The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 10 January 2019

The changing EU Sir: If, as Frederik Erixon writes, ‘there is a strange pre-revolutionary atmosphere in Brussels’ and ‘power will be handed back from Brussels to the nation states’ (‘The Last Heave’, 5 January), isn’t this what we have wanted and shouldn’t we delay our Brexit negotiations in order to see what happens? The Brexiteers have always said that the EU, its immigration policies and the euro are not sustainable. After the elections across Europe in 2019 the forces for change will be greater than David Cameron found. Surely we need to combine with other like-minded nations, as we have done in the past, to strengthen the forces demanding change rather than walking away, leaving us unable to influence what happens in Europe?

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Rise above it

For several weeks now, a group of anti-Brexit protesters have found a way of regularly appearing on television news. They wave banners and chant slogans and try to disturb politicians being interviewed. Most MPs take it in good part. Jacob Rees-Mogg even expressed his admiration for those able to shout ‘Stop Brexit’ in a way that is picked up by microphones a hundred yards away. But when pro-Brexit protesters called Anna Soubry a Nazi, dozens of MPs wrote to the police asking them to intervene. The police issued new guidelines to officers. Broadcasters have been conducting interviews with politicians on the green outside parliament for decades. Protesters have rarely interfered. That they do so now on a daily basis is a reflection of the coarsening of political debate.

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Portrait of the Week – 10 January 2019

Home The government drifted towards a vote by the Commons, which it had cancelled in December, on its withdrawal agreement from the EU. British and European officials discussed extending the period under Article 50 before Britain leaves the EU, which would otherwise come into effect on 29 March. ‘We’re continuing to work on further assurances, on further undertakings from the European Union in relation to the concern that’s been expressed by parliamentarians,’ Theresa May, the Prime Minister, said. She even invited groups of MPs for a drink at 10 Downing Street to court their votes. The government was defeated by 303 votes to 296 on a cross-party amendment to the Finance Bill to limit tax-raising powers for no-deal preparations unless authorised by Parliament.

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to 2388: Sea rocket

The quotation was ‘IN MY BEGINNING IS MY END’ (12/15) from East Coker (an anagram of the title), second poem of T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. Remaining unclued lights are words whose first half is the same as their second half: 5, 16, 42, 43, 10 and 13. ELIOT (diagonally from the twelfth row) was to be shaded.   First prize Mike Conway, Grantham, Lincs Runners-up Edward Staveley, London SW15; S.C.

Thursday

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Barometer | 3 January 2019

Paths of infection 2019 marks the 100th anniversary of the height of the Spanish flu pandemic which is believed to have killed 3 per cent of the world’s population. But how Spanish was it, and what should it have been called? Spanish flu: There is little evidence it originated in Spain, but news of the disease first appeared in the Spanish press, because the country was not subject to the wartime reporting restrictions of most European countries, so it was assumed it started there. French flu: Virologist John Oxford has suggested the disease crossed to humans at Étaples, a transit and hospital site in the Great War.

The Spectator

Letters | 3 January 2019

Lords reform Sir: How astonishing that the historian Robert Tombs (‘Beyond Brexit’, 15 December) should think that the Lords might ‘at last be seriously reformed’ after more than a century of schemes that foundered in the Commons. MPs have an unthreatening upper house; they will never agree on substantial changes that would increase its power. They will leave the Lords to implement its own sensible plans to cut its numbers to 600 by bringing party strengths into line with those in the Commons over the next few years.

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Rough crossings

It has been a messy start to the new year for Sajid Javid. For months now, migrants using small boats have been landing in Kent, usually no more than a dozen people at a time. For a country that receives up to 2,500 asylum applications a month, this falls short of a national crisis. It was quite absurd for Tory MPs to talk about deploying the Royal Navy to fend off a few dinghies, and absurd for the Home Secretary to rush back from his holiday to handle the non-crisis and declare it a ‘major incident’. It is a minor incident, but may turn into a major one if the government panics. Migration patterns change, as do the methods.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 3 January 2019

Home The number of would-be migrants known to have reached England in small boats from France in the last two months of 2018 reached 239, with 40 making the crossing on Christmas Day. Most said they were Iranian. Sajid Javid, the Home Secretary, transferred two Border Force cutters to help the one patrolling the Channel. The government awarded a £13.8 million contract to Seaborne Freight to run goods ferries between Ramsgate and Ostend in the event of Britain leaving the European Union without an agreement; a £46 million contract went to Brittany Ferries and one worth £42 million to the Danish shipping firm DFDS. Without the slightest encouragement, leaders of political parties issued New Year messages.

