Melanie McDonagh is an Irish journalist working in London.
Four months after the election, Ireland finally has a government and a prime minister, Taoiseach Micheál Martin. The country has since independence been governed by the two old Civil War parties – a conflict without any resonance whatever in contemporary Ireland – and, surprise surprise, it still is. The difference now is that whereas previously,
One of the umpteen things people don’t elect a Tory government for is to make marriage more easily dissoluble. In the last year for which figures were available, 2017, the number of opposite-sex marriages was the lowest on record – just shy of 243,000 – and I’m not sure that’ll be boosted by making marriage
Andrew Morton is being a bit previous, isn’t he, in suggesting to the Telegraph that the Covid crisis means that the Queen has more or less abdicated? Or as he puts it: ‘The brutal truth is that her reign is effectively over. Covid-19 has done more damage to the monarchy than Oliver Cromwell. Corona has
45 min listen
Are we witnessing the death of the liberal ideal? (01:02) Next, what’s behind the government U-turn on primary schools and what effect could it have on the poorest students? (20:14) And finally, Britain’s ash trees are facing a pandemic of their own, with so-called ash dieback sweeping the nation. Can Britain’s ash trees be saved?
So, the Government has abandoned plans to bring all primary school pupils back before the summer holidays, in addition to the two cohorts who have already returned. The opposition of teaching unions and some regional authorities and mayors have seen to that. As for secondary schools, only two of their year groups are returning; no
You’d think that any measure that would help to get people out spending would be all to the good, wouldn’t you? Well, not so. The government’s latest genius idea for rebooting the retail sector is to abandon Sunday trading laws for a year, at least in the case of the larger supermarkets. Those laws at
Sally Challen killed her husband, Richard, with a hammer in 2010. She was convicted of murder and given a life sentence but on appeal the conviction was replaced with one for manslaughter. A psychiatric report had concluded Challen was suffering from an ‘adjustment disorder’. The judge, Mr Justice Edis, said the killing came after ‘years
Happy now? Thought not. Dominic Cummings has delivered his statement and answered questions but still the critics aren’t appeased. Not at all. In fact, the tenor of the questions that were put to him suggested that quite a few of the journalists lucky enough to be socially distancing in the Downing Street rose garden, plus
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The government has come out in defence of Dominic Cummings’s decision to travel to Durham during lockdown. On the podcast, two Spectator writers give their opposing views on whether or not he made the right decision.
The question is, does Dominic Cumming’s four-year-old son possess preternatural resilience – a bit like the infant John the Baptist who went off into the desert as a boy. Or does he, like my own children at that age, need a bit of feeding, occasional supervision to stop him playing with matches and a bath
Children of richer families are studying six hours a day compared with four-and-a-half hours for children from poorer families. Which translates, says the IFS, which conducted a survey of 4,000 parents, to a gap of seven days advantage for the haves over the have nots by next month. Surprise! I don’t, myself, think they’ve quite
As we can see from the reaction to the PM’s speech, there are several ways of looking at the lockdown. Some people can’t wait to get back to business. Lots are frankly nervous at this sort of talk. And there are those, like my friend the clap consultant, who see it as an opportunity. Let
When I first heard that Neil Ferguson, the Government’s Covid adviser, had had to resign, I thought the BBC broadcast had announced that it was because he had seen his married mother during lockdown. Aw, I thought. Filial duty. He couldn’t bear to leave his poor mother at home by herself, though what’s the big
It seems that a quarter of A level-students preparing to go to university haven’t been set any work by teachers. So… what does that tell you about the rest of them, the ones who aren’t the focus of teacher attention? Perhaps all over the country, there is a frenzy of education going on. It just
It is 178 years since the last recorded charge of blasphemy in Scotland, against the Edinburgh bookseller Thomas Paterson for ‘exhibiting placards of a profane nature’ in his shop window in 1842. One of those placards announced that ‘Paterson & Co (of the Blasphemy Depot, London)… Beg to acquaint infidels in general and Christians in
Yep, the end is in sight, courtesy of other countries organising the practicalities for the return to some sort of normal life – shopping and schooling, as in Germany. That means Britain will, like it or not, be playing catchup sooner rather than later. And when this oddly dreamlike existence is over, it’s going to
You know what day it is? That’s right, St George’s Day, England’s own. Except he’s also patron of Georgia, Portugal, Venice, Malta, Ethiopia, Serbia (one of them) and Lithuania. Plus the Boy Scouts. And I am told, of syphilis sufferers. A happy feast day to you all. George is that excellent thing, a saint who’s
Those of us who are sceptical about the worth of citizens’ assemblies have been noting with interest the upshot of the French citizens’ convention for the climate which delivered its recommendations this week. The thing about these assemblies of randomly selected citizens mulling over thorny issues is that they’re a brilliant way for elected politicians
44 min listen
Historian Niall Ferguson writes in this week’s cover piece that, even before coronavirus, the Cold War between America and China was already getting underway. With the current pandemic, animosity between the two superpowers has only increased. So when it comes to the geopolitics of the ‘corona wars’, who will win? Niall tells Cindy on the podcast
Ofqual, the exams watchdog, has issued a consultation document about its proposals for exams this year. It’s proposing to delegate the whole business of awarding grades to teachers, based on mocks, previous work and anything else that comes to mind. Pupils would not, under these plans, be able to appeal the ‘professional judgment’ of teachers