Parliament

Power struggle, by James Close

15 March 2010 | James Close

Suddenly, the prospect of a Conservative election victory is far from certain. Government ministers and strategists have a bounce in their step not seen since Gordon Brown’s very first months as prime minister. Read more...

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Tough call on care costs, by Richard Humphries

27 February 2010 | Richard Humphries

This year’s general election could be the first in which social care is a key campaign issue. Everyone agrees that sorting out the wicked issue of paying for care needs consensus. But electioneering is about conflict, demanding that each party demonstrates loudly how different they and their policies are from each other.  So the collapse of private, cross-party talks aimed at establishing a political consensus, and the welter of misunderstanding and mutual recriminations that followed, should not come as a great surprise given the proximity of polling day.   Read more...

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Getting it Wright? by Guy Lodge

18 November 2009 | Guy Lodge

It seems someone from Tony Wright’s House of Commons reform committee has been speaking to the Times, which recently provided a sneak preview of the committee’s main recommendations. The decision to leak aspects of the report to the media is amusing only in that the committee contains many MPs who regularly demonise the government for making announcements to the press before they do so in the citadel of our democracy. If you can’t beat’em join’em. Read more

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Clearing the decks, by Peter Riddell

8 October 2009 | Peter Riddell

Parliament faces a tough few months. The party conferences are over and MPs and peers are returning after a near 12-week recess. But some familiar problems are about to reappear. The expenses row, which has been largely dormant since July, is set to reignite, threatening not only the future of many MPs but also to dominate the period running up to the general election. Read more...

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Today vs Parliament: the people’s right to know

24 June 2009 | Conor Ryan

The modernising new Speaker John Bercow has a lot going for him. He has successfully overseen his first Prime Ministers’ Questions, earning plaudits for his timely interventions and brisk business-like manner. Read more

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Bercow reforming Parliament – what should he do?

23 June 2009 | Colin Talbot

colin_talbotSpeaker Bercow clearly has his work cut out for him. Not least because his own former Conservative party colleagues clearly loathe him and some have been making extremely injudicious statements about getting rid of him as soon as they get into power. Read more

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