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2387: On the Spot

The HISPANIOLA was the ship that brought the other unclued answers to TREASURE ISLAND in the novel by R L Stevenson. No pirates were named in the grid, except Ben GUNN who joined against them, but (Long John) Silver appeared in the clues, which had a nautical/piratical flavour. The map in Treasure Island had three red X’s, like the grid.

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A model president

From The Spectator, 4 January 1919: President Wilson arrived in London on Thursday week, and was greeted with full expression of the heartiest goodwill. The welcome began at Dover; and when the visitors drove through the streets of London, they passed through a heavy barrage of cheering, which was renewed when the President appeared with the King on a balcony of Buckingham Palace.

Wednesday

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From the archive: The Spectator’s original verdicts on literary classics

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë, reviewed 18 December 1847 An attempt to give novelty and interest to fiction, by resorting to those singular ‘characters’ that used to exist everywhere… the incidents and persons are too coarse and disagreeable to be attractive, the very best being improbable, with a moral taint about them, and the villainy not leading to results sufficient to justify the elaborate pains taken in depicting it. Bleak House by Charles Dickens, reviewed 24 September 1853 Bleak House is chargeable with not simply faults, but absolute want of construction.

Friday

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The drone problem could be just beginning

We’ve seen over the last 48 hours the disruption that drones can cause – and frankly it's surprising it's taken this long for it to happen. The UK Airprox Board, which monitors air safety, says these incidents are on the rise: from 29 in 2015, to 71 in 2016, and 92 last year. Among those recorded are serious incidents like near misses with commercial aircrafts. This is largely because drones are becoming increasingly common.

Thursday

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Letters | 13 December 2018

Life in the borderlands Sir:  The Irish border question has grabbed political headlines this year, but spare a thought for those who live near it. The border takes a haphazard route along river banks, and even through farms. I recall visiting a farm in Fermanagh: I drove into the farm from Northern Ireland but the farmer showed me an exit which led straight into the Republic. For a number of years the Methodist Church in Pettigo (NI) had a minister whose house was on the other side of the border. This porousness is remarkable considering the historical conflict between our two countries. To this day, many Irish call Northern Ireland ‘the North’, as if to deny the border exists.

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Barometer | 13 December 2018

Crisis at Christmas MPs were warned that they might have to give up part of their holidays to deal with Brexit. Here are some other political crises from Christmases past: 1066 William I was crowned on 25 December. Trouble was expected from the English so the streets of Westminster were lined two deep with soldiers. The service was interrupted by a boisterous crowd and houses near the abbey were set alight. 1974 Embarrassment for Harold Wilson on Christmas Eve — his former postmaster general John Stonehouse turned up in Australia, having faked his own death. 1989 Deposed Romanian president Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena had their festive season curtailed by a brief trial, after which they were shot.

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Two futures

Last Christmas, The Spectator set up an appeal — not for money to be given to charity, but for our readers to use what influence they have to offer internships for children selected by the Social Mobility Foundation. The response was wonderful. Offers arrived from across the country and, as a result, teenagers found themselves in barristers’ chambers, railway companies, even the royal household. It was such a success that we are repeating our appeal this year. Several of our readers wrote in to make an interesting point: that while they were delighted to help, they could not pretend their motives were entirely charitable. There is great demand for young talent nowadays, so shrewd employers go the extra mile to find it.

The Spectator

Portrait of the year | 13 December 2018

January Four young men were stabbed to death in London as the New Year began. The Crown Prosecution Service was to review rape cases, after several prosecutions collapsed when evidence was not disclosed to the defence. Carillion went into liquidation. London Zoo delayed its annual stock take after a fire killed an aardvark called Misha. Turkish forces shelled the Kurdish enclave of Afrin. The supreme court of Iceland upheld an import tariff on potato chips of 76 per cent. The Grand Mufti of Egypt said that bitcoin was forbidden by Islam. California legalised recreational cannabis. February The Charity Commission launched an inquiry into Oxfam staff paying for prostitutes in Haiti in 2011.