Statistics

Thursday

Rory Sutherland

Things we don’t mind paying for

Here’s a challenge for film buffs: can anyone remember, from the entire canon of cinema and television, a single scene set in an underground car park in which something unpleasant or nefarious did not occur? Yet I still rather like them. By far the best car park in London is the one found underneath Bloomsbury Square, which is in the shape of a double-helix. This allows you to drive all the way down and all the way up again with your steering wheel in one position. About once a year I park in the Mayfair car park at the bottom of Park Lane. I recently noticed that an annual season

Monday

Brendan O’Neill

The sacred mother-baby bond is being eroded by an overzealous state

These figures should send a chill down the spine of anyone who values basic human dignity: in England in 2013, 2,018 newborn babies were taken from their mothers and put into the care of the state. This represents a huge hike from five years earlier, in 2008, when 802 newborns were taken into care. To put it another way: in 2008, 0.1 percent of newborns were taken into the care system, while in 2013 it was 0.3 percent. What’s going on? Education secretary Nicky Moran says the figures, released today by researchers at Lancaster University, are ‘worrying’. She means it’s worrying that so many mums are so rubbish at parenting that their

Thursday

Mary Dejevsky

The war on pensioners

Who controls the media in Britain? Depending on your political outlook, you might answer: the Conservatives, the liberal-left chattering classes, Rupert Murdoch or the BBC. But if the coverage of the elderly is anything to go by, then we can perhaps agree on one thing: the headlines are decided by a cohort of 25- to 45-year-olds who believe that other people’s parents and grandparents — a.k.a. Britain’s pensioners — have stolen their future, dashed their dreams and nabbed all the plush property. How else to account for a headline such as ‘No pay rise? Blame the baby-boomers’ gilded pension pots’ and a plethora of articles maintaining that pensioners have ‘never had

Thursday

The Spectator

Barometer | 27 August 2015

How many cheats? More data on members of extramarital dating site Ashley Madison were put online. How widespread is adultery? — The 2000 National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles found 15% of men and 9% of women admitted an ‘overlapping relationship’ within the previous 12 months. — In 2010 an opinion poll for a dating site found 25% of men and 18% of women had ever cheated on their current partners. — In most cases, however, the cheat seems to get away with it. In 2012, adultery was cited as the reason for one in seven of 118,140 divorces. This accounts for just 0.07% of the UK’s 24 million

Thursday

The Spectator

Barometer | 20 August 2015

No sex, please Several friends of the late Sir Edward Heath asserted that he could not be guilty of sexually assaulting children because he was asexual. How many adults do not experience sexual attraction? — A 2004 study by Anthony F. Bogaert, of Brock University, Ontario, Canada, analysed responses to a British questionnaire ten years earlier. Of 18,000 respondents, 195, or just over 1%, had agreed with the statement ‘I have never felt sexually attracted to anyone at all’. — A 1983 study by a student at the University of Michigan classified 5% of males and 10% of females as asexual. Unaccountable spending The EU declined to offer a breakdown

Thursday

The Spectator

Barometer | 9 April 2015

The Scottish way of death Nicola Sturgeon said the SNP would block a rise in the state pension age on the grounds that it would be unfair to Scots, who don’t live as long as the English. — The idea that the Scots die early was fuelled by a study by the Glasgow Centre for Population Health in 2006, which found male life expectancy in the Calton area of Glasgow to be 54: less than in many developing countries. — The figure, derived from statistics collected between 1998 and 2002, was exaggerated by the presence of a large number of hostels in the Calton taking in drug addicts from other

Thursday

The Spectator

How weird is it to have a second kitchen?

