The slowest general election in history plods on
The latest defection to Labour feels like bad news for both parties, but worse bad news for the Conservatives.
The hits just keep on coming for Rishi Sunak, who this week continues to put on a brave face while he goes down with the slowest ship-sinking in history.
Two Conservative MPs have defected to Labour in just two weeks. NHS doctor Dan Poulter’s decision to cross the floor to Labour could be shrugged off by Tories with a “who?”.
However Dover and Deal MP Natalie Elphicke feels a little different. She’s on the far-right side of the Conservative party and has been extremely critical of Labour’s policy to tackle the small boats in the past. She labelled Sir Keir Starmer “Sir Softie” and said he has no plan. And yet she’s crossed over to his party, presumably because even his lack of a plan is more convincing to her than the Conservatives’ current plan to stop illegal arrivals.
As the Conservative member in a constituency directly impacted by the arrivals of small boats carrying people from France, for her to say the party’s policy to stop the boats won’t work is a huge blow. She won’t stand for re-election, so this isn’t a move to save her own skin.
In a Sky News interview yesterday, Conservative science and technology secretary Michelle Donelan struggled to defend her description of Elphicke’s defection as “nonsensical”. And it’s worth watching that interview to see Donelan try to claim that small boat crossings are down by a third when the latest data puts them at record levels.
And yet it’s not like Labour are breaking out the Champagne. Twitter erupted in memes after news of Elphicke’s defection broke and Labour issued their standard “welcome to the new Labour member for Dover and Deal” tweet. Copycat posts jokingly welcomed Darth Vader, Saruman from Lord of the Rings and Hans Gruber from Die Hard to the party.
Female Labour MPs have told reporters they feel uncomfortable with the move. Elphicke took over her seat from her former husband, Charlie, a Conservative MP who was convicted in 2020 of three counts of sexual assault and sent to prison.
In an op-ed after his conviction, Natalie Elphicke wrote that he had been punished for being “charming, wealthy, charismatic and successful — attractive, and attracted to, women. All things that in today’s climate made him an easy target for dirty politics and false allegations.”
The party is also concerned that Elphicke’s political record and statements appear so distant from Labour’s - this is why her defection was met with such surprise. Elphicke previously criticised England footballer Marcus Rashford over his free school meals campaign.
On a day when Labour should be celebrating another step towards victory, some in the party are concerned Starmer has gone too far in accepting Elphicke into the fold.
So this feels, in some ways, like bad news for both parties, but worse bad news for the Conservatives.
And it comes alongside the local election results from last week and former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi’s announcement that he won’t stand at the general election.
Despite this I suspect Sunak will continue to try to limp along until autumn - although my general election date guess is by no means set in stone.
Every week I summarise the big stories and talk about what’s going on behind the headlines. Plus you get some TV and movie recommendations from me at the end.
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Are all signs pointing to a hung parliament? No. PM Rishi Sunak made the claim this week in the wake of disastrous local election results in England and Wales. The Conservatives lost nearly 500 council seats and a key mayoralty in the West Midlands. Sunak said the results of the next general election are not a “foregone conclusion” and he was "determined that we will come together as a party”. He warned that the data from the local elections suggest we are heading for a hung parliament with Labour as the largest party. This claim has set the scene for the Conservatives to say a vote for Labour would be a vote for a “coalition of chaos” with the SNP, Greens and Lib Dems involved. Sunak based his claims on analysis by Prof Michael Thrasher for Sky News - which suggested Labour would win 294 seats at a general election. The projection used the local election results to make a nationwide estimate of vote share at a general election. But it assumes everyone would vote in the same way at a general election as they did in last week's local elections, when smaller parties and independent candidates tend to do better in local elections. It also does not take account of what could happen in Scotland, where Labour are now polling better than the SNP. A new YouGov poll this week put Labour at its biggest poll lead since Liz Truss was PM - with the party 30 points ahead of the Conservatives.
Thousands of people have fled the southern Gaza city of Rafah to avoid being harmed in an imminent escalation of Israel’s military action. This new phrase in Israel’s operation against Hamas has been widely opposed by the international community due to the sheer number of civilians in Rafah. The Israeli military said troops had killed Hamas fighters in eastern Rafah as part of a "precise" counterterrorism operation this week. Nations including the UK and US have urged Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu not to go ahead with an assault on Rafah - where several battalions of Hamas fighters remain - due to the potential for a humanitarian disaster. The city is where many thousands of Palestinians have fled after widespread bombardment across Gaza. Israel has seized control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, which it says was being used for terrorist activities. Another crossing in the south - Kerem Shalom - has been damaged in a Hamas rocket attack. The crossings are where crucial aid has been entering the Gaza Strip. US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller described the interruptions to aid deliveries as “unacceptable". Rafah’s mayor, Ahmed al-Sofi, warned it is “on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe of unprecedented proportions” in an appeal to the international community on Wednesday. “The streets of the city echo with the cries of innocent lives lost, families torn apart, and homes reduced to rubble,” he said.
