Politics Archives

Monday

18 Sep 2023

Russell Brand’s gags are coming back to haunt him

It has now officially all gone wrong for stand-up’s sex god. Ahead of Saturday night’s Channel 4 documentary about Russell Brand, and the newspaper disclosures in the Sunday Times, there was speculation that the witnesses could be opportunistic attention-seekers. The account of the first complainant appears to undermine that idea. On the same day as her alleged encounter with Brand, she apparently visited a rape crisis centre, according to medical records, and accused him of wrongdoing. If the case reaches court, her testimony could be hard for Brand – who strongly denies all the allegations against him, said his relationships have all been consensual and that he has ‘evidence directly

Sam Leith

The ‘naive cynicism’ of Russell Brand’s hasty defenders

I can’t imagine that Channel 4’s investigative slot Dispatches has had such an audience in living memory. On Saturday evening, many thousands of people who seldom if ever watch terrestrial television – I was one of them – will have tuned in at 9pm, just like the old days, to watch a conventional broadcast. Most of these people will already have known the substance of what was in the programme, because it was a joint investigation with a good-old-fashioned newspaper – whose version of the story was published a few hours earlier and was eagerly and widely read online. Quite a moment for the so-called ‘legacy media’. The gist of the

Alec Marsh

A driver’s case for 20mph limits

Speeding kills, we’re told. But in the right circumstances, exceeding the limit is no bad thing. Take motorways: few drivers seem to stick to 70mph, yet most journeys are perfectly safe. Indeed, when I’m behind the wheel, I like putting my foot down as much as the next driver. Fortunately in the 30 years since I passed my test I’ve been pretty lucky; I’ve clocked up two or three speed awareness courses, but somehow I’ve managed to keep hold of my licence. Yet despite my run ins with the DVLA, I firmly believe there’s a case for 20mph limits in certain areas. This new speed limit has been rolled out on

Sunday

17 Sep 2023

Dalibor Rohac

Poland and Hungary could come to regret their Ukraine grain ban

The row over Ukrainian grain imports shows that politicians in Eastern Europe can be their own worst enemies. Five Eastern European countries – Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia, led by Poland and Hungary – failed to convince other EU member states that the existing ban on imports of grain from Ukraine, imposed earlier this year, should be extended beyond 15 September. As a result, at least three of them – Poland, Hungary and Slovakia – will now adopt their own restrictions, in defiance of the EU. What is all too clear is that the countries seeking a ban, particularly Poland, have elevated short-term political considerations above their own long-term interest in Ukraine. Their

Joe Bedell-Brill

Sunday shows round-up: Cleverly says questions to answer over Russell Brand allegations

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly: We must be careful when listening to the voices of the ‘powerless’ Comedian Russell Brand has been accused of rape, sexual assault and emotional abuse. Brand denies the allegations against him and said his relationships have all been consensual. The BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg asked Cleverly if he thought there were ‘wider questions the industry must answer’. Cleverly agreed, and suggested that abuse was particularly challenging in places where there are ‘acute differentials in power’. On Libya: After devastating floods hit Libyan city Derna, Cleverly said that the UK was doing what it could to help, but pointed out that the lack of an effective government in

Joel Kotkin

The decline of the West: America’s Pacific cities face a bleak future

As recently as the early Nineties, when the great cities of the Midwest and East Coast were careening toward what seemed like an inevitable downturn, the urban agglomerations along the Pacific coast offered a demonstrably brighter urban future. From San Diego to the Puget Sound, urban centres along America’s western edge continued to thrive and expand as migrants from other parts of the country, and the world, crowded in. In the process, the Pacific cities seized the economic initiative. The West Coast became home to the country’s premier trade entrepôt and its dominant entertainment and technology centres, and home to five of the world’s six most valuable companies. Yet now

Seth J. Frantzman

Kamikaze drones are the future of warfare

The West is struggling to confront the modern military technologies of Russia, Iran and China. A year and a half of the war in Ukraine has proved it. Iran has exported cheap Shahed-136 kamikaze drones to Russia, and they have been used to terrorise Ukrainians. Putin appears ready to invest further in procuring thousands more. Sir Tony Radakin, chief of the defence staff, said this week that, in response, the British Army wants to create regiments of kamikaze drone pilots. He’s right to do so. Iran’s drones are cheap to make, estimates say around £15,000 each, but the air defences needed to shoot them down are far more expensive. This difference between how western

Damian Reilly

Does tennis have a doping problem?

