Society

Wednesday

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The personal faith of PMs

I have seen it suggested that because Rishi Sunak is a Hindu, it would be wrong for him to have any role in the appointment of bishops in the Church of England. This is a non-sequitur. So long as the C of E remains the church by law established, its main appointments must, in formal terms, be made by the Supreme Governor of that church, the monarch, ‘on advice’. That advice, though informed by the views of the hierarchy, must be tendered by the Prime Minister. Gordon Brown, when prime minister, tried to shuffle off these responsibilities, perhaps feeling rather Presbyterian about them; but this does not work. If the Church of

Taki

New York’s new normal

New York Ms Geniece Draper is a Noo Yawker who has been in the news lately. She is a 40-year-old with modern Bagelite manners, and by that I mean they are not exactly those of, say, C.Z. Guest or Babe Paley, two ladies who are no longer with us but whose presence in drawing rooms we could rather desperately do with. Ms Draper is angry as hell and has declared she will not take it any more. She was recently charged with grand larceny and petit larceny for snatching a wallet from a Manhattan man. Nothing strange about that: it’s an everyday occurrence in the city that never sleeps. In

The Spectator

Letters: What to do with the Elgin Marbles

Sculpting a solution Sir: Noel Malcolm’s article ‘Relief fund’ (22 October) rightly suggests that legislators should consider the issue of the Parthenon sculptures seriously. Yet the article does little in the way of advancing a meaningful solution. What makes The Parthenon Project unique and not just ‘the latest in a sequence’ is that it offers a real, viable way of breaking the impasse on a centuries-old debate. Its proposal of a win-win solution involving the return of the sculptures to Athens and the establishment of a rotating exhibition of Greek artefacts in London is new but already changing minds – including my own. A positive, collaborative solution would also say

Dot Wordsworth

Why ‘great’ should be used with great caution

Sir Keir Starmer told his party conference last month that a Labour government would within a year set up a publicly owned company to be called Great British Energy. Perhaps it was thought to have a ring of the popular Great British Bake Off. (The series is called The Great British Baking Show in America because a company running competitive bake-offs there since 1949 claimed commercial ownership of the term.) I’m not sure that all the echoes of Great British Energy are entirely positive. Great British Public has been in use, chiefly ironically, since 1833, when the popular novelist Catherine Gore, known simply as Mrs Gore, wrote in The Sketch

Julie Burchill Julie Burchill

The myth of the jolly fat man

After last week’s revelation that James Corden was banned from a New York restaurant for being repeatedly horrible to staff, I’ve been considering the different way fat men and fat women are viewed. Fat men are invariably seen as jolly – who can imagine a thin Father Christmas? – despite the rollcall of porky evil, from Fatty Arbuckle, abuser of women, to Cyril Smith, abuser of boys. If they are well–connected drunks, fat men may also be called ‘bon viveurs’ whereas fat women are seen as ‘eating their feelings’ at best, being lazy and thick at worst. When they’re not helping themselves to thin girls, many fat men feel they

Alexander Downer

The threat to Britain’s undersea cables

‘In the digital age of cloud computing, the idea that steel and plastic pipes are integral to our life seems anachronistic,’ wrote Rishi Sunak. ‘But our ability to transmit confidential information, to conduct financial transactions and to communicate internationally all depend upon a global network of physical cables lying under the sea.’ And what if those cables are cut? ‘The threat is nothing short of existential.’ Sunak wrote those words five years ago in a paper for the thinktank Policy Exchange. Last weekend, as he was running to become prime minister, he was proven right. The Shetland Islands lost phone and internet connections after the cable that links the islands

Mary Killen

Dear Mary: Should I give weekend guests paper napkins or napkin rings?

Q. I have a hatred of paper napkins – eating outside, they blow away; inside, people drop them on the floor and my dogs chew them, making a horrid mess. I love the old-fashioned way of giving weekend guests napkin rings but our friends tend to drink too much and can’t remember which is theirs! We have a lot of people staying for Christmas – what is the answer? – A.E., Pewsey A. Many companies now will embroider names on to pretty napkins which you can give your guests on Christmas Eve and not only can they keep them for the whole festival holiday but they can take them home

Louise Perry

Why the next wave of feminism is conservative

At a recent dinner, an MP told me a story that reveals a great deal about the current state of feminism. One of her constituents had come to her surgery in some distress. She had children at a local primary school, she said, and had been alarmed to discover that the school’s sex education curriculum contained explicit details that she considered wildly inappropriate. She was aware of the prevailing culture in which adolescents – particularly girls – are sexualised at an ever younger age, and she did not want that for her own children. But parents are increasingly powerless in the face of progressive schools, and not having been to

The Spectator

The economic storm ahead is losing some of its power

When Russia invaded Ukraine in February, German protesters lined the streets holding placards saying ‘Better a cold shower than Putin’s gas’. Their resolve was soon to be tested: energy costs surged and Berlin’s longstanding policy of relying on Russian gas started to cost the country dear. Germany set itself the hugely ambitious target of having its gas stores 95 per cent full by November, a policy that remained even after Moscow turned off the Nord Stream pipeline. It seemed a near-impossible target. But this target has now been met ahead of schedule. German gas usage is down by about a third after major changes to industry. With the panic over,

