News and Opinion

Former English Defence League leader Tommy Robinson has been arrested on suspicion of assault. Robinson was detained after police received a report of an assault on a man at Hollywood Retail Park in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, shortly after 8.30pm on Thursday. He is also being questioned in custody on suspicion of a public order offence, along […]

Protestors have staged a ‘die-in’ protest in the streets outside Dominic Cummings’ home calling for his resignation over his lockdown rule-breaking and the government’s handling of coronavirus. Around 20 campaigners joined demonstrations outside the north London home of Boris Johnson’s senior aide on Thursday evening as they resumed calls for him to resign. Protestors wore […]

Tim Davie will take a pay cut when he replaces Tony Hall as the director general of the BBC. The chief executive of BBC Studios, the corporation’s commercial production and distribution arm, will earn £525,000 a year when he takes over the post, down from the £600,000 he earned in 2018/19. He has also agreed […]

A pollster has suggested that new polling numbers indicate that Sir Keir Starmer has help ‘detoxify’ the Labour Party since becoming leader in April. Ipsos MORI ‘party favourability’ chart which shows the gap between people who view the Labour Party favourably or unfavourably is shrinking; Ipsos MORI, Twitter – Credit: Archant A snap poll carried […]

Despite beating Jeremy Corbyn at the last election, Boris Johnson appears to be making the same mistakes in his leadership techniques. Up to now Johnson had a triple strength political honeymoon, generated by huge electoral success, ‘getting Brexit done’ (part one, anyway), and widespread deep sympathy after his Covid-19 brush with death. His government’s risible […]

Tory Brexiteer MP Mark Francois has swapped clapping on a Thursday night for a pint, after he was spotted with an alcoholic drink on a Westminstrer street. Despite pubs remaining closed for drinking during lockdown until July 4th, the Tory MP was spotted on Marylebone Street with what appeared to be an IPA. ‘My mate […]

Labour politician David Lammy has told a minister the UK is a ‘laughing stock’ because of its coronavirus response on BBC Question Time. Lammy told junior business minister Nadhim Zahawi his government needed to ‘get a grip’ of its handling of the coronavirus outbreak. ‘We’ve got the worst rate, in fact we’ve got a higher […]

Talks between Britain and the EU have ended with little sign of progress on a post-Brexit trade deal. The latest four days of negotiations marked the final opportunity for the two sides to move the process forward before a potentially make-or-break high-level summit later this month. The UK has until the end of June to […]

A senior official in Northern Ireland has warned there are just three weeks left to finalise plans for a ‘smooth end’ to the Brexit transition period. Measures must be in place to carry out checks on goods moving between the region and Great Britain after the UK leaves the EU to comply with the Northern […]

Think you know Europe? Take our latest lockdown quiz As a New European reader, you probably reckon you know the continent inside out. Test yourself with our fiendish quiz…

EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier has warned there will be a hard border in Northern Ireland if Brexit talks fail to end in a deal. Barnier said a hard border would be inevitable unless both sides struck an agreement before the December 31 deadline. Accusing the UK of backtracking on its commitments in the Withdrawal […]

Readers have their say on the government’s response to the coronavirus, and how Dominic Cummings has only made things worse. So, our new not-quite-yet world-beating NHS Test and Trace system is, uh, on the way to being up-and-running and it might take a few weeks to get it fully in place. Of course, it was […]

Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg has quoted Margaret Thatcher as he dismissed calls for a Brexit extension. The former European Research Group chair evoked the former Tory prime minister when he flatly denied any hopes of an extension, telling MPs: ‘No, no, no.’ Quoting sections of the Thatcher’s 1990 speech amid calls for greater central control […]

Piers Morgan has encouraged the government to continue the boycott of Good Morning Britain because it’s led to the ‘highest ever ratings’ for the programme. Morgan tweeted: ‘BREAKING: Good Morning Britain had its highest ever ratings yesterday: 27% audience share, peaking at 32%. ‘The longer the govt boycotts us, the more people are tuning in. […]

Governments in Scotland and Wales have joined the Northern Ireland assembly in pressing Westminster to seek an extension to Brexit trade talks. Holyrood has claimed continuing the transition period for two years would boost Scotland’s economy by up to £1.8 billion. Scottish cabinet minister Michael Russell claimed there was a ‘growing common-sense coalition’ pushing for […]

Prime minister Boris Johnson was caught breaking social distancing rules on camera minutes after debating their importance during Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs). Johnson was seen greeting MPs on his way out of the Chamber following his debate Sir Keir Starmer. Cameras in the Commons snapped the prime minster up close with two MPs as the […]

