Fact check: are the NYT’s experts right about UK immigration?

Yesterday’s release of immigration figures by the ONS didn’t make for particularly pleasant reading. While net migration had fallen to around...

yesterday 8

Steerpike

Starmer faces Labour rebellion over employment U-turn

Another day, another drama. On Thursday afternoon, it emerged that Sir Keir Starmer’s government were rolling back their commitment to change the ‘...

yesterday 7

Steerpike

So what if Nigel Farage was the school bully?

There may well be, somewhere in this nation of ours, a long-established succession of sensitive, emotionally aware 14-year-olds who can appreciate...

yesterday 20

Rob Crossan

Starmer’s Mr Fix-it / Nick Thomas-Symonds: ‘The Brexit architects essentially ran away’

With his owlish expression and affable manner, Nick Thomas-Symonds looks more like the academic that he was, rather than the political bomb...

yesterday 10

Tim Shipman

Books / Jessica was the only Mitford worth taking seriously

Can there really be any point in yet another fat book about one of the Mitford sisters? Their antics have been appearing in print since the late...

yesterday 10

Anne Chisholm

The Ajax scandal is worse than embarrassing

Luke Pollard, recently promoted to Minister for Defence Readiness and Industry, must have looked forward to visiting General Dynamics UK in Merthyr...

yesterday 7

Eliot Wilson

Nigel Farage must come clean about his Dulwich College schooldays

The allegations concerning Nigel Farage’s conduct as a schoolboy have returned with unusual force, not because the country is suddenly preoccupied...

yesterday 7

Jonathan Sacerdoti

Five bets for Newbury’s superb two-day meeting

Trainers Harry Derham and Emma Lavelle will almost certainly leave their mark at Newbury over the next two days. Whereas Britain’s most successful...

yesterday 7

Penworthy

The path to peace in Ukraine will be tortuous

In order to impose peace terms, you first need to win the war. That fundamental principle seems, for the moment, to elude Ukraine’s European...

yesterday 7

Owen Matthews

Why Australia’s sharks keep on targeting tourists

Thursday dawned bright and warm over the beaches of northern New South Wales. It was a perfect morning to enjoy sun, surf and sand. One young...

yesterday 9

Terry Barnes

The Mansion Tax trap

All I seem to do these days is stand in the school car park having anguished, if largely pointless chats: the Mansion Tax chat. But let’s call it...

yesterday 7

Arabella Byrne

What my run-in with Michael Gove can teach Labour MPs about digital ID

There are times in politics when a feeling of dread overwhelms. When your boss wants to go down a path you think is wrong. Spring 2021 brought one...

yesterday 7

Julia Lopez

I’m a Christmas pudding convert

I used to be a Christmas pudding denier. I couldn’t see the attraction of a dense pudding made mostly of currants; frankly, I’d rather have a...

yesterday 8

Olivia Potts

This is Hong Kong’s Grenfell

Hong Kong is reeling from the tragedy of a devastating fire which ripped through seven 30-storey apartment blocks in a crowded housing estate two...

yesterday 6

Benedict Rogers

The strange death of England

Whatever happened to Britain, or the UK, or England, or whatever they’re calling it? We can’t even agree on what it’s called. But what happened to ...

yesterday 10

Tucker Carlson

France’s military service rollout is about more than Russia

National service is being brought back in France. Emmanuel Macron used a visit to a military base in the Alps on Thursday to outline his...

yesterday 20

Gavin Mortimer

Agony Auntie / The obvious truth about BBC bias

For quite a few members of the House of Commons culture, media and sport committee, the answer to the claims of left-wing bias against the BBC...

yesterday 40

Rod Liddle

The Budget speech Rachel Reeves could have made

yesterday 2

Tim Shipman

Starmer’s workers’ rights U-turn is a small victory for business

A psychoanalyst might have some ideas as to why Keir Starmer’s thoughts have suddenly turned to the subject of unfair dismissal. But on the face of...

yesterday 6

Ross Clark

France finally agrees to intercept Channel migrant boats – but there’s a catch

After months of pressure from Britain, France has agreed to begin intercepting small boats in the Channel. The move comes after Keir Starmer wrote...

yesterday 6

Lucy Dunn

The war is far from over for Vladimir Putin

‘When the Ukrainian troops leave the territories they occupy, then the hostilities will cease,’ declared Vladimir Putin during his state visit to...

