Afternoon summary
- Pat Glass, the shadow Europe minister, has apologised for calling a voter a “horrible racist” after they clashed over immigration. According to ITV, the Conservative MP James Wharton, who is backing Brexit, says she should resign.
The Conservative MP @jameswhartonuk has called for @PatGlassMP to resign as shadow Europe Min after she called a voter a 'horrible racist'
— Paul Brand (@PaulBrandITV) May 19, 2016
However, given that Number 10 needs Labour (and its shadow Europe minister) to help it win the EU referendum, it would be surprising if pro-Remain Tories were to start attacking her too.
- David Cameron has taken a fresh swipe at Boris Johnson, saying he “told a lot of people that he would never be a Leaver” before he came out in favour of Brexit.
- Number 10 has said it will accept the amendment being proposed by Labour and rebel Tory MPs criticising the Queen’s speech for not including a bill to protect the NHS from TTIP (the transatlantic trade and investment partnership). A Number 10 spokesman said:
As we’ve said all along, there is no threat to the NHS from TTIP. So if this amendment is selected, we’ll accept it.
- Kirsty Williams, the sole Liberal Democrat in the Welsh assembly, has become education secretary in the Labour-led government. Labour does not have a majority and needed Williams’s support for Carwyn Jones. Tim Farron, the Lib Dem leader, said:
Kirsty will be a strong Liberal voice in the assembly, challenging the horrid and sexist views of UKIP, but also holding Labour’s feet to the fire.
Education is the essential investment to allow everyone to succeed. And I have absolute confidence that Kirsty is about to have an incredible impact in improving education for children in Wales.
That’s all from me for today.
Thanks for the comments.
Updated
Cameron says he does not want EU referendum to become 'Tory psychodrama'
LBC is broadcasting its interview with David Cameron, but it was pre-recorded and, helpfully, LBC have send out a transcript in advance.
Here are the key points.
- Cameron said he did not want the EU referendum to become a “Tory psychodrama”. He also said he did not want “too many ‘blue on blue’ conflicts” in the debates. That may be significant because until now Number 10 has implied it wants to avoid all ‘blue on blue’ conflicts (ie, Tories debating other Tories head-to-head). Cameron said:
I don’t want too many blue on blue conflicts partly because I want to demonstrate that those arguing to stay in the European Union, reformed European Union, include the Labour party, the Green party, the Liberal Democrat party, the trade union movement, most of British industry, the majority of small businesses. I want to prove the breadth of the campaign and I don’t want this to become a sort of Tory psychodrama between me and Boris or me and Michael Gove.
- He said Johnson had “told a lot of people that he would never be a Leaver” before he came out in favour of Brexit.
- He said Johnson was wrong to compare the EU to Nazi Germany.
I just I think he’s wrong. Hitler wanted to snuff out democracy across the continent and the European Union is basically an alliance of countries that share a view about democracy and liberal values.
- He implied that he would be taking part in the BBC’s Question Time EU referendum programme. It has already been announced that he will take part in an ITV referendum programme, with Nigel Farage, and a Sky one.
- He said he thought of himself as a Eurosceptic.
Was Pat Glass stitched up?
Here is the audio of the Pat Glass interview.
Having heard the clip, I’m slightly surprised that the BBC are broadcasting this comment. Glass clearly thought the broadcast interview was over - the interviewer says, “Okay, that’s great - before she went on to make the point about the “horrible racist”. At that point it is obvious that she thought she was off-the-record, and that she was just having a chat. It also sounds as if she was not being 100% serious when she said she was “never coming back to wherever this is”; from the recording, it sounds as if there was at least a sliver of jocularity in there.
Was it legitimate to use it? Glass is not heard saying that her next remark was off-the-record, or not for broadcast, and the recorder was still running, and so in that respect her comment was fair game. But at that stage both parties seem to have been operating on the implicit understanding that the formal interview was over, and in that sense it is understandable that she thought she would not be quoted.
