The Spectator’s Economic Innovator of the Year Awards 2023 in partnership with Investec are open for business. We’re looking forward to hearing from entrepreneur-led high-growth businesses across the UK and we’re especially pleased to welcome back our partner Investec – an international banking, wealth and investment group with an extensive UK regional network and a
When Donald Trump ran for the presidency in 2016, he took on a very well-funded politician who had been a successful governor of Florida. And he destroyed him. Trump humiliated ‘low-energy’ Jeb Bush, son of one president and brother of another, and trashed his family’s legacy so comprehensively that the Bush-era Republican party is now
When Simon Case was named as cabinet secretary in September 2020 he became, at the age of 41, the youngest appointee in more than 100 years. He will probably earn another distinction soon: the youngest ex-cabinet secretary in history. In Westminster, some say his departure is a question of when not if. Should he go
For all that the Lockdown Files, as reported in the Telegraph, sometimes read like the screenplay of The Thick of It, they will be a wonderful resource for historians. Whatever one thinks of the morality of Isabel Oakeshott’s actions vis-à-vis Matt Hancock, we now have 2.3 million words of WhatsApp messages that offer a rare
Michael Caine is 90 this week, and he offers to accept questions by email, which he will then answer by email, as if we are communicating between galaxies. Normally this would bother me – gah, actors – but it is Michael Caine, so I can’t mind. Maurice Micklewhite’s invention Michael Caine – he named himself
Lviv My favourite hotels in Lviv were all booked out over the weekend. The world’s justice elite were in town for a gathering on how to hold Russia accountable for its crimes. The US Attorney General and the Chief Prosecutor from The Hague, as well as President Volodymyr Zelensky, were there. It was an apposite
Stockholm Barely a day goes by in Stockholm without a shooting or a bombing. In one part of the city, housing estate residents have been informed about what to do if their building is a bombing target. For all too many Swedes, this is the new normal. Under Swedish law, children under 15 cannot be
Lanfranco Cirillo, architect and interior decorator to the Russian elite, is shaking his head in horror. ‘Absolutely not. No.’ He is answering my question about whether he put a gold toilet and even a gold toilet brush into a villa he built that the Russian opposition says belongs to President Vladimir Putin – and which
Maternal nocturnal worry number 57a: how are our offspring going to get their toes on any rung of the property ladder if they want to carry on living in London? I’m sure thousands of us mothers of young adults lie awake at 2.30 a.m. contemplating the fact that a one-bedroom flat in Leytonstone now costs
‘This is not about Ukraine at all, but the world order,’ said Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, a month after the invasion. ‘The unipolar world is irretrievably receding into the past … A multi-polar world is being born.’ The US is no longer the world’s policeman, in other words – a message that resonates in
‘Yalla! Yalla! Yalla!’ shouts a Saudi man. There are arms dealers, fixers, military men and gun geeks; tanks, assault rifles, mortars and drones. Jets do aerobatics overhead and a band plays Maroon 5. A Chinese robot dog bangs into delegates. Welcome to the International Defence Exhibition in the United Arab Emirates. Business is booming. On
‘Dear parents, a reminder that we are dressing up for World Book Day! Don’t forget your child should come to school in costume as their favourite character tomorrow…’ It’s the email every parent dreads receiving. (Or one of them, anyway.) It tends to be opened at eight o’clock the evening before World Book Day, to
Ravenna, Italy Italy’s first female Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, is steadily becoming the most important political leader in Europe. Some are even saying that it is her destiny to be the next Angela Merkel. If so, that would mean a dramatic change in direction for the European Union towards what she calls a confederal, instead
Cape Town South Africa is falling apart. Blackouts of up to ten hours a day are bringing businesses to a halt, making teaching harder and turning traffic lights dark. Food is rotting in warm fridges. There were more than 200 blackouts last year and they have continued every day so far in 2023. ANC strategists
On 12 April last year, Boris Johnson’s fixed penalty notice was dominating the news. Few noticed another, perhaps equally seismic political story in Bournemouth: a member of Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet was being booed by the unions. Speaking at the National Education Union’s annual conference, shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson faced a revolt. She had
On hearing the rumours that the boxer David Haye is in a ‘throuple’ – a three-person romantic relationship – with Una Healy from the Saturdays and a model named Sian Osborne, I felt a rare flicker of carnal pique. Apparently Victoria Beckham is off her feed (a prawn and two capers) with worry that her
Ayear ago on Friday, President Vladimir Putin unleashed blitzkrieg on Ukraine. It was an unprovoked assault that has so far led to more than 200,000 people being killed or wounded, but has failed in its intention of establishing Russian hegemony over its democratic neighbour. The West and much of the rest of the civilised world
Kyiv General Valeriy Zaluzhny, stocky, forceful, apple-cheeked, sits at the desk in Kyiv from which he commands all Ukraine’s armed forces. I ask him what they need from the West. First, air defence. With a twinkle in his eye, he unzips his khaki fleece to reveal a garish T-shirt demanding ‘F-16s!’ Next on his list
I am a 56-year-old dad of four. I live with my wife and dog in Surrey, where I run a successful building firm. But I also know Shamima Begum, who this week lost her appeal to have her citizenship reinstated, perhaps better than anyone else in Britain – apart from her family. I’ve visited her
‘Look at the dates.’ That’s what I am told as I enter the State Elders Room in Tallinn. I’m here to interview the woman dubbed Europe’s new Iron Lady – Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas. The walls in the room between her office and the cabinet room are lined with portraits. A small plaque beneath
