Days before Article 50 is triggered, with Britain wobbling halfway over the cliff edge like the van at the end of The Italian Job, Labour speaks only to itself. Or, more accurately, bits of itself scream at other bits like a loft full of mad aunts and uncles.
On one side of the attic, a leaked tape suggests a planned Momentum-Unite alliance to ensure the far left retains power in perpetuity. On the other, surviving Blairites stagger lividly about beneath the pulverising weight of their sense of entitlement denied. Wandering morosely about in the middle are the undead, whose craving to be rid of Jeremy Corbyn is outmatched only by fear of strengthening him with another laughable leadership challenge.
Meanwhile, Tom Watson, the Glastonbury tent bopper who moonlights as deputy leader, pours petrol on the fire by exaggerating any pact between Jon Lansman of Momentum and Unite’s Len McCluskey into an existential threat.It's not as bad as that? In the immortal words of Mr Dalgleish, "mibbes aye, mibbes naw"
A tasty amuse-bouche with the first drink, fresh flowers in the lavatories, a generously sized washbag and a pair of slippers — all free. These were the little touches that first-class customers with British Airways had come to expect.
Insiders at the airline, however, claim that BA is now cutting back on some of its first-class and business-class perks as it races to cut costs.My usual mode of airline travel is cattle class on Ryanair where luxuries are non-existent.
Friday
So. It’s been announced. There’s quite the uproar. At lunchtime I visit the paper and tell the staff how excited I am to be becoming a top journalist. Then I call Theresa May, to let her know I’m a newspaper editor now, because, well, why not, and how hard can it be?
“I’m surprised you have the time,” she says.
“Stop it,” I say. “It’s only editing a newspaper! It’s like people have forgotten I combined being an MP with running Britain’s economy for six whole years!”
“And how did that go?” says Theresa.
“That’s irrelevant,” I say.
First minister’s questions in Scotland is an altogether more enlightening affair than prime minister’s questions down south. Not least because serious questions get asked. And answered. It helps that the two main adversaries, Sturgeon and Conservative Ruth Davidson, are rather sharper than their UK counterparts – not difficult for Davidson as Jeremy Corbyn hit a new low at PMQs the day before by even forgetting to ask a couple of questions. It’s also a major plus that the rest of the chamber manages to listen without sounding like a Bash Street Kids school reunion. When each speaker has finished talking, there is a round of applause. Or silence. It’s disconcertingly polite.
Nicola Sturgeon has accused Theresa May of sealing the fate of the United Kingdom after the prime minister rejected her demand for a second Scottish independence referendum before the Brexit talks conclude.
The first minister said May’s stance was “completely outrageous and unacceptable”, hours after the prime minister had insisted that “now is not the time” for the referendum that the SNP had hoped to stage between autumn 2019 and spring 2019.
Sturgeon said on Thursday: “It’s an argument for independence, really, in a nutshell, that Westminster thinks it has got the right to block the democratically elected mandate of the Scottish government and the majority in the Scottish parliament. History may look back on today and see it as the day the fate of the union was sealed.”
She insisted she would press on with plans for a vote at the Scottish parliament next week seeking its approval to request the legal power from Westminster to stage the referendum on Holyrood’s terms – a vote she is expected to narrowly win with Scottish Green party support.I am far from sure that the Blessed Nicola actually wanted IndyRef2 at this time (or at least within the next two years) but felt obliged to go along with the bulk of opinion in the SNP, even if the omens for an early referendum were less than propitious (oil, currency, economy and all that). So now she may be quietly relieved that Theresa has produced the kibosh. Nicola can once again point to perfidious Westminster, thus keeping the party activists happy while metaphorically girding her loins for a more realistic prospect of a successful IndyRef2 in the early 2020s when Brexit will have been proved to be a catastrophe but the Tories remain likely to be in power for ever and ever.
The phone call had come through just after eight in the morning while Phil “The Undertaker” Hammond was eating breakfast. It was the prime minister ordering him to bury Class 4 NICs. He had tried telling her that doing a U-turn on your only real budget measure less than a week after it had been announced made him and the government look hopelessly incompetent, but Theresa wasn’t having any of it. The Tory backbenchers were on her back. The Daily Mail was on her back. And now she was on his back.
