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On Netflix

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Blair and Brown: The New Labour revoltuion 

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Blair and Brown: The New Labour revoltuion 

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blair & brown: the new labour revolution

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Blair & Brown: The New Labour Revolution - Series 1: Episode 1

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Two young MPs, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, set out to modernise the Labour party.

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Inside Obama's White House - 1. 100 Days

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Obama promises to close Guantanamo within a year - and it is still open.

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Panorama - The Downfall of Boris Johnson

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With Boris Johnson forced from office, Laura Kuenssberg looks at what led to his downfall.

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2024 election, primaries, political parties

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Could Donald Trump return to the White House?

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Documentary: Disclosure: The Resignation of Nicola Sturgeon

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Documentary: Disclosure: The Resignation of Nicola Sturgeon

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Indepth look at resignation of Nicola Srutgeon.
Devoltuion, Party leaders

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Disclosure - The Resignation of Nicola Sturgeon

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Reporter Mark Daly examines what pressures led Nicola Sturgeon to stand down.

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Documentary series: Thatcher: A Very British Revolution

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Documentary series: Thatcher: A Very British Revolution

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Guide to consrvative party prinicples under MT. Focus on Elections in 1979, 1984 and Thacthers removal from office.

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The irresistible rise and dramatic downfall of Margaret Thatcher.

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BBC produced podcast about current US political issues

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BBC Sounds - Americast - Available Episodes

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Listen to the latest episodes of Americast on BBC Sounds

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Guide to front runner in US Republican Primary

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DeSantis is Trump’s main rival as they do battle to be their party’s 2024 pick. So what are his policies?

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Powers of Congress

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Days before the US government could start to run out of money and default on its debt, Congress has approved a deal to lift the country's borrowing limit.

US President Joe Biden and Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy hammered out the agreement after weeks of high-stakes budget negotiations to prevent global financial chaos.

It now awaits Mr Biden's signature to be signed into law.

This is how we got here and what it means.

Also known as the debt limit, this is a law that limits the total amount of money the government can borrow to pay its bills.

This includes paying for federal employees, the military, Social Security and Medicare, as well as interest on the national debt and tax refunds.

Every so often, US Congress votes to raise or suspend the ceiling so it can borrow more.

The cap currently stands at roughly $31.4tn (£25.2tn). That limit was breached in January, but the Treasury Department used "extraordinary measures" to provide the government with more cash while it figured out what to do.

Historically, it's a formality for Congress to raise the limit as needed, but in recent years, as the parties have become more polarised, they can't seem to agree on the terms.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned that without more borrowing, the US will not have enough money to meet all of its financial obligations as soon as 5 June.

What's in the deal?

Last month, Republicans put forward a deal to keep spending for key agencies at 2022 levels during the next financial year - and limit growth to 1% annually over the next decade.

The proposal would have repealed key priorities of the Biden administration, such as student loan forgiveness and tax incentives for electric vehicles. They also wanted more work requirements for those receiving healthcare and food welfare.

They did not get all they wanted, but neither did Mr Biden's Democrats.

The deal means a freeze on non-defence budgets for 2024, followed by a 1% rise the following year and no budget caps after 2025.

What happens now?

The House of Representatives passed the 99-page bill on Wednesday, and the Senate passed the bill today.

Members of both political parties have expressed disquiet at the agreement.

On the right, some Republicans think it does not go far enough in curbing spending.

And on the other side, some Democrats are unhappy at the extra work requirements on some benefit recipients.

It now heads to President Joe Biden's desk to be signed into law.

This has never happened before, so it is not entirely clear, but it would cause major economic damage.

The government would no longer be able to pay the salaries of federal and military employees, while Social Security cheques - payments that millions of pensioners in the US rely on - would stop. Companies and charities that count on government funds would be in peril.

If the government stops making interest payments on its debt, that would also put the country into default.

The US briefly entered default in 1979, which the Treasury blamed on an accidental cheque processing issue, but an intentional default would shock the financial system, where more than $500bn in US debt gets traded every day.

Moody's Analytics predicts that in a prolonged stand-off, stock prices would fall by almost a fifth and the economy would contract more than 4%, leading to the loss of more than seven million jobs.

Over the long term, if investors start to see US debt as risky, they will charge the US more to borrow money. And since government borrowing helps determine interest rates more widely, the impact would trickle out to the rest of the economy, making borrowing money for a home or a car more expensive for everyone.

There are debates about whether the government could prioritise interest payments to avoid a debt default. But honouring commitments to the owners of US debt, which include financial firms, pension funds and foreign investors, while retirees and others go unpaid, is seen as a difficult one to sell politically.

The debt limit debate highlights one of the fundamental ideological differences between the two major US political parties.

The Republicans view government spending sceptically. To them, rising national debt is evidence of out-of-control government.

While debt-limit brinkmanship is a relatively new strategy for the party, many Republicans believe it is necessary because the nation's current course will ultimately lead to economic and social ruin.

Democrats, on the whole, view national government power as a force for good - a means to improve American lives and right historical wrongs.

They see raising the debt limit when necessary as housekeeping needed to maintain the operation of the government.

The national debt, in their view, is simply a means to fund legislative programmes that have already been discussed and approved.

The debate dimmed when Donald Trump, a Republican, was in the White House and Congress raised the limit three times without major debate. It reignited when Joe Biden became president.

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US debt ceiling - what it is and why there is one

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Days before the US government could start to run out of money and default on its debt, Congress has approved a deal to lift the country's borrowing limit. US President Joe Biden and Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy hammered out the agreement after weeks of high-stakes budget negotiations to prevent global financial chaos.

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‘Whatever it takes’: Biden and McCarthy’s tense journey to debt deal

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‘Whatever it takes’: Biden and McCarthy’s tense journey to debt deal

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President, Congress, Bipartisanship

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hen Kevin McCarthy was struggling early this year to get enough votes from his own Republicans to become speaker of the House of Representatives, Joe Biden called the prolonged saga a national embarrassment, then had a little fun.

"I've got good news for you," the president said, pointing playfully at a reporter after a speech in Kentucky. "They just elected you speaker."

During months of tense exchanges over the US debt ceiling, McCarthy has also taken some swipes at Biden. Arguing that Biden should meet him to discuss his demands for lifting the debt ceiling in March, McCarthy made fun of the 80-year-old president's advanced age.

"I would bring lunch to the White House. I would make it soft food if that's what he wants. It doesn't matter. Whatever it takes to meet," McCarthy told reporters.

