Society

Saturday

Alan Judd

Motoring: Designer’s dream

I have seen the future and it looks like a Jaguar. It’s sleek and curvaceous and, although it’s a fraction under four-feet high, ingress and egress are easier than in a flattened fag-packet Ferrari. A 195bhp electric motor at each wheel means 0–62mph in 3.4 seconds and zero tailpipe emissions in urban use. Switch on the diesel-powered twin turbines and you can recharge on the move, giving a range (with a 60-litre tank) of 560 miles and nugatory emissions of 28g/km of CO2. Above all, it’s beautiful. That’s what makes you think it must be a Jaguar. Confirmation came in the form of Jaguar’s legendary designer, Ian Callum, in Knightsbridge

Robin Oakley

The turf: Ups and downs

The more unctuous of vicars tend to assure us through December that ‘the true joy of Christmas lies in giving’. There are moments, however, when one’s faith in such advice is sorely tested. After trawling most of the West End, Mrs Oakley had this year secured the ultimate outfit for Grandchild No. 5. Unfortunately, when we moved house in early December, the package containing dress, blouse, headband, etc. disappeared. Ultimately, there was no option but to search through the remaining 53 unopened boxes of books, which have been stowed in an icy cold, unlit outhouse until we build shelves to accommodate them. The removers, we felt, just might have tucked

Melissa Kite

Real life | 8 January 2011

‘Hello, Miss Kite, this is the RAC solutions centre.’ Oh, dear god, it’s all over, I thought. Nothing except the exact opposite of a solution ever comes out of a place called a solutions centre. I had hit a curb while driving over Chelsea Bridge and my front tyre was in shreds by the time I’d nursed the car to a side street. I abandoned it (it’s a convertible with no spare) and went to wait at a nearby friend’s house for the recovery people. For a while, however, I could not remember who I had breakdown cover with. This is because, like everyone else, I suspect, I have to

Jeremy Clarke

Low life | 8 January 2011

The registrar opened a screen and clicked and typed her way down a list of questions. I was ‘giving notice’ of our intention to be married after a statutory 15 days had passed. It was the day before Christmas Eve. ‘Has either of you been married before?’ she said. (She was tired and distracted. So many elderly people had died in this recent cold snap, she’d told me earlier, she was run off her feet.) ‘No,’ I said. ‘Your partner’s full name?’ she said, fingering her mouse. For a split second, before it came to me, my mind was a blank. The registrar eyed me speculatively as she touch-typed. ‘And

Taki

High life | 8 January 2011

Six hours into the new year and already there was trouble. My own bash to welcome 2011 with 50 of my nearest finished around 5 a.m., so I rolled down towards the Palace hotel still looking for some action. I had a very pretty German girl in tow, Fiona, a friend of my son, so I swept into the lobby in style. Then it happened. I saw the vision to end all visions and a desperate, sensuous pain — the type that can make a grown man cry out — hit me as never before. This is the curse upon those who follow the supreme Beauty — that is to

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 8 January 2011

Q. A close friend has married, in later life, a very nosy and mischievous man. She adores him and keeps boasting about what a computer wizard he is. Unfortunately, I have sound reason to believe he has been hacking into my emails and reading them. It was pretty smart of him to work out my password but this he undoubtedly has done. I have nothing to hide but I resent the invasion of my privacy. I don’t want to embarrass my friend by confronting her husband directly. As my own husband says, ‘what grown man in his right mind would bother to hack into a Sloane Ranger’s email account?’ How

Toby Young Toby Young

Status Anxiety: Moccasins don’t make you a murderer

Like many people, I’ve been following the saga of Joanna Yeates’s murder with rapt attention. Unfortunately, I’m not at all confident that her killer will ever be caught. The Avon and Somerset Police just don’t seem up to the job. To begin with, they neglected to intercept her rubbish and that of her neighbours before it was carted away by dustmen after she’d been reported missing. The upshot is that they now have to sift through 293 tonnes of the stuff to stand any chance of finding a missing pizza box. (She bought a Tesco pizza on her way home from the Ram pub on the last night she was

