When it comes to protests against immigration and asylum hotels, accusations of two-tier policing are never far away. This week the spotlight has fallen on Essex Police, and its handling of a demonstration last week by Epping residents against an asylum hotel in the town, following an alleged sexual assault by a recently arrived Ethiopian
‘We are facing a long, hot summer’, warned a report on social cohesion on Tuesday, ‘with a powder keg of tensions left largely unaddressed from last year that could easily ignite once again’. It only took two days for the first sign of this grim prediction coming true. This time, though, the expression of public
It is with some measure of irritation, I must confess, that I am drawn away from this balmy weekend to discuss the idiotic antics of a so-called musical act by the name of ‘Bob Vylan’. At Glastonbury on Saturday, the frontman of the English ‘punk duo’ led the crowd in a chant. First it was just ‘Free, free Palestine’; but then it became ‘Death, death to the IDF’. They also
It’s an ominous time for a state-of-the-nation conference. Each week, the shores we defended against Hitler, Napoleon and the Spanish Armada are breached by hundreds of foreign men, while asylum seekers make up ‘a significant proportion’ of those currently being investigated for the grooming of British children. Earlier this month, there were days of violent anti-immigration riots
Was the prosecution of Lucy Connolly in the public interest? That is the question now being asked of the embattled Attorney General, Richard Hermer, following my story in the Sunday Telegraph that Hermer approved the charge of stirring up racial hatred against the mother and childminder last summer, over a hastily deleted tweet on the night
In 2021, after the barbaric Islamist murder of Sir David Amess MP, the response of Britain’s political class was as baffling as it was shameful: it decided to ramp up censorship of the internet. Somehow, MPs’ vital personal safety came to be equated with the nebulous concept of ‘safety’ online, along with the protection of
A 53-year-old man has been arrested after a car ploughed into a crowd of Liverpool supporters during their Premier League trophy parade last night. Hundreds of thousands were out on the streets to celebrate when the car collided with pedestrians on Water Street, in the heart of Liverpool city centre, shortly after 6 p.m. Twenty-seven were taken
Sir Keir Starmer, remarkably, has launched an immigration crackdown. Britain risks becoming an ‘island of strangers’ after the Tory ‘one-nation experiment in open borders’, he said on Monday. A Home Office white paper has introduced several measures which will supposedly bring the sky-high numbers down. Most interestingly, the government will extend the required qualification period
What really caused the countrywide unrest after the Southport massacre last summer? Last week, a report by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS), shed a much-needed light on this vital question. This was the second part of HMICFRS’s inspection of the police response to the public disorder that followed Axel
The shocking case of Lucy Connolly is becoming a cause célèbre. In October, the Northampton childminder and wife of a Tory councillor received 31 months behind bars for stirring up racial hatred for a tweet on the night of the Southport massacre. Suella Braverman, the former home secretary, now says her sentence was ‘excessive’ and
At yesterday Prime Minister’s Questions, for the second week running, Kemi Badenoch was savaged by Sir Keir Starmer on the key issue of immigration. A fortnight ago, eye-watering ONS figures showed that we have added a city the size of Birmingham to our population, with most of the influx coming from outside Europe. This is
What is the purpose of Private Eye? I know it’s supposed to be some kind of anti-establishment satirical magazine, boldly holding power to account and standing up for the little guy. But I must say I’m finding its response to the extraordinary police doorstepping of Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson rather puzzling. You would think that this supposed thorn in
The shocking police doorstepping of Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson last week has rightly sparked grave concern about the parlous state of freedom of speech in Britain. Sir Keir Starmer has now joined the leader of the opposition Kemi Badenoch in arguing that police should be concentrating on the physical crime increasingly blighting our towns rather than things that are
The Tory leadership candidate Kemi Badenoch has long argued against the Labour party and the left’s ‘divisive agenda of identity politics’. Instead, she has sought to portray the Conservatives as a truly ‘colour-blind party’ and a ‘genuine meritocracy’. Speaking to the Times earlier this year, she even argued that we should not make a ‘big deal’ of
Postman Tadeusz Potoczek had completed his deliveries for the day. At around 3 p.m. on 3 February, the 60-year-old was returning from work via the London underground, still wearing his red postman’s coat. As the southbound Victoria line train rumbled towards Oxford Circus, he headed for the far end of the platform, perhaps in the
Popping champagne, skulking off to smoke a spliff and pledging to become a life-long Labour voter. Anyone concerned about criminal justice in Britain will find the well-documented glee of the 1,700 prisoners given early release around the country this week galling indeed. As domestic abusers and career criminals walk free, many will have been struck by the contrast with
When Sir Keir Starmer faced off against Rishi Sunak at the despatch box today, in the first Prime Minister’s Questions after the parliamentary recess, he seemed to be rather unsure what his role was. Over the course of their exchanges, the ostensible leader of the country referred to his opposite number not once, not twice,
It is perhaps unsurprising that Sir Keir Starmer’s admission that he may soon be our first part-time prime minister has been seized on gleefully his opponents. ‘I haven’t finished at 6 p.m. ever’, Rishi Sunak has sniped, with the Tories accusing Starmer of wanting to work a ‘four-day week’. The Labour leader told Virgin Radio that as PM he
Emerging from a pub after his campaign launch in Clacton yesterday afternoon, Nigel Farage was milkshaked. A 25-year-old woman has been charged with assault by beating and criminal damage. The incident has, quite rightly, been widely condemned. Farage’s Conservative opponent in Clacton, Giles Watling, tweeted that ‘every candidate has the right to campaign without fear of violence or intimidation’. Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper
Threats to freedom of speech in Britain today typically stem from a combination of two ways of thinking. First, the kindly authoritarian view that it should be the job of the state to protect its citizens from ‘harmful’ speech – and to censor and punish those who cause offence. And second, woke ideology, which means