In the last few weeks, however, both men have stopped the put-downs and cobbled together an agreement that will now lead to a congressional vote to suspend the US debt ceiling and avoid a default that would wreak economic havoc on the country.

Like the deal they crafted, the relationship the two men forged does not look pretty but appears to have gotten the job done.

"I think he negotiated with me in good faith," Biden said of McCarthy on Sunday. "He kept his word. He said what he would do. He did what he said he would do."

The deal caps federal spending and forces more poor people to work for food aid, concessions that Democrats hate. But it also preserves much of Biden's Inflation Reduction Act and punts the next debt ceiling showdown into 2025, which Republicans hate.

The two leaders are strange political bedfellows. Biden, a veteran former senator from Delaware, talks about the days when both parties would often come together to solve pressing problems. Although he initially called for the debt ceiling to be raised without negotiations, he ended up making compromises.

McCarthy, a 58-year-old Californian, is representative of a pugilistic style of Republican politics that took root with the rightwing Tea Party congressional group formed during the Obama administration, which blossomed when Donald Trump was president.

He came up through the party ranks pushing tax cuts for companies and reduced government spending and is now presiding over an unruly House Republican membership in which radical lawmakers have threatened to force him out of the speaker job unless he takes a very hard line with the White House.

After an initial 1 February meeting at the White House, an optimistic McCarthy predicted that he and Biden would find common ground and meet again soon. Instead, a three-month standoff ensued.

Even after negotiations finally began in earnest, McCarthy tweeted about Biden: "He'd rather be the first president in history to default on the debt than to risk upsetting the radical socialists who are calling the shots for Democrats right now."

But his tone changed as both sides moved toward a deal last week, expressing his respect for White House negotiators, saying: "These are highly intelligent, highly respected on both sides. They know their work, they know their job, they know the numbers."

House Republican Patrick McHenry, a key negotiator in the talks, said last week of the two leaders: "What I saw in the Oval Office yesterday was a willingness to engage with each other in a sincere way - air disagreements, listen.

Biden aides say the relationship is largely cordial and businesslike and that the president recognizes the speaker has a struggle on his hands presiding over the various party factions.

It may not help their relationship that both men were very close to the other's predecessor.

Biden idolized former Democratic House speaker Nancy Pelosi, a woman "who I think will be considered the greatest speaker in the history of this country", he said.

McCarthy was an enthusiastic Trump supporter and a frequent flyer on Air Force One with the then-president.

He was among 147 Republicans who voted to overturn Biden's 2020 election victory, but eventually acknowledged Biden as the legitimate president.

He criticized Trump for failing to stop his own supporters as they stormed the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, but remains in touch with him.

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'Whatever it takes': Biden and McCarthy's tense journey to debt deal

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hen Kevin McCarthy was struggling early this year to get enough votes from his own Republicans to become speaker of the House of Representatives, Joe Biden called the prolonged saga a national embarrassment, then had a little fun. "I've got good news for you," the president said, pointing playfully at a reporter after a speech in Kentucky.

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The debt ceiling fight was never about debt. It was about Republican power

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The debt ceiling fight was never about debt. It was about Republican power

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Congress, Political Parties

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he debt ceiling drama seems to be nearing its end, as the US House of Representatives passed legislation that would lift the debt ceiling in accordance with a deal reached last weekend between Joe Biden, the president, and Kevin McCarthy, the Republican speaker of the House. The Republicans have been fighting to force cuts in spending and/or eligibility for food stamps (Snap), Medicaid, childcare and pre-schools, education and grants for higher education.

By linking these and other provisions to the lifting of the debt ceiling, the Republicans tried to use the threat of default on the public debt to force Democrats to accept them. The legislation, which now goes to the Senate where it is expected to pass, did not satisfy most of their desires.

The worst abuse that Republicans managed to include will be suffered by the hundreds of thousands of poor people who will likely lose access to food assistance under the Snap program. Many are in poor health and will not be able to complete the work requirements that Republicans have insisted on imposing for people of age 50-54; others will lose benefits due to additional red tape.

There was also damage done by the fictitious narrative that Republicans were able to successfully promote about the "ticking time bomb" of the public debt. There is no bomb and if there were, it would not be ticking.

The relevant measure of our debt burden is how much we pay annually in net interest on the debt, as a share of our national income (or roughly, GDP). That number was 1.9% for 2022. That is not big, by any comparison. We averaged about 3% in the 1990s, while experiencing America's then longest-running economic expansion.

The constant repetition of the "threat" posed by our national debt was a big win for Republicans, who are always looking to cut spending on social needs and safety nets; and more strategically important, to cut spending that could aid recovery from an economic downturn when Democrats are in power.

In the Great Recession (December 2007 to June 2009), Republicans fought against measures to stimulate an economic recovery, which were already too small as proposed by Democrats. By October 2010, unemployment was still at 9.4%. In the election a month later, Republicans gained 63 seats to take the House and six Senate seats.

The debt ceiling was used to threaten the Biden administration with a default on the public debt if they did not agree to Republican demands, mostly for spending cuts. The ceiling itself doesn't affect new spending; it's just holding up a chunk of the spending that our government is already obligated by law to carry out. In a democracy, this type of extortion should not be permitted.

But Republican power isn't based on democracy; on the contrary, it's become highly dependent on institutions and practices that most people, including experts, would consider undemocratic or anti-democratic. Republicans benefit enormously from the fact that 80% of senators are elected by about 50% of voters. And if that's not slanted enough, there is the filibuster, which effectively requires a 60-vote majority to win almost any pro-democracy reforms. This includes changes that are needed even for the Senate as presently constituted: eg representation for Washington DC, which has more population than a couple of states. We are the only democracy in the world where people who live in our national capital city don't have full voting rights.

Then there is voter suppression and gerrymandering, for both state and federal elections. These two methods of influencing election outcomes have gone hand-in-hand. Of course swing states are prime targets: recall that Republican presidents who ruled for 12 of the past 22 years came to power while losing the popular vote.

When Republicans win, they then use their power to stack the cards further in their favor. This includes packing the judiciary, where Republican judges advance their agenda.

Their decades-long struggle to control the judiciary reached its pinnacle with a 6-3 majority of the US supreme court, with five justices appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.

The current Republican majority now "substitutes a rule by judges for the rule of law", the dissenting justices wrote when that majority revoked the right to abortion last year.

Dozens of senators have described the supreme court as " captured" by "dark money" from Republican donors, including "rightwing billionaires", and it is currently facing lost credibility as well as accusations of corruption.

