Society

Thursday

Robin Oakley

The turf | 5 January 2017

The biggest oohs and aahs on the entertainment scene this winter were nothing to do with the ‘He’s behind you …oh no he isn’t’ of pantomime. They were the collective gasps of astonishment from 21,000 spectators at Kempton Park on Boxing Day as Thistlecrack, a novice steeplechaser in only his fourth race over the big fences, took on two previous winners of the King George VI Chase and beat them hollow. He beat them not just because of the massive engine within his spectacular frame but thanks to the sheer majesty of his explosive jumping, often taking off far beyond the wings of the fences and soaring over them as

Janet de Botton

Bridge | 5 January 2017

Simon Gillis’s team has had a very successful year. They won the Gold Cup (for the second time), they joined the Premier League in the second division and got promoted, and they won the team’s event in the 2015 London Year End congress. This year the congress went slightly askew for him. His 16-year-old son Theo has taken up bridge and is clearly a natural. Playing with Liam Sanderson, Heather Bakhshi’s son and also very talented, they did quite a lot better than Simon and Norwegian International Eric Saelensminde in the Open Pairs; so much so that Simon’s other regular partner, Espen Erichsen, now calls him the second best player

Toby Young Toby Young

Why meritocrats are the new aristocrats

After Sir Stafford Northcote and Sir Charles Trevelyan completed their report on civil service reform in 1854, in which they made the controversial recommendation that recruitment should be based on a competitive exam, the government carried out what today would be called a consultation. Among the more interesting objections was the view that the reforms would make the civil service less democratically accountable. This argument was summarised by Helen Andrews, an Australian policy wonk, in a fascinating essay entitled ‘The New Ruling Class’ published last summer: ‘Civil servants who felt they owed their jobs to no one and nothing but their own merit would be independent, which was also to

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 5 January 2017

Q. I have bought a second-floor flat which comes with a bow-shaped balcony which overlooks a communal garden. My problem is that I will want to go on to the balcony to smoke but I won’t want my neighbours to see me doing this. Nor will I want them to be able to see who is standing on the balcony smoking with me. Solution? — Name withheld, London W11 A. Why not take a tip from the late Lucian Freud? When the reclusive painter had his own bow-shaped balcony, he concealed his doings from neighbours with a 7ft high wall of tightly packed Chinese bamboo. This device allowed Freud to

Tanya Gold Tanya Gold

Garden variety

Margot is an Italian restaurant on Great Queen Street in the still interesting part of Covent Garden. The uninteresting part is the piazza, once the first classical square in London but now a shopping district so devoted to famous brands that it is essentially Westfield in WC2, and WC2 has no need of it, already having a superior culture of its own. Even so, I expect some day to find St Paul’s church a smouldering pile of ash waiting for an Audi concession. Margot used to be Moti Mahal, an unlamented Indian restaurant next to Freemasons’ Hall, which posed as MI5 in Spooks, a BBC drama in which a one-nation

Dot Wordsworth

Americanisms

Here are eight invasive Americanisms to continue annoying us in 2017. Running for office. Liz Kendall was ‘running for the party leadership last year’, the Times said. In Britain she should have been standing. Standing in line. A mother was ‘standing in line at the Post Office to collect her benefits’, said the Daily Mail. British people queue. Commit to. Plenty has been committed to the flames, to memory or to prison. Giving an undertaking was to commit yourself. The OED found the first example of committing to a relationship in 1987. Advocate for: the return of an old construction. ‘I am not advocating for the Dissenters,’ wrote Daniel Defoe.

Harry Mount

Diary – 5 January 2017

On New Year’s Day I went for a swim off Broad Haven beach in Pembrokeshire. The water was 10.3ºC: pretty good agony, but not as bad as the cold on the soles of my feet as I changed on the icy sand. Cold-water swimming is on the up — 700 people took part in the Boxing Day swim in nearby Tenby, the most in its 46-year history. I can see the attraction. A freezing sea is a tremendous hangover cure. Once back indoors you glow as the blood, which rushes to the core of your body to prevent heat loss underwater, races back to your skin. A cold swim is

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 5 January 2017

Home Sir Ivan Rogers, Britain’s ambassador to the EU, resigned; he had been expected to play an important part in talks on Brexit. In a lengthy email to staff he said: ‘Free trade does not just happen when it is not thwarted by authorities.’ He referred to ‘ill-founded arguments and muddled thinking’ and noted that we do not know the ‘negotiating objectives for the UK’s relationship with the EU’. Southern railways advised hundreds of thousands of commuters not to try to travel during a three-day strike by train drivers, due to begin on Monday. China began a direct freight rail service to Barking in London. Len McCluskey, the head of

Mr Magoo

2291: Seriously?

In ten clues, the wordplay omits one of the letters of the solution. These letters in the grid, read row by row, complete the missing two words of an 11-word quotation (in the ODQ) given by five unclued entries. The other unclued entries give the name of the speaker. If these same letters in the grid are read column by column, they give a relevant location.   Across 1    Miracle-worker likely to conceal end of trick (5) 10    Amazing bird played with niece (10) 11    I go in with my partner more exposed (6) 12    Number Ten haggled with Germany (7) 15    Angola imports my fruit (5) 16    Bieber talked oddly

Mr Magoo

to 2289: I don’t believe it!

