Interview

As the deadline for Brexit trade talks looms, the man who co-founded a grassroots action group in Hertfordshire against leaving the EU has shared his thoughts on the last four rollercoaster years of politics. On the surface, 49-year-old Richard Scott from Harpenden is like any normal family man who “works hard to put food on the table.” He describes his upbringing […]

TIM WALKER talks to Lib Dem acting leader Ed Davey about the role of politics during the pandemic, and what Keir Starmer’s success could do for his own party’s prospects. Sir Ed Davey is working from home in his south London constituency, but, while his daily commute from his bed to his desk is shorter, […]

Actor and force of nature Frances Barber talks to TIM WALKER about Twitter battles, her tangled relationship with Labour and the hedonistic thought driving her through lockdown. At about this time, Frances Barber would have got back refreshed from a yoga retreat in Sri Lanka and be beginning rehearsals for a new play that Mark […]

Layla Moran talks to TIM WALKER about how parties and political opponents should find ways to work together to tackle the coronavirus. In this brave new world, politicians are gasping for relevance. Holed up in her constituency home in Oxfordshire, Layla Moran, a former teacher, is managing to keep us attentive. More than that, she’s […]

Leading pro-EU campaigner Lord Heseltine talks to TIM WALKER about where the battle was lost, the likely fate of Dominic Cummings and the press barons he holds responsible for Brexit. Few politicians have counted in – and counted out – quite as many prime ministers and their minions as Lord Heseltine, and, so far as […]

John Bercow speaks to TIM WALKER about Remain’s mistake in voting for an early general election, his view of Boris Johnson, and why he thinks it’s wrong to blame Jeremy Corbyn for Brexit. One had imagined John Bercow, the speaker of the House of Commons during the most bruising and brutal period of post-war political […]

TIM WALKER meets Lib Dem leadership candidate Jo Swinson to talk about the challenges facing liberalism, coalition mistakes and… Brexit Liberal Democrat deputy leader Jo Swinson. Photograph: Andrew Milligan. – Credit: PA Wire/PA Images I ask Jo Swinson why she should lead the Liberal Democrats and she takes a deep breath and manages to get […]

TIM WALKER speaks to Michael Longhurst about the Donmar Theatre’s revival of Europe – and why he is keen that it sends a very political message. “This country has been sitting on a powderkeg for too long. A spark was bound to catch. He said he’d tighten up on immigration controls. After all… feelings were […]

Liberal Democrat leadership candidate Sir Ed Davey tells TIM WALKER how the party now leads the opposition to Brexit. As secretary of state for energy and climate change and a member of the privy council during the coalition years, Sir Ed Davey sat on the national security council. “We met each week and the heads […]

TIM WALKER interviews Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, as he tries to remain loyal to Labour’s line on Brexit despite the damage it is causing him politically With the highest personal mandate of any politician in the country when he was elected mayor of London three years ago, Sadiq Khan is undeniably a rock […]

Tim Walker talks to the former attorney general who is now eloquently making the case for a People’s Vote. If Boris Johnson were to finally succeed Theresa May as prime minister, and – in the interests of unifying the Conservative Party – he decided to offer Dominic Grieve a place in his cabinet, the answer […]

With the Liberal Democrat conference opening in Brighton this weekend, Layla Moran talks to Tim Walker about Brexit, Vince Cable’s proposals for the party – and those rumours she’s about to succeed him. Layla Moran, the 35-year-old Lib Dem MP touted as the next leader of her party, was relaxed to the point of insouciance […]

TIM WALKER talks to actor and campaigner Sir Patrick Stewart about politics, Star Trek and a very spiky encounter with the Labour leader Ever since he first stood with a placard bearing the name of his local Labour candidate in Mirfield in the West Riding of Yorkshire in the 1945 general election – at the […]

The Labour MP tells Tim Walker that voters won’t forgive politicians who put party politics before the national interest. If there is one individual in Westminster who has not been transfixed by the latest dramatic episode in the Brexit soap opera – David Davis, Boris Johnson and Steve Baker being dramatically written out of the […]

The fearless Tory MP says the Foreign Secretary has lost all credibility writes TIM WALKER It exasperates Anna Soubry that Theresa May has found it necessary to invite her cabinet to Chequers this week to try to bang some heads together about how exactly Britain should go about exiting the European Union. ‘We had the […]

Free from the pressures that are silencing other MPs, the Conservative Party’s great europhile tells TIM WALKER about his meeting with Theresa May and why this is no time for despair. There would be no messing about if Ken Clarke were prime minister. Boris Johnson would have been sacked by now and the rest of […]

Lib Dem elder statesman Menzies Campbell talks about the polarised nature of modern politics. In common with a great many others, ‘Ming’ Campbell was impressed with the speech that Theresa May delivered from the steps of Downing Street when, almost two years ago, she became Prime Minister. ‘She made it clear how much she wanted […]

Tory grandee Lord Heseltine is not afraid to think, and say, the unthinkable when it comes to Brexit – even if it rattles his party’s top brass. TIM WALKER speaks to one of British politics’ biggest beasts In the company boardrooms, on the streets of the deprived inner-cities and addressing the Tory faithful as their […]

Afghanistan treasures its relationship with Britain, says its ambassador to the UK, said Tayeb Jawad. Here he outlines his hopes that relationship will not be harmed by Brexit. Afghan ambassador  When Said Tayeb Jawad, Afghanistan’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, woke to the news that the country had voted for Brexit, he knew that his […]

TIM WALKER talks to Labour MP David Lammy about what he expects to happen later this year, when the full force of Brexit hits the UK. The final descent towards Brexit has begun: safety belts are tightened and prudent passengers are in brace position. At some point in the autumn, as David Lammy warns, the […]

Campaigner Gina Miller tells TIM WALKER about her latest legal challenge to the government, and why the law still offers the best hope of holding it to account. ‘The Brextremists are calling for Theresa May to go full steam ahead, but that’s actually the last thing we want now,’ says Gina Miller. ‘We’re heading into […]

When stand-up, fantasy football fanatic and novelist David Baddiel first became famous hecklers were in the audience. Now, talking to NATHANIEL TAPLEY, he explains how trolls have become a new, nastier version of the loud-mouth in the crowd One of the things I remember best about being young during the 1990s was our attempts to […]

Alex Taylor, a British broadcaster working in France, was so angered by Brexit he decided to become French, a process which ended in a ceremony at the country’s Pantheon. Vanity Fair’s MARION VAN RENTERGHEM was there to watch it happen One day, earlier this autumn, Alex Taylor entered the Pantheon, in Paris. This is not […]

Britain’s unofficial poet laureate Tony Harrison tells ANTHONY CLAVANE about how the divisions exposed by his landmark poem, V, are as raw now as ever They say you should never meet your heroes. It is even less advisable, perhaps, to chair a question-and-answer session with them in a beautiful church after they have just declared […]

Few MPs have banged the drum against Brexit more consistently than David Lammy. He tells EMMA JONES why there is still so much to fight for When I meet David Lammy in his office in Westminster he has just delivered a letter to David Davis, signed by more than 120 politicians, demanding he publish his […]

Since the murder of her son Stephen, Doreen Lawrence has fought for justice and racial harmony. EMMA JONES hears what she thinks Britain still needs to do to combat discrimination. It is almost 25 years since Stephen Lawrence was murdered in south east London in a sickening racist attack. He would now be 43. Now […]