21.02.2021
The City could enjoy a golden age - but only if it cuts loose from EU regulationBy denying Britain the equivalence rights it gives to Mexico and China, Brussels forces the City to diverge...
17.02.2021
Brexit has weakened the Western allianceThe UK is looking increasingly to the Anglosphere, the EU to Eurasia...
15.02.2021
Nationalists without being patriotsWestern democracies are losing ground to authoritarianism - globally and domestically...
13.02.2021
If we want to return to growth, we need to reverse the Covid spending increases and controlsRestrictions brought in on a supposedly contingent basis are proving hard to lift...
11.02.2021
We need lockdown dissenters more than everThe Twittering of debate makes even scientists reluctant to challenge the consensus...
09.02.2021
The more time we spend online, the angrier and more extreme we becomeOn Brexit, Trump and the lockdowns, I have gone from being extreme to being wet without altering my views...
07.02.2021
The Northern Ireland Protocol has had itIt should never have been agreed, and now the EU itself has backhandedly killed it...
05.02.2021
Britain’s Pacific PivotJoining the CPTPP will strengthen the Anglosphere and boost jobs and growth...
03.02.2021
Open. The. Schools.Closing primary schools, in particular, inflicts vast educational cost for minimal epidemiological gain...
01.02.2021
Maybe Americans will finally understand what Brexit was really aboutIt is the EU, not Britain, that is the populist, protectionist rogue state...
30.01.2021
Europhiles are finally seeing the EU for the inept, protectionist, self-serving racket it isLike Western Communists after the 1968 Prague Spring, many Remainers have had their eyes opened...
28.01.2021
Britain is already trading more freely than it was in the EUEveryone said it was impossible, but the UK has signed 63 FTAs, with more on the way...
27.01.2021
Overseas travel may never returnRoger Scruton would have welcomed a world in which we spend more time at home...
25.01.2021
Does the label “genocide” make anything better?We should be wary of collectivising people in death, as in life...
24.01.2021
The EU is a sovereign state in every meaningful sense, and we should treat it as suchThe EU has hit the roof at suggestions that its ambassador might be traced as the representative of an international association...
22.01.2021
Free association is an absolute right, not conditional on identity politicsA club can insist you wear a tie, a gym can refuse to admit men, a platform can refuse to host people whose opinions it dislikes...
20.01.2021
Will every dangerous virus now trigger demands for a lockdown?The early signs are not encouraging...
18.01.2021
The solution to America’s culture war is radical decentralisationThe two tribes are now so far apart, and so geographically clustered, that there is no way of bridging the gap...
17.01.2021
The trashing of the British brand puts the Union in jeopardyUnionists can't just keep saying no. It is time for a new constitutional settlement...
14.01.2021
Why are the teaching unions so determined to stop teaching?First they insisted that all teaching be moved online, now they are campaigning against that, too...
13.01.2021
The republic will survive Trump - but will the Republicans?The GOP must break cleanly with the man who came late and malevolently to the party...
11.01.2021
Don’t excuse insurrectionFor four years, Trump's supporters have given him a pass - something the Chief Executive should never get...
07.01.2021
We need to grow our way out of this mess - here’s a list of EU laws to scrapBritain has been uniquely badly hit by the lockdowns, and economic recovery must now be the sole aim of public policy...
04.01.2021
The coronavirus may be what finally kills capitalismIt has been endlessly predicted since Karl Marx's time, but the end is truly now on the cards...
26.12.2020
We can now expect good relations with the EU - maybe, at last, the culture war can endGiven the hand he was dealt, Boris played a blinder ...
24.12.2020
Both sides are sounding off furiously about a deal that neither has seenAs usual, people are starting with their preferred conclusions and then casting around for rationalisations...
21.12.2020
The woke will stop at nothing in pursuit of their demented cultural revolutionJulie Burchill, a provocatrice hired to write a provocative book, has it cancelled - fore being too provocative ...
17.12.2020
There is now more man-made stuff in the world than there are animals - but don’t let it bother youThere's evidence that we have passed the peak, because capitalism encourages minimisation...
15.12.2020
If there were a way to make wealth taxes work, some country would have found it by nowYou can only confiscate present wealth, not future wealth - and future wealth won't be created if it's subject to confiscation...
13.12.2020
Brexit as it might have beenBoris Johnson becomes PM in 2016, Britain joins EFTA and a culture war is avoided...
10.12.2020
The EU’s attitude to Britain is that of an empire toward a renegade provinceThe EU is offering deliberately hostile terms in order to make a point - even at cost to itself...
09.12.2020
The day is coming when we will wonder how anyone could eat an animalClean meat will free up vast tracts of land and reduce carbon emissions...
06.12.2020
Valéry Giscard d’Estaing embodied the de-haut-en-bas arrogance of the EU elites'Si extraordinairement distingué, quand je lui dis "bonjour" je me fais toujours l'effect de lui dire "merde".'...
