Responding to the story in the Daily Telegraph that Theresa May wants a live televised debate with Jeremy Corbyn, Andrew Allison, Head of Campaigns, said:

"This is something we should resist. We are not in the middle of a general election campaign. The broadcasters will love the idea as it is good for them. Instead of debating the issues, they will be billing this as the heavyweight championship of the world with a build up going on for days. It will also be a biased Remain v Remain fight without a Brexiteer in sight. It would be a distraction - one we can do without as the future of our country as a sovereign nation hangs in the balance."

ENDS

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association.

The former Chief Rabbi, Dr Jonathan Sacks, has compared Jeremy Corbyn’s remarks about Jews to Enoch Powell’s so called “rivers of blood” speech of 20th April 1968. Dr Sacks says Corbyn’s words were “divisive and hateful like Powell’s speech” and he accuses both men of “…undermining the existence of an entire group of British citizens by depicting them as alien.”

Political opportunism. Betrayal. Selling out. Whatever you call it, Jeremy Corbyn's plans for a new UK-EU customs union would mean the UK would not be able to sign trade deals and we would be beholden to the EU. 

As Matt Ridley explained in his excellent article in today's Times, the poor have the most to gain from Brexit. Here's an example that he gave:

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association. 

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a piece which I titled “The Guardian: a psychiatric casebook.” In the light of new clinical information I need to revise the judgement I made there. I originally thought the mental disease which The Guardian is suffering from is some form of neurosis. It turns out to be much worse – a full-blown psychotic illness. You know the difference between a neurotic and a psychotic? The neurotic builds castles in the air while the psychotic lives in them.

Young Owen Jones is the psychotic in question. He has written an article in The Guardian which qualifies him for immediate transportation to the nuthouse.

I want to visit the Blighty UK Cafe at Finsbury Park. It sounds like a great place. It is decorated with model spitfires and has a statue of Winston Churchill. You can even drink your tea out of a Churchill mug, and one of the breakfasts on offer is the "Winston". If you are hungry, now is the time to skip the rest of this paragraph, because for £9.90 you will be served a traditional full English. The "Winston" comprises of British bacon, 2 fried eggs, Cumberland sausage, Yorkshire black pudding, bone marrow, tomatoes, mushrooms, red onion, thyme, homemade baked beans, and sourdough toast.

If you are a vegetarian, you can try the "Clementine", and if you are a vegan, you can tuck into the "Ghandi". The website states that they are serious about coffee and all the beans are sourced from Commonwealth countries - Rwanda, Kenya, India, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea and Malawi. What isn't there to like about this cafe?

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association. Peter takes a look at the three new people who have been elected to the Labour Party's National Executive Committee. 

While May’s so called “government” lurches from one crisis of ineptitude to the next fiasco, Jeremy Corbyn is quietly assembling his politburo – the polite name for which is Labour’s National Executive Council (NEC).

One of my favourite films for a wet Saturday afternoon is Superman II in which our hero grapples with a trio of malevolent opponents. The three people appointed to the NEC last week rather reminded me of that film. They are: Jon Lansman, Yasmine Dar and Rachel Garnham who accumulated more votes than the lefty comedian Eddie Izzard. Those three are a huge force behind Labour’s shift to the hard left and their election gives Corbyn a majority on the ruling Council. 

I have discovered a little about each of this trio and what they stand for…

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association. 

 “A creeping sense of hostility to business” has taken hold in the Conservative party, says George Freeman, former head of Downing Street’s policy unit. This hostility is not “creeping,” George; under Mrs May it is galloping. Last Saturday the prime minister denounced “the unacceptable face of capitalism.” I suppose her statement was a follow-up to her disastrous election manifesto which a commentator at the time described as “somewhat to the left of Ed Miliband’s.” No wonder she lost her party’s majority when she began the campaign by alienating her core supporters. Alas we now have not only an extreme socialist opposition in this country; we also have a socialist government.

This is a guest post by Harry Clynch, an English undergraduate at Cambridge University, and an officer of the Cambridge University Conservative Association. 

The general election was a complete travesty for the Conservative Party. Through a grossly incompetent campaign, the Prime Minister managed to squander a twenty-point lead to put the most dangerous Labour leader in the party’s history within inches of Downing Street.

Of course, identity politics was a factor in this. Mrs May’s rather robotic approach to the election, and the symbolic damage done by such things as her refusal to partake in the televised debates, and her U-turn on what was already a flawed policy regarding social care (only exacerbated by her refusal to admit it even was a U-turn), always created the sense and atmosphere that the Conservatives were constantly trying to repair damage rather than guiding effortlessly towards a majority government, let along the huge Commons majority that some initially predicted.

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association. 

It is more than likely that Jeremy Corbyn will be our next prime minister. His political idols are Hugo Chavez and his successor Nicolas Maduro who have turned Venezuela into a hell on earth. Corbyn’s social and economic policies would quickly bring Britain to a similar catastrophe. Here are a few details…

Miguel Rodríguez Torres, a Venezuelan general who served as President Maduro’s interior minister in 2013 and 2014, recently warned that his country is on the verge of civil war. Large riots and protests have intensified in every major city, including the working class neighbourhoods which once firmly supported Maduro’s government.

The following is a guest post by the Rev Dr Peter Mullen, Hon. Chaplain of The Freedom Association. 

Theresa May’s brand of conservatism has been called “socialism lite.” This is unfair to her. Perhaps it used to be socialism lite, but it now shows every sign of turning into socialism ‘evvy.

The latest wheeze takes the form of a bribe as the Tories hope to grab the young voters by offering cheaper rail travel. But this is only a gimmick, a sideshow. Across the whole range of economic policies, the government looks increasingly left wing: not far off Miliband’s 2015 election manifesto and certainly well to the left of anything produced by Harold Wilson or Jim Callaghan in the 1960s and 1970s.