The Spectator
Thursday
Outlook
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Letters | 12 September 2013
Tories and Italians Sir: Roger Scruton must be laughing, or more likely crying, to hear his Meaning of Conservatism described as the ‘Bible of the Tories’ (‘Italians for Maggie’, 7 September). Nothing could be further from the truth. According to Farrell, ‘Italians believe that only the state can bring freedom.’ But that’s closer to Scruton’s position than the ‘freedom’ Farrell imagines him to be defending. According to Scruton, ‘conservatism is not about freedom, but about authority, and freedom divorced from authority is of no use to anyone — not even to the one who possesses it’.
How to save the BBC? Privatise it
Three years ago, our columnist and former editor Charles Moore was summoned to Hastings Magistrates’ Court to pay £807 for refusing to pay his television licence. He was protesting against the BBC’s ‘gross violation of its charter’ by broadcasting obscene phone calls made by Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand to the former Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs. The court did not have much time to hear his case, or anyone else’s. That day, 560 others would have been prosecuted for not paying their dues to the BBC. Now it has risen to 700 a day, accounting for an extraordinary one in ten of English court cases. We now know why the Beeb needs the money: it has paid some £60 million in severance payments to various senior managers in the last eight years.
Portrait of the week | 12 September 2013
Home George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that the British economy was ‘turning a corner’, with ‘tentative signs of a balanced, broad based and sustainable recovery’. Unemployment fell to 7.7 per cent for the quarter May to July from 7.8 in the previous quarter. Jaguar Land Rover is to create 1,700 jobs at Solihull, where it is planning production of aluminium chassis. The Highways Agency published details of a new 25-mile stretch of toll-road on the A14 bypassing Huntingdon. Churches on the Isle of Sheppey held prayers of thanksgiving that no one was killed in a crash in the fog involving 130 cars on the bridge to the island.
Barometer | 12 September 2013
Trust us The National Trust opened the Big Brother House at Elstree Studios at the weekend. Some other less grand National Trust properties: — 575 Wandsworth Road, Lambeth. 19th-century terraced house that was home to Kenyan-born civil servant Khadambi Asalache who, to keep out the damp, decorated the walls with elaborate panels made from pine salvaged from skips. — Birmingham Back-to-Backs. A 19th-century courtyard of artisans’ dwellings which survived slum-clearance. — Mr Straw’s House. 1920s semi in Worksop kept just as the day it was built. — 20 Forthlin Road, Liverpool. 1950s council house that was the childhood home of Paul McCartney. Trust me George Osborne said he had been vindicated on the economy.
Books and Arts – 12 September 2013
Wednesday
Full text: Nigel Evans’ statement to the House
Following his resignation as Deputy Speaker after being charged with offences including sexual assault and rape, Nigel Evans made a statement in the House of Commons: listen to ‘Nigel Evans' statement’ on Audioboo.
Tuesday
Ed Miliband’s speech to the TUC: full text
Listen to Ed Miliband give his speech at the TUC here:- listen to ‘Ed Miliband's TUC speech: Labour has a 'historic opportunity' to change’ on Audioboo.
Monday
George Osborne’s speech on the economy: full text
listen to ‘George Osborne speech: British economy is 'turning a corner'’ on Audioboo.
