Angus Colwell

Angus Colwell

Angus Colwell is The Spectator’s daily newsletters editor, and lead author of Morning Press. He also reviews restaurants for the magazine.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

Are the ‘lanyard class’ the new enemy?

From our UK edition

Globalisation, liberalism, neoliberalism, managerialism, internationalism, multiculturalism, human resources, wokeness, identity politics, progressivism, EDI, DEI, corporatism, proceduralism, elitism, environmentalism, transnationalism: there are a lot of things that voters are said to be protesting against. But now there’s a new buzzword going round. What voters are really annoyed about is the ‘lanyard class’. Lord (Maurice) Glasman came up with the phrase. I visit him in the House of Lords (wearing my parliamentary lanyard, of course) to ask him what he means. ‘The lanyard came into my head about 18 months ago as the symbol of the progressives,’ he says. ‘It was more of a poetic idea: “The Lanyard”.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

Chambers of horrors, the ‘Dubai-ification’ of London & the enduring obsession with Diana

From our UK edition

37 min listen

This week: the left-wing radicalism of Garden CourtGarden Court Chambers has a ‘reassuringly traditional’ facade befitting the historic Lincoln’s Inn Fields in the heart of London’s legal district. Yet, writes Ross Clark in the cover article this week, ‘the facade is just that. For behind the pedimented Georgian windows there operates the most radically effective cell of left-wing activists in Britain’. Ross argues that cases taken on by Garden Court lawyers raise questions of impartiality. Is this just another example of ‘law’s expanding empire’ over the domain of elected politicians, as former Supreme Court judge Jonathan Sumption has warned? The Spectator’s editor, and former Justice Secretary, Michael Gove joined the podcast to discuss.

Angus Colwell

The creeping Dubai-ification of London

From our UK edition

In December 2023, a TikTok influencer called Maria Vehera opened a packet of ‘Dubai chocolate’ in her car and filmed herself eating it. Since then, 124.6 million people have watched her swallowing this pistachio-based gloop. Oh Maria, what have you done? A butterfly flaps its wings – or an influencer eats some chocolate – and soon people are setting their alarms for 5 a.m. to queue outside Lidl for the ‘drop’ of LIDL’S OWN DUBAI CHOCOLATE. Guess what? M&S made one too (£8.50). Morrisons then had the bright idea of creating a pistachio cream Easter egg. Waitrose’s Dubai chocolate was so popular it had to ration it to two bars per person. Knock-off brands now feature at the counter of almost every news-agent in London.

Friday

Angus Colwell

Owen Matthews, Matthew Parris, Marcus Nevitt, Angus Colwell and Sean Thomas

From our UK edition

31 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Owen Matthews reads his letter from Rome (1:21); Matthew Parris travels the Channel Islands (7:53); Reviewing Minoo Dinshaw, Marcus Nevitt looks at Bulstrode Whitelocke and Edward Hyde, once close colleagues who fell out during the English civil war (15:19); Angus Colwell discusses his Marco Pierre White obsession, aided by the chef himself (21:26); and, Sean Thomas provides his notes on boredom (26:28).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

My Marco Pierre White obsession

From our UK edition

Pierre White, Marco. Chef. Michelin stars: five (all handed back). Wives: three (all handed back). Restaurants owned: number unclear. Hours in a cell: 14. Party: Reform. Brands promoted: Knorr stockpots, Lidl, P&O Cruises. Protégé: Gordon Ramsay. YouTube views: hundreds of millions. Current residence: the countryside, somewhere near Bath, far far away from anyone who tries to talk to him. The obituaries will all call Marco Pierre White a ‘rock star’, and they will be correct. In the 1980s, he was all shaggy verve and sweat and ash. He ‘changed the game’ – as they all say – not so much through his cooking, but through his good looks.

Friday

Angus Colwell

Henry Jeffreys, Marcus Walker, Angus Colwell, Nicolas Farrell and Rory Sutherland

From our UK edition

29 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Henry Jeffreys looks at the potential impact of Trump’s tariffs on British drinkers (1:31); on the 400th anniversary of Charles I’s accession to the throne, Marcus Walker explains what modern Britain could learn from the cavalier monarch (7:10); Angus Colwell provides his notes on beef dripping (13:55); Nicolas Farrell reveals he refused to accept the local equivalent of an Oscar (16:40); and, Rory Sutherland makes the case for linking VAT to happiness… with 0% going to pubs, Indian restaurants and cheddar cheese (24:08).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

Labour’s growing pains, survival of the hottest & murder most fascinating

From our UK edition

43 min listen

This week: why is economic growth eluding Labour?‘Growing pains’ declares The Spectator’s cover image this week, as our political editor Katy Balls, our new economics editor Michael Simmons, and George Osborne’s former chief of staff Rupert Harrison analyse the fiscal problems facing the Chancellor. ‘Dominic Cummings may have left Whitehall,’ write Katy and Michael, ‘but his spirit lives on.’ ‘We are all Dom now,’ according to one government figure. Keir Starmer’s chief aide Morgan McSweeney has never met Cummings, but the pair share a diagnosis of Britain’s failing economy. Identifying a problem is not, however, the same as solving it.

