Alexandra Vivona is a family lawyer based in London. She is a grassroots activist and comments on US and British politics.

The Westminster bubble has spent their time gnawing on its own scandals, but the real story, the genuine barometer of where British campaigning is heading, lay hundreds of miles away in the rain‑soaked streets of Gorton and Denton. This is a constituency split down the middle, a place where two political climates exist side by side: Manchester’s youthful, diverse wards on one hand, and Tameside’s older, more traditional communities on the other.

Electoral Calculus claims this seat might even fall to Reform, projecting them at 32 per cent to Labour’s 22.6 per cent and the Greens not far behind on 23.3 per cent. The predicted probability of victory is Reform 61 per cent, Labour 21 per cent and Greens 18 per cent, turning what was once a Labour stronghold into a three‑cornered brawl.

The seat itself contains eight distinct wards: Burnage, Denton North East, Denton South, Denton West, Gorton and Abbey Hey, Levenshulme, Longsight and Audenshaw. Each one brings its own electoral flavour, its own backstory, its own tensions. Manchester’s wards are young, mobile and diverse, with significant population under 35, while the Tameside side skews older and more rooted. You can feel the difference physically when you cross from one into the other.

This was a by‑election I wanted to see firsthand. Not through the usual sanitised tranquilliser of party press releases, but through the raw weather of it: doorstep arguments, half‑lit streets, volunteers stomping through puddles. Politics is only ever truly understood when it’s blowing sideways in the rain.

It was raining steadily when I checked into the hotel, the sort of constant Mancunian drizzle that dulls the edges of everything except political ambition.

The Industrial Estate Odyssey

Reform HQ sits on a Denton industrial estate which has all the glamour of a tax return. The car park was alive with activists. I leaned out of my window, asked if they were Reform, and was directed toward an office thrumming with energy.

Security on the door nodded as if I were entering a private members’ club for the permanently aggrieved. Inside, it felt more like a campaign start‑up than a fringe insurgency: banners, posters, stacks of literature, a photo wall ready for digital consumption.

Matt Goodwin moved past with the steady confidence of a man who has done the work and knows it shows. Zia Yusuf watched everything with quiet precision. An ex–Mumford & Sons guitarist appeared with the kind of unexplained surrealism you eventually stop questioning in politics.

The activists were friendly, brisk, and thrust a clipboard into my hand. Paper, not apps. Ink, not pixels. The old ways. Data is king, and the disciples know it.

Before long, my London polish dissolved and the Mancunian accent came roaring back.

Into Levenshulme, the Forbidden Zone

I stared at the route sheet in disbelief when I saw our destination. Levenshulme. I asked George Hollyhead, the activist I was assigned to, whether this was a joke. He explained that Reform insisted on canvassing everywhere, arguing it was undemocratic to allow whole areas to become no‑go zones. Noble, brave or slightly naive depending on your point of view.

Rain lashed the windows as we drove. Light dimmed. The atmosphere took on the feel of a social science field trip conducted under hostile conditions.

The first door hadn’t even slammed shut behind us when a woman threw open her downstairs window and unleashed a torrent of abuse that could have stripped varnish. She kept going long after we’d moved on, screaming as if we’d stolen something from her, sanity, perhaps.

Every door on the street glowed with Green Party signage. Thousands of tiny, fluorescent reminders that this was not friendly terrain. It felt less like canvassing and more like walking through a theme park designed by George Orwell.

Then, out of the mist, a man with a camera. Eyebrows raised to the heavens. A glint of disbelief. And then the recognition hit: Aaron Bastani, co‑founder and public face of Novara Media, eyebrows raised in amused astonishment.

He looked at our group and asked, with visible disbelief, whether Reform were truly canvassing this side of the constituency. His expression suggested the answer ought to have been no.

“Reform? Here? Really?”

Yes. Really. And the astonishment on his face was the most British thing I’d seen all day.

At this point, the Reform group decided my five‑foot‑three frame and blonde bob did not make me ideally suited to the rising street hostility and ushered me back toward HQ. Chivalry is not dead in British politics; it simply wears waterproofs.

A Darkening Contest

Constituency Chairman, Rob Barrowcliffe, radiated optimism despite the political storm. Three canvassing sessions a day. Volunteers flat out. The classic battle cry of campaigners running on determination and too little sleep. If we lose, he said, there was nothing more we could have done.

