UK politics
In search of the Eurosceptic Nick Clegg
In recent weeks British government visitors to Berlin have been confronted with a persistent question: when will David Cameron make…
The betrayal of Wales
Devolution has left my country with catastrophic misgovernment
A bacon bap isn’t Miliband’s problem. We are
That bacon bap earlier this month was not the cause of Ed Miliband’s unpopularity. Ed Miliband’s unpopularity was the cause…
Osborne’s northern ‘super-city’ looks like a cynical vote-grab – but I’m all for it
When John Prescott used to wax garrulous about a ‘superhighway’ from Hull to Liverpool, everyone assumed it was a wheeze…
Ukip needs an ‘-ism’ – and I know just the one
I’m worried about Ukip. It’s possible that my concerns are entirely misplaced but let me give you some examples of…
The radical centre
In almost a decade as Conservative leader, David Cameron has tended to avoid talking about his political philosophy. He has…
Ukip isn’t a national party. It’s a Tory sickness
It can happen that something ought to feel wrong yet somehow doesn’t; and you wonder whether this means that in…
The Spectator’s Notes
‘Twenty-six million people in Europe are looking for work. And whose jobs are they after?’ asks the Ukip poster for…
Yes, Britain is a Christian country
I can’t say it was a great surprise to read a letter from a group of well-known authors, academics, comedians…
Why it’s right to criticise the newly dead
I could start by remarking that we should not speak ill of the dead, quoting the pertinent Latin phrase: de…
Gove’s friends are out to get him
From the moment he took his job, Michael Gove knew that he would make energetic and determined enemies. The teachers’…
A reminder of the UK energy gap as Putin prepares to put another knot in his pipeline
To have written last month that the headline ‘Kiev in flames’ looked like a black swan on the economic horizon…
The dawn of four-party politics
Two things will make the next general election campaign quite unlike any previous election in this country. The first is…
A time to spend
There is nothing inevitable about the by now familiar sight of residents being towed away from flooded homes, of shops…
Cameron’s watershed moment
It is all hands to the pump in Downing Street. The entire No. 10 operation from the Prime Minister down…
‘Instant wildlife – just add water’
The ideology that created an unnatural disaster
Union in peril
Alex Salmond is on course to win. Why hasn’t England noticed?
Transparency is the Tories’ greatest legacy to the NHS
Pinned to the wall of Jeremy Hunt’s office in the Department of Health is an A1 piece of paper detailing…
Armageddon awaits
Sunni vs Shia, Saudi Arabia vs Iran. A new great war has begun
Cameron’s mission for 2014: stay out of third place
European elections are normally an afterthought in British politics. As even David Cameron admits, most of us struggle to remember…
When scaremongering stops being funny
My grandmother, Nanny Nancy, is 99 and going strong. But it can’t be denied that while she’s all there mentally,…
If a bank looks dull, it probably isn’t: so what’s new at Standard Chartered?
The cautionary tale of the Co-operative Bank, its black hole and its naughty chairman has recently taught us that if…
Britain’s dirty secret
A documentary has finally exposed what life is like at the bottom. So why is the left so angry?
The return of compassionate Conservatism
‘Has the Secretary of State, like me, managed to watch programmes such as Benefits Street and On Benefits & Proud?…
Labour’s immigration nightmares
Victor Spirescu came to Britain last week looking for work washing cars, but seems to have landed himself with a…
