Society

Thursday

25 May 2017

Goof

Susie Dent has been trying to make us love Americanisms on Radio 4. Now Miss Dent knows far more about language than she has had much chance to express during her 25 years in Dictionary Corner on Countdown. She is quite aware that there is no such thing as an Americanism tout court (or perhaps one should say ‘an Americanism period’). It is true that British speakers of English are annoyed by hearing their compatriots use an American word for something already covered by a perfectly good British word. A Briton would have to be cracked to use hood for bonnet; sidewalk for pavement; mad for angry; diaper for nappy.

Doc

2311: Keith II

The unclued lights, (two of two words), are of a kind. Chambers does not give the solution at 12 Across. So as to avoid alternative thematic solutions at 28A, solvers should know that the first letter is the same as the final one. Across 2 Amblers won’t be adapting military item (13, three words) 12 Reported as irresponsible piano disposal (6, two words) 14 Cure for one at sea (4) 15 Yearn to get control of free shot in hockey (10, two words) 16 Tenements holding ordinary footlights (6) 18 Sayings of one involved in gaol-break (5) 19 Type setter and mason’s assistant? (9) 22 Abner’s boss that is

Michael Heath

The Battle for Britain – 25 May 2017

Doc

Solution to 2308: Landmark

Solution to 2308: Landmark This puzzle was Doc’s 600th to be published in this series. The unclued lights are two-word phrases beginning with D and C (DC = 600). The paired lights are 7/8, 21A/39, 21D/3, 35/25 and 40/24. The solution at 7A, D-0-C, is the serendipitous link between the theme and the compiler’s name. First prize M.F. O’Brien, London N12 Runners-up John Cruickshank, Aberdeen; Geran Jones, London SW1

Nick Hilton

The Spectator Podcast: The Islamist worldview

On this week’s episode, we reflect on the tragic events in Manchester and what can be done to prevent similar attacks in the future. We also look at the emergence of political courts in America, Russia, France and beyond, and tip which constituencies to have a flutter on in next month’s election. First, we took a moment to consider the terrorist attack that struck Manchester on Monday evening. With scores dead and injured, including children as young as 8, what can be done to stop another atrocity like this taking place? Douglas Murray says, in this week’s Spectator cover piece, that we have long understood the Islamist worldview, but failed to tackle its ideology.

Laura Whitcombe

How to finance home improvements with a mortgage

A property should have two bathrooms for every three bedrooms to maximise its value and desirability. That’s according to 70 per cent of real estate experts from across the UK who were quizzed by Direct Line Home Insurance. On average, they estimated an extra bathroom could add just under 7 per cent to the £174,340 average value of a three-bed property – a boost of almost £12,000. Of course, the figures change significantly depending on where in the country the home is located. For example, the extra bathroom could add £26,485 to the value in London but just £5,967 in Liverpool. With the average cost of installing a new bathroom

Tom Goodenough

Police stop sharing information with the US after Manchester bomb leaks

Yesterday morning, Home Secretary Amber Rudd warned the US government to stop leaking details from the investigation into the Manchester bombing. Her words appear to have fallen on deaf ears: last night, photographs taken at the scene of the blast, showing a possible detonator used by the bomber, appeared on the New York Times website. The pictures, in which bloodstains on the floor were clearly visible, were the type of detail which would only emerge, if at all, during a court case in the UK, rather than in the hours after the bombing. The backlash from the British government has been furious – a senior Whitehall source told The Daily Telegraph

Roger Alton

Metal fatigue in the golden generation

Not a bad week for Roger Federer then: first pootling along being cool and rich in a morning suit at the Philippa Middleton wedding, then being named in the world’s tennis top five again, with his increasingly elderly chums. It’s the first time all five (Murray, Djokovic, Federer, Nadal and ‘Stan the Man’ Wawrinka) have been over 30. Indeed, the only player born in the 1990s to reach a grand slam final is Milos Raonic; no spring chicken at 27. This is an astonishing time in tennis; a golden generation indeed. We have come a long way since Lleyton Hewitt beat David Nalbandian 3-0 to win Wimbledon. Nalbandian won just

Jenny McCartney

A war on joy

When the pictures of the dead came in, it was hard to take, even from a distance. There was Georgina Callander, 18, a bespectacled Ariana Grande ‘superfan’ who had tweeted that she was ‘so excited’ to go to the concert in Manchester Arena. There was Saffie Roussos, aged 8 and still at primary school, who went with her mother and older sister. There was Olivia Campbell, aged 15. I looked at their bright faces and thought of all the love their families had carefully decanted into them over the years, their wealth of possibility. Then on Monday night a suicide bomber smashed up all their futures in an instant. What

Henry Jeffreys

Kentish wine

As a wine bore, holidays abroad are a battle with the family to cram in as many vineyard visits as possible when all they want to do is go to the beach. But it’s only recently that I have begun to take advantage of the riches on my doorstep. I wonder how many Londoners realise that half an hour from St Pancras is one of the world’s most dynamic wine regions — Kent. My previous reluctance might have something to do with the weather. As you leave London on the M20, there always seems to be a moment of sunshine that lights up the countryside before it starts to rain

