Election 2015: Nick Robinson, one man who’d welcome a second election

Lib Dems ‘stuck in no man’s land’

Posted at 09.45, Fri 13 Feb 2015

It only gets worse for the Lib Dem leader: having learnt yesterday that the party’s share of the national vote had dropped to six per cent (see above), Nick Clegg woke up this morning to a chilly blast from a former Lib Dem minister and one-time ally.

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In an interview with The Independent, Jeremy Browne accuses the Lib Dem leader not of teaming up with the Tories in the first place – the normal complaint against Clegg – but of selfishly deciding in 2012 to distance himself from the Tories in order to save his own skin.

As a result, says Browne, the Lib Dems are getting no credit for Britain’s economic recovery. "We are in no man's land,” says Browne. “We don't have a distinctive proposition." And it will be difficult to recover from the losses the party now faces on 7 May.

Read The Independent interview in full

Voters return to main party showdown

Posted at 09.45, Fri 13 Feb 2015

The other big losers in the Ipsos-MORI poll (see above) are Ukip. They have slipped into single figures – nine per cent - for the first time since November 2013.

So who’s gained? Both Labour and the Conservatives. Labour are in the lead with 36 per cent and the Tories are on 34 per cent: it’s the first time since December 2013 that the two parties’ combined support has topped 70 per cent.

As the Evening Standard’s political editor Joe Murphy writes, “It suggests the public are finally focusing on a showdown between the two would-be prime ministers as the election countdown kicks in.”

Read Joe Murphy’s full report here

Harman and the ‘You’re too pretty’ row

Posted at 09.45, Fri 13 Feb 2015

Harriet Harman has denied a claim made by Karen Danczuk, the wife of Rochdale’s Labour MP Simon Danczuk, that she said Karen was “too pretty” for politics and should join Girls Aloud instead.

“It’s inconceivable I would have ever said that," Labour deputy leader insists. "I have always believed it’s what you do in politics, not what you look like. I have never discouraged a woman from getting involved in politics on the basis of their looks.”

As Jack Bremer writes today, Mrs Danczuk has 38,000 Twitter followers who look out for her latest “cleavage selfies”. Some are asking: did Harman mean “too pretty” or “too petty”?

Read Jack Bremer’s report in full

Peter Oborne: In praise of Ed Miliband

Posted at 09.45, Fri 13 Feb 2015

If you step back and ignore the press headlines – the bacon sandwich, the geeky looks, etcetera – Ed Miliband “becomes a far more interesting, significant and distinctive figure”, writes Peter Oborne in The Spectator.

During his term as Labour leader, he has been bold enough to confront the power of Rupert Murdoch (by challenging his bid for the remaining shares in BSkyB), he has taken on the abuse of corporate power, he has opposed the Whitehall establishment by voting against Britain joining a war against President Assad’s regime, and, most recently, he has ensured that all Labour MPs back the recognition of the Palestinian state.

Yet for showing courage and principle, he has been trashed and ridiculed. “Consider this,” Oborne concludes, “if Ed Miliband does become prime minister, he will have done so without owing anything to anybody.”

Read Peter Oborne’s article in the new edition of The Spectator, on sale now, or online here

IDS: 'free council house if you come off benefits'

Posted at 09.30, Thurs 12 Feb 2015

Iain Duncan Smith is back with one of his “big ideas” – and, not for the first time, the Tory Work and Pensions Secretary is “channeling” Margaret Thatcher.

In a radical extension of Mrs T’s “right to buy” campaign, he wants to reward families who come off benefits for more than a year with the “gift” of their council home – and he wants the proposal written into the Tory election manifesto.

Such tenants would cease to be eligible for housing benefit, The Times reports. They would not pay anything up front, but if they sold their property within three years - according to one model under discussion – they would have to pay 35 per cent of the proceeds in tax. The amount of tax payable would fall the longer they owned the property.

It’s all part of an IDS plan to extend the “right to buy” to millions of working families who are currently housing association tenants. As the Daily Mail reports, it could help attract the votes of C2 families currently eyeing up Ukip - “the skilled working classes who helped to deliver Lady Thatcher’s three election victories”.

There will inevitably be a backlash – again, not for the first time when IDS puts on his thinking-cap. It will come, The Times warns, “from those who believe it is unfair to reward the recently jobless when most homebuyers have to work for years or decades to own their first home”.

Is ‘Horrid Ed’ Miliband ready to be sued?

Posted at 09.30, Thurs 12 Feb 2015

'Horrid Ed' certainly beats 'Red Ed' and the Labour leader has David Cameron to thank for the new label: apparently, when leaving the Chamber after yesterday's unusually personal exchanges at Prime Minister's Questions, Cameron told government ministers: “Ed was personally horrid to me because he was losing.”

Being 'horrid' involved Miliband telling the PM to his face: “He's a dodgy Prime Minister, surrounded by dodgy donors... There's something rotten at the heart of the Tory Party and it's you.”

During the exchanges about the HSBC scandal, Miliband asked whether Cameron would "explain what steps he is going to take to find out about the tax avoidance activities of Lord Fink?”

To which Fink has responded by challenging the Labour leader to repeat the allegation outside the Commons where he won't be protected by parliament privilege. The Mole says it look like 'Horrid Ed' plans to do just that.

Read the Mole's column in full

Tories target Lib Dem heartland seats

Posted at 09.30, Thurs 12 Feb 2015

Yesterday’s mystery of why the Tories are apparently giving up fighting certain seats may have been solved: it seems they are concentrating their efforts on winning a swath of Lib Dem seats in the southwest of England.

One in three election visits made in January by the prime minister was to the southwest, says Peter Kellner of YouGov, and he believes there’s a good reason for that: support for the Lib Dems in their heartland has fallen from 35 per cent in 2010 to only 16 per cent in January, according to YouGov polling, while the Tories are on 37 per cent across the region, ahead of Labour (21%), Ukip (17%) and the Greens (8%).

As The Times reports, these figures could see the Lib Dems lose all but three of their 15 seats in the region - Yeovil, Bath and Thornbury & Yate – to the Tories on 7 May.

Read The Times article in full

Believe in me, Farage urges readers

Posted at 09.30, Thurs 12 Feb 2015

Nigel Farage has been a little quiet recently, with Ukip flatlining or even falling in the polls as media attention reverts to the main parties. Today he bounces back with an article in the Daily Telegraph in which he outlines his ‘Vision for Britain’.

“We believe that the backbone of this country – small business owners, families and indeed the legal migrants who come here to better their lives – know that we no longer have a capitalism that works for all. Instead, we have corporatism, lavishing attention on big corporations while ignoring the little man. Only Ukip will address and tackle this imbalance.”

Farage’s core message is simple: in order to protect “the little man”, Ukip is going to need “a sizeable number of Ukip MPs” in the Commons, holding the main parties to account. In short, “I urge you, when you go to the ballot box, when you send in your postal vote: believe. Believe in Britain. Believe in real change. Believe me when I say this is not just another election and yours is not just another vote.”

Read Nigel Farage’s article in full