Is Gordon Brown back?
Last week, there was a surprise visitor to the Treasury: Gordon Brown. The former prime minister and chancellor secretly returned…
Rachel Reeves is right to cut the winter fuel payment
Gordon Brown introduced the winter fuel payment shortly after becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1997, following his party’s landslide…
A new chapter for The Spectator
For the past year or so, I’ve been involved in selling The Spectator as well as editing it. A long…
Portrait of the week: State pension to rise, prisoners released early and a new owner for The Spectator
Home The government won by 348 to 228 a Commons vote on limiting the winter fuel allowance for pensioners to those…
How to manage migration like the Swedish
In the end, the German state of Thuringia did not fall into the hands of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland…
How Michael Craig-Martin changed a glass of water into a full-grown oak tree
‘Of all the things I’ve drawn,’ Michael Craig-Martin reflects, ‘to me chairs are one of the most interesting.’ We are…
Elvis Costello remains the most fascinating songwriter Britain has produced in the past 50 years
Song for song, line by line, blow for blow, Elvis Costello remains the most consistently fascinating songwriter Britain has produced…
How Berlin nearly broke Bowie
This week’s Archive on 4 is a treat for David Bowie fans. Francis Whately, the producer behind several of the…
Help! I’ve got class envy
The summer holidays were a washout as far as my children are concerned, because we had to cancel our trip…
The problem with Klaus Makela
Klaus Makela is kind of a big deal. He’s a pupil of the Finnish conducting guru Jorma Panula – the…
Is protest counterproductive?
If I had my life again and was asked to choose a superpower, I’d like to come back as one…
Don’t look back in anger… it’s just how ticket sales work
We expect Ryanair tickets to cost more on holiday Saturdays than term-time Tuesdays and Uber fares to surge in the…
Letters: A cautionary lesson for England’s schools
Lessons to learn Sir: Your leading article ‘Requires improvement’ (7 September) rightly raised concerns that a curriculum review in England…
Why people would hate a property tax
My friend Tim Leunig is a cerebral thinker of the best kind. Though not party-political, he has worked for Tory…