Jonathan Ray

Wine Club 27 May

All six wines this week come from the Languedoc, courtesy of Jason Yapp, that canny wine hound who understands the twists and turns of France’s largest vineyard area better than anyone I know. And so happy is he with our selection that he’s lopped a quid off every bottle. The Domaine Collin Crémant de Limoux Cuvée Rosé Brut NV (1) is a stunningly fine pink fizz from just south of Carcassonne where they were making sparkling wines almost 140 years before they worked out how to do it in Champagne. A bottle-fermented blend of Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc and Pinot Noir, it’s full of lush, ripe raspberries and wild strawberries but

Matthew Parris

A dementia tax would be a euthanasia bonus

Had Theresa May not on Monday summarily abandoned her manifesto threat to raid the savings of those who end up senile in care homes, I had planned to defend the idea here in terms that might have added to her woes. I’ll do so regardless. The so-called dementia tax would, over time, have become a euthanasia bonus. And that would be a good thing. As I argued on this page two weeks ago, morality is the father of religion, and not the other way around. Secular morality can be largely explained by social Darwinism. For a society to prosper it requires an ethical framework that boosts, rather than encumbers, the

Mary Wakefield

Why do nurses quit? Because they care

Sometimes, on Sundays, I visit Richard, a friend who’s 95 and lives alone. The idea originally was that I’d be doing Richard a favour, but the truth is he cheers me up far more than I do him. I visit because I like him, but as the weeks go by, I’m afraid I’ve also developed a grim curiosity about what it’s like to be in your nineties. Meals-on-wheels, crumbling knees, hernias, cannulas, the way a day dissolves into unintended naps… ‘Can’t we talk about something more cheerful?’ says Richard, as we sit knee to knee. But I’m obsessed, like a tourist taking notes on some awful country they must one

Martin Vander Weyer

We’d all like to see Fred on the hook but RBS investors will be wiser to settle

‘Fred Goodwin off the hook again,’ declared the Scottish Daily Record. That neatly summed up one strand of sentiment behind the RBS Shareholder Action Group’s battle for compensation for losses incurred in the bank’s £12 billion rights issue in 2008 — preceding its £45 billion taxpayer bailout, in which any remaining shareholder value was largely wiped out. Investors who believe they were misled by RBS’s directors and the rights-issue prospectus have been campaigning for their money back ever since. Most have already accepted a rather modest settlement, but some 9,000 have persevered with a case against the bank itself, Goodwin, former chairman Sir Tom McKillop and two other former directors,

James Tooley

First class

On the Today programme a month ago, Education Secretary Justine Greening was asked whether she could name any ‘respected figure or institution’ in favour of more grammar schools. She declined to answer, which was taken to mean that she couldn’t, and that there wasn’t. I’ve been travelling a lot this year, so wasn’t around to offer my support. I’m back now. Assuming that a professor of education at a Russell Group university is respectable enough, let me wade into the debate: yes, I’m in favour of more grammar schools. Educational experts against more grammar schools — of which there are plenty — point to the current evidence from England and

Lucy Vickery

A bad lot

In Competition No. 2999 you were invited to supply a poem which takes as its first line W.S. Gilbert’s ‘A policeman’s lot is not a happy one’ but replaces ‘policeman’ with another trade or profession. Although this line doesn’t come until line eight in Gilbert & Sullivan’s ‘Policeman’s Song’, it was the opening I prescribed and so it was with a heavy heart that I had to disqualify some excellent entries that veered off piste. A competition-setter’s lot is not a happy one, then, but it does have its consolations and I was entertained — and informed — by your parade of teachers, lawyers, coroners, morticians and hitmen. The bonus fiver

Wednesday

24 May 2017

Helen Monks Takhar

Are older borrowers being punished for their age?

Imagine having an immaculate credit record and a secure income, only to be locked out of some of the most competitive mortgage deals. Some older borrowers have been facing just this scenario. ‘Many have felt excluded from the mortgage market, as the criteria have tightened and lenders have typically imposed a maximum age of 70 or 75 at the end of the mortgage term. But for older borrowers with good pension income, why shouldn’t they be able to take advantage of today’s super-low interest rates?’, asks David Hollingworth, associate director at L&C Mortgages. ‘As more of us live and work for longer, it’s likely the need for mortgage borrowing will

Steerpike

Corbyn supporter led away by police outside Downing Street

Today Labour have announced that the party will re-commence its general election national campaign on Friday, after all campaigning was put on pause following Monday’s terrorist attack, which left 22 dead. Alas this memo has failed to reach one of Jeremy Corbyn’s ardent supporters. Although all campaigning is meant to be on hold, this afternoon a woman by the name of Tina descended on the gates outside Downing Street to heckle the police and army for defending ‘the biggest terrorist’ — also known as Theresa May. Wearing a rucksack with a photo of Jeremy Corbyn emblazoned across it, she called on voters to plump for Labour: ‘Theresa May was losing. She is going to lose.

Will Heaven

Should there be troops on the streets?

In the wake of terrorist outrages such as Monday’s bombing, the British public tends to keep calm and carry on. We saw it in London after the Westminster attack in March; we saw it yesterday on the streets of Manchester – a stirring sight. That calmness in the face of evil is an attitude that has almost always been reflected by those who govern and lead us. Think of Margaret Thatcher’s steely response to the Brighton bombing. It’s the British way. But it has, until now, also been the British way not to put troops on the streets unless absolutely necessary. It’s a delicate balance: a prime minister has a

Jenny McCartney