Society

Wednesday

Sarah Vine

Don’t cancel Diane Abbott

Browsing my local Oxfam, my eye was drawn to a faded hardcover with the title The Merry Wives of Westminster. As some readers may know, my Twitter handle is @WestminsterWAG, so I bought it for the princely sum of £2.99. It wasn’t until I got home and started reading it that I realised who the author was: Marie Belloc, sister of Hilaire, a successful novelist in her own right. Married to the Times journalist Frederick Lowndes, she died in 1947; this little book was published in 1946. She writes with clarity and confidence on the SW1 of her day, but what’s fascinating are the parallels with modern life: the money

Cosmo Landesman

I’m grey – and proud

In the wake of new research by New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine, scientists think a treatment for stopping our hair going grey – and even reversing it – may soon be possible. Their optimism is based on early positive experiments with mice, which is great news if you’re a mouse, but what if you’re a man over 60 and totally grey like me? Yes, women go grey too – but it’s different for them. The ones I know don’t make a big existential drama out of it the way men like me do. Women simply dye their hair or just let it go grey. Men panic and turn

Eva Vlaardingerbroek

Dutch farmers vs greens: why it matters

Amsterdam It’s not often that regional ballots in the Netherlands capture the attention of the international media. But last month that is exactly what happened. On 15 March, the so-called ‘provincial elections’ were held. Although technically these are regional, they also indirectly determine the composition of the Dutch senate – and, if the ruling parties lose their majority there, the chances of being able to pass legislation become very slim. It’s part of a larger conflict between the authoritarian green agenda and the silent majority paying for it all This time, however, the stakes were higher than ever – because, as incredible as it may sound, the Dutch government has

Dot Wordsworth

Why is ‘NPC’ an insult?

An 11-year-old boy is doing well after being stabbed at a Dollar Tree store in Mill Creek, Washington State. Dollar Tree is like a pound store and attracts poor folk. According to court documents the insult ‘NPC’ had been shouted at a man who has now been charged. My husband didn’t even say ‘What?’ when I told him, so for information I resorted to Veronica, who not so long ago counted as a young person. I was little the wiser to learn that NPC stood for non-playable character (or non-player character). The reference is to computer games, in which NPCs are, as it were, extras not controlled by the players.

Mary Killen

Dear Mary: should I ask guests to pay to charge their Tesla?

Q. My wife’s daughter and son-in-law and their family live about 40 miles away. Whenever they come to stay, he asks if he can use an electric socket to charge his new Tesla. Although he thanks me profusely for making a socket available, he does not offer to pay for the electricity. Were he to do so, I would decline the offer, but I do feel that it is discourteous of him to take it for granted that it is a gift. How can I get him to raise his game? – Name and address withheld A. There is a protocol to deal with this emerging dilemma. Electric car drivers must make

The Spectator

Who still smokes?

By George Keir Starmer was mocked for showing footage of Glasgow in a video he made to celebrate St George’s Day. But the legend of St George (who is, after all, also the patron saint of Georgia and Ethiopia) did not leave Scotland untouched.  – Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Aberdeen and Stirling all have churches dedicated to St George. St George’s Cross is an area of central Glasgow which gives its name to an Underground station and also boasts a statue of St George and the Dragon. Central Glasgow also had a St George’s Place, outside St George’s Church, but it has since been renamed Nelson Mandela Place. – There is

Nicholas Farrell

Meloni knows that immigration and fertility are linked

Ravenna, Italy Italy’s Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, met Rishi Sunak this week at the start of her two-day visit to Britain, as part of her mission to convince Europe that she’s a conservative not a fascist. Top of her agenda was the importance of continued military aid to Ukraine, but after that the two issues about which she hopes to be most persuasive are the ones that threaten Europe most: migrants arriving on boats, and Europe’s plummeting fertility rate. On the first of these, the small boat migrants, Italy is in deep trouble. Already this year, nearly as many illegal migrants have arrived there by sea as arrived in Britain

Andrew Haldane

Are we entering an unknowable future?

Neither of the UK’s main political parties is saying anything especially interesting about education. In an economy chronically short of skills – more than ten million people lack the skills they need to do their jobs effectively – that’s odd. The education cupboard is not entirely bare. Last week saw the latest instalment of the Prime Minister’s programme to support maths education to age 18. And a big number – more than £500 million – is being bunged at the UK’s numeracy problem through the government’s Multiply programme. This maths initiative has had its critics but, as vice-chair of the charity National Numeracy, I am not one of them. We

Mary Wakefield Mary Wakefield

Here’s why the NHS is broken

I was having tea with my neighbour in her second-floor flat when a man, a stranger, appeared in the room. This is quite a regular occurrence at Alice’s. She’s deaf and she can’t really walk so any number of agency staff have access to her front-door key. They materialise wearing gloves and usually a face mask, and because Alice relies on lip-reading she hasn’t a clue what they’re about to do to her. Is it bath time? Injection time? Oh, it’s fun to be housebound and old. This time the man had a clipboard which he consulted, then said: ‘We’re going to hospital.’ Alice turned to me: ‘What did he

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

The war on landlords is a plague on the economy

During a lull in the pandemic I rented a little flat in Oxford for the academic year I was thrilled to have been offered; then Covid came back, my college all but closed and I made so little use of my lodgings that it would have been cheaper per night to stay in a suite at Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons. As bills mounted, I learned that modern renting is astonishingly expensive – while for the landlord, I thought, it looked like easy money. So in the next phase of life, I became a buy-to-letter myself – and as I do the maths at the end of the tax year, I’m

The Spectator

Letters: what’s wrong with adoption?