yesterday 6

Svitlana Morenets

Yes, John Swinney is a head of government

yesterday 1

Stephen Daisley

Evgeny Kissin’s stand-in brings the house down

It was such an enticing programme, too. The Philharmonia had booked Evgeny Kissin, the last great piano prodigy of the Soviet era and one of the...

previous day 30

Richard Bratby

The revelations about what the Gaza hostages suffered are the most painful yet

The Israeli hostages recently freed from Gaza have begun to speak, and among the new revelations is that some were subjected to sexual assault and...

previous day 10

Jonathan Sacerdoti

A Frenchman who does not drink wine is a disgrace

The world is in an even greater mess than was apparent. I am not referring to Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan or other swamps of mayhem and misery, although...

previous day 10

Bruce Anderson

The genius of William Nicholson

Even if you think you don’t know William Nicholson, it’s a fair bet that you’ve come across his work. If you’ve read those excellent...

previous day 10

Melanie Mcdonagh

An adorable Taiwanese debut: Left-Handed Girl reviewed

Left-Handed Girl is a Taiwanese drama about a single mother who moves back to Taipei with her two daughters to run a noodle stand in the night...

previous day 10

Deborah Ross

Marriage is the real rebellion

Jonathan Swift had a suitably unromantic attitude to holy matrimony. Once, when sheltering under a tree during a storm near Lichfield, he was asked...

previous day 9

Madeline Grant

My life as a writer

It was roughly 55 years ago, at the tail end of the 1960s, that I took the monumental decision to become a writer. It wasn’t exactly an agonising...

previous day 10

Taki

The scientific case for marriage

‘Those whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.’ With this stern admonition, the Church has long been a fervent defender of marriage....

previous day 9

Nicholas Wade

A sack of bilge: End, at the Dorfman Theatre, reviewed

End is the title chosen by David Eldridge for his new relationship drama. Clive Owen and Saskia Reeves star as Alfie and Julie, a pair of wildly...

previous day 9

Lloyd Evans

The glory of gravy

In Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, when Ben Gunn is found by Jim Hawkins, sunburnt and wide-eyed after three years of being marooned on...

previous day 10

Olivia Potts

Gothic lives matter: BBC2’s Civilisations reviewed

Anybody growing weary of the debate surrounding the BBC’s unexamined assumptions and biases about modern politics might have expected to find some...

previous day 9

James Walton

Theatre’s tragedy / The theatre isn’t a thinktank

Readers tend not to approve of rows between columnists, but I must take issue with something Lloyd Evans wrote in ‘No life’ last week. Our theatre...

previous day 10

Douglas Murray

Why are today’s choreographers so musically illiterate?

Most choreographers today have lost interest in using music as anything more than a background wash of colour and mood. More’s the pity. For an...

previous day 8

Rupert Christiansen

Are you too cool for marriage?

The term ‘spinster’ doesn’t seem to scare young women like it once might have. In fact, it is rarely heard nowadays. Instead, women are declaring...

previous day 7

Lara Brown

Baby steps / The path to peace in Ukraine will be tortuous

In order to impose peace terms, you first need to win the war. That fundamental principle seems, for the moment, to elude Ukraine’s European...

previous day 7

Owen Matthews

Epping is being punished by the asylum system

Just two weeks ago Epping lost its court battle to shut the Bell Hotel and expel unwanted asylum seekers from the town. Now it seems the state has...

previous day 9

David Shipley

Thom Yorke reminds me of David Brent: Radiohead reviewed

There were times watching Radiohead’s first UK show for seven years when Ricky Gervais came to mind. As Thom Yorke dad-danced around the circular...

previous day 8

Michael Hann

Reeves’ Budget could mark the finish line for British horse racing

When Rachel Reeves confirmed in her Budget that horse racing will be exempted from rises in gambling taxes, there were cautious celebrations....

previous day 9

Rupert Hawksley

David Lammy wouldn’t even show up to defend abolishing juries

Wantage may seem an unlikely birthplace for England’s greatest gift to the world. Yet as well as being the site of King Alfred’s birth, it gives...

previous day 10

Madeline Grant

OBR chief offers to quit over Budget chaos

As if the Labour lot hadn’t leaked enough ahead of Rachel Reeves’s big Budget announcement, a slip-up at the OBR meant that the report the...

