After a decade of financial austerity, is Europe now on the brink of a new age of energy austerity? The city of Hanover has recently introduced strict energy-saving rules that include cutting off the hot water in public buildings, swimming …
Starmer can’t afford to be Blair
It was one of the hottest summers recorded in British history. Living standards were under intense pressure from an energy crisis and rising inflation. Industrial relations across the country were breaking down. At a factory in north London, working conditions …
The hypocrisy of Pope Francis
Pope Francis is sorry and not sorry. Last week, he was in Canada to deliver an apology for the abuse suffered by indigenous children in schools run by the Catholic Church. He was rewarded with approving headlines — and an …
The West needs to grow up
The first modern revolution was neither French nor American, but English. Long before Louis XVI went to the Guillotine, or Washington crossed the Delaware, the country which later became renowned for stiff upper lips and proper tea went to war …
Was the sexual revolution a mistake?
One of the many clashes within the modern feminist movement is between sex-positive feminists and sex-negative feminists, otherwise known as the prudes. The former argue for the virtues of no-holds-barred sexual freedom, while the latter believe that liberal feminism’s focus …
Why the Tories love a clown show
It was the summer of 1995. The Tory leadership struggle was in full swing, and after days of intense excitement Britain’s next Prime Minister — or so he hoped — was poised to emerge into the national spotlight.
The challenger …
Anarchy rules South Africa
Personal attacks within the ANC come either by smear or funeral oration; the organisation’s strong traditions of omerta allow few other avenues. So when the former South African president Thabo Mbeki recently warned incumbent Cyril Ramaphosa that his inaction was …
Lena Dunham’s depraved comeback
Lena Dunham made her name pushing back against the extremes of sex positivity. In the second episode of the TV series Girls, which she wrote and starred in, her character capitulates to a sex partner’s insistence that they act …
How Allison Bailey crushed Stonewall
Ever since Stonewall, formerly known as a gay rights organisation, decided to focus on trans rights at the expense of all others, anyone articulating a reasonable objection to this change of direction has been subject to abuse, threats, and even …
The fate of Europe lies in the steppes
On the road between the frontline cities of Sloviansk and Bakhmut, in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, three stone statues stand mutely by the side of the road, observing the coming and going of military traffic with impassive detachment. Known as …
Why is the Church obsessed with gay sex?
Every ten years, bishops from all over the global Anglican Communion meet up in Canterbury to argue about gay sex. They are supposed to be talking about other things as well — after all, there are 90 million Anglicans worldwide …
Publishing will never be fair
When I worked in publishing in the early Noughties, “nobody is going to buy a book with a black girl on the cover” was a thing that people still said, out loud, in professional settings. The received wisdom was that …
The rebirth of Newcastle
There’s a glorious curvaceous grandeur to Victorian railway architecture. I love the sinuous bends of those northern English stations whose geography prevents them from being termini but who nevertheless try to give themselves the airs of one. None is greater …
Remote learning was built to fail
Imagine that it’s September 2020 and you’re teaching at a middle school that has gone online. Miraculously, all of your students have functioning laptops and can join class remotely. You’ve checked your equipment with a colleague, who assures you that …
Will Europe survive?
In our age of crisis, the state has been reawakened, breaking the taboos of the past few decades. But it’s still an uphill climb. Over the past 40 years, there was broad political agreement that markets were not to be …