Six hours later The Undertaker rather sheepishly arrived in the Commons to try to explain how it was that, though he still absolutely stood by his budget because it was his budget that was his, he now wanted to fundamentally change it because although he hadn’t broken any promises in the Conservative party manifesto, as that’s not the sort of thing he would ever dream of doing, he had in fact broken the promises he had made in the Conservative party manifesto.
It had been absolutely right to raise NICs and that’s why he wasn’t doing it. And no, before anyone asked, he hadn’t worked out how to fill the £2bn black hole that had just opened up in the country’s finances. Give him another six months. Maybe changing to one budget a year wasn’t such a good plan after all.
The Treasury select committee chair, Hilary Benn, warmed up with a bit of free association. Did no deal mean WTO tariff barriers? “Yes,” said Davis. Would there be border checks between Northern Ireland and the rest of Ireland? “Yes.” Would the EU/US open skies agreement be dead in the water? “Yes.” Would we lose passporting rights of financial services? “Yes.” Did this mean that the foreign secretary was idiotic to say that dropping out of the EU on WTO terms would be fine? “Yes.” Whoops. He had just landed Boris in it. Still, Boris wouldn’t have thought twice about knifing him.
Benn then went for the throat. Had Davis made any calculation of the exact costs of leaving the EU on WTO terms? “God no,” said Davis breezily. “I know how it’s going to work out. I just haven’t quantified it.” Every member of the committee – even the leavers – stared into the abyss. Davis had just admitted the government was saying no deal would be better than a bad deal when it didn’t even know the cost of no deal. A parish council wouldn’t get away with that level of unaccountability. Davis shrugged. There was something liberating about telling the truth. Why not let the country know that the chancellor hadn’t a clue about the economy and Brexit was heading for the rocks? It wasn’t as if there was an effective opposition to stop them.
... May should ... focus on the central reason for Monday’s coup de theatre. Sturgeon has always believed independence offers her country its best future. With Scotland a backseat passenger in a vehicle careering towards the cliff’s edge, she probably believes it more passionately than ever.
Now, you can agree or disagree with her there. For what incalculably little it’s worth, I agree. Were I Scottish, I would be mad for independence. I’d say sod the crude oil price, sod the Barnett formula and sod the pernicious English meme that poor wee Scotland hasn’t a prayer of making it across the road without Nanny May holding her hand.
I’d also say sod the uncertainties. With Brexit, how much more uncertain can it possibly get? And I’d certainly say sod the buffoons of Brexit – Gove, Boris, Fox, and the rest – who argued last summer that liberation from a union which restricted self-determination justified any risks, but will now counsel the Scots to keep a hold of nurse for fear of something even worse. How transparently hypocritical do these people need to get before a residue of self-respect automatically shuts their mouths?I can sympathise with the sentiment. But we Scots need a more dispassionate approach; we cannot let our hearts rule our heads. If we opt for independence, it needs to be based on a rational assessment of the costs and benefits.
George Osborne has declared a salary of £650,000 a year for working just four days a month at BlackRock, the world’s biggest fund management firm, as well as almost £800,000 for speeches to financiers.
The former chancellor’s earnings were revealed in the latest register of MPs’ interests, which shows that he will make more than eight times his salary as a backbencher as an adviser to the Wall Street firm.No need to call on the foodbank, then.
Adults are having sex less often than they were 20 years ago, according a US study based on a survey of almost 27,000 individuals.
Researchers have found that adults, on average, were having sex seven fewer times annually in the early 2010s compared to the early 1990s, and nine fewer times compared to the late 1990s.
The study follows research published by the same team last year which found that the percentage of adults aged between 20 and 24 who had had no sexual partner after the age of 18 had more than doubled between those born in the 1960s and the 1990s, rising from 6% to 15%.
Taken together it would seem that millennials are having less sex, but the finding is not necessary bleak. “It is very possible that for young people this is a conscious life choice,” said Ryne Sherman, co-author of the study from Florida Atlantic University, pointing out that millennials might be choosing to spend their time in other pursuits or could simply be more empowered in their sex lives.Alternatively, respondents are being more or less truthful, then or now...
... at an EU summit in Malta earlier in February, May and Rajoy were said to have struck an understanding.
