The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 9 June 2016

From our UK edition

War and Brexit Sir: Over the past few weeks every underemployed academic, hack or backbencher has come forward offering opinions on the Brexit dispute. The result has been one pool of confusing sludge. I wonder if, as a nonagenarian, I could contribute a view before the deadly vote comes along? After four years’ service in the wartime army I was appointed to Germany as Daily Telegraph correspondent. Though it was several years after the war, what I saw appalled me. I don’t think I realised quite what a job the RAF had done; or imagined the appalling suffering of the enemy civilians. What would another European war do? We were fearful, and grasped at straws.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 9 June 2016

From our UK edition

Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, caused mild surprise by cancelling a cabinet meeting and hastily convening a press conference on the roof of Savoy Place, where he warned against ‘taking a leap in the dark’, urging voters in the referendum on EU membership to ‘listen to the experts’ about the risks of leaving. Some supporters of the Leave campaign began to think they had a chance of winning. The campaign had already taken a turn towards reciprocal accusations of dishonesty between Conservatives. Boris Johnson MP, speaking in favour of leaving the EU, said: ‘The botched bureaucratic response to the migration crisis means the Eurocrats are demanding even more of our money.

The Spectator

The leap

From our UK edition

This week the Prime Minister devoted a speech to what he regarded as six lies being told by his opponents in the EU referendum campaign. He later confessed that the idea for the speech had come to him while watching the news at 9 p.m. the previous evening. It would have been better if he had contented himself with shouting at the television, rather than adding yet more rancour to what has become a slanging match. Most voters tune into an election campaign only in its final few weeks; those who do so now will find nothing but hysteria, hyperventilation and obloquy. Where, it is often asked, are the facts? If we can distil the arguments down to the most salient points, what are they?

The Spectator

EU referendum TV debate – Leave and Remain face off in ITV showdown

From our UK edition

Fraser Nelson, James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman review the ITV debate: Welcome to Coffee House's coverage of ITV’s EU referendum debate. Boris Johnson, Andrea Leadsom and Gisela Stewart made the case for Brexit, and Nicola Sturgeon, Angela Eagle and Amber Rudd argued for Britain to stay in the EU. Here's our commentary from the debate, as well as all the audio and video highlights. Here's Isabel Hardman's summary of the various speeches: OUT: Boris Johnson: 7/10 - stayed calm under non stop personal onslaught. Still didn't offer much of a detailed sense of what Brexit would look like.

The Spectator

All the Ins and Outs

From our UK edition

We asked two of the most eloquent voices in the EU referendum debate to put their best arguments in the most condensed form — and gave them a few words to rebut each other.

The Spectator

The Kitchener effect

From our UK edition

From ‘Lord Kitchener’, The Spectator, 9 June 1916: The central fact in Kitchener’s administration of the War Office is that he both invented and created the New Armies, and that he did it of his own motion, alone bearing the responsibility of the idea, and almost alone stubbornly asserting and reasserting the belief that this miracle was possible. Beside this everything else that Kitchener did seems of small account.

Wednesday

The Spectator

Transcript: George Osborne vs Andrew Neil on Brexit

From our UK edition

  Coffee House Shots James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman discuss George Osborne's performance Abridged transcript of George Osborne's interview with Andrew Neil. AN: Now you claim the European Union could cause armed conflict if we leave, could put a bomb under our economy if we leave – the Prime Minister’s words: hurt pensioners, collapse house prices. Why are you risking all that with a referendum? GO: Well, I don’t think it is ever a risk in a democracy to ask the people. And all my lifetime this issue of Britain’s membership of the European Union has hung over our economy and our security and I think it’s right that the people decide.

Tuesday

The Spectator

EU referendum TV debate – David Cameron vs Nigel Farage

From our UK edition

Welcome to Coffee House's coverage of ITV's EU referendum debate. David Cameron and Nigel Farage faced public questions on the EU referendum. Here's our commentary, as well as audio and video highlights, from the discussion.  PODCAST: Listen to Fraser Nelson, James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman give their verdict on Cameron vs Farage: DAVID CAMERON:   James Forsyth David Cameron looked pretty happy at the end of that. He got his choice of opponent in this debate and did everything he could to take advantage of that, mentioning Farage at every opportunity. Cameron also benefited from going second, another thing which he got his way on, as he could rebut Farage's points without any opportunity for Farage to reply.

Thursday

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 2 June 2016

From our UK edition

Home Two British men were charged with immigration offences after the rescue by night of 18 Albanian migrants, two of them children, from an inflatable boat off Dymchurch, Kent. ‘We don’t want the English Channel turning into the Mediterranean with fleets of small boats coming over,’ said Chris Grayling, the Leader of the House of Commons and a campaigner for Britain to leave the EU.

The Spectator

Letters | 2 June 2016

From our UK edition

Cameron’s bluster Sir: Peter Oborne is surely right that lying and cheating are now commonplace in the heart of government (‘The new dodgy dossiers’, 28 May). If David Cameron truly believed that exit from the EU would mean economic meltdown, a third world war and always winter but never Christmas, his decision to hold a referendum would be the most irresponsible act of statesmanship since Chamberlain signed the Munich agreement. But he doesn’t believe it. Something else entirely is bringing out his inner Pinocchio. Having promised a referendum at a time when a Tory majority in the Commons seemed unlikely, the personal political risk to Cameron must have seemed remote.