05.12.2020
The lockdown has divided us into two unreasonable and hostile tribesAs with Brexit, I find that I have migrated across the spectrum without changing my opinions...
01.12.2020
When even Eton goes woke, the war is overReason, tolerance, moderation, courtesy - we are leaving them all behind...
30.11.2020
Why the United States should join the CPTPPPulling out of the Pacific trade deal opened the door to Chinese hegemony...
28.11.2020
How odd that the rebellion should begin just as the lockdown is finally being liftedWe are hitting what marathon runners call "the wall": the end is in sight, but our muscle energy has run out...
25.11.2020
Vaccinate staff, keep kids in class, hold exams on timeIt is almost literally unbelievable that we might repeat this year's exams fiasco in 2021...
23.11.2020
Irish America clings to quarrels now largely forgotten in Ireland itselfThe tragic circumstances of the migration made the US different from other diaspora communities...
22.11.2020
Devolution will be a disaster until Scotland gets meaningful fiscal autonomyIn an age which elevates victimhood over liberty, the British brand is bound to lose its appeal...
20.11.2020
The lockdown has undone a decade of progress for poor childrenWe are running schools in the interests of the producers, not the consumers...
17.11.2020
GOP leaders know that Trump has lost - but they won’t say so out loudThe president's peevishness is harming the Republicans and undermining the Republic...
14.11.2020
More tax rises would kill any chance of a recoveryThe way to balance the books is to spend less, not to tax more...
12.11.2020
Republican candidates outpolled Trump - yet they are too scared to act against himThe idea that Trump has a unique appeal to blue-collar voters is hard to reconcile with the results...
11.11.2020
Je me souviens des jours anciens et je pleureHow can anyone look at trees in November and not be pierced by the terrible beauty of mortality?...
09.11.2020
One thing distinguishes the United States from Latin America - the rule of lawThose who refuse to accept an election result because they resent the outcome are endangering American exceptionalism...
08.11.2020
We are heading for decades of debt and Big GovernmentThe impact of the coronavirus crisis will last a generation...
06.11.2020
Official Britain grovelled before agitators representing just three per cent of the publicBLM is indulged for the same reason that most food is halal: asymmetry of conviction...
02.11.2020
Commentators are over-compensating, refusing the believe the signs that Biden will winAs with Britain in 2019, the polls may turn out to have been right all along...
31.10.2020
Why, given everything we now know, are we locking down again?The only argument for a lockdown is that it buys time. But what are we buying time for?...
30.10.2020
Brexit is a colossal opportunity for our coastal communitiesIceland shows us how to treat fisheries as a valuable renewable resource...
29.10.2020
How much is all this costing?It won't do any more to promise to defeat Covid "at any cost" - we need figures...
26.10.2020
The world that lies beyond the lockdowns will be an uglier and more authoritarian onePower has shifted to the autocracies, and even in the West liberalism is in retreat...
24.10.2020
I feel it in my bones: public enthusiasm for the lockdowns is about to turnLabour has picked the worst possible moment to jump on the lockdown bandwagon...
22.10.2020
My native Peru had the world’s toughest lockdown, but still ended up with the worst fatality rateWe need to accept that government intervention does not make much difference either way...
20.10.2020
It’s Kang versus Kodos, a knave or a fool, a fantasist Falstaff against a senescent LearWhoever wins the 2020 presidential election, America is heading in a darker direction...
19.10.2020
The EU is treating Britain like a renegade provinceThere is no good faith from Brussels, and Britain should not accept the Withdrawal Agreement without a trade deal...
15.10.2020
As a lockdown sceptic, I now know how it must have felt to be a RemainerEveryone you know agrees with you, you're convinced the facts are on your side, but the polls show you're in the minority...
14.10.2020
The police have taken it upon themselves to snuff out free speechInvestigating Darren Grimes isn't just a waste of money, it's an assault on liberty...
12.10.2020
Sweden has demolished the case for the lockdownLow population density? Economic hit? Higher death rate than Finland? All utterly irrelevant...
11.10.2020
Labour would leave Britain with the most restrictive trade policy outside North KoreaUnder the pretence of defending food standards, they would make any trade deals, even with the EU, impossible...
06.10.2020
A war out of a comic novelThe Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has a Gilbert and Sullivan quality...
01.10.2020
Beardless men will soon be in the minority - againThe periods when men were clean-shaven are brief interglacials between long hirsute ice ages...
30.09.2020
Charles Moore would make the perfect BBC ChairmanClever, witty, independent, broad-minded, humane, well-read, courteous - he is the best ally the Corporation could have...
28.09.2020
Hume, Voltaire, Kant, Darwin - identity politics is turning on the men who made the EnlightenmentAn irrationalist creed is now openly attacking logic and science as white male baggage...
26.09.2020
Medical advisory committees are prone to absurd pessimism and risk-aversionTheir members' personal incentives push them towards excessive caution...