If the Republicans had gotten all that they had included in their legislation to lift the debt limit, it would have reduced the public debt by less than one half of 1% next year.

This makes it even clearer that the debt ceiling fight was never really about debt reduction. It's part of a vicious cycle in which political power is abused in order to consolidate a system that is increasingly undemocratic; and then further abused. The debt ceiling is just one part of that cycle, and should not have been negotiated; it needs to be abolished.

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The debt ceiling fight was never about debt. It was about Republican power | Mark Weisbrot

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he debt ceiling drama seems to be nearing its end, as the US House of Representatives passed legislation that would lift the debt ceiling in accordance with a deal reached last weekend between Joe Biden, the president, and Kevin McCarthy, the Republican speaker of the House.

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The Supermajority review: How the supreme court trumped America

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The Supermajority review: How the supreme court trumped America

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Judicary, President, Pressure Groups

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ichael Waldman ran the speechwriting department in Bill Clinton's White House. His new book about the conservative supermajority which dominates the supreme court is written with the verve of great campaign oratory.

Waldman is also a learned lawyer, president of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, and a talented popular historian. His new book focuses on three horrendous decisions the court rendered at the end of its term one year ago, but it includes a brisk history of the court's last 200 years, from the disastrous lows of Dred Scott v Sandford (1857) and Plessy v Ferguson (1896) to the highs of Brown v Board of Education (1954) and Obergefell v Hodges (2015).

But the longest analysis is devoted to those three days in June 2022 when the court "crammed decades of social change into three days".

Waldman writes: "It overturned Roe v Wade [ on abortion] ... putting at risk all other privacy rights. It radically loosened curbs on guns, amid an epidemic of mass shootings. And it hobbled the ability of government agencies to protect public health and safety and stop climate change."

These decisions were the work "of a little group of willful men and women, ripping up long-settled aspects of American life for no reason beyond the fact that they can".

Waldman describes how earlier extreme decisions of the court provoked gigantic national backlashes.

The civil war started just four years after the court held in Dred Scott that African Americans could not sue in federal court because they could not be citizens of the United States.

In May 1935, the "Black Monday decisions" obliterated key parts of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal, including striking down the National Recovery Administration. Those rulings led to Roosevelt's unsuccessful plan to expand the size of the court, which in turn led the court to reverse its position on the New Deal, suddenly upholding social security and the National Labor Relations Act. Referring to the number of justices on the court, one newspaper humorist called it "the switch in time that saved nine".

Waldman describes the current makeup of the court as the ultimate outcome of the longest backlash of all - the one to the court led by Earl Warren, who crafted the unanimous opinion in Brown, outlawing segregation in public schools.

Equally important were decisions requiring legislative districts to have equal populations. Before Reynolds v Sims in 1964, nearly 40% of the population of California lived in Los Angeles but the state constitution awarded that county just one of 40 state senators. Proclaiming the revolutionary doctrine of "one person, one vote", the court said: "Legislators represent people, not trees or acres." By 1968, 93 of 99 state legislatures had redrawn their districts to comply.

But these vital building blocks of modern American democracy coincided with the dramatic social changes of the 1960s, including the fight for racial equality and the explosion of sexual freedom.

"The backlash to the 1960s lasted much longer than the 1960s did," Waldman observes. "Most of us have spent most of our lives living in it."

Richard Nixon's 1968 campaign was the first to capitalize on this backlash. A young campaign aide, Kevin Phillips, explained the plan to the journalist Garry Wills: "The whole secret of politics" was "knowing who hates who", a theory that reached its apotheosis 50 years later with the ascendance of Donald Trump.

The problem for the US was that most of the energy on the left dissipated after the election of Nixon. At the same time, the right began a decades-long battle to turn back the clock. For 50 years, the right has had overwhelming organizational energy: it built a huge infrastructure of thinktanks and political action committees that culminated with the election of Trump and his appointment of the three justices who cemented the rightwing supermajority.

Recent reports have highlighted the enormous amounts of money that have directly benefitted justices John Roberts and Clarence Thomas (never mind Thomas's own gifts from Harlan Crow) through payments to their wives. Waldman reminds us how long this has been going on. Way back in 2012, Common Cause charged that Thomas failed to disclose nearly $700,000 from the Heritage Foundation to his wife, forcing him amend 20 years of filings.

Clarence Thomas talks with John Roberts at the supreme court in 2018. Photograph: Jim Young/Reuters

Waldman is particularly good at explaining how earlier rulings have accelerated the infusion of gigantic sums that have corrupted American politics. Most important of course was Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, in 2010, when five justices including Roberts "undid a century of campaign finance law".

Citizens United made it possible for corporations and unions to spend unlimited sums in federal elections as long as they plausibly pretended they were independent of the candidates they backed. As Waldman writes, quickly "that proved illusory, as presidential contenders ... raised hundreds of millions of dollars for their campaigns, all of it supposedly independent".

This was the beginning of the Roberts majority's use of the first amendment guarantee of free speech "to undermine democracy, a constitutional contradiction". Two years after Citizens United, the court eliminated "a long-standing cap on the amount" individuals could give to federal candidates.

These rulings "remade American politics", Waldman writes. "In the new Gilded Age of fantastically concentrated wealth, billionaires again dominated the electoral system."

The shift was dramatic "and largely unremarked". In 2010, billionaires spent about $31m in federal races. A decade later they spent $2.2bn. Last year, Peter Thiel provided nearly $30m in "independent funds" to support JD Vance in Ohio and Blake Masters in Arizona.

Waldman concludes that the court has become a serious threat to American democracy. He suggests our only hope is that Democratic successes in last year's midterms - many based on fury over the fall of Roe v Wade - mark the beginning of a backlash against the rightwing revolution the court now shamelessly promotes.

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The Supermajority review: How the supreme court trumped America

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ichael Waldman ran the speechwriting department in Bill Clinton's White House. His new book about the conservative supermajority which dominates the supreme court is written with the verve of great campaign oratory. Waldman is also a learned lawyer, president of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, and a talented popular historian.

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Trump critics warn of ‘deep decline of rule of law’ if he wins second term

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Trump critics warn of ‘deep decline of rule of law’ if he wins second term

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Elections , President, Constitution

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As Donald Trump begins another campaign for the presidency, hisextremist rhetoric and lies about the 2020 election signal that in a second term, Trump would attempt to thwart the rule of law at the justice department and other agencies in an effort to expand his power and attack critics.

Former DoJ officials, some Republicans and academics say that if Trump becomes the Republican nominee and is elected again in 2024, he would most likely appoint officials who would reflexively do his bidding, target dissenters he deems part of the "deep state" and mount zealous drives to rein in independent agencies.

