Politics Archives

Monday

14 Jul 2025

Sam Leith

Banning disposable vapes was a waste of time

When we’re debating the introduction of a new law – ban this, ban that, crack down on the other – most of the energy in the public conversation goes into the question of whether this, that, or the other is something that deserves to be cracked down on. It seems to be after the event, usually, and with the sound and fury at last subsided, that we discover whether the law in question will achieve its stated purpose. A corker of a recent example, I think, was the Blair government’s foxhunting ban. It sucked in hundreds of hours of parliamentary time. It generated thousands of headlines. It brought hundreds of

Sunday

13 Jul 2025

Joe Bedell-Brill

Sunday shows round-up: Labour defends its ‘one in, one out’ migrant scheme

The government is piloting a ‘one in, one out’ migrant scheme with France. As part of the deal, the UK will return some migrants to France, and in exchange others with a strong case for asylum in the UK will come the other way. On Sky News, Trevor Phillips noted that France could refuse to take back certain individuals, and asked Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander why they would accept ‘violent offenders and rapists’. Alexander said there is a lot of ‘operational detail’ that the Home Secretary and Prime Minister are working on, but claimed the deal was ‘robust’ and ‘workable’, and could ultimately ‘break the model’ of the international people

Adam Hay-Nicholls

In defence of Christian Horner

Christian Horner has very beady eyes. If you sit opposite him, his shark-like spotlights will dart around you, probably in the hope there’s someone more important he can talk to, but also spying for threats and opportunities. His sacking as the team principal of Red Bull Racing after 20 years in the job has caught the paddock off-guard. We were at Eddie Jordan’s memorial on Monday at Central Hall Westminster with F1 powerbrokers past and present and none of them knew this was coming. But Horner surely did, and I bet he’s one step ahead. Christian has faced more threats than opportunities during the past 18 months. There was the embarrassing leak of sexualised text messages to a personal assistant which proved, at the very least, that he

Nigel Jones

Reform is right to reject Liz Truss

Reform UK topping the opinion polls and winning local council elections has prompted several leading Tories to defect. But now Nigel Farage’s insurgent party is riding so high that it is getting choosy about which Conservatives it will accept into its swelling ranks. If too many Tories join Reform they will begin to look like a convenient vehicle for rats leaving the sinking Tory ship Sources in the party have told the Mail on Sunday that it would spurn any attempt to defect by former Prime Minister Liz Truss or former Home Secretary Suella Braverman, as both are so unpopular that they would ‘damage Reform’s public image’. Reform leader Nigel Farage

Steerpike

Thatcher hit job piece backfires

It is a century this year since the Iron Lady’s birth – and conservatives are determined to mark it in style. Amid a whole host of dinners and seminars, the Margaret Thatcher Centre held a symposium on Monday to debate the legacy of the former Prime Minister. Among the likes of Lord Lilley, Sir Anthony Seldon and David Starkey was a writer from the New Statesman who duly filed a predictably snippy piece about the day. Quelle surprise… Yet it seems that the piece has backfired somewhat. For Donal Blaney, the conference organiser, has penned a letter in response. It thanks the journalist in question and says: We have shared

Rory Hanrahan

Norman Tebbit, forgiveness and my father, the IRA bomber

Norman Tebbit, who died this week at the age of 94, embodied a sterner Britain. His political career was remarkable but it paled in comparison with his unyielding love for his wife Margaret, whom he wheeled through life for four decades after the IRA’s Brighton bomb paralysed her body in 1984. Tebbit never forgave those who nearly killed him and left his beloved wife in pain for the rest of her days. My dad met Tebbit several times, earning his ‘hero of the week’ nod in his Sun column for exposing the IRA My father, Sean O’Callaghan, was an IRA bomber who turned against his comrades and, in doing so,

Matthew Greenwood

English schools are failing disadvantaged children

Education should be the great equaliser – the ladder with which all children, regardless of circumstances of birth, can improve themselves and, by doing so, climb towards a more prosperous future. It was certainly that way for me. I loved learning, and my state education took me from humble beginnings in Clacton-on-Sea to working in Westminster. Fixing this system will not be politically easy … but political difficulty is no excuse for inaction But not all children are so lucky. Despite England’s significant success at raising overall attainment over the past decade, the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged pupils has stubbornly remained – despite the significant sums of money spent