Is it more remarkable that Romanian two-time Grand Slam tennis champion Simona Halep took performance enhancing drugs, or that she was caught? I ask only because the sport’s authorities seem to catch vanishingly few dopers, which surely means either they’re very bad at it, or elite players rarely cheat to win enormous sums of money. Certainly, it’s easy to be cynical about tennis. When in 2017 I interviewed legendary doping chemist Angel ‘Memo’ Hernandez – who during the nineties and 2000s was the world’s leading illicit sports chemist, providing undetectable super-stimulants to a wide range of household name athletes – he burst out laughing when I asked about doping in tennis. ‘Tennis was paradise for a long time. No testing

Leon Mangasarian

Nimbys and Greens are teaming up to block German wind farms

Germany’s Robert Habeck might well be an excellent children’s book author but he is proving to be a dismal economy and climate minister. Habeck, who also serves as the Greens vice-chancellor in the country’s coalition government, rode to power in 2021 promising to speed up the transition to renewables. At the heart of his pledge: more windmills, bigger windmills and, above all, built much, much faster. But these promises are proving to be little more than hot air, as my own fruitless struggle to build windmills attests. Wind energy is crucial if Germany is to meet its goal of renewables producing 80 per cent of electricity by 2030, up from

Iain MacGregor

Putin is resurrecting Russia’s ‘iron rogues’

A year before Russia launched its brutal campaign to subjugate Ukraine, I visited a wintry Moscow. It was striking to see how far the capital had moved away from celebrating the cult of the old communist leadership that had dominated the then Soviet Union with an iron fist. The tomb of Lenin by the Kremlin was, of course, still doing good business with tourists. But the bust of Joseph Stalin, standing on guard outside his old boss’s gaudy vault, resembled a forgotten relic. The sorry state of these statues was no accident. After the failed coup by Kremlin hardliners in August 1991, First Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev’s power drained away. As

Gerry Hassan

Why has Scottish politics forgotten about religion?

During the SNP leadership contest, something unusual happened: religion became a talking point in Scotland. Comments made by leadership hopeful Kate Forbes, a member of the Free Church of Scotland, on issues like gay marriage, abortion and having children out of wedlock, dominated the newspapers. But it became clear, after the dust settled – and Humza Yousaf defeated Forbes – just how unusual this discussion was. Even people of faith find it hard to talk about religion. This summer, when reflecting back on the leadership contest, Forbes said ‘there is a fear which characterises right now any discussions about faith’. But a Scotland which does not reflect upon the role religion has

Saturday

16 Sep 2023

David Shipley

The toxic prison attitude that can cost inmates their lives

David Morgan, a 35 year-old man, told staff he’d taken an overdose. A nurse decided the man seemed drunk and needed to ‘sober up’. No proper medical assessment was conducted, and staff locked him in a holding cell. Over the next two and a half hours David became ‘increasingly distressed and unwell’, ‘incapable of coherent speech’ and ‘was unable to prevent himself from repeatedly falling on the floor’. Meanwhile the nurse, and prison staff looked on. As a result of these multiple falls, David broke his nose, fractured both legs and sustained significant bruising to his head and face. Eventually he lost consciousness, was taken to hospital and died eight

Harry Mount

Why some men are obsessed with the Roman Empire

Why do men think about the Roman Empire so much? That’s the subject of a new social media trend, where women ask their partners how often they think about ancient Rome. Some men do it every day; one admitted to doing it three times a day. But why is it men who love the Empire so obsessively? ‘There’s so much to think about,’ one man said to his fiancée on TikTok. Another admitted he loved ‘their aqueducts and the fact that they had concrete that could harden’. He’s right. The Pantheon in Rome was built out of a special Roman concrete that has held up its extremely delicate dome since 126

