flat white

Trust the union movement to guarantee a sleazy start to the political year

Analysing and critiquing the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic is one thing. It’s quite another insinuating that Prime Minister…

1 Feb 2021

China’s bullying backfires: Australia ahead in trade spat

The events might come from a Hollywood script. School bully (China), annoyed over being left out of games (lucrative overseas…

1 Feb 2021

Big Tech: private companies now wielding the coercive power of government like a one-party state

Anyone with siblings knows that trying to win an argument by yelling louder than your sister, or sticking fingers in…

31 Jan 2021

Kevin Andrews’ defeat: a setback for ScoMo at the start of the parliamentary year

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has received an unwanted spanner in the works ahead of Tuesday’s return of parliament with barrister…

31 Jan 2021

Insiders is insiders. How can they speak for ordinary Australia?

This morning I watched Insiders; the first episode of the year. In the first 15 minutes, the three guests —…

31 Jan 2021

It’s shameful being gay was a crime in Victoria before 1980. Daniel Andrews’ conversion practices bill is shameful too

Shamefully, being gay in Victoria was a crime in Victoria before 1980. It will be no less shameful that in…

31 Jan 2021

Biden and big tech: a fatal mix?

For many, Joe Biden is a welcome return to normalcy following four years of Trumpian antics. However, a return to…

31 Jan 2021

The great Kiwi kowtow

News item: New Zealand Trade Minister advises Australia to show China more “respect”. New Zealand has offered to teach Australia…

30 Jan 2021

Sign up to the Morning Double Shot newsletter

The Spectator Australia's Morning Double Shot delivers a hearty breakfast of news and views straight to your inbox

Sign up to the Flat White newsletter

Weekly round up of the best Flat White blogs - delivered straight to your inbox

What happened to the populist left?

To this day, my iPhone still changes the word ‘too’ to ‘TPP,’ a reminder that about five years ago I…

1 Feb 2021

One year after Brexit, Britain is reaping the benefits of independence

A year ago today Britain awoke to a rather muted celebration – which seemed to consist largely of a bubble…

1 Feb 2021

The free speech row tearing apart the tech community

Donald Trump’s Twitter suspension after the riot at the US Capitol made headlines around the world. What was less reported,…

31 Jan 2021

Might Macron lose to Le Pen?

The latest French opinion poll puts Marine Le Pen on around 26 per cent, ahead of President Emmanuel Macron on 23 per…

30 Jan 2021

Sign up to The Spectator Australia newsletter

Australia's best political analysis - straight to your inbox

Sign up to the Best of the World newsletter

Get the latest developments around the world

Dreaming of a White Paper

Honouring Malcom Turnbull by making him a Companion of the Order of Australia gave our 29th Prime Minister an opportunity…

30 Jan 2021

Twiggy’s Green steal?

There was a time when the ABC’s Boyer Lectures made sense. Based on the Reith Lectures sponsored by the BBC,…

30 Jan 2021

Biden’s brave new transgender world

That Joe Biden, on the first day of his presidency, signed an Executive Order advancing the transgender movement sends an…

30 Jan 2021

Stranded

In 2019, America recorded the world’s largest decline in energy-related carbon dioxide. But to credit President Trump, would discredit other…

30 Jan 2021

Humourless moral imbeciles

A century ago one of the best-selling authors in the world was the son of a Scottish Free Church Presbyterian…

30 Jan 2021

Court short

Reserved for ‘eminent achievement and merit of the highest degree in service to Australia’, no more than 35 people in…

30 Jan 2021

Divided We Fall

In the middle of the 15th century, Italian philosopher, bishop, and humanist Francesco Patrizi of Siena wrote a number of…

30 Jan 2021

A great president

The United States has led the free world for the best part of a century, producing a record number of…

30 Jan 2021

On The Beach

The aftermath of Australia Day seems like an appropriate time to watch On the Beach, for a belated first time,…

30 Jan 2021

Elijah Moshinsky

Earlier this month, the opera world sadly absorbed the news of the death of Elijah Moshinsky. Born in Shanghai in…

30 Jan 2021

The Investigation

Slowly, after what seemed like infinite, malingering delays, virus-driven, the world of arts and entertainment is starting to open again…

23 Jan 2021

Masked opera

We were all excited to be there.  You would have thought that we hadn’t been to an opera performance.  Well,…

23 Jan 2021

Aussie Life

Has any speech by an American politician ever received more attention in the Australian media than Joe Biden’s inauguration speech?…

30 Jan 2021

Aussie Lingo

Every other day some minor celebrity complains of being ‘trolled’ on social media. The answer is to get off social…

30 Jan 2021

The fakery of Martha Gellhorn

Gstaad Martha Gellhorn was a long-legged blonde American writer and journalist who became Papa Hemingway’s third and penultimate wife. She…

30 Jan 2021

What should you put at the end of an email?

Suzanne Moore, the Telegraphcolumnist, found it ‘deeply annoying’ when perhaps five years ago she noticed people putting ‘Kind regards’ at…

30 Jan 2021

Queer Teen Craze

It is remarkable how quickly the cause of transgenderism has moved from being a strange object at the back of…

30 Jan 2021

Lives unlived: Light Perpetual, by Francis Spufford, reviewed

Francis Spufford was already admired as a non-fiction writer when he published his prize-winning first novel, On Golden Hill, in…

30 Jan 2021

A bored business administrator in Leicester puts the intelligence services to shame

In the summer of 2012, a man was walking near Jabal Shashabo, a Syrian rebel enclave, when he spotted a…

30 Jan 2021

Memory – and the stuff of dreams

Can you remember when you heard about 9/11? Chances are you’ll be flooded instantly with memories — not only where…

30 Jan 2021

One of the last men-only jobs left — offshore in the North Sea

As a child, I loved the Ladybird ‘People at Work’ series. I had the ones on the fireman, the policeman,…

30 Jan 2021

A beastly cold country: Britain in 1962

Like this author, I was happily snowbound at a beloved grandparent’s house during the big freeze that began on Boxing…

30 Jan 2021

Holding the Empire responsible for the state of modern Britain is becoming commonplace

It seems to have become a virtual orthodoxy of the academic and publishing worlds that history and fiction now have…

30 Jan 2021

Rescuing Elizabeth Barrett Browning from her wax-doll image

‘Ah, did you once see Shelley plain?’ asks the speaker in Robert Browning’s poem ‘Memorabilia’ — a line which recognises…