Society

Friday

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

Don’t tell schoolboys to call themselves feminists

In the Independent this week, Yvette Cooper suggested that British boys should grow up as ‘confident feminists’. They need to have lessons in feminism to help them learn how to treat women, she argued. But school shouldn’t be a place where you indoctrinate pupils to believe a particular ideology. And feminism, for all its admirable achievements in the 20th century, is an ideology. Compulsory sex education in which boys are taught to be feminists is beyond silly. By all means explain that they shouldn’t go round lifting up girls’ skirts for a peek, but it’s possible to do this without telling them they must call themselves feminists. They might not like

Ruth Porter

Unions are harming their members’ interests with strikes

Industrial relations experts have said that the latest public sector strikes are unlikely to have any impact on government policy. I don’t think you have to be an ‘expert’ to reach that conclusion. The last time industrial action led to substantial demands being met was probably back in 1981, when the Thatcher government backed down over a planned programme of pit closures after an NUM strike ballot. And little wonder this was the last taste of success for strikes. Strikes do little but alienate people. The present set of demands – anger about a rise in the pension age for fire fighters from 55 to 60, a demand for substantially

Ed West Ed West

Why we’ll mostly be supporting Germany on Sunday

If you’re walking through any built-up area in England between 8 and 10pm this Sunday and you hear a cheer you can be pretty sure it means one thing – Germany have scored yet again. One of the great myths we were fed as children in the 1980s and ‘90s was that the English don’t like the Germans, and in particular the living representatives of all things Teutonic on earth, the German national football team. We love ‘em, and I imagine most English people will be supporting Germany on Sunday. I remember being stuck in the countryside in 2006 and watching the Argentina-Germany quarter-final in a pub; the place went

The Spectator

How can we build ‘Brand Britain’?

The Spectator, in association with BAE Systems, hosted a half-day forum entitled ‘Exporting for Growth’ on 27 June. The event was held to discuss what can be done to spread British products and services globally, and to try and promote ‘Brand Britain’. This week’s magazine contains a supplement on the same theme, with pieces from speakers at the event and others with an interest in the state of British exports. In it, Martin Vander Weyer argued that we, as a nation, need to broaden our horizons if we want to remain a major player in the global economy: ‘There is a fizzing revival of entrepreneurialism in post-recession Britain, and an

Melanie McDonagh Melanie McDonagh

If you want social mobility, teach kids at the bottom end to write thank you letters

Last week’s readers tea party at The Spectator was a delight. You always suppose that the people you’re writing for are interested, intelligent and nice….and there you go: they are. But after meeting them, I’ve been brooding about the importance of, how can I put it, charm, as a class issue. One attractive woman – who had been telling me how, in the Sixties, she thought something was wrong with her if she didn’t get groped on the Tube – encouraged me to move on with the observation: ‘I must let other people enjoy you’. Graceful and expert. For ages, coming from a background that was the reverse of grand

Douglas Murray

The emergency surveillance legislation will make us safer

Isabel wonders whether it is a good thing that all main parties allied in passing emergency surveillance legislation into law yesterday. While it’s true that legislation passed without any significant political objection can be bad news, this is one case where that rule does not apply. There are a number of reasons why the legislation was necessary. One was the European Court of Justice verdict from earlier this year that meant that this country and a large number of internet providers were at risk of entering a legally grey area. Far from being an ‘extension’ of powers, this bill is about the retention of powers which had been accepted until the

Thursday

The Spectator

Spectator letters: A surgeon writes on assisted dying, and an estate agent answers Harry Mount

Real help for those in pain Sir: The fickleness of existence is exemplified by the fact that being Tony Blair’s ex-flatmate puts you in the position of further eroding the moral fabric of the nation without ever having had stood for office. An advert for Charlie Falconer’s Assisted Dying Bill is rather cynically placed opposite Jenny McCartney’s nuanced examination of the implications of this potential legislation (‘Terminally confused’, 5 July). Among other points, Ms McCartney quite correctly reprises the ‘slippery slope’ argument, which in the case of legalised abortion turned out to have been prophetic. One of her issues is the involvement of medical staff. Apart from the actual executioner’s

The Spectator

So are public-sector workers really underpaid?

