AboutArticles by John Rentoul

Keir Starmer thinks he’s defeated Labour’s hard left

30 Jul 2023

Keir Starmer’s marginalisation of Jeremy Corbyn and the former leader’s supporters has been so complete that it was a surprise when one of them fought back. Jamie Driscoll, the mayor...

That is for sure the door is still open for the Tories

24 Jul 2023

Overinterpretation is the curse of the political classes. The prime example this week was the reading of Thursday’s by-elections as spelling doom for net zero — the target of...

British democracy is strong enough to bend

11 Jun 2023

On leaving parliament, Boris Johnson has decided to blame everyone for his downfall except himself. He accuses the privileges committee, with its Conservative majority, of being a “kangaroo court”. By...

Labour party is now the low-immigration party

29 May 2023

Something significant happened this week. Labour confirmed its position as a party advocating lower immigration than the Conservatives. When a Redfield and Wilton opinion poll this month asked which party...

Starmer’s U-turns make it look as if he doesn’t believe anything

21 May 2023

Keir Starmer is “working forwards not backwards”, a Blair-era cabinet minister told me after one of the Labour leader’s recent U-turns. This was a cryptic way of saying that Starmer...

Starmer will say whatever it takes to win

14 May 2023

You have to admire Keir Starmer’s ambition. He wants to fight the 1945, 1964 and 1997 elections all at once. “In 2024 it will have to be all three,” he...

Starmer may be on course for No 10 and coalition of chaos

07 May 2023

The Conservatives did so badly in the local elections that their own spin backfired. Greg Hands, the party chair, said he was expecting to lose 1,000 seats, with the transparent...

‘Come outside and we’ll sort it out’: Lee Anderson’s thuggishness is a throwback to an undemocratic past

29 Apr 2023

Lee Anderson sent me an email last night headed, “Here’s what happened at 7pm, John.” I thought he was going to explain the fracas in which he was involved with...

Labour campaign machine is definitely out of control

16 Apr 2023

Speculation about the next election is constant, yet it alternates between two outcomes that ought to be unlikely. One is a Labour majority, which would require an unprecedented recovery in...

As Biden visits Northern Ireland, can US again help seal the deal?

10 Apr 2023

One of the stars that aligned when Tony Blair felt the hand of history on his shoulder 25 years ago was the changing politics of the Irish lobby in the...

John Rentoul

Chief Political Commentator, The Independent; visiting professor, King's College, London.

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