Society

Thursday

Simon Courtauld

Why Gibraltar needs its hunt back

The British overseas territory of Gibraltar, or, as some would have it, the wart on the bottom of the Iberian peninsula, is not an exciting place for a holiday. You don’t go for the food (mostly English pub grub and pizzas), or the nightlife (there isn’t any) or the beaches (overcrowded, with sand imported from the Sahara). But there are a few interesting legacies of three centuries of British occupation of what was known in Greek mythology as one of the Pillars of Hercules. In the Trafalgar Cemetery, containing the graves of those who died in Gibraltar following the battle, a typical inscription records the death in December 1805 of

Lucy Vickery

Two hander

In Competition No. 2871 you were invited to submit a dialogue in verse between man and God. The tone of the discourse was far from cordial, ranging from boredom and -disinterest to outright hostility. Here’s Alanna Blake’s disgruntled deity: ‘I’m old and growing deaf and very tired/ These are my final words: I have retired.’ Loss of faith, it seems, works both ways. Honourable mentions go to Peter Goulding and Emma Mascarenhas. The winners below earn £25 each. W.J. Webster gets £30. Forgive me, God, but might I know What on Earth you do these days? If you’re at work it doesn’t show Even in mysterious ways. You never make

Douglas Murray

Jonathan Sacks on religion, politics and the civil war that Islam needs

Jonathan Sacks has an impressive track record for predicting the age we are in. In his 1990 Reith Lectures, ‘The Persistence of Faith’, the then chief rabbi pushed back against the dominant idea that religion was going to disappear. In the early 2000s, he predicted a century of conflict within Islam. And he was one of the first religious leaders and thinkers not only to critique multi-culturalism (‘the spanner in the works for tolerance’) but to try to think of a path beyond it. We recently talked over some of this at his house in London, where he lives during gaps in a busy teaching schedule that also takes him to

Roger Howard

The myth of the White Widow

Over the past year or so, a determined and fanatical Islamist has been waging a deadly and bloody war against the western world. This enemy is capable of moving unnoticed across continents and inflicting savage violence in each of them; inspires young Muslim men to become suicide bombers and die in their thousands. The enemy is particularly horrifying for being a traitor, born in Britain and a woman to boot. The ‘White Widow’, remember her? Samantha Lewthwaite from Aylesbury, usually described by our tabloid press as one of the most evil and powerful women alive. But is she really evil? Is she really even much of a threat? My contention

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Rod Liddle: The top 10 most fatuous phrases in the English language

An apology. A few weeks back, in my blog, I promised a regular series called ‘Fatuous Phrase of the Week’. Like so many publicly uttered promises, this one has failed to materialise. There has been no update to the Fatuous Phrase of the Week. This is because for the past two weeks I have been battling my demons — and horrible, vindictive little bastards they are too. While I would have been happy to fulfil that promise, and had plenty of phrases at the ready, the demons crowded around. Nah, they said, take the dog for a walk instead. Jabbering in my ear, poking me with their little pitchforks. Forget the

Hugo Rifkind Hugo Rifkind

I’ll take Jeremy Clarkson over a howling mob any day

Perhaps it’s a glaring and personal flaw in my observational skills, but if somebody tried to insult me via a number plate attached to their car, I’m not at all sure I’d notice. I suppose if it was really obvious — ‘HUGO TWAT’ sort of thing — then the synapses would fire, but anything more subtle would pass me by. And I don’t think it’s just me. Imagine, for example, driving through Scotland in a car with the registration ‘H746 CLN’. How likely is it, do you think, that some super-observant thug would interpret this as a reference to the Battle of Culloden in 1746, and then gather together a posse to

Matthew Parris Matthew Parris

Help me become an addict

When the White Queen told Alice she had sometimes believed as many as six contradictory things before breakfast, she spoke for us all. But our irrationality goes further than a simple after-the-event report. Even while we’re believing it, we can know that something we’re believing contradicts something else we believe. Take, in my case, addiction. I believe that addicts lack self-discipline and willpower. Yet I know that this cannot really be the explanation. I feel a faint but ineradicable disapproval of people who can’t stop eating, smoking, drinking or injecting themselves with heroin, while knowing that this reaction is not only harsh, but must be ignorant. I half suspect people

