News and Opinion

How the best rugby union players from England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland come together to bring unity. It really shouldn’t work. Every four years, the best rugby union players from England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland are brought together for a couple of months to take on one of the sport’s southern hemisphere giants. New Zealand, […]

Michael Gove has refused to rule out suing Nicola Sturgeon’s government if it tries to hold a second referendum on Scottish independence, in a briefing with journalists. The cabinet minister avoided answering the question when probed twice by reporters. Asked if he would take Sturgeon to court over her proposals to hold a new vote, Gove […]

Marine Le Pen is successfully convincing French voters that Emmanuel Macron is out of touch… could she succeed in 2022? Earlier this month thousands of people joined the May Day protests across France. Trade unionists and workers marched to demonstrate against coronavirus restrictions and their impacts, particularly on the working class. This comes less than […]

The Green Party says its record-breaking local election result shows Britons are “fed up” with the two-party system after gaining 99 seats and polling highly in the London and Bristol mayoral races. The Greens won a total of 155 seats and gained representation on 18 new councils in this year’s local elections, bringing the total number of […]

It has not even been five months since the end of the Brexit transition period and there have been armed patrol vessels in the Channel. The sad thing is: this is only the latest stage in a development that began with the Brexit referendum and saw a significant decline in Britain’s role on the diplomatic […]

English football supporters are deluding themselves over fan power and the idea that the Bundesliga is more even than the Premier League. What do you imagine upset the Glazer Brothers more – their football team across the pond being prevented from playing on Sunday, or the Monday morning hit to the Manchester United share price […]

Boris Johnson is being investigated for two possible breaches of Commons rules, the parliamentary commissioner for standards has announced. The prime minister is being probed over his Downing Street flat makeover and a Christmas holiday he took in the Caribbean. Johnson was among a list of MPs under investigation that was kept under wraps during the […]

Gordon Brown is launching a fresh campaign to keep Scotland in the UK in the wake of the SNP’s latest election victory. The former Labour prime minister declared that the think tank he set up, Our Scottish Future, will become a “campaigning movement” to make the “positive, progressive and patriotic case for Scotland in Britain”. […]

A senior Tory has revealed plans to repeal the Fixed Term Parliament Act, which some speculate could pave the way for an early general election. Commons leader Jacob Rees Mogg said the government would introduce legislation on shelving the Act in the Queen’s Speech on Tuesday. The Act – introduced by former prime minister David Cameron […]

Manufacturers based in Boris Johnson’s new freeports will not be able to enjoy the full benefits if they are exporting to a series of countries with which the UK has signed post-Brexit trade deals. The prime minister and chancellor Rishi Sunak have championed freeports – special economic zones offering tax breaks and lower tariffs – […]

The government is pushing ahead with changes to electoral law that could make it easier for Conservatives to win future mayoral elections. Home secetary Priti Patel has already unveiled plans to introduce the first past the post electoral system used to elect MPs in Westminster. Mayors across England are elected from the existing supplementary vote […]

Labour’s new national campaign co-ordinator has refused to rule out the party adopting a new policy for freedom of movement. In 2019, Labour’s manifesto committed the party to extending rights, with Keir Starmer pledging to his supporters that he would “defend free movement as we leave the EU” during the leadership race. But after Brexit took place […]

The media ignores the impressive gains made by the Greens and independents The headline results of the local elections in England are clearly bleak for Labour and rosy for the Conservatives. The Liberal Democrats are, in effect treading water, while the Greens and independents have made some gains in terms of numbers of councillors. But […]

There has been a post-Brexit trend exhorting food shoppers to ‘buy British’. But just how feasible is it? And is it necessarily a good thing? It is not just food. On the ‘Buy British’ Facebook group, recent requests for advice on UK-sourced homemade goods include everything from ‘leisure batteries’ to Lancashire sofa cushions. No, I didn’t know […]