If this by‑election is a preview of the general, then Britain is in for three years of political trench warfare conducted in drizzle. Hostility. Suspicion. Demographic territories defended like fiefdoms.

Electoral Calculus’ projections show why emotions here run so high. Labour may have won 50.8 per cent of the vote in 2024, but their predicted share has collapsed. And the Manchester wards, younger and more Green‑inclined, drag the race leftward while the Tameside wards pull hard in the opposite direction. A seat cracked down generational and ideological lines is now expected to produce one of the most volatile results in the country.

Hotel Bar Seminary

Later, at the hotel bar, I met the future of British politics in the form of young activists, everyone seemed to be called Adam. They were polite, Mancunian, and entirely free of the red‑pill nonsense the commentariat claims is consuming all young men.

I had a slight exchange of words with a young female councillor who complained that she wasn’t allowed to run her own TikTok account.

That’s Gen Z: Politics is increasingly just branding with a ballot box attached.

Sunday Surge

Despite my commitment to the previous night’s wine list, I arrived bright‑eyed for the 10 a.m. session, baffling the HQ lads who had assumed I was dead.

Lee Anderson appeared to declare that if Reform could win here, they could win anywhere. Gawain Towler stalked the streets in red scarf and tweed.

Residents were weary. One woman swore everyone had knocked on her door this week, and the numbers backed her up. Labour fielded around a hundred activists on Sunday, and the previous day the area had already been heaving with hundreds more.

Tactical voters spoke cryptically about “doing what’s best for the community,” which invariably means “voting against the people we dislike.”

A regional campaign manager (also named Adam) summarised the battlefield like a general marking trenches. Levenshulme is Green. Longsight is Labour-ish. Burnage, Gorton and Abbey Hey are the pivotal swing wards.

Interesting, it appears the Greens are focusing on leafleting rather than canvassing. Tameside Council candidate, Raymond Dunning, declared that the Greens “aren’t knocking because they’ve nothing to say to the people here,” He further dismissed their rhetoric as merely: “Greyhound dogs and a load of bollocks.”

What Triggered the Contest

The by‑election was precipitated not by policy failure or political fatigue, but by the fallout from a vile and deeply damaging WhatsApp scandal centred on former MP Andrew Gwynne. Messages leaked from the Labour WhatsApp group Trigger Me Timbers revealed Gwynne making offensive remarks about the very residents he was elected to represent, including saying he hoped a 72‑year‑old constituent “croaks” before the next general election, after she complained about bin collections.

The messages also showed him joining conversations laced with racist, sexist and derogatory slurs, contributing to what investigators later described as “complete disregard” for standards in public life among group participants. Gwynne was suspended from the Labour Party in 2025 and ultimately resigned in January 2026, forcing the by‑election.

His downfall has become a symbol of something larger and far more corrosive: a Labour hierarchy seen as insulated, coarse, and contemptuous of ordinary people. The revelations sparked genuine anger in Gorton and Denton, where residents already felt politically overlooked.

Seeing their own MP joking about their deaths, mocking vulnerable individuals, and disparaging local communities confirmed a suspicion long whispered on doorsteps, that the party’s local machine had grown detached from the lives and dignity of those it claimed to champion. The scandal has created a vacuum of trust, and every candidate now must contend with the shadow of a party exposed as out of touch with its own electorate.

Welcome to Gorton

I’m frustrated that this by-election hasn’t had more coverage and that the news cycle is once again dominated by scandals amongst the elite, all taking place within the Westminster village. This only feeds into the problem of an electorate increasingly suspicious and apathetic towards politicians.

Looking closer, it feels like a warning, a premonition of what the next general election will look like. Hostility, demographic silos, tactical voting dressed up as moral superiority, activists marching through hostile terrain with clipboards held like shields.

Gorton and Denton is modern Britain in miniature. Fractured. Suspicious. Bristling. And utterly unpredictable.

And if the Electoral Calculus projections are right, the chaos has only just begun.

So on the one hand there’s obviously very little point paying attention to the SNP’s regional list candidates for May’s Holyrood election, because as this website has comprehensively demonstrated over recent months, the chances of the SNP having any list MSPs elected are remote.