Donald Ayer, a former deputy attorney general during the George HW Bush administration, told the Guardian: "Of all the many reasons Donald Trump's candidacy should be rejected out of hand, none is more important than his utter disdain for the rule of law - the idea that we are a society governed by rules and not by the will of one person."

Ayer said: "It's hard to imagine what would become of our legal system if Trump became president again.

"In his first term, aided by attorney general William Barr, who made a pretense of believing in even-handed justice, Trump was still able to grossly misuse the Department of Justice as a political campaign tool, to do favors for his friends, and to seriously undermine the separation of powers.

"There would be no arguable adults in the room in a second Trump DoJ. Beyond pardons for the January 6 criminals and politically motivated prosecutions, one can expect a broader pattern of abuses aimed at securing his autocratic power."

Trump has given plenty of hints about what he would do in a second term, many of which suggest he would become more extreme than during his previous four years in office.

In the wake of his loss to Joe Biden in 2020, Trump falsely claimed the election was rigged and, with help from key allies, he tried to overturn the results in several states Biden won. Separately, after leaving office Trump retained classified documents. These Trump moves have sparked federal and state criminal investigations, which could result in charges against him and others in coming months. Trump has vehemently denied any wrongdoing in all these matters.

At campaign stops in Texas, New Hampshire and elsewhere, Trump has demonized critics, including the prosecutors leading these criminal inquiries, and spoken of the inquiries in conspiratorial terms.

During a March rally in Waco, Texas, Trump lashed out at the "thugs and criminals who are corrupting our justice system" before denouncing prosecutors and investigators. Ominously, he warned the crowd: "When they go after me, they're going after you."

He said: "Together, we are taking on some of the most menacing forces and vicious opponents our people have ever seen, some of them from within."

As part of his dark Waco messaging, Trump added: "Either the deep state destroys America, or we destroy the deep state." One of the targets of Trump's ire has been the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, who charged him earlier this year with 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments he allegedly made to the porn star Stormy Daniels. Daniels claims she had an affair with Trump in 2016.

Similarly, at the CNN town hall in New Hampshire in early May, Trump doubled down on his claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him. He also seemed to glorify the mob of loyalists who attacked the Capitol on 6 January 2021, which led to the deaths of nine police officers and others.

In an appeal to his base, Trump said that if he gets re-elected, he will be "inclined" to pardon "many" of the protesters involved in the insurrection during Joe Biden's certification by Congress. He even called January 6 "a beautiful day".

Given these comments on the campaign trail and his past performance in office, Trump's critics say a second term would mean few, if any, checks on Trump's impulsive behavior, and that he would surround himself with pliant allies.

"Donald Trump has no regard for our institutions," the ex-DoJ inspector general Michael Bromwich told the Guardian. "There is no better proof of this general truth than his attitude towards the Department of Justice. He believes it should be the political tool of the White House, which should target his enemies and go easy on his friends."

Bromwich noted that Trump's choices of Barr and Jeff Sessions as attorneys general ultimately disappointed him, "because there came a point for both of them that they couldn't go as far as Trump needed".

"If Trump were re-elected, we can look forward to a swift and deep decline in the rule of law," Bromwich said. "Top levels of the DoJ would be staffed with election deniers; there would be a wholesale exodus of talented career personnel from every division of DoJ; and large numbers of January 6 insurrectionists would be pardoned. After four more years, the Department of Justice as we know it would be in tatters."

Bromwich stressed too that "Trump doesn't believe in any type of oversight, whether conducted by Congress or inspectors general", and that voters "should expect total resistance to any congressional oversight and the firing of IGs who dared to do their jobs of ferreting out waste, fraud, abuse and misconduct".

Steven Levitsky,a professor of government at Harvard andthe co-author of How Democracies Die, said Trump was an even more extreme candidate now than he was in his previous campaign.

"It's pretty clear that Trump will come in as a more dangerous figure than in 2016. He had no inclination then to respect the rule of law. He saw the state as subordinate to his own will, much like a tinpot dictator. He came in as an authoritarian figure but with no plan," Levitsky said.

"Trump filled his government mostly with conservatives who cared about not breaking the law. They provided some resistance. Civil servants and people he appointed put the brakes on his wildest instincts. Now, he's angrier and bent on revenge. Trump's got people he wants to go after, as well as the so-called deep state. He's going to be much more careful in the people who he appoints. Trump has a much more authoritarian plan."

John Kelly, Trump's former chief of staff, at the White House in October 2018. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

The prospect of a more authoritarian President Trump is one that scares other critics who say his conduct in his first term was, at least in part, checked by conservative figures such as his ex-chief of staff John Kelly, and former secretary of state Rex Tillerson. Notably, both have voiced their opposition to Trump since they left their posts.

Kelly told the Washington Post that Trump's pardon pledges for the January 6 rioters were not surprising: "All those people who tried to overturn the election, that's exactly what he wanted them to do. He can't be turning his back on the people who tried to save him in the election," he said.

Trump has displayed other troubling signs, including allying himself with some of the most extremist Republican figures. One such person is Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general who tried to help Trump reverse his loss to Biden. In late May, Trump used his media platform Truth Social to attack the GOP-controlled Texas House for impeaching Paxton over bribery and other alleged misconduct. The ex-president labeled Paxton's impeachment the work of "radical left Democrats" and "Rinos" [Republicans in name only].

In another radical Truth Social post shared in lateMay, Trump pledged that on his first day in office he would issue an executive order to overturn birthright US citizenship - a right guaranteed in the 14th amendment.

Former GOP House member Charlie Dent told the Guardian he believed that "Trump would engage in more conduct through" executive orders upon re-election, and would "use his powers to do executive actions and ignore congressional powers and prerogatives".

Dent predicted that in a second term, "Trump would load up his administration with sycophants, unlike in the first term", adding that the kinds of conservatives who Trump tapped before, such as the defense secretary James Mattis and Kelly, "will be gone".

"Trump will surround himself with people who would be disinclined to offer any restraints on his worst impulses," he said.

The conservative lawyer George Conway alsoissued dire warnings about a second Trump presidency.

"He's going to manipulate the levers of government to help himself personally and to go after his enemies," Conway said. "He's going to turn our government into a third world government."

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Trump critics warn of 'deep decline of rule of law' if he wins second term

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As Donald Trump begins another campaign for the presidency, hisextremist rhetoric and lies about the 2020 election signal that in a second term, Trump would attempt to thwart the rule of law at the justice department and other agencies in an effort to expand his power and attack critics.

