Politics
Students aren’t being told the truth about the British Empire
The debate over how we teach the British Empire has become one of the most polarising arguments in modern British education. Some insist the empire was a force for progress – ushering in parliamentary institutions, the rule of law, global trade and modernity. Others emphasise its violence, exploitation and the long shadow it casts over current-day inequalities.
What is striking is not that these views exist, but that arguments about empire increasingly sit within wider disputes about national identity, race, belonging and how Britain understands its past. We ask students to understand one of the most complex forces in world history, yet we are too often urged to present it as a single story.
This is why Parallel Histories, where I am the CEO, is launching a new eBook series on the British Empire. We believe that contested history should be taught as contested. The empire is not a morality tale with a single lesson – it is a vast, contradictory and deeply human story. To teach it responsibly, we must teach it from both perspectives – its architects and its subjects, those exercising power and those living under imperial rule, its beneficiaries and its victims, its triumphs and its traumas. These are competing claims that must be tested against evidence. The task is not to weigh benefits against harms, but to test competing claims about how empire was justified, how it was experienced and how it should be understood today.
The British Empire was never one thing. It was a global system that spanned continents and centuries, shaped by millions of people with competing motives and experiences. To reduce it to either a celebration or an indictment is to flatten the past into propaganda. Students deserve better.
From the imperialist British perspective, the empire was often justified as a civilising mission, a commercial enterprise or a strategic necessity. Many believed they were spreading law, order and modernity. Some saw it as a source of national pride and global influence.
From the perspective of the colonised, the empire could mean dispossession, racial hierarchy, economic exploitation and cultural suppression. It could also mean collaboration, adaptation, resistance and the forging of new identities under pressure.
When students encounter these perspectives side by side, something powerful happens – they begin to think critically. They learn that history is not a set of answers, but a set of arguments. They learn to weigh evidence, question assumptions and recognise bias – including their own. They learn that people in the past, like people today, acted from mixed motives and lived with unintended consequences. They test claims against evidence, look at sources, draw inferences and confront contradictions between different interpretations.
The current debate about the empire often collapses into a tug-of-war between nostalgia and condemnation. But the real problem is not about which side wins – it is that students are rarely shown that there are other sides at all.
When we teach only the positive story, we risk producing students who cannot understand why the empire remains a source of pain and anger in many parts of the world. When we teach only the negative story, we risk producing students who cannot understand why the empire was supported by so many at home and abroad, or why its legacy is still defended today.
In both cases, we produce citizens who are poorly equipped to navigate the complexities of modern Britain – a country whose multicultural fabric, global relationships and political debates are all shaped by imperial history, and shaped by the decisions we the British took after the end of empire. A single story creates fragility. Parallel stories create intellectual resilience.
Our approach is simple but transformative: we present students with competing historical narratives, each grounded in primary sources, and ask them to interrogate both. We do not tell them what to think. We teach them how to think. Students investigate the evidence from one perspective and argue from that position, and then switch to do the same from the alternative contested perspective. The strength of this process is that it requires students to weigh evidence and test conclusions.
In our British Empire programme, students encounter British politicians defending imperial expansion as a moral duty alongside Indian nationalists describing the economic devastation of colonial rule. They read about African leaders negotiating between collaboration and resistance, and Caribbean voices reflecting on slavery, emancipation and identity. British soldiers, missionaries, merchants and administrators explaining their motives in their own words, alongside anti-colonial thinkers articulating visions of freedom and self-determination.
Students then analyse and debate from these perspectives – not to endorse them, but to understand them. They learn that history is constructed, contested and alive. This method does not dilute the truth – it deepens it. It does not avoid controversy – it equips students to handle it. It does not impose a narrative as much as it empowers students to build one.
We live in a moment when public discourse is increasingly polarised, when social media rewards outrage over understanding and when young people are bombarded with simplified narratives about complex issues. Teaching contested history through parallel perspectives is not just an academic exercise – it is a democratic necessity.
When historical judgements become markers of political or cultural allegiance, enquiry becomes harder. Parallel Histories separates scrutiny from allegiance: students argue from one interpretation, switch to the competing interpretation and then reach their own judgement.
If students cannot grapple with the contradictions of the past, how will they grapple with the contradictions of the present? If they cannot understand why people disagree about history, how will they understand why people disagree about politics, identity, or justice today?
The British Empire is not just a chapter in a textbook. It is a living force in our national story. To teach it honestly, we must teach it in full. The question is not whether the British Empire was good or bad. The question is whether we trust students enough to let them decide for themselves.
Dame Priti Patel former Home Secretary, and recently shadow Foreign Secretary issued a statement on Sunday 30 August saying she was leaving the shadow cabinet to take up a new role for the Party.
Her statement followed days of speculation about her future in Kemi Badenoch’s top team, and a Telegraph story suggesting that Tom Tugendhat MP will be made shadow Foreign Secretary in any imminent reshuffle Badenoch is about to make.
Republicans and Democrats are fighting over working class voters. Americans don’t believe the rhetoric.
Fifty-five percent of Americans think politicians are just trying to win votes when they say they will help the working class, according to new results from The POLITICO Poll. It’s a view held by majorities of people who voted for President Donald Trump, who voted for Kamala Harris and who self-identify as working class.
