Inside Politics | For the many not the few – take two

There are now only 21 days until the general election

Percy Bysshe Shelley is one of Jeremy Corbyn’s favourite poets. He’s cited ‘The Masque of Anarchy’, written after the 1819 Peterloo Massacre, on several occasions. Even on the main stage at Glastonbury. "Rise like lions after slumber, in unvanquishable number! Shake your chains to earth like dew, which in sleep had fallen on you. Ye are many – they are few,” the final stanza reads. It’s not difficult to see echoes of the poem in the tagline for Labour’s 2017 manifesto: “For the many, not the few.” Today the Labour leader will repeat this message as he offers his vision for Britain. But whether the party rises from its recent slumber and diminishes the Tories’ lead in the polls in the next few weeks remains to be seen. I’m Ashley Cowburn, and welcome to The Independent’s Inside Politics newsletter.

Our political commentator Andrew Grice on what to look out for on the campaign trail today

Jeremy Corbyn and the shadow cabinet will be in Birmingham to launch Labour’s manifesto. It might be remembered as the one which offered more “free stuff” than any other such document. Well, it is a Christmas election after all. The manifesto is expected to include pledges of free broadband; university tuition; personal care for the over-65s; dental check-ups; prescription charges; hospital parking and more free childcare. Ahead of the manifesto being unveiled, the Labour leader said it will be the “most radical and ambitious plan to transform our country in decades”.

VIVE LA RÉVOLUTION: Both the Conservatives and Labour will today will concentrate on the UK’s housing crisis. Brandishing his manifesto, Corbyn will announce the biggest scheme of council house building since the Second World War, with a pledge to build 100,000 a year, along with 50,000 “genuinely affordable” homes. It will be funded by the party’s £150bn “social transformation fund”. He will say that “ferocious” attacks on his leadership are a sign the powerful elite are scared of his determination to change a system rigged in their favour. Channelling Franklin D. Roosevelt, the president who led the US out of the Great Depression, he will say: “They are unanimous in their hatred for me, and I welcome their hatred!”. According to i newspaper, the Tories will also offer renters “lifetime rental deposits”, meaning tenants who move will no longer have to raise ludicrous amounts of money while waiting for a previous landlord to return to the old one.
GREEN NEW DEAL: Slightly altering the late president’s “New Deal” reforms, Labour’s manifesto is also expected to heavily focus on a Green New Deal. As the Corbyn-supporter Paul Mason pointed out, the 2017 manifesto mentioned the phrase climate change a handful of times. Today it will be central. According to The Guardian, the party will also promise to create one million green jobs in the energy sector through nationwide home refurbishments. “This election is the last opportunity to tackle the action to head off runaway climate change,” Labour said. But the party has already come under criticism for softening a pledge for net zero carbon emissions by 2030, by pledging to find a “pathway” towards this goal, which of course is not a firm commitment.
MAGIC MONEY FOREST: We’ve all been there and accidentally blurted out a key pledge from our manifesto for government during a factory visit in the North-East. Or maybe not. Speaking on Wednesday, the prime minister claimed he would increase to £12,500 the level at which workers start paying National Insurance. He insisted the increase from the current threshold of £8,632 would put an additional £500 a year in workers' pockets. In an interview with The Times, the prime minister insisted he didn’t accidentally reveal the key manifesto pledge after being interrogated by workers at a Teesside engineering plant. “I’m a tax cutting Conservative,” he said. “But I want the people who need to it most to feel the benefit of the tax cuts. I think it will be good for the economy,” Naturally, the devil will be in the detail. The Conservative manifesto launch is on Sunday, and expect questions about whether the tax will be phased in over the course of the next parliament, or whether it is just a vague “ambition”.
BREXIT SNOOZE: Just like 2017, Westminster said this would be the “Brexit election”. Turns out that’s not quite the case, again. Voters are now more likely to base their choice at next month’s election on the state of the NHS than they are about Britain’s departure from the EU. In a significant boost for Labour, the long-running Ipsos MORI tracker recorded large jumps in concern about the health service, with some 60 per cent of voters citing the issue. With winter closing in, and the strains on the NHS becoming increasingly more evident, it is likely this figure will increase in the coming weeks. No wonder Corbyn dedicated a significant part of the election debate on Tuesday to accusing Johnson of trying to sell off the NHS to Donald from Washington.
THE CROWN SEASON 7: After that extraordinary interview with BBC Newsnight, friends of Prince Andrew briefed members of the press that he believed it was a “great success”. Friends of the Duke of York will have been surprised then when news broke last night that he is to step away from public duties. He said he regretted his association with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein that had become a “major distraction” from the work of the royal family. Prince Andrew also insisted he was “willing to help any appropriate law enforcement agency with their investigations, if required”. It came after a growing exodus of charities and companies severed links to the prince, quite possibly marking the end of his public life.
NIGHTMARE AT WHITE HOUSE: If you think British politics is wild at the moment, all you have to do is flick to the world section of any newspaper and skim read the latest from Donald Trump’s White House. Relatively, we’re strong a stable, to borrow a phrase. On Wednesday, the president’s ambassador to the EU delivered an explosive testimony at an impeachment hearing, “We followed the president’s orders,” Gordon Sondland said as he stunned Washington. “Was there quid pro quo? He asked in his opening statement to the inquiry. “The answer is yes.” 

“I very much want to start doing revised versions of my show on Sunday evening with everyone – guests, me, producer, camera, sound – completely smashed. I think it would make great telly and perhaps be more politically revealing”.

The BBC’s Andrew Marr on an intriguing rebrand to his flagship Sunday morning programme.

“The Conservatives are… trying to win this seat.”

Sky News’s Tamara Cohen reacts to home secretary Priti Patel suggesting poverty in Britain is not the government’s fault during a visit to Barrow - a marginal constituency.

“Where do local authorities get their money from again? Oh…”

… adds the Mirror’s political editor Pippa Crerar

Gina Miller, The Independent: Ignore doubters – tactical voting is the only way to stop Brexit

Chris Stevenson, The Independent: The Tories’ fake ‘fact-checking’ service shows the same disdain for the truth as Trump

Andrew Grice, The Independent: The Liberal Democrats’ bold ambitions won’t take them far in this two-party stitch up

Owen Jones, The Guardian, Labour must turbocharge its offer to young people. Britain’s fate depends on it