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The ‘blue wall’ home counties are falling out of love with the Tory party

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The ‘blue wall’ home counties are falling out of love with the Tory party

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Elections and Voting behaviour

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f you close your eyes and imagine an archetypal true blue Tory heartland, there is a good chance your mind's eye will conjure up something close to the quaint Surrey town of Godalming. Boutique bakeries and inviting tea rooms dot the immaculate high street, still festooned with union flag bunting from its coronation celebrations.

Estate agents' windows feature large detached houses with impossibly long drives. One has an indoor swimming pool. Narrow, cobbled streets sit below Tudor-period facades. At the bottom of its thriving main thoroughfare is the obligatory Waitrose. It comes as no surprise to discover the MP is, naturally, the chancellor of the exchequer, Jeremy Hunt.

Yet this seeming cliché of a Conservative fiefdom is under concerted electoral attack. The fortress of Godalming is being besieged. The nearby village greens of Bramley and Brook are in the crosshairs. The gravelled drives of Hascombe and Chiddingfold are no longer safe.Suddenly, no Tory stronghold in the area is deemed out of bounds.

"If you didn't know any of the politics, you would probably assume this was a hardcore Tory place," concedes Paul Follows, the beaming Liberal Democrat candidate, as he takes his latest tour of Godalming high street. "But almost all of these really clichéd Conservative places have not been so Conservative for a little while."

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, pictured in 2019 at the Surrey Para Games in Godalming, is among the MPs in the 'blue wall' home counties seats that will be under threat at next year's general election. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

Unlikely as it might once have seemed, Hunt's South West Surrey constituency - in Tory hands since its formation in 1983 - has now become one of the bricks in the "blue wall" of affluent, pro-remain Tory constituencies that the Lib Dems believe they can dislodge.

That would put Hunt at risk of one of those humiliating election night oustings. Attention on Hunt will only grow after the most obvious candidate for electoral defeat, the former deputy prime minister Dominic Raab, announced that he would not contest his more marginal Surrey constituency of Esher and Walton at the next election.

Back in 2017, when Follows joined Godalming town council, he was the only non-Conservative on it. Now the Tories have just two of 20 seats. Over the same period, the number of Tories on the local Waverley borough council has dwindled from about 50 to 10 after the disastrous local election results last month. Follows says that the chaos of Boris Johnson's leadership, followed by the full-scale implosion of Liz Truss's tenure, have catalysed a longer-term decay in the foundations of this blue wall mainstay. Hunt's 8,817-strong majority is large, but it is at risk should Rishi Sunak fail to reverse his party's recent fortunes.

Liberal Democrat candidate Paul Follows, second right, talks with residents in Godalming. Photograph: Andy Hall/The Observer

"The values of the people here have always been what they are now," says Follows. "That's pretty centrist, pretty moderate, very tolerant, pro-European, pretty compassionate and reasonable, very well educated. What they've seen is their party move to a really rightwing group. And it doesn't matter how reasonable Jeremy [Hunt] can come across on occasion."

It is not just campaigning Lib Dems who claim something significant could be brewing in these seats, and can be found across the home counties and the south-east of England. Many Conservatives are also concerned that in their party's desperation to win swathes of traditionally Labour "red wall" seats in the Midlands and north, they have neglected these seats at the other end of its 2019 electoral coalition.

Its embrace of Brexit and culture war battles never played well among blue wall voters, they warn, but the threat of Jeremy Corbyn kept them within the Tory tent last time.

They argue that Keir Starmer provides less of a perceived threat, while rising mortgage costs and NHS problems now impinge on the lives of these voters.

According to a calculation by Oxford University's Prof Ben Ansell, the South West Surrey seat would now fall into Lib Dem hands on national polling averages. To make matters more perilous for Hunt, the constituency is being redrawn, which could make it more marginal.

"It's clear that these are kind of Sunak-sympathetic, Sunak-curious voters," says Ansell. "A full Sunak approach, which was less 'stop the boats' and more 'stop the culture war', might work. The problem is it will lose other parts of the country. The electoral sheet leaves either the feet or the head uncovered."

The talk among some Tories in parliament has become apocalyptic. "I'm more worried about the blue wall than anything," one former cabinet minister said in the recently. "I really think there's a chance that what happened to Labour in Scotland in 2015 could happen to us in the blue wall at the next election. What are we offering these voters now?"

Others are less alarmist, but share much of the sentiment. "I do think we've been somewhat cavalier with what one might loosely call the home counties vote," says Ed Vaizey, a longtime minister under David Cameron and now a Tory peer. "To a certain extent, we've risked what Labour experienced in Scotland and arguably in the north - just assuming those voters will continue to vote for us.

"I don't necessarily think there's a huge Liberal Democrat surge going to happen in the south-east, but I do think that mainstream Tory voters need to feel that they've got a government that cares about them."

The problem emerging in affluent, liberal Tory seats comes with a parallel debate over tactics raging among Conservative MPs on the One Nation wing. Some want to take a "more muscular" stance with the right of the party. Others want to maintain a softer approach, cajoling Sunak and his team behind the scenes. They point out that while the blue wall may be wobbling, their wing of the party is better represented in the cabinet now than it has been for years.

Hunt himself is now chancellor. Just last year, he failed to secure sufficient support even to enter the leadership contest. Elsewhere, figures from the One Nation group of liberal Tory MPs - Gillian Keegan, Alex Chalk, Victoria Prentis and Tom Tugendhat - are now around the cabinet table.

While liberal Tories regard Sunak himself as on the right of the party (an "orthodox Thatcherite", as one calls him), they also view him with relief, and credit him with restoring order and moderation - qualities they were desperate to see.

However, despite the recovery in terms of power within the government, some on the liberal wing say the party is suffering the delayed effects of declaring war on them during the years of Brexit infighting.

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"A lot of the moderates were booted out," points out one former minister. "People like Nicky Morgan, or David Gauke, or Rory Stewart. People who carry some real heft in the party are no longer frontline politicians."

Gauke himself is not panicking about Tory prospects in the blue wall at the next election, but he does see longer-term problems looming.

"Obviously, the local election results were pretty terrible," he says. "My view is that the blue wall is going to crumble, but it's not going to collapse next year. The Conservative party's got a real long-term problem in the home counties. Rishi Sunak is perfectly capable of appealing to blue wall seats, but he's the leader of a party that people have seen over quite a long period of time heading in a particular direction. Those memories are not going to disappear quickly. There's an element of 'long Boris' about it all."

