Society

Thursday

Why Leavers should support a border in the Irish Sea

Would it really be so terrible if there were checks at the Irish Sea instead of at the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland? Such checks could be carried out without threatening the constitutional status of Northern Ireland as part of the UK. Some say that there should be no differences between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK but there are already differences of the most fundamental kind. The Belfast Agreement accepts that if the majority of people in Northern Ireland vote to join the republic then the UK government will not stand in their way. There is also a British-Irish Council which gives the Irish Government a

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

The real reason snobs are calling for a Ryanair boycott

If you had to draw up a list of people and things it is de rigueur to loathe, it would definitely include Ryanair. Tabloid newspapers, Jeremy Clarkson, Brexit, red-hued men who pop up in the Question Time audience to moan about Jeremy Corbyn, and Ryan-bloody-air — these are things that every self-respecting member of the chattering class must bristle against. And that is why one moral error made by a Ryanair crew member has led to demands for the entire company to be boycotted. ‘Let’s all boycott this airline!’, the right-on have cried in response to a racist incident on a flight being badly handled by an attendant. Yeah, right,

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

What I learned at the People’s Vote march

Two beliefs obsess the Remain cause. First, that voters were lied to during the referendum campaign. (Questionable). Second, that the negotiations are being botched. (Indisputable). But while Remainers believe that their opponents are fibbers, they can’t see that they too are being misled. At the People’s Vote rally last Saturday, I found general acceptance of these four myths. 1. Brexit is a ‘far-right’ policy. 2. Europe will be closed to Britons after we leave. 3. The EU is run by saints who negotiate in good faith. 4. A second vote will heal the divisions caused by Brexit. The rally was vast and good-tempered. Many demonstrators had come to be photographed

John R. MacArthur

All the rage | 25 October 2018

My father, an avowed liberal, taught me old-school manners: hold the door and give up your seat for ladies; stand up when anyone, male or female, enters the room or approaches you at a social gathering; extend your hand in greeting; listen politely when others speak. My mother issued similar instructions in French, and as a consequence I almost never fail to say bonjour before I address a French merchant or telephone operator. Now 93, she recently admonished me that ‘one shouldn’t make fun of people for being incapable of doing this thing or that thing’. So it’s come as a rude surprise that good manners and polite behaviour seem

Lionel Shriver Lionel Shriver

The march of the migrants poses a dilemma for the US

Trump has hinted that Democrats may have been secretly funding the ‘caravan’ of more than 7,000 Honduran immigrants trooping towards the United States. I don’t think so. In the lead-up to the midterms, if any party would sponsor by far the largest organised mass migration to the US on record, Republicans would. For politically, the spectacle is a gift. Thousands of clamorous would-be asylum seekers crammed onto a bridge with no toilets, stampeding, breaking into fights, demanding to cross the Mexican border, the better to gatecrash the US: it was a premier photo op for anti-immigration Republicans. Trump has threatened to close the American border and bring in the military.

Colin Freeman

Homage to Ambazonia

 Calabar, Nigeria Simon Ngwa is a gentle and polite man, and he apologised to me first for what he was about to say. ‘I’m sorry if this upsets you, but we in Cameroon are very bitter towards Britain,’ he said. ‘As a child, I was taught to look up to the British Crown as a symbol of fair play and the Queen as a guarantor of moral values. But Britain is doing nothing to stop this genocide.’ Mr Ngwa and I had our conversation in a shabby refugee centre in the Nigerian town of Calabar, on Cameroon’s western frontier. Despite his impeccable manners, Mr Ngwa is a wanted man back

Rory Sutherland Rory Sutherland

Why the four-day week could work

Most people were scandalised by John McDonnell’s proposal to promote a four-day working week. But before we get incensed about giving people more leisure during their working life, we need to ask another question. If it really is so vital to the economy that people spend more time at work, then why does the government spend £41 billion every year (a third of the cost of the NHS) providing tax relief on pension contributions? This merely encourages older and more experienced employees to leave the workforce several years earlier than necessary. Remember, five years needlessly spent in retirement is 20 years that could have been spent enjoying a working life

