Author: Miles Donavan

The Labour MP for North Hertfordshire urges the government to stop playing it safe and take on the vested interests holding the country back. Chris Hinchliff is the Labour MP for North East Hertfordshire. Over the last year, the historic significance of serving as the first Labour MP representingcommunities in North East Hertfordshire since Shirley Williams has never left me. After years as a charity campaigner, some of my most fulfilling moments serving as a backbench MP have come from seeing policy proposals I had been pushing for adopted by Ministers in a progressive Labour Government. What we’ve achieved so…

‘One well-placed insider claimed Mrs Braverman was ‘not a team player’, adding: ‘Her record shows she is just too disruptive.’ With rumours of more Tory defections to come, Reform have drawn the line at Liz Truss and Suella Braverman, warning that the pair would be too toxic for the party’s image. It comes after a string of senior Tories defected to Nigel Farage’s party, including the likes of former Cabinet ministers Sir Jake Berry and David Jones this week, as well as ex-MP Dame Andrea Jenkyns – now the party’s Greater Lincolnshire mayor. The Mail now reports that a Reform…

‘The shadow Home Secretary just wants to pretend that the last eight years never happened.’ Yet again, shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp needed reminding of the Tories’ abysmal record on immigration. Yesterday, it was the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper who delivered that lesson.   In a statement to the House, the Home Secretary set out the government’s new “one in, one out” small boats deal with France.  In response, Philp tried to attack the deal again, claiming it is a “gimmick”, only to be reminded that he had wanted to strike such an agreement back when he was immigration minister,…

‘This absolute nonsense that you come out with. You do need to actually look at the facts.’ Zia Yusuf, head of Reform UK’s so-called ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ was called out by Labour MP Barry Gardiner for saying that climate change does not pose a threat to the UK.  Yusuf said on GB News that while the “British way of life” is under threat, “If there’s one thing it is not under threat from, it’s climate change”. Gardiner, the former shadow secretary of state for Climate Change highlighted that scientists across the world “agree that climate change is a huge…

After a year in Parliament, Leishman writes about how he’s been holding the Labour government to account. Brian Leishman is the Labour MP for Alloa and Grangemouth in Scotland, and is a member of the Socialist Campaign Group of Labour MPs. Just over a year ago, electors in Alloa & Grangemouth placed their faith in me andgave me the best job in the world – being their Member of Parliament. I have been working hard since to represent them in Westminster and campaignedon a wide range of issues, such as the Grangemouth refinery, the future of busmanufacturing at Alexander Dennis…

‘Reform are now doing their best to reverse the positive work we have been doing.’ Amid the third heatwave so far this summer, Reform-run Durham County Council has submitted a motion to ditch the council’s 2019 climate emergency declaration. Darren Grimes, the former GB News presenter claimed he is tabling the motion “to inject a bit of common bloody sense into Durham County Council”.  Last month, councillors pressed the Reform UK administration on whether they would continue to commit to reducing carbon emissions, to which they responded that they would review the council’s net-zero policies. Mark Wilkes, the climate lead…

The Right is fuming that the government isn’t considering giving Trump the honour of addressing MPs and peers Parliament will not be recalled for Donald Trump during his state visit to the UK, and Nigel Farage is furious. Trump will visit the UK on 17 September, the day after Parliament goes into recess for party conference season.  And the Reform UK leader, who is trying to import Trump’s politics to the UK, with his Doge unit and Maga-style think tank, has claimed Parliament should be specially recalled for the occasion.  But No. 10 has confirmed there are no plans to…

Truss is being mocked for claiming the Greek statues are part of “our national culture” Former prime minister Liz Truss and right-wing group Great British Political Action Committee (GB PAC) have threatened legal action against Keir Starmer over plans to return the Parthenon marbles to Greece. In the letter, organised by GB PAC, they allege that a “covert negotiation” is underway and cite an “accelerating campaign to remove the Elgin Marbles from the British Museum”.  The letter warns that they “reserve the right to seek legal advice on how best to protect the interests of the British public”.  They say…

Lawyers have been hired to challenge Doge’s data grab Reform UK’s controversial Elon Musk-styled Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) unit is hitting major roadblocks.  Lawyers and data handlers at several councils have so far blocked unelected volunteers running the party’s so-called ‘Doge’ team from accessing personally and commercially sensitive data. Reform-led Kent County Council has hired lawyers to push back against Doge’s attempts to access internal data, The Financial Times has reported. A senior Reform figure told the FT that no data-sharing agreements have yet been signed with any Reform-run councils. The source added that there has been “resistance in…

Who appears on money has always been a political choice. A fresh culture war has emerged, not over statues or street names, but over something more ordinary and every day, banknotes. As the Bank of England opens public suggestions for who or what should appear on future currency designs, some right-wing commentators have responded with predictable outrage. Among them is historian David Abulafia, who, writing in the Telegraph, rails against what he sees as the creeping influence of ‘woke’ values on national symbols. Abulafia’s piece is laced with sarcasm. He scoffs at the idea that only the dead can be…