A new report proposes a budgetary increase of some £10 billion a year that would be lavished on a rebranded, semi-independent body called “Global Affairs UK”, run by people who disdain our traditions and want to put our mid-sized, offshore country firmly in its place.
Or: “Why Marjorie Taylor Greene was not entirely wrong to tell the Foreign Secretary to kiss her ass”.
The author recalls the high hopes with which Blair entered power in 1997, and the extreme difficulty of devising a viable European policy.
“We are prepared to follow our words and warnings with actions”, Cameron tells Kuenssberg.
The Foreign Secretary talks to Trevor Phillips about performing his role from the House of Lords.
In his youth he was mocked for being weird, but in middle age he upholds conventional wisdom.
He will likely be subject to more expert scrutiny than he would in the Commons – and if MPs want more opportunities to hold him directly to account, Parliament can create them.
As Prime Minister, he swapped scepticism for interventionism, with unfortunate results in Libya.
The new Foreign Secretary is asked whether he wants to distance himself from his predecessor’s rhetoric.
This way of thinking also contrasts with the naive counting of the civilian dead. In this tradition, war can be a necessary evil, but that judgement requires attention to its practical consequences.
During the half century since the Yom Kippur war took place, conflict abroad has increasingly meant consequences here.
Pakistan has long been one of our largest aid recipients, and between 2015 and 2019 Pakistan was the largest single recipient of direct British government-to-government bilateral aid. Yet its courts uphold forced marriages arranged by kidnapping.
If a mainstream candidate is needed, when next the Conservative leadership is contested, in order to stop some more ideological figure such as Kemi Badenoch, it is just possible that Cleverly might fit the bill.
My last Chagos piece, one year ago on 28 December 2022, expressed the hope that 2023 would be my final post and that a satisfactory conclusion to the UK/Mauritius negotiations announced in a statement on 3 November 2022 would be reached. Why the hold-up?