menu_open
Sonia Sodha

Sonia Sodha

The Guardian

We use cookies to provide some features and experiences in QOSHE

More information  .  Close

Voters must learn to accept that Britain’s challenges are too big to solve straight away

It’s a running joke in Westminster that some on the British centre-left are fascinated by American politics to the point of obsession. So much so...

24.11.2024 70

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

England’s universities flex their muscles to hike fees, while students get a bum deal

Sometimes you just need to call something out for what it is. English undergraduate education is a hot mess that works in the institutional interests...

10.11.2024 30

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

What sort of society rations support for children with special learning needs?

There’s a proliferation of acronyms assigned to children whose needs the state is struggling to meet. SEN (children with special educational needs),...

27.10.2024 30

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The assisted dying debate is about so much more than kindness v conservatism

There is perhaps nothing more 2020s than taking a sensitive, morally fraught issue loaded with complexity and nuance, and casting it as progress and...

20.10.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Kemi Badenoch is no cartoon villain. Labour underestimates her at its peril

The beauty parade of Conservative leadership hopefuls is finally approaching its end stages. Tory MPs have spent six weeks whittling down six...

13.10.2024 10

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Bringing an end to child poverty really ought to be an economic no-brainer

What’s Labour’s governing philosophy? That was the question posed at a dinner I went to with some MPs and former staffers during the party’s...

29.09.2024 90

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

A rushed UK law is no way to make such a vital, painful decision as how to die

Labour goes into its conference this weekend with a friendly warning it would do well to heed. The Starmerite thinktank Labour Together has just...

22.09.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Academic free speech is too crucial to be used as a political football by left or right

Michelle Shipworth, an associate professor at University College London (UCL), has for several years taught a “data detectives” masters module on...

01.09.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Punish the men who pay for sex, rather than the women lured into that life

Labour’s most ambitious pledge isn’t to reach the highest sustained growth in the G7, or to transition Britain to zero-carbon electricity by 2030....

25.08.2024 60

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The BMA’s stance on puberty blockers defies the key principle of medicine: first, do no harm

We entrust doctors with our health. Patients have the right to expect that those doctors will make decisions based on evidence-based clinical...

04.08.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The Observer view: Kamala Harris has risen above doubters, now she must stay on high ground

The speed and single-mindedness with which Kamala Harris secured the Democratic presidential nomination following Joe Biden’s sudden decision last...

28.07.2024 50

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The perfect feelgood TV, did Strictly’s sparkle blind it to flaws in its format?

S trictly Come Dancing always seemed to me like the no-brainer reality TV show from a contestant perspective. At best, it’s seriously...

28.07.2024 10

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Yes, five years in jail is too harsh, but the Just Stop Oil Five shouldn’t have done it

It was “a dark day”, according to a UN special rapporteur. Others lamented “a gross miscarriage of justice” and “a farce” marking...

21.07.2024 40

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The falling birthrate threatens a disaster so costly no politician dares think about it

A conference on changing demographics I attended last week tackled the fact that, while we are living longer – a great product of medical...

23.06.2024 30

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

The law on single-sex spaces is a mess. It needs fixing, not political point-scoring

A friend of mine runs a residential writing retreat attended by women with experience of trauma and abuse. It is vital to those who take part that it...

09.06.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Child sex abuse is all around us – and online it can start with legal porn

Think of a man viewing images or footage of child sexual abuse online, and what comes to mind? I’d bet that for most of us this horrible thought...

02.06.2024 50

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

It is foolish and self-indulgent for the anti-Starmer left to split the Labour vote

All political parties face a trade-off under a first-past-the-post electoral system. Governing depends on attracting a broad coalition of voters,...

26.05.2024 200

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Righteous fury over Gaza must allow empathy for fearful Jewish students

Moral logic that seems crystal clear on paper often becomes murkier on contact with reality. So it is with the question of how to pick a path through...

12.05.2024 90

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Sometimes our take on human nature trumps our political allegiances. Good

It’s not often you find yourself nodding along with those with whom you normally profoundly disagree, and raising an eyebrow at the contributions of...

05.05.2024 30

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Some are born lucky, so the left shouldn’t flinch from giving others a helping hand

Life is a game of chance. Or that’s what I tell myself when I’m losing at my newest hobby, poker. Of course it’s a different story when I win...

28.04.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Thanks to Cass, evidence not ideology will be used to guide children seeking gender advice

‘First, do no harm” is the sacrosanct principle that is supposed to underpin modern medicine. But history is littered with examples of medics...

14.04.2024 10

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

When the right to die becomes the duty to die, who will step in to save those most at risk?

It’s rare to get a politician who openly admits they are torn on an issue, but in recent days there have been two striking examples. First, Wes...

07.04.2024 40

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Will this brutally honest look at dementia finally get us talking or will we turn away?

We see a man giving a speech at his mother’s wake. It starts off as you might expect. But he goes on to tell us how his mother died multiple times...

31.03.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Fat-shaming Keir Starmer was wrong, but we all judge people by their appearance

Nobody could have predicted that Keir Starmer’s waistline would have become one of the talking points of budget week. But a throwaway comment by...

10.03.2024 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Meet the modern-day censors, wielding their purse-strings over artists and their work

Who determines whether a play can get staged? In the unnamed authoritarian regime that serves as the dramatic backdrop for A Mirror, the answer is...

18.02.2024 50

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Students are racking up huge debts, but how can they tell if it’s value for money?

High interest rates mean that, for the vast majority of recent graduates in England, student loans have become the equivalent of running up a down...

11.02.2024 40

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Vindictive, cowardly leaders bowed to the gender bullies and failed Jo Phoenix

Sometimes the people around you scramble reality to turn up into down, black into white and open into closed. That’s how Prof Jo Phoenix must have...

28.01.2024 100

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Yes, parents have the right to educate their children at home. But children have rights too

What happens when a parent’s right to decide how to bring up their child comes into conflict with that child’s right to a safe, fulfilled life?...

14.01.2024 10

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Criminalising women is no way for the BBC to make up for funding freezes

Look at patterns of criminal offending, and one of the first things to stand out is the differences between men and women. Men dominate when it comes...

17.12.2023 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

Scottish schools have tumbled from top of the class. This is what went wrong

The Scottish school system was once the jewel in the British educational crown. With good standards and low levels of social inequality, it was seen...

10.12.2023 20

The Guardian

Sonia Sodha

3f6b25675cc3cc38968fd2b29facc092