There is a respectable case for saying that journalists should never agree to protect sources by treating information as off-the-record, because that amounts to a conspiracy against the public. But most journalists accept that that there is nothing inherently wrong with politicians being entitled to say things in private that they would not want to say attributably and on the record. (This only becomes objectionable when what they say in public contradicts what they say in private.) Journalists also often find that respecting confidences enables them to find out things which can make their reporting more informed, even if the price for that involves not being able to use direct quotes.
Labour sources familiar with what happened to Glass, and what was said in her conversation with the voter, are very supportive of her position.
Updated
Labour MP apologises for calling voter 'horrible racist' after clash over immigration
Pat Glass, the shadow Europe minister, has apologised after she was inadvertently recorded describing a voter as “a horrible racist” during an EU referendum campaign visit.
She was in the village of Sawley in Derbyshire and was interviewed by BBC Radio Derby. At the end of the interview she was recorded saying:
The very first person I come to is a horrible racist. I’m never coming back to wherever this is.
The BBC said that the man she was referring to later denied being a racist, but said that in his conversation with the MP he had referred to a Polish family in the area who he thought were living on benefits. He had described them as “spongers”, he told the BBC.
In a statement issued after this became public Glass said:
The comments I made were inappropriate and I regret them. Concerns about immigration are entirely valid and it’s important that politicians engage with them. I apologise to the people living in Sawley for any offence I have caused.
The episode has very strong similarities with what happened to Gordon Brown during the 2010 general election campaign when he was recorded describing Gillian Duffy as a “bigot” after meeting her and when he thought his microphone had been removed because she had been complaining to him about immigration from Eastern Europe.
Maggie Throup, the Conservative MP whose Erewash constituency includes Sawley, said that Glass “needs to understand that the EU referendum is a highly emotive subject with passionate views on each side of the debate”. Throup said the remarks “clearly demonstrate just how out of touch Labour still are with a large proportion of British people.”
In her statement Glass apologised to the people of Sawley, and not specifically to the individual concerned. Throup said Glass should “make a full apology to my constituent at the earliest opportunity” and to return to the area “to see for herself just how great a place it is to live, work and raise a family”.
Updated
If Andy Burnham wants to become Labour’s candidate for mayor of Greater Manchester, he will have to beat Tony Lloyd, the former minister who is currently Greater Manchester’s police and crime commissioner, as well as its interim mayor (an unelected post created ahead of the proper mayoral election next year.)
Lloyd already has the backing of the Unite union.
And today Unison has announced that it is backing him too.
Labour has announced that it is hosting a “state of the economy” conference at Imperial College in London on Saturday. Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, will be speaking, and the other participants will include the economist Ha-Joon Chang, the journalist Paul Mason, the Unite general secretary Len McCluskey, the business broadcaster Linda Yueh, the economist Jonathan Portes, British Chambers of Commerce acting director general Adam Marshall and Helen Walbey from the Federation of Small Businesses.
Chang said:
I’m looking forward to speaking at Labour’s economic conference as I think it’s great that in the spirit of Labour’s new politics the Shadow Chancellor is opening up the debate on the future of the economy to people from all round the country.
Perhaps if the Conservatives listened to a broader range of viewpoints the economy wouldn’t be in such a mess.
No sensible economist agrees with the way the Conservatives are handling the economy at the moment, so I hope this conference will play a major part in developing Labour’s alternative plans for a more dynamic, fairer, and more sustainable economy.
Here is the Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast, with Heather Stewart, Rafael Behr, Hugh Muir and Tom Clark discussing the Queen’s speech, the EU referendum and the Green party.
Lunchtime summary
- Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, has been accused of prolonging the junior doctors dispute unnecessarily for three months after it could have been settled by putting personal “pride” before a resolution. As Denis Campbell and Damien Gayle report, Labour’s Heidi Alexander claimed in the Commons that the health secretary had missed an opportunity to settle the bitter row by displaying a damaging “computer says no” attitude to talks.Hunt and Alexander, the shadow health secretary, traded verbal blows during a House of Commons debate on Thursday on the new deal announced on Wednesday, which both Hunt and the British Medical Association (BMA) hope will end the nine-month dispute.
- Andy Burnham, the shadow home secretary, has said he wants to make Greater Manchester “a beacon of social justice” as he launched his bid to become Labour’s candidate for mayor there. (See 11.51am.)
- Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, has launched a Workplace 2020 initiative to develop ideas as to what the work should be like in the future. He said:
Workplace 2020 will be at the heart of how Labour is going to develop our alternative for the workforce of the 21st century. Instead of David Cameron’s agency Britain, with its zero hours contracts, insecurity and wage undercutting, we will be engaging with workers and employers to shape the policies that will deliver the high quality jobs of the future.
Instead of a race to the bottom in jobs, pay and workplace rights, we will be shaping a different approach for the 2020s: based on a full-employment, high-skilled workforce, with decent pay, rights for employed and self-employed, and a voice at work through collective bargaining.
- Lord Owen, the former SDP leader, has given a speech for Vote Leave saying leaving the EU would produce a £10bn “national dividend” that could be used to alleviate the impact of high immigration. In a speech entitled “The Courage of our Convictions” he said:
Immigration levels at present increase social tensions in the UK and are driving the rise of right wing extremist parties in Europe. Leaving the EU means there can be an annual National Dividend of £10bn which would otherwise be spent by the EU much as we had a Peace Dividend from reduced defence spending after the collapse of the Soviet Union. A National Dividend should be earmarked to alleviate the social impact of immigration in very specific areas of the UK. most impacted by high immigration, the NHS, education and housing.
David Blunkett, the Labour former home secretary, responded by saying: “It’s extremely rich for David Owen to talk about ‘conviction politics’ when he has a long history of abandoning his political roots and turning his back on those he’d worked with back in the 1970s. He betrayed Labour once by splitting our party in the 1980s and he did it again by astonishingly endorsing the Tory Party in 1992.”
- Tim Farron, the Lib Dem leader, has challenged Lord Owen and Vote Leave to condemn Nigel Farage’s claim that staying in the EU could provoke violence on the streets. In an open letter to Owen Farron said:
As someone who holds progressive values, I am particularly surprised that you are aligning yourself with these venomous views.
Continued silence by you will be taken as agreement with Nigel Farage’s shocking and outrageous comments, which should have no place in modern Britain.
Asked about Farage’s comment, Owen said he did not think people would resort to violence.
Lord Owen on @Nigel_Farage words 'violence is the next step': I am confident the British people will not resort to violence.
— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) May 19, 2016
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Boris Johnson has won a £1,000 prize from the Spectator for a rude poem about the Turkish president having sex with a goat. The limerick itself does not mention Recep Tayyip Erdoğan by name, but the Spectator says Johnson produced the poem with him in mind. In its news release it said:
In an as-yet-unpublished interview with Swiss newspaper Die Weltwoche, Boris Johnson was asked about the competition. Declaring that there ought to be no limits on what any European can say ‘about the love that flowers between a Turkish president and a goat’, he proceeded to make up a limerick on the spot. It was a belter, and fills the poetry spot in this week’s Spectator.
- Alun Cairns, the Welsh secretary, has said in a speech that staying in the EU increases the chances of finding a buyer for Tata Steel’s UK business.
- Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York and owner of the financial news company, has said the British economy would suffer from Brexit. Visiting London he said:
It’s not for me to tell British people how to vote, it’s for me to explain what - as an employer of 4,000 people in the UK, somebody who has a residence here, somebody who is building two of the most expensive buildings ever built here in the UK, in London, to make this our European headquarters - what it means for our employees, and what it means for our company, and what it means for America.
I just think that the UK would be disadvantaged compared to the situation they are now. They have a special relationship with the rest of the EU. They have the borders that they can control, unlike the rest of the EU. They have a trade surplus with the rest of the EU. They have some abilities to influence the dialogue that without which they would, and America - which is my concern - would not benefit.
Updated
Here is the academic Rob Ford, an elections expert, on the Ipsos MORI polling.
Oppo ldr ratings after 8 mths:
— Rob Ford (@robfordmancs) May 19, 2016
Foot -27
Kinnock +2
Smith -1
Blair +30
Hague -23
IDS - 1
Howard -12
Cameron +2
Ed M -8
Corbyn -19
So after a brief rally last month, Corbyn falls back. Rates just above Foot and Hague, below everyone else (incl Ed M, Howard, IDS, Kinnock)
— Rob Ford (@robfordmancs) May 19, 2016
As the Press Association’s Richard Wheeler tweets, Chris Grayling also cracked a joke about the recent SNP sex scandal during business questions.
