Red Box - Wednesday October 28 2020

PLUS: Dimbleby's school dinners menu

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Wednesday October 28 2020

By Esther Webber

Good morning,

A few of our recent prime ministers have gained notoriety for misjudging the public mood: David Cameron when he called the EU referendum, and Theresa May when she went for a snap election.

At least now they can comfort themselves they're not as tone-deaf as Kim Kardashian, who posted pictures yesterday of her family on holiday on a private island for her 40th birthday.

Esther Webber

Red Box reporter

@estwebber

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The briefing

A further 367 coronavirus deaths were reported yesterday, the highest since May. George Eustice, the environment secretary, said this morning the government was sticking to the three-tier system but would not rule anything out.

Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, told Times Radio "we should be extremely worried" about the latest figures and suggested ministers had missed their chance to go for a circuit-breaker lockdown.

I hope ministers like reading about free school meals, because it's being served up again and again. Henry Dimbleby, the government's own food tsar, has come up with a £1.2 billion plan structured around holiday activities to stop children going hungry.

Also on board is Anne Longfield, the children's commissioner for England, who writes in devastating detail for Red Box today about how holiday clubs have long been accepted as a solution but no government department wants to take responsibility for them.

Dame Louise Casey, adviser on social welfare, joined the chorus on Times Radio this morning, calling the extension of free schools a "no-brainer", adding: "We all know families and kids are suffering because of covid despite the measures brought in."

The next big row(s): unease is growing ahead of a benefit cut for self-employed workers next month, and it's only a taste of what is yet to come when the government has to decide whether to keep the £20 rise in universal credit.

Priti Patel said she was "truly saddened" and pledged fresh action on people smugglers after at least four migrants, including two children aged five and eight, died when their small craft with about 20 people on board capsized near Calais.

Trivia question: Henry Dimbleby was a contemporary of which cabinet minister at Eton? Answer at the bottom of today's email

RED BOX: COMMENT

We can't pass the buck on child poverty any longer

Anne Longfield – Children’s commissioner for England

Battle of the bands

Jake Berry: The Harry Styles of the Northern Research Group?

The world might never have been exposed to the joys of One Direction or Little Mix had it not been for the strange stage of the competition in ITV's The X Factor where the judges choose a few random people who aren't going to make it on their own and jam them together in a group who must feign an internal connection for every Saturday night thereafter, and possibly the rest of their lives.

It's going that way with "research groups" inside the Conservative Party, some of which are now larger than the original iteration of So Solid Crew, and producing more hits.

The Northern Research Group is the latest to burst on the scene, chaired by former Northern Powerhouse minister and erstwhile Boris Johnson superfan Jake Berry. The collective ruffled feathers this week with a letter released against the chief whip's express wishes, calling on the government to honour its commitments to the north with a bespoke coronavirus recovery plan.

The intervention appears to have paid immediate dividends, with Rishi Sunak appearing on BBC Radio 1's Newsbeat yesterday, not to treat us to his charity single (although he could probably do with raising some money) but to assure us that he, like, totally gets it. “I am a northern MP. I represent a constituency in North Yorkshire, just south of Teesside, and I am a northern chancellor as well," he said. Got that? He's northern.

Incidentally, one of Berry's former colleagues could not resist sniping that Berry embodies a certain kind of aspirational northern Toryism that is "about living in a nice house in north Yorkshire or Lancashire which is much cheaper than if you were in Hampshire or Surrey, with dogs and a nice big car" - and that it applies equally to the chancellor.

But what are these groups, are they any use, and why are they all the rage right now? The original model was the European Research Group, formed by Michael Spicer in the early 1990s to resist further integration into the European Economic Community. The idea was to furnish eurosceptic MPs with the information they needed to rebut arguments for closer union and to form an organising force that could co-ordinate a joint approach in the press and in parliament.

Its members - along with a separate but overlapping "awkward squad" of Tory backbenchers - played a role in the genesis of the 2016 Brexit referendum, but really rose to fame after the 2017 general election when they became adept at keeping up pressure for a harder Brexit and generally making Theresa May's life difficult.

Despite its ultimate success at resisting May's plans, it was never fully co-opted into the Johnson government. While ERG figureheads Priti Patel, Michael Gove and Anne-Marie Trevelyan are all in the cabinet, other giants such as Steve Baker, Sir Iain Duncan Smith and Sir Bernard Jenkin remain fully live and unplugged.

Tom Tugendhat, who with Neil O'Brien founded the China Research Group (CRG), says they consciously used the ERG as a model. "We'd been talking for six months before we actually set it up, and the idea was not to whip exactly but to have a caucus which could come together on this issue even though we might have different views on other policy questions."

He adds that the group holds events, hosts discussions and invites guests, and is therefore more than a headache for the government on particular votes. However, the CRG has already shown its effectiveness, with the government's partial climbdown on Huawei and 5G being credited in part to their efforts.

The NRG shares some key characteristics with the ERG and the CRG, which could make it a force to be reckoned with. As one close observer puts it: "It's all about brand. Jake Berry has been responsible for turning 'levelling up' into one of the most successful Tory brands since euroscepticism.

