The Tories introduced the 50% strike ballot threshold to make industrial action harder. MATT WRACK argues that a Labour government has no justification for leaving it on the statute book
OVER the last 13 years or so in Britain, there has been a perceptible decline in public — and probably private — manners. Whence it came? I posit the Tories and their allies (and competitors) on the right.
See first: the glorification of rudeness and its degrading effect — Donald Trump, Lee Anderson, Nadine Dorries, Boris Johnson (face-pulling and all) and many more. The bullying and sexual harassment conducted by Chris Pincher, Peter Bone and others. Therese Coffey’s legendary combination of stupidity, arrogance and bad manners. Ditto her bessie mate Liz Truss.
Second: the wider behaviour of politicians who feel no shame in behaving brattishly on camera — see Oliver Dowden, Grant Shapps, and Kwasi Kwarteng.
STEPHEN ARNELL looks at some of the notorious political corruption cases from British history
STEPHEN ARNELL wonders at the family resemblance between former prince Andrew and his great-uncle ‘Dickie’
With the recent release of Paul Thomas Anderson’s movie One Battle After Another, STEPHEN ARNELL gives the storied history of the British real-life left-wing urban guerillas
DENNIS BROE enjoys the political edge of a series that unmasks British imperialism, resonates with the present and has been buried by Disney


