Latest news with #JacobRees-Mogg
Scotsman
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Scotsman
Why Labour must act over democratic scandal of 750,000 people robbed of their vote
Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... After the requirement for people to have photographic identification in order to vote was first put to the test in local council elections in England in 2023, the then Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg lambasted his own government in no uncertain terms. 'Parties that try and gerrymander end up finding their clever scheme comes back to bite them – as dare I say we found by insisting on voter ID for elections,' he told the National Conservatism conference. 'We found the people who didn't have ID were elderly and they by and large voted Conservative, so we made it hard for our own voters and we upset a system that worked perfectly well.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Some had believed voter ID – apparently introduced to address the extremely rare problem of people voting fraudulently in someone else's name – would reduce the number of poor people able to vote and disproportionately affect Labour. However, regardless of which party suffered the most, it's crystal clear that it prevented vast numbers of people from exercising their democratic rights. In a democracy, the more people who are able to vote, the better (Picture: Glyn Kirk) | AFP via Getty Images According to the Electoral Commission, around 750,000 people were unable to vote at the last general election because of a lack of ID. Something needed to be done and the government has now announced a number of proposals. These include increasing the number of acceptable forms to include bank cards and automated voter registration, already used in Canada and Australia. The government will also press ahead with its manifesto commitment to reduce the voting age to 16. According to Keir Starmer, 16-year-olds are old enough to pay tax, so should have a say in how it's spent – ie, no taxation without representation. Conservative shadow communities minister Paul Holmes pointed out that 16-year-olds are unable to buy a lottery ticket or alcohol or 'even stand in the elections they're voting in'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad However, Scotland's experience of lowering the voting age has been largely uncontroversial and, in cynical times, an injection of youthful enthusiasm would do no harm. The important point is that these changes will all increase the number of people able to vote.
Scottish Sun
11-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Scottish Sun
Fly-on-the wall reality show following very unlikely TV star and his family ends after just one series
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) BEING TV's poshest ever reality show hasn't saved Meet The Rees-Moggs. I can reveal the fly-on-the-wall documentary featuring top Tory toff Jacob Rees-Mogg and his family, which launched with a blaze of publicity last year, has been axed and won't be returning for a second series on Discovery+. 6 Meet The Rees-Moggs won't be returning for a second series on Discovery+. Credit: PA 6 Jacob was seen in the show losing his seat at the General Election last July Credit: PA It is another setback for the former MP, who was seen in the show losing his seat at the General Election last July. A TV insider said: 'Although the critics seemed to lap up the ridiculousness of the show, it didn't quite get the response from audiences they had hoped for. 'Though it was easy to see how the series could run and run, the feeling among the execs was this should be a one-off capturing of a moment in time, namely the last general election.' Jacob felt that making the Keeping Up With The Kardashians-style show was a way to help 'get the Conservative message out there' while admitting it was a 'calculated risk'. But it doesn't seem to have paid off. When it aired last December, it followed him and his incredibly aristocratic wife, Helena, plus their six children — Mary, Peter, Thomas, Anselm, Alfred and Sixtus. The family provided a snapshot of their privileged and eccentric lives as well as charting the MP's bid to hold on to his seat in North East Somerset constituency. Discovery+ were approached for comment. JOHNNY ON ADHD AND ART JOHNNY VEGAS is back with a new documentary. The comedian, who took a break from his Channel 4 series Carry On Glamping after struggling with his ADHD, will head back to his hometown of St Helens in Merseyside to create a piece of artwork for public display. 