Only one in four Americans who self-identify as working-class say politicians genuinely want to help them.
That wariness comes as both parties increasingly see working class voters as key to their winning coalitions. But The POLITICO Poll results show both parties face serious challenges to doing so.
Neither party does particularly well with Americans who identify as working class: 38 percent of them say Democrats best represent them, while 32 percent say Republicans. Americans, broadly, are almost identically split, with a 37 percent plurality saying Democrats best represent the interests of the working class, while 30 percent say Republicans.
Democrats wrestling with how to win back voters who have drifted toward the GOP — as their coalition has grown increasingly dominated by college-educated Americans — are locked in an intraparty battle over which wing of the party, progressives or moderates, best speaks to these voters.
“We’ve struggled with the working class for quite a while and it’s been a combination of being out of touch with working class values on a lot of culture issues and being seen as either not helpful or not helpful enough on economic issues,” said Jim Kessler, executive vice president for policy at the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), widely considered the leader of the progressive movement, told Playbook’s Will Steakin that progressive Democrats “are speaking to the needs of working families.”
“It is not just traditional Democrats or independents,” he said. “There are a lot of working-class Republicans who understand that there’s something wrong when we are the only major nation on Earth not to guarantee health care to all people.”
Republicans, meanwhile, are trying to hold onto the gains Trump made in 2024 with working class voters — including Black and Latino voters frustrated with the Biden-era economy — at a time when cost of living remains voters’ top concern.
“With the [Iran] war, with gas prices, with cost of food, the working class is not happy with the president, and many who are independents and even some Republicans have said that he’s forgotten about them,” said former Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Renacci.
Who is working class?
Complicating both parties’ efforts to win over these voters is that Americans do not agree on what makes someone working class. Neither do lawmakers and party officials.
When asked whether the term “working class” describes them, a 59 percent majority of Americans broadly say it does, while just 31 percent say it does not, according to the survey conducted by London-based polling firm Public First. But when forced to choose from a list of labels — including wealthy, middle class, lower middle class, working class and poor — just 16 percent of adults say they identify as “working class.”
Americans are also divided over what characteristics define the working class.
Some politicians, including progressive New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Andy Schor, the centrist Democratic mayor of Lansing, Michigan, have argued the definition of working class is expansive — encompassing anyone who needs to work to pay their bills.
“If you’re not making enough money that you don’t have to work, then you’re working class,” said Schor in an interview. “The American Dream is to be able to work hard and get ahead, and people are not getting ahead like they used to, and they’ll look at the folks that they vote for and think, ‘Who can help me to get ahead?’”
The POLITICO Poll illustrates the difficult path for the GOP to solidify its gains with working class Americans as economic concerns continue to be top of mind: More than a third of this group say they are not currently employed. A 35 percent plurality also say Trump, not former President Joe Biden, is fully responsible for the economy and many oppose the war in Iran, which most say has made things more expensive for them.
Half of self-identified working class Americans say Trump has spent too much time focusing on international affairs instead of on domestic issues.
“I think [Republican candidates] just got to tell the truth,” Renacci, the Ohio Republican, said. “You just have to start realizing that those middle class voters are struggling and they’re just looking for somebody who’s going to understand their issues and problems.”
The race for 2026
November will offer a major test of whether each party’s working class pitch is working, carrying implications that extend into 2028.
Candidates in both parties are racing to flex their working class bonafides this cycle, leaning on their biographies to signal ties to these voters. Trump pushed that playbook to extremes in 2024, when he briefly worked the fryer and drive-through window at McDonald’s as part of a campaign swing through Pennsylvania.
Republicans have continued that approach, with candidates and administration officials emphasizing their blue-collar roots on the campaign trail. Vice President JD Vance recently returned to his hometown of Middletown, Ohio, where he spoke at the steel plant where his grandfather worked.
In battleground Georgia, Rep. Mike Collins — the state’s GOP Senate nominee — often touts his background as a trucker. And GOP Sen. Susan Collins has broken with Trump on tariff policy, saying his trade fight with Canada hurts working families and small businesses in Maine, where she’s locked in a competitive battle for reelection.
These efforts come against the backdrop of increasing concerns about the economy, fueled by the ongoing Iran war.
Democrats, meanwhile, are divided over which flank of the party can best appeal to working class voters, a fissure that burst into public view during primary season, when a slate of progressives prevailed in high-profile contests.
“The working class are giving Democrats another look and we better not blow it,” said Kessler of Third Way. “Donald Trump got reelected based on the notion he was going to fight for you, working class men and women, and his first year and a half has been anything but that.”
Some Democrats have made their working class background central to their pitch: Sam Forstag, a union leader and former smokejumper, is running in an open district in western Montana that Trump won by double digits in 2024. Bob Brooks, a firefighter union chief, is challenging GOP Rep. Ryan Mackenzie in Pennsylvania.
