Will Tony Blair help or hinder the campaign for a second referendum? December 16, 2018 Of the four living former Prime Ministers, three are united in vocal and (to a varying degree) active opposition to current government policy. John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have taken very different approaches to life after Downing Street but what unites them now is support for a second referendum. Major has called for [...]
Theresa May attacks Tony Blair for ‘subverting’ Brexit process with call for a second vote December 16, 2018 Theresa May has launched a stinging attack on former Prime Minister Tony Blair, branding his efforts to bring about a second referendum an “insult to the office he once held”. The Prime Minister, who has endured a string of recent setbacks including defeats in parliament, a leadership challenge and a difficult trip to Brussels, accused her [...]
Blair says UK must prepare for a second Brexit referendum December 14, 2018 Former Prime Minister Tony Blair is to say that the UK and EU should prepare for a second referendum because parliament is unlikely to be able to agree on a Brexit deal. Blair will say it is perverse that the UK and the EU are preparing for a potentially economically damaging Brexit without any deal, [...]
Bored of Brexit? How the B-word went from advertiser’s dream to branding disaster December 11, 2018 The word “Brexit” is unavoidable. When we pick up a newspaper, turn on the TV, or log in to social media, the B-word follows us everywhere. For many of the world’s largest brands, this would be a dream. The likes of Nike, Coca-Cola and Amazon spend billions of pounds for the kind of ubiquity that [...]
Tony Blair: There’s no point in May pressing forward with parliament vote on ‘half in, half out’ Brexit deal December 6, 2018 Tony Blair believes Theresa May should scrap next week’s vote on her Brexit deal as she is about to hit a “brick wall at speed”. The former Prime Minister told journalists on Thursday afternoon May needs to begin finding a compromise that will pass through the Commons instead of pushing ahead with her “half in, [...]
DEBATE: Should we be concerned that the Brexit secretary didn’t realise the extent to which we rely on Dover-Calais trade? November 9, 2018 Should we be concerned that the Brexit secretary didn’t realise the extent to which we rely on Dover-Calais trade? Richard Angell, director of the think tank Progress, says YES. The admission by Brexit secretary Dominic Raab that he “hadn’t quite understood” how “reliant on the Dover-Calais crossing” the UK is would be funny if it [...]
Forget Trump, the midterms are about populism November 6, 2018 When the results of the US midterms start to come in this evening, some here in the UK will roll their eyes and think “what a crazy country”. Others will wonder why Britain and America are such anomalies with Brexit and Trump, and wish that we could be more like, say, Germany. The truth is [...]
Former Cabinet secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood dies of cancer aged 56 November 4, 2018 Former Cabinet secretary and head of the civil service Sir Jeremy Heywood has died of cancer, aged 56. Heywood, who served in Downing Street under Labour Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and Tory leaders David Cameron and Theresa May, retired from the civil service on 24 October to focus on his cancer treatment. Downing Street confirmed [...]
Richard Branson pulls out of $1bn investment talks with Saudi Arabia over missing journalist October 12, 2018 Virgin's Richard Branson said he had scrapped talks with Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund about a $1bn (£755m) investment into its space ventures late last night, in light of the disappearance of a prominent Washington Post journalist. "What has reportedly happened in Turkey around the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, if proved true, would clearly change [...]
Bereft of new ideas, Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party is dead set on sticking its head in the sand October 3, 2018 One of the most dispiriting aspects of the Labour Party conference, which ended last week, is how deeply conservative the political left has become. Its remedies for Britain’s problems look to the past and not the future. Far from embracing new technology, the left is hostile to it. This was not always the case. Labour [...]