Opinion

The People’s Vote march received just the kind of snarky criticism we have all come to expect, says MITCH BENN. Like many of you in body and all of you in spirit, I imagine, I spent Saturday last taking part in what became known as the People’s Vote March, and have the badly sunburnt ever-expanding […]

Readers that marched in London last weekend have a lot to say about the Labour leader missing the event and those that are defending his position. The world is certainly changing. I attended the very inspiring People’s Vote march in London. It was the biggest demonstration I have ever been on without either Jeremy Corbyn […]

Surely even Theresa May must agree that Boris Johnson’s alleged response of ‘f*** business’ to a question at a diplomatic event about business concerns about Brexit renders his position untenable. For most of us in the UK, business is essential to our very survival. Business provides employment. Business enables us to put a meal on […]

Government ministers call the Airbus warning ‘part of a new Project Fear’. They would do well to take this warning seriously. Shortly before his death, I sat with one of the team who had negotiated the agreement for Broughton to manufacture the wings of these multinational European projects. He told me of the determination, of […]

The events of the referendum night, writes JAMES BALL, shine a fascinating light on the world of finance, polling and politics It was the week a major news organisation accused Nigel Farage of perhaps the most cynical manipulation of financial markets in history Bloomberg, the international financial news agency, suggested the former UKIP leader might […]

With another chaotic week for the cabinet unravelling, this should have been like taking candy from a baby for Jeremy Corbyn – but once again he flattered to deceive. Theresa May speaks during Prime Minister’s Questions Photo: PA – Credit: PA Wire/PA Images Don’t get me wrong, he has certainly had worse outings at the […]

Why are so many immune to the impending disaster facing us? Geroge Orwell would recognise the answer. George Orwell wrote in The Prevention Of Literature that ‘freedom of the press, if it means anything at all, means the freedom to criticize and oppose’. And: ‘In the past… the idea of rebellion and the idea of […]

A quick puzzle for you and your readers… the following quote belongs to who? ‘Any new law needs to be debated, We don’t have legislation by decree – that is what they have in Putin’s Russia or Erdogan’s Turkey. ‘What is our defence against legislation by decree? It is our parliament and the right of […]

Theresa May plainly took notice of Boris Johnson’s desire to see what Brexit would look like if it was negotiated by Donald Trump. In the last few days she has moved from hapless jargon-spouting bureaucrat to brazen liar. She has lied to Dominic Grieve and the rebels and lied that extra money for the NHS […]

With only nine months left before our EU exit, we have no coherent government proposal for Brexit which even meets Theresa May’s own commitments. With only nine months left before our EU exit, we have no coherent government proposal for Brexit which even meets Theresa May’s own commitments. At the same time, there must be […]

Wearing Thatcher blue, a defiant Theresa May looked steely and confident as she walked into the Commons amid cheers from her MPs. Prime minister Theresa May speaks during Prime Minister’s Questions Photo: PA – Credit: PA Wire/PA Images But Jeremy Corbyn appeared determined as well – going on the Brexit dividend and asking ‘what taxes […]

JAMES BALL deconstructs Corbyn’s economically illiterate talking heads If Brexit is the biggest issue affecting your life then you must be doing alright. I'm happy for you. Most people have to worry about more pressing issues than the UK's post-Brexit institutional arrangements. Stop confusing your only concern with the country's main priority — Matt Zarb-Cousin […]

Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership was built on democratic foundations, it’s time for him to give us a say on Brexit, writes Antony Thomas. As a long-time socialist and Jeremy Corbyn supporter (from the days when it was unfashionable to be one), I am mystified not just by Labour’s response to the absolute Tory chaos of Brexit, […]

The co-ordinated Twitter bashing by key Corbynistas shows what the Labour leader really thinks of Brexit, writes Jonathan Hendrick. https://twitter.com/mattzarb/status/1005410512522407936 The co-ordinated Twitter bashing of Remainers by several Corbyn surrogates ahead of this week’s big parliamentary votes leave us in little doubt what Labour’s leadership really thinks of Brexit. We’re told by Matt Zarb-Cousin, Aaron […]

