The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: China has peaked

From our UK edition

China has peaked Sir: Niall Ferguson makes some good points about the nature of Xi Jinping’s imperial aspirations but misses two important parts of the picture (‘The China model’, 8 May). First, the Chinese Academy of Science predicts that China’s population will peak at 1.4 billion in 2029, drop to 1.36 billion by 2050, and shrink to as few as 1.17 billion people by 2065. They even forecast that China’s population might be reduced by about 50 per cent by the turn of the next century. And second, China’s economic rise is stalling.

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Portrait of the week: Scotland votes, Queen speaks and Israel-Palestine crisis escalates

From our UK edition

Home A new complexion of British politics was revealed by the capture of Hartlepool by Jill Mortimer for the Conservatives in a by-election, with 15,529 to the Labour candidate’s 8,589. Since its formation in 1974, the constituency had been Labour. Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, said his party had ‘lost the trust of working people, particularly in places like Hartlepool’. The Conservative Ben Houchen was re-elected as mayor of the Tees Valley with 72.8 per cent of the vote. Of 143 English council seats, the Conservatives now control 63, 13 more than before, with 2,345 councillors; Labour lost control of eight councils to end up with 44, and 1,345 councillors. Sir Keir then made a botch of a shadow cabinet shuffle.

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What Europe could learn from Britain’s new migration system

From our UK edition

While the EU’s former chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has no formal role in devising the bloc’s immigration policy, his words this week have turned much of the Brexit debate on its head. In an interview on French television, he said that France should suspend non-EU immigration for three to five years — with the exception of students and refugees — and that the EU needed to toughen external borders that have become a ‘sieve’. Had those words come from the mouth of Nigel Farage, he would have been excoriated, not least by Barnier himself. How can any country (let alone a continent) manage in the modern world while shutting itself off to people from, say, India, Australia and America?

The Spectator

How does the ‘red wall’ story end?

From our UK edition

At Redwall Abbey Does fiction provide any guide as to the ultimate fate of Labour’s Red Wall? — Redwall Abbey was the setting for a series of children’s novels written by Brian Jacques between 1986 and his death in 2011. It revolved around the peace-loving creatures of Mossflower Wood who were forced to fight invading vermin. The first of the novels, called Redwall, featured an orphaned mouse who had become a novice monk and was forced to fight off an evil, one-eyed rat. At the end of the final novel, published posthumously, an otter and hedgehog emerged triumphant over the ‘vermin’ — a loose band of creatures which included rats, foxes, wildcats, magpies, rooks and crows. Critics complained that the plots were somewhat repetitive.

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2503: Applery – solution

From our UK edition

The traditional county towns were Chester (misprinted as CHEATER: 27), Durham (DERHAM: 21), Derby (DERRY: 32), Lewes (LENES: 36), Reading (RENDING: 28) and York (WORK: 8). The correct letters could give SUBWAY (26), examples of which are UNDERGROUND (1A), TUNNEL (17) and METRO (22A). Title: ‘Appleby’ misprinted.

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: The C of E’s obsession with critical race theory

From our UK edition

Christian approach Sir: Dr Michael Nazir-Ali’s criticism of our report ‘From Lament to Action’ (‘Bad faith’, 1 May) was wide of the mark in its suggestion that Marxist-inspired critical race theory was the ‘intellectual underpinning’ of our approach. Far from it. The source material for our report was three decades of reports on the issue of racial justice from the General Synod of the Church of England. Doubtless there are valid criticisms which can be made of Synod; however, being a hotbed of radical Marxism is not one of them. Our report explicitly rejects any idea that our work should be viewed as a battle in a culture war.

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Data, not dates: there is no reason to delay a return to normal life

From our UK edition

A slogan can come back to haunt you. For Boris Johnson, the words ‘data not dates’ sounded powerful at a time when Covid cases were high and hospitals full. The idea was that the government would be guided by scientific reason, would respond to the figures and would not let rigid targets dictate policy. Since the Prime Minister announced his roadmap at the end of February, however, ‘dates’ seem to have become far more important than ‘data’. How can he claim to be following the data when he will not budge from a timeline which now looks like it was designed for a different phase of the pandemic? Why were people braving the cold and rain outside restaurants on a bank holiday when there is every chance it’s safe to go inside?

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Innovators will lead the post-pandemic renaissance

From our UK edition

So much has been changed by Covid. Science and entrepreneurship have combined brilliantly to mass-produce life-saving vaccines. Working from home, video communication and online retail have become the new normal — perhaps heralding a permanent shift that will leave office towers and city centres searching for new roles. And the responsibility of every business as a corporate citizen as well as a profit generator has come into focus as never before. In 2021 and beyond, innovators have a huge opportunity to make our lives better again. In bioscience and healthcare. In logistics, data analytics and every kind of digital technology. In sustainable housing, transport and agribusiness and all the ways in which entrepreneurs can help address the dangers of climate change.

