Society Archives

Wednesday

30 Sep 2009

Roman Polanski’s Friends Should Probably Shut Up

Director Roman Polanski attends Che Tempo Che Fa TV Show held at RAI Studios on November 23, 2008 in MIlan. Photo: Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images. So, what about Roman Polanski, eh? Let me suggest that you can a) acknowledge that his arrest is scarcely an urgent priority, that b) there are questions to be asked about the original handling of the case, c) that the victim’s desire to see the matter dropped is noteworthy, though not of great legal import and that d) Polanski is probably not a threat to the public. Nonetheless, the rush to defend the film-maker has been nauseating. Consider Robert Harris’s piece in the New York

David Blackburn

Who is to blame for the Pilkingtons’ deaths?

I empathise with the jurors who decided the Pilkington case: it is impossible to make sense of this senseless episode. Yet society must ensure that the tragedy is not repeated. The jury, the Home Secretary and even the Opposition, up to a point, all blamed the police. Simon Jenkins’ piece in the Guardian savages the political Establishment’s refusal to address a democratic deficit, which has eradicated local civic leadership, a status quo that leaves the police caught between being a law enforcement force and an organisation that promotes community cohesion, a dual task that it is ill-equipped to perform. ‘Monday’s Leicestershire jury verdict on the Pilkington deaths was typical of

Peter Oborne

A new jihad in the Philippines

Very few outsiders ever venture into the Liguasan marshes, the remote inland sea which stretches across hundreds of square miles of the southern Philippine island of Mindanao. These marshes, for the most part approachable only by jungle tracks and navigable by shallow-bottomed boats, form the perfect hiding place for criminal gangs which make a good living by kidnapping businessmen from nearby towns and cities. The Liguasan marshes also provide a base for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), an insurgency which claims to speak for the native Bangsamoro people who were living in the Philippines long before the Spanish invasion in the 16th century. Despite repeated assaults, which have intensified

Anders Hultin

Profit is the key to success in ‘Swedish schools’

Anders Hultin, an architect of the Swedish government’s voucher system, says the Tories’ plan to emulate it will fail unless they encourage a new breed of education entrepreneurs For us Swedes, it is gratifying to see David Cameron put our free schools model at the heart of his reform agenda. He has chosen well. In a few short years, the voucher system has transformed education in Sweden and led to the creation of almost a thousand new schools. But the Conservative leader has failed to grasp a key aspect of their success. To flourish, these schools must be allowed to make a profit. This isn’t just one of a long

Tuesday

29 Sep 2009

James Forsyth

Policy-lite

Labour always likes to contrast Gordon Brown’s substance to David Cameron’s shallowness. But the briefing note that is sitting in the press room to explain the policies announced in Brown’s speech is, shall we say, rather brief at just three pages.

James Forsyth

Brown’s speech fails to convince Brighton

The mood here in Brighton is pretty flat. In contrast to last year, no one really believes that Gordon Brown’s speech has changed anything. I’m sure he’ll get a bit of a bump in the polls: a YouGov poll finds that 63 percent of viewers thought the speech was good or excellent. But Labour still lacks a coherent domestic policy message with which to go to the country. On a process point, I’m puzzled by why Labour had Brown speak today. They need to milk this conference for all it is worth and that means they should have had Brown speak on Thursday. They are going to find it far

Alex Massie

Gordon Brown Fail.

Gordon Brown’s speech to the Labour party conference this afternoon was, in its way, breathtaking. Breathtakingly shameless, mendacious, confused, contradictory, delusional, dishonest and irresponsible that is. It was also the speech of a Prime Minister resigned to defeat. Elections are won in the centre, not on the extremes. But Gordon’s speech was designed to appeal to the Labour base, not to Middle Britain. It was, then, designed to shore up existing support, not appeal to floating voters. It was for the left wing of the Labour party, not the Blairite voters who flocked to the party in 1997. Some of them left in 2001, still more stayed at home in

James Forsyth

Whatever you do in Brighton, don’t mention journalists

Labour activists don’t have much in common with Republican activists but they seem to agree on one thing: the media are loathsome. The hostility towards journalists from the delegates this week reminds me of being at Republican gatherings in 2008. When someone stood up at a fringe meeting yesterday and introduced themselves by saying ‘I am not a journalist’ they received a spontaneous and sustained round of applause. There is a perception that the media are biased and beneath contempt. Undoubtedly this is due in part to Andrew Marr’s inappropriate question to Brown on Sunday morning. But there is something deeper at work, a belief that the press are preventing

Alex Massie

The Enraging Case of DC Shepherd & DC Jarrett

The case of Leanne Shepherd and Lucy Jarrett – the job-sharing police constables whose child-minding arrangements have become a matter of some controversy* – rightly enrages all sensible folk. To recap: the two women are best friends and share a job, each working 20 hours a week. Their husbands, also policemen, work irregular shifts. Their daughters are essentially the same age. And also friends. So it makes a good deal of sense for them to pool resources and arrange for whichever woman isn’t working to look after both children. I dare say there are many women who had as convenient and elegant a solution to the child-care problem as that.

