All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
The government’s announcement last week of a funding package for feasibility studies into a range of modular nuclear reactors went largely unnoticed by the media. However, as a report published this week makes clear, the news actually represents a significant reversal of policy, and one that achieves the remarkable feat of making the UK’s energy
As the European Research Group breaks out in to open revolt and rumours of no confidence letters abound, it seems like Theresa May’s hold on power is looking precarious at best. So, when in trouble, send Michael Gove on the airwaves. The Environment Secretary attempted to prop up his leader with an appearance on the
UK spirits are key to our economy. Take, for instance, Scotch; sold in 200 markets worldwide, it supports 40,000 jobs and is our single biggest food and drink export, with 39 bottles exported each second. Or how about gin? The UK exported half a billion pounds of gin in 2017; a figure that could top
‘Well what sort of question is that? That’s bloody stupid if you ask me. I’ve two daughters and five grandchildren. I’ve got my bits and him indoors, he’s got his – that’s just nature.’ Those were the words of my octogenarian neighbour Joan who, reasonably enough, looked at me like I was a simpleton when
I am just going to let this speak for itself. It’s a slightly edited but verbatim account of tonight’s weekly meeting of the Brexiter European Research Group faction of the Conservative Party. It requires no additional comment from me – other than that I have multiple sources vouching for its veracity. “We’ve just had an
This week was supposed to be the week that the European Research Group of backbench Brexiteers finally revealed their hand and published a Brexit plan to rival Theresa May’s. With the Prime Minister currently without the numbers to get her Chequers proposal through Parliament (even if there were no further concessions), there were concerns from
I cannot speak for Boris Johnson’s politics, for he can barely speak for them himself, but his taste in restaurants in excellent. According to people that follow his romantic entanglements – for I follow none but my own – he dined in Rules of Covent Garden on Valentine’s Day with a woman whose name escapes
Yesterday, the LGBTQ+ society of Goldsmiths University, emitted a series of tweets defending the educational value and ‘compassion’ of Soviet Gulags. Writing to ‘clarify what a gulag is’, the group sought to demonstrate that to send a friend, family member, or stranger to the gulag ‘is actually a compassionate, non-violent course of action’. It turns
Boris Johnson appears to have perfected the art of triggering his Westminster colleagues. First with letterboxes, now suicide vests, the former Foreign Secretary has developed a particular knack for driving fellow Tory MPs round the bend with a simple turn of phrase. This latest round of ‘outrage’ has seen a number of Conservative MPs condemn
Three senior bankers from Barclays, J.P. Morgan and Citi descended on the House of Commons today to give evidence to the Treasury Select Committee on the impact of a No Deal Brexit. Their interview must have seemed like perfect timing for Chancellor Philip Hammond, who is currently doing his own tour of the Commons and
Cold calculation suggests there won’t be a second referendum. It could destroy both the Tory and Labour parties, and in any case, we appear to be heading for a classic EU fudge that will postpone hard choices. But as all predictions in 2018 are likely to be false, and the Tory right appears determined to
ISAs have fallen from grace in recent years, and are now being ignored by many savers. ‘One of the biggest influences on the ISA market has been the disrupting force of the PSA since its inception in 2016. Savers have also faced the blight of Government lending initiatives, which decimated the savings market and forced
With September marking a decade since the Lehman Brothers implosion, stand by for a slew of economic retrospectives. Any meaningful analysis, though, needs to get beyond historic balance sheets and plunging share price graphs — however dramatic the data. For the most significant impact of the biggest financial and economic upheaval since the Great Depression
Serena Williams has just set back the cause of women’s equality. Not by losing her cool during the final of the US Open: women are as entitled to temper tantrums as men are. No, it was her playing of the misogyny card that has potentially harmed the cause of women. It was the fact that
It’s been over a year since the last general election, but it looks like there are still some Labour MPs who are confused about their presence on the opposition benches. One such appears to be the shadow minister for women and equalities and Corbyn devotee, Dawn Butler. In an interview on TalkRadio this afternoon, it
Should there be an independent inquiry into the cost of doing nothing in Syria? That’s what MPs on the Foreign Affairs Select Committee think in any case, as they publish a report today that looks at the consequences of parliament’s decision not to intervene in the conflict in 2013. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt has already
We don’t hear much of the phrase ‘despite Brexit’ any more – it is just a little too obvious. Instead, pro-remain news sources have decided to apportion good economic news on the weather and the World Cup. This morning, the ONS announced that GDP growth in the three months to the end of July had
