Chris Whiteside's Blog

Ahead of the football match between England and Norway, this report on the publicity for an exhibition about the Vikings was shared today:

"Twitter today was making me reflect on when the press were befuddled at Tony Benn for going to Enoch Powell's funeral and when one journalist demanded to know why Benn was mourning someone he was at odds with, Benn replied "he was my friend." Shame we don't have more of that." (Posted on X by an account called "History and such.")

I was saddened to learn of the death of Ann Widdecombe and horrified to learn that the police are treating her death as murder. A 26-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of the crime. We don't yet know who killed her or why, and must not rush to conclusions until or unless there is a conviction.  There will be those who say that this suggests we need to review the security of people involved in politicians, and I can see the logic of that, but if you regard someone like Ann as a potential target you are in danger of having to provide protection for the entire political class. It is decades since she was a front bench MP, years since she was an MEP, and although she had some controversial opinions nobody with an ounce of judgement who met her for more than five minutes would consider that she had a malicious bone in her body. I met Ann Widdecombe many years ago when I was a Conservative constituency chairman (the first time) and she visited the association as a front-bench...

I have put up the song "I need a hero" so many times, usually with a comic or space fantasy sequence such as Shrek storming the castle in Shrek II or Luke Skywalker carving his way through a platoon of almost invincible (to anyone else) killer robots to rescue the main characters in the season II finale of " The Mandalorian. " But today I am posting it as a tribute to, and with video of, the singer, Bonnie Tyler, who has sadly died at the age of 75. Welsh singer Bonnie Tyler, known for worldwide hits Total Eclipse of the Heart and Holding Out for a Hero , has died aged 75. In a statement, Tyler's family and team confirmed she died "unexpectedly" on Wednesday evening in a hospital in Portugal due to the "illness that she was being treated for". In May, Tyler had been rushed to hospital in Faro, Portugal, for emergency intestinal surgery and placed in an induced coma to aid her recovery. After growing up in a council house in Skewen, so...

Robert Jenrick:    "Nigel Farage had the courage to put himself up for a by-election, which very few people do in politics."   Telegraph interviewer:   "Well, you didn't."    Robert Jenrick:  "Well, quite. Very few people do it."  

  The Clacton by-election is hotting up ... All the Reform groupies who spent the Makerfield by election complaining that it was terrible and was dividing the right and handing victory to Andy Burnham that the Conservatives and Restore put up candidates in that by election ... are now screaming at the top of their voices accusing the Conservatives and Restore of being "Terrified Spineless Chickens" and part of an establishment plot to stop Reform by NOT standing candidates in the Clacton by-election. It is rare, but there are several precedents for major parties deciding not to contest an election. If the Speaker of the House is seeking re-election to that position he or she is not usually opposed. It's a comparatively recent practice which was not in effect at the time the late Ian Gow MP was murdered, but on the last two occasions when an MP was assassinated, (Jo Cox and David Amess) the major parties other than that to which the murdered MP belonged did not stand. Far ...

"I will accept Nigel Farage’s request to be appointed Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead. It is a farce and a desperate distraction, and the people of Clacton deserve better.  But if he wants to spend the summer arguing with a bin, I won't stop h im." Chancellor Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP The present chancellor is not someone I would normally quote, let alone endorse, but as there has been a lot of controversy about whether she would try to block the Clacton by-election, I thought her statement explaining that she will not do so was of potential interest to readers of this blog.

"You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks." Winston Churchill

The Conservatives tabled an Opposition Day motion in the House of Commons calling for convicted rapists, paedophiles, and child sexual exploitation offenders, including grooming gang members, to be excluded from the government's automatic early release scheme and to serve longer custodial terms. The motion was passed by 115 votes to zero-0 with votes from 89 Conservatives, 4 DUP, 3 Greens, 11 Labour MPs, 4 Plaid Cymru, and others. Most Labour MPs, along with Reform UK and the Lib Dems, abstained. The vote is not binding on the government. Ministers indicated they would proceed with the scheme starting after summer recess.

Nigel Farage, Leader of Reform UK, has decided to pre-empt the parliamentary inquiry into whether he broke House of Commons Rules by failing to declare a £5 million donation, by "doing a David Davis" and resigning his Clacton seat to fight a by-election. The other parties have criticised this on grounds which range from the sound - for instance, that it's a bit daft to ask voters to endorse Farage's conduct when he has deliberately called a by-election ahead of the investigation - to the rather less sound. It is admittedly a bit of a cheek for Labour to criticise Reform for inflicting the cost and inconvenience of an unnecessary by election on the taxpayer and the voters of Clacton when they have just inflicted the costs of a parliamentary by-election and a Mayoral election on the taxpayer and the voters respectively of Makerfield and Manchester. At the time of posting, it look like none of the other major parties are going to legitimise the by-election by contesting ...

