Society

Thursday

Robin Oakley

Christmas racing reading

In one of those old Mae West films a girl admires her friend’s jewellery: ‘Goodness, what lovely pearls,’ only to meet the reply, ‘Goodness, my dear, had nothing to do with them.’ The same was true of the sealskin fur coat and silk stockings worn by the gorgeous Micheline Lugeon, a would-be beautician from Switzerland who became notorious on British racecourses in the Sixties. Lugeon was the mistress of the high-rolling gambler-bookmaker Bill Roper. Roper, who maintained a wife in style as well, and put his children through private schools, needed money to keep the champagne flowing for his mistress at the Pigalle. To find it, he assembled a bunch

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 5 December 2013

One of the most dramatic events of the Spanish American War was the sinking of the cargo ship Merrimac. Early in 1898, a bold plan was hatched by the US navy to rig the Merrimac with explosives, sail it into the narrow channel leading into Santiago harbour, then blow it up — thereby blocking the Spanish fleet within the harbour. As it was basically a suicide mission, the skeleton crew of just eight men were all volunteers. In the end, the mission failed: the Merrimac’s steering gear was damaged by enemy fire and, despite sinking, the vessel failed to block the channel. Although they were captured, the crew did at

Peter Jones

Master charlatans at work

To watch the Revd Paul Flowers being grilled by the Treasury Select Committee on his role in the demise of the Co-op Bank is to watch a master charlatan at work: dignified, polite and supremely self-assured, even as he is stripped to the bone by Andrew Tyrie. The ancient world boasted plenty of such, and they all exhibit identical characteristics. Take one Peregrinus, whose story is told by the Greek satirist Lucian (ad 115–180). He was exiled for killing his father, but saw there was advantage to be gained through the new religion on the block, and became ‘Christian’. He soon turned himself into a prophet and church leader, interpreting their

The Spectator

Letters | 5 December 2013

Climate scientists write… Sir: Lord Lawson has written in his diary (30 November) under the online summary headline ‘my secret showdown with the Royal Society on global warming’, but the reality is rather different. As he is aware, the purpose of the meeting on 19 November was not to put on a public performance, but to provide Lord Lawson with expert advice on climate science. The science summarised by the climate scientists was generally agreed to by all present. Lord Lawson charges that we ‘were very reluctant to engage on the crucial issue of climate change policy at all’ and that we had no interest in ‘the massive human and

Steve Punt

Steve Punt’s diary: Britain is now living in a middle-class parody of itself 

One of the most dispiriting experiences currently available is any commercial break during a televised football match. In a Champions League game, within seconds of the half-time whistle you are pitched into a garish carnival of crap which glaringly and proudly condenses Everything Wrong With Modern Britain into three bombastic minutes, beginning with the laughably pompous Champions League choral theme and then going downhill from there. Adverts follow for gambling, drinking, and borrowing money, along with violent computer games and cars. A multi-millionaire actor will exhort recession-hit viewers to bet on the next goal, via a handy app. Glossy couples and sexy croupiers make online cash-fleecing look like a James

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 5 December 2013

Home George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that average energy bills would be brought £50 lower through government intervention to reduce the obligation of energy companies to subsidise insulation. The government also said it would cut subsidies for onshore wind turbines and solar energy, and increase those for offshore wind farms. David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said that new arrivals from Bulgaria or Romania found to be begging or sleeping rough would be thrown out of the country and barred from returning for a year, unless they had a job. He then flew to China to further British trade. A bridge across the Thames from Temple to the

Raymond Keene

London classics

This year’s London Classic tournament, organised by the indefatigable Malcolm Pein, who also heads up the charity Chess in Schools and Communities, is composed of several sections. The main group is graced by the presence of numerous elite international and British grandmasters, notably Viswanathan Anand, fresh from his title defence against Magnus Carlsen. All the action can be followed on www.londonchessclassic.com.   This week I pay tribute to historical chess events in the capital, starting with a victory from the London tournament of 1851, the first ever major international chess tournament, by the celebrated historian Henry Buckle. In fact Buckle had been the winner of an earlier event held in

Toby Young Toby Young

Toby Young: Nobody appreciates you sending Christmas cards of your children’s ‘art’

I’ve just had a massive row with Caroline about Christmas cards. We usually send about 120 and this year we’ve each ordered them from a different source — Caroline from the children’s primary in Shepherd’s Bush and me from the West London Free School. Our fight was about which batch to keep. Caroline has sentiment on her side because the cards she wants to send out have been made by our children. It’s essentially a fund-raising ruse whereby the school gets each pupil to ‘design’ a Christmas card, i.e. put a few scribbles down on a piece of paper, then has them printed and sells them to parents at a

Raymond Keene

7 December

Black to play. This position is a variation from Evans-Staunton, London 1845. Can you spot Black’s fine finish to the attack?   Because of the Christmas printing schedule, we regret that this is not a prize puzzle.   Last week’s solution 1 Qh6 (1 … c1Q+ 2 Bf1 d4+ 3 Kg1 Qe3+ 4 Rf2 and Black has run out of checks and will be mated) Last week’s winner Jeremy Hart, Yatton, Somerset

Mary Killen

Dear Mary: How appropriate is it to send a Christmas card with the word ‘merry’ to a widow? 

