Red Box - Wednesday January 15 2020

PLUS: Nandy wins over the miners

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Wednesday January 15 2020

By Matt Chorley

Good morning,

On step forward, one step back.

Greggs has been driven out of Cornwall, after its only shop (which didn't even sell pasties) was closed down after a year of poor trading.

At the other end of the country Rutland has lost its status as the only county in Britain without a McDonald’s restaurant.

LISTEN: Catch me every weekday morning giving a sneak preview of what's coming up in Red Box at 7.30am with Julia Hartley-Brewer at breakfast on TalkRadio. Listen here

Matt Chorley

Red Box Editor

@MattChorley

The briefing

The Times splash reveals that Boris Johnson aims to “cut the head off the snake” of criminal gangs and restore the Conservatives’ reputation as the party of law and order by setting up a cross-Whitehall taskforce.
The troubled regional airline Flybe was given a reprieve last night after ministers agreed a multimillion-pound rescue deal to prevent its collapse.
The Big Ben ding dong continues: Boris Johnson's plan to crowdfund the £500,000 to sound the bell for Brexit on January 31 er... doesn't actually exist. And now the body that represents Britain’s bellringers yesterday refused to endorse the commemorations, saying that ringing should not take place for political reasons. Bishops and vicars supported its stance.
A veteran peer has been suspended by the Labour Party after the standards watchdog found that he had sexually harassed two women working in parliament.
Esther Webber's trivia question: Before Sir Keir Starmer, who was the last MP to be elected for the first time with a knighthood? Answer at the bottom of today's email

Red Box: Comment

Two years on from Carillion’s collapse we have not learned the lessons

Rachel Reeves – Labour MP

Inside the 109

When does 109 not equals 109? When it is 66.

The new intake of Conservatives is huge. It accounts for almost a third of the entire parliamentary party in the Commons.

Marshalling them, whipping them, even getting to know them is not going to be easy. And there are so many, it would be wrong to treat them as a single homogenous block. Although some of them are trying.

There are two main WhatsApp groups that the newbies are in. "The New Intake" is run by the Tory whips, pumping out instructions about where to be, and when. At the end of last week a panicked message was posted by Team Johnson noting that not many had put in to ask a toadying (I mean, "helpful") question at PMQs.

So many of the new MPs dropped everything and rushed down to the table office to put their name into the ballot that a queue quickly formed out the door. It was not a huge success: of the 15 MPs listed on the order paper this morning, only Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) had his name pulled out of the hat. Must try harder.

There is another WhatsApp group for the new intake of Tory MPs. It is called "The 109". It features a picture of the 109 in the Commons chamber. But I understand that there are only 66 MPs in it. The description: "Our intake, no whips!"

Some have not been let into this group because they are seen as too likely to tell teacher and leak to the whips. Others don't know exists. Some have already gone off to do their own thing. "There are, as always," says one uber-keen newbie. "Some people who don’t seem to be engaging as much with the caucus, but, after all, there are 650 different ways to be an MP."

Set up by Theo Clarke, the new MP for Stafford, The 109 has become a network for those finding their feet. When someone is about to do their maiden speech, a message is posted and a dozen or so colleagues will rush into the chamber to offer support.

Others have used it to suggest going for drinks or dinner, as they settle in to London life.

And some have tried to co-ordinate a 2019 "caucus", including the idea of holding hustings for the select committee chairmanship elections, then voting in a bloc – an idea not universally welcomed, either by those who want to do their own thing, or by the government whips who like to think of themselves as the ones who tell Tory MPs how to vote.

With this new hoofing majority, the message from the whips has been essentially: sit down, shut up, do as you are told. Those with long memories remember the likes of Heidi Allen and Sarah Wollaston, elected as Tories in 2015 and 2010 respectively, who immediately started railing against being told what to do by Tory whips.

Meetings between the whips and the new MPs have gone one of two ways: the ambitious say they want to be in the cabinet by the time of the next election; the sensible say they want to win their seat again at the next election.

For the whips, controlling this intake is going to tricky. Some of the new MPs had worked their seats for some time. Others inherited safe Tory constituencies from grandees who stood down. Others were standing in no-hope areas who were swept into office when the red wall collapsed.

What unites them all is that they are striking a markedly different tone to the existing Tories. Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) started his maiden speech yesterday with: "Ay Up Duck.” He went on to explain that "as a teacher, a school trade union representative and a Tory, I realise I am not the typical stereotype".

One MP noted: "We are different. We are definitely younger, more northern, even more gay." More likely to have been to a comprehensive. More likely to have had a proper job outside politics. More likely to think that they owe their loyalty to their constituents first and foremost.