 

  Mexico 2, England 3. Well done guys!

Best of British to the England men's football team in their world cup match in the early hours of tomorrow morning. PS - I also congratulated Scotland on winning their first World Cup match for many years, and if they were still in the competition at this stage I would be wishing them good luck too. 

"Britain must live within its means while making the defence of the realm the highest priority. Strong defence relies on a strong economy. And tax rises will do even more damage to our economy. Burnham must cut welfare to fund defence." Kemi Badenoch

 

Labour never had a plan.    

I know I have posted this piece, often accompanied by a montage of pastel pictures of summer scenes, many times before,  but it is such a beautiful way to relax on a summer evening. The paintings are by Vladimir Volegov

Nearly always worth listening to Andrew Neil, and he has a regular "The Andrew Neil Report" which you can get as a podcast or in Youtube. Here is yesterday's report on a very strange week, in which Andrew Neil is giving his view in response to questions from viewers and listeners. The question which will probably be of most interest is the very last one, which is posted 53 minutes and 34 seconds into the video, " Which prime minister disappointed you most? " Neil gives a quick masterclass covering fifty years, of all thirteen Prime Ministers from Ted Heath to Sir Keir Starmer, saying whether he had "high hopes" of any of them (he mostly didn't) and whether each in turn disappointed him or surpassed his expectations. There are three Prime Ministerial administrations which he praises as "transformational" or "serious," and met or surpassed his expectations, there is one who he doesn't criticise because the PM concerned did wha...

Here is a summary of the aggregate results of the 53 council by-elections since the May 2026 local elections, compiled by Election Maps UK. Reform UK, who were defending six seats, made five net gains to end up with 11 seats, on an aggregate vote share of 23% The Conservatives, who were defending twelve seats, made net losses of three to end up with nine on an aggregate vote share of 19%. In both cases those net figures include both gains and losses in various directions, including both Conservative gains from Reform UK and Reform UK gains from Conservatives. This should be a corrective both to anyone who goes too far overboard on the "Reform have peaked" narrative - however much I may think it's true, they are still in the lead - but also on the "The Tories are dead/The Tories are no longer a national party" narratives as we had wins in England, Scotland and Wales and are winning too many elections and votes to justify any such conclusion. Essentially the patte...

"A society that puts equality - in the sense of equality of outcome - ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality or freedom. The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom. On the other hand, a society that puts freedom first will, as a happy by-product, end up with both greater freedom and greater equality. Freedom means diversity but also mobility. It preserves the opportunity for today's less well off to become tomorrow's rich, and in the process, enables almost everyone, from top to bottom, to enjoy a richer and fuller life." Milton Friedman

  You can sign the petition at: Save the Summer Job

According to a social media tracker referenced by the website "The Daily Britain"  here , Reform UK has suffered the loss of 120 councilors. The number of council seats loss is slightly higher as those quitting Reform or resigning their council seas included at least one dual-mandate councillor. The breakdown of losses in the tracker is, quote, " 21 councillors kicked out, 38 defected, six suspended, one disqualified, 50 resigned, and five who lost their seats outright. " The headline says that 120 have gone since May but I think there may be some confusion about May of which year this applies to: the figures for the number of councillors shed by Reform since the May 2026 elections are: " 41 entries: five lost seats, 17 resignations, 13 defections and six suspensions. " I have seen various different figures floating around for exactly how many councillors Reform UK has lost, the differences may be due to factors like some lists including Town and Parish co...

 

There is a shocking allegation in the Spectator that the Treasury is more concerned about "diversity" than numeracy. If there is an atom of truth in the suggestion that HM Treasury removed a Numerical Reasoning Test from the department's graduate scheme in 2020  "due to evidence of the test having adverse impact on candidate diversity" , that is deeply concerning. Diversity is, provided it is applied in a way which is not allowed to conflict with the need to recruit the best people, a good thing. But prioritising it above skills and abilities which are clearly highly relevant to the functioning of a department is indicative of a recruitment policy which is seriously off balance. By the way, this policy was never announced to parliament and very possibly not presented to any minister: the Spectator found out about it trough an FOI request.   Here is an extract from the article by John Connolly: "Whoever enters No. 11 will find themselves dealing with a count...