Australia
Australia proves the cost of zero Covid
The UK is growing at the fastest pace in 80 years. The United States, fuelled by President Biden’s stimulus programme,…
Portrait of the week
Home On the eve of the day that most coronavirus restrictions were to be lifted, the Prime Minister and Chancellor…
Portrait of the week
Home England expects everyone to wear masks in crowded places, Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, said in a televised address,…
Revealed: How the UK-Australia deal was struck
The UK’s first bespoke trade deal agreed since leaving the EU was finalised with Australia over two dinners. One took…
Where’s the beef?
If Britain had been unable to agree a trade deal with Australia, then Brexit really would have been pointless. The…
The Spectator’s Notes
If it is true, as Lords Hall and Birt told a Commons committee this week, that Martin Bashir succeeded in…
The political advantages of the UK-Australia trade deal
The UK government has agreed its first bespoke trade deal since leaving the EU. After Boris Johnson met with Australian…
We don’t have to swap sovereignty for trade
A new court will be established with powers over both countries. Labour and product laws will be harmonised. Flags with…
The Australian trade deal is about more than just trade
What happens with an Australia trade deal won’t just reveal how serious this country is about free trade but also…
Boris must stand up to farmers – and back the Australia trade deal
Farms will be devastated. The countryside will be ruined. And we will all be forced to eat weird food that…
Roadmap to nowhere
Britain’s vaccine success was supposed to lead to freedom. What happened?
Why is New Zealand afraid of criticising China?
It is becoming harder and harder to ignore China’s aggressive behaviour. As I say in the magazine this week, China…
Aussie rules
The One Day In the Year is an Australian drama about the annual commemoration of the Gallipoli campaign in 1915.…
Facebook has called the Australian media’s bluff
In 2021, it’s not uncommon to hope that everyone involved in an argument can lose, or to suspect that pretty…
A prison of our own making
Anyone who’s been through customs Down Under isn’t surprised by the region’s OTT response to Covid. Having been X-rayed before…
Why are trans activists and a Melbourne bookstore trying to cancel me?
Imagine my surprise to wake up this morning to be told that Readings book store in Melbourne had posted an…
Isolation nation: how Australia is dealing with its pandemic
At 6.20 p.m. on Friday evening, Scarborough Beach, an oceanside suburb of Perth, looked like it always does: families picnicked…
Aussie rules
Closing the borders worked Down Under. Could it work here?
The human costs of an ‘Australian-style’ quarantine system
Richard Curtis’ iconic Love Actually airport scenes may fall on the wrong side of saccharine, but they capture something of…
The long road to normality
The government’s most important economic policy is its vaccination programme. The speed at which people are immunised will determine when…
Life and death decisions
Thanks to the Booker Prize, Richard Flanagan is probably the only Tasmanian novelist British readers are likely to have heard…
Transport of joy
If 2020 has given us something to talk about other than Covid, it’s been history — and, more precisely, to…
China needs to make reparations
It is time we started to talk about reparations. I am not of course referring to the demands made by…
Twitter is in China’s pocket
Twitter has been quick on the draw when responding to tweets by President Trump in the last month, as he…
It isn’t always easy to give money away
I always felt sorry for my father, then president of a chronically strapped educational institution, for having ceaselessly to approach…