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

How Italy failed the stress test (and Emilio Botín didn’t)

Continuing last week’s theme, it was the Italian banks — with nine fails, four still requiring capital injections — that bagged the booby prize in the great EU stress-testing exercise, followed predictably by Greece and Cyprus, while Germany and Austria (with one fail each) fared better than some of us had feared. The most delinquent European bank turned out to be the most ancient, Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, which was judged to have a capital shortfall of €2.1 billion as a result of a very modern set of problems. Founded in 1472 as a kind of charitable pawnbroker, the bank which eventually became Italy’s third largest had a

Marcus Berkmann

Michael Frayn’s new book is the most highbrow TV sketch show ever

Enough of big ideas and grand designs. Instead, here are 30 unusually small ideas from the giant pulsating brain of Michael Frayn. Matchbox Theatre is a collection of tiny playlets, all one-handers or two-handers, designed to be performed in the most intimate theatrical space of them all: your mind. In ‘Sleepers’, Sir Geoffrye de Frodsham and Lady Hilarye lie motionless in their tomb, and bicker throughout eternity. ‘Since when has he been doing choral Evensong in the crypt?’ ‘Since 1997.’ ‘I’ve never heard any choral Evensong in the crypt.’ ‘You were asleep.’ ‘You’re telling me I slept through that?’ ‘You slept through the second world war…’ Elsewhere we hear the

Jonathan Ray Jonathan Ray

November Wine Club I

There is nothing that Esme Johnstone and David Campbell of FromVineyardsDirect.com don’t know about Bordeaux. Their contacts there are legendary and they put them to good use in quietly snapping up the surplus production or the wine that doesn’t quite fit the final blend of the Grands Vins from some of the region’s finest châteaux. These ‘defrocked’ clarets (and one Sauternes) are made using fruit from the relevant château itself, with the same care and attention that goes into the Grands Vins, by the same winemaking teams, and they allow canny wine lovers the chance to enjoy a bit of Bordelais stardust at the fraction of the usual price. I

Wednesday

Paul Dacre

Paul Dacre: Watch out, BBC. The political class may come for you next

The below is an edited version of a speech given yesterday by Paul Dacre to the NewstrAid Benevolent Fund, a charity for those who sell and distribute newspapers and magazines. Newspapers are all only too painfully aware of how we are having to adapt to survive in today’s modern, fast-paced, ever-changing digital media world. But the way I look at it, we have always had to fight to survive, ever since the birth of the mass media in the 1890s – the decade, if I may indulge in a little product placement, in which Alfred Harmsworth launched the Daily Mail. In more than a century since then, we’ve grown and we’ve

Ryan Bourne

How to defuse Britain’s £1.45 trillion public-debt time-bomb

Last week’s public-finance statistics were truly dreadful. They showed that despite a year of fairly robust economic growth, UK government borrowing since the start of the financial year 2014 to 2015 was actually 10 per cent higher than in the same period in 2013 to 2014. Once again, it seems, our public finances will be in deficit by more than £100 billion this year. Running sustained deficits of this kind adds to the overall debt burden. According to the new ONS figures, public-sector net debt is currently £1.45 trillion (79.9 per cent of GDP) – meaning we are paying just over £50 billion per year in debt-interest payments. Whilst debt

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: American sympathy

From The Spectator, 31 October 1914: We do not ask for help of any material kind from the United States; we recognize that a strict neutrality is not only her proper course, but represents her true interests. All we desire is the sympathy of comprehension, the sympathy of a clear understanding of the principles on which we have acted. When a man is in a great crisis, whether of sorrow, adversity, or illness, he craves for the sympathy of persons of his own flesh and blood. Their money and their energies may be of no use at all to him, but he does value their thoughtfulness and their regard. We

