The beach magician’s vanished, gone home. Now it’s my sleeping cousins’ turn to disappear. Out of the creaking depths of old deckchairs their teenage spirits rise, drift down to the shore. The mackerel are in. Helen’s in blue, Cat in her yellow dress.
Zero-sum game Sir: Though troubled by the impact of Budget measures on employers and economic growth, I am more baffled by the regressive nature of those measures on the most vulnerable sectors – retail, hospitality, social care and students (‘Tax, spend, borrow’, 2 November). While the employer of a full-time employee earning £50,000 a year will see a cost increase of 2 per cent, the comparable increases for a full-time adult, a half-time adult and a 16-hour-a-week student on the minimum wage are 10.4 per cent, 13.1 per cent and a staggering 23.2 per cent respectively – and retail and hospitality are also hit by a major reduction in business rates relief.
Peter Parker The New Zealand novelist Catherine Chidgey ought to be much more celebrated in this country than she is. Do not be put off by the fact that The Axeman’s Carnival (Europa, £14.99) is narrated by a magpie; whimsy is entirely absent from this highly original, thrillingly dark and often very funny novel. The bird is adopted by the wife of a cash-strapped farmer and learns to speak, becoming an internet sensation and so providing useful income. At the same time, its guileless chatter includes picked-up phrases that inadvertently expose what is really going on in the household where it has made its home. Treat of the year was Sheila Robinson’s Balance, Humanity and Nature (Random Spectacular, £27.
From our US edition
Welcome to The Spectator’s live 2024 election coverage. Stay tuned throughout the night as our writers bring you news, analysis and commentary on the presidential race and others from across the country.
From our US edition
Welcome, DC Diary readers, to the last edition of this newsletter before Tuesday night’s election. Most polls still have the presidential race at a dead heat between Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump. Pennsylvania remains the lynchpin, as the paths for the respective candidates appears to be the Rust Belt and Pennsylvania for Harris, and the Sun Belt and Pennsylvania for Trump. Each campaign is pointing to data that they think gives them an advantage tomorrow.Trump’s team published a memo Monday, for example, pointing out that early vote numbers suggest turnout among urban voters and women is down significantly in the seven swing states compared to 2020.
The Spectator Economic Innovator of the Year Awards, in partnership with Rathbones, celebrate the passion and creativity of British entrepreneurs. From hundreds of entries we have narrowed down to some 50 finalists across the United Kingdom. In this episode, the judges discuss the innovators within the Manufacturing and Engineering category – 3D printing hydraulic systems, making plastic alternatives out of plant-based polymers, creating recyclable electronics, and more.
31 min listen
The Spectator Economic Innovator of the Year Awards, in partnership with Rathbones, celebrate the passion and creativity of British entrepreneurs. From hundreds of entries we have narrowed down to some 50 finalists across the United Kingdom. In this episode, the judges discuss the innovators within the Business Services and Logistics category – the companies that help other innovators and companies operate day to day. The judges in this episode are mechanical engineer and venture capitalist Adrian de Ferranti; Caroline Theobald CBE, managing director of Bridge Club Ltd which helps connect entrepreneurs with investors, expertise and skills; Michelle White, Head of Private Office for Rathbones; and Martin Vander Weyer, The Spectator's business editor.
From our US edition
Former president Donald Trump slammed former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney, who has been campaigning on behalf of Vice President Kamala Harris, for her war-hawk tendencies and quickly found himself in a media feeding frenzy. Trump said during a town hall with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, “She’s a radical war hawk... Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK? Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.”He added, “Look, they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying, ‘Oh gee, let’s send 10,000 troops right in the mouth of the enemy.
The journey was that of the Owl and the Pussy-cat, by Edward Lear. OWL appears diagonally backwards in the bottom right of the grid. First prize J.
The first fiscal event to be delivered by a female Chancellor of the Exchequer is a landmark moment, but in every other regard this Budget was a return to the familiar, and failed, approach of Labour governments past. This was the Life on Mars Budget – a journey back to the 1970s, only without the cheap booze and fags. Tax rises, increased borrowing, a bigger state, spending on public services unaccompanied by meaningful reform and additional costs for those businesses which create wealth – we have seen all these before and we know they are the markers of decline. This Budget was a journey back to the 1970s, only without the cheap booze and fags Before the election there were signs that Labour’s leadership understood the need for a different approach.
Home Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, repeatedly mentioning an inherited ‘£22 billion black hole’, raised taxes by £40 billion in the Budget, while saying she was abiding by Labour’s manifesto promise not to increase taxes on ‘working people’. A big hit came from increasing employers’ contributions to national insurance; the threshold at which it begins to be paid was reduced from £9,100 to £5,000. But income tax and NI thresholds for employees would be unfrozen from 2028. Capital gains tax went up; stamp duty for second homes rose. Fuel duty would again be frozen. The non-dom regime was abolished. Tobacco went up; a pint of draught went down a penny. The minimum wage would rise. Defence spending would rise by £2.9 billion.
