I’m trying to imagine the BBC’s Eddie Mair interviewing Nelson Mandela, the elderly African squirming uncomfortably in his seat as Mair, like one of the late Eugene Terre’Blanche’s famous Dobermans, snarls ever more menacingly, foam dripping from his bared gums. ‘So, in 1961, with several others, you founded a vicious terrorist movement, Spear of the
‘A conduit for pissed-off protest voters.’ ‘Farage’s Falange.’ ‘Fascists in blazers.’ These are some of the things friends have said about Ukip recently and I don’t want to embarrass them by naming names, for the last thing I’d wish on a mate is the queasy feeling I had this morning after a particularly bizarre anxiety
Last time I was here (two weeks ago; how’ve you been?) I briefly mentioned Bitcoin, an emerging internet currency I didn’t understand at all but via which I had nonetheless made a bit of money (£57). Since then, I’ve been reading up and the whole thing has gone supernova, largely thanks to the extent that
A few years ago George Osborne would have bristled at the idea that one of his budgets wouldn’t be the biggest event of the political week. His ability to conjure rabbits out of hats had already prevented electoral defeat for the Tories once (his 2007 inheritance tax pledge, now consigned to history, scared Gordon Brown
Westminster’s top amateur prize-fighter, Eric Joyce, may face assault charges after his latest unscheduled bout in the House of Commons. The Falkirk MP had to be restrained last week after an alleged unseemly set-to at the Sports and Social Club. Ex-soldier Joyce first revealed his flair for pugilism in February 2012 when he ‘went berserk’
I had forgotten about Cyprus. I suppose it was lodged somewhere near the back of my mind as a cheap British Mediterranean satrapy usefully divided into two: a southern bit, where our chavs went on holiday, and a northern bit where our criminals hide out from the filth. I was dimly aware that we had
Chesterfield is a medium-sized town just off the M1, near what were once the coalfields of north-eastern Derbyshire. Not without history (and a lovely old market square) and not without character (a church with a splendidly warped spire, positively Van Goghian, is its most famous feature), the town is nevertheless an unassuming, formerly industrial north
It was the night that the Conservatives’ dream of a majority died. The first televised election debate in British history was meant to be the moment that David Cameron moved decisively ahead in the polls. Cameron and his camp had arrived at the Granada Studios in confident mood on 15 April 2010. But the evening
So I’m outside Finsbury Park tube station, the other morning. There’s a girl in front of me, white, twentysomething, rosy-cheeked, long and ruddy hair bouncing in the brisk spring air. Not that I’m, like, noticing. From behind me, overtaking, comes a tall, handsome black guy, smartly dressed. ‘You’re so lovely,’ he booms, as he draws
I think we should all support the Iranian government in its legal action against the Hollywood actor and director Ben Affleck, for misrepresenting their lovely country in the film Argo. They have a serious legal team lined up to counter the suggestion raised in Argo that Iran is full of half-witted, bearded, brutal Islamist maniacs,
If those who can do and those who can’t teach, then that must make me a totally useless git for I’ve just had a go at being a schoolmaster and I loved it more than any job I’ve ever done. I did it at my alma mater Malvern College, where I spent most of last
David Cameron needs a Willie. So say the ministers who work most closely with No. 10. It is not a call for shock-and-awe radicalism, but for someone who can help the Prime Minister as the late Willie Whitelaw helped Margaret Thatcher — gliding around Whitehall, pushing forward the Cameron agenda, smoothing over difficulties and ensuring
‘Can you imagine anything worse,’ a Hungarian once said to me, ‘than a Slav who thinks he’s Latin?’ He was referring to the Romanians, of course. There is a certain degree of tension in Romania between the ethnic Romanians, who run the place, and the ethnic Hungarians, who feel that they have been press-ganged into
How much would you stump up for the Economist? Most of us would draw the line at a fiver, but I’m told that Mike Bloomberg, mayor of New York, is drawing the line at £300 million. Bloomberg is busy relocating to London and he’s poised to snap up the Financial Times later this year. But the
Were you to try to identify the sort of journalist least likely to feel sympathy for Keith O’Brien, I suppose you’d place near the top of your list a columnist who was (a) an atheist, (b) especially allergic to the totalitarian mumbo-jumbo of the Roman Catholic church, (c) gay, and (d) a strong supporter of
I was seated at a rather stiff and formal BBC dinner a dozen or so years back, one of those ghastly occasions upon which the boss class attempt, painfully, to commune with the corporation untermenschen over noisette of chicken, or something similar. There were perhaps 15 of us, drawn from various levels of the BBC
Imagine if seven Tory Cabinet ministers had resigned since David Cameron became Prime Minister. Then think about another seven being accused of having covered up alleged sexual misconduct by a senior party official. It would put ‘Back to Basics’ in the shade. It would be the biggest scandal the Tory party had faced. But this,
It started the other week, when David Cameron was in India. Although it started like a bout of malaria starts, so I suppose the more precise term would be ‘recurred’. There he is in Amritsar, touring the site of a massacre, possibly in that hat. And all Britain wants to know is what he thinks
One of the things I love about being a classical liberal is that I’m always on the right side of every argument. I’m pro: freedom, jobs, self-determination, cheap energy, higher living standards, academic excellence, property rights, an even better future, Michael Gove MP, wine, women, song. (So long as the song is not by Maroon
Dave’s a listener. He listens to women in particular. That’s the sub-text of his recent disclosure that Sam keeps urging him to promote more women to the Cabinet. Yet Dave’s top table boasts just four leading ladies. And at his last reshuffle he replaced ousted females with men. ‘He’s listening all right,’ says a junior