43 h. ago QUENTIN LETTS: Ambitious Ed took ownership of the PM. Maybe, just maybe, he could seize the helm again...

When we could all have done with some soothing liniment, up stepped Ed Miliband to create a fresh squall of argy-bargy. It was the last morning of Labour's tetchy conference.

Politics

61 h. ago QUENTIN LETTS: For a grinding hour, Sir Keir pulverised the nation into a powder of boredom

Sir Keir Starmer lumbered on stage, clerical and boxy. His hair was scraped, the face shiny. A plodder newly released from the barber's chair. He did a walk of destiny.

Politics

3 d. ago QUENTIN LETTS: She droned on and on like a robot with a bunged

She has gone the full Bernard Bresslaw. A horrible year in office has tarred Rachel Reeves's voice. It is deeper, more adenoidal. In her conference speech she kept honking.

Events

4 d. ago QUENTIN LETTS: His eyeballs thrashed in their sockets during his BBC party conference interview... the Prime Minister was jolly cross

Reform bashing was everywhere. It cheered up the delegates. Charlatans, snake-oil salesmen, peddlers of division and hatred: these were but some of the insults hurled at Mr Farage's brigade.

Politics

9 d. ago QUENTIN LETTS: Bereft of ideas, plunging in the polls, Labour's come up with a patronising new buzzphrase. Give me strength

After the Big Society and Levelling-Up, we are now to be lectured about another opaque political idea, writes QUENTIN LETTS.

Politics

9 d. ago QUENTIN LETTS: Jutting his jaw and stiffening his neck, Ed Davey's Lib Dems speech was a performance rehearsed in front of a full

While Donald Trump was making a serious speech about 'the death of western Europe', writes QUENTIN LETTS, Sir Ed Davey was musing about sunshine and rollercoasters.

Politics

1 week ago QUENTIN LETTS: Ed Davey's seesawing Dems don't know if they're Liberal or not

Here in sunny Bournemouth, amid the conference sound system's canned Vivaldi and the gentle burps (and worse) of Lib Dem activists during debates, you hear swipes at Sir Ed Davey.

Politics

1 week ago QUENTIN LETTS: Is it time to retire the stunts? 'Nooo' the activists shouted, and Sir Big Ed beamed

Sir Big Ed arrived at his party conference with a marching band, writes QUENTIN LETTS, pretending to be a drummer. Soon he was dressing up to reflect his party conference 'buzz'...

Politics

2 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: If Starmer won't admit that his beloved human rights law is a democratic liability, he'll go the way of the Scottish Earl executed by the guillotine he invented

William Shakespeare would have savoured such a comeuppance. That priggish legalist Sir Keir Starmer has been snagged by, oops, the law.

Politics

2 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: 'No courage, no judgement, no backbone,' thundered Kemi as just ONE Labour MP defended Keir Starmer

Just one Labour backbencher defended the absent Sir Keir Starmer. Name of Slinger, the Member for Rugby.

Events

2 w. ago For the first time in a year the Tories felt like a serious force in parliament: QUENTIN LETTS

It was an 'abandon ship' variety of interview rather than providing reassurance. Keir Starmer, from a torpedo-damaged Downing Street, gave a less than serene account of himself.

Politics

3 w. ago His fatal flaw wasn't sex or even money, for all his love of whiffy billionaires. No what captivated Mandelson above all else was power: QUENTIN LETTS

Third time lucky, goes the proverb. Peter Mandelson has been re-toppled. This most vivid of political butterflies has previously, twice, escaped his critics' nets; this time it could be the end.

Economics

3 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: Bridget Phillipson's weirdly precise bob of inky hair swung like a black satin curtain in an Istanbul brothel

And they're off. We may need racing commentator Cornelius Lysaght to do justice to Labour 's deputy leadership election, there are so many runners.

Politics

3 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: Did Keir give Maria the boot because he was too terrified to sack her sister?

Eager to assert her tough-guy credentials, new Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood welcomed counterparts from the 'Five Eyes' alliance.

Events

3 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: By the time she reached the lectern, Dame Andrea

On a day of dizzying politics, nothing quite topped Dame Andrea Jenkyns's arrival on stage at Reform's party conference.

Politics

4 w. ago She was the authentic voice of the snarling Left, but as we now know, the Red Queen was a woman of gluttonous appetites with little between the ears: QUENTIN LETTS

Amid a Cabinet of dull mumblers, Angela Rayner was the eye-flashing exception. Sir Keir Starmer praised her 'working-class background' but actually that wasn't so rare, even in the modern Labour party.

Politics

4 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: With a voice as soothing as the Psycho soundtrack Bridget Phillipson was dispatched to defend Mrs Rayner

As is the way in political scandals, a Cabinet colleague had to be 'sent out' to defend the stricken minister on the morning round of broadcast interviews.

Science

4 w. ago Nuclear triad and ‘robot wolves’: parade shows off array of Chinese weapons

On display in Beijing were nuclear weapons launched by air, sea and land, laser weapons and four-legged dronesIt was hardly a subtle attempt to project power. China showed off air-, sea- and land-launched nuclear weapons in its parade on Wednesday, a triad intended to demonstrate that Beijing’s long-term aspiration is to match US military might.Also on display were large underwater torpedo-like drones, intended to threaten western warships, as well as anti-drone lasers and four-legged “robot wolves”, all designed to be noticed, regardless of their actual military effectiveness. Continue reading...

Events

4 w. ago QUENTIN LETTS: For Kemi, here was a prize opportunity. All she had to do was rub their noses in it and Mrs Rayner would be a goner, surely. But no, Kemi goofed it

What a difference a comeuppance makes. Angela Rayner, Westminster's most careless taxpayer, entered the Commons. A full House was hushed, stunned.

Politics

last month QUENTIN LETTS: His jagged, gapped teeth had shades of Hannibal Lecter. Better watch out

The new supremo is Zack Polanski, 42, a smooth-talking vegan and ex-Lib Dem hypnotherapist who used to tell women they could think their way to a bigger bust.

Politics