The Spectator’s Notes
Why is it wrong, some ask, for senior British businessmen, former civil servants etc to work for Huawei UK? After…
The Spectator’s Notes
The government’s promised ‘pathway to citizenship’ to Hong Kong people is wonderful, but has the Foreign Office arranged a get-out…
What is it about Chinese totalitarianism that makes clever people so silly?
There is something about Chinese totalitarianism which brings out the silliness of many clever people. I suspect it is to…
The Spectator’s notes
This week in 1989, the Chinese authorities massacred protestors in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. I was editing this paper. It struck…
The Spectator’s notes
At Dominic Cummings’s press conference on Monday, reporters tried two lines of attack. One was to behave like local detectives,…
The Spectator’s Notes
Last month, writing elsewhere, I quoted the website of the China Centre at Jesus College, Cambridge: ‘Under the leadership of…
The Spectator’s Notes
A friend, a senior retired mandarin, emails. He complains that rural lockdown means that he and his wife have ‘got…
We should heed the world’s warnings about China
Mathias Döpfner is that still rare thing — an outspoken German. I have known him slightly for many years and…
The Spectator’s notes
Mathias Döpfner is that still rare thing — an outspoken German. I have known him slightly for many years and…
The Spectator’s Notes
During the second world war, the collection of the National Gallery had to be hidden in a mountain in Wales…
The Spectator’s notes
Although I once edited this paper, and have written for it for almost 40 years, I did not know that…
Should medics be hassling old people with ‘do not resuscitate’ forms?
A neighbour of ours, self-isolating and with poor lung function, has twice been telephoned recently by the medical authorities. After pleasant…
The Spectator’s Notes
We know, because of the lack of widespread testing, that incidences of Covid-19 are under-reported. What is less well known…
The Spectator’s Notes
It is good of President Trump to offer Boris Johnson his best wishes and the best American pharmaceuticals (though no…
The Spectator’s Notes
‘I am a columnist for the Daily Telegraph,’ I began a text message to an NHS executive last week. Due…
The Spectator’s Notes
‘Lourdes shrine closes healing pools as precaution against coronavirus,’ says a discouraging headline in the Catholic Herald. Jesus ‘made the…
The Spectator’s Notes
When we left this Britain on Thursday last week, life was almost as usual. Shops and restaurants were open. The…
Coronavirus might not be all bad news for the stock market
There cannot be many positive aspects to the coronavirus outbreak, but I wonder if it carries one for stock markets.…
The Spectator’s Notes
Monday night’s Commons rebellion over Huawei was on a surprisingly serious scale for a new government with a big mandate.…
The ugliness of carbon zero
The government is trying to get onshore windfarms going again, defying the damage they do to unique environments. I am…
The Spectator’s Notes
The government is trying to get onshore windfarms going again, defying the damage they do to unique environments. I am…
The Spectator’s Notes
The fall from grace of Jean Vanier is truly a sad story. The founder of the L’Arche communities did extraordinary…
The Spectator’s Notes
My parents told me that their wartime childhoods were punctuated by the expression: ‘Don’t you know there’s a war on?’…
The BBC’s big problem is its obsession with itself
One reason people are disillusioned with the BBC is its obsession with itself. Here is the text of a question…
The Spectator’s Notes
How depressed should one be about the HS2 go-ahead? The cost is stupefying. The offering to the north — considered…