Tuesday

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Nick Boles: We can’t control immigration as EU members

Nick Boles has a habit of making explosive interventions and then disappearing from political debate for a little while after an almighty telling off from Number 10. Tonight he may be planning to lay low for a while, because he’s probably wanted for causing another big row. The Skills Minister has told Total Politics magazine that the government may never be able to control immigration properly, suggesting that this will be the case as long as Britain remains in the EU. He said: ‘We may never be able to control it entirely, because it’s a fundamental principle of the EU, but it will be very hard for the British people

Anne Jolis

My generation can’t afford to buy a house in London; so what?

The UK Land Registry today released its latest report on house prises, showing the ticket-cost of an average home in England and Wales down 2.2 per cent to £177,299 in September from a peak of £181,324 in November 2007. No, that still doesn’t mean that underpaid Westminster interns can afford to buy a home in central London. Per the Land Registry, average house prices in the capital rose 18.4 per cent since this time last year. Cue the New York Times with an opinion article composed by a young writer, cavilling about the matter: ‘Without capital, those of us who do not own property resign ourselves to running in an

Steerpike Steerpike

Should Cameron be worried about Neville Thurlbeck’s New Year surprise?

Given how close the phone-hacking scandal got to the heart of Downing Street, the Tories will be hoping nothing will provoke more questions this side of the election about Cameron’s hiring of Andy Coulson. So there will be some worries about an intriguing book deal done late last night. Neville Thurlbeck – the jailed News of the World chief reporter and, more recently, Coulson’s cell mate in Belmarsh –  will be telling all, in true tabloid style, just a couple of months before polling day. Political publishers Biteback have bought up Thurlbeck’s ‘Tabloid Secrets’ for an undisclosed sum and Mr S understands the book is due in the New Year. Happy reading, Prime Minister.

Ed West Ed West

Border controls are a basic human right – is it un-Christian to oppose mass immigration?

[audioplayer src=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_21_August_2014_v4.mp3″ title=”Damian Thompson joins Fraser Nelson to discuss the Pope v the Vatican.” startat=928] Listen [/audioplayer] Is it sinful to be not so keen on the whole immigration thing? I suppose Justin Welby thinks so, according to his recent comments. ‘We have to be careful and you can’t over-burden the community, you have to be realistic about that but also we must never – part of the Christian, at the heart of Christian teaching about the human being is all human beings are of absolutely equal and infinite value and the language we use must reflect the value of the human being, and not treat immigration as just a

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: The spirit of the sailor

The most curious thing of all is that the sailor should become so much a part of his peculiar element that his detachment from the land is even more marked than the landsman’s imperfect acquaintance with the sea. The sailor comes on shore like a man penetrating doubtfully into an unknown hinterland; he has the air of a foreign being in the streets of his native land; he looks about him as though adventures might fall out of the sky. The author of The Ingoldsby Legends has described the impression made by the sailor on others : “It’s very odd that sailor-men should talk so very queer— And then he hitched

Monday

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Justin Welby: I worry about damage caused by language on immigration

When Justin Welby spoke to the Parliamentary press gallery today, he took great care to emphasise a number of points. One was about the influence the Church of England has in public debate, and the other was about the church’s influence in local communities and the strength of its connections in those communities. He didn’t give the impression initially that he didn’t want to intervene in the public debate about immigration when asked about it, but then couldn’t resist commenting anyway. He told journalists that he was worried about the language in the debate, and that local churches were seeing a rise in racism, which he seemed to think was

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: Men, men, men

From The Spectator, 31 October 1914: The Germans are doing rapidly and effectively what we ought to be doing, and what we must do if we are to win. They are raising new armies and training the remaining portion of their adult male population to arms. When the war began we all thought that about four million German fighting men was the most we need reckon with. These men have already been put into the firing line in the two theatres of the war, and now Germany is turning to that part of her adult male population—another four millions—who have not yet been trained, or else were trained so long