Nikki Da Costa

Why the Lords doesn’t have to accept the Assisted Dying Bill

In an effort to hasten the Assisted Dying/Suicide Bill on to the statute books, Esther Rantzen and Lord Falconer have offered a novel interpretation of the role of the House of Lords. Falconer suggested that the Lords must ‘uphold’ what ‘the Commons have decided to go ahead with’. Meanwhile, Rantzen said of Parliament’s upper chamber: ‘Their job is to scrutinise, to ask questions, but not to oppose.’ Someone like Rantzen may be forgiven for playing so loose with conventions, but a former Lord Chancellor may not. Labour’s manifesto made no reference to assisted suicide nor assisted dying The reality is that both the House of Commons and the House of

Debbie Hayton

ITV’s Transaction is painfully unfunny

The plot of Transaction, a six-part comedy currently showing on ITV2, is simple. A supermarket accused of transphobia hires a transgender night shift worker to protect themselves from an activist mob hammering on the doors. The problem for manager Simon (played by Nick Frost) is that he employs a transwoman on a mission to be outrageous, vulgar and crude, and to lecture the audience on trans rights. Promoted as humour, there’s a big problem: it just isn’t funny. Transaction was written and created by Jordan Gray who also plays the part of egocentric transwoman Liv, someone more accustomed to sponging off friends and surfing the internet than earning a living

Saturday

12 Jul 2025

Julie Burchill

Wimbledon’s Royal Box has become naff

As Wimbledon reaches its climax this weekend, those of us neither interested in tennis, nor in taking a fortnight off work for solid perving purposes, are delighted it will soon be over. I couldn’t care less about the tennis, but the comings and goings in the slightly obscene-sounding ‘Royal Box’ are impossible to escape from. The comings and goings in the slightly obscene-sounding ‘Royal Box’ are impossible to escape from This year has provided a bumper bonanza: Rebel Wilson, Cate Blanchett, Celia Imrie, Rory Kinnear, Nick Jonas, Bear Grylls, Hugh Grant, Olivia Rodrigo, Priyanka Chopra, Gary Lineker, John Cena, Dave Grohl, Dominic Cooper, Judd Apatow, Leslie Mann, Russell Crowe, David

Gavin Mortimer

France doesn’t need Boomers dreaming of political comebacks

If France didn’t have enough to worry about right now with its soaring rates of debt, crime and immigration, now comes news of a political comeback. Dominique de Villepin, prime minister between 2005 and 2007, earlier this month launched his political party called Humanist France. ‘I decided to create a movement of ideas, of citizens, through the creation of a political party,’ he explained. ‘This movement is for everyone. We need to unite all French people to defend social justice and the republican order,’ he said. Given some of his recent statements about Israel, de Villepin will have his work cut out to unite the country. In October, the Jewish

Nick Timothy

How to save Conservatism

It is impossible to deny the sense of gloom and pessimism in Britain today. The economy is stagnant, and our society is divided. The opinion polls convey what many of us know: that the public do not trust the mainstream parties to steer us away from our predicament. The conversation around many family dinner tables is dark: parents worried that their children will miss the opportunities they enjoyed, and young people contemplating emigration. Even the spectre of civil war is being discussed – not just in private but online and in the media. It is easy to list the individual things that are going wrong. But to really understand what is happening and

Jonathan Sacerdoti

Jewish doctors are sick of the BMA

Around sixty Jewish doctors, including senior consultants and general practitioners, have left or are planning to leave the British Medical Association. Their decision is not a fleeting protest, but a serious response to what they consider to be a deeper institutional malaise that has gone untreated for too long. Many Jewish doctors feel their concerns have been ignored The BMA, whose purpose is to protect its members’ welfare, is now regarded by many Jewish doctors as compromised. They feel that it is no longer impartial, no longer safe. For a professional body that prides itself on care, inclusion and advocacy, this represents a systemic failure of grave consequence. The resignations follow the

