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Columns

James Forsyth

Liz Truss’s first big test

Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng are determined to show that Britain’s economy is under new management. They want to indicate through their decisions – such as cancelling the corporation tax rise and reversing the National Insurance rise – that they are breaking away from the fiscal approach of recent years. More broadly, they want to

Labour has a problem – but it’s not Keir Starmer

I see that Green campaigning groups are angry that the Conservative party has received donations from the aviation industry, because they are not in favour of aeroplanes. Or, at least, these campaigners are not in favour of aeroplanes until they need to use one to get somewhere. A holiday at some eco lodge in Indonesia,

Leicester and the downside with diversity

As I have said many times in recent years, if you import the world’s people you import the world’s problems. Which is not to say that you do not also get some upsides. The upsides of ‘diversity’ are focused on all the time. But we have a curious habit of downplaying the downsides. Just one

Why are so many young women buying into polyamory?

The saddest thing I saw this week was a dating advert written by a woman – let’s call her Jane – looking for a man to start a family with. There was nothing sad about Jane per se: she’s attractive and accomplished in the usual alarming millennial way. Not only does she have a well-paid

The Spectator's Notes

Should Queen Elizabeth II be made a saint?

If this were a Catholic country, up would go the cry for canonisation. When Pope John Paul II died, the crowds in St Peter’s Square shouted ‘Santo subito!’ And the Polish Pope was indeed made a saint with unusual speed. What about St Elizabeth, with Windsor as her Compostela? Well, we are not a Catholic

Any other business

Is this really the moment to scrap bankers’ bonuses?

Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng – keen to sharpen the City’s competitive edge, we’re told – wants to remove the legislative cap, imported from Brussels in 2014, that limits bankers’ bonuses to 100 per cent of their base salary, or up to 200 per cent with shareholder approval. That raises interesting questions. Was the cap a good