World
Revealed: Huawei's Oxbridge millions
British universities have received twice as much funding from Huawei as previous estimates suggest, according to new figures obtained by The Spectator.…
Sage data suggests Omicron patients leave hospital sooner
Recent Sage reports have stressed that we’re still waiting on a major piece of information: the average stay in hospital…
Could Covid finally end the tradition of Japan’s dreaded 'bonenkai' parties?
John Updike described America as a ‘vast conspiracy to make you happy’. Japan, a wonderful place to live in many…
A blurred distinction between refugees and migrants is a recipe for chaos
Among the most evocative and distressing press images of the year were those of Maryam Nuri Hama Amin. The 24-year-old Kurd…
Why isn’t John von Neumann better known?
More than anyone else, John von Neumann created the future. He was an unparalleled genius, one of the greatest mathematicians…
Why should I be 'cancelled' for arguing that biological sex is real?
‘I just get the impression she hates men’, said a wound-licking James Max, on TalkRADIO, after he interviewed me on Wednesday.…
David Cameron winds his office up
In 2021 we bid many things farewell: Philip Green’s retail empire, England’s Euro chances and Donald Trump’s presidency. And now, joining them…
Will Trump’s pro-vaccine stance prove his undoing?
Donald Trump famously boasted that he could “stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody” and still not…
Don’t blame deforestation for the pandemic
With a laboratory leak in Wuhan looking more and more likely as the source of the Covid pandemic, the Chinese…
Labour MP demands 'free movement for all'
New year, old Labour. As 2021 draws to a close and Keir Starmer’s managers seek to establish Labour as A…
No, babies shouldn't be allowed in the Commons
Babies have no place in the chamber.I’ve asked to leave debates to feed my child a few times and have never been…
Around the World In Eighty Days is the worst TV this Christmas
‘In many ways, Phileas Fogg represents everything that’s alarming and peculiar about that old sense of British Empire. Potentially, it’s…
Banana republic Britain and the curse of reverse exceptionalism
A day did not go by on social media in 2021 without some high-profile performative outrage about Boris Johnson and…
France has the most to lose from Britain's turn away from Europe
It was Napoleon who declared that ‘a state has the politics of its geography’. We do well to remember that…
Will Trump's pro-vaccine stance prove his undoing?
Donald Trump famously boasted that he could ‘stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody’ and still not lose voters. That…
Abortion has poisoned American politics. Good
In the months before and after the 2020 presidential election, I was ready to take the blackpill. I had become…
Remember panic-buying? Here's what will happen next time
It’s post-Christmas, and there are already murmurs about supermarkets with empty shelves. Just as with the petrol shortage in September and…
Boris's lockdown gamble could spell big trouble for Labour
Has Boris Johnson just been thrown a lifeline by a devolution settlement that has caused nothing but trouble for UK…
Stonewall's annus horribilis
The year 2021 has been an annus horribilis for Stonewall. For much of the last decade, the charity could do no…
Labour in limbo over Covid curbs
Wes Streeting has enjoyed something of a dream start since his promotion to shadow health secretary a month ago. Confident…
The Father I knew: A tribute to Desmond Tutu
The tributes being paid to Desmond Tutu this week often begin with words like ‘activist’, ‘campaigner’, ‘protester’, ‘fighter’ or ‘opponent’.…
Diane Abbott’s Zero Covid crusade
With Christmas over, the turkey consumed and Maughamtide been and gone, the eyes of an anxious nation have turned once…
The modern economy is built on addiction
Two stories, side-by-side in theSunday paper I was looking at online. The first — ‘Strip Dame Dopesick ofher title’ —…
Scotland's 2022 constitutional courtroom drama will be pure theatre
This is the time of year when economists and political scientists make their predictions for the upcoming 12 months. Will…
Afghanistan's troubles can't only be blamed on the Taliban
In 2001, I spent part of a hard winter in a remote village near Bamiyan in the Afghan central highlands.…
