Fraser Nelson

Every successful digital publication has one thing in common: brilliant analytical people working hand-in-glove with editors. We’re looking to hire such a person. We have a strong data team at The Spectator which allowed us to scrutinise Sage in lockdown and allows us, now, to look at how we can better serve our own readers. This is not about chasing clicks – it’s about helping us create an app and a website that reads as easily and intuitively as the magazine. We need to identify and eliminate any point of friction that annoys our subscribers and do what we can to make it easy for them to find the best of what we have to offer. In the digital age, where most people download an app as soon as they subscribe, we’re judged – quite rightly – by how easy our tech is to use.

This was supposed to be the year when Recep Erdogan would finally come to grief. Instead, he has defied the odds and won today’s runoff in the Turkish presidential election with 52 per cent of the votes vs 48 per cent for 74-year-old opposition leader Kemal Kiliçdaroglu. This establishes Erdogan as one of the great political survivors, whose personal popularity has risen over the declining stature of his party. And it all but kills off the hope that reformist Turks had for change. Anyone who has visited Turkey recently will know the mayhem that Erdogan’s rule has introduced. When I was last there, inflation was so bad that shops didn’t have price tags as they changed from morning to afternoon.

Manchester is desperate for workers. There are 40,000 jobs advertised in the city at the moment, at every pay grade. Ann Summers wants a stockroom assistant (£10.70 an hour), or you could invigilate exams at £14 an hour or post videos on TikTok for £20 an hour. Sellcheck Chemicals is offering up to £75,000 a year for a sales manager (‘No biology background needed, no previous experience necessary’). Even the army is offering trainee officers £34,000 after their first year. But ask any employer in the city what it’s like hiring and they’ll tell you: it’s a battle. What’s strange about this is the fact that though all these jobs are on offer, unemployed Mancunians don’t seem to want them.

The Spectator is looking for a freelance newsletter assistant for early-morning morning shifts (which can be done at home) for our Lunchtime Espresso newsletter. The lunchtime email goes out to more than 120,000 people: one of our most-read, and one of the most influential newsletters in Britain. It should reflect the same ethos as the magazine, our website, and our broadcast offerings. We’re looking for someone with curiosity, who can separate wheat from chaff, who can work out what’s happening that matters – and summarise it all in a sentence. You provide the first draft: a team then pick up, add, enhance. But the first draft matters a lot. Sounds daunting? Perhaps: but if you have a keen interest in current affairs, you’ll be across the news already.