Columns
If you think your bills are bad now, just wait
Forgive the doom-mongering, but the US, and especially the UK, may be dangerously on course for a sovereign debt crisis.…
Things can always get worse
I have spent the past week marvelling at the behaviour of our commentating class. They seem to have whipped themselves…
Farage’s plan to win over the left
The loudest man in politics knows when to keep his silence. Nigel Farage held his tongue on Monday as Keir…
The unstoppable rise of stupidity
Hold the front page: I’ve found a very good contemporary novel to occupy my time. Such things have become vanishingly…
What the Two Fat Ladies taught us about Britain
‘Grab that crab, Clarissa!/ Eat that meat, Jennifer!’ It was with these words – the start of their self-sung theme…
Stopping the boats shouldn’t require magical thinking
The BBC’s tracking-down of Kardo Ranya as a people-smuggling mastermind is a triumph of investigative journalism. But anyone who thinks…
18 ways to save your political career
Dear wannabe leaders of Britain. What a lot of you there are! I’ve been writing about leadership and the craft…
I admit it: I was wrong about the Premier League
Yes, of course, one sometimes yearns for the old days. The friend who, appearing in court on a charge of…
Let’s ditch the idea of the ‘black vote’
I long took for granted that US opinion polls break down respondents into white people, black people and Hispanics. But…
The obvious truth about anti-Semitism
There are many ways to do nothing. One is to sit on your hands; another is to call for ‘a…
Is Reform now Scotland’s leading unionist party?
In Scotland, a changing of the guard is near. But while Hearts are set to break the duopoly of Celtic…
When will we admit that the special relationship does not exist?
It was to King Charles’s great credit that he refused to fall for the Trump power handshake thing and instead…
The ‘sensible’ class is losing control of the House of Lords
The House of Lords is often described as ‘the best private members’ club in London’. Certainly, it has an appearance…
With a shudder, I’m voting Labour in the local elections
You may be disturbed by a column urging whites (among others) to vote as a bloc in the coming local…
My night under fire at the White House correspondents’ dinner
Last Saturday evening, the American media class descended for its annual jamboree of back-slapping at the Washington Hilton. Protestors outside…
‘Even Corbyn at his worst never lost here’: how bad will it be for Labour in Wales?
Of all Labour’s heartlands, none has more mythos or magic than Wales. Its history of pits and pulpits produced Nye…
Voters get the politicians they deserve – so get ready for PM Polanski
It is a truism that in a democracy the voters get the government they deserve – and so we should…
For progressives, ‘ageing’ is the one acceptable slur
Willie Donaldson, who died in 2005, has a claim to having had the best obituary sub-heading of any writer I…
Tea-towel-gate is everything wrong with modern Britain
During last September’s freshers’ fair at Royal Holloway, University of London, two students got into a brief verbal tiff that…
Britain’s ‘drone gap’ makes us vulnerable
When John Healey was asked, on stage at the London Defence Conference, whether the armed forces were ‘ready’ for war,…
What we can learn from the Southport killer
It was a matter of some disappointment to me that Kanye West was barred entry to this country as a…
Trump’s goals in Iran have always been clear
The bombing of the Revolutionary government in Iran is drawing comparisons with the war in Iraq. But the comparisons are…
Tomorrow belongs to the vegetarians
Can there be any thinking person who has passed a lorry filled with live animals peering out through the slats…
What happened to Britain’s fighting spirit?
When war is in the air, young men traditionally sign up – and they traditionally sign up, disproportionately, from the…
The Tory-fication of Reform
Nigel Farage likes a gamble. Crypto bros and hedge-fund managers bankroll his enterprises; his social circle is filled with traders,…