The Spectator

Which prime minister spent the most on their Downing Street flat?

From our UK edition

Flat spin Which prime minister spent the most on their Downing Street flat, according to figures reported over the years? Margaret Thatcher £0 (Kept 1960s kitchen. Is reputed to have paid for her own ironing board) Tony Blair £127,000 spent on larger flat above No. 11 (including wallpaper reputed to have cost £70 a roll) Gordon Brown £84,000 David Cameron £92,900 (with £64,000 spent on kitchen and bathroom) Theresa May £25,500 Boris Johnson Between £88,000 and £200,000 (according to various reports) But all were eclipsed by the £650,000 of public money spent by former Lord Chancellor Derry Irvine on his flat in the Lords, including £59,000 of wallpaper.

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Portrait of the week: Covid retreats, raves resume and a £165,000 squid

From our UK edition

Home ‘I think we have got a good chance of being able to dispense with the one-metre-plus from 21 June,’ Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, remarked. By the beginning of the week, 29 per cent of the adult population had received both doses of coronavirus vaccination; 65 per cent the first dose. In the seven days up to the beginning of the week, 107 people had died, bringing the total number of deaths (within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus) to 127,534. Maldon in Essex reported three cases per 100,000 people, which meant only two people in the whole district. Care home residents in England were allowed to make outdoor visits without having to self-isolate for 14 days on their return.

Monday

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: The veiled elitism of social mobility

From our UK edition

Levelling up Sir: In making the case for social mobility, Lee Cain unwittingly endorses the classism he hopes to fight (‘Left behind’, 24 April). As the historian Christopher Lasch has argued, the canard of social mobility merely replaces ‘an aristocracy of wealth with an aristocracy of talent’. Far from being egalitarian, the concept is inherently elitist: it implies moving up, out or away from a class, town or profession condemned as undesirable. And by paying lip service to ‘meritocracy’ it becomes a self-serving justification for elites’ power and privilege — if they had the ‘ability and ambition’ to rise to the top, it must only be indolent dullards who are left behind.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: A political squall, sub-postmasters exonerated and India’s Covid crisis

From our UK edition

Home By the beginning of the week, 12,071,810 people had received both doses of coronavirus vaccine, and the proportion of the adult population with both soon rose to more than a quarter. In the seven days up to the beginning of the week, 159 people had died, bringing the total of deaths (within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus) to 127,417. Fares Maatou, aged 15, was fatally stabbed at half past four in the afternoon outside a pizza shop in Newham, east London. Anthony Thwaite, the poet and editor of Philip Larkin’s letters and poems, died aged 90.

The Spectator

A vote for the SNP would mean another wasted decade in Scotland

From our UK edition

Sometimes, Westminster unwittingly makes quite a good case for Scottish independence. Britain’s Covid emergency has ended, but the damage of the last year is enormous: the knock-on effects of lockdown can be seen in NHS waiting lists, the devastated high street, the mental health backlog and the 20,000 pupils who are absent from the school register. There is urgent work to do, yet the government is engaged in a battle to the death over who paid for wallpaper in Downing Street. We see a Prime Minister at war with his ex-adviser, unable to rise above the fray and capitalise on the opportunity of his vaccine success. Then there’s the opposition, unable to oppose.

The Spectator

2501: Delightful – solution

From our UK edition

The ‘Transport of Delight’, in the song by Flanders and Swann, was that ‘big six-wheeler, scarlet-painted, diesel-engined, London Transport, ninety-seven horse-power omnibus’. First prize H.

Tuesday

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Notice: The Spectator’s agreement with The American Spectator

The Spectator and The American Spectator are pleased to announce the settlement of the recent lawsuit between the parties. The Spectator and The American Spectator are independent publications and have been available in the United States for many decades. Historically, The Spectator has focused primarily on UK politics and affairs while The American Spectator has focused primarily on US politics and affairs. This arrangement has worked well and the publishers have even considered each other to be more friends than competitors. The Spectator has recently decided to launch new publications with a focus on US politics and affairs.

Thursday

The Spectator

The public has kept its side of the lockdown bargain. Now it’s the government’s turn

From our UK edition

Over the past week, the country has started to spring back to life. Trains and buses are no longer running empty. Bars and restaurants have put out signs proclaiming they are fully booked. Pubs are using school playgrounds as beer gardens and filling every seat. In Soho, people danced in the streets when someone walked through with a stereo. A country that has been locked down for months is finally coming back into the open, with not a penny of government bribery required. There is a palpable sense of both relief and accomplishment. Yet the recent noises from No. 10 have been far from positive. The Prime Minister has claimed, oddly, that the decline in Covid cases has almost everything to do with lockdown and very little to do with vaccination.