British politics often resembles a golden-age murder mystery, with multiple parties sitting anxiously on the sofas/green benches waiting for the detective/electorate to crack the case. The Reform, Labour and Tory conferences provided a plethora of clues. But just as Sherlock Holmes solved ‘The Adventure of Silver Blaze’ by diving into the significance of the dog
I’ve just got back from doing a spot of shopping in my local town – and do you know what struck me? How white it was. Absolutely heaving with ghostfaces. In fact, in the hour or so that I spent there I don’t think I saw a single non-white person, apart from some young ladies
Can you be a spy by mistake? If, with no treacherous intent, without ever intending to disadvantage your own country, you share information which might give another country advantage over yours, are you spying for that country? In ordinary usage I’d answer these questions with a firm no. Spies operate for many reasons – reward,
Scientists at the Oregon Health and Science University have created the beginnings of a baby using not human eggs, but skin cells. My reaction upon reading this news was to try to fold it up and tuck it away deep in some mental crevasse where I’d be sure never to see it again, because the
‘The facts of life are Conservative.’ This sentence is often attributed to Margaret Thatcher, whose centenary falls next week. The exact words are ‘The facts of life invariably do turn out to be Tory’ and were not hers. They appeared in the first major policy document produced under her leadership, ‘The Right Approach’ (1976). The
Between news bulletins of the Manchester synagogue attack last week, I popped into my local Co-op for some groceries. When the public address system said something indistinct about ‘solidarity’, I paused to listen: it was an advert for Sun & Stone lager, produced in Scotland in collaboration with Taybeh, a Palestinian microbrewery, and with a