Commons leader Chris Grayling has his say on the SNP affair allegations... pic.twitter.com/F9DqDIzmBF
— Richard Wheeler (@richard_kaputt) May 19, 2016
The ongoing investigation into allegations that the Conservatives broke election law at the general election by ignoring constituency spending limits was raised in the House of Commons this morning. Pete Wishart, the SNP spokesman, raised the matter during business questions. He said that 14 police forces were now investigating. Calling for a government statement, he also quoted from Tim Ross’s election book, Why the Tories Won. Ross wrote:
Buses were critical in moving party troops from where they live to where the swing voters could be found. The central party paid for all the buses and trains, as well as hotels and hostels.
Chris Grayling, the leader of the Commons, responded by saying these were matters “for the appropriate authorities”, not for the government.
Here is more from the new Ipsos MORI poll. David Cameron and Jeremy Corbyn have both seen their satisfaction ratings fall in the last month, although Corbyn’s net ratings are higher than Cameron’s. Here is an excerpt from the news release.
Satisfaction ratings for both the prime minister and the leader of the opposition have fallen this month. Satisfaction with David Cameron has fallen from 37% to 31%, and dissatisfaction risen from 56% to 61% (giving a net rating of -30, his worst since March 2013). Satisfaction with Corbyn has also fallen, from 38% to 31%, while dissatisfaction has risen from 43% to 50% (giving a net rating of -19). David Cameron however enjoys higher satisfaction ratings from within his own party than Jeremy Corbyn. Two in three (66%) Conservative supporters say they are satisfied with Cameron (27% are dissatisfied) compared with 56% of Labour supporters satisfied with Corbyn (31% are dissatisfied).
Here is the Guardian’s story about rebel Tory MPs joining up with Labour to back an amendment to the Queen’s speech motion saying the NHS should be excluded from TTIP (the transatlantic trade and investment partnership).
Unite is backing the amendment. This is from Gail Cartmail, Unite’s assistant general secretary.
Legal advice from a top QC shows that the NHS is at ‘serious risk’ from TTIP. This threat has become a real issue in the EU referendum debate.
The amendment gives MPs a unique opportunity to neutralise the NHS as an EU referendum issue and to protect our health service from irreversible privatisation. This is a chance that the UK cannot afford to miss. Once TTIP is signed the UK will be locked into the deal for two decades.
But Unite may be overstating there case. Even if the Commons were to pass the amendment, that in itself would not make any difference to the TTIP negotiations because it is just a declaratory statement, not legislation or a binding commitment on the government.
real q: will @jeremycorbyn & @angusrobertson sign up to this amendment, force a defeat? LAb & SNP have TTIP concerns pic.twitter.com/xEcZ6LAOIq
— Faisal Islam (@faisalislam) May 19, 2016
Poll suggests public confidence in government's handling of economy has fallen sharply
New polling from Ipsos MORI shows that public confidence in the government’s handling of the economy has fallen sharply since last year’s general election, the Evening Standard reports.
Some 47 per cent think the government is doing a bad job at running the economy, found Ipsos MORI researchers. The figure is up from 37 per cent in March 2015, when the Conservatives kicked off their general election campaign on the back of rising growth.
The same survey also shows that Labour is, by a wide margin, not seen as ready to form a government, and that it seen as even less ready to form a government than it was in May 2011.
Jeremy Corbyn is also seen as not ready to be prime minister. But he is seen as more ready to be prime minister than Ed Miliband was in May 2011.
Corbyn says Labour will back rebel amendment saying TTIP should exclude NHS
Jeremy Corbyn said today that Labour would be backing the proposal to pass an amendment to the Queen’s speech motion saying the NHS should be excluded from the EU/US free trade deal, or TTIP (the transatlantic trade and investment partnership). See 9.43am. He said:
Yes we will be backing that. I would personally go much further because my concerns about TTIP are not just about the effect on public services but also the principle of investor protection that goes within TTIP planned rules which would in effect almost enfranchise global corporations at the expense of national governments. This protection of the NHS is an important step but it’s not the whole step. We will be supporting it.