6 Johnny Vegas will front new documentary Johnny Vegas: Art, ADHD And Me Credit: Rex His most personal project yet, Johnny Vegas: Art, ADHD And Me will follow him on a journey of self-discovery after his ADHD diagnosis in 2022. Johnny said: 'I used to sit at a potter's wheel on stage, and people thought it was a gimmick, but I actually started out as a dedicated wannabe ceramicist. "Art was my educational saviour. 'Over years of an ongoing decline in educational commitment to the very same arts, I felt it was time to kick-start a debate about culture in general, whilst giving something of a visual a symbol of gratitude back to my honestly beloved town.' The two-parter will be shown on Channel 4. SKY Max has confirmed that its rebooted version of panel show Never Mind The Buzzcocks will be returning for another series. Greg Davies will be back in the hot seat for the fifth season of the show, which previously aired on BBC Two from its launch in 1996 to 2015. LAUREN RETURNS AS TV TEC LAUREN LYLE will be getting her detective uniform back on as ITV cold case drama Karen Pirie returns. The actress, who plays DI Karen Pirie, will be joined by her loveable sidekick, DC Mint (Chris Jenks), and the romantically complicated DS Phil Parhatka, played by Zach Wyatt. 6 Karen Pirie is returning for a second series with Lauren Lyle Credit: Rex The story, based on the novel Darker Domain, follows the discovery of a man's body linked to the first series' spine-chilling kidnap of a young heiress and her baby son. The discovery will put Karen under closer scrutiny from her boss, the media and sinister forces linked to the crime which begin to come to light. It will air on ITV this summer. RUTH HAS WILL FOR NEW ROLE SHE waved goodbye to her role in Gavin and Stacey when the series ended last Christmas, but now Ruth Jones has her eyes set on a new character. The actress, who has just released her fourth book, hopes to have her latest novel turned into a TV series so she can play the leading lady. 6 Ruth Jones wants her latest novel turned into a TV series so she can play the leading lady Credit: Getty By Your Side features Linda Standish, a divorced, plus-sized Scots woman in her fifties working at the Unclaimed Heirs Unit, which traces family members of people who die without a will. And it follows her last case before retiring, involving Welshman Levi Norman. Revealing fans ask who she would cast as a character like Linda, Ruth said: 'I'm in my fifties, and I'm a plus-size woman, but admittedly I am not Scottish!' PANEL show Sorry, I Didn't Know has landed its sixth series on ITV. Jimmy Akingbola will be replaced by former Holby City actress Chizzy Akudolu – who will join team captains Eddie Kadi and Richard Blackwood. Filming will take place this summer. CYNTHIA'S LESSONS IN FAILURE AS Miranda Hobbes in Sex And The City, Cynthia Nixon has seen her character have no shortage of mishaps. But far from getting her down, the actress says she has learned a lot about how to deal with things going wrong. 6 Cynthia Nixon as Miranda Hobbes in And Just Like That... Credit: © Home Box Office, Inc. All rights reserved. HBO® and all related programs are the prope She told Elizabeth Day on the How To Fail podcast: 'Right from the get-go, we've seen Miranda fail at a lot of things – and that was the best thing to happen. 'She didn't actually fail at being a lawyer, I think she realised that her life quest to be on top of the corporate law world was a mistake. 'That's the wonderful thing about the show, it shows there's enough time to make a change. 'A lot of people identify with Miranda, and as years have passed, more of them identify with her. I love her.' Series three of spin-off And Just Like That . . . is available to stream now on Sky. Unlock even more award-winning articles as The Sun launches brand new membership programme - Sun Club.