The Spectator

Letters | 8 January 2011

Godly geologists Sir: Bruce Anderson’s article in your Christmas special (‘Confession of an atheist’, 18/25 December) was a great example of the thoughtful and reasonable atheism of which we have been starved over recent years. That said, he still makes one howling and oft-repeated error when he claims that Christianity never recovered ‘from the loss of medieval cosmology and the emergence of modern geology’. The idea that it was science that was somehow responsible for the waning of Western religion is a relatively recent one, its origins lying in a number of popular but egregious histories of the two disciplines published in the late 19th century. It is badly wide

Peter Jones

Ancient and modern | 8 January 2011

Every year the situation in Afghanistan is reassessed, and every year the conclusion is the same — mixed military progress, but otherwise, zilch. Every year the situation in Afghanistan is reassessed, and every year the conclusion is the same — mixed military progress, but otherwise, zilch. Romans would not have gone there, at least not on the terms that we are there. The Roman empire was a success, for the Romans at any rate, because it was under their total control. When they moved into places like the Greek East, they were dealing with cultures that were largely urbanised. Administrative structures were in place to handle governance and taxation, and

The Spectator

Barometer | 8 January 2011

Prison regimes A riot at Ford Open Prison in Sussex raised questions as to the regime in jails. This is some of what prisoners can expect: — Category A (Whitemoor, Cambs): work opportunities in recycling, laundry and restoring computers for schools in Africa. Courses in thinking skills and anger management. Gym, sports hall and Astroturf. Prisoners may apply for two PE sessions within a working week, one in the evening and two at the weekends. Acupuncture for staff and prisoners. Visits Thur-Mon 1400-1600, must be booked 24 hours in advance. — Category B (Wandsworth): courses include bricklaying/plastering, industrial cleaning. Multi-choice pre-select menu with halal and vegetarian options. Visits every morning

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 8 January 2011

Home Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, said that the rise in VAT from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent would cost the average family £7.50 a week. George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said: ‘If you look at the population and how much they spend, then VAT is progressive.’ The average price of a pint of lager rose to more than £3. A railway season ticket to Sidcup rose by 12.5 per cent, among many others higher than the average of 5.8 per cent. In some places domestic rubbish went uncollected for a month because of bad weather and holidays. A fox weighing 28lb was trapped at Maidstone

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Society can’t function without some degree of trust

One of the most worrying developments of recent years has been a belief that any adult who wants to teach or help children should be suspected of immoral tendencies. This has led to a belief that even the most innocent of actions should be seen as perverted until proved otherwise. It is harder to find a purer expression of this viewpoint than the videos produced by the musicians’ union called ‘Keeping children safe in music’ and backed by the NSPCC. These videos urge music teachers never to touch children while teaching them. When you consider the process of teaching someone how to play the violin or the piano, you realise

David Blackburn

Sex gangs and the triumph of ignorance

As Rod Liddle notes, there’s a hell of a media storm raging over sexual abuse committed by men of Pakistani origin. Certain of the media’s more craven elements have capitulated to the politically correct mantra that it’s wrong to judge at all; and certain of the media’s more reactionary outlets are entertaining blanket condemnations of the entire Pakistani community. Jack Straw has it about right. He told Sky News: ‘There is a specific problem about a very small minority of normally Pakistani heritage men who are targeting young, vulnerable white girls. It is somethingt which is abhorred by the Pakistani heritage community as much as anybody else, but it is an

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Public service broadcasting?