Burnham says he wants Manchester to be 'beacon of social justice' as he launches mayoral bid
This morning Andy Burnham, the shadow home secretary, has been launching his bid to become Labour’s candidate for mayor of Greater Manchester (which, in practice, means mayor of Greater Manchester - it’s a Labour area, and it is hard to see the Labour candidate being beaten).
My colleague Helen Pidd has already interviewed Burnham, and her long article is well worth reading.
Here are some more lines from the speech Burnham was delivering this morning. (I’m using the text of his remarks sent out in advance.)
- Burnham said he wanted to make Greater Manchester “a beacon of social justice”.
Greater Manchester can be even greater than it is today. A major European economic and creative centre - unashamedly entrepreneurial and endlessly innovative - but at the same time, and here’s the crucial part, a beacon of social justice in this country and to Europe and the World.
That is a vision which I think captures the essence of Manchester. It is full of people who want to get on but who also want to give back. This is a vision that would make us unique and set us apart. It is one people could buy into. Yes, let’s help people to succeed. But let’s never forget our roots and those coming after us.
- He said, as mayor, he would try to ensure that all teenagers in Greater Manchester could go to university, get a good apprenticeship or set up a business.
As mayor, I will ask the birthplace of the industrial revolution to lead a revolution in technical education. I will set an ambition of a quality apprenticeship for every young person who gets the grades and ask all businesses and public bodies to buy into it. But I also want young people here to think of starting their own business as a natural thing to do. So I will ask Manchester’s most successful entrepreneurs to devise a new support scheme for school and college leavers to set up their own company.
So that’s my ambition for the young people of Greater Manchester: university, apprenticeship or entrepreneur. If you get the grades, we will support you into the route of your choice.
- He said, as mayor, he would buy up homes from absentee landlords and set up a rent-to-own scheme.
Our goal should be an affordable home for everyone - to rent or to own - and an end to the homelessness that blights our city region. I would want to use the Mayor’s housing fund to buy out the absent private landlords who have barely ever been to Greater Manchester and don’t care about the place. Let’s return these properties to the public housing stock. I would also set up a Greater Manchester Rent-to-Own scheme to build the new homes we need and get our young people on the housing ladder.
- He said he wanted a new east-west high speed rail link to take precedence over Crossrail 2.
I will make it my business to ensure the government commits to major investment in brand new high-speed East-West rail across the North. Let me be clear: this is the top priority for the country, not Crossrail 2. If George Osborne is serious about a Northern Powerhouse, he must put his money where his mouth is.
- He said he would integrate the NHS and social care in Greater Manchester. This reflects his priority when he was shadow health secretary in the last parliament, which was a plan to integrate health and social care nationally. He said:
As mayor, I will make it my mission to build here the country’s first fully-integrated National Health and Care Service - working to bring social care into the public sector and the NHS; taking Bevan’s great vision from the last century and updating it for this.
You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here.
As for the rest of the papers, here is the PoliticsHome list of top 10 must-reads, and here is the ConservativeHome round-up of today’s political stories.
And here are three stories I found particularly interesting.
Downing Street officials discussed calling the police over a letter from a businessman to David Cameron that senior Whitehall figures believe was leaked to the media by Michael Gove or one of his allies at the Ministry of Justice.
Two senior civil servants discussed whether to involve the police in an inquiry that has begun after the unauthorised disclosure of a letter from Rupert Soames, chief executive of the outsourcing company Serco.
The leak suggested that Mr Cameron was in discussion with big business about campaigning for the EU before he had formally concluded his renegotiation. However, the letter is understood to be mostly about prisons, and would have been copied to the Ministry of Justice, which is run by Mr Gove.
A number of businesses complained vigorously to No 10 officials about the unauthorised disclosure, arguing that the letter was confidential, potentially market sensitive and may have breached the Official Secrets Act.
