Black to play. This is a variation from Osborne-Hawkins, British Championship, Coventry 2015. Black is a piece down. What is his idea? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 18 August or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk or by fax on 020 7681 3773. The winner will be the first correct answer out of a
Caught working The government announced a crackdown on illegal workers. How many illegal workers are caught in Britain? — From October to December last year, 716 illegal workers were caught, 337 in London and the south-east. Among those caught were restaurant workers in Chinatown, a takeaway worker in Norwich, a fish-and-chip shop worker in Lincoln
Islington isn’t indifferent Sir: I was shocked to read Mary Wakefield’s article accusing Islington’s middle classes of ‘extreme indifference’ to the death of our young people (1 August). As the local MP and a resident of N1, I can assure you that all these losses are deeply felt. It is provocative to suggest that there
While the Labour party rakes over its past in an effort to find a policy for its future, the commentators continue to speculate about Boris’s role, if any, in a Tory party increasingly dominated by chancellor George Osborne. Romans would have sympathised. Life in the imperial court in Rome was not necessarily one long orgy.
A while ago, David Hockney mused on a proposal to tax the works of art stored in artists’ studios. ‘You’d only have to say they weren’t finished, and you are the only one who could say if they were,’ he suggested. ‘There’d be nothing they could do.’ This is the state of affairs examined in
The wind is maddening and constant, and gets stronger as the sun falls below the horizon. The streets are lined with plastic and rubbish, the beaches covered with greasy bodies and sunbeds, and ghastly music blasts away all day and night. Motor scooters without mufflers and cars choke the tiny roads that lead to the
I hadn’t realised quite what a thriving bridge scene Manchester has until spending a weekend there recently. I went with Sally Brock and Barry Myers for the annual mixed pivot teams held in memory of Michelle Brunner. It’s a wonderful event: Michelle, who died of cancer four years ago, was one of England’s top players
Toby goes to bed at 10 o’clock sharp every night otherwise he gets irritable. Toby sleeps on the bed always. Toby is too old to jump up on to the bed, so the bedroom footstool should be placed next to the bed to help him to climb up. He is also allowed up on the
Surely it can be no coincidence that the road by which one enters St George’s Hospital, Tooting, is called Effort Street. The taxi trundled along this road, pulling up at the drop-off point in front of the Lanesborough Wing, home to the specialist I have been assigned. It has taken the best part of two
I’m going off Jeremy Corbyn. He seems more and more pleased with himself by the minute. But I understand why he is so popular with Labour supporters. It isn’t just his perceived authenticity in a field of machine politicians — the same attribute that has thrust Donald Trump to the fore in the race for
Our son, William, celebrated his marriage on Saturday. You would expect me to say that it was wonderful, sunny occasion. I do, and it was. I have been trying to work out why. The most important factor is something which parents can, fortunately, affect very little. Will was marrying a beautiful, kind and thoughtful woman,
The 70th anniversary of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has produced some predictable wailing and gnashing of teeth about the horrors of nuclear weapons. The Guardian called the dropping of the bombs ‘obscene’, citing the figure of 250,000 casualties, and CND organised a commemorative event where Jeremy Corbyn renewed his call for unilateral nuclear disarmament. As a
Toxic virus or Taleban: it’s funny how the mild-mannered Liz Kendall has attracted for her Blairite associations the most violently pejorative terms. Hardly had the Labour leadership contest begun before her allies were being called ‘Taleban New Labour’. No one thought New Labour was really much like the Taleban. That’s why the metaphor was effective:
Q. Is there a polite way of not letting someone hold your baby? I love giving mine to people to hold but I don’t like it when he gets handed back to me stinking of someone’s perfume. Is there a kind way of keeping him away from anyone I don’t like the smell of, ideally
Should we have celebrated VJ Day? Hearing the hieratic tones of the Emperor Hirohito on Radio 4 the other day, announcing the unthinkable — the surrender of the great imperial power to the secular, gas-guzzling, unheeding West — seemed like a profanity. So much came to an end with that surrender that it is not
Speaking after the Stafford hospital scandal in 2010, the then newly appointed Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, grandly announced plans for a charter to support whistleblowers. The government, he said, would ‘create an expectation that NHS staff will raise concerns about safety, malpractice and wrongdoing as early as possible’. We now know just how that fine
Home The Metropolitan Police encouraged people to celebrate VJ Day despite reports in the Mail on Sunday (picked up from an investigation by Sky News) of plans by Islamic State commanders to blow up the Queen. The RMT union announced two more strikes on the London Underground for the last week in August. Network Rail
The unclued lights (two of two words), individually or as pairs, are of a kind. Elsewhere, ignore one accent. Across 9 Aromatic fragrance from front half of royal residence (4) 11 How embroiderers’ work fell apart — without any trouble (10) 12 The best spinners? (4) 16 Loved one
It’s a red-letter day for us here at 22 Old Queen Street. The latest circulation figures for British magazines have just been published and show that sales of The Spectator have broken through their all-time high. More people are buying the magazine now than at any time since we started publishing 187 years ago. Our last high
The unclued lights are heraldic terms. First prize Simon Horobin, Kidlington, Oxon Runners-up Mick O’Halloran, Dunsborough, Australia; John Roberts, Cheltenham, Glos
