Assisted dying

Kim Leadbeater has described her assisted suicide bill as ‘potentially one of the most important changes in legislation that we will ever see’. For Leadbeater and her allies, it is an attempt to make the law merciful: to give relief to those who want to control the manner of their death. But there is another, darker way to see the Leadbeater bill, and last week at the bill committee we got a glimpse of it. The committee stage was meant to reassure the doubters. At second reading, MPs were told that if the vote – just 18 days after the bill was published – seemed rushed, there would be plenty

Home The Labour government announced a ‘Plan for Change’ that it refused to call a reset. Sir Chris Wormald was named Cabinet Secretary. In his Guildhall speech at the Lord Mayor’s banquet, Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, said that ‘the idea that we must choose between our allies, that somehow we’re with either America or Europe, is plain wrong’. He said ‘we must continue to back Ukraine’ against Vladimir Putin as something ‘deeply in our self-interest’. With the arrival of another 122 people on 1 December, more than 20,000 had crossed the Channel in small boats since Labour entered office. A group of about 60 Sri Lankan Tamil asylum-seekers

There is no proper reason for the resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby. No iniquity was proved against him. It has never been clear why, in the horrendous case of John Smyth, people thought the buck should stop with him. Smyth was never an Anglican priest (indeed, he was refused ordination), nor paid by the Church. When in England, he worked for the Iwerne Trust, an independent evangelical body. Most of the abuse Smyth perpetrated was when he took boys out from Winchester College to lunch with his family in the country nearby. In a hut in his garden, he beat the boys savagely, in the interests, he

Being Cambridge, I thank God that we have no nonsense about electing our chancellor. We have had a blameless, unchallenged succession of eminent persons. Since 1900, three prime ministers (Balfour, Baldwin and Smuts), two military commanders, one royal Duke (Prince Philip), two great scientists (Lords Rayleigh and Adrian) and now that prince of commerce and philanthropy, Lord Sainsbury of Turville. Their presence has passed almost unnoticed, rightly so: a chancellor’s role is to be, not to do. Poor Oxford, however, has a form of democracy to choose its chancellor, and now has insanely extended its effective franchise by online voting. So there are 38 candidates, and pressure that they should

Pointless laws Sir: The leading article ‘Wrong problem, wrong law’ (19 October) makes cogent points about the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill, in particular pointing out that it would probably not have made any difference had it been in force at the time of the Manchester Arena bombing, and that if passed it will impose disproportionate and often unmanageable burdens on venues such as churches and village halls. There is, in truth, a wider point here: most legislation is either counterproductive, useless or both. All legislation has five aspects: (1) A real purpose. This may be to achieve the ostensible purpose of the legislation, but is often really to make