If the BBC is the cultural expression of the British state, then the omens are surely unfavourable. Its funding contested and overstretched, bogged down in interminable culture war disputes, the BBC does not know what it is for. Every few …
Britain’s future is Pagan
The West Country is better known for Poldark’s smoulder than the fires of Paganism. But, as a local Heathen priest, I can assure you that the Pagan revival down here is in full swing. Just last week, a builder working …
Scotland’s hateful hate-crime law
If the Scottish establishment is to be believed, ordinary Scots are positively frothing with hatred at the moment. Already Police Scotland record “non-crime hate incidents”, based solely on an onlooker’s perception of hatred, as a matter of course. But this …
The village that made Nigel Farage
In almost all respects, life for Reform UK’s “honorary president” couldn’t be any better at the moment. About to turn 60, Nigel Farage is earning more than ever, drinking less (a third of what he used to, he told me), …
Kate is not your drama queen
Just over a decade ago, the late novelist Hilary Mantel delivered a lecture to an event at the London Review of Books and triggered national outrage. In the course of a talk on “Royal Bodies”, which ranged widely across royal …
The lost art of hedgelaying
Among the rural professions, we hedgelayers get an easier time of it than most. Not in a physical sense, of course. Laying hedges is skilled hard graft. By the end of the season, which runs from the first day of …
Why we musn’t ban TikTok
For the third time in just over a century, the US is, once again, in the grip of a full-blown Red Scare. The home of the “communist threat” may have changed — China rather than the Soviet Union — but …
The suicide of Wales
Rising above the mouth of the vale of Neath, the smoke hangs over the village like a dejected memory, a tragic reminder of what will soon evaporate. The recently announced closure of the blast furnaces at the Port Talbot steelworks …
The suicide of Wales
Rising above the mouth of the vale of Neath, the smoke hangs over the village like a dejected memory, a tragic reminder of what will soon evaporate. The recently announced closure of the blast furnaces at the Port Talbot steelworks …
The plot against Britain’s children
Last year, the Financial Times reported from the village of Ichinono in Japan. In common with a lot of Japanese villages, Ichinono’s population is small, old and vanishing: just 53 people, most of them over retirement age. In Japan as …
Why we demand Kate’s sacrifice
Since the Princess of Wales withdrew from public life in January for planned abdominal surgery, her continued absence and relative Palace silence have prompted a frenzy of ever more deranged internet speculation. As the legacy press vacillated between fawning and …
Why we demand Kate’s sacrifice
Since the Princess of Wales withdrew from public life in January for planned abdominal surgery, her continued absence and relative Palace silence have prompted a frenzy of ever more deranged internet speculation. As the legacy press vacillated between fawning and …
The TV show that liberated Britain
To cheers, comedian Leslie Crowther strides into a studio and peers down at a gold-coloured card. “Wendy Partridge, come on down!” The camera cuts to a 300-strong audience that’s rowdier than normal for mid-Eighties ITV on a Saturday evening. Thrusting …
The TV show that liberated Britain
To cheers, comedian Leslie Crowther strides into a studio and peers down at a gold-coloured card. “Wendy Partridge, come on down!” The camera cuts to a 300-strong audience that’s rowdier than normal for mid-Eighties ITV on a Saturday evening. Thrusting …
David Cameron’s vanity trip
It’s amazing how little it takes. After a premiership marked by foreign-policy failure — and a political afterlife sullied by profiteering — here we are, only four months since his return as Foreign Secretary, and David Cameron is being talked …