Like the Scots, the Welsh Conservatives face a once-in-a-generation strategic opportunity
Tacking towards the devocrat consensus and positioning for a pact with Plaid seems to be the preferred option, but it looks like a tactical cul-de-sac.
Grayling needs to show he is not just in charge of the clattering train, but is modernising it
The Transport Secretary’s announcement this week about price indices sounded timid and technocratic.
The Government must get to grips with graduate oversupply
Fresh thinking on vocational and technical education is a good start, but fundamental questions about higher education and the state’s role in it remain.
The gathering wait for a Johnson burka inquiry decision
A consequence of the new Code of Conduct may be that he is referred to a panel – whether Number Ten wants it or not.
Terror and Westminster. There is no way of designing out risk.
It cannot be eliminated altogether – at least without placing a steel curtain between Parliament and the people.
The poverty of May’s language is an insult to the public
But Corbyn is so third-rate he helps to keep her in power, and both of them epitomise a wider decline in political speech.
Drawing a veil over the incident
All concerned want to save face over the Johnson burqa row – May, Lewis and the man himself. Here’s a rough and ready way to correct its mishandling.
If May had honoured this Israeli terrorist’s grave…
There is a solid reason why headlines about Labour prejudice have run for months and those about a claimed Tory equivalent for only a week.
There’s a case for an ‘Amazon tax’, but it isn’t saving the high street
The online retail revolution has brought more convenience and lower prices to millions. Fighting it is an unworthy mission for a pro-consumer party.
A bigger, more vocal grassroots presence at Conservative Party Conference
We gather the turnout – particularly among young Tories – is set to rise, and there will be more opportunities for members to speak from the stage.
Where bungling the burka row has got the Conservative Party. Damned if it investigates Johnson. And damned if it doesn’t.
Any proceedings against him under the Party’s Code of Conduct threaten a cats-cradle of conflicts of interest and breaches of natural justice.
“Difficult, and often embarrassing, conversations”
May’s muddled call for an apology from Johnson suggests that her approach to integration, cohesion and extremism is all at sea.
Truss cuts the Gordian Knot on housing
She notes that the choice is not between maintaining prices or building more, but between building more and ushering in Corbynism.
Political beliefs ought to be the subject of robust debate, not protected with legal cotton wool
The way equalities law applies to “philosophical belief” has created a messy courtroom battleground for all sorts of angry fringe groups to seek protection.
If HS2’s bill keeps inflating, it might yet explode the whole scheme
The project is already well over its original price. Some dream of abandoning it.