The Battle for Britain | 15 June 2024
Society
Thursday
Don’t let City spoil top-flight football
The Pac-Man defence, as all high-flying financiers know, is a tactic borrowed from the enjoyably addictive computer game which means that if you feel you are under attack then you fight back even harder to scare the crap out of your enemies. It seems that in Abu Dhabi and at the Etihad the poor beleaguered executives of Manchester City have been at their Nintendo machines. What place a Wolves or an Ipswich or a Burnley in this oil-rich, dollar-strewn new world? How else to explain City’s private court case against the Premier League? City already face 115 charges brought against them by the top tier of English football but it’s
My dreams of Jeremy Clarke
The other week my eldest daughter and I were staying with friends in Richmond for the launch of Jeremy’s third collection of Low Life columns. The night before the anniversary of his death – the day of the launch – I woke at 2 a.m. and unable to sleep was back in the cave holding Jeremy’s hand; machines clicking and beeping as his life ebbed unpeacefully away. He died at 9 a.m. A few weeks after Jeremy died, I dreamt he walked into the house… he looked fit, strong and full of life At 9.05 a.m., in tears and still wearing a nightie, jumper and flip-flops, I ran downstairs, almost colliding with one
Dear Mary: how can I stop shrieking women from ruining my dinner?
Q. Two American clients, with whom I have bonded on a personal level, rang me to say they were coming over to London for a few days. They asked me to book ‘somewhere really special’ so they could treat me and thank me for a particular thing I had done for them. They liked my suggestion of a top Chinese in Mayfair and we ordered Peking Duck – (which needs three days’ notice). We were all looking forward to visiting this elegant and highly rated restaurant. Unfortunately, on the night there was a really noisy table adjacent to ours. Its mainly female occupants were overloud and bumptious and shrieking with
‘An exceptional roast lunch’: Quality Chop House reviewed
The oldest and best chophouse in London was Simpson’s Tavern in Ball Court Alley off Cornhill (since 1757 on that site): Charles Dickens’s favourite chophouse, and mine. Simpson’s was locked out by landlords who impersonate cartoon villains at the end of 2022 for failing to pay pandemic arrears promptly. Simpson’s said they survived world wars, the plague and the Industrial Revolution, but not a landlord who doesn’t understand chops. (This part I paraphrase.) We settle into a spindly table for what is, by any measure, an exceptional roast lunch Court proceedings are ongoing: meanwhile it’s a ruin. It was vandalised in May, as these things tend to be. Now it
The trials and tribulations of getting a plumber
‘Please, I’ll do anything,’ I told the plumber. ‘I’ll give you all the money I have if you just come back here for one day and connect the new hot water system.’ The plumber said no bother, he would come this weekend. But he says that every week, and every weekend when he doesn’t come he says he’ll come the next week. And the next week he says he’ll come at the weekend, and so on. And this has been going on for months. Which is nothing, apparently. Frankly, the builder boyfriend could go to college and get a degree in plumbing faster than we could get a plumber It is
How to decode adspeak
The National Galleries of Scotland is singular. In its public pronouncements its pronouns are it and its. Fair enough. Though it appears plural, I shall not misuse its chosen pronouns. Visitors must also learn a new language to visit its three galleries, for they are not now called galleries. They are called National, Portrait and Modern (comprising Modern One and Modern Two). The new names, adopted last year, are ‘snappier and more memorable for visitors than the previous longer names’ such as the Scottish National Gallery. So you should say: ‘I’m just off to see Women in Revolt! at Modern Two.’ The National Galleries of Scotland has been looking for a Director
Why would Labour be anti-racing?
Enjoying the election? It was a colleague from my days with CNN who alerted me during Donald Trump’s first contest to an obituary notice in a US local newspaper which summed up the feelings of many: ‘Faced with the prospect of voting either for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, Mary Anne Noland chose instead last Sunday to pass into the eternal love of God.’ There is no reason to suppose Labour would be anti-racing. Starmer’s wife, Victoria, is said to be an enthusiast For British racing the very calling of an election has been a blow. Poor prize money levels compared with its international competitors and falling attendances have been
Bridge | 15 June 2024
How many times have I said ‘You are soo lucky’ to whichever expert opponent had brought in a tricky contract. ‘Every card would be wrong for me.’ Well ofc it would because sometimes you have to work out in which order to take your chances, which involves planning the play from dummy going down until the final trick when you have ruffed what you need to ruff, and preserved the correct entries. Not my strong point. Not my point at all. Take this hand, played by Thomas (Charlie) Charlsen in the recent WBT in Norway. He took his time and worked out in which order to play the various options
Why Britain isn’t following Europe rightwards
My father was fond of telling anyone who would listen that Britain would never entertain fascism because we all had a sense of humour which enabled us to see the ridiculousness of its hastily fabricated myths and legends. By contrast, mainland Europeans had no sense of humour at all and would happily follow any strutting oaf in a spittle-bedecked uniform. So, while the Germans had Hitler, the Spanish Franco and the Italians Mussolini, the closest we came was Roderick Spode and his Black Shorts, a hilarious creature who P.G. Wodehouse modelled on the scarcely less risible Oswald Mosley. It is a comforting notion and yet, much as with his other
What tax rises are Labour planning?