The unclued lights are expressions meaning NEVER (3A, 4D+43A, 21D+14D, 37A+1D and 37A+15D).   First prize Hilary James, London W5 Runners-up David Henderson, Almonte, Ontario; A.H. Harker, Oxford

Rachel Cunliffe

Politics can be sexist, but Arlene Foster was wrong to play the misogyny card

Let’s say you’re a rising minister put in charge of the department for enterprise. You have the great idea to incentivise businesses to invest in low-carbon energy by offering a subsidy for renewable fuel used. Unfortunately, something goes wrong in the planning or execution of the scheme, with the result that claimants are paid more for low-carbon fuel than the amount the fuel actually cost them. Market forces kick in, businesses use as much fuel as possible to gain the maximum profit, the fancy renewable energy scheme ends up £490 million over budget. The opposition, the media, and most importantly the public are understandably very upset, and call for you

Theo Hobson Theo Hobson

George Michael’s death shouldn’t mean that we gloss over his flaws

One should not speak ill of the dead, but if their flaws or vices are glossed over that is also problematic. George Michael was admirable in some ways, especially for his quiet charitable donations, but less so in others. I don’t see why his penchant for anonymous sexual encounters should be politely passed over, or treated as a harmless lifestyle choice. He ‘loved anonymous sex’, said Owen Jones in the Guardian – as if fondly recalling someone’s love for opera or snooker. Jones and others will doubtless say it is homophobic to moralise about this. So it must clearly be said that sexuality is irrelevant: whether it is homosexuals or heterosexuals

Laura Whitcombe

Why I’m swapping my debit card for a credit card in 2017

This year, I’m swapping my debit card for a credit card. It’s not because I’m starting 2017 in the red. It’s to make sure I stay comfortably in the black. My New Year’s resolution is to make my money go further – and this is where my credit card comes in. I’ve taken inspiration from friends and family who’ve long been rewarded for paying for virtually everything other than their mortgage and bills on credit. I’ve watched as their spending has earned them perks including concert tickets, meals out, hotel stays and even free flights. So my plan is to do what they do – pay for everything that doesn’t

Helen Nugent

Debt, fuel costs, wealth and pensions

Debt charities have urged the Government to tackle the UK’s debt crisis after official figures revealed that household debt has soared to its highest level in eight years. The BBC reports on Bank of England statistics which show that personal debt grew 10.8 per cent in the year to 30 November to £192.2 billion. Step Change wants ministers to implement a scheme that gives problem debtors 12 months’ breathing space to get back on track. Fuel There’s more gloomy news on fuel prices. BBC online reports that the cost of petrol and diesel has increased to its highest since July 2015. According to analysis from the RAC, the average cost of unleaded petrol

Marcus Berkmann

Pub quizzes

For more than 20 years now, I have been trudging up the hill to the Prince of Wales in Highgate on Tuesday evenings to take part in that tiny pub’s venerable weekly quiz. Each evening promises something different and yet somehow the same: ferocious competition, ridiculous arguments over the answer to question four, several glasses of red wine and usually, during round three, a few packets of Sweet Thai Chilli Sensations crisps. The quiz is unusual in that it is set by its regulars, and my next turn behind the microphone will be on St Valentine’s Day. (This is always a good night for us; most people will do anything

Tanya Gold Tanya Gold

Dumb and dumber | 5 January 2017

Katie Hopkins did something dreadful this week, which is not unusual, because she craves such things. She retweeted praise — also not unusual, for she is narcissistic for a masochist — from a Twitter account called AntiJuden SS. The page even featured a swastika, should AntiJuden SS not have been clear indication enough. For Hopkins, however, neo-Nazi praise is a dog making love to your ankle. It would repel most people, but for her it still counts. Fake outrage begat fake outrage and Hopkins de-tweeted the retweet, and apologised: ‘My New Year’s resolution is to show contrition.’ To show contrition, not to be contrite; that is quite precise for Hopkins.

Roger Alton Roger Alton

Unimpressed by the Root cause

Those who occupy them sometimes say that the only two jobs that matter in England are Chief of the Defence Staff and editor of the Times. Others argue for Prime Minister or England’s cricket captain. Either way, a shoo-in is not the way to get the right person. Remember Gordon Brown? Despite the best efforts of some of us to get Alan Johnson or even David Miliband to have a pop, in the end Brown took over as uncontested Labour leader and unelected Prime Minister. That went well, didn’t it? Now a similar din is building up for Joe Root to take over from Alastair Cook. I am not quite

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

My poster girl for free speech

Now is the time of year to take down the Christmas decorations from your front window and put up, in their place, the anti-immigration posters. Please display them prominently and make sure the message on each is suitably strident. It behoves all of us to do this, as quickly as possible, even — perhaps especially — if we are liberally minded. For this is not about immigration, per se. It is to show solidarity with Ms Anne Maple, who is aged 61 and unfortunate enough to live in Lewisham. I do not know Ms Maple personally. It may well be that, rather than a sainted individual, she is a meddlesome

Hugo Rifkind Hugo Rifkind

In our virtual future, why would anyone work?

A flash of the future, over the holidays, that felt like a flash of the past. It happened on Christmas Day, just after lunch, when my father-in-law gave me a virtual reality headset. It looks like a pair of ski goggles. They used to be fearsomely expensive, but recently some bright spark came up with the idea of replacing the screen and the computing power with a slot into which you pop your phone. All you need now is a frame and a couple of lenses, and you’re off into a virtual world. You can get a cardboard one for a tenner. They’re amazing. We all had a go. First,