We continue our rundown of the top 10 most-read Spectator articles of 2015: No7 is Miles Goslett’s exposé of Kids Company, published in February. As Goslett related six months later, this was the first piece to break the taboo on criticising the charity – and had it all. The questionable finances, the way civil servants were nervous about continuing funding but were overruled by No10. Only newspaper awards recognise ‘scoop of the year’ and we’re a magazine so we don’t qualify. But this, surely, was the scoop of 2015.
In 2006, when David Cameron was leader of the opposition, he made an infamous speech that is remembered as an exhortation to hug a hoodie. Feral youth, he said, should be helped rather than demonised. He was reaching towards what he hoped would be a new, ‘compassionate’ conservatism inspired in part by the charismatic social activist Camila Batmanghelidjh.
She was the perfect lodestar for the young Tory leader.
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