previous day 8

Steerpike

Reeves’s tax raid rocks Gibraltar

The Chancellor’s Budget may have gone down well with Labour backbenchers, but its ‘smorgasbord’ approach has managed to rather annoy a rather...

previous day 6

Steerpike

Rachel Reeves may have just killed the Great British pub

It is just after tea-time on Budget day, and my pub is already half-empty. A few hours ago, Rachel Reeves stood up and, in the name of ‘fiscal...

previous day 10

Rory Hanrahan

Budget blues / Rachel Reeves’s road to ruin

Rachel Reeves is lucky that the name ‘omnishambles Budget’ has already been taken. When the entire document was published long before she got to...

previous day 7

Tim Shipman

Je m’accuse / The art of owning up

Though Rebecca Culley is obviously a wrong ’un – having stolen £90,000 from her dear old gramps while pretending to care for him and only spend a...

previous day 6

Julie Burchill

The Wiki Man / Could a degree make you less employable?

A few years ago my employer, the advertising agency Ogilvy, introduced a recruitment scheme called ‘The Pipe’. It was a ‘non-graduate’ recruitment...

previous day 5

Rory Sutherland

Young people are fleeing Britain

Net migration has fallen to its lowest level in four years. Figures released this morning show that 204,000 more people arrived in the UK than left...

previous day 5

Michael Simmons

Why the Gazan family weren’t entitled to asylum

The Court of Appeal has delivered a judgment on the so-called ‘Gaza family’ claim, which sparked such outrage at Prime Minister’s Questions back in...

previous day 5

Alexander Horne

Britain is giving up on work

Work is good. Work generates wealth, makes people happier and, maybe, delivers salvation. The Protestant work ethic is much disputed among...

previous day 4

Categories

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Newspaper Columnists

Fact check: are the NYT’s experts right about UK immigration?

Steerpike

Starmer faces Labour rebellion over employment U-turn

Steerpike

So what if Nigel Farage was the school bully?

Rob Crossan

Starmer’s Mr Fix-it / Nick Thomas-Symonds: ‘The Brexit architects essentially ran away’

Tim Shipman

Books / Jessica was the only Mitford worth taking seriously

Anne Chisholm

The Ajax scandal is worse than embarrassing

Eliot Wilson

Nigel Farage must come clean about his Dulwich College schooldays

Jonathan Sacerdoti

Five bets for Newbury’s superb two-day meeting

Penworthy

The path to peace in Ukraine will be tortuous

Owen Matthews

Why Australia’s sharks keep on targeting tourists

Terry Barnes

The Mansion Tax trap

Arabella Byrne

What my run-in with Michael Gove can teach Labour MPs about digital ID

Julia Lopez

I’m a Christmas pudding convert

Olivia Potts

This is Hong Kong’s Grenfell

Benedict Rogers

The strange death of England

Tucker Carlson

France’s military service rollout is about more than Russia

Gavin Mortimer

Agony Auntie / The obvious truth about BBC bias

Rod Liddle

The Budget speech Rachel Reeves could have made

Tim Shipman

Starmer’s workers’ rights U-turn is a small victory for business

Ross Clark

France finally agrees to intercept Channel migrant boats – but there’s a catch

Lucy Dunn

The war is far from over for Vladimir Putin

Svitlana Morenets

Yes, John Swinney is a head of government

Stephen Daisley

Evgeny Kissin’s stand-in brings the house down

Richard Bratby

The revelations about what the Gaza hostages suffered are the most painful yet

Jonathan Sacerdoti

A Frenchman who does not drink wine is a disgrace

Bruce Anderson

The genius of William Nicholson

Melanie Mcdonagh

An adorable Taiwanese debut: Left-Handed Girl reviewed

Deborah Ross

Marriage is the real rebellion

Madeline Grant

My life as a writer

Taki

The scientific case for marriage

Nicholas Wade

A sack of bilge: End, at the Dorfman Theatre, reviewed

Lloyd Evans

The glory of gravy

Olivia Potts

Gothic lives matter: BBC2’s Civilisations reviewed

James Walton

Theatre’s tragedy / The theatre isn’t a thinktank

Douglas Murray

Why are today’s choreographers so musically illiterate?

Rupert Christiansen

Are you too cool for marriage?

Lara Brown

Baby steps / The path to peace in Ukraine will be tortuous

Owen Matthews

Epping is being punished by the asylum system

David Shipley

Thom Yorke reminds me of David Brent: Radiohead reviewed