Category Archives: Politics

Britain, Economic, Government, Politics, Society

Starmer needs to recalibrate the mood

LABOUR PARTY

ELECTED to office less than three months ago, the Labour Party has begun its annual conference – this year in Liverpool – already weighed down by incumbency: rows over gifts from wealthy party donors and tickets to football games as well as rifts about Keir Starmer’s chief of staff’s pay are feeding into the public disquiet. These come amidst the burden of government in difficult economic circumstances. Coupled with the low public trust and the needless surplus of gloom, the political honeymoon period for Labour is well and truly over. We knew change was high up on the political agenda for Labour, but since day one of government it has set out with the explicit objective of dampening expectations of how soon change might come. The gloom is palpable.

There is a degree of urgency for Starmer to recalibrate the mood with a sense of optimism and purpose. He needs to give the country reasons to be glad of a Labour government in ways that go beyond relief at no longer being governed by Tory rule. New governments often come to power blaming the last for what it has inherited. The PM has given the nation an unvarnished account of the dismal legacy left for Labour; a bleak audit that covers a record of political and financial maladministration.

Conservative ministers, driven by ideological fanaticism and self-serving cynicism, squandered energy and vital resources on ill-conceived, unworkable policies. Public services were starved of the means by which they could effectively operate. With that in mind, it is easy to see that Sir Keir has a difficult job because the country is in a dire mess. Putting things right will take time. Nevertheless, that morose message has been bitterly soured by a performance of fiscal discipline, delivered without a hint of uplifting accompaniment.

The prime minister says things will get worse before they get better. His chancellor, Rachel Reeves, cites “black holes” in the budget, withdraws winter fuel payments for all but the poorest pensioners, and continually pledges that there is more pain to come. Ms Reeves’ argument is that government departments under the Conservatives overspent by £22bn in the budget and that deep cuts are needed to compensate. This is a self-imposed restriction that stems from ill-advised fiscal rules. The force of that constraint, and the zeal with which it is applied as austerity across Whitehall, is also a matter of political choice.

The government’s strategists argue that adherence to Tory spending limits was a “non-negotiable” condition of persuading the public that Labour could be trusted on the economy. Possibly, possibly not. There is no way to test the counterfactual scenario, where Ms Reeves could have fought the election with a wider range of tax-raising options still open. However, the decision to lean into unpopularity so hard, so fast, and without a countervailing narrative of hope looks like very poor strategic judgment.

Labour’s election manifesto contained plenty of reasons to expect a substantial departure from a grim status quo. A marked progressive shift was promised in the areas of workers’ rights, a robust commitment to net zero, improved relations with the rest of Europe and, perhaps most significantly, readiness to embrace a more interventionist model of economic management, including public ownership of utility companies.

The Starmerite script contains rather too much fiscal conservatism, but the hope on the left of the party is that there is a social democratic framework at its core. That would express the opposite of the Tory conviction that government’s main function is to facilitate market supremacy and then get out of the way. Many Labour MPs, activists, and Labour supporting people in the country will feel unsure which of the two strands – cringing continuity or bold departure – will dominate. Keir Starmer’s task is to answer in terms that give hope of meaningful change to come.

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Britain, Government, Immigration, Politics, Society

Stopping the small boats. Labour is doing well.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

TWO MONTHS after taking office, there are tentative signs Keir Starmer and the Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, may just be starting to get to grips with the Government’s most significant – and seemingly intractable – problem. Stopping the small boats.

Recent headlines have been telling a very different story. “Migrant crossings top 20,000 so far this year,” announced the BBC in the last few days. “Record numbers of people have crossed the Channel in small boats since January,” declared the Guardian. Neither headline was from a media outlet exactly famed for highlighting the perils and extreme dangers of illegal migration.

But inside the corridors of Government, they’ve been crunching the numbers, and they paint a different picture. The line Labour’s political opponents have been trying to peddle is of a new liberal administration losing control of the nation’s borders by axing the deterrent supposedly provided by the much-maligned Rwanda deportation scheme.

Yet, in reality, the actual figures show Starmer performing slightly better than his predecessors.

Our new Prime Minister hit the dubious milestone of 6,000 new arrivals on August 27, the 54th day of his premiership. Liz Truss reached it after just 29 days, Rishi Sunak after 38.

Similarly, the period between the start of the year and election day saw the highest number of small boat arrivals on record, with more than 13,000 people landing on Britain’s shores.

But since then, the rate of new arrivals has actually fallen – it is currently 25 per cent lower than the 25,000 who had arrived by this stage in 2022. And that’s despite the warm weather and calm seas of the past month.

Ministers believe there are several reasons for this positive turnaround. The first is a decision to redeploy the huge resources the Home Office was funnelling – and failing – to get the Rwanda flights off the ground. One of the first acts of the new Home Secretary was to move 300 officials off the Rwanda scheme, and on to ordinary deportations.

This produced immediate results. Although it was implemented with little fanfare, on August 23 a flight left the UK with 220 illegal migrants on board. Ministers refuse to reveal the destination for reasons of diplomatic protocol, but it represented the biggest single-day deportation in British history. It was processed without the last-minute legal wrangling and recrimination normally associated with previous removal efforts. Ostensibly, one of the reasons for this improved efficiency is the burgeoning working relationship between the Home Secretary and the Director General of Immigration Enforcement, Bas Javid.

Mr Javid, a former police officer, impressed Ms Cooper during the “access talks” that took place before Labour entered office.

Javid, the brother of the former Tory home secretary, Sajid Javid, made two important recommendations that Cooper has decided to implement. The first was to focus on the removal of illegal migrants from those countries with “low grant rates”. In other words, those nations where there is virtually no chance of an asylum request being approved and options for a successful legal challenge are much more limited.

