UNRWA hasn’t earned our trust in Gaza
Before 7 October last year, observers had long suspected an uncomfortable symbiosis between UNRWA, the UN organisation tasked with organising…
The National Portrait Gallery’s bizarre obsession with slavery
We might have foreseen that the movement to radicalise the art and museum world would in time come back to…
The courts can’t solve climate change
It was always a racing certainty that this week’s ‘Swiss grannies’ climate change judgment in Strasbourg would spawn a new wave of…
Is climate change really a human rights matter?
The media and the middle class may love net zero. Unfortunately, it is increasingly clear that voters are less keen.…
Civil servants can’t down tools if they don’t like Israel
Britain in the nineteenth century pioneered the idea of the professional, impartial civil service independent of politics. In the twenty-first,…
Barristers should be allowed to join the Garrick
The Garrick Club affair has taken a new and slightly worrying twist, this time courtesy of – of all bodies…
Why the WHO’s pandemic planning poses a threat to Britain
The fall-out from Covid continues. Its latest manifestations on the international stage are a draft pandemic preparedness treaty, soon to…
Why can’t Ukraine trademark the phrase: ‘Russian warship, go f**k yourself’?
Ukraine’s bravery and daring in the face of Russian aggression marks a stark contrast with European – or at least…
UCL is harming itself by pandering to China
We have suspected for some time that UK universities were supping with the devil when they relied on legions of…
In defence of Judge Tan Ikram
Judge Tanweer Ikram is not your usual judge. Ikram, who has a CBE to his name for services to diversity,…
The Church of England should stop distracting itself with ‘racial justice’
Churches are emptier than ever since Covid. Fewer clergy have more and more parishes to look after; the buildings themselves are…
Dartmoor’s mass trespass isn’t what it seems
The largest mass trespass in a generation will take place in Devon today. Hundreds of protesters belonging to the pressure-group…
Rishi Sunak should ignore this biased Rwanda Bill report
‘UK’s Rwanda Bill incompatible with human rights obligations… damning report by MPs warns.’ So ran the headline yesterday morning, referring to the report released…
Why the EU detests Hungary
To misquote von Clausewitz, the European Union sees lawfare as the continuation of politics by other means. Brussels’s latest sally against the…
Viktor Orban has proved he’s a shrewd negotiator
All eyes were on Hungary’s Viktor Orbán at yesterday’s EU summit in Brussels. The issue at stake was simple but…
Estate agents shouldn’t need A-Levels to sell houses
Last week the shadow housing minister Matthew Pennycook tabled an opportunistic amendment to the government’s Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill.…
Why is the UN sticking up for Just Stop Oil protestors?
Do you remember when you couldn’t get your child to school on time because of a Just Stop Oil slow…
In defence of Katharine Birbalsingh’s prayer ban
We won’t know for some time what the outcome of the claim that a London school has broken the law…
The European Court has become positively immoral
Another new year, and on the very first day we hear of two cases where human rights law has made…
The trouble with the United Nations’s fringe organisations
A new year is a good time for nations, like families, to review the institutions they support. For 2024 I…
The Tories have messed up the return to imperial measurements
Cheers! You will soon once again be able to buy champagne and wine in pint bottles – Winston Churchill’s favourite measure. It…
Why was this Christian teacher hounded for her views on LGBT issues?
Who’d be a teacher these days? Until about 50 years ago, your outlook didn’t matter very much provided you were…
The CofE’s same sex blessings stance is even more illogical than the Vatican’s
Traditionalists in the Church of England and the Catholic church don’t, of course, always see eye to eye. But on…
The unexpected free speech threat coming from Northern Ireland
Threats to free speech can come from unexpected places these days. A law passed in Northern Ireland has troubling implications for…
If France can ignore the ECHR, why can’t we?
A couple of weeks ago, according to a story broken last Friday in Le Monde, the French government did the unthinkable. ‘MA’,…
