Books and Arts – 17 January 2013
From our UK edition
The Spectator
Thursday
Grill the Housing Minister: Mark Prisk answers Coffee House readers’ questions
From our UK edition
Housing Minister Mark Prisk’s brave request for a grilling from Coffee House readers generated a very enthusiastic response. Here are the minister’s answers to your questions. House Prices Q: What will the Government be doing to rebalance things back towards private buyers and away from the BTL speculators that have driven the market up to such
Wednesday
Rod Liddle on Moore, Burchill and Featherstone’s lovely bitch fight
From our UK edition
In tomorrow’s Spectator, Rod Liddle gives his verdict on the social media storm caused by Suzanne Moore and then Julie Burchill. Liddle suggests that until the ‘entire bourgeois bien-pensant left’ self-immolates, leaving a slight scent of goji berries, bystanders can ‘enjoy ourselves watching them tear each other to pieces, mired in their competing victimhoods seething
Saturday
Mali: a Coffee House briefing
From our UK edition
David Cameron has today confirmed that UK troops will offer logistical “assistance” to those of France now fighting Islamic insurgents in northern Mali. The below briefing outlines developments there so far. 1) The Basics · Mali is a landlocked West African former colony of France, with a population of 14.5 million, half of whom live below
Thursday
Genie
From our UK edition
Office
From our UK edition
‘You’re running at full capacity! You need another in-tray.’
Clouds
From our UK edition
‘Why does every cloud look like an invasion map to you?’
Dad
From our UK edition
‘Sorry, babe, I should have pointed out — that’s Dad’s chair.’
Elephants
From our UK edition
‘Well, if you think you’re tickling my ivories you can think again.’
Mummy
From our UK edition
‘Oh no! It’s the mummy’s curse!’
Steam
From our UK edition
A return to the age of steam
Rent
From our UK edition
‘Then she said those three little words that changed my life: “Buy to Rent”.’
Fairy
From our UK edition
Belfast
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‘Here’s an idea — let’s run it up the flagpole and see who salutes it.’
Celibacy
From our UK edition
Celibacy
Paddington
From our UK edition
‘I couldn’t afford the fare to Paddington. I’m Victoria Coach Station bear.’
Letters | 10 January 2013
From our UK edition
The aid argument Sir: ‘The great aid mystery’ (5 January) presents the development sceptics’ case — which in five years in opposition (2005-2010) the Conservative party set out to address head on. Although the huge changes in British development policy over the last two and half years appear to have eluded Messrs Foreman and Shaw,
Troubles ahead
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If the Belfast riots were happening in any other city in the United Kingdom, there would be uproar. For almost five weeks there have been violent clashes each night. Live rounds have been fired on city streets, politicians’ houses set ablaze, petrol bombs thrown at police and over 60 officers hurt. David Cameron seems to
Portrait of the week | 10 January 2013
From our UK edition
Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said that, for the ‘coalition government with a full tank of gas, it’s full steam ahead’. He announced a ‘mid-term review’, but an audit that showed which pledges had not been met was held back. ‘We are married, not to each other,’ he said at a joint press conference
Barometer | 10 January 2013
From our UK edition
Welfare state The government was attacked for wanting to increase benefits by less than inflation. How have benefits changed in real terms since they were introduced? — Unemployment benefit began with the National Insurance Act 1911, when unemployed workers became eligible for payments of seven shillings a week for up to 15 weeks in the