Given the turbulence since 2016 and the Tory party's embrace of Brexit and an iconoclastic radicalism that ended in Truss breaking the record for the shortest-serving prime minister, it should come as no surprise that the small-c conservative home counties feel ruffled.

Even without the demographic changes and the cost of living issues, the government would be struggling. Lib Dem canvassers also report finding more Labour-voting young couples in Godalming who have moved out of London. They can then be targeted as potential tactical voters.

On top of all that, the liberal wing in parliament have also been warning about the fact that the stock of traditional Tory voters is not being replenished. A recent report co-authored by Bim Afolami, an MP in the similarly besieged blue wall seat of Hitchin and Harpenden, found that young voters who once turned to the Conservatives as they progressed in their careers are not making the same journey.

It found just 21% of 25 to 40-year- olds, or millennials, would vote for the Conservatives today. In the 2010 election, the Tories had been the most popular party among that age bracket. In 1979, Margaret Thatcher won among the under-30s. "Millennials are the first demographic cohort not to become more right wing as they age," Afolami wrote. "They are failing to acquire many of the attributes that have traditionally moved voters rightwards: home ownership, secure and stable employment, starting families."

Gauke has another nagging fear about a development that may put off younger voters even more. "I still think hanging over all of that is what is going to happen in the event of a Conservative defeat at the next general election, followed by a vacancy for the leadership and a party membership that is going to get its say.

"It seems implausible that the right wing won't have at least one candidate that goes through to the membership and they've got a very good chance of winning it. So the medium-term prospects for the liberal part of the Conservative party is still very worrying."

Retired insurer John Payne, pictured with his wife, Christine, says he will vote tactically to remove 'the worst government in my lifetime'. Photograph: Andy Hall/The Observer

Back in Godalming, there is some Tory hope. One voter tells a Lib Dem canvasser that he will "stay loyal" to the Tories, whatever the problems besetting the country at the next election. But there are plenty of warning signs, too. Debbie and John, an articulate couple looking after their grandson, are scathing about the childcare and mortgage costs their daughter faces in the town. "There's no affordable alternative here," says Debbie. John points out that Sunak opted to retain Suella Braverman, one of the right's probable next leadership candidates, as his home secretary.

Elsewhere in the town, John Payne, a retired insurer, said he would be voting tactically in the seat to remove "the worst government in my lifetime".

It is no wonder then that, with 18 months at most until the next election, liberal Tories are willing to speak up. Damian Green, the chairman of the One Nation caucus of Tory MPs, urged Sunak to ensure the cricket pavilions and village fetes of the home counties are kept in mind as he battles to rescue the party's fortunes.

"Keeping voters in the blue wall with us is about showing that the Conservative party is not populist," he says. "It is realistic. It has got an economic policy that will bring inflation down and, therefore, make mortgages more affordable long term. But at the same time, it is showing that it has an attitude to the world which is optimistic and outward-looking, providing opportunity for people.

"These are the things that the Tory party needs to be saying if it is to keep that appeal. If we appear to be sour and old-fashioned and pessimistic, then those sorts of voters will be turned off."

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The 'blue wall' home counties are falling out of love with the Tory party

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f you close your eyes and imagine an archetypal true blue Tory heartland, there is a good chance your mind's eye will conjure up something close to the quaint Surrey town of Godalming. Boutique bakeries and inviting tea rooms dot the immaculate high street, still festooned with union flag bunting from its coronation celebrations.

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Brexit, the environment, energy bills … it’s hard to tell Labour and Tory policies apart

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Brexit, the environment, energy bills … it’s hard to tell Labour and Tory policies apart

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Political Parties, Ideologies

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ack in the 1950s, a term was coined to describe the consensus that had allegedly emerged over the way to run the economy in the postwar world. An amalgam of the names of two chancellors of the exchequer - Rab Butler for the Tories and Hugh Gaitskell for Labour - it became known as Butskellism.

Dispute has raged ever since over whether there was any such thing, yet while it is true that the two main parties had their differences - often serious ones - on certain broad principles they did agree: a mixed economy, the permanence of the welfare state and the need to maintain full employment.

After a fashion, Butskellism lasted until the 1970s, with the governments of Ted Heath and Harold Wilson struggling to keep the postwar show on the road. Its demise was only sealed by a combination of stagflation and the arrival of Margaret Thatcher.

Whisper it softly, but Butskellism has returned. While there are still areas where the Conservatives and Labour disagree, these tend to be managerial and technical rather than ideological. On the big issues not much separates them, with both parties shifting towards the centre in recent years. For want of a better word, let's call it Reevuntism in honour of the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, and the man she wants to replace at the Treasury, Jeremy Hunt (the Economist has gone for Mr Heeves).

One obvious example of Reevuntism is the cross-party consensus over Brexit. Hunt and Reeves were both remainers in the 2016 referendum campaign; both now insist that Brexit can and will be a success. Neither party wants a second referendum, or even a renegotiation that would involve going back into the single market. Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer are both keen to remove some of the trade friction between the UK and the EU, but that is as far as it goes.

For a variety of reasons, the right's vision of a post-Brexit Britain in which the economy would be made more competitive as a result of lower taxes and deregulation has never materialised. Nor was it the sort of Brexit leave voters in the less well-off parts of the country wanted anyway.

Starmer and Reeves hope to convince the public that there is a better way to do Brexit. They will be helped in this by the second strand of the new consensus: the recognition that a bigger and a more activist state is here to stay.

By no means all Tories are comfortable with the idea of the government running large chunks of the rail network or that tax as a share of national output is on course to rise to its highest level in seven decades. Liz Truss based her campaign to be prime minister around the idea the way to grow the economy faster was through cutting taxes and red tape.

'The government is in talks with Tata, the owner of Jaguar Land Rover, over a £500m subsidy to build a new battery factory in the UK.' Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

Increasingly, though, the right of the Tory party looks as if it is fighting a losing battle. The government has been paying a chunk of domestic energy bills. It is in talks with Tata, the owner of Jaguar Land Rover, over a £500m subsidy to build a new battery factory in the UK. In the clearest sign that these are indeed different times, ministers have been urging the supermarkets to bring down the cost of food through voluntary price curbs.

Sunak and Hunt might not like this, any more than Conservatives in the late 1940s and early 1950s liked the idea of a National Health Service or state ownership of the coalmines. But the dream of a free-market utopia in which goods, money and people moved unchecked around the world has slowly faded over the past 15 years.