Just days ago Palestinians in Rafah were filmed celebrating after hearing news from Hamas that the group had approved a ceasefire deal. However the deal has been rejected by Israel, which says Hamas had softened the terms previously put forward. Negotiations on a new ceasefire and hostage release deal have resumed in Cairo, with the US saying it believed a revised Hamas proposal could lead to a breakthrough - although this optimism has been repeated many times in recent months. One of the key sticking points has been that Hamas wants an agreement the war would end, however Israel is determined to see Hamas removed from power over the Gaza Strip. Israel also wants all its hostages returned. Over 130 people remain captive in Gaza, after being kidnapped on October 7 by Hamas. At least 30 are thought to have died in captivity.
The US has paused a shipment of bombs to Israel to prevent them from being used in the assault on the city of Rafah. Administration officials said that 1,800 2,000-pound bombs and 1,700 500-pound bombs are being withheld. The US is the biggest supplier of weapons to Israel. US president Joe Biden has issued a blunt warning to Israel that his administration will stop supplying bombs and artillery shells if its military pushes ahead with an offensive on Rafah. In an interview with CNN, Biden delivered his sternest warning yet directed at Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu. “I made it clear that if they go into Rafah – they haven’t gone in Rafah yet – if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities – that deal with that problem,” Biden told CNN. In the same interview he also reiterated the US’s commitment to maintaining Israel’s security in the Middle East. Biden is attempting to maintain relations and the safety of his key ally in the region, while also trying to prevent the unfolding civilian catastrophe in Gaza. This is no easy balancing act when Netanyahu has vowed to destroy Hamas and the terror group embeds itself within civilian locations. Biden’s politics is at odds with Netanyahu, who knows an end to the war in Gaza would speed up his own inevitable political demise. Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, called Washington’s decision to hold up some weapons shipments “very disappointing”. He said Biden “can’t say he is our partner in the goal to destroy Hamas while on the other hand delay the means meant to destroy Hamas”.
Student activist groups have set up pro-Palestinian camps in Oxford and Cambridge. The camps are inspired by students in America, where there have been violent clashes between police and protesters. The Oxford and Cambridge protests take the number of encampments at UK universities to 11, all of them established in the past fortnight. The protesters want universities to cut commercial ties, such as investments, with Israel.
Stormy Daniels gave evidence at Donald Trump’s hush money trial on Tuesday, describing in detail an alleged sexual encounter with the former president in a hotel suite by Lake Tahoe in 2006. Trump faces 34 felony charges related to the $130,000 payment that Michael Cohen, his former lawyer and fixer, made to Daniels to stop her claims of the alleged sexual encounter with Trump from becoming public on the eve of the 2016 presidential election. A reminder, that it’s not the fact he paid her money to buy her silence that has landed Trump in court. It’s that prosecutors argue he tried to conceal the payments to Cohen as something else and that he did all of this in order to protect his presidential election chances. Midway through Daniels’ testimony, Trump’s lawyers moved for a mistrial. His lawyer Todd Blanche argued that Daniels’ testimony about the alleged encounter and other meetings with him had “nothing to do with this case,” and would unfairly prejudice the jury. Prosecutors countered that Daniels’ testimony gets at what Trump was trying to hide and they were “very mindful” not to draw too much graphic detail. Before Daniels took the stand, they told the judge the testimony would be “really basic,” and would not “involve any details of genitalia”. Trump has been fined $10,000 for 10 breaches of a gag order that prevents him from attacking witnesses and the jury publicly during the trial. The judge has told Trump he faces jail if he continues to breach the order. Knowing how much Trump likes to let loose on his Truth Social platform, you can only imagine how much restraint, or convincing, it took to prevent him going off after Daniels’ testimony this week.
Prince Harry was just a couple of miles away from his father King Charles this week as both carried out engagements in London. However the pair have not been able to schedule a meeting while Harry is in the UK due to Charles’s busy schedule, according to a statement from the Duke of Sussex’s office. It said: "In response to the many inquiries and continued speculation on whether or not the Duke will meet with his father while in the UK this week, it unfortunately will not be possible due to His Majesty’s full programme. The Duke of course is understanding of his father’s diary of commitments and various other priorities and hopes to see him soon.” As I said on Instagram this week, I think it’s a shame for both sides no meeting could be worked out. Charles clearly had a busy diary this week with meetings and the Buckingham Palace garden party, as well as treatment for his cancer. But the royal family is supposed to be a symbol of unity, and this ongoing distance between father and son risks undermining that image going forward. Of course the royal family has never been drama-free, but a simple meeting would have avoided a lot of negative headlines and perhaps started to dull the intensity of speculation around the rift.