"The fact no one really knows what it is or what its successful implementation would look like only makes it more powerful, and means you can never be too extreme in advocating for it."

On first glance, it looks strange that these splinter groups find themselves able to exert pressure now, while the government enjoys an 80-strong majority, but as one senior Tory MP puts it: "We're seeing them spring up at least partly because the government doesn't enjoy the whole Conservative Party's support across many areas apart from Brexit - we haven't got much in common apart from that."

Another official observes that it's a function of power being wielded by a select few at the top, and the apparent departure from cabinet-style government. "These days if you asked me which would you rather be - a junior minister taking orders, or the leader of my own band, I know which I'd choose."

The north needs a way out of Covid lockdown, says Rishi Sunak

RED BOX: COMMENT

Election promises to the north are being delivered against the odds

Katherine Fletcher and Andy Carter – Conservative MPs

Chart of the day

By Francis Elliott

Just one in six people believe Boris Johnson has a clear plan to tackle Covid-19 and that the present strategy is curbing the spread of the virus, a poll has found.

The prime minister is still being given the benefit of the doubt by half of voters, according to YouGov. Its survey shows that the proportion of those who regard him as doing a good job, or as well as expected, remains almost unchanged since August.

There is far less confidence, however, in the wider government and how it has responded to individual aspects of the pandemic.

Just 35 per cent of those questioned believed that the government had made the right decisions and 27 per cent thought it had done a good job in reducing the number of those becoming infected.

Read the full story

RED BOX: COMMENT

Ethnic minorities should get priority for Covid testing

Carys Roberts and Halima Begum – IPPR and Runnymede Trust

Need to know

IN A SPIN: Former Labour spin doctors have rubbished a campaign to target Rishi Sunak with highly personalised attack adverts on social media, warning against a return to the “politics of envy”. (The Times)

MANAGING EXPECTATIONS: Management consultants have been awarded £180 million to deliver Brexit as a potential “no-deal” looms and ministers turn increasingly to experts from the private sector. (The Times)

MIND THE PALACE: Lucy Worsley, the television historian and chief curator of Historic Royal Palaces, is leading a review of the residences’ links to the slave trade. (The Times)

PEAK PRESSURE: Boris Johnson is coming under pressure for a new lockdown, with Number 10 expecting a lower but longer peak in virus deaths. (The Telegraph)

DOG'S DINNER: John Penrose, Conservative MP married to coronavirus Test and Trace chief Dido Harding, has criticised “chaotic parents” who send their children “to school without breakfast". (Daily Mirror)

RED BOX: COMMENT

Let’s talk about the education of white working-class boys

Professor Brad Evans – University of Bath

In yesterday's poll, 69 per cent of you said Chris Whitty was our last hope, while 15 per cent voted no confidence in him.

RED BOX: COMMENT

We need to find the best way forward for trans equality in the UK

Caroline Nokes – Chairwoman, Women and equalities committee

Have your say

Yesterday Matt asked which northerner the Northern Research Group should recruit to their cause.

Wendy Booth: "Simon Armitage could offer his well-versed views of the class system and illustrate them with his wry sense of humour. Just what we need (here in Tier 3) at the moment."

John Andrews: "May I be allowed to nominate a 'not to be selected' please? If so it’s Geoff Boycott - in these exceedingly difficult times this government is already too slow to react to the point of constipation."

Gina Burton: "Sally from Coronation Street. She was mayor of Weatherfield, after all."

Michael Leapman: "The late Wilfred Pickles. His catchphrase, 'Give 'em the money, Barney', couldn't be more appropriate."

Ann-Catherine Moerner: "They need the legendary Eamon Wright."

Roger Baker: "The Angel of the North. Divine intervention is required."

TODAY: What cause would you champion with a new "research group" in parliament? Email redbox@thetimes.co.uk and we'll use some of the best tomorrow.

The best comment

Feed the children but help their parents too

James Kirkup – Director, Social Market Foundation

Regimes have learnt not to fear street protests

Roger Boyes – The Times

Let’s focus on real threats women face today

Alice Thomson – The Times

There's a cost to these hateful attacks on Rishi Sunak

Sarah Vine - Daily Mail

Tories aren’t rooting for Trump, despite what the left might say

Mark Wallace - The i

The cartoon

Today's cartoon from The Times by Peter Brookes

Now listen to this

The Commons is in recess so we don’t have PMQs today, instead I will bring you the Midday Update - your indispensable half-hour news bulletin.

It’s Wednesday so will still have Disunited Kingdom, rounding up the latest politics from the four corners of the UK.

And in our big thing at 11 o’clock I’ll speak to Ed Balls about the economy, the Labour Party, and of course Strictly.

Join me on Times Radio from 10am

TMS

From the diary

By Patrick Kidd

Criminal's literary gift

Jeffrey Archer has got a lot of words out of our justice system. First there were his Prison Diaries, and now the opening of his new book comes from the head of London’s drug squad. It took ages to get a story out of him until Archer asked if anything annoyed the policeman. “I had this burglar once, who knew I was chasing him,” he said. “It used to drive me mad that we couldn’t nail him, but what really made me cross is that every Christmas he would send me a Harrod’s hamper.” The bad news was that he had to hand the hampers in as evidence and never saw them again.