Wherever they are from they will bring to bear massive pressure for more public spending. Whether from the West Midlands and Black Country, the deindustralised north east or coal fields of the north west, the home counties or Cornwall, they want to see both more spending on infrastructure and tax cuts for the working classes.

"It is the thing which unites Chipping Barnet, West Bromwich, Heywood and Middleton, and Darlington," one MP told me earlier this week.

They talk of touring council estates during the election, something Conservative MPs of old tended not to do, or at least not brag about. They are conscious that people only leant them their vote, and they need repaying.

In the short-term that means the two Bs: buses and bypasses. Every MP has a demand for more, better buses, and a road improvement scheme or two that could transform their areas pretty quickly.

Then there are more long-term schemes, like upgrading the A1, which connects London with Edinburgh and passes through many of the seats which turned blue on December 12, and duelling the A303 linking Hampshire and Devon via Stonehenge. These are unlikely to have been finished by the time of the next election, but candidates want to be able to point to work underway.

"If the key challenges of my constituency can be summed up in one word, it is infrastructure," said David Johnston (Wantage) in his maiden speech yesterday, calling for improved road safety, a reopened train station, broadband, school places, and increased educational opportunities. He also demanded a new focus on social mobility "because last year it was referred to fewer than half the number of times it was in 2016".

This was echoed by Paul Holmes (Eastleigh): "It was social mobility that allowed a council estate boy like me to sit in the mother of all Parliaments today."

And there is HS2. Over the past few weekends Andrew Gilligan, the PM's transport adviser, has been ringing round the new intake urging them to back cancelling phase one of the high speed rail line from London to Birmingham. The Mail on Sunday reported that the Birmingham to Leeds and Manchester stretch could be spared, as part of the of commitment to the north.

While all the focus has been on the northern influx, a number of new MPs from seats south of Birmingham are plotting their own regional caucuses to make sure they are not overlooked. While northern newbies like HS2, southern newbies don't.

Tom Hunt (Ipswich) said of northern towns in his maiden speech yesterday: "We hear understandably how many within these communities feel that their areas have been left behind, but many in the town I represent feel exactly the same, and their concerns should not be forgotten in the stampede rightly to invest in the north. It is hardly like Ipswich and East Anglia have been basking in it."

All of which means Sajid Javid, the chancellor, has a lot of circles to square in his budget on March 11.

For now, at least, Boris Johnson can do no wrong. One MP who won unexpectedly coos: "He is brilliant, I couldn't have won without him."

"The prime minister is very good at distancing himself from the previous government, even from his own government," says a more cynical new MP.

"He is a semi deity, rising above the melee of even his own ministers," says another.

He is not, though, totally infallible. The group known as "The 109" takes its name from when the PM addressed his colleagues before Christmas and welcomed his 109 new MPs.

In fact there are only 107, as was pointed out by Mark Wallace at a ConservativeHome drinks reception last night. Overnight there has been a debate about whether to rename the group or not.

The first rule of politics, as they say, is being able to count.

Red Box: Comment

Parliament will be powerless to scrutinise the next phase of Brexit

Lord Kinnoull – chairman of lords EU COMMITTEE

Labour leadershipwatch

Lisa Nandy has secured the surprise backing of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), with general secretary Chris Kitchen said the Wigan MP was who “Labour needs to rebuild the party and regain trust with the voters we’ve lost”, the Yorkshire Post reports. The New Statesman's Patrick Maguire explains why this is a coup.

Momentum has been accused of attempting to “stitch up” the Labour leadership contest after balloting its members on whether it should back Rebecca Long Bailey without offering an alternative. (The Daily Telegraph)

Jess Phillips uses an article in The Guardian to set out her six-point plan to restore trust in politics, which includes a citizens’ assembly on how Britain should tackle climate change.

The Sun reports that Labour Party membership has surged by a "whopping" 60,000 since their election disaster as moderates launch an all-out bid to stop a Corbynista becoming party boss.

Yvette Cooper told BBC 5Live that she "always argued it’s time we had a Labour woman leader", but is back er... Sir Keir Starmer, the only man in the contest.

