By Mark WallaceFollow Mark on Twitter. There's always been something of the religious mantra about the Left's refusal to believe that the British private sector was capable of picking up the slack by creating jobs to replace those lost in the public sector. Perhaps it's a lack of imagination which leaves them unable to conceive of jobs […]
By Peter HoskinFollow Peter on Twitter Paul Goodman recently wondered if Jonathan Freedland reads ConservativeHome before writing about us. Now we have cause to wonder whether Polly Toynbee reads Tim Montgomerie before writing about him. Last week, she described him as the "master-manipulator" of the Conservative Party. Yesterday, she wrote that he was "dominating the scene […]
By Matthew BarrettFollow Matthew on Twitter A fine, cut-out-and-keep column from Polly Toynbee today. She kicks off by calling this government "small-staters": "So far, the small-staters are losing. A small state means – and Cameron has not budged – a smaller police force and shrunken social programmes, with more potential for anarchy."
by Paul Goodman Follow Paul on Twitter. Charles Moore's recent scourging of Britain's banking elite struck a nerve – and not only among bankers – so the new campaign trailed in today's Guardian to rein it in may strike another one. The campaign says that – "A 1,000-strong "public jury" should be selected at random […]
By Matthew BarrettFollow Matthew on Twitter There are many forces inside and connected with the Labour Party that are discouraging modernisation. The unions. The lack of private sector voices in the parliamentary party. And, the subject of this post, the Left-wing pundits. There is a thoughtful centre left commentariat but there is a much bigger […]
By Matthew BarrettFollow Matthew on Twitter One of the left's main objections to the Coalition's Free Schools policy since the election last year has been the possibility of religious groups setting up schools. This left-wing opposition has involved smearing people of faith and whipping up fears about the spread of religious schools (as if the […]
By Tim MontgomerieFollow Tim on Twitter. Earlier this week Paul Goodman wrote about the failures of some private providers of residential care. He called for better regulation and suggested local control of care watchdogs. Polly Toynbee offers less reasoned reflections about Southern Cross' financial difficulties and the Winterbourne View scandal in her Guardian column today. […]
By Paul Goodman According to Guido Fawkes/Paul Staines, who has today issued a blast of the trumpet against the monstrous regiment of looters, the Guardian isn't averse itself to tax avoidance (which of course, unlike tax evasion, is perfectly legal) – see here, here and here. The man in the basement with a match, a […]
By Tim Montgomerie Earlier Tristram Hunt argued that Tories wanted the poor in Victorian workhouses. Polly Toynbee thinks we want a "final solution" for the poor… Hat-tip: Guido Fawkes.
From Polly Toynbee's Guardian column: "If Conservatism cannot win a majority under dream circumstances with every fair wind blowing in its favour, it has become a minority rump belief in British life. Labour was on its knees with a singularly disliked leader. Cameron was better by far than the Tories' last four leaders, astute in […]
In her Guardian column today, Polly Toynbee dismisses the businessmen attacking Labour's planned rise in national insurance and laments that Labour courted business and "never confronted the worsening dysfunctions of modern capitalism". Seemingly despairing at what Labour can propose to win the election she proposes adopting a number of policies being suggested by Labour campaign […]
Yesterday I blogged about Treasury Chief Secretary Liam Byrne's statement that Labour would not introduce any new tax rises if re-elected. Notwithstanding the fact that the credibility of that assertion is seriously questionable, Polly Toynbee is less than enamoured of the idea, as she writes in this morning's Guardian: "The budget is 10 days away […]
Polly Toynbee in The Guardian: "Mandelson is profoundly wrong and out of date to accuse others of "class war". The 50p tax rate and tax on bonuses are not some "core-vote" strategy. Polls and focus groups prove them so popular that the Tories dare not vote against them. Mandelson's claim that taxing the rich makes […]
The year isn't 48 hours old and two Labour MPs – Barry Sheerman and Greg Pope – have called on Brown to go. Polly Toynbee uses her first Guardian column of the year to slam Gordon Brown's record and to predict defeat if he stays as Labour leader: "There is nothing to celebrate in the […]