However, nothing is impossible, so let’s take a look at the B team, which also serves as a guide to the party’s upcoming talent taking its first steps towards the gravy bus.

Well, that was even grimmer than expected.

We should probably start at the very bottom of the barrel.

Because the SNP seem absolutely hell-bent on inflicting the utterly loathsome Fatima Joji on the people of Scotland by hook or by crook.

Not only is she the constituency candidate for Aberdeenshire West – currently held by Alexander Burnett for the Tories on a slim majority of under 3,400 and looking very vulnerable given their collapse in national polling from 22% to 11% – but she’s also been voted third on the SNP’s regional list, which sounds like no chance until you realise that the top two (Stephen Flynn and Gillian Martin) will very likely win their constituency seats, which are both currently SNP with the Tories in second.

So in the event that the SNP do fail to win a few constituency seats in the North-East, Joji will effectively be first in line to pick up a list seat even if she hasn’t won Aberdeenshire West. And even in a region currently represented by both Karen Adam and Maggie Chapman, that is a pretty catastrophic degradation in member quality.

But Joji isn’t the only one being offered a belt-and-braces double ticket. Most of the regional lists are being topped by people also standing for (and likely to win) constituency seats, so the electorate’s chances of rejecting them are almost nil. Let’s redline those and see what’s left.

An incredible 45 of the full slate of 71 list candidates (63%) are also contesting constituency seats, which means that some of the very worst of the party’s absolute dregs – including serial carpetbagger Graham Campbell, the hideous Declan Blench and his fellow “Out For Independence” stalwart Michael Gibbons – are actually in pole position to get list seats should the SNP manage to secure any, despite finishing as low as NINTH on the party’s internal ballot.

There’s also a generous smattering of FILTH – Failed In London, Try Holyrood – trying to get back to the trough after being unceremoniously binned at the 2024 UK election.

(bold entry indicates a double ticket, both constituency and list)

John Beare
Steven Bonnar 
Deidre Brock
Alan Brown
Allan Dorans
Patricia Gibson
David Linden 
Kirsten Oswald 
Tommy Sheppard
Alyn Smith
Alison Thewliss 

(You can be forgiven if you’ve never heard of some of those names despite them being MPs for years, we hadn’t either. But it’s nice to see serial failure Toni “independence is off the agenda” Giugliano getting yet another swing at it. Poor old Katy Loudon must be gutted.)

Basically, as long as you really really hate women’s rights and represent no danger whatsoever of dissenting from the leadership, the SNP will bust a gut to make sure you get into Parliament somehow, no matter what the voters think.

What all that tells us, of course, is that the SNP’s talent pool has the depth of a soggy tissue, and that its next generation makes the useless current one look like a team of geniuses. Readers, if there were still any of you contemplating a list SNP vote despite everything, we simply invite you to picture Fatima Joji, Graham Campbell and Declan Blench trousering £75,000 a year for the next half-decade and shaping the laws of Scotland while they do it.

There is no rescuing the party. Only its destruction will do.

Donald Trump is accused of censorship in an escalating row over Stephen Colbert’s interview of Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico.

US journalist Joshua Eakle explained that Trump threatened the US broadcaster CBS over Talarico’s segment. And CBS caved!

It’s important that you understand what happened last night.

Last night, Stephen Colbert interviewed Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico, a candidate who, by all accounts, is on track in the polls to flip Texas blue.

In response, Trump’s FCC reportedly threatened… pic.twitter.com/IEyWg7KnuW

Advertisement

— Joshua Reed Eakle 🗽 (@JoshEakle) February 17, 2026

Eakle posted the segment, which was still published online, adding:

In modern American history, no president has been more hostile to free speech than Donald Trump. But censorship always backfires.

Colbert himself said:

He was supposed to be here, but we were told in no uncertain terms by our network’s lawyers, who called us directly, that we could not have him on the broadcast

Cancel Kid Trump for the loss

Now Talarico’s team is making hay with the cancellation – OBVIOUSLY.

.@JamesTalarico: The reason the Trump administration and their billionaire friends are trying to silence me and this movement is because they’re worried that we are going to flip Texas in November.

