Society

Saturday

Agnieszka Kolek

Copenhagen shooting: we debated free speech despite the gunfire – we will not surrender

I was invited to Lars Vilks* Committee in Copenhagen to present Passion for Freedom London Art Festival. The committee is organised annually, on the anniversary of Salman Rushdie’s fatwa. The meeting started with a short introduction from one of the organizers followed by François Zimeray, the French ambassador, commemorating Charlie Hebdo and discussing the challenges that we face when it comes to the threats to freedom of speech and democracy in our countries. After a short introduction, Inna Shevchenko opened the panel and started to talk about Femen and her work. She also discussed her close friendship with Charb, the editor of Charlie Hebdo, and how they both stood strong exercising their right to

Steerpike Steerpike

Tom Hollander’s disastrous dinner date with Joan Collins

When Tom Hollander met Joan Collin on the set of The Clandestine Marriage the pair hit it off. In fact, they got on so well that Hollander attended the Dynasty star’s Christmas party alongside Conrad Black and William Hague, before receiving an invitation to stay with her in St Tropez. However, as Hollander writes in this week’s edition of The Spectator, their friendship took a turn for the worse when the Rev actor called Collins to confirm a date. Collins was out at the time of the call so she rang Hollander back and left a voicemail for him. ‘The next day I got a long voice message on my mobile. ‘Hi darling, it’s Joan here. I’ve

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: Open markets

From News of the Week, The Spectator, 13 February 1915: In the House of Commons on Thursday Mr. Asquith made three notable announcements. In future Sir John French will send twice a week a communication summarizing the doings of the British Force. Evidently “Todgers’s can do it when it likes.” Next Mr. Asquith explained that the Government are considering the adoption of more stringent measures against German trade. Thirdly, he declined to fix maximum prices – “an experiment which the German Government had made with disastrous consequences.” We record this decision with intense relief, for it means that the Cabinet realize that the sure way to starve the working classes

Friday

Steerpike Steerpike

Guardian editorship: Staff ballot revealed

The names for the Guardian‘s staff ballot are in, and judging by the shortlist the publication could be close to following in the footsteps of the Economist by appointing its first female editor. Of the four candidates on the list, three of the candidates are members of the fairer sex. The four names selected for the ballot are: Emily Bell, former director of digital content for Guardian News and Media Katharine Viner, deputy editor of the Guardian Janine Gibson, editor in chief of the Guardian website Wolfgang Blau, director of digital strategy at the Guardian Rather surprisingly executive editor Jonathan Freedland, who had been a bookies’ favourite, is not on the list. Neither is the publication’s political editor Patrick Wintour.

Molly Guinness

The sadistic sport of the hunt saboteurs makes you long for the good old days

At a recent day’s hunting in Wiltshire, a man in a balaclava trying to pull a rider off his horse and said, ‘Some of you will be going home in body bags today’. Later, after the huntsman had put his horse and hounds in the lorry, masked men armed with iron bars set upon him and knocked him out, kicking him repeatedly in the head as hard as they could even after he was unconscious. It’s 10 years since the hunting ban came into force but the sadistic sport of the hunt saboteurs is as popular, and as vicious, as ever. It makes you long for the old days; in

Thursday

The Spectator

Spectator letters: The ENO must go on; another expensive typo; and PC and Pamela

A vandalistic proposal Sir: Igor Toronyi-Lalic (Farewell, ENO, 7 February) displays a lack of judgment in advocating ENO’s demise and in suggesting that opera needs no opera houses, companies or subsidy. That its new arts editor should plead for the closure of England’s great repertory opera company is unworthy of The Spectator. Toronyi-Lalic is wrong to think that the hundreds of thousands of English opera-goers will be content with performances by itinerant ensembles only. Small-scale performances presented anywhere can be moving, but the public demand productions of a scale that befits the art form as it has grown over the last four centuries. An orchestrated ‘farewell’ to ENO would be

Mary Killen

What do you do about a friend who cannot make a request directly?