Bruce Anderson

Searching for God in the twilight

My friend Jonathan Gaisman recently gave rise to a profound philosophical question concerning wine. Jonathan is formidably clever. He has a tremendous reputation at the Commercial Bar. Although he brushes aside any compliments from the unqualified, there was a recent case — Excalibur — where his performance won the awed approval of lawyers to whom even he might concede quasi-peer status. They aver that his preparation was exemplary, his cross-examination ruthless and relentless; his triumph total. That said, he is anything but a monoglot lawyer. Not only a music lover but a musicologist, modesty alone would prevent him from claiming that Nihil artium a me alienum. Among the minor arts,

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

Was your Halloween costume woke?

Halloween used to be easy. It was a fancy-dress party: you could wear whatever you liked. The idea was to have fun. As teens, my friends and I would dress up as ghouls, spiders or witches, with cones of black paper on our heads. When we became more mature, Halloween turned into a tarty affair. We thought this seemed authentic, somehow all-American. Our costumes became flimsier and more flammable. One girlfriend made a habit of always going dressed as ‘sexy cat’. Inevitably, somebody would dress as a zombie Princess Diana or Amy Winehouse, or another celebrity who had died unpleasantly. The more risqué the better. I was once served a

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Mad about the beast

Richmond Park is an eerie place at this time of year. It’s not just that it’s the deer rutting season, when huge stags fight over their harems, charging heavily about the misty grassland and bellowing as they go. It’s also the herds of photographers looming out of that mist, as strange as the prehistoric cries of the deer. Deer rutting is one of the most spectacular sights of autumn, and if you’re an amateur wildlife photographer like me, it’s hard to resist the attraction of rising early to photograph a 200kg monster roaring into the dawn. I did just that last week, pedalling my way to the park in the

Lucy Vickery

Accentuate the negative | 25 October 2018

In Competition No. 3071 you were invited to supply a demotivational poem.   This was your opportunity to come up with a bracing antidote to the world-view peddled by an eye-wateringly lucrative self-help industry that feeds on a mix of insecurity and the aspirational narcissism du jour.   You came at the challenge from various angles, but the opening to Tracy Davidson’s entry speaks for many:   It doesn’t matter what you do in life, It’s just a constant loop of pointless shite.   Honourable mentions go to Adrian Fry’s paean to the power of no and to Douglas G. Brown’s 21st-century spin on Longfellow’s ‘Psalm of Life’. The winners,

Jonathan Ray Jonathan Ray

Wine Club 27 October

Esme Johnstone of FromVineyardsDirect.com is nothing if not well connected. Nobody has their ear closer to the Bordeaux ground than he does and so it is that FVD hear about and snaffle up all manner of vinous goodies that either escape the notice or the clutches of their rivals. Their celebrated ‘declassified’ or ‘defrocked’ clarets are prime examples. Hailing from some of Bordeaux’s finest estates (which, sadly, I can’t name but can hint at), the wines come from the same vineyards and winemaking teams that produce the estates’ fabled grand vins. In short, they boast impeccable pedigrees. The 2011 Saint-Estèphe (1) has unimpeachable provenance, hailing as it does from the

Wednesday

Sam Leith Sam Leith

Books Podcast: how genes can predict your life

In this week’s Books Podcast I’m talking to the behavioural geneticist Robert Plomin about his new book Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are, in which he argues that it’s not only height and weight and skin colour that are heritable, but intelligence, TV-watching habits and likelihood of getting divorced. I asked him about the risks he takes publishing this book, the political third rail of race and eugenics, and what his discoveries mean for the future of our data and for medical care. You can read Kathryn Paige Harden’s review of Blueprint, meanwhile, in this week’s magazine.