We have traveled every corner of this state, recruited more than 22,000… pic.twitter.com/kCvQiDrfGu

— Team Talarico (@TeamTalaricoHQ) February 18, 2026

But here is the thing. The young candidate is a liberal Christian with some mild criticisms of US-Israel relations and who has slammed Christian Nationalism:

.@JamesTalarico: For 50 years, the religious right convinced our fellow Christians that the most important issues were abortion and gay marriage—two issues that aren’t mentioned in the Bible.

Jesus tells us exactly how we’re going to be judged: by feeding the hungry, by healing… pic.twitter.com/FapsoUzZwB

Advertisement

— Team Talarico (@TeamTalaricoHQ) February 17, 2026

As you can see, he’s hardly the second coming of Lenin.

Yet the cancellation has seen a spike in interest in what this guy is saying:

Try to censor @JamesTalarico at your own risk. pic.twitter.com/RkDt95PFHa

— JT Ennis (@jt_ennis) February 17, 2026

Advertisement

LOL.

And the Youtube video of the Colbert interview is in 2.7m view after 24 hours:

As the Guardian reported, CBS’ lawyers allegedly pulled the interview:

stemming from a concern that it would trigger a legal requirement to provide equal access to Talarico’s campaign rivals.

As YouTube is not subject to restrictions from the Federal Communications Commission, the interview is freely available online.

Texas can whup your ass

Texas is a volatile state and one which some argue is a bellwether for US politics. The idea of a left-ish Democrat taking a seat there is obviously terrifying to the Trump regime.

Texas is often viewed by ignorant outsiders as innately right-wing. The state is no stranger to reactionary ideas, but as liberal Texan and Pulitzer Prize winner Lawrence Wright has pointed out, the truth is far more complicated. Up until the 1970s, Texas was “an entirely Democratic state”.

And what Texas does can shift US politics entirely:

What happens in Texas doesn’t stay in Texas. …Texas is a behemoth and it has an outsize influence on the direction of America and we have a responsibility, I think as Texans, to make sure that we take care of our state in a way that would enable us to be the proper custodians of the future of America.

It’s hard to say how it will all play out in a place like Texas. But the truth is if Trump isn’t careful the Lone Star state which gave us Megan Thee Stallion, weed-smoking, bio-fuel selling country star Willie Nelson and the Alamo might just whup his orange ass. It’s also a state which has felt the brunt of Trump’s paramilitary thugs in recent months.

Here is Nelson with honorary Texan Johnny Cash and actual Texans Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson speaking out against war, poverty, fascism and the sniveling state of US media 30 years ago:

So there’s only one thing Donald trump needs to do now. And that’s quit his damned hollerin’.

Featured image via the Canary

Anouska de Georgiou is a British survivor of the crimes of serial child-rapist Jeffrey Epstein and his sick circle of powerful men and their enablers. She has published a TikTok video rejecting Keir Starmer’s weasel non-apology for knowingly appointing Epstein fanboy Peter Mandelson as ambassador and his senior adviser.

De Georgiou has spoken of receiving death threats, threats to her family, and sinister packages from Epstein’s clients and enablers who want to remain hidden. And she says that Starmer is part of the structure that is protecting perpetrators and betraying victims.

Epstein: Starmer is complicit

Starmer knew Mandelson had continued his friendship with, even ardour for, Epstein long after the latter’s first paedophile conviction. In fact, such a fact was freely known amongst the British media.

Starmer’s ‘apology’ was in fact all about Starmer – an attempt to exonerate himself for his decision. He ‘apologised’ for “believing Mandelson’s lies”, yet clearly signalled he will block as much as he can get away with from becoming public. ‘National security’ and ‘foreign relations’ concerns, don’t you know.

But de Georgiou didn’t just reject it for herself. She said she was speaking on behalf of all those who survived Epstein’s evil – and the victims of his UK-based fellow paedophiles in the al Fayed/Harrods empire. To all of them, she said, Starmer and his regime are a barrier to justice and his ‘apology’ does nothing to change that at all:

@anouska_de_georgiou #jeffreyepstein #keirstarmer #harrods #alfayad #trafficking ♬ original sound – Anouska de Georgiou

Starmer and his “paedo lover” party are more than a passive barrier. Starmer is accused of:

Whistleblower

Nicolai von Ondarza explores the possible avenues for UK-EU defence cooperation following the breakdown of talks on UK participation in the EU’s SAFE programme.