The second was to align those removals with enhanced operational intelligence on where those particular illegal migrants are operating within the black economy. For example, it was discovered a large number of those with low grant rates are working in carwashes, nail bars, and some specific areas of the hospitality sector. So, the decision was taken to start prioritising raids on those sectors. And it’s working.

A third component of the Government’s strategy is down to Keir Starmer’s own personal “obsession” with smashing the people-smuggling gangs. It’s one of those issues that invariably takes him back to his time as Director of Public Prosecutions: he’s wholly committed with stopping the boats. The Prime Minister is convinced we can take these gangs down, smash them, and destroy their business models.

As part of this process, Labour’s Eliot Ness believes the key is not just preventing the smugglers from launching their boats from the beaches of France but tackling their operation “upstream”. In particular, he has demanded a new emphasis on targeting the corridor that operates between Germany and France and is used to transport the large dinghies that carry the migrants to the South Coast of England. A crackdown on human-traffickers is very much a priority for Sir Keir Starmer’s Government. Mr Ness is the US lawman whose team of Untouchables brought down Al Capone.

Analysis by the National Crime Agency indicates the clampdown is already having an impact. The larger dinghies operated by the smugglers carry an average of 50 people. Since 2018 there have been 32 instances of boats with higher occupancy rates, and a third of those have been intercepted since the election.

In addition, UK and French border officers have noticed an increasing number of engine failures and dinghies failing to make it out of French waters.

This shows the smugglers are finding it more difficult to secure the boats and equipment they need to facilitate the crossings – helped by shutting the German corridor. But the fight with the profiteers in human misery is set to be a protracted one. The Prime Minister, Home Secretary, and their Cabinet colleagues are a long, long way from declaring victory.

They are well aware that the traffickers will adapt their own tactics. And there’s a recognition they are in part at the mercy of the elements, with a mild autumn and winter potentially reversing the successes of the summer.

There’s also an acceptance within Government that to really break the people-smugglers’ stranglehold some major new deterrent policy may have to be unveiled. With the Rwanda scheme deemed a costly shambles, Labour might have to look at some sort of offshore processing model in order to send a firm signal.

Rishi Sunak famously pledged, “We will finally stop the boats”. His failure to do so cost him his premiership.

We will not be hearing Keir Starmer making the same rash promises. But, there is no doubt, Labour believe they are in a war with the small-boat traffickers. And, so far, in these early days of rule, they are doing a good job in smashing the gangs.

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Britain, Government, Israel, Middle East, Politics, Society, United States

Escalating tensions could induce a wider war

MIDDLE EAST

SOME are wondering whether the blizzard of missiles, rockets, and drones blasted from Lebanon into Israel in the early hours of yesterday may have been no more than a preliminary.

The shelling could have been much worse but for a series of earlier Israeli air strikes designed to pre-empt plans by Hezbollah to launch an even bigger wave of rockets.

The Israeli air force struck at thousands of rocket launchers and bunkers housing everything from antiquated Soviet Katyusha systems to modern Iranian missiles.

Many of the missiles fired from Lebanon can do serious damage if they hit a target, but as it happens they are mostly easy for the Israeli air defences to detect and destroy.

Nonetheless, this latest fusillade serves to further deplete Israel’s defensive capability – notably, the Iron Dome system – thereby improving Hezbollah’s chances of hitting major targets with more powerful missiles in the future.

The Islamist leadership is claiming to have damaged buildings deep inside Israel, as far south as the outskirts of Tel Aviv – hitting a military base, and a patrol boat further north.

We cannot be sure of this – Israel has prohibited the publishing of photographs of bomb damage, both on TV and via social media. This prevents Hezbollah making a damage assessment.

A state of emergency has also been declared.

Whatever the case, Hezbollah’s attack has been expected for weeks, as payback for Israel’s double assassination of one of its commanders and the Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh, killed in the Iranian capital Tehran in July. The revenge strike was delayed because of the Shi’ite holy festival of Arbaeen, when up to two million pilgrims travelled overland from Lebanon and Iran to Karbala in Iraq.

Now their journey is over, the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard – Hezbollah’s real masters – has warned the war will commence in earnest.

Israel says it is well prepared, but it’s pre-emptive strikes yesterday may not have been enough to deflect the onslaught. It’s estimated that Hezbollah has around 150,000 rockets in its secret cache of hidden arsenals. This escalation also seems certain to have put paid to American efforts at brokering a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Central to this is the release of the surviving hostages seized on October 7.

Both sides say they don’t want all-out war. But neither is willing to be the first to turn the other cheek and stop retaliation – so war is looming. If that does happen, it will be on a scale that dwarfs the unfathomable civilian cost of Israel’s heavy assault in Gaza over the past ten months.

Many observers to this conflict believe that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is relying on a constant state of conflict to keep him in power.

As long as there’s no ceasefire in Gaza, an uneasy truce will continue within Israeli politics. If the fighting stops, Netanyahu will be ousted by his rivals, and will face prosecution and perhaps prison on corruption charges.

America is pledged to support Israel in any war against Iran. The U.S. has already deployed vast naval forces, including three nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, to seas around the Middle East.

With our military bases in Cyprus, a little over 100 miles from the nearest missile launchers in Lebanon, the UK would be drawn into the war, too. Expats and holidaymakers in Cyprus would also be in danger.

And within the last few days, Hamas announced that Israelis in Europe and elsewhere were now regarded as targets for attacks abroad.

Meanwhile, schools in northern Israel are closed and up to 100,000 Israelis have been evacuated from the border with Lebanon.

The threats to peace continue to loom beyond the Middle East. Fears are growing that the vortex of escalating violence could drag us and many others into the conflict.

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