The pair agreed they wanted to reach an early agreement on reciprocal residency rights for their citizens, according to British officials. May’s team in London believe Rajoy could also make a powerful ally during complex trade negotiations that will form part of Brexit talks, one official said.
Almost 18 million Britons, a number equivalent to almost a third of the U.K. population, visited Spain last year. Spanish companies also export far more to the U.K. than the other way around.But there's a fly in the ointment: Gibraltar. Rajoy will seek joint sovereignty and May will inevitably resist.
AG Barr is to halve the amount of sugar in its leading Irn Bru brand, ahead of a government crackdown on the fizzy drinks industry.
The Cumbernauld-based firm, which also makes Rubicon and Tizer, said it would cut Irn Bru's sugar content from about 10g per 100ml to just below 5g.
It will reduce the calorie count per can from just under 140 to about 66.
AG Barr said the move was part of a "long-standing sugar reduction programme".I will have to find some other way of getting my calories in future ...
It was not simply the prolonged failure to find a way around the Azzurri’s cute diversionary ruck tactics – odd as that appeared in an era when coaches can get messages on to the field almost instantly. More glaring still was the lack of mental flexibility, the bafflement and the sheer confusion when the anticipated masterplan – a 60-point romp in this instance – unravelled. At times it was like watching 15 Daleks stuck at the bottom of an unexpected staircase.
Scotland Women bounced back at Broadwood to close out a tough match against Wales to claim a one-point win – their first victory in the Six Nations since 2010.
It was two tries a piece with Edinburgh University backs Lisa Thomson and Rhona Lloyd each scoring for Scotland, with Sarah Law sealing the 15-14 win with a penalty kick on the 77th minute.
Wales’ captain Carys Phillips crossed the whitewash for her side followed by a penalty try in to take a 7-point lead into the break.
But it was Scotland’s ambition and belief up until the final whistle that saw them through to defeat Wales in the Six Nations for the first time since 2005.It's no fun losing all the time. But the women finally did it. Congrats.
Gary Lineker has condemned Leicester City’s decision to sack Claudio Ranieri as “inexplicable, unforgivable and gut-wrenchingly sad”.
Ranieri, who led the relegation-tipped club to a remarkable Premier League title victory last season just nine months ago, was relieved of his duties on Thursday night.
The Italian’s departure was confirmed in a statement on the club’s official website, which claimed that “a change of leadership, while admittedly painful, is necessary in the club’s greatest interest.”But there's always a but:
Ranieri, who was named FIFA’s Coach of the Year just last month, signed a new four-year contract with Leicester last August.So he will probably be entitled to a massive pay-off, likely to be in the millions, and should have little difficulty finding another lucrative post.
It’s a bit rich for the chancellor, now reportedly in “listening mode” on business rates, to signal that he is aware of the challenges the digital economy presents to a property-based tax. That fundamental problem has been voiced for more than a decade and has simply been ignored by government. Amazon and the other big online retailers are no longer modern creations.
Philip Hammond, one suspects, will end up inventing various reliefs to try to quell the anger of those small businesses in London facing increases of up to 400%. But something more than a sticking-plaster is required. If not, this toxic row will return every time potential rents – the basis for establishing rateable values – are recalculated.Aye, but what is the answer - nobody seems to know.
First, it was the BBC’s costume drama Jamaica Inn, which attracted thousands of complaints in 2014, then last year’s Happy Valley. Now, the alternative history miniseries SS-GB has become the latest primetime BBC programme to draw criticism about characters mumbling their lines.
Following the success of TV shows such as Amazon’s The Man in the High Castle, the BBC hopes its five-part dramatisation of Len Deighton’s 1978 novel, which imagines that Germany won the Battle of Britain and the Nazis occupy the south of England, will be a hit.
Following the success of TV shows such as Amazon’s The Man in the High Castle, the BBC hopes its five-part dramatisation of Len Deighton’s 1978 novel, which imagines that Germany won the Battle of Britain and the Nazis occupy the south of England, will be a hit.
But the first episode of SS-GB – which had already faced some scathing reviews from TV critics for its first episode on Sunday night – has been criticised by viewers who said they had struggled to hear what was going on.
