Society

Thursday

Doc

2416: Silence

The unclued lights share a common feature at least once, different in each case.   Across 7    Liechtenstein test about roses and orchids, say (6) 13    Dot’s second kiss (5) 14    Paragons left out for plans (5) 15    Shave with iodine in Eastern part of China (7) 17    Right to hold gun overturned? Confirmation’s needed (7) 18    Five hundred flourishing trees. Not here, surely? (6) 19    Publication, one for long-distance travellers (4) 25    Spandex — beautifully crafted clothes (5) 28    One sharing digs making call before tea (9, hyphened) 30    Realise when touring, English not required here (6) 33    Furniture store, one with NZ parrot (4) 36    German lad who’s watching

Jemma Wayne

Why the hype over women’s football isn’t all good news

I hate football. Wait, that’s a bit strong, I’ll rephrase: I have no interest in watching a bunch of grown men chase a piece of leather around a pitch while fans either wallow in devastation, or smugly taunt the opposition with their triumph: “we won!” You had nothing to do with it, mate. You were sat on the sofa. Perhaps my distaste comes from this weird tribalism. Perhaps it’s because, when I do watch these globally-revered footballers, they just don’t seem that good. I mean, if you’re paid that much and train that much, surely, when you take a penalty, you should never actually miss the target? But maybe there

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Will the House of Commons really change after the latest bullying report?

Gemma White QC clearly heard many shocking individual cases as she was working on her report into bullying and harassment of MPs’ staff. There are tales of sexual assault – ‘breasts being grabbed, buttocks being slapped, thighs being stroked and crotches being pressed/rubbed against bodies’ – and MPs demeaning and belittling their staff so much that their mental health collapsed. But what is most shocking is the way that this behaviour from members was regarded as a ‘necessary’ evil. White found that there was a culture where victims of bullying or harassment felt there was no point in complaining, either because it would be ‘career suicide’ or because they felt

Jonathan Ray Jonathan Ray

Château Beauchêne lunch review

Jonathan Ray reviews our recent Spectator Winemaker’s lunch with Amandine Bernard of Ch. Beauchêne Our most recent Winemaker Lunch was a rare occurrence in that nobody around the table once mentioned Brexit. A turn up for the books, given it’s usually amongst the most discussed topics. And one I’m more than happy to attribute to the quality of the wines on offer, thanks to which the dreaded b-word slipped our collective mind. Another achievement then for Chateau Beauchêne, whose owners – the Bernard family – have been making wine since the 18th century. Our host, Amandine Bernard, told us that the family’s first vineyard – purchased in 1794 – is

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

My campaign for fairer treatment

I am a football fan. Each fortnight I go to watch my club and, like the overwhelming majority of the football–supporting community, I do so peaceably, giving offence or threat to nobody. Sometimes I take boiled sweets. At halftime I might enjoy a chicken balti pie and a glass of lager. I do not lamp opposing supporters over the head with a bottle, or chase them around the back streets of the local area screaming: ‘I’m going to open you up like a can of peaches.’ Only a tiny minority of the football-supporting community do things like that, and so I am disinclined to consider them football supporters at all.

Mark Mason

Motorways

The first one was too straight. In the absence of a speed limit, early motorists on the M1 used the long sections without bends as racetracks. The record was set in April 1964 by two drivers testing their AC Cobra for Le Mans: they reached 185 mph. The following year new express trains appeared on the track next to the motorway, and some drivers tried to keep up with them. So the 70 mph limit was introduced. Subsequent motorways were built with curves even where they didn’t need them, purely to discourage speeding. As if driving itself wasn’t risky enough, some users of the new M1 stopped for picnics on

Roger Alton Roger Alton

Rocket’s science

A chum was in Waitrose a year or two back, and was bending down with some difficulty to look at the sandwiches when he realised the sprightly elderly chap next to him, eyeing up the cheese and celery, looked very familiar. It was the greatest tennis player of all time, the one and only Rod Laver, the Rockhampton Rocket himself. They had a pleasant chat, for the Rocket is nothing if not affable, and Laver agreed to call my pal’s tennis coach and say: ‘Hi, it’s Rod Laver here.’ The coach didn’t believe him, of course, but it was true. When you saw the ecstatic reaction of Centre Court last

Lucy Vickery

Twister

In Competition No. 3106 you were invited to submit a poem with an ingenious twist at the end. This challenge, a popular one, was deceptively tricky and while there were many accomplished and enjoyable entries, none of your twists truly blew my socks off. Douglas G. Brown, Max Gutmann and Martin Elster were unlucky runners-up. The six below take £25 each.   The deadly battle is renewed each morning; The enemy, entrenched within the field, Defeated for a while at each day’s dawning, Regroups by night, yet I shall never yield.   I arm myself with blades that need no honing To face the war that must be fought each

Lynn Barber

‘Duty howled’

We could all forget about Ann Widdecombe for the past nine years while she was doing Strictly Come Dancing and panto and Celebrity Big Brother and the rest. But now she has risen from the political grave to become a Brexit MEP. Tragically, it has meant cancelling her Christmas panto booking as Chop Suey in Aladdin, which she was hugely looking forward to, but ‘Duty didn’t just call,’ she says, ‘it positively howled.’ So now she is playing Chop Suey to Nigel Farage’s Aladdin. They certainly made an eye-catching entrance to their first plenary session in Strasbourg, turning their backs on parliament while the ‘Ode to Joy’ was played. And

