Tory voters more likely to back the cigarette ban than Labour ones apparently. Interesting.

A plugged-in Conservative recently told me they thought Andy Street was going to get heavily beaten at the mayoral election. I dismissed it at the time as overly-zealous expectation management, but maybe not...

Great to speak to @KiranStacey at the Guardian - and make my front page debut - about the limited progress the Government has made vis-à-vis tackling regional inequalities. Reasonably or not, the public expect more progress to have been made ahead of the General Election.

Great analysis from Kiran Stacey The Guardian on why the government’s levelling up policy has gone nowhere. 👇🏾👇🏾

Read Kiran Stacey

Britain’s levelling up agenda was stymied from the very start

Meg Hillier MP Chair Public Accounts Committee, John Stevenson MP Chair Northern Research Group (NRG), Greg Clark former Business & Levelling Up Secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, Angela Rayner 🌹 & me for The Northern Powerhouse Partnership

theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/a…

Josh Halliday “I did notice to my great regret how a lot of these funds were dictated centrally through often very bureaucratic applications to Whitehall': Kiran Stacey on how control freakery, political short-termism, and poor policy design stalled Levelling Up theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/a…

“You have got to involve the people you are trying to help and not just send them Christmas presents every so often”: why Boris Johnson's hyped flagship levelling up policy aimed at shrinking regional inequality stalled theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/a… via Kiran Stacey and Josh Halliday

On almost every metric levelling up is failing. Partly because the way it was designed was never going to work. theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/a…

EXC: The Conservatives have made no progress on half the levelling up targets they set for themselves. Part one in our series on how levelling up - which could have been the great project of this parliament - fell flat. theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/a…

EXC: Labour has been promising Tata millions in public subsidies to keep the Port Talbot steelworks open. Only problem - Tata sources say that even if they had the extra money they would shut the plant anyway. theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/m…

Yes, it's the new Politics Weekly UK, with Kiran Stacey, gabyhinsliff and me, on Hester, Anderson and the whole shitty mess podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/pol…

Here is our story on Diane Abbott not being allowed to speak during PMQs today - including her version of what she said to Keir Starmer in their brief conversation afterwards. theguardian.com/politics/2024/…

Seems the speaker is *not* going to call Diane Abbott for a question. Genuinely shocked.

Diane Abbott is looking to ask a question at PMQs. The speaker must surely call her soon. Would be a awful look to have a succession of men talk about her but not hear from her herself.

Incredible details in this investigation into a top Tory donor by Rowena Mason matthew weaver and Henry Dyer theguardian.com/politics/2024/…

Featuring a fine cameo by the back of John Crace's head.

On today's Pod Save the UK, Rachelle Earwaker from Joseph Rowntree Foundation & @KiranStacey from The @Guardian are analysing @jeremy_hunt's budget.

Out later today. Follow us now so you don't miss it... go.crooked.com/PodSaveTheUK

#PodSaveTheUK

Could assessing child benefit by household rather than individual create losers as well as winners? George Osborne seems to think so. (On his Political Currency podcast)

Interesting carve-out for inheritance tax from the new regime for taxing non-doms. No changes for now, and even if changes happen, there will probably be a 10-year exemption period for new arrivals.

For all the govt talk of getting the long-term sick back into work, the percentage of people in employment is now forecast to *fall* over the next five years.