Features
Gresham College
How many people need to gather together before it becomes more likely than not that at least two of them…
Can we be friends?
Have you heard the one about the new Labour MP who refuses to be friends with Tories? When Laura Pidcock…
Brexit wars
The time for choosing is fast approaching for Theresa May. Soon she must make a decision that will define her…
A court’s contempt
The issue of sovereignty has mysteriously disappeared from the debate over Brexit. Some business-focused commentators even like to assert that…
Crime and prejudice
Beware of jumping to conclusions about Brexit-induced violence
Ukraine’s last best hope
Georgia’s former president may be a reckless narcissist, but he could change everything
Theresa May’s phoney war
Next month, Theresa May is expected to launch her long-awaited audit into racial disparities in public services. We are being…
Our browbeaten universities
Are university vice-chancellors paid too much? The government clearly thinks so, and is planning to fine universities that can’t justify…
Decision breakers
‘The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision,’ said Maimonides. How right he was. Today,…
The straight dope
It’s not easy to get hold of Ángel Hernández, the legendary Mexican chemist who for a decade provided illicit performance-enhancing…
Watergate
Enough has been written about a Conservative government that knows its electoral success depends on Britain remaining a property-owning democracy,…
Ya Allah!
Last month Luigi Brugnaro, the mayor of Venice, warned that anyone who yelled Allahu Akbar (‘God is the greatest’) in…
Dover
When people come to Dover, it’s usually to pass through. The magnificent castle on the cliffs may be a tourist…
Tapestries
It is rare nowadays to see someone pull out a half-finished tapestry from their handbag and get on with their…
Starting again at 48
My name is Katherine and I’m an intern at The Spectator. What does that say about me? If you had…
The Merkel supremacy
Berlin ‘Capitalism is armed robbery,’ reads the graffiti on the subway wall, but here in Berlin, German capitalists are doing…
The fat tax fallacy
James Cracknell, the athlete turned anti-obesity campaigner, was the subject of sniggering and derision in April when he said that…
Love rats
Paris A rat’s not called a rat for nothing, and — as we are repeatedly told — we are never…
The lure of the abyss
I received a sad letter this week: Steve is back in prison. Each day the mail comes down to the…
The green giant
Environmentalism has gone too far; renewable energy is a disaster; scares about pesticides and chemicals are horribly overdone; no, the…
Fat Britannia: what can be done about our expanding waistlines?
The good news is that Theresa May has dropped the threat to withdraw universal free school meals. Thank God (and…
Our big fat problem
The good news is that Theresa May has dropped the threat to withdraw universal free school meals. Thank God (and…
Greater Oxbridge
Oxbridge is an ivory-tower state of mind, perhaps, or at least two ancient rival universities, but how about this: in…
Why is the National Trust hounding hunters?
For the sound of his horn brought me from my bed/ And the cry of his hounds which he oft…
Lessons from Houston
The numbers are awesome. In a matter of hours, Hurricane Harvey dumped nine trillion gallons of rainfall on Houston and…
