All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
We had a sell-out debate on global warming at The Spectator on Tuesday and, as I found out this morning, the debate is still going on. The teams were led by Nigel Lawson and Sir David King, and I was in the audience. I tweeted my praise of Simon Singh’s argument as he made it:
The lack of weaponry is not the only problem plaguing the Libyan rebel forces. Their disordered retreat reveals that they need training, better organisation and in-theatre liaison and support. From what I saw, the Transitional Council is very well organised politically, but there is a general lack of military cohesion. Youthful volunteers and self-armed families
Good to see that Tim Montgomerie is keeping his peepers peeled on this, producing his latest edition of Sell-Out Watch* today. He concludes: The Coalition is still doing plenty of very important things that Conservatives can be very proud of. The budget eradication plan. Lower corporation tax. Welfare reform. A massive increase in the number
Back in Cairo, I try to find answers to what everyone wants to know. Who are the Muslim Brotherhood? What role will the Muslim Brotherhood play in the future? Even to seasoned observers it seems hard to divine. Their support in the country has never been tested and the constitutional referendum, where the brotherhood was
The drama over Durham’s Zurbaran paintings has reached an extraordinary conclusion — and one that is revealed exclusively in this week’s Spectator. The protest against the Church of England’s proposed sale had snowballed into a national campaign, with Jeremy Hunt calling for them to be “enjoyed by the public.” Today we can disclose that they
Moussa Koussa, one of Gaddafi’s closest henchmen, has given himself up in Britain. He left Tripoli supposedly on a diplomatic mission, but arrived in Britain declaring that he “no longer wanted to serve the regime”. This development suggests that the regime is crumbling and pundits opine that the balance has now tipped against Colonel Gaddafi.
Hypocrisy is a necessary condition of leadership in a large, modern democracy. Not just there either, now that I think of it. That’s often obviously the case in foreign affairs and clearly so in our present Libyan adventure. It is quite a remarkable undertaking, based on the most remarkable set of circumstances and thanks to
The Alternative Vote isn’t a great voting system but neither is First Past the Post. I suspect inertia and boredom and a lack of outrage will help swing the day for the status quo in the end. Neither side has impressed during the campaign thus far. Claims that AV is some kind of elixir that
Relations between the coalition partners are fraught at present, more of which in the column tomorrow. The main cause of this tension is the AV referendum which is pitting the two sides against each other in an increasingly bitter fight. But even by recent standards, Chris Huhne’s response to the Tory chairman Sayeeda Warsi’s claim
Good afternoon. I’d like to thank you all for coming to this godforsaken hell hole – sorry, I mean, Ed’s constituency. Believe it or not, I once expressed an interest in becoming the Labour MP for Doncaster North, but as soon as Ed heard about it he tossed his hat into the ring. Funny that.
The Auk and the Desert Fox ride again. As in 1941-2, the military position along on Libya’s northern coastal road is extremely fluid. After the celebrated rebel gains over the weekend, Gaddafi has counter-attacked without remorse. Skirmishes escalated yesterday and now the rebels are in full retreat (£) from the strategically vital oil town of
Cameron was at pains to disguise it, but his impatience finally gave way at PMQs today. What a contrast with the last 24 hours. The nemesis of Gaddafi, the terror of Tripoli, the champion of the rebels, the moral conscience of the West, the world’s latest and greatest international tyrant-buster had to return to earth,
James is right to draw attention to the problems arising from the coalition’s decision to hike taxes on oil companies. Perhps halting the fuel duty escalator was worth it but there are always costs associated with this kind of populism. Oil companies, like the banks, are friendless enterprises and so easy targets for tub-thumping or
This PMQs will be remembered for the Cameron Balls spat. As Cameron was answering a question from a Labour MP, he snapped at Balls who was heckling him, shouting ‘you don’t know the answer, you’re not properly briefed, why don’t you just say you’ll write to her’. A visibly irritated Cameron shot back, ‘I wish
VERDICT: What happened there, then? The Prime Minister often has a confident swagger about him when it comes to PMQs — but today it went into overdrive. He simply couldn’t conceal his glee at taking on Eds Miliband and Balls; the first over his appearance at the anti-cuts demonstration, the second for just being Ed
In the aftermath of the Budget, the Lib Dems were keen to let it be known that the idea of a windfall tax on North Sea oil companies to pay for ending the fuel duty escalator was Danny Alexander’s idea. But, as Andy Sparrow notes, this claim has ended up causing them some problems. In
Twelve different checks later and I’m in Free Libya, hurling down the road to Tobruk at 100 mph, with Arabic music blasting away. This place is firmly held rebel territory and most journalists have moved towards the battlefields further west. A pair of beautiful American relief workers tell me just to keep going “to see
