#cpc17

[ham-em-pton-ma]

What a day.

[mknewsmedia]

China’s bold challenge to the west.

published in FinancialExpress 26/10/17 - FinancialTimes SyndicationService

[nirmolakheera]

When you come back from conference with a present for baby #nephew #cpc17

[jakobsteffen]

Party conference season in Britain

Tories fail to plaster over Brexit rift, while Labour expects run on Sterling if elevated to power - my piece for my company It is the recurring spectacle for the interested observer of (British) politics. This year’s edition, after a bungled election in June (at least from the government’s point of view), and with a seemingly ever deepening Brexit-induced rift ripping through both main parties, their conferences in Brighton and Manchester, respectively, get attention from a wider audience than usual. Sticking to a well-observed tradition of British party politics, down at the Channel coast Labour orchestrated not only a platform’s feast of sweeping nationalisation and vast tax increases, but staged a veritable display of personal cult for its leader, too. Jeremy Corbyn has consolidated his authority over his party in such a way that he even got away with curtailing any meaningful debate on Brexit – the one issue Labour’s new-found peace with itself might be disturbed. Were Labour stuck at the bottom of the polls, it would not all matter very much. Yet after its success in June’s snap election even greater than we had anticipated, it is running neck-and-neck against the Conservatives’ weak minority government, the latter’s downfall but a lost Commons vote on any of those 150+ Brexit amendments away. Thus, it was not mere propaganda that the party and indeed Jeremy Corbyn himself stated that Labour was “a government in waiting”. Remarkably, then, it was no other than the Shadow Chancellor himself who recognised that most probably there would be a run on the pound if Labour gets propelled to power. And we have nothing to add: On its current platform, Labour presents one of the most direct and daunting challenges to the established economic order in the United Kingdom. Its advancing to power would amount to nothing else but a simultaneous economic upheaval alongside Brexit – with all the related initial shock effects. Yet this event, as stated above, is now always at hand and must not be discounted. The Conservatives, gathering in Manchester, have failed to display any authentic unity in spite of their frantic efforts, even into the conference’s second day only. On opening day (incidentally the Prime Minister’s birthday), Boris Johnson yet again tore at the nerves of his party colleagues by giving an interview on Brexit in which he basically refuted almost every position taken by Theresa May in her Florence speech a fortnight ago. By that renewed affront to the Prime Minister, he reasserted his role as unofficial spokesman of the hard-line Brexiteers in the Conservative Party, demonstrating that contrary to Theresa May’s protestations, Cabinet is anything but united on its Brexit approach. The leading soft Brexiteer, Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond, gave a speech in which he conspicuously avoided Brexit as far as possible. When he hit the subject eventually (and somewhat fleetingly), he merely reiterated his priority to remove the uncertainty emanating from the split government as well as the stuck negotiations in Brussels. This points towards two conclusions: First, Boris Johnson’s heft within the Conservatives is very much alive, enabling him to grab the limelight at the expense of the Prime Minister and getting away with it. Second, the power struggle within the Conservatives for the final, authoritative interpretation of Brexit is far from over, risking the negotiations’ timely success before businesses, domestic and foreign alike, begin to retrench their operations in the United Kingdom. Put succinctly: Time is running out on Brexit, and the British government has still not agreed on a strategy. Theresa May’s speech on Wednesday will round off this season’s conferences, offering more detail on her personal approach to Brexit (hopefully). We will comment on that and set it into context in the new issue of our monthly bulletin released on Thursday.

[nirmolakheera]

Brexit day at conference! Q&A with Matthew Elliott and hearing Boris Johnson speak were the highlights. My question to Matthew was "what is his biggest regret of the vote leave campaign" and he responded that allowing Farage to take centre point narrative on election night was it. I'd 100% agree with him!! #cpc17

[nirmolakheera]

Early morning start for BBC radio on day 3 of conference! #cpc17

[nirmolakheera]

Great to have been on BBC 5Live radio earlier speaking about day 1 of conference! #cpc17

[nirmolakheera]

Great discussion at CPF event on Conservative values. My contribution was around empowerment - the idea that people are judged on merit and shouldn't be held back because of gender, creed, colour. That we shouldn't go down the route of "positive discrimination" but instead empower and educate people to remove prejudice, discrimination and unconscious bias from society #cpc17