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To appreciate the unique affection enjoyed by the British farmer, it is necessary to look no further than the bumf put out for British Food Fortnight, a series of harvest festivals, farmers’ markets and barbecues to be held across the country from 20 September to 4 October. ‘Farmers would gain if we could all eat
Britain sent about 1,400 more troops to Iraq, the 2nd Battalion Light Infantry and the 1st Battalion Royal Green Jackets, to supplement its force of 10,000. Another 1,200 may be sent too. A man died during a clash between two factions of Iraqi asylum-seekers and two dozen men using baseball bats, sticks, bricks and knives
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Comment on Forza Berlusconi! by Boris Johnson and Nicholas Farrell (06/09/2003) As a Swiss citizen interested in political history, and as an observer of recent political developments in Europe, I must question the approach of the media to the phenomenon Berlusconi and the effects it may produce in the long term. After 1989, a new
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Justice should not only be done, but be seen to be done, and therefore secrecy in trial proceedings is to be countenanced only when circumstances genuinely demand it. However, justice also requires that people should not be punished for what they have not done, or for what it cannot be proved that they have done.
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Mr Alastair Campbell confirmed that he was to resign as the Prime Minister’s director of com-munications and strategy. He is to be succeeded, at least in the first half of the title, by Mr David Hill, but there is to be a general musical-chairs in the department, about which Mr Peter Mandelson is said to
Comment on Render unto the Pope… by Adrian Hilton (30/08/2003) Hiltons fear is not an irrational one. It is true that Europeans are threatening England’s sovereignty. However the EU is not a front for Rome. The existence of predominately protestant nations in the EU proves that. Many sovereign nations both inside and outside of Europe
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The most revealing evidence to the Hutton inquiry so far has been provided not by Alastair Campbell, Andrew Gilligan or Geoff Hoon but by David Kelly’s sister, Sarah Pape. In the run-up to war, she told the inquiry on Monday, she had discussed the issue of Iraq with her brother, believing that he would agree
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The Hutton inquiry into the events surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly, the expert on Iraqi weapons, heard evidence from Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, Mr Geoff Hoon, the Secretary of State for Defence, and Mr John Scarlett, the chairman of the joint intelligence committee, who said that on 4 September the committee
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Comment on The Gospel according to Braveheart by Deal W. Hudson (23/08/2003) My thanks to Mr. Hudson for a sober and fair review of this forthcoming film. It seems as if certain people at the Anti-Defamation League and in “progressive” Christian circles are so keen to avoid suggestions of “collective guilt” for Christ’s suffering and
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Sir Wilfred Thesiger, who died on Sunday, needs no memorial beyond his own books and photographs. These will live for as long as mankind is interested in the traditional societies of which he left such a brilliant record. Nobody can ever again write that kind of book or take in such abundance that kind of
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Documents presented to Lord Hutton’s inquiry into the events surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly, the expert on Iraqi weapons, showed that Mr Geoff Hoon, the Secretary of State for Defence, overruled a recommendation from Sir Kevin Tebbit, the permanent undersecretary at the ministry, that Dr Kelly should not be required to appear before
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The murderous attack on the United Nations in Baghdad has brought some clarity to the situation. It has exposed the essential community of interest between the UN and the United States. Those two entities often disagree so radically about methods that the fundamental similarity of their aims is easily overlooked. In Iraq, they are engaged
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Lord Hutton began his inquiry into the events leading to the death of Dr David Kelly, the expert on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Mr Andrew Gilligan, who had used Dr Kelly as his source for a report on the BBC about the ‘sexing up’ of the government’s September dossier on Iraq, made available notes
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It has become customary to preface any comment on the government’s policy on school examinations with a glowing tribute to schoolchildren who have worked hard for their grades. The school standards minister David Miliband goes so far as to cite the hard work of school pupils as an excuse for avoiding debate on the issue
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Lord Hutton began his inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly, the Ministry of Defence expert on Iraqi weapons, by disclosing part of a letter by the scientist to his superior, in which he said that, judging from the report by the BBC’s Andrew Gilligan about the government’s September dossier on Iraq, ‘I can
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Comment on Pre-emptive force (02/08/2003) Perhaps it is the accent and perfect diction, but the British often appear to Americans to be of superior intelligence. That is, until we learn of some curious incident which quells such thought instantly. Take the Tony Martin case, for example. We always thought the phrase “a man’s home is
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By the time The Spectator goes to press, the record for the highest-ever authenticated measurement of air temperature in the British Isles may or may not have been broken. The only certainties are that the railway industry will have dreamed up yet more reasons why trains may only run at 20mph, that there will scarcely
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Mr Alastair Campbell was expected to resign as the director of communications and strategy at the Prime Minister’s office before the Labour party conference at the end of September. Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, let it be known through friends including Lord Falconer of Thoroton that he intends to complete a third term. The