There is something about the dying embers of a year which causes the world to concentrate on entirely the wrong story. In the last days of 1999 many were fixated on the so-called ‘millennium bug’ rather than on the real computing crisis: the absurd over-valuations of internet companies which was soon to lead to stock
Home On the eve of a speech by David Cameron, the Prime Minister, on the EU, Andrew Duff MEP, the leader of the Union of European Federalists, suggested that Britain could be offered second-class ‘associate member’ status in the EU. ‘If the British cannot support the trend towards more integration in Europe,’ Jacques Delors, the
I am re-reading D.H. Lawrence’s Sea and Sardinia. The opening line runs: ‘Comes over one an absolute necessity to move…’ He expands on the dilemma (I paraphrase): you are afflicted by wanderlust, you want to move, you don’t have any money, you’ve only recently moved but for some reason you want to move again. It
Justin Welby, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, may have to confront this year the possible break-up of the world-wide Anglican communion. Perhaps the splendid letter from Seneca the Younger (AD 1-65), sketching a pagan take on religious feeling, will suggest a way ahead. After discussing the divine spirit ‘which guards us and watches us in
The Seacole empire Education Secretary Michael Gove says he wants to rewrite the national curriculum in history to concentrate on figures such as Cromwell and Churchill instead of Mary Seacole. Some institutions which have been named after Seacole in recent years: — Mary Seacole House, ‘mental health drop-in centre primarily for black and ethnic communities
Caught in the ratchet Sir: Melissa Kite (‘Hunting for Dave’, 29 December) wonders why the Prime Minister won’t reopen the question of hunting. Is it not just possible that the reason given is the real reason — he knows he could not win a vote on it? There is no point in leading the troops
