Latest news with #politicalRevolution
Telegraph
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Nigel Farage should do a deal with the Tories, but not now
The latest YouGov mega poll – with MRP analysis, which projects likely vote share – suggests Reform will win 271 seats at the next general election. This would make it the largest party, but with no overall majority. On YouGov's analysis, Labour would secure 178 seats, but the Tories a lowly 46. It would mark the end of politics as we know it and would herald a period of political revolution, even if Reform held no majority. We are a long way from a general election. While it is a reasonable bet that Keir Starmer will not last the course as Labour leader – he will be vulnerable within eighteen months at this rate – and while it is also a reasonable bet that this Labour Government will not last the course either, there is no prospect of an election soon. This means seat projections at this point are interesting but must be taken with a pinch of salt. That said, my working assumption for many months has been that the next election will bring a coalition Government. Reform's surge and the collapse of both main parties means British politics is being fractured; only a coalition of the broken pieces will likely form an administration next time. What does that mean for Reform? Should they start negotiations now to form a pact with the Tories to make a Right-leaning Government more likely? Or carry on in the hope they can win a majority? Reform and the Conservatives will almost certainly do a deal; it is just a matter of time. Because in almost any realistic scenario you can think of, such a deal makes sense. Let us look at the two currently unlikely possibilities first. If the Tories recover dramatically to, say, the high 20s in the polls, and Reform poll about the same, then the two parties ought to see sense and agree a non-aggression pact, where Reform stands in seats they are likely to win, and the Tories stand in seats they will win. They would be slitting each other's throats pointlessly without such a pact. This goes against everything the Tories currently believe about standing in every seat, but we are in an entirely new world. And if Reform completely collapsed and the Tories recovered, the Conservatives would want to try to fold Reform MPs and candidates into their movement, even unofficially, to maximise their chances of winning or governing effectively in a coalition. This was essentially the position agreed between Boris Johnson's Conservatives and Nigel Farage's Brexit Party in 2019. More likely is that Reform stays strong and the Tories stay weak. YouGov's new MRP analysis is more detailed than other polls put out to date, but other pollsters confirm Reform is in the ascendancy. In this scenario, Reform should offer a deal which effectively seeks a takeover of the Conservative Party under Farage's management. This prospect is already being considered by senior Tory figures, who think a merger is the only realistic prospect for the right. It would, in effect, be a variation of the Maga takeover of the Republican Party. In some ways, it would mark drastic change; in other ways it would merely mark a return to a more Thatcherite party. Whether the Conservative Party name remained is another question. But this does not mean Farage should seek a deal now. This would be a pointless distraction and would imply fear and weakness on his part. Not least because the Tories are ludicrously still posturing as if they are a relevant party. They are not; they are finished as we know it, but need more time to realise their predicament. Rather, Farage should focus overwhelmingly on creating a message which is popular enough to propel them into power, and recruiting serious candidates who will not blow up their movement through stupidity. This is harder than it sounds; Reform, like any ideological party, attracts eccentrics. If Reform can maintain their poll lead, they will be in a much, much stronger position to dictate terms to the Conservatives. With one eye on coalition Government, and another eye on a takeover, however, Farage needs to be careful about how he attacks the Conservatives. He may, after all, end up effectively leading the party in the not-too-distant future. With this in mind, it is better to do two things. Firstly, criticise the Conservatives for specific policy failures in office (which even Tory activists agree with). Do this rather than attacking the institution as beyond hope. Farage should remember his Brian Clough, who so trashed his Leeds United rivals from Derby in the 1970s that he could not manage the team when he was appointed at Leeds. Secondly, direct attacks on Kemi Badenoch as leader; not her personality and values but, again, her record and policy choices. There will be plenty to go on. This will mean, in time, that Farage can do a deal with 'anyone but Kemi'. She will be gone and he can take over a party which he has not too brutally derided and with a leader (or, rather, a deputy leader) with whom he can do business. A new Right-wing movement is coming, regardless of what happens in the next few months. The entire Conservative base has collapsed, donors are moving over and MPs and candidates know Westminster politics will soon become a distant dream. The polls are real. A deal will ultimately suit both Reform and the Tories.