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

Deutsche Bank is right to return to its domestic roots

Among the numbers attached to the restructuring of Deutsche Bank announced by Chief Executive Christian Sewing this week, the 18,000 job cull is most startling. But others tell the story just as vividly. First, the fact that the venerable institution, a pillar of Germany’s post-war economic resurgence, had raised €30 billion of new equity in the past decade in pursuit of a dream of becoming ‘Europe’s Goldman Sachs’ — but that sum is double its current shrivelled market capitalisation. Second, its most recent investment banking boss Garth Ritchie is leaving with an €11 million payoff, having collected ‘about €36 million’ over three years in which it became obvious his division

The Spectator

An absurd craze

From ‘Keeping fat’ by Geoffrey Wheatcroft, 7 October 1978: The running craze is a symptom of our deplorable age, in particular of our obsession with health, slimness, fitness and, above all, longevity. Jogging is not only undignified but absurd. It is a confession that people feel that they lead displeasingly unhealthy lives, but are not prepared to do anything preventative, rather than remedial, about it. The answer for someone who thinks that he is overweight is to eat less for a while, not to leap around at unseemly exercises. And the way to eat less is, simply, to eat less.

Harry Mount

Jog on

Forget the cigar, the homburg and the V-for-victory sign. If Winston Churchill were around today, he’d be pounding the streets in T-shirt, shorts and chunky trainers. Jogging is an almost compulsory obsession for any Tory alpha male. Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt are forever out running; Michael Gove has lost a drastic amount of weight racing around west London; and Boris has revealed he’s down to 15 and a half stone, from 16 and a half. He’s also declared he’d freeze obesity taxes on fattening food — the answer to losing weight was more exercise, he said — and admitted to failing to keep up a vegan diet (he likes

Tuesday

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

With Jeremy King

31 min listen

Jeremy King, one half of the restaurateurs Corbin and King, is behind some of the most iconic restaurants in London, including the Ivy, the Delauney, and Fischers. In this episode, he talks about why he left banking for hospitality, how he redecorates restaurants according to their architectural influences, and people watching in his establishments.

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Hancock given hard time over sugar tax and social care

On the subject of MPs who hope Boris Johnson might give them a job, Matt Hancock was before the Health Select Committee this afternoon, where he ended up taking a fair bit of flak for what the current government hasn’t done, and what the next administration might do. After his own failed leadership bid, the Health and Social Care Secretary backed Johnson, which made for a very awkward section in today’s hearing about the sugar tax. Hancock was repeatedly pressed on Johnson’s pledge to review ‘sin taxes’, including the one on sugary drinks, and he repeatedly answered that the most important thing was to look at the evidence behind the

Geoffrey Alderman

Are British universities institutionally racist?

How genuine and inclusive are complaints about institutional racism affecting non-white academics and students in British universities? To find out, over the past half year I’ve made it my business to attend academic conferences (four in all) focused or largely focused on alleged racism at UK universities and the experience of Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) students and staff. I had been shocked by the insistence of my colleagues and peers that racism on university campuses is not merely alive and well, but flourishing and growing. Could this be possible, when it seems that every UK higher education institution has draconian policies and procedures in place to combat racism? I am

Monday

Douglas Murray

The three unanswered questions from the Roger Scruton hit job

The New Statesman has apologised to Sir Roger Scruton. In a statement published on its website, the magazine has admitted that in April this year its deputy editor, George Eaton, tweeted out ‘partial quotations’ from an interview with the philosopher ‘including a truncated version’ of a quotation. The New Statesman has further admitted that the effect of this quote-tampering was that: The views of Professor Scruton were not accurately represented in the tweets to his disadvantage.  We apologise for this, and regret any distress that this has caused Sir Roger. It is good of the New Statesman to finally admit what any fair observer has known for months. And to catch up with what I revealed on the

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

Economic Disruptor of the Year Awards 2019 – the regional finalists

We’re pleased to announce the regional finalists for The Spectator’s Economic Disruptor of the Year Awards 2019, sponsored by Julius Baer. We were delighted to receive some 50 per cent more entries this year — including many more from the regions outside London and the South. Business sectors represented range from fintech to funerals, and from ‘big data’ to dating. The full set of entries illuminates how entrepreneurs are addressing today’s pressing social and environmental issues, whether that be food waste and sustainable packaging, or the decline of town centres and the shortage of affordable housing, or the need for greater efficiencies in the NHS. When we launched the Economic

Steerpike Steerpike

The New Statesman apologises to Roger Scruton

It’s been three months since the housing tsar and philosopher Sir Roger Scruton was sacked from the government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful commission after he gave an interview to the New Statesman’s George Eaton, in which several of his quotes about China and Hungary were taken out of context. Now, after a lengthy inquiry into the controversial interview, it looks like the New Statesman has finally issued an official response. In a statement posted online today, with the simple title of ‘Sir Roger Scruton’ (and burrowed away at the bottom of their homepage), the political magazine has acknowledged that the full context was not given to Scruton’s quotes, and has