But some progressives are still running into limits: In Michigan, one of Democrats’ must-hold seats in November, the state’s divisive Senate primary illustrated that debate in real-time. Progressive Abdul El-Sayed, who won the Democratic nomination, performed best in the state’s wealthiest and most highly educated areas, while moderate Rep. Haley Stevens did better in places with lower average incomes and where fewer votes have college degrees.
Jessie Blaeser contributed to this report.
4 min read
“PR’s time has definitely come – because I think the world we are in now demands a new politics. It demands a new approach.” That was Andy Burnham speaking at Labour Party Conference almost a year ago.
Listening and waiting to speak alongside him in support of electoral reform, I couldn’t agree more: we are at a turning point, and Labour must deliver change before the crunch.
The British public’s trust in democracy is at record lows, with just 12 per cent trusting political parties to put the country first. The UK lags far behind most of our European counterparts – almost all of whom use Proportional Representation (PR) – when it comes to public trust in government. Meanwhile, New Zealand, which switched to PR in the 1990s, has weathered the increasingly dangerous headwinds facing democracies around the world, and now ranks the highest. Across the Atlantic, the USA’s use of First Past the Post (FPTP) offers a vision of the politics we might face if we don’t act now to safeguard our democracy.
If democracy is a problem-solving vehicle, then FPTP is increasingly starting to seem like sand in the engine.
In Westminster, the outdated system has contributed to the instability that has defined our politics in recent years. That should come as no surprise given that, on average, governments last 11 years in countries that use PR and just 7 years in those that use FPTP, Make Votes Matter analysis shows. Prime ministers and ministers also last longer under proportional systems. Simply put, the most stable democracies use PR.
That matters for our policy-making, too. Our country currently faces a multitude of seismic challenges, yet FPTP’s instability makes long-term responses harder. At the same time, the adversarial nature of our winner-takes-all system makes cross-party agreement seem unusual, rather than something to champion. When governments are unable to deliver long-term projects, and businesses lack confidence about the direction of future governments, we all suffer.
It is notable that even some Conservatives such as former prime minister John Major have begun to recognise that FPTP is no longer sustainable.
It is increasingly difficult to avoid the same conclusion when you consider that with every election under FPTP, more and more people are being shut out. In the 1950s, Labour and the Conservatives combined won over 95 per cent of the vote. In 2024, that number was just 58 per cent. Regardless of which parties lead the race, the long-term trend is the same: we are moving towards a multi-party democracy. Electoral reform is now both necessary and inevitable. But what we can control is how we get there.
There are also widespread warnings from academic experts in politics and constitutional law that this system is not sustainable, with over 50 of them writing an open letter to the government earlier this year and Hannah White of the Institute for Government think tank warning: “If casting a vote starts to feel more like participating in a lottery than making a positive and principled decision, then voters are going to become ever more frustrated. This is dangerous.”
The public is ahead of Westminster on this. Fifty-three per cent of people now support electoral reform, up from 27 per cent in 2011. Across Labour, there is widespread support for change. A majority of MPs support setting up a National Commission on Electoral Reform, and I’m proud to be among the almost 100 Labour MPs who have signed Alex Sobel’s amendment to the Representation of the People Bill calling for one.
A National Commission would first examine options for introducing proportional representation to the UK. Then it would recommend a system most suitable for Westminster that both retains a constituency link as a key component for trust and accountability, and protects us from extremism in political discourse. Here we can learn from the modern parliaments Labour has established across the UK. We already use the Additional Member System in London and Scotland, and the Single Transferable Vote in Northern Ireland.
We must not delay. The country needs a political system capable of restoring public trust, boosting business confidence and facing off the threats facing democracies around the world. The Labour movement, which overwhelmingly supports PR, needs to know it can trust its leaders to keep their word.
I hope the Prime Minister will lead this change and change politics for good by launching a National Commission on Electoral Reform within his first 100 days.
Rachel Blake is the Labour MP for Cities of London and Westminster
Something ugly has erupted in Middlesbrough. Nine people are dead after two separate incidents days apart – first a high-speed crash on the weekend, then what appears to be a deliberate arson attack on a family home. Police strongly suspect that both events were gang-related. Around 200 extra officers have been sent to the city to aid investigations and quell the growing sense of anarchy.
And right on cue, the excuses have started. I’ve already seen Labour and Green politicians talking about deprivation and a lack of opportunities for young people. What bloody lack of opportunity?
On Friday, I stood beside the flowers left for PCs Matthew Blades and Tom Clough – two victims of the weekend’s head-on collision. Barely 200 metres away is Boho X – the gleaming, 60,000 square-foot global headquarters of games developer Double Eleven, packed with ambitious young people working in a global industry. Clustered around it are dozens of vibrant small businesses, cashing in on the opportunities the world presents.
Teesside has enormous industrial investment, booming businesses, apprenticeships, great colleges and one of Britain’s biggest digital sectors. But we’re being told that our underclass is violent and criminal because society hasn’t provided enough career options.
Total bollocks. I spent four years as the mayor of Middlesbrough, and many more working with charities in our poorest neighbourhoods. I’ve seen the worst of poverty, addiction and genuinely awful childhoods.