21.09.2020
Joe Biden’s ignorance about Northern Ireland jeopardises the Atlantic AllianceThe Democrat, who has long flirted with extreme republicanism, is threatening the UK over a complete non-issue...
19.09.2020
Looking at the data from different countries, there is no evidence that lockdowns are effectiveIf I asked you to match the countries to the infection and fatality graphs, you wouldn't;t be able to say which had closed down...
18.09.2020
Boris is right to act to secure the Union - and voters know itThe Internal Market Bill is moderate, proportionate and necessary...
14.09.2020
Sweden’s strategy is working - which suggests that the rest of us ruined ourselves needlesslyThe Swedish counter-example means lockdown enthusiasts can't claim that things would otherwise have been worse...
11.09.2020
This is far more dangerous than “political correctness gone mad”We are returning to pre-Enlightenment thinking, where tribe and identity trump science and reason...
09.09.2020
The Rhodes statue will be brought down by a woke committee, in defiance of public opinionThus does the Left continue its long march through the institutions...
07.09.2020
If the presidential election is close, the losers won’t accept the resultCivil wars happen, not when people disagree about what should be done, but when they disagree about who has the right to do it...
06.09.2020
Tax rises now would choke off any chance of a recoveryOn the contrary, we need to cut taxes - especially on employment and investment...
03.09.2020
Britain won’t concede the principle that it is sovereign over its maritime resourcesIf the EU refuses to do a deal, it is European skippers who will suffer...
02.09.2020
Are tanks now redundant?What about aircraft carriers? The deployment of hypersonic missiles turns a lot of our assumptions on their head...
01.09.2020
We are outliers in our reluctance to go back to workBritish voters demanded the toughest possible lockdown, and now face the economic price...
31.08.2020
Canada’s new Conservative leader speaks to and for the common sense majorityErin O'Toole wants to lead Canada back to the heart of the Western alliance...
29.08.2020
William Shakespeare was all things to all men - and all women(See also the second column on the excellent news that Tony Abbott is joining Britain's Board of Trade)...
25.08.2020
Americans no longer care about the rule of lawWhat is howled down as an abuse from the other side is cheered from your own - an attitude incompatible with liberal democracy...
23.08.2020
Britain’s administrative machine has broken down irreparablyOfqual, PHE, the immigration service, the police - the crisis has exposed the utter uselessness of our quangos...
22.08.2020
Precisely 100 years ago, a ragtag army of Polish volunteers saved Europe from tyrannyWe in the West barely remember the Polish-Soviet war, but it was a damned near run thing...
19.08.2020
We demand that politicians “let the professionals get on” - then blame them when quangos screw upOfqual, PHE, the NHS - all are free from political control. But they are never blamed for their own failings...
10.08.2020
Victimhood does not confer virtueJohn Hume was no better, morally, than his Unionist opponents; but he happened to represent the side seen as the underdog...
05.08.2020
Sweden is in the happy position of not needing to worry about a second waveEven now, few commentators seem to grasp that flattening the curve doesn't affect the size of the area under the curve...
04.08.2020
Failing to reopen schools is unforgivableNo one has suffered more from these closures than the young people who are least at risk from the disease...
03.08.2020
No country is perfect, but the notion that slavery was a peculiarly American vice is ridiculousWhen people say they want to study American history "warts and all", they often want to look only at the warts...
02.08.2020
Republicans finally glimpse a post-Trump futureIt took the crazy proposal to postpone polling day, but big-R Republicans are at last standing by small-r republican principles...
27.07.2020
Twitter has infected older media with its angry, aggressive, infuriating toneSocial media give us what we secretly want: opinion presented as news, moralising assertions, confirmation bias...
26.07.2020
We have lost the most influential philanthropist of them allStuart Wheeler was a flinty patriot, an expert gambler, a generous host and a loyal friend...
24.07.2020
Let British jihadis come back here - and then try them for treasonWe should allow UK nationals to return, but that should be the last journey they make...
23.07.2020
Why are we so reluctant to come out of lockdown?The lifting of restrictions has had a surprisingly slight impact - for reasons that owe more to psychology than epidemiology...
20.07.2020
We have inverted the old liberal ideal - skin colour should matter no more than hair colourThe NYT's logic is that two American babies born on the same day arrive with pre-existing grievances against each other...
18.07.2020
Britain can avoid depending on China by leading the world in hydrogen technologyHydrogen is the philosopher's stone of energy - the way to transmute water into fuel...
15.07.2020
Too many people are going to universityThe jobs vacancies are for qualified electrical engineers, not philosophy graduates...
14.07.2020
The silent majority is always bigger than you thinkVoters hate disorder more than anything else. The BLM unrest might just have put Trump back in the game...
11.07.2020
Workers’ rights mean little when there are fewer and fewer workersGovernments can't create jobs. Their task is to remove obstacles so that firms can expand and hire people...
09.07.2020
We can’t spend our way out of this messAny jobs "created" by government spending must always, by definition, come at the expense of jobs elsewhere...