Toby Foster

Local election voters delivered an emphatic warning to Rishi Sunak, but stopped short of anointing Sir Keir Starmer as Britain’s PM-in-waiting. These contests were in many ways a dress rehearsal for the likely 2024 general election, with 70% of England’s electorate having the opportunity to cast a ballot. And while there is always some debate over voters’ primary motivations for choosing a particular party in a local poll – potholes perhaps mattering more than PMQs – there is no doubting that the Conservatives were sent packing by the electorate in swathes of England. The Tories lost more than one thousand seats nationwide and had 48 councils taken out of their control, in results even Rishi Sunak described as “disappointing”. They suffered bruising defeats in East Staffordshire, Dover and Medway, with the councils switching from Tory to Labour control, while the Liberal Democrats seized Windsor & Maidenhead and Dacorum from Conservative clutches. Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey jubil...

Review: 'Out of the Blue: The inside story of the unexpected rise and rapid fall of Liz Truss' by Harry Cole and James Heale ( Harpercollins ) Rating: 3.5 out of 5 When Boris Johnson finally gave in to fierce pressure from backbenchers, ministers, the media and the public by announcing his resignation as Prime Minister, it fired the starting gun on one of the most extraordinary four-month periods in British political history. A giant field of candidates threw their hats into the ring for the titanic tussle to be Johnson's successor.  Among them were so-called 'big beasts' of the Conservative party (Grant Shapps, Nadhim Zahawi, Rishi Sunak), the 'rising stars' (Kemi Badenoch, Penny Mordaunt) and those who might be most politely described as 'under the radar' (Rehman Chishti). Elizabeth Truss MP, the Foreign Secretary, was the eleventh and final candidate to declare, and the last one standing when all was said and done. She battled her way through the ...

Recap and Review: The Apprentice 2023 (Series 17), Episode 1: Antigua Tourism Score: 2.5/5  The following review contains spoilers When The Apprentice bounded back onto our screens in 2022 after a two-and-a-half year pandemic-enforced hiatus, it delivered one of its finest series to date. Brilliantly-chosen candidates and an enjoyable set of tasks made the show a captivating, entertaining triumph - and my TV highlight of the year.  Which means there's plenty to live up to for 2023's eighteen confident contenders, all scrapping for Lord Sugar's £250,000 investment in them and their business proposal. And scrap they most certainly do, after being dispatched to Antigua for an extravagant first task in which they must sell and conduct tours of the island. The ladies team are at daggers drawn almost immediately, with discord at almost every decision point, while some of the gents try to insure themselves against an early firing by theatrically announcing their disagreement wit...

  In Britain, the world’s sixth-largest economy, it has long been taken for granted by many that our electricity provision is fit for purpose. But for the first time in almost half a century, this supposed guarantee of living in the first world is no longer so cast-iron. National Grid, the organisation responsible for balancing Britain's electricity supplies, has warned in its annual winter outlook that Europe faces a “challenging winter for energy supply”. In the event of reduced gas and electric imports from the continent, coupled with insufficient gas supply in Britain, National Grid warns there will be a “large negative surplus” of energy. This may result in emergency measures that would leave some customers “without power for pre-defined periods during a day – generally this is assumed to be for three-hour blocks.” While National Grid stresses that this situation continues to be an “unlikely event”, and that it remains “cautiously confident” of maintaining supplies throughout ...