Cooking statistics Ed Miliband was photographed in a miserable kitchen, but it turned out to be only a snack preparation room which he has in addition to a large kitchen downstairs. What is the state of the nation’s kitchens? — The average size in England, according to official data, is 11 square metres. Five per cent of homes have a kitchen smaller than five square metres and 17 per cent have kitchens large than 15 square metres. Some 13 per cent have, like Ed’s, a separate utility room or second kitchen. — 955,000 English homes are estimated to have a hygiene problem, and in 4 per cent of these the cleanability of

Thursday

The Spectator

Female bishops are very, very old news

Female bishops The Reverend Libby Lane was ordained as Bishop of Stockport, the Church of England’s first female bishop. — By the time the first 32 female C of E vicars were ordained in 1994, the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts had had a female bishop, Barbara Harris, for five years. — Yet the first Anglican woman priest was ordained half a century earlier. Florence Li Tim-Oi had been deacon at Macao Protestant Chapel in the early 1940s. When the war prevented a priest travelling from Japanese-occupied territory to administer communion, Li Tim-Oi was ordained by the Bishop of Victoria on 25 January 1944. Cash or card? The managing director of Visa

James Delingpole James Delingpole

The hottest year on which record?

Did you know that 2014 was the hottest year ever recorded in the entire history of the world? Probably you did because it’s been all over the papers. Not only that but President Obama slipped it into his State of the Union address and the president of the World Bank quoted it at Davos and the singer and rap producer Pharrell Williams is so concerned that he plans to stage a series of Live Earth concerts with Al Gore to emphasise the seriousness of the problem. And these luminaries must know what they’re talking about, right? After all, it’s not just one distinguished scientific institution which has endorsed the ‘2014:

Thursday

The Spectator

Reasons for Ed Miliband to be cheerful (we had to stretch a bit)

Election omens Reasons for Ed Miliband to feel confident in 2015: — Only three parliaments since 1945 have run to their full five-year term. The subsequent general elections, in 1964, 1997 and 2010, all resulted in a change of government. But John Major did hold on in 1992, having gone to the country four years and ten months after the last election. — In four elections since 1945, the three main parties have been led by MPs who represent constituencies in each of the three countries which make Great Britain: 1970, 1979, 1983 and 1987. The Conservatives won them all. This year’s election, assuming no change of party leadership between now and

Thursday

The Spectator

100 years of Pyrex, processed cheese and nudes in movies

Marking a century Some things which celebrate their 100th birthday in 2015: 3-D films The first was shown at the Astor Theater in New York on 10 June, featuring the Niagara Falls. Nude scenes in films Audrey Munson played an artist’s model in Inspiration, a film by George Foster Platt released by the Mutual Film Corporation on 18 November 1915. It didn’t lead to a long career. By 1920 she was selling kitchen goods door-to-door. The following year she tried to take her life and in 1931 was consigned to a psychiatric hospital where she spent the rest of her life before dying, aged 104, in 1996. Pyrex, which was

Thursday

Rod Liddle

Left-handed people are stupid (and everyone who worries about immigration is a bigot)

Thoroughly cheering news emerged this week that left-handed people are likely to earn between 10 and 12 per cent less than their right-handed colleagues. (So 11 per cent less, then). Good. I have never cared for left-handed people, considering them arrogant and possessed of unsavoury personal habits — and were I an employer I would not give jobs to any of them. I would let them moulder on benefits, and laugh and point as I passed them waiting at the bus stop on their way to the dole office. Awful people. The most famous left-handers from history were Gerald Ford, Fidel Castro, the spoon-bending self-publicist Uri Geller and the controversially sexist

Thursday

The Spectator

The price of seeing Santa (and what it gets you)

Dear Santas A £22.50 a head Christmas theme park in Warwickshire designed by Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen closed temporarily for improvements after visitors complained of mud, a skinny, swearing Father Christmas and elves who stood around smoking. What do you get when you take your children to see Santa? Prices for family of four: — £20 Santa Lane, Hyde Park. Rides, visit to Santa’s toy factory plus visit to Santa. (Visit to Santa is free; the charge is for the adjoining Magical Ice Kingdom.) — £44.40 Santa’s Magical Wonderland, Motherwell. Reindeer visit, indoor carousel, 1 hour soft play or skating, plus Santa visit. — £57.96 Twinlakes Winter Wonderland, Melton Mowbray. 25ft high

Thursday

Tom Chivers

Lies, damn lies and health statistics – smoking is more deadly than serving in Afghanistan