Public benefit Public sector unions held a strike over pay. How well are public-sector workers paid compared with their counterparts in the private sector? — Comparing jobs like for like, public sector workers earn between 2.2% and 3.1% more than private sector workers in April last year. — In the lowest-earning 5% of workers, public sector workers earned 13% more than private sector workers. — In the highest-earning 5%, public-sector workers earned 6% less than private sector ones. Source: ONS Fine, fine, fine Network Rail was fined £53 million for running late trains. We are used to public authorities fining us, but how much do they fine each other? £2.5m:

Peter Jones

Assisted dying? Ancient religion was all for it

There is something mildly unexpected about religious groups’ hostility to euthanasia. After all, in the ancient world one of the major differences between e.g. Christians and pagans was that Christians were renowned for welcoming, indeed rejoicing at, death. Pagans found this incomprehensible. Not that pagans feared the afterlife. Although, in the absence of sacred texts, there were no received views on the matter, Greeks reckoned that if the gods were displeased with you, they would demonstrate it in this life rather than the next. Initiates into the Eleusinian Mysteries were promised a prosperous afterlife, but Diogenes the cynic retorted: ‘Do you mean that Pataikion the thief will enjoy a better

Taki

With a hangover like this, my soul is ready to be saved

 Island of Rhodes When I’m on the water, I feel I was born to it. Yachting has always been a way to enjoy the sea and the nature associated with it. The motion through water, the breeze and spray on the face, the looking forward to a landfall, the sheer beauty of leaning into the wind and watching the bowsprit plunge in and then emerge shaking water off itself like a puppy. These are some of the pleasures. Well, I’m on a gin palace, and none of the above is happening. I’m a guest of John and Darcy Rigas, whose chartered megayacht accommodates 16 in pasha-like comfort, and to my

Jeremy Clarke

Honesty, simplicity, integrity: not what I want the morning after

Tap tap tap at the door. I opened my eyes. ‘Check-out 10.30,’ said a neutral or possibly slightly hostile female voice on the other side of the door. I looked at my phone. As I looked, the clock changed from 10.29 to 10.30. Then I heard what I perceived to be the irritated rustling of a large plastic bag and receding carpeted footfalls. This wasn’t a hotel as such. It was a ‘club’ into which non-members like myself are welcomed and charged slightly more than members. I’d chosen it because it was called the Penn club, and it was in Bloomsbury, and I’d seen it advertised in the Times Literary

Raymond Keene

Attack

This was the watchword of Grandmaster Dragoljub Velimirovic, one of the leading players of the former Yugoslavia. I first encountered Velimirovic when he represented Yugoslavia on top board in the Students’ Team Championship of Harrachov 1967. He already enjoyed a reputation as a ferociously aggressive player, and he went on to win both individual and team silver medals at the Nice Olympiad of 1974. His forte was to invent sharp attacking lines against one of Black’s most popular defences, the Sicilian. Indeed he expended so much energy looking for ways to demolish it that he probably held himself back — in particular when he played as Black and had to

Alexander Chancellor

I thought paedophiles were rare – but then I read the newspapers

One problem from which I am confident I don’t suffer is paedophilia. I have always liked picking up babies and hugging them, especially my own children or grandchildren, but never in the ‘Rolfie deserves a cuddle’ kind of way. The idea of sexually lusting after children seems to me not only abhorrent but also almost unimaginable. If anything is against nature, it must be to regard children as sexual objects. I have always known, of course, that paedophiles exist. I was aware of it when, as an eight-year-old, I went to a prep school in Berkshire where the headmaster would snog the prettiest boys (alas, not me) in their dormitory

Raymond Keene

No. 322

White to play. This position is from Velimirovic-Gipslis, Havana 1971. How did White conclude? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 15 July 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 shall be offering a prize of £20. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery.   Last week’s solution 1 g5 Last week’s winner Philip Winston, London W4

Melissa Kite

Since when is it too much trouble to serve proper tomato juice?

