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The Spectator’s Notesrss

18 May 2013

The BBC loves nothing better than a narrative in which Tory anti-European eccentrics split their party, and a bewildered public votes Labour. It is certainly the case that some of… Read more

11 May 2013

On Tuesday night, at a Spectator readers’ evening, Andrew Neil interviewed me about my biography of Margaret Thatcher. He asked me if, after leaving office, Lady Thatcher had come to… Read more

benefits

4 May 2013

It is fascinating watching the great welfare debate as the universal credit starts its life. The ruling elites have very, very slowly caught up with public understanding. The simplest way… Read more

27 April 2013

The first volume of my biography of Margaret Thatcher was published on Tuesday. Since Lady Thatcher had stipulated that the book could appear only after her death, we were, in… Read more

20 April 2013

When Winston Churchill died, Lady Violet Bonham Carter made her maiden speech in the House of Lords. ‘It is hard for us to realise,’ she said, ‘that that indomitable heart… Read more

13 April 2013

It is strange how we are never ready for events which are, in principle, certain. The media have prepared for Margaret Thatcher’s death for years, and yet there was a… Read more

6 April 2013

The press is now to be regulated under the supervision of a body created by Royal Charter. On the website of the Privy Council Office, it explains that a Royal… Read more

30 March 2013

‘And just to round off the week,’ said the chirpy Radio 3 announcer, ‘the St Mark Passion on Friday.’ Just to round off the week, eh? Did Jesus say, ‘It… Read more

23 March 2013

There is supposed to be a Leveson Part II, although everyone has forgotten about it. As well as telling him to look into everything bad about newspapers (‘Please could you… Read more

16 March 2013

In Washington last week, I encountered amazement that the Bank of England is about to be run by a foreigner. This was not because of any contempt for Mark Carney,… Read more

2 March 2013

On the BBC television news on Monday night, the first three items concerned alleged misbehaviour by the famous — Cardinal Keith O’Brien, Lord Rennard and Vicky Pryce, the ex-wife of… Read more

23 February 2013

People are quite often pilloried for saying the opposite of what they actually said. I have read Hilary Mantel’s London Review of Books lecture, and she is quite clearly not… Read more

16 February 2013

Pope Benedict is stepping down for conscientious reasons about which he will have thought deeply. But I still fear that his decision is a mistake. First, its manner was unfortunate.… Read more

9 February 2013

It was rude and impolitic of David Cameron not to sit in on the parliamentary debate on the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill. The whole thing was his idea and… Read more

26 January 2013

In which forthcoming by-election does one candidate’s election address boast that he was the ‘last Captain of Boats [at Eton] to win the Ladies Plate at Henley in 1960’, while… Read more

19 January 2013

David Cameron’s long-awaited speech on Europe this week falls 50 years to the day after the death of Hugh Gaitskell. Gaitskell, who died in harness, was the last leader of… Read more

12 January 2013

Poor Nick Clegg keeps trying to change the constitution and keeps being balked (the Alternative Vote, Lords reform). At last, he believes, he will be able to fulfil his ambition… Read more

5 January 2013

‘The rain is ever falling, drip, drip, drip, by day and night… The weather is so very bad, down in Lincolnshire, that the liveliest imagination can scarcely apprehend its ever… Read more

15 December 2012

Here is a point about the coalition which is so obvious that I have not seen it expressed. When a single party is in power, the approach of a general… Read more

8 December 2012

You will have read in every news outlet that the baby whom the Duchess of Cambridge is bearing will be third in line to the throne if she is a… Read more

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