From our US edition
Here’s what was supposed to happen: Vice President Kamala Harris would speak at the Ellipse, just as Donald Trump did on January 6, 2021, before his supporters entered the US Capitol in order to prevent the certification of the last presidential election. Harris would strike a stark contrast; she would deliver a disciplined address to all Americans, a week before polls close, and show that the Democrats were still in the fight, despite the recent “vibe shift” toward Trump. Tens of thousands would attend. The visuals would be striking.Everything went to plan. Enter Joe Biden.
Working people Government ministers may have had trouble defining what was meant by ‘working people’ in the Labour manifesto, but where did the idea of classifying people who earn their living as a distinct group come from? – According to the OED,the term ‘working class’ has been traced back to the 1757 edition of the Universal Dictionary of Trade and Commerce written by Malachy Postlethwayt, a former adviser to Horace Walpole. Postlethwayt was born the son of a wine merchant in Limehouse, east London, in 1707. He certainly fitted Starmer’s definition of a working person in that he appears to have died, in 1767, owning no assets.
The survey says Sir: David Butterfield’s 21 years of experience of higher education (‘Decline and fall’, 26 October) chimes with my 35. But the decline in the rigour of university education which he so deftly describes has not been entirely self-willed. Successive governments have championed a consumerist understanding of higher education. Students have become consumers and academics have become service providers. The reduction in the intellectual demands of undergraduate courses and grade inflation are due to the annual National Student Survey. Universities are in thrall to this and make ever greater efforts ‘to enhance the student experience’. This includes pandering to the desire of most students to have fewer essays, slimmer reading lists, few exams and higher grades.
Jonathan Sumption Barbara Emerson’s The First Cold War: Anglo-Russian Relations in the 19th Century (Hurst, £35) is an outstanding account of Britain’s relations with Russia at a time when ambassadors mattered and Britain was the only world power. No one has explained the Great Game in Central Asia or the intricacies of European dynastic politics so well. Anne Somerset’s Queen Victoria and Her Prime Ministers (Collins, £30) overlaps with it, since one of the abiding themes of the queen’s relations with the eight men who occupied No. 10 in her long reign was her enthusiasm for going to war with Russia. Victoria was opinionated and outspoken, but easy to manipulate if you knew the codes.
35 min listen
The Spectator Economic Innovator of the Year Awards, in partnership with Rathbones, celebrate the passion and creativity of British entrepreneurs. From hundreds of entries we have narrowed down to some 50 finalists across the United Kingdom. In this episode, the judges discuss the innovators within our consumer goods and services category, from suppliers of wonky fruits to producers of supplements for pets. The judges in this episode are Merryn Somerset Webb, senior columnist at Bloomberg and the founder of MoneyWeek; entrepreneur and investor Gordon Black, whose company Peter Black Holdings was a major supplier of the UK's leading retailers; Michelle White, Head of Private Office for Rathbones; and Martin Vander Weyer, The Spectator's business editor.
From our US edition
New York For New Yorkers fed up with the Jets, Giants and Yankees, this weekend offered no shortage of entertainment, with former president Donald Trump returning to his hometown for a sold-out rally at Madison Square Garden, the “world’s most famous arena.”While the election isn’t over for more than a week, Trump made what is likely his highest-profile event before Election Day in the heart of deep-blue New York City. While his speech did not deviate from his traditional remarks about the border, Vice President Kamala Harris being a “very low-IQ” person, no taxes on tips and more, it was a clear display of confidence in the home stretch of the 2024 campaign.
The Spectator Economic Innovator of the Year Awards, in partnership with Rathbones, celebrate the passion and creativity of British entrepreneurs. From hundreds of entries we have narrowed down to some 50 finalists across the United Kingdom. In this episode, the judges introduce those start-ups rethinking and finessing the battle against climate change, from vertical farming to carbon capture technology; as well as those working for a greater social purpose, such as getting more women into tech.
From our US edition
Democrats including presidential nominee Kamala Harris and 2016 candidate Hillary Clinton are accusing their Republican opponent of being a Hitler-esque fascist. Spurred by a curiously thin report from the Atlantic claiming that former president Donald Trump disrespected the memory of a fallen soldier and praised Adolf Hitler and his generals, Harris held a press conference on Wednesday in front of her Washington, DC residence in which she warned Trump is “increasingly unhinged and unstable.” During a CNN town hall later that evening, Harris answered in the affirmative when she was asked if she believes Trump is a fascist. Meanwhile, Clinton likened the upcoming Sunday Trump rally at Madison Square Garden to an event held by Nazis at the same venue in 1939.
Back to the White House If Donald Trump wins on 6 November, he will be the first US President to serve two separated terms since Grover Cleveland, who was president between 1885-89 and 1893-97. Cleveland actually won a higher share of the popular vote in the 1888 election, but lost to Benjamin Harrison in the electoral college after an election fought on the issue of trade tariffs. Cleveland’s wife Frances was confident she would return to the White House, reputedly telling her staff to keep things in good order for when they return four years to the day. So it proved – Cleveland won the 1892 election easily.
