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This week it is the scientists’ turn to appear before the Covid Inquiry with Sir Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer and Sir Patrick Vallance. James Heale speaks to Fraser Nelson and The Spectator’s data editor, Michael Simmons to discuss the findings this week.
Rishi Sunak wants to frame a benefits crackdown in tomorrow’s Autumn Statement in compassionate terms, with ministers saying people with mobility problems and mental illnesses can no longer be ‘written off’ thanks to advances in technology making it easier to work from home. Instead, they will be expected to look for work or face benefits sanctions. The ‘carrot and stick’ approach being proposed will include a promise to claimants that their right to benefits won’t be reassessed if they look for work, as well as better support in the package of reforms being developed by work and pensions secretary Mel Stride. In lots of ways, this is compassionate: being out
To the rarified surroundings of the Upper House, where the newest member of the government took his place on the red leather of the ministerial front bench. Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton attracted quite the crowd yesterday when he was introduced for the first time, with one peer remarking that they had not seen the Tory benches so full since Covid. It was a similarly full turnout this afternoon when the new Foreign Secretary made his debut at the despatch box. Turning it on thick with his fellow peers, Cameron remarked happily on his newly enhanced surroundings: ‘When I look at the ornate carved wooden panels that surround us, and
Anyone who’s ever had a conversation with a Corbynista will know it’s impossible to talk to these people about anti-Semitism. The minute you mention the world’s oldest hatred their ‘buts’ come flying. ‘But what about Islamophobia?’, they say. ‘But what about other forms of racism?’, they cry. It’s like a tic, an involuntary ideological spasm that makes them mouth that intrusive ‘BUT’ before you’ve even got through all six syllables of ‘anti-Semitism’. For those of us who have tried to draw attention to rising Jew hatred in recent years, it is incredibly frustrating. I’ve been ‘butted’ in numerous TV and radio debates. You come to expect it. You know if
Scotland’s government has plenty of things on its to-do list: tackling inflation, dealing with unemployment and cleaning up the mess left behind by Nicola Sturgeon. But amidst these tasks, it has found time to wade into the gender debate – by publishing its ‘non-binary equality action plan’ to help those who do not fit in to one gender or another. Predictably, not everyone is happy. Tory MSP Murdo Fraser – a former deputy leader of the Scottish Conservative party – quipped: ‘Choosing to identify as ‘non-binary’ is as valid as choosing to identify as a cat.’ For that, Fraser has got himself into hot water with the usual suspects. Maggie
Why was the UK plunged into a lockdown with such little understanding about the likely consequences? This week it is the scientists’ turn to appear before the Covid Inquiry and Sir Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer, has highlighted a problem: the extensive and expensive UK pandemic planning did not consider lockdown as an option. This ‘might be considered a failure of imagination by a group of scientists who understood the nature of epidemics and their history,’ says Sir Chris, in his witness statement to the Inquiry. With ‘the benefit of hindsight’, he said, the first lockdown in March 2020 was ‘a bit too late’. With this comment, Sir Chris
Should we bother taking any notice of what Andrew Bailey says about inflation, given that he and his colleagues on the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) failed miserably to foresee any of the inflationary forces of the past two years? As late as May 2021 they were still predicting that the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) would rise no higher than 2.5 per cent at the end of 2021 before falling back to 2 per cent. For what it is worth, the Governor of the Bank of England has come over all pessimistic. Addressing the Treasury Select Committee this morning he said markets have got it wrong: they are putting too much emphasis
We shouldn’t be surprised that Ian Fry, the United Nations’ rapporteur for climate change and human rights, has waded in on the jail terms handed to Just Stop Oil (JSO) activists. The UN has a growing habit of muscling in and trying to micromanage states’ internal affairs, especially in cases where there’s a progressive point to be made. Fry said he was ‘particularly concerned’ about the sentences received by the two activists who scaled the M25 bridge over the Thames at Dartford last year. Marcus Decker and Morgan Trowland were convicted of causing a public nuisance, with Decker imprisoned for two years and seven months and Trowland for three years. Fry said the punishments were ‘significantly more
Dutch politics got a blast from the past on Monday when a right-wing politician was assaulted. The country goes to the polls tomorrow and the hospitalisation of Thierry Baudet, attacked with a bottle in a bar in the northern city of Groningen, is a reminder of what happened to Pim Fortuyn in 2002. After being assaulted in the weeks leading up to the Dutch elections, the flamboyant right-wing Fortuyn was then shot dead nine days before voters went to the polls. His assassin was an animal rights extremist who told a court he didn’t like the way Fortuyn talked about Muslims. Many people on the left long ago gave up protecting free speech and
Javier Milei, Argentina’s anti-establishment, pro-dollarisation and pro-privatisation president, is already making a splash. Milei, who won a surprise victory in the country’s election on Sunday, said in his campaign that the future of the Falklands ‘cannot be ignored’. The islands, he said, must be returned to Argentina. It didn’t take long for Britain to hit back. ‘The Falkland Islands are British. That is non-negotiable and undeniable,’ defence secretary Grant Shapps wrote on Twitter/ X this morning. Brits – and Argentines – should brace themselves for much more of these bust ups now that Milei is in charge. But the future of the Falklands is likely to be far down the