Deeper cooperation in security and defence policy is one of the main aims of the current Renewed Agenda between the EU and the UK. Given the breakdown of the liberal rules-based international order and the geostrategic pressures facing the UK, the EU and its member states, this seemed the most obvious starting point of the ‘reset’. In this spirit, as part of the May 2025 EU-UK summit, both sides signed their first ever ‘Security and Defence Partnership’ (SDP).

However, in November 2025, talks broke down on one of the key aims of the SDP, UK participation in the EU’s “Security Action for Europe” (SAFE) programme. Three months later, amid further transatlantic turbulence, the European Parliament has called for a resumption of talks on UK participation in SAFE, whereas UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer also signalled an openness to return to the question of EU-UK cooperation on defence financing. But can the breakdown easily be reversed?

SAFE was setup to enable third county participation

SAFE matters because it was set up by the EU in the first half of 2025 as one element of a push to strengthen European defence spending. It is a €150bn loan facility, where the EU provides loans to EU member states for defence investments, preferably based on joint procurement and/or cooperation with Ukraine. This sits alongside the decision to exempt defence spending from EU fiscal rules, which makes it easier for EU member states to ramp up their defence spending. So far, it is shaping up to be one of the most successful EU instruments for defence cooperation, with all the money already accounted for. Out of 27 member states, 19 applied for EU-backed loans and about half of their spending plans are already approved.

From its design, the SAFE instrument was meant to be open to third countries like the UK. For this, SAFE changed the EU’s model for external cooperation. Whereas most previous EU defence industrial initiatives were only open to its member states or those integrated into the single market via the European Economic Area (essentially Norway), SAFE explicitly allowed procurement from industry in third countries with whom the EU has signed an SDP. This turns cooperation into a political choice rather than resting on the legal requirement to be integrated into the single market. Yet, whereas the EU came to an agreement with Canada on SAFE-participation, similar talks with London broke down over the design and size of what would constitute a ‘fair and proportionate’ UK financial contribution to SAFE.

The direct effects of this failure are clear. The SAFE regulation stipulates that at least 65% of the value of a contract should go to suppliers from inside the EU, the EEA, Ukraine or partner countries. While UK defence companies may still play a part, their contribution to any orders is limited. And as the spending plans for using the €150bn loans have already been put forward and largely been approved, that ship has now sailed.

The danger of cascading effects

There are, however, reasons to restart talks. The first is the risk of cascading effects. The SAFE instrument sets a precedent for how the EU will design a ‘European preference’ in future EU defence initiatives. As SAFE is seen as a success, there are already conversations for a follow-up. The EU’s next multi-annual financial framework is also set to include the largest budget for defence related spending at EU level ever.

These cascading effects can already be seen in the design of the €90bn loan for Ukraine, of which €60bn are targeted at strengthening Ukraine’s defence capabilities and military procurement. As the servicing costs from the loan are covered by the EU budget, the EU institutions modelled the conditions for how Ukraine can spend the €60bn on SAFE, meaning with a ‘European preference’ of at least 65% for EU/EEA/Ukrainian companies, except in special circumstances where EU alternatives are not available such as Patriots air defence missiles.

This would have again locked out UK defence companies. For instance, the Franco-British storm shadow missiles could, from this loan, only be acquired from their French and not their UK production site. In the final decision, to avoid this fragmentation, the EU decided in early February to leave a door open: The loan would also be open to purchases from third countries that have a participation agreement with SAFE – so far only Canada – or those who are ‘providing significant financial and military support to Ukraine’ and agree to share ‘fair and proportionate financial contribution to the costs arising from borrowing’. The latter could provide the basis for full UK participation at least on the Ukraine loan, on which EU-UK talks have already started.

Beyond the impact on industry, the failure to agree on SAFE is the wrong political signal at the worst possible moment. As the foundations of the European security architecture are under threat, like-minded Europeans should take every opportunity to reduce barriers between the EU and NATO and work together. In this context, London and Brussels can’t afford to be held back by old Brexit wounds.

