90 m. ago Keir Starmer’s legacy could be electoral reform – or Farage as prime minister | Polly Toynbee

MPs are voting to get rid of first past the post in mayoral elections. Doing the same at a national level would be an antidote to Reform UKWake up to the peril. As MPs return to parliament, they should abandon that self-deluding pretence that it could never happen here in our “moderate” and “tolerant” land. On the contrary, Britain is at more risk of a populist right takeover than many of our European neighbours. With Labour in an electoral slough of despond, and the Tories looking dead already, the reptilian grin of Nigel Farage haunts the political landscape after his satisfactory summer spent stoking division and cynicism.Our first past the post (FPTP) elections make us particularly vulnerable. As Rob Ford, professor of politics at Manchester University, notes: “This is now a Farage-friendly electoral system.” Reform UK has reached the tipping point where winning as little as 30% support in our corkscrewed lottery of a voting system could propel him into No 10, however much that ...

Politics

18 h. ago Keir Starmer slams Nigel Farage's 'scaremongering' as he makes pledge to British families

Keir Starmer has slammed the 'scaremongering' tactics of Reform UK and the Tories and said he is rolling up his sleeves to make a genuine difference to British families’ lives

Politics

5 d. ago There’s an obvious way to challenge Nigel Farage. But Keir Starmer won’t do it | Rafael Behr

Labour’s reluctance to name Brexit as the cause of so many problems hasn’t stopped Reform’s rise. It’s time to try the truthSo begins another chapter in the liberation struggle. Released from bondage to the EU, Britain finds itself subjugated to a more insidious foe. The border that should have been sealed is wide open. The foreign hordes are still coming, but their passage is no longer directed by bureaucrats from Brussels. This time, national emancipation depends on breaking the tyranny of human rights lawyers.That is the plot to Nigel Farage’s Brexit sequel, previewed on Tuesday in an airport hangar in Oxfordshire. The Reform UK leader laid out plans for “mass deportation” of migrants – all who arrive without permission, plus those who are here already and came by illicit channels.Rafael Behr is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Politics

6 d. ago Keir Starmer hits back against Nigel Farage and says illegal migrants face deportation

Keir Starmer has hit back at Nigel Farage after the Reform UK leader launched major plans for mass deportations of migrants. We'll bring you updates on this Breaking News story

Events

6 d. ago Farage warns of ‘threat to public order’ without action on illegal migration

Some 600,000 asylum seekers could be deported in the first parliament of a Reform UK government, Nigel Farage indicated.

Events

6 d. ago Farage unveils plans for 'mass deportations'... but Tories say migrant policy blitz is copied from them

Nigel Farage will today challenge Keir Starmer to ditch his support for foreign courts as he sets out plans for the mass deportation of illegal migrants.

Events

6 d. ago Ministers prepare to deport migrants as Reform unveils small boats plan

Reform UK, which has sought to gain from public dissatisfaction about migration, will reveal its plans to tackle the small boats crisis.

Politics

6 d. ago Nigel Farage vows to scrap UK human rights law to tackle small boats crisis

Mr Farage described international treaties governing human rights law as ‘malign influences’ which had been ‘allowed to frustrate deportations’.

Events

1 week ago By sanctioning journalists, the Kremlin admits how much the truth hurts | Rafael Behr

I’ve been accused of ‘anti-Russia narratives’ but Russia has many stories – including resistance against tyrannyThere is a Russian proverb: don’t blame the mirror if your face is crooked. I first came across it as the epigraph to The Government Inspector, Gogol’s 1836 masterpiece satirising corruption and hypocrisy in the provinces of the tsar’s empire.The phrase sprang to mind last week when I learned that a 21st-century government inspector is displeased with things I have written about Vladimir Putin and his imperial war against Ukraine – the land of Gogol’s birth. This I know because my name has been added to the “stop list”, a growing roster of undesirable elements – politicians, journalists, charity workers, consultants – banned from entering the Russian federation.Rafael Behr is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Court ruling complicates UK government’s efforts to house asylum seekers

The U.K. government faces increased challenges in housing migrants after a court ruling blocked the use of a hotel for asylum seekers

Events

2 w. ago Lords does not need ‘Putin apologists like Farage’, minister says

Defence Secretary John Healey said the voice of Reform UK is ‘conspicuously absent’ in Commons debates on Russia and Ukraine.

Politics

2 w. ago Nigel Farage demands Keir Starmer gives him some Reform UK peers in the House of Lords as he blasts 'democratic disparity'

The Reform leader has hit out at a 'democratic disparity' that sees his party have no representation in Parliament's unelected upper chamber.

Politics

2 w. ago Trump swallowing Putin’s lies is a bigger threat to Ukraine than bombs | Rafael Behr

In Alaska the Russian leader will claim to want peace, but only on his terms – and play on the president’s desperation to ‘make a deal’ quicklyWars do not have to be won. Total victories loom largest in the popular imagination because those are the stories nations always tell to sustain patriotic feeling. The fuller version of history is written in stalemates.That is worth remembering when Donald Trump meets Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday. Both leaders have incentives to pretend that Ukraine’s fate can be settled decisively without any Ukrainians at the negotiating table. That doesn’t make it so. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago PM rebukes Andrew Tate and warns boys at risk from ‘toxic masculinity’ online

Sir Keir Starmer said he felt a duty ‘as a Prime Minister’ and ‘as a dad’ to call out the likes of Andrew Tate.

Events

3 w. ago We’re being deafened by digital noise. Pause it and you hear the sound of democracy in crisis | Rafael Behr

Politics is struggling to cope with the pace of technological change – and that is affecting every single one of usReturning from holiday, asked where I have been, I want to say “offline”. The more precise answer is France, where the internet is available. But I tried not to use it compulsively because there isn’t much point in getting away from it all if you carry it all with you on a phone and check it every few minutes.At some point in the past decade or so, the condition of vacation came to be defined more by detachment from the digital realm than departure from home. The break begins not in a departure lounge but with the act of logging off, setting the out-of-office email auto-reply, archiving work-related WhatsApp chats, deleting social media apps. Continue reading...

Events