William Atkinson is The Spectator's assistant content editor
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Iloved my moustache. Unfortunately, my fondness for it seemed inversely proportionate to its popularity among my peers. After much unsolicited feedback from friends (‘You look like a young Peter Mandelson’) and online strangers (‘You look like a 1970s porn star’), I put a poll on my Instagram asking my followers whether or not I should
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‘O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?’ Keir Starmer seems to have mirrored Juliet after deciding to move on Chris Wormald on as Cabinet Secretary. Yet the young Capulet was asking not where her lover was, but why he must be Romeo – a Montague. ‘Deny they father and refuse they name’, she implored, so that the pair could be together. With
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Last weekend, I sat in my kitchen to build and paint an Airfix model. I’d experimented before with mindful colouring and adult Lego, but this was my first try at the solo bachelor activity par excellence. After a few hours of tugging, sticking and dabbing, I was quite impressed with my little Tiger 1 tank.
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Predictions ageing poorly is an occupational hazard for journalists and commentators. But few have gone as sour as those made by Roger Cooper in this magazine, in February 1979, days after the last Shah of Iran had fled. In a piece titled ‘Is Khomeini the leader for Iran?’, Cooper speculated that ‘the prospect… of an
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As per J. M. Barrie, one either believes in fairies, or they don’t. I take a similar approach to Rory Stewart. To his legions of Rest is Politics listeners, the ex-Tory MP, bedroom-squatter, and Afghanistan-botherer is a sage – as right-wing a voice as their timid and tiny middle-class minds can handle, successfully neutralised by
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32 min listen
On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Justin Marozzi analyses what Trump’s coup in Venezuela means for Iran; Lisa Haseldine asks why Britain isn’t expanding its military capabilities, as European allies do so; William Atkinson argues that the MET’s attack on freemasonry is unjustified; and, Toby Young explains why the chickenpox vaccine is a positive health measure.
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It’s a personal delight that on 29 September 1829, the first day of Robert Peel’s new force, the first warrant number issued by the Metropolitan Police was to a William Atkinson. I’m less happy that officer number one was sacked after just four hours on duty, for being drunk. As the Met approaches its 200th
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16 min listen
Regular listeners will remember back in May we recorded a podcast debating whether Kemi Badenoch was the right fit for Tory leader. At that point in time the Conservatives were falling in the polls and she was facing allegations of laziness and a lack of a political vision. Spool forward to the end of the
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Much like Alan Partridge, Kemi Badenoch hopes to have bounced back. After an unsure start to her first year as Tory leader – hopeless interviews and PMQs showings, and a local election shellacking – she now seems to be on a roll. Her two recent set piece speeches at conference and responding to the Budget
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I started counting magpies during my brief, doomed time as a history teacher. Trudging in every morning, the grim prospect of Weimar Germany with the Year 11s ahead, I began to take note of the number I spotted. If, on first sight, I spied only one, I knew I would have a terrible day. If
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35 min listen
On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: William Atkinson reveals his teenage brush with a micropenis; Andreas Roth bemoans the dumbing down of German education; Philip Womack wonders how the hyphen turned political; Mary Wakefield questions the latest AI horror story – digitising dead relatives; and, Muriel Zagha celebrates Powell & Pressburger’s I Know Where I’m Going! Produced
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Like Adolf Hitler, I have been involved in a Channel 4 documentary about penises. I also share a love for watercolours and a partiality for Wagner but that, I promise, is where the similarities end. But back to penises. The Führer’s genitalia – or lack thereof – is a feature of a new documentary, Hitler’s
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40 min listen
From wartime leadership to economic revolutions, Conservative figures have shaped Britain’s past and present. But who stands out as the greatest of them all? In this conversation, recorded live at Conservative Party Conference: Katie Lam makes the case for William Pitt the Younger, Camilla Tominay nominates Margaret Thatcher, William Atkinson points out the number of
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10 min listen
This morning Kemi Badenoch wrapped up Tory conference with a speech that will – for now at least – calm Conservative jitters. The Tory leader’s hour-long address in Manchester was intended as a rejoinder to critics of her leadership and she certainly achieved that aim. Having been accused of lacking spirit, imagination and vigour, Badenoch
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25 min listen
On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: James Heale says that, for Labour, party conference was a ‘holiday from reality’; William Atkinson argues that the ‘cult of Thatcher’ needs to die; David Shipley examines the luxury of French prisons; Angus Colwell provides his notes on swan eating; and, Aidan Hartley takes listeners on a paleoanthropological tour
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Like every Tory Boy, I had a Margaret Thatcher poster. I put it up when I was 15 and had just joined the party. Above my bed, resplendent in blue, the Iron Lady glowered down at my teddies. Naturally, it came down when I first brought home a girlfriend. For any young Tories lacking in
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In the street across the road from my third-year Christ Church room, sat a pub called The Bear. It marketed itself as Oxford’s oldest inn – as so many of the city’s hostelries do – but it is most famous for its tie collection. More than 4,500 are on display, enclosed in cases around the
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Naturally, the start of the new school year is often stressful for pupils. Perhaps those anxious children returning to their classrooms this week could follow the example of Milly, a young Lancashire student. When picking up her GCSE results from her school, Tarleton Academy, near Preston, she brought her ‘best friend’ Kevin – a four-year-old
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Would a Reform government lift the ban on fracking? ‘Abso-bloody-lutely,’ is Nigel Farage’s answer. Fracking and nuclear will form the core of Reform’s push for British energy self-sufficiency – a drive that will see the Net Zero target junked if the party wins power. The Reform leader made his remarks at ‘Net Zero: The New
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On Wednesday, The Spectator dispatched me to Dominic Cummings’s Pharos lecture in Oxford. Packed into the Sheldonian theatre was an interesting crowd. I spotted several X anons, my A-Level politics teacher and Brass Eye creator Chris Morris. For many in the audience, this was a rare opportunity to see their hero; for one or two
