The Spectator’s Notes
The Spectator’s Notes
The Duke of Sussex says that he and his wife can never return to live in the United Kingdom. They…
The Spectator’s Notes
Sir Keir Starmer says the House of Lords is ‘indefensible’. It is an odd thing to say about an institution…
The Spectator’s Notes
Things are currently so bad in the western democracies that we tend to ignore how much worse they are in…
The Spectator’s Notes
The Supreme Court decided rightly on Wednesday, rejecting the Scottish government’s claim that a second referendum on independence was not…
The Spectator’s Notes
In order to understand why all Cops (Conference of the Parties), including the one which began this week, are so…
The Spectator’s Notes
Greta Thunberg said, in a newspaper interview, that Cop27 is a ‘scam’ for ‘greenwashing, lying and cheating’. Then she said…
The Spectator’s Notes
I have seen it suggested that because Rishi Sunak is a Hindu, it would be wrong for him to have…
The Spectator’s Notes
In the House of Commons on Monday, someone accused Liz Truss’s government of being ‘in office but not in power’.…
The Spectator’s Notes
Much of this is not Liz Truss’s fault. The great big adjustment all over the West is that the era…
The Spectator’s Notes
Thought for the Day appears every morning on BBC Radio 4. This preachy slot is hallowed by longevity, if not…
The Spectator’s Notes
Yes, but why did the IMF put out its Tuesday night statement? Even if all its criticisms of the government’s…
The Spectator’s Notes
If this were a Catholic country, up would go the cry for canonisation. When Pope John Paul II died, the…
The Spectator’s Notes
‘So it is come at last, the distinguished thing!’ exclaimed Henry James on his deathbed. Such a thought is reflected…
The Spectator’s Notes
As is now well known, Liz Truss has travelled politically. Her parents are left-wing, and there is a photograph of her…
The Spectator’s Notes
David Trimble, who has just died, has rightly been praised for his courage. History may prove him to have been…
The Spectator’s Notes
Whitehall is telling ministers that this is a ‘caretaker’ government and so, by convention, cannot take decisions. This is not…
The Spectator’s Notes
If you had said, even ten years ago, that there was no chance of a white male cabinet minister becoming…
The Spectator’s Notes
Few leaders could be as different in character as Margaret Thatcher and Boris Johnson, but one can compare their predicaments…
The Spectator’s Notes
If anyone was suitable to be the Prime Minister’s adviser on ministerial interests, it was Lord Geidt. Self-effacing, professional, unself-righteous…
The Spectator’s Notes
Even before the ECHR injunction, the bishops had issued their anathema. All 25 of them in the House of Lords…
The Spectator’s Notes
It was reported gleefully that Boris Johnson was booed as he entered St Paul’s Cathedral for the Jubilee Thanksgiving service…
The Spectator’s Notes
Like many people who do not share his views, I have felt intermittent admiration for Peter Tatchell over the past…
The Spectator’s Notes
I wrote recently elsewhere about Jeremy Hunt’s good new book examining unnecessary deaths in the NHS. Someone should write a…