The broadcaster has promised to promised to examine the sound levels before the next episode is broadcast after dozens of viewers complained.I'm not really bothered by the sound quality. But I rather doubt that in the 1940s our hero would be wearing a natty dark blue shirt and tie to the office. It would also add to the verisimilitude if the actors had learned how to smoke a cigarette without looking as if they had never done so before.
NPR's National Security Correspondent Mary Louise Kelly said she had spoken to a White House official on Wednesday, who succinctly described a scene of chaos. "I just reached somebody inside the White House today and asked them to describe, what's the mood like in there? What's going on in the halls?" " Kelly told the NPR Politics Podcast. "And this official said, it is an absolute effing trainwreck"
Ms Kelly also described "a lot of empty desks in the basement of the West Wing," which is where senior members of the National Security Council usually reside, after many abandoned their roles after clashing with the Trump administration.
Citing her sources, Ms Kelly said nobody was sure who was “steering the ship” anymore, and added the White House was, “to put it charitably, in upheaval”.
"This administration is running like a fine-tuned machine, despite the fact that I can't get my cabinet approved."You pays your money and you takes your choice ...
Every day new leaks emerge from the White House about a state of fear and loathing at the National Security Council, which Mr Flynn at least nominally heads. The latest, published by the New York Times, suggested things were so chaotic that members of staff were waking in the morning, reading Mr Trump’s latest Twitter posts, and then struggling “to make policy to fit them”.
The same report said that others have begun using encrypted communications to talk with each other, after hearing that Mr Trump’s top advisers were considering an “insider threat” programme that could result in the monitoring of phones and emails.
Meanwhile, efforts to get Mr Trump to focus on complicated issues are not straightforward. In short, Mr Trump is not a details man. NSC staff members have been told keep papers to a single page, with lots of graphics and maps. “The president likes maps,” one official told the newspaper.So policy recommendations and position papers have to be in picture-book form for the presidential child-man ...
In his first call as president with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump denounced a treaty that caps US and Russian deployment of nuclear warheads as a bad deal for the United States, according to two US officials and one former US official with knowledge of the call.
When Putin raised the possibility of extending the 2010 treaty, known as New START, Trump paused to ask his aides in an aside what the treaty was, these sources said.
Trump then told Putin the treaty was one of several bad deals negotiated by the Obama administration, saying that New START favoured Russia. Trump also talked about his own popularity, the sources said.
...
Typically, before a telephone call with a foreign leader, a president receives a written in-depth briefing paper drafted by National Security Council staff after consultations with the relevant agencies, including the State Department, Pentagon and intelligence agencies, two former senior officials said.
Just before the call, the president also usually receives an oral "pre-briefing" from his national security adviser and top subject-matter aide, they said.
Trump did not receive a briefing from Russia experts with the NSC and intelligence agencies before the Putin call, two of the sources said. Reuters was unable to determine if Trump received a briefing from his national security adviser Michael Flynn.Even Putin must be wondering if it was a good idea to have elected Trump ...
President Donald Trump fired acting Attorney General Sally Yates as conflict escalated over his executive order banning entry to the U.S. by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations.
Yates, an Obama administration holdover, was ousted Monday just hours after she told Justice Department staff not to defend the ban in court because she didn’t think it was legal. A White House statement said she was removed for “refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States.”Good for her! She'll not be unemployed for long.
"As the two leaders finally shook hands, the bust of Churchill covered its eyes and begged to be sent back to Britain. Their hands remained uneasily entwined as they walked down the colonnade towards the Palm Room. When Trump started to creepily stroke her hand, Theresa almost retched. She quickly pulled herself together and reminded herself to just think of England. Sometimes you had to take one for the team."
Revenue & Customs collected £1 billion less tax from the 6,500 richest people in Britain six years after they gave them their own “customer relationship managers”, a critical report reveals.
Parliament’s spending watchdog said that HMRC could not explain why tax revenues from individuals worth more than £20 million had fallen by 20 per cent since 2009 while tax paid by everyone else had risen by 9 per cent over the same period.
The public accounts committee added that Revenue’s approach to the very wealthy suggested that they were getting “help with their tax affairs that is not available to other taxpayers”.Stockholm syndrome, perhaps? Ot HMRC simply seduced by wealth and power?