Your editorials advocating a People’s Vote on whatever terms Theresa May may negotiate in Brussels are welcome but do not explain the democratic necessity for such a ballot. So here it is. The UK entered the common market in 1973. Heath pushed the decision through parliament. There was no national debate ahead of accession on […]

As the World Cup kicks off in Russia, MITCH BENN is inspired by David Beckham’s never-give-up attitude to his England career. The World Cup is upon us again; I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t seem to be capturing the public’s imagination quite so inescapably as on previous occasions. Perhaps the genial madness attending […]

In the end it was another fudge, another desperate bid to avoid a spat with either Tory Leavers or Remainers. And now the next five days will be key for Theresa May: the battle over exactly what will be in the Brexit Bill when it goes back to the House of Lords starts here. In […]

At a pedestrian crossing in Bucharest a woman overheard us speaking English and said to us: ‘You are English, why are you in Romania?’ When we looked bemused at her question, she added: ‘The English, they hate the Romanians. I know. My sister lives in England.’ It turned out she had visited her sister here […]

However much hardship a straight white guy may have to deal with, there are whole worlds of hardship he’ll never experience, says MITCH BENN. Something which most outwardly progessive-thinking people can generally be expected to agree upon is the principle of the level playing field. This is, of course, the idea that a person should […]

It was striking to note the portents of doom heralded by various sections of the media around the issue of the so-called constitutional crisis besetting Italy. This was, as they saw it, yet another nail in the EU’s coffin post-Brexit. Much to their disappointment, this issue was quickly resolved, with a new populist government comprising […]

The whole country now has a real need to step back and do a reality check as to where we actually are with regard to Brexit, and the unbelievably ridiculous proposals being put forward by people in charge. The justice secretary David Gauke has stated that prisoners will be able to fill the post-Brexit workforce […]

Following the cancellation of sitcom Roseanne, BONNIE GREER looks at the changing landscape of American television. America is and was built on myth. It is impossible to understand the US, to live and thrive there, without knowing this and somehow, in the end, becoming a part of it, too. Every American carries within herself/himself myth […]

Negotiating a smooth exit from a fragmented EU is even more challenging, writes JAMES BALL. Once again the EU is reportedly in crisis and this time it hasn’t been caused by us. Italy’s new populist government almost collapsed before it had begun after its president rejected the appointment of a finance minister who wished to […]

The Labour leader’s moves on the Lords amendments show he has no interest in halting Brexit Jeremy Corbyn attracted positive reviews for his prime minister’s questions performance yesterday, although it is telling that, against an opponent as unthinking on her feet as Theresa May it is considered a triumph if he takes to his despatch […]

Brexiteers often claim trade will boom after the UK quits the EU. Here RICHARD ANGELL, director of Progress, explains why that is nonsense Some people talk about ‘stopping Brexit’ as though it is a binary: you either stop it or you do not. But part of the danger of this is that it includes an […]

Xenophobia and misogyny is a systematic feature of power relations. In her letter to The New Feminist, Helen De Cruz explains more. Misogyny is often seen as a hatred of women that some men feel. But as philosopher Kate Manne has demonstrated in her powerful book Down Girl, the logic of misogyny (OUP), misogyny isn’t […]

As the Mamoudou Gassama incident adds to Emmanuel Macron’s accumulation of glowing publicity, BARNABY TOWNS challenges some Brexit myths about the UK’s supposed superiority to our southern neighbour Another day, another picture-perfect photo opportunity for President Emmanuel Macron, this time thanking Mamoudou Gassama — the undocumented immigrant who saved a child dangling from a balcony […]

Maria Bates on how her identity has been changed because of Brexit. She no longer feels she is an individual. My identity, or more specifically the way in which I am perceived by others, appears to have changed since Brexit. I used to be seen as a friend, colleague, teacher, neighbour, customer, volunteer – the […]