Opinion

British politics is reverting to old-fashioned class war

Labour leader Keir Starmer (L) and Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves speak to the media during a visit to the London Stock Exchange on September 22, 2023 in London, England. Labour leader Starmer and Shadow Chancellor Reeves pledged to introduce legislation to ensure that the Office for Budget Respons...

Opinion

UK leadership faces scrutiny after Raab’s resignation

Dominic Raab announced his resignation as UK's deputy prime minister and justice secretary on Friday via a Twitter post. This decision was prompted by the outcome of an official inquiry, which found that some of the allegations against him were valid.Image Credit: AFPRishi Sunak is the “ch...

Opinion

Do intellectuals have a role to play in politics?

According to an authoritative study of American leaders by the psychologist Dean Keith Simonton, politicians with an impressive formal education fail overall to achieve the eminence of their less academic rivals. Maybe that’s why the Conservatives, dubbed “the stupid party” by 19th...

Opinion

Rishi Sunak is trapped in a Tory civil war

When Lewis Carroll’s Alice says she can't believe impossible things, the White Queen gives the smart politician’s reply: “I daresay you haven't had much practice. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”Rishi Sunak, the UK&r...

Opinion

How King Charles’s reign can be a fruitful one

The oldest Prince of Wales in history was kept waiting longer than any other royal heir before he could take his mother’s place on the throne. If the 73-year-old Charles III seeks a role model, he need only look to his great-great grandfather, Edward VII, son of Queen Victoria, the longest-rei...

Opinion

Boris Johnson’s Thatcherite housing ideas

In the words of Noel Coward’s chirpy song of doom, “there are bad times just around the corner” for Boris Johnson.The prime minister ends the week as walking wounded, having narrowly survived a no-confidence vote on his Conservative party leadership on Monday. If such a test was lo...

Opinion

UK maternity scandal and the danger of dogma

A five-year investigation into the avoidable deaths of 201 babies and nine mothers at a U.K. hospital — described by one British newspaper as “the worst maternity scandal in history” — has ignited a debate over health care that has ramifications outside of Britain. The o...

Opinion

Boris Johnson walks a tightrope to judgment day

ll tenants of 10 Downing Street know that British politics is driven by combat each Wednesday at Prime Minister’s Questions. Faced with a crisis, leaders must display strength and conviction to friend and foe alike. Betray weakness and they are doomed. In the scandal over illicit parties durin...

Opinion

The fate of Boris Johnson now hinges on three factors

Boris Johnson is the Harry Houdini of British politics, blustering his way through scandals about fibs, finances and a colorful love life that would have sunk most other British politicians.On Wednesday, he embarked upon his most dangerous feat of escapology yet. The prime minister is accused of who...

Opinion

Local elections might be the time of maximum danger to Johnson

Tory MPs describe Boris Johnson as forever slipping from the clutches of his political enemies just when they think they have him cornered. The UK prime minister will require all his fabled survival skills after the Liberal Democratic Party overturned a large Conservative majority to secure a by-ele...

Opinion

Boris Johnson’s Houdini Act loses its magic touch

Boris Johnson has always had a promiscuous relationship with the truth. The media knows it, his Conservative party knows it and the voters know it. That was priced in when he won an overwhelming victory at the last general election in 2019. From the outset of his political career, it was appare...

Opinion

Britain begins to think the unthinkable

The world’s leaders are gathered in Glasgow this weekend for COP26, but Queen Elizabeth II — most likely the dignitary they were keenest to glimpse — will not be there to greet them. She will address delegates in a recorded video instead. The conference will lack the magic dust tha...

Opinion

Boris Johnson’s clear and present danger

With an eight point lead in the opinion polls, an 83-seat majority in the House of Commons and economic growth figures for the second quarter revised upwards from 4.8% to 5.5%, what does U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson have to fear?Although the opposition Labour party requires an enormous swing of...

Opinion

Boris’s tax hike is a defining moment for UK Conservatives

There are moments in a government’s lifetime that symbolize a change of ideological direction. Last week U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s decision to raise taxes to pay for social care and bail out the National Health Service was one of them.However worthy the objectives, the result w...

Opinion

Can Britain go green?

The leadership of the U.K.’s party of power can take credit for placing climate change at the forefront of its domestic and international concerns. Carbon-reduction commitments are enshrined in law and Boris Johnson’s government has set ambitious green targets. He hosts the COP26 United ...

Opinion

The pandemic has books back in business again

Theaters went dark in London’s West End last year, while galleries closed and concert halls stood silent. But there was one creative industry that flourished during lockdown: the reading and publishing of books. Many in the industry, as well as parents and educators, are now hoping the ha...

Opinion

Where is the economic case for Scottish independence?

Getting a touch ahead of events, the New York Times noted last week that the recent electoral victories of the Scottish National Party could lead to “the biggest blow to a British prime minister since Lord North lost the colonies in America.”The markets took a different view. In Monday m...

Opinion

Britain’s Greensill cronyism is worthy of Anthony Trollope

Britain’s Conservative Party is mired in an influence-peddling scandal, not for the first time in a country that gave the world 19th-century novels of political and financial cronyism via Anthony Trollope. The question, when the latest embarrassing details of nest-feathering have been ful...

Opinion

Boris Johnson has played a blinder on the EU vaccine spat

A blustering prime minister and a rule-breaking U.K. government present few problems for the European Commission. It has long experience of dealing with troublemakers on the fringes of Europe. A sweetly reasonable Boris Johnson, however, is a more formidable opponent. He should try making nice more ...

Opinion

What Captain Tom taught Boris Johnson about being British

Cometh the hour, cometh the hero as everyman. Few politicians have emerged from the Covid crisis with their reputations enhanced — unless you count Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand — but the death of Captain Sir Tom Moore, the 100-year-old Yorkshireman who raised millions of pounds for heal...