The sins of the world Sir: Matthew Parris (‘Cross purposes’, 22 April) claims that Paul invented the Church’s teaching about redemption on the cross and that Christ was silent on the topic. This is simply not true. An obvious example is found in the gospel of Mark, chapter 10, verse 45: ‘For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’ But it is Jesus’s words of institution at the Last Supper which provide the most clear explanation of what his death would achieve: ‘This is my body which is given for you… This cup

Sam Leith Sam Leith

‘Everything is going to be turned upside down’: Michio Kaku on the new world of quantum computing

If you’ve ever wondered how an invisibility cloak would work, how to terraform Mars, how to make a forcefield, whether we’re living in a Matrix-like simulation or how far we are from a working teleportation device, Michio Kaku is your man. In books such as Physics of the Impossible, Physics of the Future and Parallel Worlds, Kaku combines the scientific chops of the theoretical physics professor he is with the gee-wow wonder of a sci-fi geek. That’s apt for someone who grew up worshipping at the twin altars of Albert Einstein and Flash Gordon. ‘It all started when I was eight,’ he says. ‘All the newspapers said that a great

Peter Jones

Twitter, Starmer and the madness of the mob

Elon Musk’s Twitter motto is Vox populi, vox Dei (‘The voice of the people, the voice of God’). This obviously appeals to the lawyer in Sir Keir Starmer since Twitter (being the voice of God) cannot be sued and therefore gives him scope to sail close to the wind. There is much he can learn from the example of the Romans. The mob is in full song on the walls of Pompeii. ‘Amplicatus, I know that Icarus is buggering you. Salvius wrote this’; ‘Phileros is a eunuch’; ‘Nero’s finance officer says the food here is poison’; ‘Secundus likes to screw boys’ and much else of this sort. Roman orators too

Lavatch

Solution to 2599: Slow to Change

The proverb reads ‘A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on’ (19/7/29/1D/8/10) by C.H. Spurgeon. The unclued lights at 13, 38 and 39 are BOOTS. First prize Janet Burke, Peterborough Runners-up Geoff Lee, London N1, Alan Connor, Kew, Twickenham

Lavatch

2602: Rolling Stones

Three unclued lights are a musician (two words) and a quotation of his (four words), which suggests the other six unclued lights, all anagrams of words of a kind (one of two words).  Across 8 Delaying intro, ace ruler (4) 11 Posh earl pokes you abroad in part of eye (6) 12 Bill eating corn in earnest (5) 17 I’m leaving rupees for Turkic speaker (5) 18 Cat heard in forest (5) 19 Sally’s Samoyed’s caught rabies (5) 21 Mist by lake in wood (5) 22 A hobo, on line, snaps here (5) 24 Energy field in Greek colony (4) 26 Tour of e.g. Ely finished (3,4) 27 A damp old

Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: poems with multisyllabic rhyme words

In Competition No. 3296, you were invited to provide a poem whose rhyme words are all at least three syllables. You riffed off W.S. Gilbert, Wordsworth and Dylan Thomas,among others, in limericks, double dactyls and villanelles, about subjects ranging from Gary Lineker to sex dolls. Philip Roe, Barbara Jones and Chris Ramsey shone, but the winners below take £25. The wisdom of Lord Bostock was, to say the least, debatable, For, shunning living ladies, he had purchased an inflatable. He took her home, unpacked her, and he used her energetically, Excitedly, delightedly, and finally frenetically. He never doubted she could bear the strain of his virility; She burst when he was

Luke McShane

No. 749

White to play. Grandelius-Aabling Thomsen, Xtracon Open 2018. White has just one winning move. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 1 May. 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 Bd5+. Depending on Black’s reply, it’s 2 Qc6# or 2 Qd2#. Last week’s winner Richard Doble, Conwy, Wales

Luke McShane

Reykjavik Open

This year’s Reykjavik Open attracted a record turnout of more than 400 players. The Icelanders’ affinity for chess is well established, and the Harpa Conference Centre is a beautiful playing hall looking over the waterfront. At the top of the seedings was Ukrainian luminary Vasyl Ivanchuk, but first place went to the affable Swedish grandmaster Nils Grandelius. He took the lead in the penultimate round. Abhijeet Gupta-Nils GrandeliusReykjavik Open, April 2023 53…Kf4 is tempting, but 54 Nb7 e4 55 Nc5 Bf5 56 Nxe4! secures a draw as the bishop can never force White’s king out from the a1-corner. In what follows, the sacrifice of knight for e-pawn is carefully avoided. 53…Bd5!

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 29 April 2023

The American multiple world champion Eric Rodwell is truly a legend of bridge. He and his former partner Jeff Meckstroth were the best pair in the world for so long that they were referred to simply as ‘Meckwell’. When he published his book The Rodwell Files: Secrets of a Bridge Champion 12 years ago, it quickly became a modern classic. I bought it a while ago, but only got round to starting it recently, and by coincidence, a friend told me he was reading it too. ‘I came across your name,’ he added. ‘Impossible!’, I replied, laughing at the idea. But he was convinced, so as soon as I got