In 1998, the Canadian media tycoon Conrad Black, then owner of the Daily Telegraph, a conservative British newspaper, gave a keynote speech at the Centre for Policy Studies, a free-market think tank in London, entitled "Britain's Final Choice: Europe or America?"
"None of the continental European countries has a particular affinity with the United States and Canada or anything slightly comparable to Britain's dramatic modern intimacy with North America," he said.
Black's argument was that the U.K. should leave the EU and join the North American Free Trade Agreement:Given Trump's current propensity to tear down NAFTA, I cannot really see this as a runner. But with Trump, who knows?Such an expanding Nafta would have every commercial advantage over the EU. It is based on the Anglo-American free-market model of relatively restrained taxation and social spending, which is the principal reason the United States and Canada together have created net, an average of two million more new jobs per year than the European Union for the last 15 years. Nafta, as its name implies, is a free trade area only. The United States will not make any significant concessions of sovereignty and does not expect other countries to do so either.
Like some latter-day Basil Fawlty, Boris Johnson mentioned the War and didn't get away with it.
The foreign secretary urged the French president not to "administer punishment beatings" on Britain for choosing to escape the EU "rather in the manner of some World War Two movie".
Not surprisingly, uproar has ensued. Former Labour leader Ed Miliband said Mr Johnson had shown once again that he could be "supremely clever and yet immensely stupid".Boris doesn't mind who he upsets, as long as he can be the centre of attention. Childish, really.
... he turned up on BBC2’s Daily Politics where Jo Coburn gave him the biggest putdown yet. “You had the president-elect for an hour and you didn’t once challenge him on any inconsistencies?” she observed. Mikey beamed. At last. Someone who got the point. It had never been about what Trump did or didn’t say. It had been about, he, the Great Mikey, getting a whole hour of Trump’s time. To bask in the orange glow of reflected glory. Me and Mini-Me. Don and Mini-Don. Mini-Mini-Mikey.
“We seek a new and equal partnership – between an independent, self-governing, global Britain and our friends and allies in the EU. Not partial membership of the European Union, associate membership of the European Union or anything that leaves us half-in, half-out,” May is expected to say.
“We do not seek to adopt a model already enjoyed by other countries. We do not seek to hold on to bits of membership as we leave. The United Kingdom is leaving the European Union. My job is to get the right deal for Britain as we do.”Is there something shameful about seeking to split the difference between full membership and a solitary. lonely existence out in the cold? Why seek to invent a new model if an existing model might be readily adapted? If it's good enough for the Swiss, for the Norwegians or for the Canadians, what makes us so different? Or are we so thirled to the notion of proud Britannia's singularity that we will cut off our nose to spite our face?
Companies are fitting thousands of their staff with body-worn tracker devices that check how much sleep they have, how well they work with colleagues and even monitor their body language, tone of voice or emotions.
Supporters of the revolution in “workplace wearables” say it is creating a more productive “augmented human being”, but privacy campaigners say it is leading to a “Big Brother” society.
Employees of at least four British companies, including a major high street bank, are already carrying “sociometric badges”, often for 24 hours a day. The credit card-sized badges are worn around the neck and include a microphone for real-time voice analysis, a device that tracks the wearer around the workplace, a Bluetooth sensor to scan for proximity to others and an accelerometer to check physical activity. Monitoring employees’ phone calls and emails provides further data.Appalling nightmare.
Theresa May is to announce that the government is prepared to accept a clean break with the EU in its negotiations for the UK’s departure. In a speech to be delivered on Tuesday, the prime minister will make clear that she is willing to sacrifice the UK’s membership of the single market and customs union in order to bring an end to freedom of movement.
An article in the Sunday Telegraph cites “sources familiar with the prime minister’s thinking” as saying that May is seeking to appease the Eurosceptic wing of her party by contemplating a “hard”, or “clean”, Brexit.
In the speech to an audience of diplomats at London’s Lancaster House May will hope to end months of speculation about her intentions by setting out her aims for Brexit. According to the Sunday Telegraph, she will say that the UK must:Expect the pound to sink like a stone on the foreign exchanges tomorrow morning.
- be prepared to leave the EU customs union;
- regain full control of its borders, even if that means losing access to the single market, and
- cease to be subject to rulings by the European court of justice.