Fraser Nelson

It’s game over for Labour in Brighton

It feels like an Irish wake here at Labour party conference. People are happy to see each other, but sad at the circumstances of the gathering. I’m blogging this from the reception of Brighton Grand Hotel – the designated conference hotel is always the main venue for getting bladdered, and for nursing a morning hangover. It seems that every third person is a journalist. Ministers, who would once pass journalists aloofly, now stop to say hello. This is how oppositions behave. Talk turns quickly to the post defeat leadership election and the nightmares that await. I featured in a “meet some evil right wingers” freak show fringe meeting, chaired by

Alex Massie

Going Rogue: Sarah Palin Finishes Her Memoir

Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Good news, Palin fans: her memoir has beaten its deadline and will now be available in November! So you won’t have to wait until spring to read Going Rogue: An American Life. That’s an interesting title: perfect, absurd and perhaps a little bit revealing. Not the American Life bit since just about everyone* has enjoyed an “American Life” but the Going Rogue** bit. This either suggests that Palin still hasn’t appreciated the damage she eventually did to John McCain’s presidential campaign (damage for which McCain was, of course, largely responsible himself) or, and this seems more probable, that she does appreciate this and has decided that

Monday

28 Sep 2009

James Forsyth

An evening of two Milibands

Tonight offered the opportunity to compare and contrast the two Miliband brothers as they were interviewed one after the other by Steve Richards. Any comparison of their performances should recognise that Ed Miliband has the far easier brief. He gets to sound bold and green and the vast majority of Labour members agree with what he is trying to do. By contrast, David Miliband has to defend Iraq and Afghanistan. But having said that, Ed Miliband struck me as being far more impressive. He is more comfortable in his own skin and connects with the audience more. Indeed, watching Ed Miliband with a Labour audience is rather like watching David

Peter Hoskin

The Times: schoolgirl dies after cervical cancer jab

A few weeks ago, there were reports that thousands of schoolgirls were suffering “adverse reactions” to the controversial cervical cancer vaccine Cervarix. Now, the Times have found that a 14-year-old schoolgirl has died after being given the jab. And this when the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, along with the Department of Health, has said that the drug is essentially safe. This is clearly a serious and tragic story. Many questions will need answering, and, until they are, we will not have a complete picture of what has gone wrong and why. But, in the meantine, you suspect there could be significant political rammifications.

Peter Hoskin

It may not last long, but Brown will be happy with this boost

Over at UK Polling Report, Anthony Wells flags up a noteworthy poll boost for Labour. In YouGov’s daily tracker for Sky News, the party are up five points from last Friday’s tracker poll. Here are the headline numbers in full: Conservatives — 39 percent (down 1 percentage point since last Friday) Labour — 29 percent (up 5) Lib Dems — 20 percent (down 1) Now, several large caveats apply: this is only a momentary snapshot; you’d expect Labour to get a boost during their conference anyway; the Tories still have a significant lead; and Brown is still operating against a politically-toxic backdrop. But, ahead of his speech, this is still

Alex Massie

Liberal Measures That Need Rescuing By Tory (or Labour) Men

Charlotte Gore is entirely correct: Lib Dems have one killer policy: Set the threshold for Income Tax and National Insurance contributions at £10,000 a year (or roughly minimum wage). It’s so good Labour activists want their party to steal it. I wouldn’t be surprised if similar pressure is being put on David Cameron to do the same, although he won’t (tax cuts are for ‘Same Old Tories’ not modern, Compassionate With Your Money Conservatives)… Its painfully obvious that if you don’t take tax off people in the first place, you don’t need a monolithic, incompetent bureaucracy to then give it back again, wasting money for the sheer hell of it.

James Forsyth

Darling’s speech: updates from the conference hall

1204: The hall is relatively full for Darling. He starts off by talking about the big choice that faces the country, saying we have learned in the last year what a difference a government can make. 1206: Darling is trying to do the populist banker bashing, but his delivery is not right for it. From the right speaker, this could have been a real crowd pleaser. 1209: Darling keeps paying tribute to Brown’s global leadership. He says the UK economy will be growing again by the turn of the year. 1211: The usual litany of supposed Tory errors comes now. Darling talks about the need for the anabling hand of

The Spectator

CoffeeHousers’ Wall 28th September – 4th October

Welcome to the latest CoffeeHousers’ Wall. For those who haven’t come across the Wall before, it’s a post we put up each Monday, on which – providing your writing isn’t libellous, crammed with swearing, or offensive to common decency – you’ll be able to say whatever you like in the comments section. There is no topic, so there’s no need to stay ‘on topic’ – which means you’ll be able to debate with each other more freely and extensively. There’s also no constraint on the length of what you write – so, in effect, you can become Coffee House bloggers. Anything’s fair game – from political stories in your local

Martin Bright

Why Say it if You Won’t Act?

The only conversation I have had so far at Labour Party conference is about why everyone realises that Gordon Brown would do his comrades a great service by standing down but no one can find a way of getting him to do the right thing. The general feeling is that the Labour Party has the right answers to the economic crisis (this is the least you’d expect), but failing to get the message across. It is right that the British electorate should face a choice between two different strategies for tackling the economic crisis. But the arguments need to be made with equal force. Alistair Darling is emerging as an impressive purveyor

Alex Massie

The BNP, the BBC and a Sense of Perspective

Photo: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images. Fraser makes a number of excellent points in his latest post on the BNP and I also agree that Jack Straw is not a great choice to debate Nick Griffin. Straw is too self-righteous for the job and, despite his lefty past, neither the bruiser he thinks he is, nor possessed of the kind of rapier wit that will, gratifyingly, make the BNP appear as the ridiculous oafs they are. Nonetheless, it strikes me that there’s rather too much hand-wringing about Griffin’s appearance on Question Time. He leads, let us remember, a party that has never won an election that actually matters. Rather few than one

Kay Hare

Web exclusive: Bestival the spectacular

Festivals, like Marmite, you either love them or hate them. My last festival, in July, was Latitude in Norfolk, which has been described as the “Waitrose of Festivals”. When I was tracking down tickets for the Isle of Wight’s Bestival, a friend, Laura, who lives on the island and is an experienced festival go-er, described it as “a more traditional festival – and magical”. I was intrigued. Laura and I arrived late Friday evening, and were greeted by a spectacular sunset. It was warm and strangers smiled. From the top of the hill we looked down at a sea of colours, the landscape decorated with stars, balloons, flags