I’ve also seen something our political class avoids acknowledging: people are behaving appallingly because we’ve allowed them to. They discover that breaking the law doesn’t cost them anything, that intimidation works and that police are stretched. Even if they are arrested, the courts are clogged for years ahead and prisons are already full. Then we’re astonished when they become more brazen.
The high-speed crash appears to prove this observation. Four of the five drivers of the car that caused the collision had pleaded guilty to a combined 37 offences. Yet none of them had ever seen the inside of a prison cell.
As mayor, I massively expanded CCTV because residents desperately wanted action against crime. Criminals arrived with industrial grinders and cut down the camera masts, so we strengthened them. So they used vehicles to ram them instead.
This wasn’t a cry for help. It’s contempt for law and disrespect for those who comply. And the people suffering from it aren’t MPs on nice streets or Guardian journalists. They’re cleaners, warehouse workers, bus drivers and their kids. Their lives can be made unbearable. Literally.
I’ve met residents too frightened to talk to me near their own homes. Some were even too scared to contact Crimestoppers anonymously. Where is the national outrage about them?
Instead, whenever criminality becomes impossible to ignore, Britain conducts another national therapy session about the criminal. What happened in his childhood? Was he excluded from school? Do we need another youth club? Stop it.
Of course circumstances matter. I’ve spent years helping homeless people, addicts and ex-offenders, and I’ve seen people turn their lives around. But sympathy or empathy before punishment is wrong. This approach has emboldened the people who are wrecking lives and communities.
The working classes work when they can. They pay taxes and obey the law. And we leave them to watch a minority deal drugs, intimidate neighbours and create chaos around them.
The truly compassionate response is to protect the victim. That means enough police to make getting caught a likely outcome of committing a crime. We need courts that swiftly judge and punish offenders while the crime is still fresh in everyone’s minds. And we need enough prison cells to keep dangerous and prolific criminals locked up.
Prison works for the simplest reason imaginable: it separates a criminal from his victims. He isn’t intimidating his neighbour, burgling someone’s home or recruiting another youngster into dealing drugs.
Here’s the most important thing about what’s happening in Middlesbrough: this isn’t really about Middlesbrough. My hometown isn’t some uniquely dysfunctional hellhole. Most people here are doing exactly what people everywhere do: working, raising families, building businesses and getting on with life. My 83-year-old mother still gets the bus into town and volunteers on the local council estate. She experiences no crime. That’s Middlesbrough, too.
What’s different today is that Middlesbrough has exposed something Britain has preferred not to confront – namely, the nationwide existence of small and poisonous groups, living outside the social rules that everyone else accepts. We’ve indulged them, coddled them and now we’re paying the price.
Don’t blame Middlesbrough. Look at the criminal underclass we’ve allowed to develop across Britain. Stop asking what society failed to give them and start asking why society tolerated them.
Andy Preston was mayor of Middlesbrough from 2019 until 2023.
Politics
Trump’s Arab American allies in Michigan are jumping ship. Mike Rogers could pay the price.
Four days before the 2024 election, Donald Trump declared in Dearborn, Michigan that “the Muslim population” is “liking Trump.” On Election Day, the state’s Arab Americans helped deliver Trump a victory.
Now, they want nothing to do with him — and are souring on the GOP overall.
Many Detroit-area Arab Americans, who swung hard to Trump over the war in Gaza and cost-of-living issues, are now saying they’re fed up with the ongoing war in Iran and slow peace process in Gaza. It’s a shift that could have direct consequences on the battle for Senate control, with former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers fighting to hold onto Trump’s 2024 gains against Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, a Muslim whose parents are Egyptian immigrants.
Trump’s perceived broken promises — exacerbated by GOP attacks against El-Sayed that some see as Islamophobic and racist — are pushing these voters out of reach for Rogers.
“[Trump] promised to make America great again,” said Albert Abbas, who presented a peace prize to Trump during his 2024 Dearborn visit. “Did he do that? Did he put American interests first? It’s the complete opposite.”
A dip in support from Arab American former Trump voters could hurt Rogers’ path to election in what’s shaping up to be a tough year nationally for the GOP. And it could offset gains he makes in other communities — including with some Jewish voters who are wary of El-Sayed for his harsh criticism of Israel and comments from him and his allies that some see as antisemitic. Both communities matter significantly in close elections, and Michigan has the largest proportion of Arab Americans in the country, with nearly 400,000 living in the state, as well as more than 100,000 Jews.
Michigan Republicans — who, just two years ago, dreamed of building sustainable support among the state’s Arab American population — now see community leaders shifting ranks.
“Once the administration got into the White House, everything we were told kind of flip-flopped,” said Hassan Nehme, who served as the Michigan Republican Party’s vice chair during the 2024 cycle and helped lead outreach to the Arab American community. “We lost all traction. Republicans are kind of dead in the water in the area right now.”
Dearborn-based Imam Husham Al-Husainy backed Trump in 2024 and was slated to offer a benediction at the inauguration but was removed from the program after complaints from pro-Israel conservatives. He said he now backs El-Sayed because Trump recanted on his promise for “no new wars.”