The Spectator

Barometer | 2 June 2016

From our UK edition

Gorilla warfare Harambe, a 17-year-old gorilla, was shot at Cincinnati Zoo after he started dragging away a boy aged four who had fallen into his enclosure. What are world’s biggest threat to gorillas? — There are approximately 100,000 left in the wild, most of them western lowland gorillas who live in the Congo. — Two per week are believed to be falling victim to poachers. — According to one estimate, a quarter of all gorillas have been killed by the Ebola virus in the past 12 years. — Gorillas contribute to their own decline through infanticide. When a dominant male dies the successor will often kill his offspring, accounting for 1.7% of all gorilla deaths, according to one study. Chill waters A dinghy full of migrants was rescued off the Kent coast.

The Spectator

Continental drift | 2 June 2016

From our UK edition

It is a long time since the term ‘sick man of Europe’ could be applied to Britain. France is now a worthier candidate for the accolade — it -increasingly resembles a tribute act to 1970s Britain. A package of modest labour-market reforms presented by a socialist president has provoked national strikes on the railways and Air France. This week, the streets of Paris resembled one big Grunwick or Saltley Gate — the trials of strength between employer and union in which so many of Britain’s most bolshy trade unionists cut their teeth. This week is not a one-off: in recent years France has had a strike rate more than twice that of Denmark, its nearest European competitor. Britain now looks a paradigm of -industrial virtue by comparison.

The Spectator

Against armistice

From our UK edition

From ‘President Wilson and the Lessons of History’, 2 June 1916: Emphatically it is not a war of what we may call the old eighteenth-century pattern, where any one could step in and say, as if speaking to a couple of duellists: ‘You have had a good honest fight. Honour is satisfied. Now don’t you think the sensible and the humane plan would be to shake hands and try to forget all about your unfortunate quarrel?’ There is nothing whatever of that nature about the present struggle. The peoples of Europe are not arrayed upon what used to be called the field of honour, but engaged in a death-struggle in which one side is fighting for domination, and the other for security that peace, justice, and national independence shall continue on the earth.

Friday

The Spectator

The Spectator poll: Are You In or Out? Bob Geldof, Tim Rice & Joey Essex have their say

From our UK edition

The Spectator's EU Poll asked a fairly random group of well-known people how they’d vote in the EU referendum, and this is what they said: Sir Tim Rice, lyricist: 'In 1975 I voted to stay in the Common Market from a standpoint of ignorance. In 2016 I shall vote to leave the EU, as a rebel without a clue. This is a gut reaction which I trust far more than the barrage of misinformation churned out by both sides of the campaign but overwhelmingly by the Remain camp. At least this time round I know I don't know anything which is more than can be said for most of the campaigners. It would be good to spend one's final years as part of a truly independent nation once more. I am intrigued that Mr.

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 26 May 2016

From our UK edition

Leave’s grumpy grassroots Sir: James Delingpole should join us at a Remain street stall. He would soon be disabused of his idea that Remainers are ‘shrill, prickly and bitter’ and Leavers are ‘sunny, relaxed and optimistic’ (‘What’s making Remain campaigners so tetchy?’, 21 May). We can often spot a likely Leaver by their angry expression. As we offer a leaflet with facts about the EU to counter the lies and distortions our acquaintance has imbibed from the Leave campaign, we are lucky to escape with anything less offensive than ‘Piss off’. If a leaflet is taken, we often see it torn up. At the grassroots, Leave is certainly grumpy.

The Spectator

Barometer | 26 May 2016

From our UK edition

A man in full A relic said to contain a fragment of St Thomas à Becket’s elbow arrived from Hungary for a tour of London and Kent. Where to go to see some of his other bits: — St Thomas of Canterbury Catholic church, Burgate Canterbury: fragments of vestment, bone and finger are in a glass case above the altar. — Church of St Maria Maggiore, Rome: shirt and fragments of bone and brain. — Most of him was interred in Canterbury cathedral until the shrine was destroyed by Henry VIII in the 1530s. Bones and a skull were discovered in Canterbury cathedral in 1888, but a later study concluded the skull was that of an older man.

The Spectator

Losing faith

From our UK edition

A landmark in national life has just been passed. For the first time in recorded history, those declaring themselves to have no religion have exceeded the number of Christians in Britain. Some 44 per cent of us regard ourselves as Christian, 8 per cent follow another religion and 48 per cent follow none. The decline of Christianity is perhaps the biggest single change in Britain over the past century. For some time, it has been a stretch to describe Britain as a Christian country. We can more accurately be described now as a secular nation with fading Christian institutions. There is nothing new in the decline of the church, but until recently it had been a slow decline.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 26 May 2016

From our UK edition

Home The government published a Treasury analysis warning that an exit from the EU would plunge Britain into a year-long recession and could cost 820,000 jobs. David Cameron, the Prime Minister, speaking with George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, at B&Q’s head office in Hampshire, said that leaving ‘would be like surviving a fall then running straight back to the cliff edge. It is the self-destruct option.’ Downing Street said that leaving the EU would make an average holiday for four people to the EU £230 more expensive. Gillian Duffy of Rochdale, the nemesis of Gordon Brown, the former Labour leader, spoke in favour of the Leave campaign.