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
The Daily T: ‘Tax rises are inevitable' – Rachel Reeves's spending review decoded
The Chancellor's much-anticipated spending review is a day away, with extra cash expected for defence, health and education. Are tax rises on the horizon to pay for all this? Camilla is joined by guest presenter Jacob Rees-Mogg, who says Labour doesn't understand business and argues that Keir Starmer could survive sacking Rachel Reeves… The former Tory MP also reacts to the Government's U-turn on the winter fuel payment, supposedly a response to a healthier economy under Labour. But the unemployment and jobs figures seem to say otherwise. Plus, how two very different rows about immigration triggered riots in North Ireland and in LA. Protests turned violent after an alleged sexual assault in Ballymena, while unrest is ongoing in California's biggest city over ICE raids and Donald Trump's immigration crackdown. Watch episodes of the Daily T here. You can also listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Daily Mirror
24-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mirror
BRIAN READE: Brexit was an act of self-sabotage and howls of betrayal are a joke
The best part of the UK's new deal with the EU is how dated and decrepit it made Brexit feel. The howls of betrayal from the likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg and Mark Francois at Labour's attempt to rebuild bridges with our European allies sounded like the last croaks from a pair of dying toads. The attempts at cutting insults from Boris Johnson and Daniel Hannan landed like rehashed gags from a clapped-out, 1950s, end-of-the-pier act. The front-pages of right-wing papers screaming 'Starmer's Surrender' 'Done Up Like A Kipper' and 'Kiss Goodbye To Brexit' felt like yellowing relics unearthed in a time capsule. In fact, the whole bitter reaction to a deal with our biggest trading partner that has won overwhelming approval from small and big businesses, was an embarrassing reminder of a futile civil war that everyone but ideological fanatics realises was a deluded act of self-sabotage. A YouGov survey this week found that 66% of voters now favoured closer ties with the EU, 62%, thought Brexit had been a failure, and only 13% viewed it as a success. That's about one in eight of us. Which, coincidentally, is roughly as many of us who have any faith left in the party that inflicted this costly mistake on us. A day after Kemi Badenoch called the EU reset a 'surrender deal' YouGov found the Tories in fourth place nationally, with 16% of Brits saying they would vote for them. Which is the lowest Tory score ever recorded by the pollster. This notion of Remainer surrender, of Labour metropolitan elitists undemocratically reversing a referendum, is a delusion clung on to by a shrinking group of backward-looking navel-gazers. As polls show, the majority of British people realised long ago that right-wing con-artists, most of them obsessed with the myth of British supremacy, others like Boris Johnson consumed solely with their own ambition, sold them a pack of lies. They know the phrase Brexit Betrayal is an oxymoron. A contradiction of terms. Because you can't betray something that has turned out to be an act of betrayal from the Tory politicians who ushered it in without a clue about how it would work. An act which has failed so abysmally that the independent Office for Budget Responsibility estimates it has brought about a 4% reduction in the size of the UK economy, equivalent to £100billion a year. There's the gaping economic black hole that Rachel Reeves is charged with fixing today. The truth is that back in 2016, Brexiteers narrowly won the vote but in the years since they have majorly lost the argument. And if the referendum was re-run today it would be a very different result. With US economic isolationism, Russian aggression and Chinese technological domination being the new world order, Britain being on its own is no longer an option. Which is why it's blindingly obvious to most sane minds that our national interest lies in closer defence and trading ties with Europe. As for Brexit, few outside of the political and media class that orchestrated it or the vein-busters on Question Time, care about it. And the easier it becomes for young people to work in Europe, families to travel there and businesses to trade there, the more the howling Rees-Moggs and Johnsons will be deemed irrelevant. It couldn't happen to a nicer shower of fossils. The teeth whitening brand has knocked up to 40% off some of its best selling products and bundles until May 27.
Spectator
15-05-2025
- Politics
- Spectator
Poll: three in four voters say Labour's priorities are wrong
They say that politics is all about priorities. But what happens when the public says you've got it wrong? Mr S has got his hands on some polling – and it doesn't make for happy reading for No. 10. Some 76 per cent of UK adults say the government has the wrong priorities, with low support for policies like football regulation and the smoking ban. It seems like the public have taken a leaf out of Jacob Rees-Mogg's book: 'Boo to nanny…' When asked which areas the government is spending too much or too little time on, the proposed football regulator and the generational smoking ban policies ranked lowest. Just 22 per cent said the government isn't spending enough time on vaping, and only 14 per cent felt the same about football regulation. Still, there is some good news for Labour: the public overwhelmingly back the PM's war on visas. When asked to rank key policy areas addressed by this parliament, 'establishing a Border Security Command with counter-terror-style powers to target illegal immigration gangs' was selected as the number one priority, chosen by twice as many respondents as any other option.
