Charles Moore is The Spectator’s chairman.
He is a former editor of the magazine, as well as the Sunday Telegraph and the Daily Telegraph. He became a non-affiliated peer in July 2020.
We are paying now for the lack of a single, comprehensive inquiry into the great foot-and-mouth outbreak of 2001. We were unprepared. Although foot-and-mouth information notices were first posted on 4 July, there was confusion when the Surrey outbreak was confirmed on Friday afternoon last week. People did not know how to operate the national
Enoch Powell once said to me, ‘I love the humbug of the English. I worship it. But I reserve the right from time to time to point it out.’ Enoch Powell once said to me, ‘I love the humbug of the English. I worship it. But I reserve the right from time to time to
David Cameron was in a tight spot because of the floods. He had arranged to address the Rwandan parliament, and this fitted with his wish to proclaim his welcome interest in development issues and his party’s new document on the subject. David Cameron was in a tight spot because of the floods. He had arranged
It is not possible to speak of a terrorist incident as being a good thing, but if it were, these latest would qualify. First, no innocent person was killed in London or Glasgow. Second, information was immediately collected by the authorities, thanks to the would-be killers’ bungling, and more will follow. Often when terrorists are
Harriet Harman seems to have won the deputy leadership of the Labour party by saying she did not want people to spend £10,000 on a handbag when other people were ‘struggling’. Polly Toynbee tells us that this ‘resonated with public distaste’ at the ‘debauchery of riches at the top’. Did it? If so, why? A
Tyranny is most successful when most extreme. Because we all know that North Korea is absolutely foul, we do remarkably little about it. The new report into mass killings, torture and arbitrary imprisonment there by Christian Solidarity Worldwide (North Korea: A Case to Answer) is amazing not only for the horror of what it reveals,
Anyone who believes British Muslim hostility to the war in Iraq is the big motivator of terrorism should read the fascinating cover piece by Shiv Malik in the latest edition of Prospect. Investigating the background of the 7 July London bombings for a television drama (which the BBC, of course, eventually rejected as ‘anti-Muslim’), Malik
It is highly likely that Tony Blair will become a Roman Catholic after he leaves office. He regularly attends a Catholic Mass rather than Anglican services — nowadays, because of security problems, usually in No. 10 Downing Street or at Chequers. It seems logical to him that he should follow the religion of the rest
The grammar school row is proving not so much a Clause Four moment as a class war moment for the Tories — now it has produced a resignation. It is suggested that David Cameron’s Old Etonians are indifferent to those struggling to better themselves, because they do not know what struggle means. The Cameronites imply
A question unasked in all this row about the Conservatives and grammar schools is, ‘Why did the Tories, in power for 22 of the 42 years since Labour first tried to make comprehensives compulsory, never bring grammar schools back?’ The answer is numerical, and it explains the problem with which poor David Willetts is wrestling.
The attempt to get rid of ancient history A-Level, which Monday’s appearance by Boris Johnson in a toga was intended to stop, is a little saga of how ‘dumbing down’ works. No one involved set out to undermine the subject, yet that will be the effect. Instructed to squeeze down A-Levels into four units instead
Tony Blair gives a date for his departure. Many say that he would have been able to stay if he had not supported the war in Iraq. But what would have happened in British politics if he had opposed the war? He would for the first time have been the prisoner of the Left. The
‘A conflict of interest’ is now almost the worst thing known to modern theories of governance. It is considered disgraceful, for example, that the Attorney-General, Lord Goldsmith, who is a government minister and was made a peer by Tony Blair, will be the man who decides whether or not there should be prosecutions in the
Next month, the Literary Society will celebrate its 200th birthday. The monthly dinner at the Garrick Club will be bigger than usual, but otherwise there will be nothing unusual. The membership has often been distinguished but, as is perhaps typical of English letters, the club has never done anything other than dine. It is not
Next year, there will be an election for the mayoralty of London. The chance to defeat Ken Livingstone is the most important contest for the Conservatives before the next general election, but they still have not got a candidate. This week they seem to be deciding, for a second time, to postpone their selection of
Hitler said, ‘I know my enemies. I met them at Munich. They are little worms.’ He turned out to be wrong, thank goodness, but the impression that his enemies gave him emboldened him for war. The Iranians must now think that we, the British, are little worms; and on the basis of our conduct in
Friends with military experience ponder two questions about the Iranian kidnap of the 15 British sailors. The first is, ‘Why didn’t they put up a fight?’ The answer seems to lie with the rules of engagement. This was effectively confirmed by Sir Alan West, until recently the First Sea Lord, who said that the rules
From the astonishing film of Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams together you can see at once that it is Paisley who has lost. Birthrights and messes of pottage come to mind. Smart-looking, cool-headed, smug Adams has gained respectability and power, and the chance to unite Ireland under his leadership without having to renounce any of
Sir Alistair Graham is presented as one of the heroes of our age. He is the chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, which was originally set up by John Major as what he (Mr Major) called ‘an ethical workshop called in to do running repairs’. Now Sir Alistair has lashed out at
Every winter morning I take a scuttle down to the cellar, fill it with coal and carry it up to light the fire in my study. The coal-dust clings to my shoes and so, as the carpets testify, I have a carbon footprint. David Cameron wants to make it — and everyone else’s — smaller.