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has sacked his shadow chancellor and chief whip as part of an overhaul in the wake of the party’s poor performance in the local elections. Rachel Reeves has been promoted to shadow chancellor as part of Sir Keir’s reshuffle of his “refreshed and renewed” top team, with former incumbent Anneliese […]

A Conservative candidate in Wiltshire and Swindon’s Police and Crime Commissioner election says he is “bitterly disappointed” after being disbarred due to a driving offence. Jonathon Seed was the party’s candidate for the post, which has been held by fellow Conservative Angus Macpherson since 2012. Vote counting is due to take place in Salisbury on […]

Former Coronation Street actress turned Labour MP Tracy Brabin has been elected as the first West Yorkshire mayor. Brabin, who will now stand down as Batley and Spen MP, received the most first and second preference votes, with a total of 310,923. She beat second-place candidate – the Conservative’s Matt Robinson – by 101,786 votes. […]

Does what we know about its creators’ mental health overshadow the brilliance of The Goon Show? Can the all-too-familiar concept of the sad clown spoil the enduring charms of one of British comedy’s enduring monuments? It is a question worth asking this month, on the 70th anniversary of the first UK broadcast of radio comedy The Goon […]

PETER TRUDGILL on how English, having spread one way around the world, suddenly reversed direction During the 1600s and 1700s, the English language spread westwards from Britain across the Atlantic to Canada, the USA, Bermuda, the Bahamas, the Caribbean, and Central America. Then, suddenly, at the very end of the 18th century, it started spreading back […]

Labour have gained a county council seat from the Conservatives in Chipping Norton, in the affluent Cotswold area where former prime minister David Cameron lives. The seat was won by Geoff Saul, who also represented the area on West Oxfordshire District Council, taking the seat with 1,528 votes (42.6%) with Conservative Maz Holland getting 1,468 (40.9%). The […]

Politics has changed and one reader says Labour loyalists must stop looking to the past. The problem facing Keir Starmer is simple to state but immensely difficult to solve.  It is one that has been with us for a very long time. After two decades working in the coal industry, I became a writer and researcher. […]

France has always prided itself on its great thinkers. But the current crop are embarrassing and increasingly irrelevant. What happened? There must be some lesson to be drawn from the fact that today’s woke crowd insults France and the French while name-dropping French totems from a great height. As the country is repeatedly condemned, Merleau-Ponty, […]

A senior government minister has told the SNP it cannot expect a second referendum to be approved after failing to secure a majority in the Scottish Parliament elections. The SNP fell one seat short of an overall majority during the Super Thursday elections, securing 64 seats in Holyrood. However, the final result still means that […]

Labour has dominated the mayoral elections, claiming 10 of the 13 posts being contested in cities and metropolitan regions across England. The Tories have won two of the contests so far, and West Yorkshire, which will be electing a mayor for the first time this year, is yet to return a result. Labour’s winners include […]

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer will carry out a reshuffle of his shadow cabinet team on Sunday as the fallout over the party’s dismal election performance continues. Sir Keir has come under fire after opting to sack his deputy Angela Rayner from her role as party chairman and national campaign co-ordinator on Saturday, with Greater […]

Jason Solomons has known Noel Clarke for 15 years and admired his refusal to be denied by the British film industry. But that was before the allegations that have left his career, and BAFTA’s reputation, in tatters… Whichever way you look at it, the Noel Clarke allegations are disastrous for British cinema.  It’s a story […]

Sergei Krikalev went into space as a citizen of the USSR. While he was away, his country ceased to exist and he was left stranded in orbit. On its 30th anniversary, MICK O’HARE tells the astonishing story of his flight. On 19 August 1991 Boris Yeltsin, newly elected president of the Russian Soviet Republic, stood […]

Labour’s Sadiq Khan has been re-elected as mayor of London in a closer contest for the capital than many had predicted. Opinion polls had suggested his Conservative rival Shaun Bailey would be a distant second in the race for City Hall. Khan took 1,206,034 votes after second preferences were taken into account (55.2%), compared to […]