All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
The news that appeared in the Sunday newspapers was intriguing, to say the least. A meeting has taken place at (appropriately enough) the Royal Over-Seas League club between Meredith Maines, the latest in Prince Harry’s apparently endless line of California-based press officers, Liam Maguire, who has that similarly thankless task in this country, and Tobyn
Back to the BBC, which is better at making the news than breaking it these days. This afternoon a report has found that the Beeb’s Gaza documentary that was narrated by the son of a Hamas official breached editorial guidelines and misled audiences. The review adds that viewers ‘should have been informed’ about the identity
For any Jew – or anyone who is alive to Jew hate – a report from the commission on anti-Semitism to be published tomorrow will make for uneventful reading. That is no slur on the report or its authors. The Board of Deputies of British Jews asked Lord Mann, the Labour peer who is the government’s
For once, Ed Miliband is right about something: the British way of life is under threat. But it is not for the reasons he claims. Our way of life is under threat because high energy prices are leading to Britain’s rapid deindustrialisation. Once a proud and wealthy industrial nation, we are becoming an impoverished country
Pensions rarely top the Westminster agenda or get politicians excited. Too boring, too distant. But maybe, just maybe, pensions will soon become political. There is a growing consensus among pensions policymakers and industry insiders: if we want future generations to retire with a bit of security and comfort, contributions into defined contribution (DC) pensions
The Labour party has long been dubbed the party of working people – but despite the term being integral to the group’s existence, Sir Keir Starmer’s army have so far demonstrated an extraordinary degree of ineptness when pushed on its definition. After new transport minister Heidi Alexander caused a flurry of excitement at the weekend
Another week, another bit of bad news for ex-Beeb star Gregg Wallace. A report into the former MasterChef presenter has substantiated a whopping 45 complaints against the TV personality – making any return to the public service broadcaster ‘untenable’. A seven-month inquiry by legal firm Lewis Silkin was carried out on behalf of the programme’s
Tomorrow is Rachel Reeves’s big speech in the City. The annual Mansion House address is a chance for the chancellor to set out their big vision for the British economy. But amid a gloomy set of economic indicators – including two monthly GDP contractions in a row – it is difficult to see what good
When we’re debating the introduction of a new law – ban this, ban that, crack down on the other – most of the energy in the public conversation goes into the question of whether this, that, or the other is something that deserves to be cracked down on. It seems to be after the event,
Science is no longer regarded or respected as an objective pursuit, one in which the principle of impartiality is sought with due diligence. This is the inference we can make from comments made by Ella Al-Shamahi, presenter of the new BBC science series, Human. ‘We do have to be a little honest,’ she says, ‘to
The UK’s steady decline continued today with reports that water companies are looking to introduce ‘surge pricing’ in order to ration demand. Trials are being introduced by 15 water companies across the country this summer, with customers either paying more for water as they use more, or charged more at certain times of year. Higher
The government is piloting a ‘one in, one out’ migrant scheme with France. As part of the deal, the UK will return some migrants to France, and in exchange others with a strong case for asylum in the UK will come the other way. On Sky News, Trevor Phillips noted that France could refuse to
Something mysterious is happening in churches across Britain: a growing number of young Christians are showing up. Millennial men, in particular, appear to be turning back to Christianity: there has been a four to five-fold increase since 2018 in 18-to-24-year-old males attending church. What’s going on? Three hundred Spectator subscribers gathered in the beautiful surroundings of St
Christian Horner has very beady eyes. If you sit opposite him, his shark-like spotlights will dart around you, probably in the hope there’s someone more important he can talk to, but also spying for threats and opportunities. His sacking as the team principal of Red Bull Racing after 20 years in the job has caught the paddock off-guard. We were at
Reform UK topping the opinion polls and winning local council elections has prompted several leading Tories to defect. But now Nigel Farage’s insurgent party is riding so high that it is getting choosy about which Conservatives it will accept into its swelling ranks. If too many Tories join Reform they will begin to look like
Today is the fortieth anniversary of Live Aid, the epic televised pop concert – or ‘global jukebox’ – designed to raise funds to alleviate the devastating Ethiopian famine. The proceedings were divided between Wembley and the Kennedy stadium in Philadelphia. It was billed, even at the time, as an epochal day, an event that would change