Irish Times
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
I gave my friends hats which said ‘Make America Hate Again'. That's what Trump is trying to do
Back in my youth we were taught in Latin class about the problems faced by Rome because of neighbouring wetlands known as the Pontine Marshes. Although Romans did not fully understand how malaria infected humans, they connected the marshes with illness and death. Their combined engineering skills failed to drain the marshes and it was only in the 1920s that Mussolini made reclamation of the marshes his successful national prestige project. I thought of the Pontine Marshes when Donald Trump promised American voters that he was going to 'drain the swamp' in Washington, DC. It was hard to see how he intended to effect a political revolution that could amount to draining the Washington swamp. The influence of powerful lobbyists and financial interests seemed to prosper between 2016 and 2020, when the Republican Party held the reins of power. The image of draining a swamp was powerful. But what have we now in its place? Trump 's second term has turned the Oval Office in the White House into a veritable political pigsty. The Musk-Trump spat (which saw Musk asserting that Trump's name was to be found on the Epstein files and Trump countering with the claim that Musk had 'lost his mind') was remarkable. Trump is not now interested in an immediate reconciliation – presumably for fear of weakening his authority or appearing to reward those who inflict political damage on him. READ MORE Meetings in the Oval Office political pigsty are obviously distasteful to his visitors. Apart from the ambush of Volodymyr Zelenskiy and the absurd encounter with South Africa's president Cyril Ramaphosa (in which Trump made grossly untrue allegations about persecution of Boer farmers and attempted to prove his lies with fake photographs), other world leaders have simply sat for 45 minutes hoping that no diplomatic damage would be done. Russia's president Vladimir Putin and China's president Xi Jinping have not participated in the ludicrous charades to which others have agreed. Trump's promise to end the Ukraine war within 24 hours now appears as some form of sick joke. But apart from childish antics (including threats to abandon any role in the dispute) the question remains as to what, if any, is America's preferred outcome of the Ukraine war. Trump has vaguely spoken about sanctions. To what end? Does he think that Ukraine will buckle under a combination of aerial and missile attacks and meatgrinder attritional warfare along its eastern frontline? What has happened to his ' deal ' to Americanise half of Ukraine's mineral and energy resources? Is there any rational strategy in play, or is Trump simply both incapable of stopping Putin's invasion and unwilling to admit his abject weakness? The evidence suggests that Trump's sole political yardstick is the state of US stock markets. Markets don't like war. For a president who has majored on controlling immigration, it is surprising to hear Trump advocate the introduction of golden visas for rich people, presumably including Russians, who wish to reside in the US in exchange for million-dollar investments. We had similar schemes in Ireland which turned out to be political failures. Why would America bare its security throat to an influx of dubious investor migrants from overseas states? Is that strategy a necessary part of making America great again? While it is obvious that Trump's vision of American greatness is to be measured in the wealth of its plutocrat class, I find it hard to understand how public opinion in America is not revolted by events such as the $200 million 'gift' of a jumbo jet from Qatar destined to become Trump's private property , or the launch by Trump of a cryptocurrency fund designed for his personal enrichment. Trump's promise to deport one million illegal migrants was easily made. Rounding them up and expelling them is a very different matter. They will turn out to be parents and spouses and sole economic providers of American citizens. They will turn out to be the fruit pickers, labourers, cleaners and counter staff of countless small enterprises. They may even include the maids and pool boys of Trump's billionaire coterie. In Trump's first term, I gave a number of my friends Maga hats embroidered instead with the message 'Make America Hate Again'. Sending marines and the National Guard to Los Angeles and other cities that have tolerated illegal migrants for many many years is a cowardly, premeditated Trump stratagem to provoke communal hatred. Democrats need to be a lot more politically agile than they have been in the last four years to stop Trump's political rampage.