Red Box: Comment

Until they are willing to compromise, Corbynistas will remain hobbyists

David Swift – Historian and author

Need to know

HUAWEI, YES WAY: Sajid Javid has abandoned his opposition to allowing Huawei into Britain’s 5G network, with Boris Johnson resisting US pressure to ban the Chinese company. (The Times)

VOTE AGAIN: Nicola Sturgeon is planning to demonstrate surging support for a second independence vote among MSPs by staging another ballot at Holyrood demanding referendum powers, after Boris Johnson rejected her request. (The Times)

ON THE HUNT: Jeremy Hunt is campaigning to be elected chairman of the Commons health and social care select committee as he gives up on a return to government. (The Times)

CAPITAL PROJECT: Tony Blair is to join the crown prince of Abu Dhabi and a Japanese billionaire in a colossal project to move the capital of Indonesia from the waterlogged city of Jakarta to the jungles of Borneo. (The Times)

COVER UP: The UK has failed to pass on the details of 75,000 convictions of foreign criminals to their home EU countries and concealed the scandal for fear of damaging Britain’s reputation in Europe’s capitals. (The Guardian)

NAZI COMPARISON: A Lib Dem peer has faced criticism for going “a step too far” in comparing Brexit Britain to Nazi Germany. (Evening Standard)

Red Box: Comment

Now it’s up and running, Stormont must deliver for my generation

Aine Lagan – Conservative activist

The Sketch

Breakfast waffle with the man from Auntie

Quentin Letts

Modern prime ministers must stay limber when being interviewed by breakfast television. One moment they may be in serious discussion about the blood-crazed politics of feudal societies (Iran/the House of Windsor), the next they will be quizzed about Big Ben’s bongs or their post-Christmas diet. They also have to keep a straight temper when the interviewer (over-familiar, with unconvincing northern vowels) tries to skewer them for having taken a week’s holiday — and then insists on shaking hands. Twice. On screen. To show the viewers how matey he is with the country’s head of government.

Read the full sketch

I asked if the taxpayer should pay for Boris Johnson's photographer. Two-thirds said no. Full result here

Have your say

Yesterday I asked which luxury aide would you hire on the taxpayer if you were prime minister.

Enda Cullen said: "A sommelier."

Angus Young said: "May I respectfully suggest that perhaps Boris should enquire of Dominic, if perhaps he knows of any turd polishers - to make the unpalatable more presentable?"

William Giles said: "A hairdresser for ensuring that the hair is suitably mussed up for the official photographer."

David Downing said: "Far too easy to say a hairdresser - how about a lie detectorist?"

TODAY: What would you call the WhatsApp group for the new Tory MPs? Email redbox@thetimes.co.uk and we'll use some of the best tomorrow.

The best comment

Sir Keir Starmer is boxing himself in over Europe

Daniel Finkelstein – The Times

Harry and Meghan can have their cake and eat it

Alice Thomson – The Times

Bank on my knowledge of London at your peril

Matthew Parris – The Times

Driving into a city should become as antisocial as smoking

Gaby Hinsliff - The Guardian

Gavin Barwell has shown why Theresa May failed

Ross Clark - The Spectator

The cartoon

Today's cartoon from The Times by Peter Brookes

Now read this

The mastermind behind the reinvention of Heywood Hill, a venerable bookshop in Mayfair, London, is Nicky Dunne, son-in-law of the shop's owner Peregrine Cavendish, the 12th Duke of Devonshire.

Cavendish supplied the bookshop, Dunne supplied the ideas. Well, he supplied one big idea: the bespoke book subscription service. Rather than deciding what books you want to read, you can let the staff at Heywood Hill decide for you. They will chat to you about what you like (a “reading consultation”), then pick 6, 12 or 40 books (in paperback, hardback or a mix of both) to send you over the course of a year. Forty hardbacks will set you back £1,150, six paperbacks only £125. For a shop with a lot of wealthy customers with not much time on their hands, this makes sense.

Step forward Bláthnaid, Dublin-born barrister and former tennis ace, and Stephen, up-and-coming composer of musicals (think Andrew Lloyd Webber but without the wrinkles or the money). Each of them will submit to a literary consultation and I will watch.

Read the full story

TMS

From the diary

By Jack Blackburn

End of the peer show

Now she’s Baroness Morgan of Cotes, the culture secretary will evade departmental questions in the Commons, but she could follow the lead of her predecessor and discharge her duty without actually turning up. When Matt Hancock was at culture he wanted to give his conference speech by hologram, despite being told it was a “stupid idea”. He moved jobs and the notion was ditched, but perhaps ministers can answer questions through the technology of their choice. This week: Morgan by hologram. Next week: Jacob Rees-Mogg by telegram.Another new peer, John Mann, has been praised for a forthright maiden speech, but bluntness can haunt a politician. The very next speaker, Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, was keen to greet him. “I am delighted to see him in this House,” said the Scots Tory, “because he is on record as saying that it is a care home for failed politicians.”