Amer Ghalib, a former Democratic mayor of Muslim-majority Hamtramck, backed Trump in 2024, and was later nominated by Trump to serve as ambassador to Kuwait, though he didn’t get confirmed in the face of bipartisan concerns about a history of allegedly antisemitic remarks. He said Republicans “should be more concerned about losing the long-term trust of the Arab American community than about losing the gains they made in 2024.”
“There is a tremendous work that needs to be done … to address people’s concerns and regain their trust,” Ghalib said.
And Faye Nemer, who leads the Dearborn-based Middle Eastern and North African American Chamber of Commerce, said the midterms will mark a “change in sentiment” in her community toward Republicans.
“Many voters, including myself, are now asking whether the policy promises we received bear any resemblance to the reality that we’re seeing on the ground,” said Nemer.
Rogers has not shied away from branding his opponent as a Muslim extremist. He’s hammered El-Sayed for campaigning with Hasan Piker, a prominent and controversial left-wing influencer who’s drawn accusations of antisemitism, as well as slamming El-Sayed for responding to an attack on a Michigan synagogue earlier this year by condemning it but saying “hurt people hurt people” because members of the attacker’s family had been killed by the Israeli military in Lebanon.
El-Sayed has condemned antisemitism throughout his campaign; in a statement distancing himself from Piker last week, he said “Antisemitism is a scourge, and we need to address it in all its forms”) On Saturday he apologized for his remarks after the synagogue attack,telling a group of Jewish Democrats that he’d “made a mistake” and that “nobody deserves to have their pain trampled on.”
Rogers’ allies have also circulated reports from conservative outlets that seek to link El-Sayed’s father-in-law to the Muslim Brotherhood.
“El-Sayed wants to represent Palestine,” Rogers said at the Michigan GOP convention last week. “I want to represent Michigan.”
Trump has weighed in, too: The week El-Sayed won the Democratic primary, the president told reporters in the Oval Office that the country is seeing “jihadists being elected all over the place.”
The National Republican Senatorial Committee’s first ad of the general election called the Democratic nominee by his full name, Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed.
The NRSC ad will “alienate and distance” potential Arab American supporters, said Nemer.
“I most certainly will not support a candidate that is alienating and vilifying my community,” said Nemer, who met Trump during his 2024 visit to Dearborn. “I was fully prepared to support Mr. Rogers. … But after seeing the direction that he chose to proceed in, that’s given me a lot of pause.”
Nehme, the former state GOP vice chair, said many Arab Americans are drawn to El-Sayed because of his background, even though many are far more socially conservative than the Democratic nominee. “They’re not even really looking at politics anymore,” Nehme said.
During Rogers’ unsuccessful 2024 Senate bid, he acknowledged that his outspoken support for Israel caused some consternation for Muslim voters. That cycle, Trump won Dearborn, a Detroit suburb that is the only Arab-majority city in the U.S., by six points; Rogers ran behind him, losing in the city by two points. It was a significant improvement over 2020, when President Joe Biden and Democratic Sen. Gary Peters each won the city by around 40 points.
Monica Yatooma, who helped the Trump campaign’s outreach to Muslim and Arab American voters in 2024 before launching a failed bid for secretary of state this cycle, said she doubts Republicans can match Trump’s gains in Arab-majority areas in the current environment.
“The only reason [Arab Americans] voted for Trump is because they were voting against [Vice President] Kamala [Harris],” she said. “They weren’t voting for Trump, so they’re not really conservative voters, and there’s no value there for them with Mike Rogers that aligns with their values.”
It is unclear what, if anything, Rogers is doing to reach out to the community. Yatooma and Nehme, both Republicans, said they have seen little outreach from Rogers’ campaign.
“I’m hoping that they pull through and they come out and at least try to address the community,” Nehme said. “But in all actuality, I’m not sure how much good it’s going to do.”
Rogers’ campaign, when asked several questions about his outreach to the Arab American community, said “the Chaldean community has been a strong ally,” referring to a Christian ethnic group with Iraqi heritage whose largest community outside the Middle East resides in the Detroit area. Yatooma, who is Chaldean, said her ethnic community has historically voted for Republicans.
“Mike Rogers welcomes all Michiganders, regardless of faith, socioeconomic status, or background, to our campaign to Get Michigan Working Again,” said Alyssa Brouillet, spokesperson for the Rogers campaign, in a statement. “The same can’t be said about Abdul El-Sayed, who continues to fan the flames of antisemitism, sympathizes with the terrorist attacker who tried to mass murder 140 kids in a Michigan synagogue, and refuses to disavow Hasan Piker, who calls Jews ‘inbred.’”El-Sayed campaign spokesperson Cole Wozniak called attacks invoking El-Sayed’s faith and identity “cheap.”
“Mike Rogers is resorting to cheap attacks to distract from his deep record as a corrupt career politician who has taken millions from Big Pharma,” Wozniak said in a statement. “Michiganders see right through it, and they’re not going to let Mike Rogers distract from the fact he’s spent thirty years in Washington making himself and his billionaire donors richer while selling out working families.”
Without hearing directly from the Rogers campaign or state party leaders, Arab American voters say their community is likely to swing back to the left this election.
Could Rogers “go into Dearborn and have those conversations and fix that?” asked Yatooma. “I think yeah, absolutely. I just don’t know if he’s doing it.”
