Why don’t we order houses from a catalogue?
One possible solution to the housing crisis is to convene a group of experts in property, housebuilding, planning and local…
Dear Mary: Can I retract a party invitation without causing offence?
Q. A very likeable woman has joined the company I work for and also just moved to my village. I…
How binding are Rachel Reeves’s ‘pledges’?
‘Pop goes the weasel!’ my husband exclaimed, expertly muddying the waters. We had just been listening to another news bulletin…
What Andrew’s Norfolk exile will look like
When Russian dissidents were bundled off into exile under the tsars, they were sent to Siberia, the ‘prison without a…
The rise of psychedelia
On YouTube – and I urge you to look it up – there is a magnificent piece of footage from…
Sydney Sweeney, the Hollywood radical
Every time you feel down about Britain’s out-of-touch elites, a look across the Atlantic is a reassuring reminder that it…
Wine to toast the fallen
Solemn, moving, serious: British. As silence fell and the wreaths were lain, even teenagers joined in the mood of reverence.…
This Othello is almost flawless
Othello directed by Tom Morris opens with a stately display of scarlet costumes and gilded doorways arranged against a backdrop…
The rise of the on-the-day party drop-out
A new drinks-party-shirking method has taken hold in British society. I call it ‘Lastminute.non’. Previously, the way of not going…
The golden thread between Donald Trump and Nero
Donald Trump has knocked down the east wing of the White House and is turning it into his Golden Ballroom.…
The army is too woke for war
Last month, in a two-page letter to colonels of corps and regiments, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant-General…
America thinks Britain is finished
‘What’s missing?’ the tech titan Peter Thiel asks me, over lunch on the hummingbird-infested patio of his house in the…
Justice in war is messy
At the end of last month, a judge in Belfast issued a verdict that was both right and wrong. The…
How to fix the BBC
Assuming the BBC is still in existence by the time you read this, the scale of the task facing the…
Was Queen Victoria’s doctor the first psychoanalyst?
Queen Victoria began to experience dark visions after giving birth to her second child. Concerned that she might have inherited…
Inside the Wes Streeting plot
Keir Starmer is stuck in a catch-22. If he is to avoid the threat of continual leadership challenges, the Prime…
The true cost of the Chagos deal
When the BBC denies ‘systemic bias’, it denies the main, the crucial thing exposed by Michael Prescott’s now-famous leaked internal…
Ireland is looking for its own Nigel Farage
A few years ago, I watched an Irish-made drama on Netflix called Rebellion. Given that it was about the 1916…
Portrait of the week: BBC vs Trump, a plot against Starmer and a weight loss deadline for North Sea oil workers
Home Tim Davie, the director-general of the BBC, resigned, as did Deborah Turness, the CEO of BBC News. Samir Shah,…
Labour isn’t working
Labour: the clue should be in the name. In March, Keir Starmer branded Labour the ‘party of work’. If ‘you…
The UK’s tax take, take, take
Helping her country ski ever more steeply down the wrong side of the Laffer curve, Rachel Reeves may be preparing…
Revealed: the bias of the BBC News app
The most influential person in British media is not Rupert Murdoch or Lord Rothermere – it’s the editor who pushes…
How to get Britain eating healthily again
Another week, another government offensive against childhood obesity. This time it’s a fresh round of pleas for new levies on…
