Patrick Gibbons

Ninety years after Liberal leader Archibald Sinclair made the case that military weakness invited aggression, a new generation of liberals is talking about rearmament. At this year’s Liberal Democrat conference in Brighton, on the same day that leader Sir Ed Davey delivered his viral ‘We care! We fight!’ moment, the party approved a new defence and security policy which, it hopes, demonstrates how far the party has come over the last decade.  The party argues the plan provides ambitious targets for defence spending, while reframing existing policies about the need for greater cooperation with allies through the lens of collective security.

Pakistani Christians could face renewed persecution following the Archbishop of Canterbury’s decision to withdraw an honour to a leading Muslim cleric, Monsignor Michael Nazir-Ali has warned on The Spectator's Holy Smoke podcast. The former Bishop of Rochester was speaking to Damian Thompson following the news that Lambeth Palace revoked an award to Hafiz Ashrafi after ‘previous comments’ by the Imam came to light. After the ‘Reconciliation and Interfaith Cooperation' award was presented on 11 September, it emerged that Ashrafi had praised Osama bin Laden in 2007, saying he would give the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks the title Saifullah, or 'Sword of God’, for ’serving Muslims by waging jihad against infidels’.

I realised I was sat next to the Irish President when she sent back her sandwich for being too spicy. I had just climbed Errigal, the tallest mountain in Donegal, on a blustery day, and had stopped at a cafe nearby in the Gaeltacht, the part of Donegal where the Irish language is predominant. It was clear that the small group next to us had done the same – wearing leggings, trainers and zip-up workout gear – and my boyfriend could understand their discussion about how windy the mountain had been. Then, as it became clear a chicken wrap was being sent back – ‘I’m so sorry’ in Gaeilge – I looked up and realised that the apologetically polite voice came from Catherine Connolly.

‘There was a cameraman in the bloody pie shop’, my auntie tells me as she complains about the press coverage Makerfield has recently received. All the attention – ‘horrendous’, she says – might be pretty common for a British by-election, but in journalism it’s rare to have such a personal connection to an election like this. Ashton-in-Makerfield is where my mother grew up, and her family still lives across the area. My grandmother still lives in the ex council house she has lived in for nearly seven decades, off the Wigan Road. Naturally, I have turned to my relatives to ask about the election, particularly my aunt, a retired careworker.

‘We’re only a few months – perhaps years at most ­– away from the first political assassination by a drone’. That was the chilling verdict delivered by Francis Dearnley on this week’s episode of The Edition podcast from The Spectator. The host of the award-winning Ukraine: The Latest podcast was speaking as Russia’s war in Ukraine reached a grim milestone: it has now gone on longer than the first world war. That Ukraine has been able to fiercely resist Russia for so long is due, in no small part, to advances in drone technology. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4r0lr8UyKY ‘Ukraine is the cutting-edge drone superpower in the world’, Francis said.

How religious is Britain? Last week the Bible Society was forced to pull their report into the ‘Quiet Revival’ of Christianity, which was published last year, after YouGov found their polling used faulty data. This report gained significant attention and was the basis of much inquiry in 2025 – including from The Spectator, through our Holy Smoke podcast. The Spectator has a number of broadcasts this Easter that explore religious faith in Britain. The first is our weekly Edition podcast, where this week Lara Prendergast is joined by Anglican priest Fergus Butler-Gallie, the historian Tom Holland and former Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Sumption.