It’s another day of exciting testimony at the Covid Inquiry. Thus far, every viral-infected cough and spit has been poured over in endless detail by the assembled hacks, with the latest witnesses no exception. This week’s line-up has been full of familiar faces from the not-so-distant past, with Sir Patrick Vallance the star-turn at yesterday’s session. Today, he was followed by that other ray of sunshine, his fellow scientist, Sir Chris Whitty. Much of the Chief Medical Officer’s testimony was to be expected: UK scientists were ‘absolutely dependent’ on advice from international colleagues, there were differences of opinion on the speed of lockdown and he feared some early interventions because
When the government announces a range of tax cuts tomorrow, it has pledged to do so in a ‘sustainable’ way. What counts as sustainable, however, is going to be hotly contested – especially in light of this morning’s update from the Office for National Statistics, which saw the UK borrow more than forecast or expected last month. Public sector net borrowing came in at £14.9 billion in October – more than a billion pounds higher than forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility and £4.4 billion more than was borrowed during the same month last year. There are two ways to look at the data. The first is to note that while
Throughout the various Covid meetings, Sir Patrick Vallance was scribbling in his notebook almost as much as Michael Gove, leading Boris Johnson to assume that he was keeping a diary to be published afterwards. This made sense to Johnson who started to tell friends that Vallance knew ‘more about arse-covering than face-covering’ (Vallance had refused throughout the crisis to say whether the policy of police-enforced mask mandates had any basis in science). Now, we see some scribbles in Vallace’s diary via the Covid inquiry: not very illuminating and some expected insults about those who questioned lockdown. But there is one point that I’d like to take issue with. Vallance says
David Cameron is the king of the wishy-washy compromise. Cameron has never looked happier than when he appeared in the Downing Street Rose Garden in 2010 with Nick Clegg. There was something about being in that awkward Conservative-Lib Dem coalition that suited Dave. It was, of course, another attempt at compromising – by striking a desperate last-ditch deal with the EU that no one wanted – that sealed Cameron’s fate. Now, he’s back – but he isn’t the only politician who has made a career out of sitting on the fence. Rishi Sunak’s cabinet reshuffle shows that the current Tory Prime Minister also likes to try and please everyone, only
Last week’s military operation in Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital was mired in controversy. According to the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), the hospital was a significant target in Israel’s war against Hamas because they believed a command centre was located under the hospital complex. International spectators, including some of Israel’s closest allies, were concerned about the raid and told Israel to act with extreme caution to avoid casualties among hospital staff and patients. International organisations – including the World Health Organisation (WHO), the United Nation Population Fund, UN officials, media outlets and Middle Eastern countries including Jordan and Turkey – condemned Israel’s operations in the hospital. The WHO described the scene as a ‘death zone’, but without
Rishi Sunak has promised to respond to the Supreme Court’s judgment that the Rwanda policy is unlawful by agreeing a new treaty with Rwanda and introducing fast-track legislation to parliament. This has been widely ridiculed, as if the proposal were for parliament simply to ignore findings of fact made by the Supreme Court or, worse, for parliament to authorise refugees being sent back to their persecutors. It is extremely unlikely that this is what will be proposed. Much more reasonable proposals are likely – and should be given a fair hearing. The Supreme Court was able to block the Rwanda plan because the government attempted to implement it without securing express parliamentary authorisation. Ministers gambled on being able to persuade the courts that
David Cameron addressed Tory MPs this evening at a meeting of the 1922 committee following his shock return to government last week as part of Rishi Sunak’s reshuffle. The impromptu meeting saw around 100 MPs gathered in parliament’s Boothroyd room rather than then usual committee corridor room 14. Cameron joked that he was relieved at the location change – as it meant he could avoid his more traumatic memories of addressing the 22’ when he was prime minister. ‘It was nostalgic for a lot of us’, says one attendee. Cameron spoke of his recent trip to meet with President Zelensky As for the purpose of Cameron’s address to MPs, the
The government’s transition on taxes has taken place at lightning speed. We’ve gone from chancellor Jeremy Hunt hinting at tax cuts yesterday morning on the BBC to Rishi Sunak confirming that not only are tax cuts coming this Wednesday, but they are now a major priority for the government, as laid out in five new promises made today. Arguably the UK economy has been defying the doomsday predictions for a while now But it’s not just the policy that’s changing. It’s the rhetoric too. Hunt has gone from insisting that tax cuts are ‘virtually impossible’ in September – not something to consider right now, he said in October – to ushering them in this November and embracing a
When it comes to Ofsted, people often like to trot out the old adage that ‘you don’t grow a pig by weighing it.’ Others might rebuttal that you grow the pig by measuring its progress and making necessary adjustments to its diet, hence the need for inspections. However, a new report by Beyond Ofsted, an National Education Union-funded inquiry, is now suggesting that the pig will grow best if we allow it to self-evaluate its weight instead. There is no doubt that radical reform is needed. Trust between schools and Ofsted has completely broken down; too many schools operate in a culture of fear because inspections have become more punitive
Did Eat Out to Help Out increase Covid? It’s a conclusion the inquiry and lockdown’s cheerleaders seem keen to push. Today they got their wish with Sir Patrick Vallance telling the inquiry it is ‘very difficult to see how it wouldn’t have had an effect on transmission’. Those comments have already been taken out of context with headlines concluding that the link had now been confirmed. But that’s not what the data tells us. Or what Vallance was saying. Eat Out to Help Out came up because of a written statement from Rishi Sunak that was read out to the inquiry. In it the Prime Minister says, ‘I don’t recall