‘I have a feeling,’ said my father, ‘that this evening is not going to go well.’ We were sitting in the bar of a local fish restaurant near my parents’ home having pre-dinner drinks, and I was throwing a wobbly because my tomato juice wasn’t right. I had arrived at the table after putting my order in as I went off to park the car, only to find a drink in a bottle called Big Tom sitting on the table. You know the drill, it’s the little things that get me. I immediately went into one because I cannot understand why asking a bartender to make a tomato juice from

Joan Collins

Joan Collins’s diary: Why I gave up on Ascot – and where I go instead

Can there be anything more perfect than early July in London, when the sun is shining, the sky a cloudless azure and the temperature hovers in the mid-seventies? Sorry, I still do Fahrenheit. It’s party time everywhere, with all the annual events happening, but I don’t do Ascot any more, too waggish, or Henley, too wet, or Wimbledon, too warm. The former has changed radically over the last 20 years, when I was fiercely censured for borrowing another woman’s Royal Enclosure badge, on a dare that no one would recognise me. Now these high jinks would be deemed innocent in comparison to the behaviour that goes on: people snogging, passing

Robin Oakley

Ralph Beckett’s winning way with the fillies

Fretful horses who waste their energies — and often their racing potential — ceaselessly pacing their stable dormitories are known as ‘box walkers’. Some trainers merit a similar description, dragging nervously on one racecourse cigarette too many. It isn’t sharing the washing-up but their teeth that have left their nails worn down to the quick. Their brows are furrowed as they saddle up their hopes. Instead of enjoying a joke with an owner’s wife their eyes flicker nervously to their four-legged charges skittering around the paddock for fear they are sweating up. Nervousness is easily transmitted between man and beast and I always feel more comfortable when the handler responsible

Janet de Botton

Bridge | 10 July 2014

The European Team Championships drew to a close last week and the most successful country overall was …England! The doughty Seniors took Gold, the Women took Silver and the Open Team took Bronze. I hardly went out in the ten days of the tournament, so glued was I to BBO and the fortunes of everyone I knew. Well done all who qualified for the Bermuda Bowl next year but especially well done to the three English teams who did us proud. Today’s hand is an example of how things can go wrong at the highest level — but you have to keep on playing. Amazingly, both rooms played the unlikely

Tanya Gold Tanya Gold

Dean Street Townhouse – at last! Somewhere I’d pay to eat

Occasionally a critic must review a restaurant in which they are prepared to spend their own money. So here is the Dean Street Townhouse. It is a terrible name, because all houses in Dean Street, a fusty artery of Soho, are town houses; they are not Wendy houses or country houses or dolls’ houses. But Dean Street House is worse, too close to Soho House, the private club and near neighbour where no one will meet your eye for wondering where the next useful tosser is. ‘Townhouse’ has a kudos, I suppose, these days. It is almost opposite the Groucho Club, which is Noel Edmonds’s Multi–Coloured Swap Shop for media

Toby Young Toby Young

If John Bercow were two-and-a-half inches taller, he’d never have been such a big success

Unlike 99 per cent of my colleagues, I was quite touched by John Bercow’s comment about how fed up he is with jokes about his height. ‘Whereas nobody these days would regard it as acceptable to criticise someone on grounds of race or creed or disability or sexual orientation, somehow it seems to be acceptable to comment on someone’s height, or lack of it,’ he said. OK, maybe taking the mickey out of someone for being short isn’t quite on the same level as, say, murdering them for being black or homosexual, but I think he has a point. I say this for two reasons. The first, obviously, is because