Society

Saturday

30 Jan 2010

The other club

‘Do you want a dance?’ she said. She stood there smiling at me with her hand held out invitingly. I’d already decided I wasn’t going to get caught up in the dancing. But this woman — well, you should have seen her. She was about 19; as full of health, life and potential fecundity as point-of-lay pullet. And yet a vulnerability in her smile gave the impression that she’d had to pluck up the courage to ask. I said to my friend, and my friend’s friend — we’d been deep in conversation about the perilous state of a football club dear to our hearts — how could I possibly refuse

Taki

Take three books

Reading good books is like making love. Reading bad ones is like masturbating. I’ve just read three good ones, one of which got on my nerves because it was about a homosexualist, as opposed to a homosexual. Which in fact was what the other two were about. Now if someone had suggested to me long ago that I would be reading three books about three men who preferred their own sex, I’d have said they’d been puffing on the magic dragon, but that’s neither here nor there. I was curious to read about James Lees-Milne (by Michael Bloch) because, although I never met him, I knew and know some of

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 30 January 2010

Q. A new flatmate at university is very likeable but I get the feeling that she only half listens to what I have to say. When we are chatting at the kitchen table, for example, she interrupts me, often mid-story, to tell a story of her own. This will invariably be very entertaining but it still feels a bit insulting that she did not bother listening to the end of what I was saying. How can I tactfully cure her of this habit without making her feel that I am jealous of her being wittier or having more interesting names to drop than I do? Name withheld, Leeds A. If

Dot Wordsworth

Mind your language | 30 January 2010

‘Kriek?’ shouted my husband. ‘Kriek?’ shouted my husband. ‘What do you mean, Kriek?’ He was only shouting because he was in the next room and couldn’t be bothered to get up. His question was a good one, for Kriek is one of the latest entries added to the Oxford English Dictionary. It is a far more interesting word than SMS, another new entry, but should it be there at all? It is never easy to know which words should be in an English dictionary. When James Murray, first editor of the OED, was working on the letter A in the 1880s he decided not to include the word African, since

Toby Young

Defining yourself these days as ‘upper class’ is the kiss of death in every walk of life

‘The basic principle of English social life is that everyone thinks he is a gentleman,’ wrote Evelyn Waugh. ‘There is a second principle of almost equal importance: everyone draws the line of demarcation immediately below his own heels.’ That was written 55 years ago and today almost exactly the opposite is true. According to a Guardian/ICM poll published earlier this week, almost no one in contemporary Britain sees themselves as ‘upper class’. The pollsters didn’t ask the respondents to define ‘upper class’, but I wouldn’t be surprised if a majority of people draw the line of demarcation immediately above their own heads. In the course of my life I have

The Spectator

Letters | 30 January 2010

For richer, for poorer Sir: Ferdinand Mount’s article (‘David Cameron should honour his marriage vow’, 23 January) is not entirely accurate. After noting that Geoffrey Howe was unable to persuade Margaret Thatcher to agree to the introduction of transferable tax allowances between married couples, he writes: ‘Nigel Lawson after him argued the same, with no better luck.’ In fact, I announced the introduction of transferable allowances in my 1988 Budget, and it was duly implemented in 1990. The full story may be found on pages 881 to 887 of my memoirs, The View from No. 11. Nigel Lawson London SW1 Sir: Well done to Ferdinand Mount and The Spectator for

Tamzin Lightwater

Diary of a Notting Hill nobody | 30 January 2010

Monday Mr Maude is ecstatic. ‘A hung parliament! I told you so! People hate us!’ Dave v grumpy: ‘Speak for yourself.’ Quietly though, I think he is a bit worried that not as many people love him as unconditionally and totally as previously thought. It’s not the polls, exactly. It’s more to do with That Poster. There’s one in Brixton, for example, with a huge amount of mud mysteriously spattered all over it. Of course, it could easily have been a bus going through a puddle. But Dave is convinced it was hoodies. I think he could have put up with having mud slung at him by any other social

Charles Moore

The Spectator’s Notes | 30 January 2010

Part of the purpose of the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war is what has become known, post the end of apartheid, as ‘truth and reconciliation’. Part of the purpose of the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war is what has become known, post the end of apartheid, as ‘truth and reconciliation’. That is why it does not matter much that material already studied closely in the Hutton and Butler reports is being gone over again: this time, the hearings are public. The trouble is that truth and reconciliation are rarely compatible with general elections. In a classic example of the lack of courage for which he is known, Gordon

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 30 January 2010

Britain technically emerged from recession, with economic growth of 0.1 per cent in the last quarter of 2009, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics, although these might be revised in a month’s time. Britain technically emerged from recession, with economic growth of 0.1 per cent in the last quarter of 2009, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics, although these might be revised in a month’s time. The previous six quarters of contraction had been the longest such period since 1955. Gross Domestic Product fell by 4.8 per cent last year. The 100 partners of Goldman Sachs based in Britain are having pay and bonuses

James Forsyth

Rawnsley revelations put Brown’s temper on the agenda

Stories of Gordon Brown’s temper are commonplace in Westminster. But they rarely make it into print. This, though, is about to change. The Mail on Sunday reports that Andrew Rawnsley’s follow-up to Servants of the People contains a string of revelations about Brown’s behaviour. The paper reports that Rawnsley has investigated whether the Prime Minister has hit a senior adviser, pulled a secretary out of her chair because she wasn’t typing fast enough and sworn at aides over the Obama snub. Downing Street is rubbishing these allegations. However, Rawnsley’s record is so good that these stories cannot easily be dismissed, also many journalists have come close to standing them up