One Whitehall source said: “It was a letter about prisons. Draw your own conclusions.”
Asked if he was the source of the leak, the justice secretary’s spokesman replied: “Absolutely not, definitely didn’t come from us. First Michael knew about it was reading it in the papers.”
For the first time, Mr Raab lifts the lid on an obscure ruling by the European Court of Justice which poses a massive headache for Britain’s police and security services.
The edict concerns cases where the Home Secretary wants to ban a suspected terrorist or extremist with an EU passport from entering the UK.
The ECJ, the official court of the EU, said that if a member state wanted to restrict a citizen’s right of free movement, it must explain exactly why - even where to do so would endanger national security.
The result is that the Government would either have to hand over the intelligence it holds on a suspect, including paper files.
Security officials are deeply reluctant to hand over any information for fearing of blowing secret operations or exposing the activities of agents.
So, alarmingly, they are left in the position where they simply have to let the fanatic in.
Mr Raab, writing exclusively in today’s Mail, says: ‘Even if UK authorities can justify barring someone as dangerous, the European Court of Justice demands we tell them why – even if that endangers national security.’
America has dramatically raised its tariffs on imports of cold rolled steel from China. Angela Eagle, the shadow business secretary, says this highlights the need for the government to push for higher EU tariffs. She said:
With the Americans taking robust action against illegally dumped Chinese steel, it is now even more urgent than ever for our Government to act. The US tariffs will protect their own industry - but it leaves UK steel producers even more vulnerable to Chinese dumping.
The EU stands ready to act by reforming the lesser duty rule. The Tory government have been the roadblock to reform that will protect our steel industry. They need to stop kowtowing to China, and start standing up for our steel industry.
The Jeremy Corbyn speech will be starting soon. I don’t think there is going to be a live feed, so I will be relying on what I get from Labour and journalists who are there. My colleague Anushka Asthana is at the event.
The Telegraph’s Kate McCann is not impressed by the choice of milk on offer.
At Jeremy Corbyn speech in Stroud. There are only two types of 'milk' available for tea, neither of them are milk. pic.twitter.com/oh7JarVDcL
— Kate McCann (@KateEMcCann) May 19, 2016
Boris Johnson wins Spectator's Erdogan offensive poetry competition
Last month the Spectator launched a “President Erdogan offensive poetry competition”. As Douglas Murray explained at the time, it was a “up yours” initiative to protest about the way Germany was allowing the prosecution of a comedian who read out an offensive poem about the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Now the Spectator has announced the prize has been won by its former editor, the Tory MP and lead Leave campaigner Boris Johnson. He won with a limerick that includes the coinage “wankerer”, to rhyme with Ankara.
Arguably Johnson’s offering could be seen as offensive to Turks, although Johnson is of Turkish ancestry himself and, compared to other nationalities and cities he has offended over the years, any slight in this verse is particularly mild.
But, in having a go at the Turks in the middle of the EU referendum campaign, you could see this as yet more evidence that Johnson starting to sound ever more Kipperish. Ukip’s leader, Nigel Farage, has praised him recently, and Johnson’s increasingly vocal attacks on corporate exploitation have had a distinct Ukip flavour.
Ed Balls, the former chancellor, has written a memoir. It is called Speaking Out: Lessons in Life and Politics, and it will be published by Hutchinson Books in September. Here is an extract from its news release.
Speaking Out is a political book like no other. It is about a politician who thought he might become the country’s next Chancellor on the night of 7 May 2015, but who woke up the next morning without a job. It is about a 27-year-old idealist who came into politics thinking he knew everything, and found out the hard way how much he had to discover.
It is about how power can be used for good, and the lessons to be learned when things go wrong. It is about the mechanics of Westminster, and of government. It is about facing up to your fears and misgivings, and tackling your limitations – on stages public and private.
It is about victory and failure: about the mistakes made, change delivered and personalities encountered over the course of two decades at the frontline of British politics. It is a unique window into a rarely seen world. It sets out what politics is about, and why it matters.
The title seems to be a reference to Balls’s problem with stammering, something that initially in his career he was reluctant to acknowledge, but which he later spoke out about openly, not least because he realised that by doing so he was helping children with the same difficulty.