The financial crisis, the pandemic and geopolitical tension have resulted in economic polices that are more interventionist, more protectionist and more centred on national self-sufficiency. Sunak's desire to turn the UK into a science and technology superpower is one example of this new reality. Starmer's green prosperity plan is another.

The third strand of the new consensus involves the way in which the economy is run. Both parties accept that interest rates should be set by an independent Bank of England, that the government's tax and spending plans should be audited by the Office for Budget Responsibility, and that the best long-term way to boost growth is through supply-side reform. Hunt wants to reduce the national debt as a share of output, but so would Reeves if she was chancellor. Both parties would be prepared to borrow - but only for investment.

When he was at the Treasury, Sunak borrowed more than any chancellor in peacetime to save the economy from collapse during the early stages of the pandemic. Would Labour have followed the same approach? Almost certainly. Would a Labour chancellor now be raising taxes - as Hunt is - to bring down public borrowing? Almost certainly.

Reevuntism has involved both parties tacking back towards the centre. This has not been an entirely trouble-free process for Starmer, especially over Brexit, where many party members would support rejoining the EU. Politically, though, the new consensus is much less problematic for Labour than it is for the Conservatives.

In part, that's because the Tories have been forced to abandon so much of what they once believed in as a result of changing economic circumstances. In part, it is because the public has moved leftwards on the economy, becoming not just accustomed to, but also welcoming a more interventionist approach. But essentially, Labour is comfortable with the idea of a more activist state and the Tories are not.

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Brexit, the environment, energy bills ... it's hard to tell Labour and Tory policies apart | Larry Elliott

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ack in the 1950s, a term was coined to describe the consensus that had allegedly emerged over the way to run the economy in the postwar world. An amalgam of the names of two chancellors of the exchequer - Rab Butler for the Tories and Hugh Gaitskell for Labour - it became known as Butskellism.

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If the Tories lose the next election, Boris Johnson won’t be the man they turn to

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If the Tories lose the next election, Boris Johnson won’t be the man they turn to

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Political parties, Leaders, Elections

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Judging by the polls and by May's local elections, things aren't looking too clever for the Conservatives. No surprise, then, that talk is already turning to what will happen to them should they go down to nationwide defeat in 2024, with speculation centred on who might take over from Rishi Sunak.

But the direction the party will take if it loses next year, and who it will pick to lead it in opposition, is ultimately going to depend on just how many Tory MPs hang on to their seats in the wake of such a defeat - and who they are. And that, in turn, might depend on quite how heavy that defeat turns out to be.

To try to get at all this, Liverpool University's David Jeffery and I decided to model three scenarios - a Labour landslide; a relatively comfortable Labour overall majority; and a hung parliament with Labour as the largest party.

The biggest change that defeat would bring would be the exodus from the Commons of most of those Tory MPs representing constituencies in the north of England. A Labour landslide might leave just one or two northern Tories sitting at Westminster, while only about 10 to 15 would survive in the event of a comfortable Labour victory or a hung parliament. Even then, that would represent only a third of those Conservatives currently holding a northern seat.

If that does come to pass, then the party's increasingly desperate attempt to hold on to the "red wall" by upping the ante on small boats and its anti-woke agenda - an effort that may well cost it seats in the southern "blue wall" - will have been in vain.

Defeat would also bring about demographic change. In all three scenarios women would probably make up a greater proportion of the parliamentary Conservative party, although the impact would be slightly greater in the event of a Labour landslide, with women then making up almost a third of all Tory MPs. And because many of the party's ethnic minority incumbents sit in some of its safest seats, a really bad defeat would also see them make up a greater proportion of Conservatives in the Commons. The same incidentally goes for Oxbridge-educated Tory MPs and for current ministers.

Depressingly for pro-European progressives, Brexit true-believers would make up the majority in all three scenarios, and while the proportion of MPs associated with the anti-woke Common Sense Group would fall, the fall wouldn't be that significant. As for the nimbys - backbenchers dedicated to opposing measures to encourage housebuilding - their strength would increase slightly, especially if there were a landslide.

On a brighter note, there is no evidence that a post-defeat parliamentary Conservative party would turn again to Boris Johnson. Indeed, the share of MPs who publicly backed him in last year's second, abortive, leadership contest falls from nearly one in five now to nearer one in 10 in a Labour landslide and isn't much more significant even in a hung parliament. In any case, unless he finds himself a safer seat fairly soon, Johnson's relatively small majority means he might not be there to take up the reins again anyway.

That said, Penny Mordaunt would be in an even weaker position to snatch the crown, even if it's a sword rather than a dagger she decides to wield. Using public declarations in last year's leadership contest as a baseline, her support at Westminster would fall a very long way short of what she would need to make it into the final two. And she would lose her seat in a landslide defeat in any case.

Culture warrior Kemi Badenoch, on the other hand, sitting as she does for rock-solid Saffron Walden, would still be around, and so in with a shout. The same goes for Sunak himself. Indeed, his supporters would, in our landslide scenario, comprise about half of the parliamentary party. Whether that might tempt him to stay on rather than skedaddle straight to Santa Monica, who knows?

Whoever is in charge, though, our modelling suggests that, in defeat, the Tories - no less Brexity, as well as more southern, more nimbyish, more Oxbridge than they already are - will find it more difficult than ever to argue that they truly are a one-nation party.
Tim Bale is professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London and author of The Conservative Party after Brexit: Turmoil and Transformation.

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If the Tories lose the next election, Boris Johnson won't be the man they turn to

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Judging by the polls and by May's local elections, things aren't looking too clever for the Conservatives. No surprise, then, that talk is already turning to what will happen to them should they go down to nationwide defeat in 2024, with speculation centred on who might take over from Rishi Sunak.

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Matt Hancock ordered to apologise to MPs for breach of lobbying rules

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Matt Hancock ordered to apologise to MPs for breach of lobbying rules

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Power of committees and ministerial responsibility.

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Matt Hancock has been ordered to apologise by parliament's sleaze watchdog after it found he broke House of Commons rules by trying to lobby an official investigating another Conservative MP for lobbying.

The former health secretary, who sits as an independent, having been stripped of the Tory whip, was found to have committed only a "mild" breach of the rules.

However, Hancock was given a rap on the knuckles for a "lack of attention" to the MPs' code of conduct. An update endorsed by MPs in December 2022 makes "lobbying the commissioner in a manner calculated or intended to influence his consideration" a specific offence.

Hancock had written to Daniel Greenberg, the Commons standards commissioner, about an ongoing inquiry into the former health minister Steve Brine. The intervention was unsolicited, and came after messages between Brine and the cabinet minister Michael Gove were published as part of the leaked cache of WhatsApps.