Here we go again. Another blistering heatwave. Just a few days after the last one. Like many, and probably like a lot of Spectator readers, I was a moderate climate change sceptic a few years ago. The whole ‘climate emergency’ thing came across as hysterical and alarmist. There seemed to be a clear agenda to get
It is a century this year since the Iron Lady’s birth – and conservatives are determined to mark it in style. Amid a whole host of dinners and seminars, the Margaret Thatcher Centre held a symposium on Monday to debate the legacy of the former Prime Minister. Among the likes of Lord Lilley, Sir Anthony
Education should be the great equaliser – the ladder with which all children, regardless of circumstances of birth, can improve themselves and, by doing so, climb towards a more prosperous future. It was certainly that way for me. I loved learning, and my state education took me from humble beginnings in Clacton-on-Sea to working in
The front desk call out a name, ‘Mohammed Ahmed!’ Four men – or boys as they claimed to be – arrive at the glass window ready for Asda food gift cards and a cash subsistence payment. It’s a small job to find the real Mr Ahmed – the one whose face matches the ID card
Norman Tebbit, who died this week at the age of 94, embodied a sterner Britain. His political career was remarkable but it paled in comparison with his unyielding love for his wife Margaret, whom he wheeled through life for four decades after the IRA’s Brighton bomb paralysed her body in 1984. Tebbit never forgave those
In an effort to hasten the Assisted Dying/Suicide Bill on to the statute books, Esther Rantzen and Lord Falconer have offered a novel interpretation of the role of the House of Lords. Falconer suggested that the Lords must ‘uphold’ what ‘the Commons have decided to go ahead with’. Meanwhile, Rantzen said of Parliament’s upper chamber:
The plot of Transaction, a six-part comedy currently showing on ITV2, is simple. A supermarket accused of transphobia hires a transgender night shift worker to protect themselves from an activist mob hammering on the doors. The problem for manager Simon (played by Nick Frost) is that he employs a transwoman on a mission to be
As Wimbledon reaches its climax this weekend, those of us neither interested in tennis, nor in taking a fortnight off work for solid perving purposes, are delighted it will soon be over. I couldn’t care less about the tennis, but the comings and goings in the slightly obscene-sounding ‘Royal Box’ are impossible to escape from.
If France didn’t have enough to worry about right now with its soaring rates of debt, crime and immigration, now comes news of a political comeback. Dominique de Villepin, prime minister between 2005 and 2007, earlier this month launched his political party called Humanist France. ‘I decided to create a movement of ideas, of citizens,
It is impossible to deny the sense of gloom and pessimism in Britain today. The economy is stagnant, and our society is divided. The opinion polls convey what many of us know: that the public do not trust the mainstream parties to steer us away from our predicament. The conversation around many family dinner tables
British schoolchildren spend more time learning about the American civil rights movement than the English Civil War. An entire generation has been taught, by omission as much as intent, to believe that our past and shared inheritance has little value, and that Britain has been a force for ill in the world. The Twelfth is
Around sixty Jewish doctors, including senior consultants and general practitioners, have left or are planning to leave the British Medical Association. Their decision is not a fleeting protest, but a serious response to what they consider to be a deeper institutional malaise that has gone untreated for too long. Many Jewish doctors feel their concerns have been
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As Labour looks to get a grip on public spending, one rebellion gives way to another with the changes to the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) system threatening to become welfare round two. On this week’s Saturday edition of Coffee House Shots, Lucy Dunn is joined by The Spectator’s Michael Simmons and former Ofsted
‘Small boats’ are the big talking point from this week’s Franco-British summit. The consensus is that there are slim pickings for Britain, and the reason why is simple: France negotiates according to its interests, Britain negotiates according to the Chagos template. France’s president Emmanuel Macron had little incentive to agree anything but a symbolic ‘returns’
Well, well, well. It transpires that Independent MP Rupert Lowe – formerly of Reform UK – has now been cleared by parliament’s standards commissioner after he was probed over funds for his independent ‘Rape Gang Inquiry’. Lowe was investigated after allegedly failing to register hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations for his project, with
Britain has a widespread and collective mental health problem – but it’s not what you might think. Specifically, it’s that many people believe themselves to be mentally unwell when actually they are not. What’s more, society and the state have been prone to taking them at their word on this matter for far too long. We’ve become
The marching season – when a section of Northern Ireland’s unionist community take to the streets to commemorate the triumph of William of Orange against James II – has always been a useful barometer of the Ulster loyalist mood. Is the bonfire in bad taste? Yes. But should the people who erected it have to
