Madeline Grant

It’s the ideology, stupid

1 August 2026 9:00 am

What do Nigel Farage, gender-critical feminism, masculinity, generalised homophobia and GB News have in common? All have been blamed in…

It’s amazing how far Burnham has got by not being Keir Starmer

30 July 2026 3:20 am

It’s amazing how far a prime minister can get just by not being Keir Starmer. There’s considerable political success to…

I’m so glad that Big Ange is back

25 July 2026 3:00 pm

Big Ange is back. From a sketchwriter’s point of view I have to say that this is marvellous news. Rayner…

Put on a suit and tie, Prime Minister

25 July 2026 9:00 am

A brass fanfare; a wide establishing shot of five men in three-piece suits, seated in a library of leather-bound tomes…

What is the point of the Lib Dems?

24 July 2026 3:00 pm

The Liberal Democrat party of Russia and the Liberal Democrat party of the United Kingdom are not, on the face…

Burnham’s coronation speech was sub-Disney schmaltz

18 July 2026 3:11 am

As coronations go, this was a particularly flat one. Instead of Zadok the Priest we were treated to New Order.…

Keir Starmer’s biggest problem was always right behind him at PMQs

16 July 2026 2:00 am

‘You’ll miss him when he’s gone!’ Lots of people have said this to me. It’s true I have had the…

The terminally mediocre were on full display at DPMQs

9 July 2026 1:12 am

Sir Keir Starmer was away this week. Nothing new there of course; indeed, it seems the thing which will change…

Farage versus the world

8 July 2026 3:02 am

He probably won’t want to hear this but there is an air of General De Gaulle about Nigel Farage. De…

Did anyone vet Big Ange’s LBC love-in?

7 July 2026 1:19 am

‘What’s Big Ange up to?’ was a question Sir Keir Starmer had to ask himself basically every day of his…

Starmer’s Wile E Coyote defence spin

2 July 2026 1:53 am

The Prime Minister began today’s PMQs by wishing a ‘happy 78th birthday’ to the NHS. This is the sort of…

Will Starmer’s last defender please turn out the lights

1 July 2026 6:14 am

There are still people out there – with access to the full gamut of unblunted cutlery – who maintain that…

Andy Burnham’s tragic Blairite tribute act

30 June 2026 12:40 am

‘What a fitting venue to be sat in – The People’s History Museum’. So began the introduction to Andy Burnham’s…

Parliament has become dangerously mawkish

27 June 2026 1:08 am

Parliament always has an otherworldly feel; it’s a world of gothic crenelations, of specialised language, of deliberate artifice. But something…

Labour MPs couldn’t handle the truth from Kemi Badenoch at PMQs

25 June 2026 1:55 am

The end of Sir Keir’s premiership, and especially his last few PMQs, was always going to be less of a…

The truth about Keir Starmer’s legacy

22 June 2026 10:10 pm

It was when Keir Starmer claimed never to have had a dream that I knew we were dealing with potentially…

Labour’s heading for a catastrophic collision with reality

20 June 2026 1:46 am

In the giddy rush to announce yet another ‘New Chapter’ in British politics – whose chapters these days seem to…

The perfect two words to describe this zombie parliament

18 June 2026 1:41 am

With Sir Keir in Evian busy taking what must surely be his last opportunity to stuff Lady Victoria’s hand luggage…

Keir Starmer can’t keep deluding himself about two-tier policing

4 June 2026 3:15 am

The House of Commons these days is hardly an inspiring place. There can be little denying that it is a shadow…

The desperate sycophancy of Mandy’s campaign for the Oxford chancellorship

2 June 2026 7:32 am

After months of back and forth, today the government finally released the latest tranche of the Mandy documents, which have…

Is Nicola Sturgeon the least curious woman on the planet?

27 May 2026 12:17 am

Peter Murrell is a strangely shiny man. He has the air of an undertaker who’s been siphoning off the corpse…

Andy Burnham’s faux insurgent act fools no one

23 May 2026 1:16 am

Today, in what will doubtless be just the first of many irritations inflicted on the unfortunate people of Makerfield, Labour…

Keir Starmer is resigned to resigning

21 May 2026 1:53 am

Has Sir Keir Starmer already checked out? There was a strange atmosphere in the House of Commons today. A sort…

Labour has bequeathed us a summer of nonsense

19 May 2026 3:07 am

The Great North summit sounds like it should have been a peace conference attended by Peter the Great. Instead, it…

What the Two Fat Ladies taught us about Britain

16 May 2026 9:00 am

‘Grab that crab, Clarissa!/ Eat that meat, Jennifer!’ It was with these words – the start of their self-sung theme…