The current predictions for the 2015 election place Conservatives and Labour neck and neck with projections of around 280 seats each. The most likely outcome of the general election would seem to be another…
News that the Conservative Party has been spending more than £100,000 a month on Facebook advertising has its supporters and rivals all wondering if this is money well spent. It seems like a lot of money…
When the new crop of MPs take their seats after the May election, many may know each other from their days at private school or Oxbridge. A new study, published by the Sutton Trust, analysed the education…
It is bitterly ironic that in this, the 800th anniversary year of Magna Carta, there are threats from the UK to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights. This convention is Europe’s own Magna…
Two noteworthy things happened in Milton Keynes on Monday morning. Ed Miliband chaired the first meeting of Labour’s English Regional Shadow Cabinet – comprising mainly leaders of councils and combined…
Until now, the policies of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) have been symbolic rather than substantive. Policy statements by the party’s leader, Nigel Farage, have been designed to build a populist support…
Recent figures suggest nearly one million people – many of them university students – have fallen off the voters’ register over the past year. With a general election looming, this is an alarming statistic…
The nationalist agenda has sprung to the fore in UK politics over the past few years – largely due to Scotland’s referendum in 2014 putting independence firmly on the agenda. Both the Scottish National…
At the launch of Labour’s election campaign in Manchester, Ed Miliband accused the prime minister, David Cameron, of playing “risky and irresponsible games” with the EU. Exit, he argued, would be a “dramatic…
If anyone thought that another scathing report by MPs into the Coalition’s academies policy might put its expansion on ice, the prime minister has quickly proved them wrong. In a speech laying out the…
A tried-and-tested forecast model has predicted that after the general election in May the UK will be led by a coalition of the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties. The chart below shows the number of…
In the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum, the UK government refused to admit to any contingency plans for relocating Trident, the four Vanguard-class submarines mounted with nuclear warheads…
My colleagues and I marked 100 days to the next general election by publishing a suite of reports comprehensively documenting the social policy record of the current coalition government, as we have done…
David Cameron has announced plans to reduce the annual benefits cap from £26,000 to £23,000 per year if the Conservative Party wins the general election in May. He argues that the cap saved public money…
New data published today from NatCen’s British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey reveals an increase in satisfaction with the NHS – up to 65% from 60% in 2013. At the same time, dissatisfaction is at its lowest…
Alan Milburn, Labour health secretary from 1999 to 2003, has caused quite a stir by attacking the party over its plans for the NHS. In an interview with the BBC, Milburn warned that Labour risked repeating…
If most commentators are right, the 2015 general election is likely to be one of the most unpredictable and exciting polls of the post-war period. The dramatic rise in support for UKIP in England, the…
News that the West End musical Made in Dagenham will close in April is disappointing on two fronts. Ignore for a moment what it says about the viability of new theatre productions in the capital, and consider…
It has been reported that former Liberal Democrat peer Matthew Oakeshott has donated £600,000 to left-leaning parliamentary hopefuls in the quest to stave off a Conservative victory in the election. Oakeshott…
The horrific murder of four Jewish men in a Paris supermarket has understandably provoked a debate about levels of anti-Semitism throughout Europe, including, of course, the UK. According to some campaigning…