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Articles tagged with Labour Party
A dire week for the Conservatives and a disaster for Labour
by Martin Shapland / 30 Mar 2012 10:07
It's Friday morning and it’s been a long, confusing, week. After government gaffe piled upon government calamity and Labour took a double digit lead for the first time this Parliament, the big story at the end of the week is a Labour by-election meltdown following their hammering by George Galloway in Bradford West.
It’s left me rather in a spin, and the government’s media operation has fared no better. Cameron suffered
Neil Kinnock turns 70
by Caroline Crampton / 28 Mar 2012 11:39
Fresh from the data page of this month's magazine, we bring you a collection of facts you may not have known about Neil Kinnock, in honour of the former Labour leader's seventieth birthday.
Party funding is about the membership
by Emma Burnell / 27 Mar 2012 11:04
Let’s imagine for a moment that the Party funding row is over. That a solution has been found, that donations have been capped and state funding introduced – the Kelly proposals have been adopted in their entirety. It’s by no means a certain scenario, but run with me.
What will parties need to do under these circumstances? How would they need to change?
Firstly and most obviously, their fundraising strategies would
'Cash for access' shows why our politics is a closed shop
by Charlotte Henry / 27 Mar 2012 09:48
It's been one of the worst kept secrets around Wesmintster that the murky world of lobbying, and the issues of party funding that surround it, were going to be the next great political scandal. The recent busting of Bell Pottinger may prove to be a mere starter, if the boasts of former Tory treasurer Peter Cruddas are found to have any foundation.
Do I think David Cameron is corrupt? Well no, not in
A dull Budget could make for an exciting chance for Labour
by Caroline Crampton / 21 Mar 2012 11:38
There is general agreement among commentators, I think, that today’s Budget is not going to be the kind that will thrill and excite you (if they ever are). But then, why should it? We’re halfway through a Parliament, there’s been no significant change in the economic outlook in the last few months, and there isn’t really any more money to play with. As Danny Finkelstein very aptly put it in his Times column
Dugher: 'We've got to demonstrate that Labour is changing'
by Amber Elliott / 16 Mar 2012 16:38
I interviewed Michael Dugher for an article in the current issue of TP about changes in the Labour Party. The full interview can be found here, but below he expands on some of the themes that I didn't have space to include.
On Ed Miliband…
"The phrase Ed [Miliband] used at the PLP recently, was [that opposition] could be described as a 'war of attrition'. It’s a long, hard business…
Ed and Ed preview their Budget thinking
by Amber Elliott / 12 Mar 2012 13:06
The first thing that George Osborne should do in next week's Budget is change course.
That was Ed Miliband's message this afternoon as he and Ed Balls stood in a boiling room on the top floor of the Southbank Centre.
It was their sort of pre-Budget briefing, and their big line was to stress that George Osborne supports tax cuts for those earning above £150,000.
Ed Miliband proposed "clear, costed ways
Cruddas: 'The penny has dropped about Labour's defeat'
by Amber Elliott / 06 Mar 2012 11:27
I spoke to Labour thinker Jon Cruddas for an article in the latest TP. He had a lot to say – some of which didn't make the piece. I've jotted down some of his most interesting comments below.
Cruddas believes that being promoted early on in your time as an MP can be a "double-edged sword".
"It’s a bit difficult for the people who’ve gone in [to frontbench positions], just like it
Video: Ken's campaign launch attack on 'Boris "Two-Jobs" Johnson'
by Simon Fletcher / 29 Feb 2012 16:57
It’s no coincidence that the prime minister took time out to attack Ken Livingstone not once but twice at PMQs.
It took place on the same day that Alice Thomson in The Times (£) reported that after a meeting with Boris Johnson and Lynton Crosby, No 10 found the incumbent mayor’s campaign ‘underwhelming’ and short of a simple ‘retail offer’ for voters.
Cameron has clearly decided that
David Miliband launches lecture series
by Amber Elliott / 13 Feb 2012 10:45
David Miliband and Jon Cruddas are to hold a second series of their Labour's Future seminars in the coming weeks.
Among the expected speakers are Liberal Democrat peer Shirley Williams and Will Hutton, who was commissioned by the prime minister and the chancellor to look into fair pay.
The seminar involving Hutton, and chaired by Miliband, is entitled: "How did we get into this mess and how do we get out of
What Bill Gates told Labour MPs this week
by Jamie Reed / 27 Jan 2012 13:56
When Peter Mandelson returned to government during the final years of the last Labour administration, he outlined a new policy approach that had been missing from British politics for decades. The phrase he coined to describe this was "industrial activism". Overdue, essential and exciting, this policy approach was right then and it is right now. To distill this policy to its essence, Mandelson meant that economic growth and recovery, with all of the social
The days of double-digit poll leads are over
by Richard Darlington / 24 Jan 2012 15:15
Long live coalition. That’s coalition government as a consequence of a hung Parliament.
The last few opinion polls have prompted a round of reflection and comment mainly as the back end of the ‘Ed Miliband’s new year’ story. Earlier this week YouGov gave the Conservatives a three point lead, the biggest since December 2010. Today, YouGov has a Labour comeback to a one point lead, but that has been ignored because Guardian/ICM has
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