collapsing, the Proms have become a flagship of national positivity. And flags are a large part of the Last Night. At one time the flag-waving was becoming something of an embarrassment, verging on the jingoistic. Nowadays it is more ironical but it was pleasing to see, at last night's Last Night, a strong showing of the golden stars and deep blue of the EU flag along with a smattering of rainbow flags. The Proms programming has changed over time, too, and become much more inclusive, embracing other musical genres than the purely classical. The Last Night now sets the seal on that. The Promenade Concerts, as they were originally known, were founded in 1895 by Sir Henry Wood and were taken under the aegis of the BBC as early as 1927. The BBC has itself been one of those great national institutions under threat from the government's ch

Let's be absolutely clear here, Daniel Abed Khalife, who escaped from Wandsworth prison yesterday, was being held on remand having been charged with, though not convicted of, terrorism and Official Secrets Act offences.   As such, under English law he is entitled to be considered innocent until proven guilty. 21 year-old Daniel has not yet been tried or convicted of any crime and his case was due to be heard at Woolwich Crown Court in November. We cannot take his escape from remand as a sign of guilt. For all we know it could be a sign of desperation. Much has been made of his army training and resilience but he is little more than a boy. Who wouldn't despair in his circumstances, in a notoriously overcrowded, insanitary and unsafe Victorian gaol? Whatever his guilt or innocence may be - and I wouldn't presume to anticipate his trial and sentencing (if, that is, he is ever recaptured) - his escape from prison has highlighted systemic failures in our prison system. These are

Credit where it's due - Rishi Sunak got one thing at least partially right in his benighted premiership: the Windsor Framework.  This was the accord reached between his government and the European Commission to resolve the impasse over the post-Brexit status of Northern Ireland. While this persisted - a purely political situation perpetuated by the hard-Brexit obduracy of Sunak's predecessors, Johnson and Truss - the UK's continuing participation in the EU's science and space programmes, Horizon and Copernicus, was in serious jeopardy. That problem has now been resolved. Hurrah! The fact that this has been achieved during the premiership of a frankly Euro-tepid British Prime Minister indicates what might be possible under a PM with a genuinely friendly and positive disposition towards the EU. If Labour wins the General Election Sir Keir Starmer would undoubtedly be that PM. His goodwill towards Europe is clear but, as things stand currently, this has to be heavily cavea

This was probably Sir Keir Starmer's best line at today's Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs), the first of the autumn term as the House of Commons returns to business after the summer recess. It's unlikely to be business as usual, however. We are clearly in General Election mode after the RAAC crisis in schools and other public buildings gifted Labour a new focus and impetus at the very beginning of the new term. Coming after a long summer of humiliation over the government's mishandling of the migrant crisis, the surprising thing was just how bullish Rishi Sunak was in his responses. One might have expected a modicum of humility, a little embarrassment even, but not a bit of it. Sunak is possibly the only person in the country who believes his own publicity. He is either utterly stupid, utterly shameless or utterly deluded - maybe all three. Whatever, the starting pistol for the race towards the General Election was resoundingly fired today and we can look forward t

So all these years of austerity have been for nothing? Well, what a surprise!  This is what you get after a long run of Tory government. It happened after eighteen Thatcher/Major years and it's happening again after thirteen Cameron/May/Johnson/Truss/Sunak years. But the savage irony of the RAAC (reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete) scandal is heightened by David Cameron and George Osborne's constant bad-mouthing of the Labour governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown for allegedly failing to "fix the roof while the sun was shining". I bet they wish they hadn't said that now (like they care!). Labour's Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme was scrapped by incoming Tory Education Secretary, Michael Gove, in 2010 on the grounds that it was "bureaucratic and wasteful". It may well have been but ditching it outright was indefensible at the time and looks positively negligent now. The last local authority school in England to be completed un