Grant Kearns

[Laura Trott MP @LauraTrottMP]

Lucy Powell believes we’ve had an “over-focus on academic outcomes.” I disagree. A knowledge-rich curriculum & rigorous assessment have raised standards in England. Look over the border to Wales & Scotland, where reforms weren’t enacted, to see how badly children are being failed.

[Robert Midgley @RobertMidgley07]

Andy Burnham shouldn’t even entertain Mauritius:

- The Chagos Islands deal has no legal basis
- Comes with a £50bn cost to British taxpayers
- Betrays Western security and self-determination 🧵

[Luke Robert Black 🌳 @lukerobertblack]

Personally loathe what many Labour MPs are implying about knowledge in Burnham’s schools policy. The idea that working class kids shouldn’t have a knowledge rich education is the bigotry of low expectations - as is making curriculum hinge on local jobs

This isn’t social mobility

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

Growth demands a relentless focus on the future.

But I worry Burnham is too focused on the past; in almost every speech, he talks about what should have happened under Thatcher in the 1980s.

This would be like Blair railing against Macmillan, or me blaming Jim Callaghan for the challenges of the 2020s.

The emphasis on the past is even more concerning given that Burnham has abolished the government department most focused on the future.

My column in @thetimes today 👇
https://t.co/BWpSGCQ0hi

[Ross Kempsell @RossKempsell]

EXC: Burnham flew to his first day at No10 North on Prime Ministerial jet GBNI, an Airbus A321. This would have cost around £30,000 for taxpayers

He landed in Manchester at 0957 so has been ‘working from No10 North’ office for less than an hour

https://t.co/d6vIhAw2jS

[Kemi Badenoch @KemiBadenoch]

In the last few hours alone Andy Burnham’s Government has talked about:

Cutting energy bills
Lifting the personal tax allowance
Nationalising Thames Water
The biggest council house programme since the War
Giving mayors more funding
Creating a new National Care Service
More overseas aid
Cutting student loan repayments
More employment support
Ending homelessness

These are billions of pounds of spending commitments and that's on top of raising defence spending to 3%.

Where’s the money coming from?

There’s been no serious explanation at all of how they will be funded. I am very concerned the Prime Minister is making a lot of promises without giving the country an explanation about how we can afford them.

We cannot borrow even more - we are paying more in debt interest than we do on defence.

The answer can’t be tax rises either. The tax burden is already far too high, and families and businesses shouldn’t face even higher bills.

The only answer is to cut spending. Andy Burnham should be in Parliament explaining what his actual plans are and how he is going to pay for them.

[Ross Kempsell @RossKempsell]

Burnham must promise he will NOT bring back Starmer's failed Chagos deal

- He should focus on the priorities of people IN THE UK

- He must spend the 47 billion earmarked for Chagos IN THE UK

- Instead of taking Mauritians out of income tax he should give Brits a tax break

[Grant Kearns @grantkearns]

@CameronDLWalker Perhaps it's the maid's day off 😀

[Liam Halligan @LiamHalligan]

Britain is doomed if Andy Burnham lurches sharply left

We risk a 1976-style crisis if the prime minister-in-waiting caves to the Labour party power brokers who are putting him in Number Ten.

UK government borrowing is out of control – we're adding more than £20bn per month to this country's national debt.

Since 2023, more than 80pc of the money the state has borrowed has been spent on debt interest – a bill that now exceeds 3.5pc of annual GDP.

This is akin to a Ponzi scheme.

Appointing trade-union fanboy Ed Miliband as Chancellor may well buy Burnham time, mollifying the massed ranks of economically-illiterate Labour MPs and party activists.

But Miliband in Number Eleven would cost Britain another £20bn-£30bn a year in debt interest – adding to an annual debt-service bill that has been consistently above £100bn since 2024 and is heading for £140bn by 2030.

And that’s if the hard-nosed, faceless institutional investors bankrolling profligate Britain don’t veto Miliband's appointment altogether – by sparking absolute chaos in the form of a payments crisis.

That would result in an IMF-style external bailout, with Britain run by unelected global technocrats, amid a crippling slump, pulverising austerity measures and a deep cost-of-living crisis – during which, of course, low-income households would suffer the most.

The economic, political and societal damage would be huge.

And it’s not just me warning of this – so are some of the world's most respected and distinguished economists, formerly holding senior leadership positions at @IMFNews, @bankofengland and @NIESRorg

My latest weekly @Telegraph "Economic Agenda" column (no paywall)

https://t.co/mKQ1xouw4r

[Ben Brittain @BenABrittain]

Devolution in Britain has always been an evolutionary process, but looks like we may be getting a devolution big bang. Managing that process to create the effective governance and accountability structures is critical to it succeeding - and it raises big constitutional questions.

[Grant Kearns @grantkearns]

While a prospective PM plays verbal chess with supposed power devolution and moving No 10 up North, reciting familiar political platitudes, where are the bold policies that might actually set businesses free to grow? Where is the vision for economic liberation? Silence, too, falls upon defence the very pillar meant to protect us all, yet curiously absent from any roadmap whatsoever, along with the need for urgent welfare reform. It appears the manifesto of promise has left its pages blank, save for polished words and empty echoes.

[JJ Stockman @StockyMan115]

Government does not create growth, government strangles growth. Andy Burnham doesn’t understand that.

@KemiBadenoch and the @Conservatives have an economic golden rule that will get Britain working again.

[Ben Brittain @BenABrittain]

Insufficient for the threats of a dangerous world and the expectations from our NATO allies. It is no surprise the defence secretary resigned.

[Royal Mail @RoyalMail]

Moving home?

Remember to redirect your mail ✉️ https://t.co/DgDFRfZ1Hk

[Kemi Badenoch @KemiBadenoch]

Energy bills are rising again. Labour will blame Iran, but you’re paying more because of Ed Miliband’s net zero taxes and refusal to drill our own oil and gas.

Our Cheap Power Plan would cut bills by 20% by scrapping the green taxes, scrapping VAT and drilling in the North Sea.

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

Unemployment is now 5% and only half of under-25s are in paid employment.

Every Labour leadership contender should have a coherent answer to how we can reverse these trends and avoid creating a lost generation of young people.

Today's @thetimes column👇
https://t.co/Bnli5IcVry

[Tom Harwood @tomhfh]

It’s absolutely staggering that days after introducing legislation to ban North Sea oil and gas exploration, this malign government lifts Russian energy sanctions in order to import Vladimir Putin’s oil products and LNG.

[Grant Kearns @grantkearns]

Replacing one socialist with another won’t resolve the issues voters relate to. We need pro-growth policies, significant house building, huge reduction in taxation especially for small business & billions out of government spending but with significant reform, not just cuts.

[Kemi Badenoch @KemiBadenoch]

Why does Sir Keir Starmer want to be Prime Minister? It’s hard to know. But what’s certain is that Britain is paying the price of having a PM with no interest in doing the job.

Perhaps you think ‘all politicians are liars’. Yet the disgraceful appointment of Peter Mandelson points not just to dishonesty, but to a prime minister too idle to ask basic questions and too weak to face the answers.

Even by his own defence (fanciful as it is), Starmer has shown himself lacking in any grip, to be lazy in his thinking and, as it turns out, too idle to ask the most basic questions of his staff.

In fact, the real scandal is not the appointment of Mandelson - serious though that is - but the woeful direction of our country under Starmer.

[Tom Harwood @tomhfh]

Why is everything about this country suddenly so mind numbingly insane?

We invented liberty and a few hundred years later ended up telling bakeries that they’re not allowed to advertise their cakes or pastries.