Q. I have a friend with multiple sclerosis. She lives alone in the countryside. There is no bus service and, due to her physical condition, she was disqualified from driving two years ago. I made my friend an open offer that should she need a lift, she should call me. Mostly I can oblige. But I failed to take account that my friend was raised never to make a direct request. Instead, if she needs a lift, she will manage the conversation until it is apparent that I should make the offer, which she will decline until, by a process of attrition, she accepts, sometimes with qualifications which mean I

Sebastian Faulks

Sebastian Faulks’s diary: My task for 2015 – get a job

Just back from Sri Lanka, a place I first went to in 1981. It was then a dreamy island. I remember giving the room boy who had brought my case to the bandicoot-infested bedroom in Colombo a few rupees, but he wasn’t interested. He just wanted to sit on the bed and talk — about London, England, cricket, life. Three decades and a civil war later, people are aware of money, there is bottled water, and a pot of tea doesn’t take half an hour to arrive. One thing that seems unchanged is the optimism of the people. The new president, Mr Sirisena, has promised an end to the corruption

Raymond Keene

Tradewise

The Tradewise Masters in Gibraltar has been won by the American grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura, with the British co-champion David Howell in clear second place. This is possibly a career best for Howell, whose forte turned out to be remarkable resilience in difficult endgames. Last week the puzzle showed Nakamura defeating the pre-tournament favourite and highest ranked competitor, Veselin Topalov. This week’s game from Gibraltar is a fine win by a grandmaster who was trained in the classical Soviet tradition.   Sutovsky-Spraggett: Tradewise Gibraltar Masters 2015; Centre Counter   1 e4 d5 Although the Centre Counter has notched some notable scalps, including that of Anatoly Karpov against Bent Larsen at Montreal

Raymond Keene

No. 349

White to play. This position is a variation from Bellin-Georgiadis, Gibraltar 2015. White has given up his queen. How does he now force checkmate? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 17 February or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk or by fax on 020 7681 3773. The winner will be the first correct answer out of a hat, and each week I am offering a prize of £20. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery.   Last week’s solution 1 Rxe5 Last week’s winner R.F. Tindall, Great Shelford, Cambs

Taki

At 78 years of age, I can’t keep up with the young shuss-boomers any longer

Gstaad Once upon a time clergymen saw mountain peaks as natural steeples leading them ever closer to God. Doctors considered mountains the best medicine for tuberculosis, while explorers saw them as rocks never before touched by humans. I thought of those good people while T-barring up the Eggli in way below freezing conditions but in bright sunshine. For some strange reason, whenever I’m really cold I try to think of the German 6th Army trapped in Stalingrad, numbed in body and mind by the cold, while Hitler sat toasty warm back home and ordered them to fight to the death. After that, skiing in subzero weather is easy. Nowadays most

Jeremy Clarke

My grandson’s getting into the rugby: ‘Which one’s West Ham?’

My grandson and I had a lovely hour-long swim at the leisure centre. We had the learner pool to ourselves for the first half an hour, during which we threw and dived for our little weighted plastic sharks. Then a stocky man, tattooed like a Maori, and his little boy entered the pool. The little boy, Conrad, was in the same primary-school class as Oscar, so they teamed up and went away with the fairies together. They played a game in which they took turns to stand rigidly to attention at the pool’s edge, then topple forward, still rigid, face-down into the water. Result: eye-watering belly flops that weren’t as

Melissa Kite

Hallelujah! And the children of Vodafone did walk again in the light!