Jacob Rees-Mogg has been told to resign over his ‘shambolic’ handling of voting arrangements in the House of Commons, which was dubbed the Mogg-conga’ by one MP. Complaints have been made about requiring members to travel across the UK to attend Westminster in person after the government dropped virtual proceedings, which had allowed them to […]

Attorney general Suella Braverman has said it was ‘absurd’ to suggest her tweet of support for Dominic Cummings was a ‘legal opinion’ during a debate in the Commons. Braverman was responding to claims put forward by shadow solicitor general, Ellie Reeves, that she ‘undermined’ the rule of law and her role as attorney general by […]

A Tory Brexiteer MP has caused anger after he responded to an email about Black Lives Matter protests in America by claiming that those rioting ‘have it coming’ if Trump allows the military to intervene. Desmond Swayne responded to an email from a constituent asking if he could support the US after it threatened to […]

Who is on the BBC Question Time panel tonight? Here’s your full guide Tonight’s Question Time comes virtually from Southampton, with audience members submitting questions from the self-styled Gateway to the World via video. But who’s on the panel? Here’s your complete guide… Nadhim Zahawi Who? Junior business minister The co-founder of polling firm YouGov […]

Westminster MPs are concerned that new Commons voting arrangements might put them in contact with parliamentarians who have coronavirus and make them potential spreaders. Opposition MPs have claimed the new voting system puts them and their constituencies at risk of a second spread of the coronavirus. The government has passed legislation forcing MPs back to […]

ANDREW ADONIS finds parallels between the situation in Hong Kong and certain flashpoints of the Cold War. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab during a media briefing in Downing Street. Photo: Pippa Fowles/10 Downing Street/Crown Copyright/PA Wire – Credit: PA Just as we were all Berliners during Stalin’s blockade of 1948 and Khrushchev’s construction of the Berlin […]

MICHAEL WHITE on the week lockdown started to lift and revealed danger to come. Just as the Minneapolis riots over the death of handcuffed George Floyd were starting to spread to other American cities one of our own newspapers reported relieved surprise among the experts that our own Covid-19 inspired lockdown had not generated civil […]

A no-deal Brexit could jeopardise the UK’s access to medicine just as a second wave of coronavirus could hit. The pharmaceuticals industry has previously told the government that it needs a stockpile of at least six weeks worth of medicines, but stock was being ‘depleted’ as a result of the first wave, with the focus […]

The challenges that lie ahead for Britain cannot be solved by one party or political ideology alone, says ALASTAIR CAMPBELL. British politician and economist Lord William Henry Beveridge (1879 – 1963), working in his study at University College, Oxford. Photo: Felix Man/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images – Credit: Getty Images At the height of the Johnson/Cummings […]

BONNIE GREER says George Floyd’s death is an old and horrible story – and one that we will continue to hear from America. My teen years were full of burning cities, and one burning prison. Attica. We called them ‘urban uprisings’. Before the 1960s, they were called ‘race riots’. My first produced play, 1919, was […]

Ed Davey has launched is campaign to become the permanent leader of the Liberal Democrats. The Lib Dems have been without a permanent leader since Jo Swinson was ousted as an MP in December’s general election. The new leader will be elected in August and Sir Ed, the acting leader of the party, put efforts […]

Business secretary Alok Sharma might have had a bout of ‘severe hayfever’ when he appeared visibly ill in the House of Commons, according to a cabinet colleague, who defended the government over its new arrangements for the Commons. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Northern Ireland secretary Brandon Lewis said: ‘I don’t want to […]

The UK has reported more deaths from the coronavirus in one day than all 27 EU member states combined. The UK saw 359 more people have die from Covid-19 on Wednesday compared with 332 across the EU. According to a tweet by Euronews political editor Darren McCaffrey, the highest single count of deaths in Europe […]

Boris Johnson has urged European workers who left the UK during lockdown to return – despite promoting an Immigration Bill making it more difficult for them to live and work here. During the general election campaign Johnson criticised the numbers of EU nationals coming to live in the UK as he promoted immigration proposals which […]

A radio broadcaster has delivered an epic rant about the state of British politics – which he found both baffling and ‘hilarious’ at the same time. Radio presenter James O’Brien said forcing MPs back into the Commons the same week the UK registered more Covid-19 deaths in a single day than the EU combined and […]

Boris Johnson and ministers may have to isolate after Alok Sharma became unwell in the House of Commons shortly after meeting the prime minister for 45 minutes. The prime minister’s official spokesman said the PM and chancellor Rishi Sunak held a 45-minute socially distanced meeting on the economy with Sharma on Tuesday. The spokesman said […]