Politics

The Sunday Telegraph has news that Boris Johnson will give a speech next week in which he will throw his weight behind a report, published by Volterra, calling for Britain to renegotiate its membership of the EU. The Telegraph reports: ‘The capital’s gross domestic product (GDP), currently £350 bn — or just over a fifth of the UK economy — would grow to £640 bn by 2034 if Britain stayed in a reformed EU and adopted policies encouraging more trade with the world’s fastest-growing markets, the report will say.  But if the UK left the EU, while pursuing its own trade-friendly policies regardless, the London economy would still grow to £615 bn over

In this week’s Spectator, Melanie Phillips argued that supposedly anti-Israel protests over the Gaza war have convulsed Europe in the worst scenes of open Jew-hatred since the 1930s. Even more appalling is the silence in the face of all this of the political class. Here’s her suggestion for what David Cameron should say if he really cared about the rise of anti-semitism in Britain: ‘I am utterly appalled by the attacks on the Jewish people on the streets of Britain and in our public discourse. This hatred and bigotry is being fuelled by warped and distorted reporting about the Gaza war. ‘Newspapers and broadcasters are uncritically treating Hamas propaganda as fact.

Nato is 65 years old this year; but there’s little cause for celebration. The Defence Select Committee’s latest report suggests that the populations of western Europe and North America are lukewarm about Nato’s collective defence guarantee – the principle that an attack on one Nato member is an attack on all. Paragraph 70 quotes research conducted in the aftermath of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Georgia in 2008; it found that less than 50 per cent of the populations of major Nato powers would support the defence of the Baltic States if they were attacked. The report explains that the substantial Russian minorities in Latvia and Estonia, under the influence of

Michael Fallon, the new Defence Secretary, is a classicist by training. What lessons, if any, might he take from his study of the ancient world, especially in relation to military adventures in far-off places? Hadrian offered the key insight on the problem when he became emperor in ad 117 and immediately abandoned some Roman provinces in the East: ‘Since we cannot control them, we must give them their freedom.’ Ancient Greeks are an interesting test case. While the city-states were free during the 5th and 4th centuries bc, they were constantly at each other’s throats, almost completely incapable of working together in each other’s interests. Athens itself was at war

The outbreak of war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia in July 1914 forced British politicians to postpone the Amending Bill for Irish home rule. This was momentous because Nationalists and Unionists had been on the verge of civil war (see picture above) over the amendments, which concerned the exclusion of the six counties of Ulster. The Spectator noted, gravely, that a continental war appeared to be unavoidable, so the nation must pull together. ‘Unity at home and strength abroad,’ it demanded. The Spectator also suggested that the ‘national energy is best conserved and best applied by a Liberal Government  supported by a Unionist Opposition’ with Asquith’s Liberal Cabinet supplement by prominent Conservatives such as Lord

For a politician to draw attention to his own deficiencies is a desperate attempt to curry favour with the electorate that has been tried before with dismal consequences. The most famous case is that of the former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith who, at his 2002 party conference, addressed the problem of his dullness as a political performer by saying that no one should ‘underestimate the determination of a quiet man’. One result was that Labour backbenchers would raise a finger to their lips and say ‘shush’ whenever this croaky-voiced man was speaking in the House of Commons. He tried to sound tougher at the next year’s Conservative conference by