The Spectator’s Notes

Trump is giving us a taste of our own medicine

5 April 2025 9:00 am

It seems the US State Department sees an impediment to free speech as an impediment to free trade with Britain.…

Has the Assisted Dying Bill been killed off?

29 March 2025 9:00 am

The reported decision to postpone the implementation of the Assisted Dying Bill until 2029 might, one must pray, turn out…

Putin is outwitting Trump

22 March 2025 9:00 am

In the incessant conflicts of life and politics, people who know what they want tend to win. That is why…

Trump has breathed new life into Davos Man

15 March 2025 9:00 am

So bad was the debut of this Labour government that many think it has already failed. But now, I suggest,…

The bully-boy tactics of Trump and J.D. Vance

8 March 2025 9:00 am

Just before Russia invaded Ukraine three years ago, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping announced a ‘friendship without limits’. The phrase seems…

What will Zelensky’s fate be?

1 March 2025 9:00 am

Kyiv We resemble pilgrims. Because of the war, no one can fly to Ukraine, and so we travel, romantically, by…

My Valentine’s Day car crash

22 February 2025 9:00 am

Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, is not a MAGA groupie, but a believer in the Nato alliance. He…

Channel 4 shouldn’t get to decide the next Archbishop

15 February 2025 9:00 am

Obviously, it is difficult to defend the leadership of the Church of England, and I am inexperienced in that art;…

Trump is like Shakespeare’s Fool

8 February 2025 9:00 am

President Trump’s role in relation to other countries resembles that of the Fool in Shakespeare. He provides a sort of…

My message to the Trumpists

1 February 2025 9:00 am

Social media benefit from creating continuous belligerence in politics. For them, Donald Trump is the perfect politician. As I wrote…

Will Trump remember his allies?

25 January 2025 9:00 am

I had thought that having to be inaugurated indoors would have cramped Donald Trump’s style. Not so. The rhetoric with…

The National Trust took the knee

18 January 2025 9:00 am

In a recent interview, Hilary McGrady, the director-general of the National Trust, complains that ‘The culture wars we’re trying to…

We need safeguarding from safeguarders

11 January 2025 9:00 am

What does it mean, in practice, to say that reporting child abuse should be mandatory? It sounds appropriately severe, but…

The joy of our village Christmas play

14 December 2024 9:00 am

We are just recovering from the village play. This annual Christmas event was taken over last year by our son…

The origin of The Spectator’s Parliamentarian of the Year Awards

7 December 2024 9:00 am

Forty years ago, a whisky company, Highland Park, which advertised its Famous Grouse in The Spectator, approached us with a…

Farmers aren’t miners

23 November 2024 9:00 am

A parallel is being drawn between the Tories and the miners in the 1980s and Labour and the farmers today.…

Justin Welby shouldn’t have resigned

16 November 2024 9:00 am

There is no proper reason for the resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby. No iniquity was proved against…

The fascinating life of Sir Henry Keswick

9 November 2024 9:00 am

Sir Henry Keswick died on Tuesday, aged 86. Under his proprietorship, from 1975 to 1981, The Spectator recovered, and began…

Has the assisted dying lobby considered the guillotine?

2 November 2024 9:00 am

My young friend Dr Cajetan Skowkronski has helped me resolve a question that has been worrying me. Why do supporters…

The 38 candidates to be Oxford’s chancellor

26 October 2024 9:00 am

Being Cambridge, I thank God that we have no nonsense about electing our chancellor. We have had a blameless, unchallenged…

Why won’t David Lammy help Jimmy Lai?

19 October 2024 9:00 am

As I write, the Foreign Secretary, David Lammy, is flying to China. So I am only guessing when I say…

Who will dress Keir Starmer now?

12 October 2024 9:00 am

It is worth upholding the stuffy point which should have prevailed at the start. It was always improper and unethical…

The Tories’ Greek tragedy has reached its catharsis

5 October 2024 9:00 am

I write this as I leave the Tory conference in Birmingham. I have covered most of these events (and many…

Who’d be an MP now?

28 September 2024 9:00 am

Sir Keir Starmer offered a sausage to fortune when he let Lord Alli bankroll half the cabinet. One’s heart does…

Do you have a ‘story’?

21 September 2024 9:00 am

As someone who worked full time in the office for 24 years and has now worked full time from home…