Excellent piece Nick Timothy. The party needs to stop these childish games which voters hate and unite behind their leader.

Fantastic long read by Tim Shipman as always. The most INSERT interesting / worrying / bonkers couple of paras are these.

I can see tory members absolutely lapping a Boris/Nigel ticket up. Not sure the electorate would mind.

Tougher on welfare
Increase in defence spending
Getting Rwanda flights off the ground

Tory message shaping up ahead of general election to reform voters. Why bother voting for a party that won’t win any seats and is delivering your agenda.

This is an excellent read.

The application process for our six month internship programme is open.

A huge thanks to Gareth Southgate for being an absolute gent last night at the Brighton v City match, taking the time to chat to my kids (and me!).

Chapeau.

It’s gone up 4 years in the space of 2 months. Our poll with YouGov back in Feb had the tipping age at 66.

Good thread on the demographic time-bomb facing the Conservatives. The tipping age at which someone is more likely to vote Tory v Labour is now 66. That’s not to mention the threat Reform UK poses to the Cons older voters.

BoE won’t be inclined to lower interest rates for a while longer I suspect. Sunak and Hunt will also be crossing their fingers for a stand down between Israel and Iran, as escalation will increase market volatility (undermining their plans to say economy is turning a corner).

I believe in the freedom of choice but fundamentally people are made to wear a seatbelt as it prevents them from dying.

“A national referendum on bringing down the rate of net migration” - what could possibly go wrong?! 🤔 thetimes.co.uk/article/immigr…

Why No 10 don’t talk up the PM’s most successful intervention is beyond me. I know people look forward not back, but a gentle reminder of a major policy success which kept millions of people in employment would help sell his leadership credentials.

I expect Daniel Finkelstein is correct that there will be more disgruntled Tory MPs who call for Sunak to go post the local elections in May (plus Reform UK overtaking Cons on headline voting intention, which I think is going to happen). But it would be madness.thetimes.co.uk/article/can-it…

It will be interesting to compare what policies MPs put forward v what might end up appearing in the manifesto itself. 🤔

The scourge of George Osborne for his relentless campaigning on keeping fuel duties frozen, Robert Halfon MP ➡️Working Hard for Harlow⬅️ was so successful at extracting £ from HMT that he was promoted to government. He’s been a great advocate for quality technical education. And is a top bloke.