The world’s press was all geared up to write “Rabble-rousing Sweden Democrat breakthrough” but Sweden’s voters have not obliged. The populists were aiming for first place, but remain in third place, behind the conservatives. The Christian Democrats (led by Ebba Busch Thor, pictured, above) and the Centre Party gained more seats between them (16) than the Sweden
Shocking news emerges that Sandi Toksvig is paid 40pc of what Stephen Fry was on to present the lamentable programme QI. Really? It had never occurred to me that Toksvig was paid anything at all. She is boring, smug and bereft of wit. I assumed she did it out of delight at being beamed into
No-one ever bought shares in Alastair Cook because they were sexy. No man has made so many runs with so little flash. But no Englishman has made as many as 12,472 runs in test cricket either. If the quantity of test cricket played these days helped Cook build his own mountain of runs, it remains
To be honest, it’s hard to think of a report by a select committee that is so well-meaning as the one issued today by the Foreign Affairs Committee, headed by Tom Tugendhat, or one that’s more misguided. The gist is that Britain’s non-intervention in Syria has been disastrous for Syria itself and for its neighbours,
It’s been a busy weekend for Boris Johnson. After the former foreign secretary came under fire over his private life, Johnson appeared to make life more difficult for himself by penning an article for the Mail on Sunday in which he suggested that Theresa May’s Brexit strategy was akin to wearing a suicide vest. Various
Sweden’s general election campaign ended with the Sweden Democrats in a huff and boycotting SVT, the state broadcaster, because it issued a statement distancing itself from comments made by Jimmie Åkesson in the leaders’ debate that it broadcast. Having a supposedly neutral state broadcaster pass judgement is the perfect gift for Åkesson, who said it demonstrates an
Sajid Javid: Boris Johnson should use ‘measured language’ Boris Johnson has been dominating the headlines today for a variety of reasons. The news that he and his wife Marina Wheeler are to divorce is juxtaposed alongside his comments in the Mail on Sunday that the government’s Brexit stance has ‘wrapped a suicide vest around the
Former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has been roughed up enough lately and I am loath to add to the calumnies but something he keeps saying bothers me. ‘The hate that begins with Jews never ends with Jews.’ Sacks has dropped this aphorism into speeches and articles for the past few years and no wonder: it’s
Well, that didn’t take long. Just one week into the new parliamentary term and a case of civil war has broke out in the Conservative party over Boris Johnson. The former foreign secretary makes the front of most Sunday papers – with some running more than one P1 story about him. Following the news that
Serena Williams’s epic tantrum in last night’s US Open final wasn’t a noble stand against racism or sexism. It wasn’t about her being black, or a woman, or a mother — although of course it very quickly became about that, as tweeters and sports hacks climbed over each other to defend the Queen of Women’s
The inspiration for the latest challenge, to submit a newspaper leading article exposing the corrupting influence of a seemingly innocuous everyday item, was the revelation, in a recent letter to the Times, that patent leather shoes were outlawed at a British girls’ public school as recently as the 1980s, lest they reflect undergarments and ‘excite
Since being appointed Home Secretary, Sajid Javid has taken a series of bold and overdue decisions. On immigration, he understood that most people would like skilled doctors and nurses to come and work for the National Health Service, so he removed them from the cap that Theresa May had imposed on skilled workers coming to
The Spectator’s leading article last week ended up saying ‘It is unrealistic to expect that we can achieve what China has in Africa over the past decade.’ If we were to have done that, I for one would wish to resign my British nationality. What they have done there for the past 30 years is
In the newspapers today, there is much talk of Sweden turning to the ‘far-right.’ The Times has a picture of skinhead nutters on the march, giving the impression that Swedes are about a day away from goose-stepping down Drottninggatan. The myth of Sweden going all Nazi is a myth that’s hard to puncture because no one has
As Machiavelli noted: in order to prevail, a successful prince needs Fortuna as well as Virtù. Matteo Salvini, who has replaced Silvio Berlusconi as Italy’s dominant politician, has got them both. In any normal country, it would surely be unthinkable that the deputy leader of a new government elected specifically to stop refugees being ferried
The UK and the EU are playing a dangerous game of chicken over the Irish border, I say in The Sun this morning. There has been almost no progress on this issue over the summer and without a deal on it, there can’t be a withdrawal agreement. One of those involved in the negotiations on
The Swedes are going to the polls in one of the most significant bellwether-elections in Europe this year. The international press has been taking an unusual interest in these elections because the Sweden Democrats look set to do fairly well, perhaps coming second if not first. Readers of The Strange Death of Europe will know