Toby Young Toby Young

At last, a PM I can look down to

Rishi Sunak’s victory is a testament to how much progress we have made on the equalities front. As recently as 25 years ago, someone with his characteristics could never have become prime minister. Yet in today’s Britain, being a member of an historically disadvantaged minority is no impediment to success. I’m thinking, of course, of his height. As one wag joked on Twitter, the shortest-serving prime minister in British history has been succeeded by the shortest serving prime minister in British history. As a vertically challenged man myself, I take great comfort from this. Positive role models are few and far between in the modern world. In film and television

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Is Rishi ready? Sunak’s first test will be getting through winter

It is the most remarkable turnaround in recent political history. On 5 September, Rishi Sunak lost the Tory leadership race to Liz Truss with 43 per cent of the vote. He was written off as another politician with a brilliant future behind him. Seven weeks later, the former Chancellor – whom, I should say, I have been friends with for many years – walked through the door of No. 10. His political resurrection was made possible by the economy. He spent the summer warning of the risk of slashing taxes without having a grip on inflation and controlling spending. When Truss followed through on her tax-cutting campaign pledges – adding

Peter Jones

The privations of Diogenes

Nine exceedingly passive ‘activists’ glued themselves to the floor of a Volkswagen factory in Germany and complained about being humiliated, left overnight in the cold and the dark and without ‘facilities’. Should they not have rejoiced at such deprivations to which the whole world ought, in their view, to accustom itself if it is to be saved? The ancient cynics could teach these narcissists a thing or two. ‘Cynicism’ derives from the ancient Greek kuôn, ‘dog’, the epitome of shamelessness. Diogenes (c. 410-320 bc) agreed, admitting that he lived in accordance with nature rather than custom and arguing that human conventions – marriage, family, politics, reputation, wealth, power, etc –

Jacob Rees-Mogg

It’s good to be back on the back benches

After the shale gas vote, I was literally sent to Coventry – to visit the UK Battery Industrialisation Centre. It is a remarkable facility that helps take batteries from development through to production. It means companies only need the hundreds of millions of pounds in investment once they have shown that their product works and is saleable. It was funded by the Faraday Battery Challenge, and I was there to announce a further £221 million of taxpayers’ money. This is one of the rather better ways the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy spends money, while some of our policies seem designed to ruin industry. I am particularly concerned

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Sunak in No. 10, pasta gets pricier and Russia hits Ukraine’s energy grid

Home Rishi Sunak, aged 42, became Prime Minister. At the weekend Boris Johnson had flown back from a holiday in the Dominican Republic in response to the resignation of Liz Truss. She said she could not ‘deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative party’. The 1922 Committee devised a hurdle of 100 nominations for any MP to be considered as leader, with secret ballots of MPs and, if two candidates remained, an online vote by party members. It was thought that if Mr Johnson secured 100 votes, the membership would elect him. At 9 p.m. on Sunday, the day before nominations closed, he withdrew from the

Luke McShane

Losing their heads

Chess players tend to fidget while they think. They crack their knuckles, stir their coffee, and bounce their legs. I have watched Boris Gelfand and Daniil Dubov twiddling a captured pawn in their fingers, with notable dexterity, despite being deep in thought. It’s a common tic, so when Sam Sevian reached out to pick up a piece while contemplating the position shown in the first diagram, I presume the motion was entirely unconscious. But it was odd for several reasons. First, it wasn’t Sam’s move, and the unwritten etiquette is to refrain from fiddling while the opponent is thinking. Stranger still, his outstretched hand didn’t settle on a stray pawn.

Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: Samuel Pepys on Liz Truss

In Competition No. 3272, you were invited to imagine a well-known diarist, real or fictitious, commenting on contemporary events. This month marks the 40th anniversary of the debut of adolescent diarist Adrian Mole, and several competitors imagined what he would have made of these turbulent times. Here’s Janine Beacham: ‘I have tested positive for Covid, worse luck! All that hand-washing, social distancing and mask-wearing was for nothing. This is what comes of living in a cul-de-sac.’ Hats off to Sylvia Fairley’s Bridget Jones for her ability to find a silver lining: ‘Perpetua at her most obnoxious. Excellent news, mortgage on her millionaire home cancelled, thanks to fiscal catastrophe. Bought more

The Spectator

2576: After Eleven – solution

The unclued lights are names of the men who followed Armstrong and Aldrin (Apollo 11) in walking on the moon First prize Glynn Downton, Maidstone, Kent Runners-up D.V. Jones, Llanfair Caereinion, Powys; John Kitchen, Breachwood Green, Herts

Mr Magoo

2579: Destructive plot

One unclued entry (three words) gives the theme, and five others give two-word names directly connected with it. Remaining unclued entries give two examples of the theme phrase, one of two words and one of three. Across 1 US underdogs willingly bring moggies under control? (4,4) 7 I’m sorry, love, to get info about daughter (2,4) 12 Deciphered name in pastry (2,5) 13 Man on board captures a wild ass (5) 14 Money-changing involves plunder, to be expected in studying growth (14) 19 Society protected arch in Edinburgh (4) 20 With DA, this youth would be old-fashioned (3) 22 One who sails along with fabled reindeer (6) 23 Frugal, not

Luke McShane

No. 726

White to play. Salov-Horvath, Groningen 1983. In this treacherous rook and pawn endgame, White found the only winning move. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 31 October. 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 Nd5! Qxd2 2 Nc7#. But not 1 Nb5 Qb6! Last week’s winner John Boyd, Ashtead, Surrey