The way forward

Taken together, it is in the mutual interest of both the UK and the EU to resolve the impasse on SAFE sooner rather than later. Legally speaking, even though the first SAFE projects are now under way, talks can be resumed at any time. Politically, both sides should pre-coordinate a resumption to such an extent that this time success is all but guaranteed. It might be wise to aim for an agreement on the Ukraine loan first to set the scene for a revisiting of the SAFE question at the 2026 EU-UK summit. For the UK, this would help prevent a gradual structural decoupling from EU defence finance; for the EU it would reduce the risk of fragmenting European defence industry and strengthen Europe’s capacity to deliver capabilities at scale.

By Dr. Nicolai von Ondarza, Head of the EU/Europe Research Division at SWP and an Associate Fellow at Chatham House.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) decided yesterday to share why the number of people claiming Universal Credit (UC) has risen. This came as a surprise to disabled campaigners, who have been fighting against the waves of disability hatred coming from the DWP for years.

The DWP being honest? Nahhh

While hatred against benefit claimants has always been bad, it seems to have ramped up overwhelmingly in the last couple of years. Not just from the media, which is of course fed the stories by the DWP, but also from ministers and MPs themselves.

But, after months of pushing that too many on Universal Credit are unemployed layabouts, Labour are apparently telling the truth. That the main reason there’s a huge influx is UC claims is that the DWP are making people switch over to UC.

On Twitter, they declared:

Here’s what’s actually happening with the increase in the Universal Credit caseload

Nearly 80% of the increase is people being moved from old benefits onto Universal Credit

Not new claims

A transition we inherited

Data source https://t.co/mnxKOZS3fP pic.twitter.com/SgzDOjuu7s

Advertisement

— Department for Work and Pensions (@DWPgovuk) February 17, 2026

The chart attached showed that in the last year, 1 million new people claimed Universal Credit. However, 800,000 of those are people who’d been forced to move over.

They quickly followed this up with sharing how many claimants couldn’t work and how forced migration inflated those figures too. Though it wasn’t reported by the DWP in that way:

And it’s the same story for those with no work requirements – at least 72% of that increase is legacy benefit claimants moving across

It’s felt very odd that they just out of the blue shared this, seemingly completely off their own backs, on a random afternoon. Especially considering that just a few months ago, they were feeding the rags ffigures on how it’d “shot up”.

There’s always a reason

For many, it was jarring to see them be so honest, but the reason why is there for everyone to see. And as usual, it’s in their sly wording.

The DWP should surely have used their own classification when reporting this second dataset- “people with limited capability for work”. Instead, they chose to say “those with no work requirements”. This implies that they’re choosing not to work, when they’ve actually already gone through a gross assessment process and been judged as not fit for work.

This subtle change in language has fueled the rags in their hatred of disabled people, because instead of it being clearly understood, this lets people draw their own conclusions. And that’s exactly what they want.

This display of “transparency” also says nothing of the 400,000 people who lost their benefits because they found the migration process too complex. But hey the DWP don’t give a fuck about them, so why should the public?

We also can’t gloss over the fact that they’re still blaming the Tories, despite having been in power for almost two years. And in that time, they’ve only made the culture worse for disabled claimants.

Disabled unemployed people screwed again

It’s no coincidence that while they’re just casually throwing out figures, DWP bigwig Pat McFadden is trying any way possible to force disabled people into work. As of April, new claimants who can’t work will get £200 less a month.

When announcing this change, the DWP said they were tackling “perverse incentives” that make people “choose” benefits over finding work. I’m not sure you can call supporting people too sick to work “perverse”, but then I don’t hate disabled people.

This is, of course, more propaganda so they can continue forcing disabled people into work. Pushing ahead with his disgusting Get Britain Working plan, McFadden is now introducing Mobile Jobcentres. Finally, an even grosser pop-up than when Embarrassing Bodies would arrive in town to tell young women their acne made them ugly!

DWP not fit for purpose

More than anything though, this just feels like another desperate attempt by the DWP to show that they are actually in any way fit for purpose. When countless committees, from Work and Pensions to Public Accounts are proving otherwise.

While this sharing of information seemed pretty inconspicuous, we must remember that the DWP always has an agenda. This wasn’t them finally being honest, they were further embedding that disabled unemployed people are the problem. And scarily one they plan to fix by any means necessary.