Francis Pike

How an American racing driver and war in Mongolia helped to defeat Hitler

Of all the ‘practice’ wars that preceded the main events of the second world war, including the Spanish civil war and the winter war between Finland and the Soviet Union, the least well known is the four-month war on the Mongolia-Manchurian border between the Soviet Union and Japan that ended in September 1939. This is not surprising, perhaps, because British attention was (and still is) more focused on Hitler’s invasion of Poland that took place two weeks earlier. Even the participants downplay the importance of a war that took place in a remote corner of Mongolia. Japan refers to it as the Nomonhan Incident while Russia calls it the Battle of Khalkin Gol after the river that runs through the region. Britain is not famed for its geopolitical

Kate Andrews

How America’s 2024 election will affect Britain’s

13 min listen

For the first time since 1992 the US and the UK will have elections in the same year, and – for the first time since 1964 – there is a real chance that those campaigns could overlap. How will they impact each other? Kate Andrews speaks to Katy Balls and Freddy Gray.

Cindy Yu

Cindy Yu, Charlie Taylor and Petroc Trelawney

17 min listen

Cindy Yu tells the story of how she got to know Westminster’s alleged Chinese agent and the astonishment of seeing herself pictured alongside him when the story broke (01.12), Charlie Taylor, His Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, talks breakouts, bureaucracy and stabbings, and wonders – where have all the inspirational leaders gone (06.45), and Petroc Trelawney shares his classical notebook and describes a feeling of sadness as the BBC Proms wraps up for another year (11.54). Produced and presented by Linden Kemkaran.

Jawad Iqbal

Why Iran’s opposition failed

Today marks the anniversary of the brutal slaying of 22-year old Mahsa Amini at the hands of Iran’s so-called morality police – a death that fuelled mass protests on a scale not seen since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Yet 12 months on from what briefly looked like an unprecedented threat to four decades of theocratic rule under the mullahs, the unpalatable truth is that the protesters have failed in their attempt to bring meaningful change to Iran. If anything, the ruling mullahs look more secure than ever. Iran’s opposition forces must buck up their ideas if they are to retain any hope of toppling the regime. It is all a far cry

Steerpike

Seven of the worst people in politics, according to Rory Stewart

If only more politicians were like Rory Stewart. That is pretty much the gist of his book Politics on the Edge. While Stewart is the man called into politics to serve the people, the same isn’t true of his colleagues. Stewart’s memoir has a short list of ‘goodies’; namely, himself. But there is a long list of ‘baddies’ who, by Stewart’s account, have brought British politics into disrepute. Mr S has read Stewart’s book so you don’t have to – and here are seven of the worst people on Rory’s naughty list: George Osborne: There’s no love lost between Stewart and Osborne. The former chancellor, who is now doing his

Mark Galeotti

The EU needs a coherent strategy on Russian sanctions

This week, the European Union opted to extend sanctions on some 1,800 Russian companies and individuals for another six months, but it also lifted sanctions on three wealthy individuals. Alongside this, a recodification of the rights of member states which means that, in the name of preventing ‘exports’, individual Russian travellers’ cars, phones and even toiletries can be seized on entry. These decisions have raised a predictable storm. The three lucky Russians whose sanctions were lifted are the billionaire Farkhad Akhmedov and businessmen Grigory Berezkin and Alexander Shulgin, all of whom had been put under restrictions for their links to the Kremlin. (A fourth man, Colonel Georgi Shuvaev, was also

Joanna Williams

How museums lost their way

What’s the point of museums? According to researchers at the University of Leicester, museums should help children explore their gender identity. Academics have issued 44-pages of detailed guidance on how museum directors can tackle ‘growing uncertainty and anxiety surrounding trans-inclusive practice’ while stimulating ‘positive explorations of gender’ for children. The University of Leicester has got this all wrong. Whether it is school sex education classes, TikTok videos, libraries hosting drag queen story hours, picture books about grandad attending Pride, or television programmes about boys who want to become girls, children are bombarded with opportunities to explore their gender identity. Yet despite almost every area of life having already been colonised