The messages revealed that Brine had been trying "for months" to "help the NHS" by connecting it with a company called Remedium. It is a recruitment firm offering doctors for free to the health service, for which he was a paid strategic adviser.

Hancock's actions on 28 March "sought to influence" Greenberg's inquiry into Brine, the commissioner said. He did not ask the commissioner in advance if the letter would be helpful or check if the terms of reference into the Brine investigation meant it would assist.

"The lobbying in his letter was likely due to inattention and carelessness rather than a deliberate attempt to subvert the commissioner's inquiry into Mr Brine," a new report on Hancock's behaviour said.

Hancock may have broken another rule, the commissioner said, after his spokesperson issued a public statement about the matter - in direct contravention of a ban on MPs commenting on live investigations. Greenberg said it did not hinder the inquiry, so decided against imposing any sanction, but added that it underlined a "further lack of attention" to the rules.

Hancock maintains his innocence. In a letter to the standards committee, which is made up of MPs and lay-members and scrutinises decisions by the commissioner, Hancock said: "While I do not agree that the letter I write [sic] was a breach of these new rules, I do accept that the Commission [sic] has found any breach to be minor and inadvertent".

Hancock's experience was viewed as an aggravating factor, given he has been an MP for 13 years. The committee said it was "concerning that a member with this experience has not taken account of these provisions of the code".

He will be forced to make personal apology in the Commons, and has been given leniency because the committee said he did not mean to break the rules, and had no prospect of personal gain through writing the letter. Hancock will also be required to attend a briefing on his obligations under the rules.

Brine was found by Greenberg last month to have not properly declared his second job for Remedium Partners, but cleared of paid advocacy because his efforts were not seeking "financial or material benefit" for Remedium because the doctors' services were offered pro bono.

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Matt Hancock ordered to apologise to MPs for breach of lobbying rules

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Matt Hancock has been ordered to apologise by parliament's sleaze watchdog after it found he broke House of Commons rules by trying to lobby an official investigating another Conservative MP for lobbying. The former health secretary, who sits as an independent, having been stripped of the Tory whip, was found to have committed only a "mild" breach of the rules.

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Keir Starmer tries to calm rift with GMB over energy policy

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Keir Starmer tries to calm rift with GMB over energy policy

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Influence of Unions over the Labour Party.

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Keir Starmer tries to calm rift with GMB over energy policy

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Labour leader makes move as union’s general secretary renews attack on plan to prohibit new North Sea oil and gas extraction

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Sir Keir Starmer under fire after Jamie Driscoll barred from longlist

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Sir Keir Starmer under fire after Jamie Driscoll barred from longlist

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BBC news article. Links to Political Parties and Elections

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Labour's Sir Keir Starmer is under pressure over the decision to block left-leaning Jamie Driscoll from running in the North East's inaugural mayoral election.

Unite, the party's biggest union donor, warned of "serious consequences".

Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham and his counterpart in the Liverpool City Region, Steve Rotherham, also criticised the decision.

Mr Driscoll is the current North of Tyne mayor.

News that Mr Driscoll, who has been described as the "last Corbynista in power" - a reference to the former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn - was being excluded from the longlist to run for the new role for the wider region was revealed on Friday.

The post will cover Northumberland, Tyne and Wear and County Durham with powers over transport, housing and skills.

A senior Labour source linked the decision to Mr Driscoll sharing a panel with filmmaker Ken Loach, who was expelled from the party amid efforts to root out antisemitism.

'Major mistake'

Figures on the left of the party have blamed "factionalism" under Sir Keir's leadership.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham warned that if Labour "remains intent on only selecting nodding heads" then it will "continue to make serious policy mistakes".

"These actions by Labour are a major mistake and have serious consequences," she added.

Mr Burnham and Mr Rotherham expressed their "concern" in a joint letter to Johanna Baxter, chairwoman of Labour's National Executive Committee (NEC).

"Whilst we appreciate the NEC's important role in upholding standards within the party, and rooting out any form of antisemitism, racism and discrimination, it also has a responsibility to ensure decisions are democratic, transparent and fair," they wrote.

"To exclude a sitting mayor from a selection process with no right of appeal appears to us to be none of those things."

They said Mr Driscoll should be entitled to an appeal process and "deserves to be treated with more respect than he has so far been shown".

'Anti-democratic'

Speaking on Sky's Sophy Ridge On Sunday show, Mr Driscoll said preventing Labour members from having a say over whether he should represent the North East was "frankly shocking".

Defending what he described as his "fantastic" track record, he said: "In a two-party system, if you're going to ban people who are promoting socialist views from participating in that, that is really quite anti-democratic."

Mr Driscoll defended discussing Mr Loach's films, some of which have been produced in the North East, despite the director downplaying the issue of antisemitism in the party.

He added: "My understanding is he's made all sorts of clarifications that he's not a Holocaust denier and I think he wrote a letter to the New York Times explicitly saying that the Holocaust was a real event, which of course it was."

Mr Loach, the director of socially critical films including I, Daniel Blake, was expelled from Labour in 2021 during what he called at the time a "purge" of Mr Corbyn's allies.

Shadow business secretary Jonathan Reynolds "strongly" disagreed with claims Sir Keir was trying to purge the left of the party.

He told Sky: "Specifically in a case where somebody shares a platform with someone who themselves has been expelled from the Labour Party for their views on antisemitism, for opposing the tough action that needed to happen, that would preclude them from being a Labour candidate going forward.

"Because when we said we'd have zero-tolerance for antisemitism, when we said we would tear it out from its roots, we were serious about that."

Mr Loach had told the PA news agency that keeping Mr Driscoll off the longlist published on Friday because they shared a platform was the "lamest excuse I've ever heard".

Follow BBC North East & Cumbria on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Send your story ideas to northeastandcumbria@bbc.co.uk.

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Sir Keir Starmer under fire after Jamie Driscoll barred from longlist

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Labour's Sir Keir Starmer is under pressure over the decision to block left-leaning Jamie Driscoll from running in the North East's inaugural mayoral election. Unite, the party's biggest union donor, warned of "serious consequences". Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham and his counterpart in the Liverpool City Region, Steve Rotherham, also criticised the decision.

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Cross party discussions about current political issues in the UK. New episodes weekly.

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Listen to The Rest Is Politics on Spotify. Two men who've been at the heart of the political world - former Downing Street Director of Communications and Strategy Alastair Campbell and cabinet minister Rory Stewart - join forces from across the political divide.