The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 21 March 2013

From our UK edition

Joining the club Sir: As Robert Hardman notes (Royal notebook, 16 March), not only is the C back in FCO but these days there is a waiting list of countries interested in joining, or being more closely associated with, the Commonwealth. I have a list of at least half a dozen, and even some strong signals from Dublin that they, too, are now thinking about joining the club. How can this be so when we were told so firmly by foreign policy experts in the past century that we should break our ties with the Commonwealth and that our future prosperity and destiny lay in Europe?

The Spectator

Barometer | 21 March 2013

From our UK edition

Big ask Birmingham Council asked residents, in a survey on wheelie bins, whether they were gay or bisexual. Some more nosey questions asked by councils: — Is your gender identity the same as the gender you were assigned with at birth? (Consultation into relief road near Manchester Airport) — Which of the following describes your religion? (Lambeth council consultation on road humps) — Which of the following describes how you think of yourself? Male? Female? In another way? (Consultation on super fast broadband for Isle of Wight council) — What do you think caused your heterosexuality?

The Spectator

The empty Budget

From our UK edition

Dangerous, unfair, verging on kleptomania: the bailout deal proposed by the EU at the weekend and rejected by Cyprus MPs on Tuesday is everything it has been described as over the past few days, and worse. Now it has been established that the EU views bank depositors as a potential piggy bank to be raided at whim, it is hard to see why anyone would keep significant quantities of cash on deposit in European banks. We are back where we started in 2007, with the threat of Northern Rock-style bank runs across the Continent. Yet the proposed raid in Cyprus is really only different in perception from what is being imposed by stealth on British savers. In his Budget, George Osborne admitted how badly his plans are going: he’s spending far more than he intended and receiving far less.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 21 March 2013

From our UK edition

Home In what he called a ‘fiscally neutral’ Budget, George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, confronted a reduced forecast of gross domestic product for 2013 from 1.2 per cent to 0.6 per cent and a further delay until 2017-18 in reducing the burden of public sector debt, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility. Most government departments would have to cut a further 2 per cent of their spending over the next two years, saving about £2.5 billion. Changes in state pensions, introduced a year earlier than expected, would save the Treasury almost £6 billion a year by 2016-17, some of it to be used for infrastructure spending.

Wednesday

The Spectator

Budget 2013: George Osborne’s statement in full

From our UK edition

Mr Deputy Speaker, this is a Budget for people who aspire to work hard and get on. It’s a Budget for people who realise there are no easy answers to problems built up over many years. Just the painstaking work of putting right what went so badly wrong. And together with the British people we are, slowly but surely, fixing our country’s economic problems. We’ve now cut the deficit not by a quarter, but by a third. We’ve helped business create not a million new jobs, but one and a quarter million new jobs. We’ve kept interest rates at record lows. But Mr Deputy Speaker, despite the progress we’ve made, there’s much more to do.

Sunday

The Spectator

Bookbenchers: Peter Lilley | 17 March 2013

From our UK edition

Peter Lilley MP is the Conservative MP for Hitchin and Harpenden, and has been an MP since 1983. He was a Cabinet minister in both the Thatcher and Major governments, and today talks to us about Waugh, Tolstoy, and his quest for timeless literature. 1) Which book is on your bedside table at the moment? The Road to Reality: A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe by Roger Penrose 2) Which book would you read to your children? I think I would read them the Chronicles of Narnia, I am told they're very good. 3) Which literary character would you most like to be? Alyosha in The Brothers Karamazov. 4) Which book do you think best sums up 'now'?

Thursday