One thing we can be sure of is that the Liberal prime minister who once tried to join the Labor…

The most bizarre feature of the Liberal party’s leadership coup is that the party has not given any explanation as…

From a One Nation kind of perspective, one of the most inconvenient truths about the Muslim population of modern Australia…

When Matt Damon starred in the movie Downsizing earlier this year, he could not have known he was providing a…

In the hour and a half it took me to drive to Sydney on August 23, I listened to what…

At a funeral, there are those who are in mourning and those who are merely paying their respects. For the…

If Malcolm Turnbull’s mainstream and social media defenders have their way, the parliamentary Liberal party’s mayhem last week will be…

A year ago I urged the Liberal National Party to lance the pustule of Paris, proposing at the Queensland LNP…

In August 2011 the Australian American Leadership Dialogue talkfest convened in Perth and one of its sessions was a panel…

I am outraged to learn you’ve cheated on me, absolutely outraged’, says the husband to his wife. Only the man…

The very best impressionists do not simply mimic the mannerisms, speech patterns and facial expressions of their targets — they…

It may seem odd that a cabal of politicians, celebrities and millionaires can successfully present themselves as a great democratic…

 Uppsala, Sweden When I dropped off my kids at school early last week, I noticed that -another parent’s car was…

When Muslims make headlines, it’s invariably for the wrong reasons. The fuss over Boris Johnson’s burka joke is a case…

A couple of weeks ago I met David Grime and Alan Noble, members of the Lakes Line Rail User Group,…

 Washington, DC The Democrats will face a dilemma if they win control of the House of Representatives in November’s midterm…

Christopher Howse has just written a book about Soho. He drank there regularly with Michael Heath, The Spectator’s cartoon editor,…

Whenever I visit a country I try to pitch high and meet the president or prime minister. In Australia this…

Battersea Power Station once generated nearly a fifth of London’s power. It must have hummed and clanked almost as much…

On her tour of South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya, Theresa May finally made a positive case for Brexit. For too…

Home Theresa May, the Prime Minister, flew off to South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria accompanied by a trade delegation. In…

Attending my goddaughter Cara Delevingne’s 26th birthday party at the trendy Chateau Marmont hotel in LA, I was interested to…

Hardly a day goes by without someone making excitable predictions about human progress and how, thanks to AI, we are…

Venezuelan sanctions Sir: Contrary to the impression given by Jason Mitchell, Venezuela does not have a socialist economy (‘Maduro’s madness’,…

If I were Benjamin Netanyahu (and I’m not) I would be thanking whatever gods there be for sending me, at…

In a recent column, I vowed to return to a point made in passing. To refresh your memory, the American…

All good things must come to an end, including summer holidays and bull markets. The bull run in US shares…

Objectivity seems to be difficult for historians writing about Britain’s long and complicated relationship with India, and this makes the…

One rainy evening in December 1948, a blue Buick emerged from the darkness of the Venetian lagoon near the village…

And so it comes, the final volume of Karl Ove Knausgaard’s My Struggle sequence: a pale brick of a book,…

There is something about the Transit of Venus that touches the imagination in ways that are not all to do…

The British experience of beavers is somewhat limited. Most of us haven’t been lucky enough to have spied an immigrant…

John Lilburne was only 43 when he died in 1657, an early death even for the time. But in many…

There is only one Andrew Miller. In the 20 years since his debut novel Ingenious Pain won both the James…

Not so long ago, the Dundee waterfront was presided over by a great triumphal arch, built to commemorate Queen Victoria’s…

Looney Tunes was always at its best when soundtracked by a Hungarian gypsy dance. (Watch ‘Pigs in a Polka’ if…

In 1675 Lady Bedingfield wrote to Robert Paston, first Earl of Yarmouth. Never, she exclaimed, had she seen anything so…

All the good non-fiction things that were ever on TV — from Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation to David Attenborough’s Planet Earth…

Here’s a thought. Matthew Bannister, former Radio 1 controller turned presenter of programmes such as Outlook on the World Service…

Yardie is Idris Elba’s first film as a director and what I have to say isn’t what I wanted to…

Non-stop chatterbox and mystifyingly revered fabricator of sub-Chekovian paddywhackery, Brian Friel has received another production at the Donmar. His play…

Grade: C+ Mumrock. A lucrative genre, dating from the beginning of the 1970s, when Mums suddenly wanted something a little…

Going from strength to strength, the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s recently announced 2019 Season shows no flagging of inspiration or ambition.…

Gstaad The pastoral heaven of this place can get very dull during the summer months. Green hillsides, neat farmsteads, pleasing…

I was present in the room when Oscar encountered his father for the first time since returning from his fortnight…

When I made a joke about ragwort being like Islamic extremism, I expected someone to write in. I was fully…

Having spent most of my life among politicians I guess I have become unaccustomed to candour. The only example I…

All the best players today are technically excellent in card play. They know all the odds and end plays to…

The Azeri grandmaster Shakhriyar Mamedyarov has been distinguishing himself recently at both classical and speed chess time limits. Last month…

White to play. This is from Mamedyarov–Georgiadis, Biel 2018. Many of Mamedyarov’s games feature a kingside attack based upon a…

In Competition No. 3063 you were invited to submit a poem about puns containing puns.   Dryden regarded paronomasia as…

The unclued lights (three of two words) are of a kind.   Across 1    Slices top of sausage in…

The unclued lights and those clued without thematic definition (2, 11, 26, 33 and 42) are Irish forenames. Nuala Considine’s…

Cassian Harrison, the editor of BBC Four, told the Edinburgh International Television Festival last week that no one wants to…

Is it me, or is business becoming a teeny-weeny bit Stalinist? Common features include 1) Paranoia about political ideology; 2)…

Q. I invited four younger colleagues, all in their mid to late thirties, to go for a meal at a…

Roy Hattersley once wrote a plangent passage about a painful aspect of the human condition: the short span of animals’…

‘I want my money back,’ said my husband. ‘This is from the 1880s, not the 1980s.’ He looked up from…