BRITAIN AND FRANCE — some thoughts. British and French politics are now moving in different directions. Macron destroyed the French centre-left/right parties in the 2017 presidential election. They have never recovered. But Macron’s centrist movement hasn’t filled the vacuum. Nor, even as his failures multiplied over almost a decade, was there a renaissance of the centre left/left but the rise of more extremes — Mélenchon’s LFI on the Left, Le Pen’s RN on the Right. Latest polls indicate they will juke it out in the presidential 2nd round next May — with Le Pen the easy winner. In Britain the rise of Reform on the Right and the Greens on the Left since the 2024 election + the collapse of Labour/Tories in the polls suggested, if not a Left/Right polarisation like France, then a new politics of multi-party democracy. But 2026 brought a major correction — it’s been a dire year for Reform and the Greens, whereas Labour/Tories (but especially Labour under Burnham) have enjoyed something of a renaissance from their polling nadirs. So, as French politics increasingly becomes a choice between populist Left and Right, the mainstream centre left/right has become once again the story in British politics. With the most recent polls showing Labour in the lead, the Tories second, Reform third (and still slipping), Greens nowhere (along with LDs). At the moment Labour must be favourite to win an election (at least end up the largest party). Of course Labour/Tories are still a long way off their former dominance in share of the vote. But they are, at least for now, on the way back, which is more than can be said for their French counterparts.

Astounding Sunday Times investigation reveals new scandal in SNP’s Socialist Scotland: 800 NHS, central government, council and quango workers whose jobs no longer exist but remain on the public payroll because of the SNP’s ‘no public-sector redundancy’ policy. Estimated cost of paying people to do nothing: £27m a year. One NHS Highland worker has been receiving a full salary and benefits for 17 years despite not having a specific job. The health board refused to say what the worker had been doing for almost two decades and how much they had been paid. Likely cost to the taxpayer is expected to be far higher with several public bodies refusing to disclose salaries for hundreds of the workers awaiting redeployment.