Amanda Spielman

Amanda Spielman on the SEND row and Labour’s Ofsted blind spot

22 min listen

As Labour looks to get a grip on public spending, one rebellion gives way to another with the changes to the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) system threatening to become welfare round two. On this week’s Saturday edition of Coffee House Shots, Lucy Dunn is joined by The Spectator’s Michael Simmons and former Ofsted chief Amanda Spielman to explore what the government is planning – and why so many Labour MPs are worried. Is the system failing the children it’s meant to support, or simply costing too much? And can Labour afford to fix it without tearing itself apart? Listen for: Amanda on the unintended consequences of the 2014

Friday

11 Jul 2025

John Keiger

How Macron triumphed over Starmer

‘Small boats’ are the big talking point from this week’s Franco-British summit. The consensus is that there are slim pickings for Britain, and the reason why is simple: France negotiates according to its interests, Britain negotiates according to the Chagos template. France’s president Emmanuel Macron had little incentive to agree anything but a symbolic ‘returns’ agreement with Sir Keir Starmer. Most of the French political class, public opinion and ‘humanitarian’ organisations do not support Britain returning migrants to France. Nor for that matter do other EU states. Why would they? What then was Macron seeking from the summit? The French president is still smarting from Brexit The French president is

Steerpike

Rupert Lowe cleared by standards watchdog

Well, well, well. It transpires that Independent MP Rupert Lowe – formerly of Reform UK – has now been cleared by parliament’s standards commissioner after he was probed over funds for his independent ‘Rape Gang Inquiry’. Lowe was investigated after allegedly failing to register hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations for his project, with more than £600,000 raised by a Crowdfunder started by the Greater Yarmouth MP in March. The Commissioner noted: I opened a formal inquiry on 10 July 2025. My inquiry sought to confirm whether these donations qualified as registrable interests and whether Lowe had failed to register them within the 28-day window set by the House.

Sophia Falkner

Sophia Falkner, Roger Lewis, Olivia Potts, Aidan Hartley and Toby Young

27 min listen

This week: Sophia Falkner profiles some of the eccentric personalities we stand to lose when Keir Starmer purges the hereditary peers; Roger Lewis’s piece on the slow delight of an OAP coach tour is read by the actor Robert Bathurst; Olivia Potts reviews two books in the magazine that use food as a prism through which to discuss Ukrainian heritage and resistance; Aidan Hartley reads his Wild Life column; and Toby Young reflects on the novel experience of being sober at The Spectator summer party. Hosted and produced by Oscar Edmondson.

Patrick West

Britain’s mental health crisis isn’t what you think

Britain has a widespread and collective mental health problem – but it’s not what you might think. Specifically, it’s that many people believe themselves to be mentally unwell when actually they are not. What’s more, society and the state have been prone to taking them at their word on this matter for far too long. We’ve become aware of this unfolding problem recently as it’s evolved into a veritable crisis. It’s at once a financial crisis, one that now costs the taxpayer and the Treasury billions in welfare payments, while it’s also a still-evolving human crisis. We’re only now beginning to grasp the human cost of maintaining a mainly younger generation in

Andrew McQuillan

The hypocrisy of those attacking Moygashel’s migrant bonfire

The marching season – when a section of Northern Ireland’s unionist community take to the streets to commemorate the triumph of William of Orange against James II – has always been a useful barometer of the Ulster loyalist mood. Is the bonfire in bad taste? Yes. But should the people who erected it have to endure insufferable opprobrium from those who justify Kneecap telling their audience to ‘kill your MP’? Certainly not From the 1960s, when Ulster Unionist MPs were barracked for their leadership’s dalliances with ecumenism, all the way to the 1980s and 90s when the right to march in certain areas came to the fore, Orange gatherings have

Sam Dumitriu

We’ll all pay for Ed Miliband’s zonal pricing folly

Philosophers have debated the concept of ‘fairness’ for centuries. Intellectual heavyweights like Immanuel Kant, Karl Marx, and Aristotle have all had their say. They need not have bothered. The world finally has a definitive answer and it has come from the most unlikely of places: the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s ‘Review of Electricity Market Arrangements: 2025 Summer Update’. Even if you have an unshakeable faith in Ed Miliband’s ability to plan a huge chunk of the economy from his desk in Whitehall, you must admit this is sub-optimal It just so happens history’s most influential thinkers were miles off the mark. Fairness, it turns out, is when