Now if Ann Widdecombe were still with us, I could expect an email missive from her later on tonight, which would go along the lines of… “I enjoy your Sunday Newsletter but I do NOT want to read about football. Honestly. Spare us!”. Anyway, here goes.
Now admittedly, I was one of the ringleaders in the West Ham campaign to oust Sam Allardyce back in 2015, but I’m not a great fan of calling for a manager to be sacked so early in the season. However, I’ll make an exception for West Ham’s Nuno Espirito Santo.
It’s not unusual for relegated teams to struggle in the first few games, and West Ham have been no exception. They lie in 19th place with only two points from their first three games. The 4-1 victory over Southampton in the Carabao Cup looked as if it would spark our season, but the manager then made eight changes for the match yesterday against Watford. He left out Luis Orford, who has had an outstanding start to the season, to the perplexity of all. Josh Ajaja, a 19-year-old striker who has come up through the youth system and who scored two goals at Southampton, remained an unused substitute at Watford. Unfathomable, in a team which only had three shots all match. He didn’t even get on for a last five minute cameo.
It’s not just the team selection, that is a problem. Just listen or watch his pre-match or post-match interviews. He mutters complete inanities, and it’s the same every time. No wonder he can’t seem to motivate most of the players. He also has a verbal tic, in that whenever he’s interviewed and under pressure he repeats most of his sentences. “We must all work harder. We must all work harder.” “We must concentrate. We must concentrate.” Kill me now.
Players know when a manager is on his way out. He won’t be sacked this week or next, although if we lose our next two home matches against Wolves and Derby, I suppose it’s possible. But unless things change, and change quickly, I can’t believe he will still be there at the end of October.
West Ham has had its problems for years. We had thought when David Sullivan stood aside, that Daniel Kretinsky would take full control and things would be different. Initially they were. He got rid of some of the old senior admin staff and appointed come good new people, but things were then upended by Amanda Staveley trying to buy into the club. This has totally disrupted the summer. We gained £200 million in player sales, yet have only spent £28 million. The rest is being used to stabilise the finances of the club and pay off debt. Good. But the boardroom situation needs to be sorted out before it starts really affecting the rest of the club.
On the bright side, we have a tremendous crop of youth team players coming through. I’ve already mentioned Lewis Orford, but we have left backs Oliver Scarles and Ezra Mayers, centre backs Airidas Olambeckis and Kaelen Casey, as well as attackers Josh Ajala, Preston Fearon and Josh Landers. They all have a bright future.
Returning to the position of the manager, of course, the grass is not always greener on the other side, as we found out when Graham Potter succeeded Julen Lopetegui but Eddie Howe or Kieran McKenna couldn’t be worse. Could they? Come on You Irons!
‘You never get a second chance to make a first impression.’
‘Better to be overdressed than under.’
‘Clothes maketh the man.’
These phrases often cross my mind when putting an outfit together, probably because I heard them so often from my mother. She, like me, believes that clothes matter. Making an effort with your outfit, showing you’ve given some thought to what you’re wearing, how you’ve put it together, what matches, and what doesn’t, shows a level of respect for a situation. And, more importantly, for yourself.
I do wish some of these well-worn phrases would cross the mind of our scruff-in-chief, Andy Burnham. Not only are some of the prime minister’s clothing choices frankly hideous, what’s worse is that it appears to be a deliberate decision. A decision so important that he chose to announce it days before he was due to become prime minister. Far from discussing the myriad of problems Britain faces, Burnham chose to share with the nation that he plans on ditching his suit and tie for the vast majority of his work.
Burnham’s recent arrival in Ukraine showed that his lax dress code has gone too far. Earlier this week, His Majesty’s prime minister disembarked the train in Kyiv wearing a zip-up polo shirt better suited to a night in Wetherspoons than his first introduction to a nation – and an ally – at war. He may have been travelling, but would it have killed him to stick on a shirt and a smart jacket?
Maybe I’ve been radicalised. I often used to broadcast in a smart suit jacket with a shirt and pocket square, without a tie, thinking this was sufficient. But the combination of a partner who refuses to put the bins out without his hair being styled, and a TV colleague who once took me aside and asked why I don’t wear a tie on air, made me realise I was demeaning my job. And, more importantly, myself.
So I now broadcast in a tie. Every time. Why? Because sartorial standards matter. They matter for those on TV. They matter for those in important jobs. And they certainly matter for the man who has one of, if not the, most important jobs in the country.
Does Burnham think he’s cool not to think this way? Does he believe it’ll make him more ‘down’ with the ‘yoof’ vote? Labour believes 16-year-olds deserve the right to vote, so maybe it makes sense that their leader dresses like one?
Burnham isn’t alone in his poor style. Who can forget the hideous sight of Tony Blair in high-waisted jeans in a ‘casual’ meeting with former US president George W Bush?
Or the worst-dressed prime minister – in fact, the worst-dressed man in history – Boris Johnson? In a stained and ill-fitting suit, un-ironed shirt, unkempt hair, Boris often resembled having been dragged through a hedge backwards, forwards and then being beaten by it.