Updated
Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, told the Today programme that he thought Steve Baker’s comments about the Remain camp using personalised attacks was wrong. Hunt said:
I respect Steve enormously for the integrity of his position, even if I don’t agree with it. But this is a campaign, this is a very, very big decision the British people are going to have to make and, inevitably, both sides make their case as strongly as they can. Arguments have been made forcefully on both sides.
Here is something to add to the agenda.
ALERT: I'll be interviewing @David_Cameron at 5pm this afternoon on @LBC.
— Iain Dale (@IainDale) May 19, 2016
My colleague Anushka Asthana says Tory rebels are planning a vote that could David Cameron serious trouble next week.
PM's EU travails continue: 25 Tory MPs backing amendment to QS that regrets it didn't include policy to exclude NHS from Eu-US trade deal.
— Anushka Asthana (@GuardianAnushka) May 19, 2016
Which- given Corbyn's views on TTIP - could get a fair amount of Labour support
— Anushka Asthana (@GuardianAnushka) May 19, 2016
Apparently Jon Cruddas among Labour MPs who will back it. And Paula Sheriff on health select committee. Plus SNP MPs. Cd be won?
— Anushka Asthana (@GuardianAnushka) May 19, 2016
The Eu referendum is making so many weird things happen: the right of Tories and left of Labour hand in hand on fears over EU-US trade deal
— Anushka Asthana (@GuardianAnushka) May 19, 2016
After a day’s (partial) respite granted by the Queen’s speech, the great EU referendum battle - or de facto Conservative leadership contest, as it is becoming - is erupting again at full pelt.
This morning, in an unsual twist, the Leave camp are accusing Number 10 of dirty tricks. The accusation has come from Steve Baker, the MP who co-chairs Conservatives for Britain, and he made in an interview on the Today programme, and an article for ConservativeHome. His remarks were clearly aimed at Downing Street.
This is what he told the Today programme.
What I am saying is - please don’t anyone on any side follow a scorched earth policy. There have been too many instances where comment in the press from a campaigner has been followed by attacks on them personally. That must stop.
Of course, I agree that we must get back together, that’s why I have taken this step, but what I am essentially saying is - Queensberry rules. So, a full frontal assault with due warning is fine, but the dagger in the heart, inserted from the back, through whispering in dark corridors is not okay.
Baker gave three examples.
I’ve named three things: the attack Lord Heseltine carried out on Boris Johnson, bringing his leadership into play and saying he was losing his judgment; the chancellor describing former chancellors and a former leader of our party as economically illiterate; and also John Major saying we were fuelling prejudice when we talk about immigration.
Baker’s interventions may prompt some readers to recall the words black, kettle, and pot. After all, it was Johnson who came close to accusing Number 10 of corruption earlier this week. In his ConservativeHome article Baker also claimed that it was “deeply dangerous for Remain campaigners in government to make this a debate about the future leadership of the Conservative party”, which is odd given that most observers would argue that it is not Cameron who is engaged in shadow leadership campaigning.
Number 10 is not impressed by Baker’s claims.
Number Ten reject say Remain campaign "rooted in the arguments" not personal attacks
— norman smith (@BBCNormanS) May 19, 2016
Here is the agenda for the day.
10.30am: Jeremy Corybn launches Workplace 2020, a Labour debate about what the world of work should be like in 2020, with a speech in Stroud.
11am: Andy Burnham, the shadow home secretary, launches his campaign to be Labour’s candidate for mayor of Greater Manchester.
11am: Lord Owen, the former SDP leader, gives a Vote Leave speech.
As usual, I will be covering the breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I will post a summary at lunchtime and another in the afternoon.
If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m@AndrewSparrow.
I try to monitor the comments BTL but normally I find it impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer direct questions, although sometimes I miss them or don’t have time. Alternatively you could post a question to me on Twitter.
If you think there are any voices that I’m leaving out, particularly political figures or organisations giving alternative views of the stories I’m covering, do please flag them up below the line (include “Andrew” in the post). I can’t promise to include everything, but I do try to be open to as wide a range of perspectives as possible.