A bizarre report on the Asian child abuse court case on the BBC last night, which spent most of its time attempting to exonerate the Pakistani community as a whole, including clips of Pakistanis saying “actually, we probably shouldn’t abuse kiddies” and a white child abuse campaigner saying hey, look, it’s not Pakistanis who are the problem, etc etc.   This was broadcasting as a form of crowd control; undiluted propaganda. The fact is that some Pakistani men think it perfectly ok to abuse white girls and there are still gangs out there right now doing so. When Nick Griffin mentioned this fact, many years ago, they tried to prosecute

David Blackburn

Hughes’ social engineering crusade

No wonder some backbench Tory MPs are apoplectic: courtesy of David Cameron, Simon Hughes has been elevated from soapbox to pulpit. Hughes’ first statement as the government’s university access adviser is to suggest that universities should limit their intake of students from private schools. He told the Guardian: ‘I think my message to the universities is: You have gained quite a lot in the settlement. Yes, you’ve lost lots of state money, but you’ve got another revenue stream that’s going to protect you. You now have to deliver in turn. You cannot expect to go on as you are. It has failed miserably.’   Hughes’ appointment was controversial, another instance of

Stanley Johnson

For the love of cod

Years — actually decades — ago, a gentleman from the British civil service, interviewing me as a potential candidate for a job in the European Commission, explained that ‘all the important decisions in Brussels are prepared by the chefs’. As he spoke, I had a vision of men in tall white hats stirring dishes on a large stove in the middle of the Berlaymont. ‘Chefs?’ I queried. The man quickly explained that he meant the ‘chefs de cabinet’, the Commissioners’ aides, who basically ran the show while the great men had long lunches at expensive Brussels restaurants. Still, this vision of the all-powerful chef was a vivid one and it

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

‘Direct government’ will offer the public a say only on the most boring issues

Last time I looked, my online petition was not generating the support I had expected. You can find it on Facebook and it is entitled ‘Everybody Should Be Sacked or Killed.’ Only 38 people have so far pledged their support for this laudable proposition, which is way short of the number that would enable my bill to be debated in parliament. The problem, I think, is not the substance of the proposal, but my own technological inadequacies. I do not know how to download an image, a feat which is required if I am to advertise my proposition to the millions of people who use Facebook (worth £50 billion apparently)

Michael Henderson

Life of pie

‘To tell the truth,’ says Peter Myers, his Cumbrian baritone untouched by four decades of life in Manhattan, ‘I’m glad it’s all over.’ By ‘it’ he means Christmas and new year, when Myers, the sausage-knotter and purveyor of pies to New Yorkers, is at his busiest. ‘It was bedlam. They began to queue up outside the shop ten days before Christmas for their mince pies. We were making thousands a day. Bedlam, I tell you’. Myers of Keswick, the shop on Hudson Street that bears the name of his birthplace, is not your average butcher’s. Looking round the shelves stocked with salad cream, Colman’s mustard, Marmite, Jaffa Cakes, Branston pickle,

Matthew Parris Matthew Parris

A new page in an old friendship

Before we sit an exam, we revise. Before we appear on Any Questions we get ourselves up to speed on the latest news. Before we dine with some grand personage previously unknown to us, we find out about them in Who’s Who. But before we go to stay with a friend we’ve known for more than 20 years, would we expect to read a book on them? A curious assignment; but that has been my task in the first few days of 2011 — and it has proved a moving one. I first met Allegra Huston in about 1988, when she was an editor at the publishers Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

Mike Paterniti

The hero of Nanjing

The Nanjing Yangtze river bridge is four lanes wide and four miles long, a monument to Maoist endeavour clogged with the traffic of China’s economic boom. And every weekend, at one of its two towers, you can see Chen Si. He is 42 years old, with spiky black hair, a rasping cough from cheap Nanjing-brand cigarettes, and a baseball cap bearing the slogan ‘THEY SPY ON YOU’. Around his neck is an oversized pair of binoculars, through which he watches the crowds unceasingly. In the past six years, according to his blog, he has saved 174 people from suicide. Mr Chen used to be a functionary at a transport company.