Mark Pack

I am usually sceptical about instant history book as they come out before there has been time for reflection or analysis and yet whilst events are still fresh in your mind. Too often therefore the instant history account simply tells you what you can still remember, and no more. However, Nicholas Jones’s book does a good [...] »

At the time the coalition government was negotiated, Trident looked to be one of the most contentious policy areas for the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to agree on. However, for all the barbed Cameron – Clegg exchanges over Trident during the election, it now looks as if the biggest tensions on the issue are coming [...] »

Nick Clegg has been giving a speech at the think-tank Demos today, setting out his vision for what this Parliament should achieve – and what the Liberal Democrats should get from it. The heart of the argument is in this early section: Now that the Liberal Democrats are in government, liberal ideas are being deployed [...] »

Whether driven by circumstance or long-term plan, the reaction of David Cameron to the general election result has been an attempt to realign British politics around the centre-right, using the need to strike – and then keep an agreement – with the Liberal Democrats as a way to drag his party away from its more [...] »

A footnote to our previous coverage of Lords McAlpine and Laidlaw, two non-dom Conservative members of the House of Lords. They had both for a long time been unmoved by criticism of their tax affairs, but ahead of changes to the law they have both decided to give up their seats in the Lords. Lord [...] »

Welcome to the fourteenth in a series of posts going through the full coalition agreement section by section. You can read the full coalition document here. The national security section is brief, outlining the creation of a National Security Council, the commencement of a defence review and a promise to “deny public funds to any group that has [...] »

Welcome to the twelfth in a series of posts going through the full coalition agreement section by section. You can read the full coalition document here. International development has been one of the totemic policy areas which David Cameron chose to show how he was changing the party. As a result, just as a promise to increase [...] »

Having seen trailed in advance the research being done for today’s piece on why Labour/Lib Dem talks broke down, I was intrigued as to what James Macintyre would dig up. But reading his piece, it’s a big disappointment – because it makes a trio of misjudgements, all of which burnish Labour’s reputation. Let’s take them one by [...] »

The Guardian reports: David Cameron’s close adviser, Andy Coulson, has come under fresh attack after the disclosure of new evidence of the News of the World’s role in the illegal interception of the royal household’s voicemail messages during his time as editor. The evidence is in the outline for a book planned by the private investigator at [...] »

Only one in five voters think David Cameron should try to form a minority government if his party is the largest but short of an overall majority after Thursday’s general election. The finding comes in a YouGov poll for The Sun which finds that 37% think in such circumstances Cameron should try to form a “grand [...] »