Remember when Nick Clegg said that the coalition was shuffling into a new phase? One where his party would would make their presence, and their differences with the Tories, more acutely felt? Turns out the Lib Dem leader wasn’t kidding. Judging by this report of a press briefing he has given in Mexico, the brave
A scoop-and-a-half for the Doncaster Free Press, who were first with the news of Ed Miliband and Justine Thornton’s wedding date. It is 27 May, lest you hadn’t heard already, and will take place at a country hotel near Nottingham. Here’s what the Labour leader tells the paper: “‘This is going to be a fantastic
Today we will hear our fate. As the head of one of hundreds of organisations waiting to hear whether we receive Arts Council funding, I have to admit these are nervous moments. My small organisation, New Deal of the Mind, was set up two years ago to help young unemployed people find jobs in the
In Washington, a budget shutdown is becoming an increasing possibility. The Republican controlled House of Representatives wants deeper cuts than the White House will accept. This has led a growing bi-partisan group of Senators to try and revive the work of the blue-ribbon commission on Fiscal Reform and Responsibility that produced its report late last
Meanwhile, STV have a poll asking punters who they think would make the best First Minister. The results are almost entertaining: Don’t Know – 37% Alex Salmond – 30% None of Them – 16% Annabel Goldie – 9% Iain Gray – 7% Tavish Scott – 2% Remember that the same poll has Labour and the
I’m fonder of wacky political hypotheticals than the next fellow but even I draw the line at Sunder Katwala’s assertion that some people can see a path towards a Labour-SNP coalition in Edinburgh. This is splendidly creative but also, alas, untethered to reality. The party leaders – apart from the Green’s Patrick Harvie who has
Far from quiet on Libya’s shifting battlefront. The latest reports are that the rebel advance has stalled, and is now moving backwards in the face of Gaddafi’s overwhelming firepower. Yet as disheartening as this development may be, it is hardly unexpected: America’s General Ham all but described it as an inevitability only a couple of
Nick Clegg is in Mexico, striving to build a trade relationship. The Guardian reports that Clegg will address the Mexican Senate, in Spanish. He will concentrate on praising the education sector, which he hopes to export. There are also plans to open British universities to affluent Mexicans, and Clegg is being accompanied by four universities
What is the biggest lie in British politics? According to a new post by Johann Hari, it’s that our debt is at dangerously high levels. “As a proportion of GDP,” he writes, “Britain’s national debt has been higher than it is now for 200 of the past 250 years.” He makes some pugnacious points that
The road from Cairo to Salloum, Egypt’s Wild West town on the border with Libya, stretches out into the desert until the patched-up, grey and black cement blurs into the yellow dunes. Throughout the journey, well-kept electricity pylons line the road, while the occasional shepherd looks out from a desolate shed-like house. Otherwise there is
We tend to steer clear of politics on the Spectator arts blog, leaving that to our blog brethren over at Coffee House. But this week we’re making an exception for a series of posts, from all sides of the debate, on arts funding during the cuts. And to get us started, this: a post from
I am struck by the confusion of left-liberal opinion over the violence at the anti-cuts demonstration in London over the weekend. Poor Lucy Annson of UK Uncut on Newsnight last night was arguing gamely that she was an artist who just wanted to set up crèches and creative happenings in the occupied shops of tax
The charge sheet against Colonel Gaddafi in any trial would be a long one. There are his crimes against his own people, his support of terrorism overseas and his wars in Chad. But, however morally right it would be to make Gaddafi face justice, the door should be left open to him to go into
David Orr, Chief Executive of the National Housing Federation, and 551 local councillors have written to the Times (£) warning that short-term cuts to care charities will bequeath deeper medium-term costs. They say: ‘Local councils face a difficult spending situation. However, cutting services for the vulnerable does not make financial sense. Without early identification and
There was one aspect of Barack Obama’s Big Speech on Libya last night that was particularly curious: for a President who is trying to downplay American involvement in this conflict, he sure went in for good bit of self-aggrandisement. The amount of references to his and his government’s “leadership” — as in, “At my direction,
Today’s Commons ding-dong on the riots that followed Saturday’s march was real, politics of the viscera stuff. The Labour benches were furious about Boris’s comments in today’s Telegraph that ‘Balls and Miliband will feel quietly satisfied by the disorder’ and that they ‘will be content to see the police being unfairly attacked on all sides’.
At last I have managed to get my five year old daughter to like Coca Cola. Previously she drank only still water, milk or apple juice. I think she found the fizziness of cola disconcerting – but at last commonsense has prevailed, helped by a little peer pressure from her brothers. Now she loves the