When did our leaders lose their sense of style? Remember Margaret Thatcher? She used to have Marks & Spencer open early to buy her power suits. The only time you ever saw her in anything other than a coordinated shirt and jacket with matching court shoes was when she was in the back of a tank. Which is exactly how it should be.
In your wildest imagination, could you picture her meeting a foreign dignitary in a t-shirt? She’d beat you with her matching handbag at the mere suggestion, and she’d be right to do so.
Even Keir Starmer made the effort with a suit and tie. Okay, it was Lord Alli who appears to have both chosen and purchased them, but at least Starmer’s clothing was more successful than his tenure as prime minister.
Burnham actually looks quite good in a suit, when he bothers. Can he not just bother a little more often?
Because I do judge people by how they dress. Not by the cost of their clothes – a wardrobe doesn’t need to be expensive to be suitable. I judge the effort made, against the occasion that requires it.
And I expect to be similarly judged. I want people to know I’ve put some thought into it. Yes, it’s a hassle to have an ironed shirt every day. To think whether my jacket and tie work together, or whether my pocket square is the right colour (I’m a fan of a slightly clashing pocket square). The shoes also have to work. Even the socks.
It’s about respect. As prime minister, you’re literally making decisions about people’s livelihoods, about their taxes, their social care, their health care, wars, infrastructure, the economy. You’re meeting other world leaders. You’re leading a huge team, many of whom look up to you.
Doing so in casual sportswear just doesn’t cut it. It shows a lack of respect for the people around you. More importantly, it shows a lack of respect for the office you hold.
And that’s much more important than any spin or focus group that might say younger voters don’t care about how you dress. Our prime minister should be showing younger voters why it matters, and why standards are important.
Andy Burnham is often accused of having much more style over substance. When it comes to his clothing choices, I really wish he did.
Cristo Foufas is a TV and radio presenter.
3 min read
The government’s plan to stop foreign money influencing our politics is welcome but must go further.
While Nigel Farage may have triumphed over a bin and an assortment of monster raving loonies, the farcical by-election that cost the taxpayer £250,000 won’t allow him to escape questions over his decision to accept £5m from a crypto billionaire living in Thailand.
This donation scandal also leaves me wondering why it is that a businessman, who prefers to live in a tax haven on the other side of the world, would be so interested in becoming a political donor. I am sure it has nothing to do with Reform’s pro-crypto policies, and everything to do with the businessman’s interest in making sure our NHS, our schools, our roads are all the best they can be. But why, then, does that businessman not choose to live here? If he cares so much, why does he not pay his taxes here? Why does he not support our public services?
I am not a dinosaur; I am just a democrat
Following a different Reform politician’s conviction for accepting thousands of pounds in foreign money to make pro-Russian statements, former prime minister Keir Starmer launched the long-needed independent review into countering foreign financial influence and interference in our politics. Thanks to Philip Rycroft’s work, which I was proud to contribute to, the government is introducing two amendments to the Representation of the People Bill when it returns to the Commons this week.
The first amendment would introduce a moratorium on cryptocurrency donations. I have spent some time investigating the attractions of this currency and why people would want to use it instead of good old-fashioned cash. Overwhelmingly, the reason is that its ultimate source can be hidden. So why, then, would we even contemplate opening our democracy to crypto? So long as I can be reassured this “moratorium” will never be lifted, then fine. But I think we should just ban it. I am not a dinosaur; I am just a democrat.
The second amendment would introduce a £100,000 cap on overseas donations annually. But I don’t believe this goes far enough. We must be much bolder and much clearer. Quite simply, if you are not prepared to pay your taxes here, not willing to contribute to our health service and our children’s education, you shouldn’t be able to bankroll political parties using funds you’ve saved up by living in tax havens far away. That’s why I am proposing New Clause 85 to the Bill, which would ban overseas donations altogether.
And if certain billionaires choose to come back to the UK to get around these restrictions, that’s great; we will welcome you back with open arms. But we will also be making sure you are fully contributing.
The Foreign Income and Gains (FIG) regime, designed to help ease the transition back to the UK, allows returning tax residents to claim tax relief on their foreign earnings during their first four years of UK residence. My other amendment, New Clause 86, would prevent individuals benefiting from this scheme from donating to political parties. My view is that, for as long as you choose to reduce the amount you contribute to our public services, you reduce the contribution you make as a whole to our country and our democracy. It should flow from that that you shouldn’t be able to make political donations.
Trust in politics is at an all-time low. Too many are in it for the wrong reason, leaving the public understandably thinking we are all the same. We can start to rebuild that trust by getting dodgy foreign cash out of our politics once and for all. It really is about time.
Emily Thornberry is the Labour MP for Islington South and Finsbury and chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee
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The night after verbally sparring with Abdul El-Sayed on primetime television, Fox News host Jesse Watters had kind words for the progressive Michigan Senate nominee.
“I like him,” Watters remarked Tuesday to his co-hosts on “The Five,” albeit right after saying he doesn’t trust him. “I don’t want to like him, but I like him.”