Angus Colwell

Bring back beef dripping!

From our UK edition

For several years, a debate has raged (mainly on Twitter, now X) over whether animal fats are actually better for you than industrially processed ‘seed oils’. The debate has become more mainstream thanks to the efforts of the new US Health Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jnr, who wants to Make America Healthy Again. His strategy involves a back-to-the-land style embrace of animal fats, particularly beef dripping. The anti-seed oil community use technical-sounding terms like ‘linoleic acids’ to firm up their side of the debate but fundamentally their point is that our bodies have evolved to process animal fats rather than overly processed stuff. J.D.

Friday

Angus Colwell

Curtis Yarvin on Britain’s demise, Putin’s red line & Churchill-bashing

From our UK edition

50 min listen

Curtis Yarvin, is a political theorist and writer known for his critiques of liberal democracy. Under the pseudonym 'Mencius Moldbug' he developed ideas that have influenced the New Right and post liberal political movements. Curtis Yarvin spoke to The Spectator's Angus Colwell about why Britain is in decline, how far Europe should go to protect itself against Putin, whether Churchill-bashing is fair, and what would be his top three book recommendations.

Friday

Angus Colwell

Loyd Grossman, Tanya Gold, Harry Halem, Angus Colwell, Philippe Sands and Michael Simmons

From our UK edition

45 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Loyd Grossman pleads to save Britain's cathedrals, as he reads his diary for the week (1:31); Unity Mitford is a classic case of aristocratic anti-Semitism says Tanya Gold (7:47); looking ahead to another Strategic Defence Review, Harry Halem warns that Britain is far from prepared for the era of AI warfare (12:42); 'the worst echo chamber is your own mind': Angus Colwell interviews philosopher Agnes Callard (24:24); reviewing Prosecuting the Powerful: War Crimes and the Battle for Justice, by Steve Crawshaw, Philippe Sands argues that while the international criminal justice system was prejudiced from the start the idea was right (31:01); and, Michael Simmons contradicts the Pope and declares that gossip is good for you (41:21).

Thursday

Angus Colwell

Migration mystery, Ipso’s trans muddle & are you a ‘trad dad’?

From our UK edition

46 min listen

This week: why don’t we know how many people are in Britain?How many people live in the UK? It’s a straightforward question, yet the answer eludes some of the nation’s brightest statistical minds, writes Sam Bidwell for the cover this week. Whenever official figures are tested against real-world data, the population is almost always undercounted. For example, in England alone, nearly 64 million patients are registered with GP practices – higher than the Office for National Statistics (ONS)'s estimated population of 58 million. Sam argues there are serious consequences for our society at large, including for tax, housing and our utilities. Who is to blame for this data deficiency? And why is Britain so bad at tackling illegal migration?

Angus Colwell

Sex, Socrates and stiff upper lips: an interview with Agnes Callard

From our UK edition

Agnes Callard is a professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago and she lives with her current husband and her ex-husband. At the same time, yes. They raised the kids together as well (two from her first marriage, now 21 and 16, then one from her second, now 11). I mention this not as gossip, but because her approach to her marriage is an example of how she lives philosophically. Her latest book, Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life, is an argument about how we shouldn’t take cultural norms and rote-learned advice for granted. Instead, we need to talk with others, regularly, about the reasons for our actions. Callard was born into a Jewish family in Budapest in 1976, but grew up mostly in New York.

Saturday

Angus Colwell

Rachel Reeves should not pack her lunch

From our UK edition

When Rachel Reeves was the shadow chancellor, she would round up the spare pastries at the end of meetings and save them for later. No wastage! Her intentions were surely good, but she would have known that there were witnesses, and she knows how political gossip works. Now, as chancellor of the exchequer, she has just told the BBC’s Nick Robinson that she brings in her own home-cooked lunches in Tupperware. Of course, every part of her personality must scream fiscal responsibility. She has a favourite chess move (the Sicilian defence), that conveniently works as an allegory for her approach to politics. She claims to enjoy freezing cold open-water swimming late at night. A half-eaten croissant sparks rage in her. Do you get the message?