‘Hello, Vodafone customer s…, can I h…you?’ This is typical, I thought. I’m ringing to complain about them charging me £137.08 for one phone call to directory inquiries and I can’t even hear them properly because the mobile reception they provide me with is so rubbish. ‘Hello? Can you hear me?’ ‘Y… I can h… you fine!’ ‘Well, I can’t hear you very well. Wait a minute…’ I got up from my desk and went to the front of the house, near the street. ‘That might be better. Can you still hear me?’ ‘Yes, I c… … you fine!’ ‘Oh, never mind. Look, I want to ask you again about

Alexander Chancellor

How the driverless car will liberate us all (except smokers, of course)

I was listening to the radio the other morning to hear people complaining about the huge cuts in the number of traffic police patrolling English roads. This meant that drivers would disobey motoring laws with impunity, they said. They would babble away on their mobile phones, unfasten their seat belts, and generally break the rules of the road in the knowledge that they were most unlikely to get caught. The only things left for them to fear would be speed cameras. As a result, road deaths, of which there were already more than 1,700 in Britain last year, would go shooting up. A grim outlook indeed. But wait, there is

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 12 February 2015

Before returning to Australia about a decade ago, Michael Courtney spent several years playing high-stake rubber bridge in London. Those of us who occasionally kibitzed him will never forget his sheer brilliance at the table. Michael has the pleasingly shambolic look of a mad professor, and his imagination seems to operate in a different dimension: he always has his eye on the deceptive card, the one to throw his opponents off the scent. In the intervening years, he’s clearly lost none of his prowess: his team has just won the Australian trials. Hearing this news prompted his former wife Margaret — also a talented player — to post a message

The Spectator

In this election, won’t someone please weaponise defence?

Britain is forfeiting its position on the world stage. With no national debate, we are surrendering our claim to be a major player in international affairs and undermining the Atlantic alliance that has kept Britain and Europe secure for 65 years. In these circumstances, it is easy to understand why Barack Obama has felt obliged to warn David Cameron of the damage he would be doing to the special relationship and to Nato if he failed to commit Britain to spending the bare minimum on defence. The Prime Minister has given several spending pledges — on education, health and overseas aid — so his silence on defence speaks volumes. It

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 12 February 2015

Home Philip Hammond, the foreign secretary, told Parliament that Britain reserved the right to supply arms to Ukraine, as ‘We could not allow the Ukrainian armed forces to collapse.’ The Prince of Wales, embarking on a six-day tour of the Middle East, said on Radio 2 that he ‘particularly wanted to show solidarity really, deep concern for what so many of the Eastern Christian churches are going through in the Middle East’. John Longworth, the head of British Chambers of Commerce, called for a referendum on membership of the European Union to be held in 2016, a year earlier than David Cameron, the Prime Minister, has promised, in order to

Toby Young Toby Young

Immigration, not money, will improve Scotland’s most deprived schools

I suppose we should be thankful that Nicola Sturgeon has acknowledged there’s a problem with Scotland’s public education system, even if she’s hit upon the wrong solution. Earlier this week, the First Minister announced that the Scottish -government would be trying out its version of ‘the London challenge’, a programme carried out by the last government, to address the chronic underachievement of Scotland’s most deprived children. In the past, the SNP has deflected criticisms of its education record by pointing out that Scottish 15-year-olds did marginally better than their English counterparts in the 2012 Pisa tests. But the difference between the two groups is minuscule and both have declined dramatically

Dot Wordsworth

That annoying ‘likely’ is more old-fashioned than American

What, asks Christian Major of Bromley, Kent, do I think of ‘this new, I assume American, fad for using the word likely as an adverb’, as in the great Taki’s remark that Alan Turing ‘likely won the war’ (Spectator, Letters, 31 January)? Well, I would most likely not use it in exactly that way, although you’ll have noticed that I have just done so slightly differently. The adverbial usage to which the Kentish Mr Major refers is now more likely to be heard on the lips of Americans and Scots, but it is hardly a fad, since it dates from at least as far back as the 14th century. In

Columba

2198: Tuck in

Each of sixteen clues contains one misprinted letter in the definition part. Corrections of misprints spell the name (three words) of a 1A, contents of which are given by five unclued lights (including two as a pair). The 1A’s name also describes the location in the grid of its contents in relation to two other unclued lights.   Across   5    Turn reptile around in silence (6) 9    Changed vote around end of transmission (10, three words) 14    Board beginning without director (3) 16    Free love stopped by force (6) 17    One in new question referring to magic square (5) 20    Showy woman once