Less than 24 hours prior, the two had engaged in an adversarial, wide-ranging interview in which Watters pressed El-Sayed to explain his stance on transgender women in sports and his support for the Green New Deal. For his part, El-Sayed tried to spin Watters’ pointed questions into opportunities to recite his core campaign slogan and call his Republican opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers, a “beta” male.
Who exactly won the interaction is less relevant than the fact that El-Sayed, a progressive, went on one of the nation’s top conservative-leaning cable news shows to spar with one of Fox News’ stars.
His performance, in which El-Sayed gave little ground to Watters — regularly talking over him to finish a point and negging him for the pointed nature of his questions — presents a new model for how some progressives, hot off a string of primary victories, are looking to market themselves to a wider range of voters while also showing they can withstand scrutiny, or even fight back, on America’s marquee conservative network.
“Even if you only get 30 seconds, that’s the length of a political campaign ad, and they’re basically handing you air time to speak to a couple million people, potentially,” said Nathan J. Robinson, editor-in-chief of progressive magazine Current Affairs and occasional guest on the network.
Those appearances, however, are fraught with risk. Every second-too-long pause, jumbled response or nodding agreement on live television can be instantaneously clipped and become fodder to delegitimize their platform. It’s already happened a handful of times this cycle.
“When you don’t do well is when you go on and hand them exactly what they want, by appearing to not know what you’re talking about,” Robinson said.
Democrats have long appeared on Fox News as a way to reach conservative audiences who otherwise might prove unreachable.
But those trudging to Fox News’ green rooms had, in the past, broadly been more centrist Democrats trying to make a general election case than progressives gearing up for a brawl, particularly with the network’s primetime lineup of conservative opinion hosts.
Potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg, considered one of the party’s strongest communicators and a self-described moderate, has been a regular on the network dating back to his 2020 run — a strategy he cast in 2024, at least, as an effort to argue on behalf of Democrats for viewers who don’t usually hear their side of an issue.
Progressives now say they see a similar value proposition. Conservative media has spent much of the ongoing election cycle scrutinizing progressives and, specifically, the Democratic Socialists of America — who have endorsed multiple candidates running in November. Going on Fox News, some argue, simultaneously gives the left an opportunity to vouch for itself while also giving the movement more visibility.
“It’s very exciting for us as leftists to finally have to think about these things,” Robinson said. “They didn’t used to invite us on cable news shows.”
When reached for comment, Fox News spokesperson Jessica Ketner pointed to viewership data from Nielsen indicating its spot as the most viewed cable network in the U.S., with an average of 2.5 million viewers during primetime.
A host of progressive candidates and figureheads accepted interviews with the network’s hosts this summer. Democratic socialists like Pennsylvania House nominee Chris Rabb and Wisconsin state Rep. Francesca Hong, then in the closing days of a tightly contested gubernatorial primary, both appeared on the network, as did Gustavo Gordillo, a co-chair of the New York City chapter of the DSA— which endorsed several primary winners in the city’s cobalt blue districts.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), another occasional guest on Fox, said in a text message to POLITICO that, rather than going on to try to show up the host, he wants the network’s audience “thinking that I deeply love our country, have ideas about how to build the future economy for every American and am a decent guy worth having a meal with.”
The purpose of those interviews, he continued, “is to try to find some common ground in our toxic political culture.”
Monday’s interview with Watters marked El-Sayed’s third interview on the network, and first since winning his primary in early August.
In a statement, El-Sayed campaign spokesperson Cole Wozniak said that “while Mike Rogers refuses to debate and ducks requests from media outlets, Abdul isn’t afraid of a fight.” He added that El-Sayed has been “showing up, taking tough questions and making his case directly to voters” throughout the campaign.
But progressives have also had their fair share of stumbles on the network.
DSA co-chair Megan Romer was widely criticized for an August interview in which she provided one-word affirmations to Fox host Shannon Bream’s inquiry into the group’s platform — which soon provided ammunition to conservatives looking to paint the organization as dangerously extreme.
“Replace the presidency and Supreme Court as we now know them?” Bream asked.
“Yep,” Romer responded.
Such misfires, Democratic consultant Mark Longabaugh said, can partially be attributed to the relative inexperience of some progressives who haven’t taken interviews with similarly adversarial outlets.
“You just may not be aware of the way that interview’s gonna unfold and how tough it’s gonna be,” said Longabaugh, who advised Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) 2016 presidential campaign.
The DSA didn’t make Romer available for an interview, but the group’s spokesperson, Priscilla Yeverino, said in an interview that “we see the feedback, and we see the blowback.”
“The co-chairs absolutely take that responsibility, and they take it in stride,” Yeverino added. “That’s what they use to continue to improve and fine tune our messaging and to try to broaden our audience.”
Still, progressives say the reward outweighs the risk — as long as the candidates come prepared. Corbin Trent, a Democratic consultant who cofounded Justice Democrats and a former communications director for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), said that a candidate greatly benefits from having time to develop a cohesive worldview that makes answering off-speed questions easier.
Trent, who has appeared on the network multiple times, added that the short nature of the TV hit gives little time to debate the nuances of political ideology — making every second count.
“You can’t go into there and have a conversation about what they want to have a conversation about,” he said. “You have to talk about the things that you think are important in your platform.”
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