Society

In this week’s Spectator USA Life ‘n’ Arts podcast, I’m casting the pod with Sir Roger Scruton, the knight of the living philosophers. Of course, Scruton is more than a philosopher. He has written widely and well on subjects as various as wine and Wagner, fox-hunting and free trade, and he has three new books out this month. The philosopher has Conservatism: An Invitation to the Great Tradition. The musician — there are two pianos at hand in Scruton’s study — has an essay collection, Music as an Art. And the fiction writer has his second collection of short stories, Souls in the Twilight. One of the pleasures of talking

It has long been accepted in Westminster, including by those who were actually in the Ministry of Justice when it took place, that the privatisation of the Probation Service hasn’t worked very well. That’s putting it mildly, as today’s report from HM Inspectorate of Probation shows. The report found that in seven out of 10 cases, private probation companies were providing ‘inadequate’ protection for victims of domestic abuse when their abusers return to the community. Probation officers were handed impossibly weighty workloads of up to 60 cases each, and the implications of this were that fewer than a third of offenders were referred to what are known as ‘perpetrator programmes’

The most recent challenge was to submit an ode to a piece of sporting equipment. There is a long and distinguished tradition of verse inspired by sport, going all the way back to Pindar’s odes celebrating ancient Greek athletic achievement. (As London mayor, Boris Johnson commissioned a poem in the style of Pindar to mark the opening of the 2012 Olympic Games.) Some entries adopted the grand ceremonial tone and structure of classical odes Pindaric, Horatian or Sapphic. Others took the more modern, anything-goes route. Ian Barker and Philip Machin earn an honourable mention, as does Adrian Fry’s clever, Kipling-esque entry. The winners below are rewarded with £25 each. Sylvia

Donald Trump campaigned as an unrepentant protectionist and, on the face of it, he has lived up to his word. He has torn up the US-Pacific free- trade partnership, threatened the European Union with trade wars and imposed tariffs on billions of dollars’ worth of imports from China. As you might expect, Beijing’s retaliation has been immediate — as has the damage. American cherry growers, for example, estimate that they have lost about $85 million after suffering retaliatory surcharges. Farmers are now having to be bailed out by the US government. Yet this week Trump has doubled down, introducing tariffs on another 6,000 Chinese imports. When China responds in kind,

I’m afraid Brexit has always been about Ireland. Perhaps Salzburg will finally, brutally, illustrate that point. The Spectator declared its support for Leave in the final week of the 2016 referendum campaign. The editorial arguing in favour of a leave vote hinged not on free trade, but sovereignty: which is a different way of saying control. It did not mention Ireland at all – but very few did. It was of marginal interest. I read that leader in Downing Street, where I then worked. I did not then, and do not now, agree with the sovereignty argument – but I can respect it. Since EU membership necessarily involves compromising on pure national

It seems that everyone, young or old, has a smartphone these days. But why are the brightest in Silicon Valley taking screen time away from their children? Have they realised that we’re addicted? Also on this podcast, Tory MEPs recently voted in favour of the Viktor Orbán government in European Parliament. Are British Tories flirting with the far right? If they are, it could be because the Conservative Party has no attractive policies. Should we return to One Nation Toryism? First, it’s time for a wake-up call. Smartphones now seem so attached to us that they may as well be organically grown. Both adults and children are addicted, and it’s