Tuesday
Emergency conference. Kellyanne is back, and Ivanka, and the boys, and my alt-right guy, Steve Bannon. News has broken about a dossier of disgusting allegations about my relationship with the Russians.
“More fake news!” I’m shouting. “Lies!”
Ivanka says she doesn’t know what a golden shower even is, anyway. Then Donald Jr says there’s one next door, next to the golden bidet. Then Steve says it’s actually a political party in Greece.
“Great guys,” he adds.
“That’s not it,” I say. “I know what it is. Don’t ask how. But it’s a lie. I’m a germaphobe.”
“It’s a smear,” says Kellyanne.
“More a stain,” says Eric.
“Oh God,” says Ivanka, who has just looked it up on her iPhone.
1) Trump uses a pretty small working vocabulary. This doesn’t seem to be a conscious strategy, though it works as well as if it had been. Much was made during primary season of the way in which reading-level algorithms (unreliable though they are) found his speeches pitched at fourth-grade level, ie the comprehension of an average nine-year-old.
2) His syntax, spelling and punctuation are – in conventional terms – a catastrophe. In his tweets, he is prone to run-on sentences, shouty capitalisations, unpresidented misspellings and malapropisms, quote marks used for emphasis and verbless exclamations. In speaking, he is prone to anacoluthon – sentences whose grammar collapses – and reflexive repetition.
3) The workhorses of his rhetoric are charged but empty adjectives and adverbs.Things are “great”, “wonderful”, “amazing”, “the best”, or they’re “crooked”, “fake”, “unfair”, “failing”. He sprinkles intensifiers liberally: “a very, very, very amazing man, a great, great developer”.Plus, he tells fibs.
All doctor’s surgeries in England will open from 8am to 8pm, seven days a week, Theresa May has vowed, unless they can prove there is no demand from patients.
Ministers hope improving access to GPs will ease pressure on hospitals, which has become critical. There is increasing exasperation in Government that the lack of GP appointments is driving patients to seek treatment in hard-pressed hospital accident and emergency departments.
...
In addition, GPs will be warned that in future money to surgeries which are not open when patients want to visit will be cut.
The director of acute care for NHS England Professor Keith Willett has recently estimated that 30 per cent of the patients attending A&E would be better cared for elsewhere in the system.I have no great sympathy for GPs - the last time I contacted my local GP practice in Edinburgh, I was offered an appointment some three weeks later. But ...
Trump suggested that the intelligence community had fabricated documents describing Russia obtaining compromising information about him. He said “sick people,” his “opponents”, had assembled the documents, and “garbage” “fake news” media outlets had disseminated them. He rejected outright claims in the documents of contacts between his campaign and Russia, and of him behaving badly in Moscow. He said he always warned people traveling with him about cameras in foreign hotels and that in any case he is a germaphobe.Doubt if that will satisfy the media ...
Corbyn looked muddled and unpopular on Brexit, muddled and potentially popular on high pay, and missed a golden chance to press Labour’s advantage on the NHS. All in one day. It is hard to believe that someone who seriously wants and intends to be prime minister could have allowed such confusion around him.
I suppose he clings in private to the idea that remarkable things happen in politics, but it cannot be fun on a personal level to have most of your MPs thinking you are a hopeless liability while the party tests record depths in the opinion polls.
What is more, he must know that, if the Conservative Party collapsed and he, who will be 70 if the election is at the set time, formed a government, he would hate it. There is no way this can end well.But, while Corbyn muddles his way ahead, the country is going to the dogs.
WASHINGTON — The chiefs of America’s intelligence agencies last week presented President Obama and President-elect Donald J. Trump with a summary of unsubstantiated reports that Russia had collected compromising and salacious personal information about Mr. Trump, two officials with knowledge of the briefing said.The Donald has responded by twitter (of course):
The summary is based on memos generated by political operatives seeking to derail Mr. Trump’s candidacy. Details of the reports began circulating in the fall and were widely known among journalists and politicians in Washington.
...
The memos describe sex videos involving prostitutes with Mr. Trump in a 2013 visit to a Moscow hotel. The videos were supposedly prepared as “kompromat,” or compromising material, with the possible goal of blackmailing Mr. Trump in the future.