Basically nothing is as bad for you as smoking. Short of fairly obvious things like blunt-force trauma or falling out of buildings, anyway. That is a fact worth keeping in mind when you read newspaper headlines about health. On the front page of the Telegraph’s print edition on Friday ran the headline: ‘Lazy lifestyle can be as deadly as smoking’. The Mail runs the same story, saying: ‘A lack of exercise is as dangerous as smoking.’ Now, remember: Nothing that you do in your daily life, even if you are a lumberjack or an oil-rig diver or whatever, is as deadly as smoking. I pretty much promise you that. Serving

Thursday

The Spectator

Six rivals for the name Isis

Not in their name The BBC decided to start calling the Islamic terror group Isis by the acronym IS instead. Some organisations who are retaining the name: — Isis Equity Partners London-based private equity group — The Isis Student magazine at Oxford University — Isis day spa and hair salon in Oxford (not to mention hair salons in Birmingham, Ascot, Sunningdale and Writtle) — HMP Isis Young Offenders’ Institution in Thamesmead — Isis Motors Secondhand car dealership in Hayes, Middlesex — Spirit of Isis Ethically sourced crystal shop in Bedford Fighting faiths It was claimed that more British Muslims are fighting for jihadist forces than have joined HM Forces. What

Thursday

The Spectator

Who cleans skyscrapers?

Tough at the top The clocks on Big Ben were cleaned by abseiling window-cleaners. Some other big cleaning/painting jobs: — Repainting the Forth Railway Bridge used to be a metaphor for never-ending work, but a new coating completed in 2012 is estimated to have a life of 25 years. — Sydney Harbour Bridge was, for the first 80 years of its life, cleaned by hand, but last year it was done for the first time by robot. — The world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, is cleaned by a team of abseilers, with all 24,000 windows taking three months to get through. — Most New York skyscrapers are

Thursday

The Spectator

If you thought this World Cup was weird, take a look at Brazil 1950

Old world Brazil has struggled to get ready for the World Cup, even though it hosted it before, in 1950. Some oddities of that tournament: — There was no final, as such. The winner was to be decided by a second group stage. But it came down to the last match, Brazil vs Uruguay, in which Brazil needed a draw and Uruguay a win. Uruguay won 2-1. — That match, at Rio do Janeiro’s Maracana stadium, still holds the record of the best-attended match in World Cup history, with 199,954 spectators. — Only 13 out of 16 teams who qualified turned up. Scotland could have gone but stuck to their

Thursday

The Spectator

If Alex Salmond is cutting bureaucracy, why does he have so many quangos?

Escape committees An LSE/Institute for Government report estimated the cost of Scottish independence at £2.7 billion, a sum arrived at by multiplying the 180 bodies which would need to be set up by £15 million. The SNP challenged the claim, saying it planned to set up a ‘slimmed-down’ administration. A reminder of some of the quangos already run by the Scottish government: — Scottish Agricultural Wages Board — Bus Users Complaints Tribunal — Rent Assessment Panel for Scotland — Scottish Advisory Committee on Distinction Awards — Hill Farming Advisory Committee for Scotland — Scottish Records Advisory Committee — Fisheries (Electricity) Committee Independent variables While support for Ukip has been growing,

Thursday

The Spectator

Are pigeons braver than dogs?

Animal spirit A labrador blown up with her handler while sniffing for bombs in Afghanistan in 2008 became the 64th animal to be awarded the PDSA’s Dickin medal for ‘gallantry’ during wartime work. — Among the total are 29 dogs, yet they are outnumbered by the 32 pigeons who have won the medal, such as Gustav, for bringing home the first message from the Normandy beach landings in 1944. — Only three horses have been given the medal, and none of them were working in a war zone. Olga, for example, was given the award after bolting 100 yards from a flying bomb, before returning to the scene and helping

Thursday

The Spectator

Do wars always start in years ending ‘14’?

Years of war Imaginative souls have tried to compared the situation in Ukraine with that which preceded the first world war 100 years ago. Are years ending in 14 especially violent? — 1414 saw the Polish-Teutonic war, one of a dozen skirmishes between Poland and Teutonic knights between the 14th and 16th centuries. The war was noted for the efforts to starve opposing armies by razing crops. — 1714 saw the outbreak of the seventh Ottoman-Venetian War, which like the first world war lasted four years. It ended with Venice losing control of the Peloponnese. — 1814 saw the Swedish-Norwegian War, which resulted in Norway entering a union with Sweden.