World
The empty Englishness of Love Actually
One of the pleasures of fiction, be it book or film, is that it can take us to actual places…
China’s zero-Covid anger is erupting
Protests seem to be breaking out in several major Chinese cities in what has been a week of horrors for…
Would Solzhenitsyn have supported Putin’s war?
A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s first novel, appeared 60 years ago this month. Vividly portraying…
The conspiracy against grammar schools
I love a good hard debate, especially at a university. I can’t recall how many such clashes I have had,…
Laughing at libertarians as crypto burns
In many countries, tricking stupid people out of money is a crime. In the United States, it’s the basis of…
Why is Britain still sending foreign aid to China?
Just why is Britain still spending over £50 million a year in development aid to China? Despite it being the…
At war with my pearly whites
I am a dental basket case. When I was a child, my orthodontist used to joke that he could drive…
What the experts got wrong about migration
On New Year’s Day, 2014, during those sunny, innocent times of Cameron, Clegg and Miliband, Labour MP Keith Vaz headed down to…
Why Britain can’t build infrastructure
The Office for Budget Responsibility estimates that the government will spend (read: borrow) £43 billion this year to keep the…
The lost souls of the Atrium hotel
Heathrow, in London’s western outlands, never lets you forget it’s there. Jets ascend and descend constantly, turning the air into…
Why America’s future is still bright
‘There is a lot of ruin in a nation.’ So said Adam Smith over two centuries ago. He reminds us…
Cardinal Zen’s conviction shows that no one is safe in Hong Kong
Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, the 90-year-old retired bishop of Hong Kong, has been convicted of failing to register a humanitarian…
How Qatar uses its wealth to challenge western values
The French have adopted a ‘when in Rome’ approach to the World Cup in Qatar, refraining from virtue-signalling their disapproval…
The Tories’ migration policy problem
Today’s net migration figures naturally present a problem for ministers in that they are going in the opposite direction to…
Theresa May savages Piers Morgan
Perhaps the most cathartic moment of The Spectator’s Parliamentarian of the Year awards was when the relatively quiet former PM…
Net migration has surged to 504,000. Why?
Net migration to Britain has passed 500,000 for the first time ever – twice as high as the recently upgraded…
New Zealand’s Supreme Court is playing a foolish game of politics
If you are still trying to come to grips with our Supreme Court’s delicate relation with the politics of Scottish…
What now for Scottish nationalists?
The Scottish parliament does not have the power to legislate for a referendum on independence. The Supreme Court has made…
The World Cup armband row would never happen in Japan
Before the start of their World Cup game with Japan, the German team chose to make a ‘protest’. Each player…
Will Rishi Sunak get away with ignoring voters on the right?
Conventional wisdom has long held that the Conservatives win elections from the centre ground – including territory just to the…
Can Boris Johnson’s Charles de Gaulle act pay off?
It is only a month since Boris Johnson gave up his dramatic attempt to regain the Premiership he reluctantly surrendered…
Ron Klain ruins Thanksgiving
Top Twitter user Ron Klain is at it again. This time, the terminally online White House chief of staff tweeted…
The Tory planning row is becoming increasingly bitter
The Tories are really wheeling out all the greatest hits for party rows at the moment. Not content with a…
Stop ignoring the real environmentalists
What does throwing soup on a piece of art have to do with the environment? When we hear the word…
Mohammed bin Salman doesn’t care what the West thinks of him
Saudi Arabia is a bit like us. It’s decent at football. It holds conferences to talk about things like ‘investing in humanity’.…