The memos also suggest that Russian officials proposed various lucrative deals, essentially as disguised bribes in order to win influence over Mr. Trump.
"FAKE NEWS - A TOTAL POLITICAL WITCH HUNT!"We'll no doubt see, in due course ...
U.K. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson met with some of Donald Trump’s top advisers as Britain looks to build ties with the incoming administration ahead of the country’s withdrawal from the European Union.
The sessions involved Trump’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, and the president-elect’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, on Sunday evening before Johnson traveled to Washington to visit with congressional leaders.
The talks were “positive and frank” and covered relations with Syria, Russia and China, the BBC reported, citing unidentified aides.Somewhat dodgy, I would have thought. Who knows what Boris might have said?
Labour MPs Stephen Kinnock and Emma Reynolds insist that the “mixed messages” from Labour over immigration are proving “deeply corrosive” of voters’ trust. They insist that it is time to unite behind a credible approach that recognises the strength of feeling in the country about rising immigrant numbers, while protecting UK and European workers and the economy.
Announcing their blueprint for change – with support from senior figures, including the party’s former policy chief and MP for Dagenham, Jon Cruddas, and former shadow cabinet members Rachel Reeves and Caroline Flint – they say Labour should press Theresa May to put a two-tier system of controls at the heart of Brexit negotiations.Tier one would include highly skilled individuals such as doctors, teachers and engineers, who would be admitted to take on specific jobs. EU students with a place at British universities would also be included in this tier.
Tier two would be made up of low-skilled and semi-skilled EU workers, whose numbers would be limited by sector-based quotas, negotiated between government, industry and trade unions. These sectors would include agriculture, food processing, retail, construction and hospitality.Seems a bit on the bureaucratic side to me. You would need an army of immigration service officials to administer the process of vetting applications and supervising appeal mechanisms. On the other hand, there are no easy solutions ...
Following enormous success of not hacking United States election, focus is now switched to United Kingdom. Haff been tasked with obtaining top secret documents outlining British government detail plan for Brexit.
“Is most odd,” am saying to hacking superior. “Can’t find them anywhere.”
Hacking superior most displeased. Is asking which cabinet minister computers haff compromised?
“First Liam Fox,” am saying, “but he is spending all time playing computer games of Global Conquest or Risk. Then David Davis, but turns out he is not even turning computer on. Just hitting buttons, madly, when anybody walks past, in front of black monitor. Then Boris Johnson. But half is Latin and rest is NSFW.”
“Keep looking,” hacking superior haff ordered. “Plans must be somewhere.”
“You’d think,” haff said.Good luck with that ...
As of now, the Government has no published Brexit plan (though it has promised Parliament and, presumably, the Queen it will have one by the end of March), no top diplomat in Brussels and no trade negotiators to speak of. It is not a position of strength.
Andrew Harrop, the Fabians’ general secretary, who wrote the report, said Corbyn and his team appeared to have little idea how to respond to such challenges or how to win back the 4 million voters who supported Labour in 2015 but say they would not do so now.
After Corbyn triumphed against Owen Smith in a leadership challenge, his team had produced “no roadmap” for overcoming Labour’s plight, Harrop wrote, while the wider parliamentary Labour party had become “barely audible”.
“In place of the sound and fury of Jeremy Corbyn’s first 12 months, there is quietude, passivity and resignation,” he said. “And on Brexit, the greatest political question for two generations, the party’s position is muffled and inconsistent. This is the calm of stalemate, of insignificance, even of looming death.”Hard to disagree. Especially as the country desperately needs a competitive and competent Opposition.
Theresa May is to overhaul the honours system after making clear that controversial appointments in the new year’s list had been put forward under David Cameron.
The prime minister is to insist that the government gives priority to people proven to have helped the economy or boosted social mobility.
...
Mrs May has said that she wants the honours system to have five priorities. It will recognise those who boost the economy; support young people in achieving their potential; aid social mobility; help local communities; and tackle discrimination.
The new system will be in place for the Queen’s Birthday honours in the summer. The awards announced by the government over the weekend had been proposed by Mr Cameron’s team, according to a Whitehall source, who said: “These things are put together with quite a lot of time to spare.”So, instead of Cameron's cronies, we can expect May's cronies to figure on the list.