Saturday

Angus Colwell

2024: Cindy Yu, Michael Simmons, Angus Colwell, Igor Toronyi-Lalic, Mary Wakefield, Fraser Nelson and Michael Gove

From our UK edition

38 min listen

On this week’s 2024 Out Loud: Cindy Yu examined Chinese work ethic (1:13); Michael Simmons declared his love of the doner kebab (6:28); Angus Colwell reported from Israel in July (9:27); Igor Toronyi-Lalic explained the inspiration behind the cinema of Marguerite Duras (14:41); Mary Wakefield analysed the disturbing truth of the Pelicot case (20:38); Fraser Nelson signed off as editor of The Spectator (27:01); and Michael Gove revealed his thoughts as he sat down at the editor’s desk (33:15).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

‘Trump trauma’ might be dead

From our UK edition

In the Spectator offices, my colleague Mary Wakefield and I often end up talking about young people while we’re making tea. She thinks I’m a bit too cocky about civilisation. Apparently when she starts telling me something weird that she’s seen my generation doing, my eyes start darting madly, looking for a way out. She probably looks at me and thinks I’d open the gates to the barbarians to avoid the horror of an earnest opinion. The re-election of Donald Trump has us feeling different ways too. Mary has written this week about the phenomenon of ‘Trump trauma’. There’s some pretty wild examples in there, all of which are deserving of our laughs. But I found these people strange, even though they’re of my generation, and I didn’t recognise them.

Wednesday

Angus Colwell

Nick Cave’s right-hand man Warren Ellis on AI, Gorecki and staying young

From our UK edition

In the next few days Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds play Leeds, Glasgow, Manchester and London. There are still some tickets left. The price is reasonable but the price doesn’t matter when the band are unequivocally one of the finest of live acts. By whatever means you can, go. When you get there, enjoy Nick Cave himself, of course. Prepare to be awed by ‘Tupelo’, converted by ‘Into My Arms’. Prepare to cry to ‘Girl in Amber’ and dance to ‘Stagger Lee’. Get ready to experience an assault on every one of your orifices by the impossibly loud and dark ‘Jubilee Street’. ‘I think you feel like you’re a young person until you accept that you’re old. And I don’t want to do that’ But also watch Warren Ellis.

Thursday

Angus Colwell

Miliband’s net zero madness & meet Reform UK’s new poster boy

From our UK edition

39 min listen

This week: Miliband’s empty energy promises. Ed Miliband has written a public letter confirming that Labour plans to decarbonise the electricity system by 2030. The problem with this, though, is that he doesn’t have the first idea about how to do it. The grid doesn’t have the capacity to transmit the required energy, Ross Clark writes, and Miliband’s claim that wind is ‘nine times cheaper’ than fossil fuels is based upon false assumptions. What is more, disclosed plans about ‘GB Energy’ reveal that Miliband’s pet project isn’t really a company at all – but an investment scheme. This empty vessel will funnel taxpayer money into the hands of private companies rather than produce any energy itself.

Angus Colwell

Is it time to pity restaurant critics?

From our UK edition

An atom is made of protons, electrons and neutrons, and protons are made of quarks, and a quark is the size of the violin you’d play for a restaurant critic who complains about their job. It’s the best job in the world: go out for dinner on expenses with a friend or a lover, then bash out a thousand words. Why, then, might we feel some pity for our restaurant critics? One reason could be that the Grim Reaper is hovering. Last week, the Evening Standard’s restaurant critic Jimi Famurewa announced that his column was being scrapped, as the paper moves to a weekly edition. Another reason, perhaps, is the lifestyle of a restaurant critic. Earlier this year, the New York Times’s Pete Wells left his column for health reasons: ‘I can’t hack the week-to-week reviewing life any more.

Friday

Angus Colwell

There should be a maximum smoking age

From our UK edition

In January 2022, the New York Times ran a piece that declared that smoking was back, quoting Martin Amis’s daughter saying it seemed like it was. In the summer of 2023, the Guardian ran a piece that declared that smoking was back, because Lily-Rose Depp looks great when smoking. Last month, the Guardian again ran a piece that declared that smoking was back, because Dua Lipa smokes and Charli XCX pretends to.  Smoking between 35 and 60, however, is really very dangerous But it isn’t back, and there’s stats to prove it. However, what those pieces do say is that smoking retains its ‘cool’ image. We know that. Kate Moss and James Dean knew that.

Friday

Angus Colwell

How to save Pret

From our UK edition

Can you imagine how great it must have felt to be a Pret a Manger executive in late 2019? There was a Pret restaurant. They’d just bought Eat and its 94 stores. Veggie Pret was taking over the south east. London mayoral candidate Rory Stewart said Pret was his favourite pub. There was a Twitter account called Pret L’Etranger where visits to Pret were written in the style of Albert Camus. They started selling lobster rolls. That starts with getting rid of 90 per cent of the rubbish sandwiches Pret bigwigs were Masters of the Universe. But then Covid, then lockdown, and disaster. Revenue in 2020 dropped by £299 million. Their survival plan was to beg: for £20 a month, you could get five drinks a day (it later went up to £30).