Featured image via the Canary

Dr Azeem Ibrahim OBE is a Senior Director at the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, a columnist for Foreign Policy, and the author of A Greater Britain: Rethinking the UK’s Global Strategy (2026)

‘Where do you see yourself in a decades time?’

It’s a classic interview question that Britain refuses to ask itself. Whether or not our leaders wish to call it ‘broken’, Britain’s predicament is now widely recognised, but rarely fully diagnosed. Growth is weak, public services are both weak and eye-wateringly expensive, and foreign policy is painfully reactive and diminished. Yet the standard responses remain managerial: issue reassurances that stability will eventually deliver results as taxes inexorably rise.

It’s true that the accumulated weight of past decisions – the courts, bureaucracies, quangocracies and regulations – makes delivery hard. It’s true that most of the anger in British politics is wasted in that it drives political energy into policy and politicians that can’t deliver. What is missing from these diagnoses is that it is not just competence, but purpose that Britain lacks.

Purpose is something that neither referendum results nor successive election victories can guarantee. Purpose and vision can only be drawn from years of clear and intentional persuasion both of the electorate and of the governing class. 2019 (and 2024) proves that a large majority can be won that nonetheless fails to cut through the many layers of state inertia.

As a professor of foreign policy, the core goal of A Greater Britain, my book releasing this week, is to do that crucial analytical legwork to build a credible vision for the UK starting, and ending, in a renewed international role. The book begins from the fashionable premise: that decline is not accidental, nor inevitable, but the product of incentives, institutions, and a governing culture that has lost confidence in prosperity, power, and can no longer even coherently define, let alone act in, the national interest is. Britain is not uniquely unlucky.

Instead, post-Brexit, it is uniquely reluctant to decide what it is for, and is stuck in the political status quo built before the financial crisis by Tony Blair. Internationally, Britain is unwilling to commit to the logic of Brexit, nor of the authoritarian century we face, and so is unable to play the mediating role we are manifestly capable of.

For decades, Britain benefitted enormously from the post-war international order it helped to construct. Open trade, American security guarantees, and relatively stable institutions allowed us to become a highly globalised, high-wage, service-led economy. That world is now fracturing.

The liberal order is no longer self-sustaining; authoritarian states are coordinating; international institutions are increasingly paralysed or weaponised. Power is once again exercised directly rather than concealed behind norms and legalism. Yet Britain continues to behave, naïvely, as though the old system will carry on doing the work for us. No. We will have to earn our place in the new world order.

A Greater Britain argues that prosperity is not merely a domestic economic question, but the foundation of power and the only coherent end of our foreign policy. Britain’s economic stagnation and its foreign policy drift are two sides of the same failure. We, unfortunately, have no plan for what we want and so the question of how  we must act is endlessly deferred. We lose every negotiation we embark upon because we don’t, at the most basic level, know where we hope to be in a decade’s time.

This is why A Greater Britain argues that Britain must think of itself as a specialised intermediary power. Poised between the United States, EU, and with historic and linguistic links with more than half the entire world’s population. We are no longer a superpower, but nor are we condemned to irrelevance. Britain’s remaining advantages lie in finance, law, technology, research, diplomacy, and convening power. These assets remain diffuse and accidental, and are not aligned in service of our strategy. Britain spends enormously to build international credibility, yet, similarly, has no idea how to use or leverage it.

Power has to be understood and leveraged. Indeed, as James Cleverly observed when he served as Foreign Secretary, we build credibility to serve our national interest. We do not sacrifice our national interests, like on Chagos, to build credibility. Yet successive governments do not have a playbook for when to cave in and when to insist.

Part of the book’s answer is the Knowledge Power Doctrine. It combines the economics of specialisation with the hard fact of our new authoritarian world. Britain already generates a disproportionate share of the world’s innovation and capacity on finance, security, climate, law, and governance. Yet this intellectual capital is rarely converted into influence or leverage.

The doctrine shows how to do precisely that: integrate research, standards, institutions, and expertise into statecraft so that Britain shapes agendas rather than merely responds to them. Now that our hard coercive power is outmatched, this is how we can adapt to continue projecting influence.

Once an international role that aims at prosperity – our guiding purpose – is established, we will have the momentum to reform domestically: collapsing investment, infrastructure paralysis, capital flight, weak productivity, and a growing exodus of talent.