Portrait of the week

Portrait of the week: Shoplifting surges, Trump eyes Gaza Strip and Norway’s government collapses

8 February 2025 9:00 am

Home Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, flew to Brussels for an EU summit, sought a ‘reset’ of relations and…

Portrait of the week: DeepSeek, Duke of Sussex’s damages and an iceberg the size of Cornwall

1 February 2025 9:00 am

Home The government would invest 2.6 per cent of GDP a year to create growth, Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of…

Portrait of the week: Trump’s inauguration, Israel-Hamas ceasefire and cardboard humans comfort lonely fish

25 January 2025 9:00 am

Home Axel Rudakubana, 18, pleaded guilty to the murder of three girls in a knife attack at a Taylor Swift-themed…

Portrait of the week: Tulip Siddiq quits, Sturgeon splits from husband and Trump spared jail

18 January 2025 9:00 am

Home Tulip Siddiq resigned as economic secretary to the Treasury, although she was found not to have broken the ministerial…

Portrait of the week: grooming gangs, wildfires and a Littler victory

11 January 2025 9:00 am

Home Responding to a rejection by Jess Phillips, the safeguarding minister, of calls for a government inquiry into historical child…

Portrait of the week: Reform’s rising membership, peerages and an 11lb puffball

4 January 2025 9:00 am

Home Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform UK, said that the party now had more members than the Conservatives. On…

Portrait of the year: Subpostmasters scandal, Rishi in the rain and Syrian rebels topple regime

14 December 2024 9:00 am

January After an ITV drama, the government suddenly proposed to do something about the unjust prosecution of sub-postmasters. Junior doctors…

Portrait of the week: Labour’s ‘plan for change’, falling productivity and 20,000 wolves in the EU

7 December 2024 9:00 am

Home The Labour government announced a ‘Plan for Change’ that it refused to call a reset. Sir Chris Wormald was…

Portrait of the week: Storm Bert, Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire and Putin gives cockatoos to North Korea

30 November 2024 9:00 am

Home A white paper outlined measures to counter economic inactivity (which had risen by September to 41.2 per cent among…

Portrait of the week: Rising inflation, electric car targets and a tax on flatulent livestock

23 November 2024 9:00 am

Home Thousands of farmers protested in Westminster against inheritance tax on farms. Tesco, Amazon, Greggs and 76 other chains belonging…

Portrait of the week: Justin Welby resigns, interest rates cut and Trump announces appointments

16 November 2024 9:00 am

Home Justin Welby resigned as Archbishop of Canterbury, after not reporting to the authorities what he knew in 2013 of…

Portrait of the week: Trump’s victory, Kemi’s shadow cabinet and footballer killed by lightning

9 November 2024 9:00 am

Home Kemi Badenoch, the new leader of the Conservative party, appointed a shadow cabinet. She made Robert Jenrick, whom she…

Portrait of the week: Tax rises, a cheddar heist and snail delivery man gets slapped

2 November 2024 9:00 am

Home Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, repeatedly mentioning an inherited ‘£22 billion black hole’, raised taxes by £40…

Portrait of the week: Budget leaks, prisoners released and Israel kills Hamas leader

26 October 2024 9:00 am

Home Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was expected to freeze tax thresholds in the Budget on 30 October,…

Portrait of the week: Weight loss jabs and England’s German manager

19 October 2024 9:00 am

Home Neither Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, nor Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, ruled out a rise…

Portrait of the week: Sue Gray resigns and the Chagos Islands are handed back

12 October 2024 9:00 am

Home Sue Gray resigned as chief of staff to Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister. She will become Sir Keir’s envoy…

Portrait of the week: Iran fires missiles into Israel, Rosie Duffield resigns and Mount Everest gets taller

5 October 2024 9:00 am

Home The Conservatives at their party conference examined the four surviving candidates for leader – Robert Jenrick, Kemi Badenoch, James…

Portrait of the week: Starmer’s sausages slip-up, Israel’s strikes on Lebanon and Amazon staff summoned back to office

28 September 2024 9:00 am

Home Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, in his speech to the Labour party conference in Liverpool, said that ‘if…

Portrait of the week: Keir Starmer’s free clothes, Huw Edwards sentenced and Tupperware faces bankruptcy

21 September 2024 9:00 am

Home Sir Keir Starmer met Giorgia Meloni, the Prime Minister of Italy, in Rome and said that sending funds to…

Portrait of the week: State pension to rise, prisoners released early and a new owner for The Spectator

14 September 2024 9:00 am

Home The government won by 348 to 228 a Commons vote on limiting the winter fuel allowance for pensioners to those…

Portrait of the week: UK cancels Israel exports, Grenfell fire report released and AfD victory in Germany

7 September 2024 9:00 am

Home The government cancelled 30 out of 350 export licences for arms to Israel on items that it said could…

Portrait of the week: Sir Keir’s tax warning, Russian air attacks and another prisons crisis

31 August 2024 9:00 am

Home Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, speaking in the garden of 10 Downing Street, warned that the Budget in…

Portrait of the week: prisoners are freed, Ted Baker closes and train drivers announce strikes

24 August 2024 9:00 am

Home Emergency measures, known as Operation Early Dawn, were brought in to ease prison overcrowding. Defendants would be summoned to…

Portrait of the week: riot justice, Olympic success and Ukraine’s Russian advance

17 August 2024 9:00 am

Home Riots subsided after 7 August, a night when many were expected but only empty streets or demonstrations against riots…

Portrait of the week: riots and Russia’s prisoner swap

10 August 2024 9:00 am

Home A week of riots, with violence against the police, threats to Muslims, burning of vehicles and looting (Greggs, Shoezone,…