Responding to Rashford

Until Ministers have a clear direction in which to steer the ship of anti-poverty policy, they will be at the mercy of the passengers.

Andrew Gimson’s PMQs sketch: This highlight of the parliamentary week is dying from long-windedness

The questions are posed with a ponderousness that recalls Polonius as his most sententious: too much evidence, too little wit.

U-turn of the year – A Level results and the Government abandoning the Ofqual algorithm for predicted grades

August’s debacle has won this category – although other U-turns are not much further behind.

Frank Young: Educational Long Covid. Why the collapse of schooling over lockdown will haunt the poor for years to come.

The second in our mini-series of pieces from the Centre for Social Justice on the virus – and helping those in deep poverty.

Syed Kamall: Rashford’s campaign calls for state action – but equally highlights the power of individuals and community

The recent debate on free school meals has shown, among many things, the impact of local civil society non-state organisations.

Philippa Stroud: The Coalition stopped officially measuring poverty – which left its successor unsighted over free schools meals

We are allowing others to create a narrative for us, and in the absence of an agreed poverty measure and subsequent strategy, we always will.

Normal relations between the Conservative leader and Conservative MPs are breaking down

Johnson’s troops are issuing declarations of intent in public. His success will depend on his ability to learn from mistakes.

Ryan Bourne: If you want to feed hungry children, don’t target food poverty. Aim to reduce poverty as a whole.

Together with tax cuts and less regulation, higher or more extensive benefits look like better support for hungry children than vouchers.

How to ensure that disadvantaged children are fed when schools are closed

Ministers could not have handled the matter worse if they’d tried. But Paul Maynard, pictured, is championing a solution.

Iain Dale: The way the BBC and Sky News behave, you’d think we are the only country in the world with a second wave

Plus: Free school meals, Pointless Celebrities, Bower’s book And: “Did the honourable lady just call me scum?” Your chance to drink to that.

Robert Halfon: Delivering social justice means feeding children properly. We’re not doing so – and we must.

The Government’s own calculations of welfare payments do not cost in the provision of a healthy diet.

Algorithm or no algorithm, the UK needs houses. Fast.

Clearly the Government’s model is flawed. But there is no perfect formula for solving this crisis.

Lewis becomes the first Conservative MP to lose the whip during this Parliament. But he may not be the last.

For the Party to take it off him is one thing; for the Government to recast the committee, or try to, would be quite another.

Friends of Cummings: “A hard rain is coming.”

“Dom is a decentraliser,” we were told.  “But he’s resistant to decentralising to people who he thinks aren’t up to the job.”

For Johnson and the Conservatives, the power of patriotism is a plus

As with Brexit, the fundamentals of the Tory position are much stronger than they may seem to be.