Q. Six years ago a rather glamorous man bought the house opposite me. Although he always responds to requests for contributions to the residents’ committee, he has yet to attend a meeting or garden party. We know he lives alone and, according to his otherwise discreet servant, there are no other visitors to the house. How can I satisfy my curiosity and let him see that I am an affable sort of person with whom he would certainly like to be friends? — Name withheld, London SW3 A. Next time you know he is in the house, why not ‘accidentally’ damage the wing mirror of his car? Wing mirrors, like

Dot Wordsworth

Dot Wordsworth: Jostling aggressively with ‘selfie’ and ‘twerk’, we have ‘push back’

Something funny happened when my husband yawned. I yawned. That wasn’t the funny thing. The funny thing was that I recognised the chain reaction from somewhere else. It was from Start the Week on Radio 4, where somebody spoke of pushing back. Before the programme was over, everyone seemed to say push back. They applied push back not to a chair, or even the date of an event (or, as the politicians would say, the rollout of some piece of meddling). No, theirs was a metaphorical usage, of sometimes no precise meaning. It is popular with academics and denizens of the Westminster bubble. I heard a high-flyer from the Department

The Spectator

Barometer: Who snorts more cocaine — the rich or the poor? 

The darkest day Several people were injured on ‘Black Friday’, a day of retail discounting imported from the US, where the fourth Thursday of November is the Thanksgiving holiday and many shops hold one-day sales the following day. There are at least 23 historic events named ‘Black Friday’, from the imprisonment of seven bishops by James II on 8 June 1688 to the hanging of four anarchists in Chicago on 11 November 1887 and the seizure of online poker sites by US authorities on 15 April 2011. What is the blackest day of the week, according to entries on Wikipedia? Black Monday 15 Black Tuesday 5 Black Wednesday 3 Black

Columba

2142: Wintry

Each of seventeen clues comprises a definition part and a hidden consecutive jumble of the answer including one extra letter. The extras spell a four-word excerpt from a quotation (in ODQ) from a translation of a work by 10 (two words).  Clues in italics consist of cryptic indications of partial answers; in each case, the indicated part must be treated in accordance with the quotation to create the full answer to be entered in the grid. Definitions of the resulting entries (two of which are hyphened) are supplied by unclued lights.   Across   1    Handle humour, man (5) 9    Casseroles lacking right filling used to be showing

Columba

to 2139: Separated

The key word is BUTTERMILK (8), which can be separated into words defined by 15, 27, 40; 4, 23, 25; and 2, 7, 35.   First prize  Brian Midgley, Ettington, Warwickshire Runners-up  John M. Brown, Rolleston on Dove, Staffordshire; K.J. Williams, Kings Worthy, Hampshire

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Nelson Mandela dies, aged 95

Look; I’m sorry Nelson Mandela is dead. It happens quite often to people in their 90s who have been very ill, even famous people, but I’m sure that doesn’t lessen the sadness for many of us. I never met the man but, on balance, I came to the conclusion that he was a force for good rather than ill. I think I came to that rather banal and broad brush conclusion twenty years ago, or maybe fifteen. So, I’m sorry he’s dead, I wish it were otherwise. But for Christ’s sake BBC, give it a bloody break for five minutes, will you? It’s as if the poor bugger now has

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Food banks and free school meals: how ministers missed an opportunity

The Trussell Trust, which runs the biggest network of food banks in the UK, has used today’s Autumn Statement to remind politicians that over 500,000 people have sought emergency food parcels since April. There is a particular poignance to this,as today was the day the Lib Dems were having a song and dance about their free school meals policy that they’re so proud of. But while that policy might be very pleasing to any parent of a child in infant school who doesn’t have to make sandwiches any more, is it really the best use of money when departments are being asked to find an extra £1bn of savings a

Sebastian Payne

Spectator podcast special: The View from 22 on today’s Autumn Statement

Following George Osborne’s 2013 Autumn Statement this morning, The Spectator’s Fraser Nelson, Isabel Hardman and James Forsyth discuss the Chancellor’s announcements, the reaction he received in the House of Commons, how Ed Balls responded to the statement, the winners and losers and what we can expect to see on tomorrow’s front pages. You can subscribe to the View from 22 through iTunes and have it delivered to your computer every week, or you can use the embedded player below: listen to ‘Spectator podcast special: The View from 22 on today’s Autumn Statement’ on Audioboo

The Spectator

Audio hub: 2013 Autumn Statement

Throughout the day, we’ll be posting audio highlights from the 2013 Autumn statement — including speeches from George Osborne and Ed Balls. George Osborne’s statement to the House of Commons: listen to ‘George Osborne’s Autumn Statement’ on Audioboo