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A Crisis in Credibility

William Davies: Labour’s Conundrum, 21 November 2024

“... the foundations of our economy’. In a pointedly downbeat speech given in the garden at 10 Downing Street in August, Keir Starmer stressed that his ‘project has always been about fixing the foundations of this country’. A slickly presented policy essay appeared online in September, co-authored by three right-wing think tank wonks, outlining the ...”

Delivering the Leadership

Nick Cohen: Get Mandy, 4 March 1999

Mandy: The Authorised Biography of Peter Mandelson 
by Paul Routledge.
Simon and Schuster, 302 pp., £17.99, January 1999, 9780684851754Show More
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“... fifth most senior post at the Department of Trade and Industry and anonymous accusations from 10 Downing Street of lunacy in Number 11 – while knowing all along that the Chancellor’s camp had a secret which might ruin him. ‘There’s a thermonuclear bomb ticking underneath Mandelson,’ Whelan whispered to lobby correspondents as Routledge’s ...”

We Are Many

Tom Crewe: In the Corbyn Camp, 11 August 2016

“... Banqueting House, where Charles had his head cut off, removal vans could be seen parked outside 10 Downing Street. In Parliament Square, the Hare Krishnas were dishing out free lentils and rice. There was another Morning Star stand. The Fire Brigades Union, which re-affiliated to Labour after Corbyn’s election, had set up a platform for speeches. A message ...”

Cronyism and Clientelism

Peter Geoghegan, 5 November 2020

“... Cain proposed adding a line about the National Health Service. The following day Johnson gave his Downing Street press conference with ‘Stay Home. Protect the NHS. Save Lives’ pinned to the front of his lectern.The message worked well (some said too well) and Johnson’s own satisfaction ratings rose sharply after he was admitted to hospital with ...”

Diary

Stephen Smith: Peace in Our Lunchtime, 6 October 1994

“... Robinson wanted a pledge from the British Government, and not just the temporary occupant of 10 Downing Street, that any change in the constitution and governance of the province would rest on consent. Robinson had been ready to be a ‘persuader’ within the Unionist community, but when Major had shown the DUP his door, he could, he said, ‘have wept ...”

Sweetie Pies

Jenny Diski, 23 May 1996

Below the Parapet: The Biography of Denis Thatcher 
by Carol Thatcher.
HarperCollins, 303 pp., £16.99, April 1996, 0 00 255605 7Show More
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“... Denis Thatcher is entirely inventable – as John Wells understood: he comes in a flat pack with easy-to-follow instructions, all the components familiar general shapes, all parts from stock, no odd angles, no imagination required. When they came up with the idea for Ikea, they used Denis Thatcher as the prototype ...”

What did Cook want?

Jon Lawrence: Both ‘on message’ and off, 19 February 2004

The Point of Departure 
by Robin Cook.
Simon and Schuster, 368 pp., £20, October 2003, 0 7432 5255 1Show More
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“... Allied bombing of Iraq and the war in Kosovo that were manifestly being driven principally from 10 Downing Street and the White House. He also had to sit tight and accept a great many heavy-handed attempts to impose the will of Number 10 on local Labour organisations – the Welsh Assembly and the London mayoral contest were notable examples. Well before the ...”

Diary

Susan McKay: Pro-­Union Non­-Unionists, 4 March 2021

“... She hasn’t even managed to persuade Sammy Wilson to wear a mask. When a Ballymena councillor, John Carson, said the pandemic was God’s judgment on Northern Ireland for introducing abortion and same-sex marriage, Foster failed to discipline him. When the same councillor alleged that Covid vaccines were made from the stem cells of aborted foetuses – a ...”

