Coffee House
Why is the National Trust waging war against its members?
The National Trust culture war has just stepped up a gear. Ahead of the Trust’s AGM on 30 October, the…
The ECJ's credibility is in tatters
Is the European Court of Justice (ECJ) a properly independent court? The damning verdict of two respected EU law academics…
A matter of Truss: the unlikely rise of Lizmania
If Boris Johnson were to vanish tomorrow, who should replace him? The American pollster Frank Luntz asked this of about 200…
Xi threatens Taiwan because he's weak
Over the weekend, China sent waves of warplanes racing towards Taiwan in numbers not seen before, forcing the democratic self-ruled…
Was Labour conference a success for Starmer?
There is relief in the opposition leader’s office this morning following a broadly warm reception to Keir Starmer’s speech at…
The real reason France was excluded from Aukus
The fallout from Australia’s cancellation of its submarine contract with France and the new trilateral Indo-Pacific security pact between Australia,…
Expelled leftists mull new party
The not-so-great and good of the onetime Labour left were out in force last night, as members of Labour Against the…
The blind spot in the SNP's 'war on drink'
Scotland’s grim reputation for abnormally high drug fatalities has become embedded in the public consciousness over the past year. The…
Boris Johnson's popularity problem
The Westminster rumour mill is in overdrive today on the question of whether Rishi Sunak will be Boris Johnson’s successor in…
It’s time to upgrade the office of the Welsh first minister
Some of the most revealing detail from newly released 1997 government files relate to Welsh constitutional affairs. The Home Office…
Will Afghanistan fall to the Taleban?
A last-ditch effort to broker peace in Afghanistan will be made in the Qatari capital of Doha this weekend. A…
A salt and sugar tax doesn’t make much sense
What is the point of the National Food Strategy? When Henry Dimbleby was hired as Britain’s ‘food tsar’ several years…
Cancelling To Kill a Mockingbird is a step too far
It often feels like we’re living through the revenge of the talentless. Cancel culture is essentially a war of no-marks…
Oxford, 'sensitivity readers' and the trouble with safe spaces
The list of things that students must apparently be protected from grows longer every day. Controversial speakers, rude comedians, sombreros…
Is the EU breaching its UK treaty by failing to protect LGBT rights?
Has the EU Commission lost any sense of moral value? This week, Hungary, an EU member state, voted to impose…
Dominic Cummings still needs to back up his allegations
When Dominic Cummings, the Prime Minister’s former chief advisor, gave evidence to the Covid-19 ‘lessons learned’ joint select committee last…
Putin and Biden need one another
Does Joe Biden think that Putin is a killer? asked ABC host George Stephanopoulos. ‘Mmm-hmm, I do,’ answered the President.…
The collapse of the Brexit scare stories
The collapse in UK-EU trade after 1 January was widely reported. What has not been reported nearly as much is…
The two elites squeezing the life out of football
So, all of a sudden the chattering classes care about football fans? Yesterday, the kind of people who usually wring…
Boris scraps daily White House-style briefings
Boris Johnson has axed plans for televised White House-style press conferences. The announcement came six months after Allegra Stratton was unveiled…
The music at the heart of the Duke's funeral
Every detail of today’s funeral of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, is likely to be pored over in the days…
Is Welsh devo-scepticism beginning to unravel?
Calls to abolish the Welsh parliament are nothing new: Wales rejected devolution in 1979 and voted only by the smallest…
Europe's human rights judges are right not to ban compulsory vaccines
If you think public health authorities in England are overbearing, spare a thought for the Czechs. Parents who fail to…
Will Lindsay get his chariot back?
As Speaker, John Bercow could never be accused of underselling his position. During his tenure the diminutive parliamentarian attracted criticism…
Why the UK shouldn’t engage in vaccine nationalism
There is a big, big hole in Ursula von der Leyen’s strategy of threatening to ban exports of the Pfizer…
