Politics

There are these peak learning moments in all our lives that don't necessarily happen in classrooms, or from reading books, not even from sitting on your grandfather's knee while he teaches you the good rules of living. Certainly all those can all apply, yet sometimes true learning moments come out of nowhere, unexpected from their sources and as such those become the vivid ones, the ones where some important aspect of the world reveals itself with the shocking vividness of...

Almost three-quarters of bets in the next Conservative leader market are now being placed on Jacob Ress-Mogg as rumours circulate that the MP is planning to launch a leadership bid. According to betting data Rees-Mogg's odds of becoming the next Conservative leader have been cut to 6/1 as the market starts to heat up. You can also find odds as short as 7/1 for him to be the next Prime Minister. Reports this weekend have suggested Mr Rees-Mogg was looking to launch a bid...

As we move into what by rights should be a relaxing summer weekend – the Premier League is back, the trees are still green, books to read and lawnchairs to sit on – unless we choose to completely ignore the news our nerves are as frayed as a university student heading into a final exam with a hangover. The party's over, now what the hell do we do? The first headline I saw this Friday morning was on The Guardian:...

'If we had an effective electoral law leading Brexiteers would now be in jail' David Davis’ former chief of staff says Boris Johnson should be in prison. The striking comments come just a week after Lord Sugar also claimed that Boris Johnson and Michael Gove should be behind bars for Brexit ‘lies’. Last week Lord Sugar told BBC Radio 5 Live that the pair should ‘100 per cent absolutely be thrown in jail for claiming the NHS would be £350...

Labour have warned today of a major rise in the amount of NHS land being put up for sale as the Tories’ mismanagement of NHS finances leaves hospitals struggling to cope. Labour have today published new research showing: · The amount of NHS land under consideration for sale has more than doubled in the past year, to over 1300 hectares. · The Government have refused to make public details for more than half of the available area in their annual...

"Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” That was a quote from Samuel Johnson, a man who knew a thing or two about snappy aphorisms in times of crisis. And, as befits the reputation of a man whose Boswell recorded life has glazed the eyes of students for over three hundred years, of course he was right. Crises, catastrophe or plain old monosyllabic doom impose on...

It was Frank Zappa who described politics as 'the entertainment division of the military-industrial complex.' I mention that wonderfully cynical observation by the late musician as if there was ever a time for cynicism, we're living in it. Cynics aren't the same as pessimists or satirists. A pessimist looks at the world, sees it is wrong, and hides. A satirist looks at the world, sees it is wrong, and exaggerates its flaws. A cynic however looks at the world, sees...

Brexit may not have happened if Britons were brighter because not enough people grew up with access to higher education, according to new research. With education the predominant factor dividing those who voted Remain or Leave, researchers from the University of Leicester reckon greater access to higher education may have reversed the result of the 2016 referendum. The paper, published in the journal World Development, suggests that greater access to higher and further education can produce different political outcomes. They...

Older people who voted for Brexit have ‘comprehensively shafted the young’. That’s the view of Sir Vince Cable, writing for the Mail on Sunday this weekend. He accuses over-65s of being ‘self-declared martyrs’ who claim leaving the EU is worth the cost. ‘The old have comprehensively shafted the young'... 'And the old have had the last word about Brexit, imposing a world view coloured by nostalgia for an imperial past on a younger generation much more comfortable with modern Europe.’...