As the Lock Rattles

John Lanchester, 16 December 2021

Breathtaking: Inside the NHS in a Time of Pandemic 
by Rachel Clarke.
Abacus, 228 pp., £9.99, September 2021, 978 0 349 14456 6Show More
Shutdown: How Covid Shook the World’s Economy 
by Adam Tooze.
Allen Lane, 354 pp., £25, September 2021, 978 0 241 48587 3Show More
Failures of State: The Inside Story of Britain’s Battle with Coronavirus 
by Jonathan Calvert and George Arbuthnott.
Mudlark, 432 pp., £20, March 2021, 978 0 00 843052 8Show More
Covid by Numbers: Making Sense of the Pandemic with Data 
by David Spiegelhalter and Anthony Masters.
Pelican, 320 pp., £10.99, October 2021, 978 0 241 54773 1Show More
The Covid Consensus: The New Politics of Global Inequality 
by Toby Green.
Hurst, 294 pp., £14.99, April 2021, 978 1 78738 522 1Show More
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“... and thorough pandemic plan – ‘We were the envy of the world,’ according to one Downing Street adviser quoted by Jonathan Calvert and George Arbuthnott in their excoriating Failures of State. Unfortunately, the reality was that the NHS had a chronic shortage of the necessary equipment and a plan that was reliant on exactly the kind of ...”

Short Cuts

Peter Geoghegan: At NatCon London, 1 June 2023

“... mixing ‘Marxism, narcissism and paganism’, a realisation of the ‘dystopian fantasy of John Lennon’. Talk of ‘white culture’ under threat lit up social media. Commentators wondered if a radical right-wing vision of politics defined by ‘faith, family and flag’ was taking root in the UK. By then, I was long gone. The press officer came ...”

On Thatcher

“... fleet had far more to do with domestic politics and the political reputation of the occupant of 10 Downing Street.Tam Dalyell, 5 April 1984The​  brutality of the riot police drafted in from southern counties has left deep scars on the minds of the people of this village, and an inheritance of hatred and mistrust of the local police. This hatred will take ...”

Diary

Tom Crewe: The Queen and I, 1 August 2019

“... But at some point I started adding in the famous people I’d seen already. In 2013 I was at 10 Downing Street for a reception – I’d written something for the history section of the website, heady days – and, unfêted at the edge of the room, gazed out of a window onto the garden. There I saw Samantha Cameron and the Cameron children playing with a ...”

My Little Lollipop

Jenny Diski: Christine Keeler, 22 March 2001

The Truth at Last: My Story 
by Christine Keeler and Douglas Thompson.
Sidgwick, 279 pp., £16.99, February 2001, 0 283 07291 1Show More
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“... of Cliveden, made available to Ward at weekends by Lord Astor, who with his friends, including John Profumo, the Minister for War, would chase a minutely towelled Keeler and others around the swimming pool. But all this, says Keeler, was a front for Ward’s real activity, which was spying for Russia on the British establishment during the months before ...”

London Review of Crooks

Robert Marshall-Andrews, 15 July 1982

Rough Justice: The Extraordinary Truth about Charles Richardson and his Gang 
by Robert Parker.
Fontana, 352 pp., £1.95, October 1981, 0 00 636354 7Show More
Web of Corruption: The Story of John Poulson and T. Dan Smith 
by Raymond Fitzwalter and David Taylor.
Granada, 282 pp., £12.50, October 1981, 0 246 10915 7Show More
Inside Boss: South Africa’s Secret Police 
by Gordon Winter.
Penguin, 640 pp., £7.95, October 1981, 9780140057515Show More
Crime in Wartime: A Social History of Crime in World War II 
by Edward Smithies.
Allen and Unwin, 219 pp., £12.50, January 1982, 0 04 364020 6Show More
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“... the burglaries of Amnesty, Zapu and Anti-Apartheid, and (possibly) the attempted bugging of No 10 Downing Street. The claim (in the blurb) that such revelations are ‘staggering’ is perhaps over-enthusiastic. Richardson, like most of his ilk, was naturally right-wing, and having been introduced to George Winter, ex-burglar, crime reporter and BOSS ...”

Every club in the bag

Michael Howard, 10 September 1992

The Chiefs: The Story of the United Kingdom Chiefs of Staff 
by Bill Jackson and Dwin Bramall.
Brassey, 508 pp., £29.95, April 1992, 0 08 040370 0Show More
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“... an overriding priority and abolished National Service; and a quartet of a century after that, when John Nott wrote off ‘out of area’ commitments, and slashed back the Navy on the eve of the Falklands affair. But the greatest civilian despot of them all was Winston Churchill, who, having observed the disastrous fumblings of the First World War at first ...”

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