Clacton is back in the news. When I visited earlier this year, I didn’t realise it would briefly become the epicentre of British politics. Nigel Farage is fighting a by-election against Count Binface. If he wins, he has beaten a bin. If he loses, he’s been beaten by one. Farage himself has considerable form when … Read more
I spent over a decade working in Government commercials. From outsourcing deals to NHS PFI. I was even a member of the DWP commercial board for a few years. There is one part of Government commercials which puzzles me: The Government insists that Britain exports very little military equipment to Israel. At the same time, … Read more
I promised myself that the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference would be my last encounter with the organised far right for a while. Then I remembered that one of Britain’s oldest far-right religious organisations meets only a few yards from my house. For years the British-Israel World Federation held meetings in Durham. Today it meets … Read more
Inside the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship I attended another far-right meeting this week. This one didn’t feature skinheads, St George’s flags or chants outside a hotel. Instead there were smart suits, venture capitalists, cabinet ministers, think tank directors and some of the most influential figures on the international conservative right. It was the Alliance for … Read more
We woke up 10 years ago to discover Britain had voted to leave the EU. For many a day of national humiliation. I started writing Industrial Estate of Mind shortly after the Brexit vote. At the time I was working just outside Durham in an area that had been solidly Labour for generations but had … Read more
I am not a big fan of Andy Burnham. That might seem a strange thing to say given that I am a member of Mainstream, the pro-Burnham group within Labour. Burnham is an astute politician. His municipal socialism is not far from my own instincts and, unlike many politicians, he has experience of life outside … Read more
There have been some noisy headlines about chaos in councils where Reform won seats last month: resignations, council meetings in disarray, councillors disappearing on holiday en masse. Durham became a Reform-controlled council last year, and I finally managed to catch some Reform councillors in action. I had spent months trying to speak to, photograph or … Read more
Another summer and, once again, another riot. By now the pattern is becoming familiar. A tragedy occurs involving a white victim and a non-white perpetrator. The victim’s family appeals for calm and asks that their loss should not be used to fuel racial hatred. The appeal is ignored. “We want to use Henry’s heartbreaking story … Read more
The short answer to this question is no, don’t be daft. Reform are the party of the elite, the leadership dominated by public schoolboys and inherited wealth. They have inherited many of the establishment networks of power, money and influence which sustained the Conservatives for over a century. So why do I hear this so … Read more
Clearly this was a big night for Reform, a bad night for Labour, and a mixed night for everyone else. Labour lost seats to the Greens, to a lesser extent Reform, and to Plaid Cymru and the SNP. The Conservatives lost seats heavily to Reform. But for the Government to lose seats at this point … Read more