Andrew Montford

Why so-called ‘earthquakes’ shouldn’t stop fracking in Lancashire

So, just a week after starting work on releasing the gas trapped in the shales beneath Lancashire, energy company Cuadrilla Resources decided to stop work, at least for the rest of the day. Soon after they had started pumping water into the rocks a mile below the surface, there were a series of microseismic events – tiny earth tremors. The green blob and their friends in the mainstream media were waiting, and quickly launched their habitual barrage of moral indignation. The Metro, for example, breathlessly reported that nearby Blackpool had been ‘hit by four earthquakes’. The Guardian was likewise certain that these were ‘earthquakes’. Watching seismologists were much amused at

Katy Balls Katy Balls

What the 48 ‘no confidence’ letters speculation is missing

The speculation that Theresa May is perilously close to the 48 letters required for a confidence vote has – as Steerpike documents here – been going on for some time. That’s not to say it won’t happen. Morale is at low point within the party. But as a consequence of that, the sheer number of downcast MPs means that if May’s critics really wanted a confidence vote this week they could make it happen. There are over 48 MPs unhappy with May’s leadership – and who think the party would be better off with a new leader. For example, the StandUp4Brexit campaign group alone has now had 50 MPs publicly

Tuesday

Spectator Money

Best Buys: One-year fixed rate bonds | 23 October 2018

Savers who are looking for a fixed return on their cash but who don’t want to invest over the longer term will be pleased by latest research conducted by moneyfacts.co.uk, which shows a vast improvement to rates offered on one-year fixed bonds in the last two years. Here are some of the best bonds on the market right now.

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Why James Dyson isn’t a hypocrite for manufacturing in Singapore

Remainers’ first response to the news that James Dyson will build his new electric car in Singapore was to accuse him of hypocrisy. Here is a man who expects others to be patriotic, goes the argument, and yet when it comes to his own interests he dumps Britain and takes his business elsewhere. But those who try to make such accusations miss the point entirely. James Dyson has never argued for a protectionist, Britain-first policy. On the contrary, he has always argued for free and open markets. He just happens to think that those markets should extend beyond the borders of Europe. Singapore has won Dyson’s business because it offers

Matthew Lynn

The real problem with the Saudis’ ‘Davos in the Desert’

At this rate, there’s going to be a very empty hospitality tent, and a heck of a lot of canapés left over in Saudi Arabia. One by one, the bigwigs of the business and financial worlds have been pulling out of the Saudi investment conference, dubbed ‘Davos in the Desert’, which opened today. The reason? They are protesting against the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey. Of the 150 high-profile speakers lined up for the event, more than 40 have dropped out, and media partners such as Bloomberg, the FT and CNN have withdrawn their support. Those that are still making the trip have come under a lot of

Monday

Dominic Green Dominic Green

Life ‘n’ Arts Podcast: History and Ism’s with David Pryce-Jones

In this week’s Spectator USA Life ’n’ Arts podcast, I’m casting the pod with David Pryce-Jones. Novelist, correspondent, historian, editor at National Review and, most recently, author of the autobiography and family history Fault Lines, Pryce-Jones has the longest association with the Spectator of any Life ’n’ Arts podcaster yet. In 1963, Pryce-Jones began his literary journey to the status of national treasure on both sides of the Pond by becoming books’ editor of our London mothership. ‘My past seems unbelievable. I can’t explain it to myself, let alone anyone else,’ Pryce-Jones says. Now into his ninth decade, he is a living history of modern letters, and a key witness

Sunday

Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: When I grow up I want to be…

The performance poet Megan Beech was so incensed by the abuse heaped by Twitter trolls on her idol Mary Beard that she wrote a poem called ‘When I Grow Up I Want to Be Mary Beard’ (‘an academic and a classy lady to boot’). With this in mind, I invited you to provide a poem with the same title but substituting your own choice for Professor Beard. Another classicist, the esteemed Peter Jones, was the object of W.J. Webster’s affection. Otherwise it was an eclectic entry that ranged from the Dalai Lama to Donald Trump. Commendations to Alan Millard, Douglas G. Brown and Paul Carpenter, who wants to be Rod