Politics

In 2000, this magazine dipped its toe in murky Irish water. Stephen Glover wrote three articles, one provocatively entitled ‘The Republican cell at the heart of the Guardian’. (For more detail, see Douglas Murray’s article.) One of the IRA supporters identified was Roy Greenslade, the paper’s media commentator. Alan Rusbridger, the Guardian’s editor, wrote angrily to the then editor, Boris Johnson, demanding an apology. Boris refused. Now Greenslade has emerged from that murky water, with an armalite in one dripping hand, and admitted he always secretly supported IRA violence and was close to IRA leaders. Where does his admitted ‘entryism’ leave the Guardian? I understand that Alan Rusbridger, editor from

Roy Greenslade held a number of prominent positions in Fleet Street over the course of a long career. But he spent the largest part of it at the Guardian, where he berated other journalists for their writings. A similar stance was adopted by him from his position as professor of journalism at City, University of London, from where he lectured students on media ethics and gave evidence to the Leveson Inquiry. At the same time he became slightly notorious outside of Islington for his support of the IRA. Whenever Gerry Adams had something self-pitying or self–exculpating to say, Roy was there as his loyal mouthpiece. In 2000 this magazine ran

Barely a year has passed since Rishi Sunak’s first Budget. Its centrepiece was a £30 billion stimulus designed to calm nerves about Covid-19 even though barely 500 cases had been diagnosed in the country. The Commons chamber was packed, with not a mask in sight. Few that day would have thought that in a year’s time the country would be in its third national lockdown and the economy would have suffered its worst slump since the Great Frost of 1709. The pandemic has made a mockery of nearly every optimistic prediction. The government is now moving with extreme caution. Even though vaccines have a greater effect with every passing day,