Fraser Nelson

The return of IDS

What to do with Iain Duncan Smith? The Sunday Telegraph tomorrow says he will be given a Department for Children and Social Justice – an idea that has been in the pipeline for a while now. At first, I was against IDS returning to the front bench given what amazing influence he has had as a backbencher. I fancied him as a Frank Field/Wilberforce type – someone used his public platform to advance radical ideas. But that changed when Theresa May was promoted to welfare reform, something which did more to damage my confidence in the Cameron project than anything else since 2007. It seemed to suggest to me that

Fraser Nelson

A tale of two FTs

The Spectator isn’t in favour of many taxes, but we are calling for a mandatory insurance premium for banks. Depending on which version of the FT you picked up today, it seems the banks are agreeing to this too. But are they agreeing to a tax, or a fee? Even the FT isn’t sure – and has two different versions in two editions (pictured). “Some of the world’s most prominent bankers have come out in favour of a global tax on banks,” says the first edition with a report from Patrick Jenkins in Davos. But later editions changed this to “a global bank wind-down fund” (ie, voluntary) and in the

James Forsyth

Polls aplenty

If we needed a reminder not to get overly excited about small variations in the opinion polls, it comes today with two surveys from the same pollster taken at pretty much the same time which return slightly different results. The YouGov survey for today’s Telegraph has the Tories on 38, down two, Labour on 31, up 1, and the Lib Dems on 19, up two. While the one for the People has the Tories on 40, Labour on 31 and the Lib Dems on 18. There are also two other polls that came out on Friday. Ipsos-Mori which had the Tories on 40, Labour up six to 32 and the

Fraser Nelson

I bear a charmed life, which must not yield to one of woman born

If Tony Blair were to go to the newsagents to day to see how his performance is being reported on the front pages, he’d be in for a pleasant surprise. He does not feature – certainly not in the biggest sellers. The extra-curricular activities of John Terry make the the lead story on the Mail, the Sun, the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mirror. Blair himself is relegated to the inside pages on most. Of all today’s press coverage, The Times is probably the most damaging. “Tony Blair was branded a murderer and a liar last night,”. But even Blair-hating papers like the Daily Mail find it hard to compete

Alex Massie

Help This Soldier

Warrant Officer Mac McGearey, who serves in the Royal Tank Regiment and is due to ship out to Afghanistan in June, has a blind daughter who contracted meningitis when she was just three days old. This left her blind and suffering from, one gathers, a range of other disabilities. At first Ciara, who is now 13, was educated at the Royal Blind School in Edinburgh. Then McGearey was posted to Suffolk. Now he and his family have been posted back to Edinburgh, the City Council is refusing to pay for his daughter to return to the Royal Blind School, insisting instead that she be enrolled at a different school that,

Andrew Gilligan

How can we punish Blair?

Readers may remember the Not The Nine O’Clock News parody of those Seventies current affairs programmes in which a professor and a social worker earnestly discussed teenage delinquency. Readers may remember the Not The Nine O’Clock News parody of those Seventies current affairs programmes in which a professor and a social worker earnestly discussed teenage delinquency. Expecting the usual concerned talk of deprivation, poor parenting, and high-rise flats, the interviewer was disconcerted to find both his guests averring that the only answer to youth criminals was to ‘cut off their goolies’. (It was perhaps funnier at the time — Britain then knew nothing of talk radio, or David Blunkett.) This

Peter Oborne

Time for a Major re-think

Instead of deriding John Major we should celebrate him, says Peter Oborne. His government was stunningly radical and initiated most of Blair’s so-called reforms Gordon Brown may be in terrible trouble but he and his allies have a defence strategy. However bad things are, they say it was much worse under John Major’s weak, hopeless and sleazy administration. I believe that the time has come to mount a serious challenge to this analysis and make the case for both Major and his government. It is becoming obvious, especially with the benefit of hindsight, that John Major was a formidable leader with substantial achievements to his credit. But the narrative of

Rod Liddle

We should not absolve Islam of the crimes committed in its name

Rod Liddle says it’s difficult to ignore the fact that the worst violations of human rights happen in countries dominated by an Islamic ideology A young girl in Bangladesh has been sentenced to 101 lashes for having become pregnant as a consequence of being raped. Her father will also have to pay a fine to the local Islamic savages who presided over the case. The rapist was pardoned by the village elders. The girl, who married shortly after the attack, has since been divorced in the usual peremptory Islamic manner. Yes, yes, I know; the point of journalism is to tell you things you didn’t know or might not have

Ken Costa

Should we break up the banks?

No The proposal on the American table is simple: break up the so-called super banks. To have the deposit-taking banks in one place, and the risk-takers (or proprietary traders) in another. The aim is laudable: that Main Street should not have to pay for Wall Street. This is, after all, the system which existed under Glass-Steagall, the Depression-era legislation. But that broke down, because finance became much more international, ingenious, complex and important. That global genie cannot be squeezed back into the national bottle — and if Obama tries, some genies may well bring their tax dollars here. The banking disease was not obesity but behaviour. Financial institutions got into

Harry Mount

Confessions of a middle-class anarchist

If Gordon Brown really wants to start appealing to the middle-class vote, he could start by picking up my rubbish. The bin bags outside my flat in Kentish Town, north London, weren’t collected for four weeks over Christmas because of the snow. When the foxes started to rip them apart and left a trail of chicken carcasses and half-chewed bread across my front garden, I cracked. Patching up the most damaged bag and strapping it to my handlebars, I pedalled along the snowy roads — if my bike could negotiate the streets, so could a rubbish truck, by the way — to my local park. There, I poured the rubbish