It’s been an odd week in US politics - even by normal standards. Presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr, who is running as an independent candidate, has revealed that a worm ate part of his brain. It has emerged the 70-year-old made the claim during a 2012 deposition in his divorce proceedings from his second wife Mary Richardson Kennedy. At the time, he said his earning power had been diminished by cognitive issues. This is significant in the election race because Kennedy has attacked his opposition - Donald Trump and Joe Biden - as being old and lacking cognitive function. And elsewhere in the election race, one of Trump’s potential running mates for vice-president boasted of shooting her dog in a new book. Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor, admitted shooting and killing Cricket, a 14-month-old wirehaired pointer, more than 20 years ago. In her memoir, published this week, the Republican details how she killed the "extremely dangerous" puppy after the animal attacked and killed a neighbouring family's chickens. After having shot her dog, she reportedly killed her family's goat, which she called "nasty and mean”. The revelation has drawn criticism from animal lovers in the US. The book also landed Noem in trouble after she claimed in one passage to have met with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. That claim has since been removed from the book and she has refused to answer direct questions about it in interviews.
The AstraZeneca covid vaccine is being withdrawn, it was announced this week. AstraZeneca said it was "incredibly proud" of the vaccine, but it had made a commercial decision. It said the rise of new coronavirus variants meant demand had shifted to newer vaccines. The announcement has however been seized on by anti-vaxxers as being in response to legal cases against the vaccine manufacturer that have been brought by people who suffered rare side effects after receiving the jab. Although the vaccine was found to be safe and effective overall, it carried the risk of a rare but serious side effect, known as thrombosis with thrombocytopenia. The rare syndrome occurred in about two to three people per 100,000 who were vaccinated with the vaccine. AstraZeneca is being sued by more than 50 alleged victims and grieving relatives in a High Court case. But AstraZeneca has insisted the decision to withdraw the vaccine is not linked to the court case or its admission that it can cause TTS. It said the timing was pure coincidence. "The truth is it made an enormous difference, it was what lifted us out of the catastrophe that was unfolding at the time, combined with the other vaccine from Pfizer," said Prof Adam Finn, from the University of Bristol.
What I’m watching
The Jinx (Now TV). The second part of the acclaimed documentary series The Jinx is still compelling, although I don’t think it will manage to recreate the “OMG” finale of the first part. But the story of Robert Durst is fascinating, and there’s still plenty of material for the programme-makers to move the story along. If you are not familiar with The Jinx, it examined the three deaths connected to Durst - son of a New York real estate magnate. Durst had escaped justice for decades until The Jinx and police chasing the cold cases finally caught up with him. If you have never watched the first part of this, I thoroughly recommend you check it out. It’s one of those “you couldn’t make it up” stories.
Clarkson’s Farm (Amazon Prime). I know that Jeremy Clarkson is a Marmite character, but I really enjoy this show. Yes a lot of it feels very obviously staged, however it’s an interesting insight into the hard slog that is farming in Britain. This series is filled with setbacks and heartache, although the show manages to maintain its trademark humour and quirks. One of the funniest parts of the series is when Andy Cato from Groove Armada and former T4 presenter George Lamb bring the idea of regenerative farming to Jeremy. Farm manager Kaleb Cooper’s reaction when he sees the ex band member ploughing a field is utterly brilliant.
Piers Morgan interviews the “real Martha” from Baby Reindeer (YouTube). A gleeful Piers Morgan has secured the first on-screen interview with “real Martha”, who has been identified as Fiona Harvey. In the hit Netflix show, based on the real experiences of Richard Gadd, Martha stalks comedian Donny relentlessly, bombarding him with thousands of emails and messages. Fiona has already done several newspaper interviews since internet sleuths identified her as the “real Martha”, but she’s now speaking out in person. It will air this evening (Thursday) on the Piers Morgan Uncensored YouTube channel. I’ve said before that I am concerned that this person is vulnerable and has had a ton of pressure and attention unleashed on her due to the popularity of the Netflix show. Netflix director of public policy Benjamin King told a Commons Select Committee this week that the platform “did take every reasonable precaution in disguising the real-life identities of the people involved in that”. He wouldn’t say if Netflix have stepped in to provide any support for Fiona after she was identified as being a subject of the show.