The Tory manifesto is ‘a clear plan’ promising ‘bold action’. Rishi Sunak uses the word ‘bold’ three times in two paragraphs. If it were bold, it would not need its 80 pages. Its detail is best seen as a resource for candidates trying to deploy specific promises with specific interest groups. This is a way of shoring up the Tory vote, not of winning the election – a tacit admission of defeat. It may have an eye, too, to what happens afterwards. Labour wants to be able to say that the Conservatives crashed out on the most extreme manifesto ever. Indeed, Sir Keir Starmer is already calling it a Jeremy Corbyn-style
My brush with doom in Tangier
I wait till early summer to spring-clean so I’m moving my study, a stirring-up that invariably releases powerful methane from its swamp. Every meaningful valueless thing I own has been sorted through and removed from the pretty, bright room next to ours, with the garden below and the custard-cream scent of blooming wisteria, to a dark, unlovely corner of the top floor. It’s a study, not a viewing platform. I tell myself. A while ago, we put a single bed in the corner of our room to tempt our youngest son from climbing into our bed when he came in at 2 o’clock every morning. And it has worked only too
How to make elderflower cordial
I have a complicated relationship with elderflower cordial. I love taking ingredients that have short seasons, preserving and squirrelling them away for future enjoyment. And I’m cheap, so the fact that the main component comes from the hedgerow is appealing. And it’s fun! It is a little like making a potion, dunking whole heads of flowers into an enormous pan and then leaving it to steep for days, before bottling it. Magical. But the truth is, I really don’t like drinking the cordial. It is too floral, too perfumed, too green. It’s just not for me. Regardless, when the tiny white flowers bloom and the hedgerows are fragrant with their
How the Tories lost their way
Do you pack up the flat or not? That’s the question that everyone who lives in Downing Street faces as an election approaches. In 1997 my job was to brief John Major each morning on the newspapers. We’d pick up the first editions from Charing Cross at midnight and young researchers would beaver away in the early hours working out how to respond. At 6 a.m. I’d then go to the flat above No. 10 and brief the bleary-eyed premier. I remember the chintzy sofas, the family photos and the awkward moments: ‘Prime Minister, your sister has told the Sun newspaper you can’t win.’ The day before polling, I crept
Portrait of the Week: Sunak’s D-Day misstep, Michael Mosley’s death and Macron’s snap election
Home The Conservatives promised to reduce National Insurance from 8 per cent to 6 per cent (and abolish it for most of the self-employed by 2029) in their 76-page election manifesto. Despite other tax cuts already announced, the tax burden would continue to rise steadily. The Tories also promised to halve migration. In its manifesto, Labour decided after all not to reinstate the lifetime limit on tax-free pension savings, but it was tempted by capital gains tax. Labour promised 100,000 extra childcare places, with nurseries set up in classrooms expected to be empty because of falling numbers of primary school children; the costs would be met by VAT on private
The danger of a Labour supermajority
We are witnessing what could well be the last few weeks of a constrained Labour party. Sir Keir Starmer is saying as little as possible about his agenda and is instead listing what he won’t do (raise income tax, etc). He is rightly fearful that the Conservatives may do better than the opinion polls suggest. That has happened in the past. There may be a ‘shy Tory’ effect in the polls as there was in 1992, 2015 and 2019. Who would admit to voting Conservative in the current climate? Regardless, power now looks certain to come Starmer’s way – perhaps with a majority bigger than that of any modern prime
Triangles
Lawyers in a courtroom, it is said, should not ask questions to which they do not already know the answer. Chess players are well advised to adopt a similar attitude to pawn endgames – steer clear unless you can anticipate the outcome with certainty. In endgames with more wood on the board, overlooking a nuance need not be catastrophic. In pawn endgames, nothing is minor, and any oversight can be decisive. Yet their apparent simplicity has the lure of a siren song. Grandmasters are usually more circumspect, so I was gobsmacked by Alireza Firouzja’s endgame howler in the recent Norway Chess tournament. Magnus Carlsen-Alireza Firouzja Norway Chess, June 2024 In the diagram
No. 805
White to play. Adapted from an example in Capablanca’s classic manual Chess Fundamentals. Only one move leads to a win for White. Which? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 17 June. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Rd6! Rd2 2 Qb1# or 1…Rxd4 2 Rxd4#. Lateral rook moves are met by 2 Bc3# or 2 Be3#. Last week’s winner Mike Grant, Eastbourne, East Sussex
Spectator competition: Running on full
Comp. 3353 invited poems about ‘dining and dashing’ – thanks to Paul Freeman for the suggestion. There was a very large postbag/inbox full of delicious offerings and I am especially sorry not to have had room for W.J. Webster condemning the crime for its name alone: ‘it isn’t just pedantic/ To say its source is transatlantic’. Josephine Boyle deserves a mention for her payoff: ‘But all deceptions have a price:/I can’t eat anywhere good twice.’ The winners get £25 (a paid-for pub lunch for one?) each. On honeymoon, in a greasy spoon Where we contrived to fetch up, The tea was sweet, but our feet were fleet – We left
2658: Yackety-yack
The unclued lights (one of three words) are of a kind and can be verified in Brewer, whose spelling is used. Across 1 Small horn from moulding left indoors (8) 6 Love being in a home on the water (6) 11 Vauxhall model almost off course (5) 13 Cooked lamb, say, is particularly bad (7) 14 Settle on port, served around four o’clock, for starters (3,3) 16 An instrument that’s used for filling cracks (4) 17 Ancient Welsh poet translated litanies (8) 21 Complain about solo commuting cost-savers (3,5) 23 The most angelic of the old masters? (7) 25 Ages leading Essex or Nottinghamshire (3) 26 Address
