George Eaton, The New Statesman Journalist Profile

Articles

Yvette Cooper’s quiet victory on immigration

4 days ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

A week ago, Westminster was emerging dazed from Reform’s triumph in the local elections. A week later, Labour has announced a panoply of measures designed to reduce immigration including a ban on new care worker visas and an increase in the normal automatic settlement period from five years to 10 years. Keir Starmer may have used the weekend to confirm that Labour now regards Reform as its main opponent but for liberal critics here is proof that he is chasing Nigel Farage’s tail.
Can Ed Miliband stand the heat?

1 week ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

Last week a trade union general secretary almost called for the replacement of a cabinet minister. You might have missed it. The interview was on the day of the local elections and attention soon moved to two familiar sights: Nigel Farage toasting his victories and the Labour Party feuding over its defeats.
Morning Call: Who will win the fight for Labour’s future?

1 week ago | morningcall.substack.com | George Eaton

Good morning, it’s George here. Across Westminster, the political fallout from Labour’s election defeats is reverberating. Below I explore the renewed backlash against the winter fuel payment cuts and the dilemmas they pose for Keir Starmer. In 1976, as Harold Wilson announced his surprise resignation, Labour was wracked by questions over its future direction. A vivid new play, The Gang of Three, depicts the fate of a trio of modernising candidates: Denis Healey, Roy Jenkins and Anthony Crosland.
Who will win the fight over Labour’s future?

1 week ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

In 1976, as Harold Wilson announced his surprise resignation, Labour was wracked by questions over its future direction. A vivid new play, The Gang of Three, depicts the fate of a trio of modernising candidates: Denis Healey, Roy Jenkins and Anthony Crosland.
Why it’s now Reform vs Labour

1 week ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

The problem with Reform, a Labour MP told me at the start of this week, is that they’re hopeless at expectation management. Rather than boasting that they would sweep the board, he suggested, they should speak of gaining a “toe hold” in local government. In the event, it didn’t matter. Expectations were high – and Reform surpassed them anyway. By winning a parliamentary by-election, nine councils and two mayoralties, Nigel Farage has confirmed his ascent to the political mainstream.
Reform’s Runcorn victory is a warning to Labour

2 weeks ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

This time, the hype was justified. For over a decade, Nigel Farage has boasted of “parking our tanks” on Labour’s lawn. But until today none of his various outfits had succeeded in winning a seat from the party. That has finally changed. After a full recount, Reform won the Runcorn and Helsby by-election by six votes – the closest result for more than a century – overturning a 14,696 majority.
Keir Starmer needs an enemy within

2 weeks ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

Back in December 2023, Morgan McSweeney gave Labour’s shadow cabinet a lesson in electoral volatility. He showed them graphs from eight contests in which the polls turned against the apparent frontrunner including the 2015 and 2017 UK elections, the 2017 Norwegian election, the 2019 Australian election, the 2021 German election and the 2023 Spanish election (one future cabinet minister called them “the slides of doom”).
Will Labour’s “Sea Wall” be swept away?

2 weeks ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

At the top of St George’s Church, Ramsgate, is a lantern tower visible from sea. Its stained-glass windows depict the Little Ships that sailed from the town’s harbour and rescued 2,800 men from the beaches of Dunkirk in 1940. These are the kinds of scenes that politicians like to invoke when they celebrate “this sceptred isle”. In February 2020, during his imperial phase, Boris Johnson called for the country to “recapture the spirit” of our “seafaring ancestors”.
The Lib Dems’ Middle England revolution

2 weeks ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

In the River Chess, dressed in fishing waders, Ed Davey is planting flag iris. The species grows aggressively, disrupting ecosystems by outcompeting native plants – a pattern the Liberal Democrats have replicated. At the general election the party toppled Tory fortresses once held by the likes of David Cameron (Witney), Boris Johnson (Henley and Thame) and Michael Gove (Surrey Heath). A recent YouGov poll put the Lib Dems first in the south odutside of London.
Does Labour have a “forgotten flank”?

3 weeks ago | newstatesman.com | George Eaton

How does Labour solve a problem like Reform? This is the question that transfixes Westminster. When Nigel Farage announced his return to politics last year, some Starmerites were jubilant – any chance that remained of a Conservative comeback was extinguished. But what began as a nightmare for the Tories could become one for Labour. That much was clear on 4 July when MPs were overjoyed by Starmer’s landslide but troubled by its lovelessness.