Best of the Spectator

This week: In the magazine we look at the Wagner Group’s failed coup and its implications for Putin’s reign. The Spectator’s Russia correspondent Owen Matthews examines why the Kremlin permits the existence of private armies such as Prigozhin’s Wagner Group, and joins the podcast alongside Jim Townsend, former deputy secretary of defence for European and NATO policy under the Obama administration....

My guest in this week’s Book Club podcast is the art critic Laura Cumming. Her new book Thunderclap: A Memoir of Art and Life and Sudden Death talks about her fascination for the paintings of the Dutch 17th-century Golden Age, and in particular the entrancing work of the enigmatic Carel Fabritius. She tells me how her preoccupation links to the story of her artist father, why she thinks academic a...

Philip Morris International is one of the world's most interesting and controversial companies. Recently, they announced their vision to exit the business of making cigarettes and enter what they describe as a 'smoke-free world'. But what pace are they moving at? And what are the risks involved? Jacek Olczak the chief executive of Philip Morris International joins The Spectator's editor, Fraser Ne...

This week: Matt Ridley reveals the identity of the Chinese scientists in the lab linked to Covid, Martin Newland makes the moral case for becoming a foster carer, and Mary Wakefield has a plan for her old age to rid the world of drones. Produced by Linden Kemkaran Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the ancient Syro-Malabar Church of south India, clergy who try to change the liturgy do so at their peril. At St Mary’s Cathedral Basilica in Ernakulam last December, a long-standing dispute over whether the priest should face the people led to scenes in which protestors attacked clergy in the middle of the service, sending the sacred vessels crashing to the ground. As a result, the cathedral w...

This week: First up: for the cover piece, The Spectator’s economics editor Kate Andrews has written about Britain’s mortgage timebomb, as the UK faces the sharpest interest rate hike since the 80s. In the year leading up to the general election, can the Conservatives come back from this? Kate joins us along with Liam Halligan, economics editor of GB News, Telegraph columnist and author of Home Tru...

Sam Leith's guest in this week's Book Club podcast is the cosmologist Andrew Pontzen. His The Universe In A Box: A New Cosmic History describes how we have learned to simulate first the weather, and then the universe itself – and how we discovered that those simulations don't just mimic reality but allow us to learn new things about it. Dark matter, the Big Bang and the scientific importance of su...

Michael Shellenberger, Twitter Files journalist and founder of Public is in London to discuss the international censorship industrial complex. He explains to Winston how the complex web of government, big tech, intelligence and media collude to suppress speech in the UK, America and beyond. Michael will be continuing the debate on the censorship industrial complex with Russell Brand and Matt Taibb...

The word ‘West’ is often used as a shorthand to describe liberal democracies in Europe, and perhaps in Asia too, such that we’ll often talk about ‘the West’s attitude to China’, or the ‘West’s relations with China’. But this is at best a lazy shorthand – because when you dig a little deeper, it’s clear that there is no unified West on China. On this episode, Cindy Yu is joined by Noah Barkin, seni...

This week: James Heale takes us through the runners and riders for the conservative nomination for mayor of London (1:00), Paul Wood discusses how Saudi Arabia is trying to buy the world (06:02), and Hermione Eyre reads her arts lead on the woman who pioneered colour photography (12:51).  Produced and presented by Oscar Edmondson.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Freddy is joined by a great American filmmaker, Oliver Stone, and a great Argentinian filmmaker, Fernando Sulichin. Their new documentary Nuclear Now proposes nuclear energy as the solution to the climate crisis. On the podcast, they address global concerns about adding nuclear to the energy mix, compare the nuclear policy of Presidents Biden and Trump and discuss the opinion that Olive...

Isabel Oakeshott is a journalist and author of numerous political biographies, formerly the political editor for the Sunday Times . She's known for a number of scoops over the years, including Chris Huhne's speeding ticket and revealing Matt Hancock's lockdown WhatsApps. On the episode, she talks to Katy about why toughness was a quality her parents particularly emphasised in her upbringing; what...

This week: For her cover piece, The Spectator’s political editor Katy Balls writes that Boris Johnson could be attempting to spearhead an insurgency against the prime minister. She joins the podcast alongside historian and author Sir Anthony Seldon, to discuss whether – in light of the Privileges Committee's findings – Boris is going to seriously up the ante when it comes to seeking revenge agains...

My guest on this week’s Book Club podcast is the former FBI director James Comey, who is making his debut as a thriller writer with an engrossing police procedural, Central Park West . Jim tells me how he mined his own early career as a prosecutor in the southern district of New York to produce this world of hard-bitten investigators and murderous mafiosi (and how he was able to bring it up to dat...

Tony Diver is part of the investigations team at the Telegraph who exposed the Government Counter-Disinformation Unit. The unit operated during the pandemic to suppress speech deemed dangerous. Tony explains how and why the government operated with social media companies to silence dissenters on lockdown, masks and more. They also discuss the Lockdown Files and the upcoming Covid inquiry. Hosted o...

Cindy Yu is joined by Neil Wallis and Freddy Gray to discuss Prince Harry’s lone crusade in the hacking trial against the Mirror. Also on the show, Katy Balls on the Prime Minister’s trip to Washington; Christopher Snowdon on why it’s time for Britain to pull out of the WHO; Michael Shellenberger to defends free speech and Helen Joyce on the terf Oxfam advert. 00:00 Welcome from Cindy Yu 02:14 Wha...

This week: Michela Wrong asks whether anywhere is safe for Kagame's critics (00:58), Emily Rhodes charts the rise of fake libraries (07:54), and Cindy Yu reviews a new exhibition at the British Museum on China's hidden century (15:25).  Produced and presented by Oscar Edmondson.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Freddy Gray is joined by Steve Edginton, video comment editor at the Telegraph and host of the Off Script podcast to discuss curious case of Sir Kim Darroch. A former civil servant has accused the government of an attempt to cover up “crimes” by the former British ambassador to the US, who he claims leaked intelligence to his lover. What has this done to the Anglo-American relations on the week Ri...

This week:  Prince Harry has taken the stand to give evidence in the Mirror Group phone hacking trial which The Spectator’s deputy editor Freddy Gray talks about in his cover piece for the magazine. He is joined by Patrick Jephson, former private secretary to Princess Diana, to discuss whether Harry's 'suicide mission' against the press is ill-advised. (01:22) Also this week:  In The Spectator pro...

In this week's Book Club podcast I talk to Peter Turchin about his new book End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites and the Path of Political Disintegration. He proposes a scientific theory of history, mapping the underlying forces that have led to the collapse of states from the ancient world to the present day, and warns of very turbulent times ahead indeed.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for...

In much of the conversation surrounding China and Taiwan, the question of invasion seems to be a ‘when’ not an ‘if’. But is an invasion really so inevitable? No one knows for sure, of course, but there are good reasons to think that speculations of a war have been overblown. For one, the economic links between Taiwan and China mean that their respective interests are not so zero sum. For another,...

This week: Lionel Shriver argues that we should rise up in our road rage (00:52), Ian Williams discusses the crackdown on China’s stand-up comics (09:42) and Matthew Dennison explains why we shouldn’t cancel Beatrix Potter (16:33). Produced by Seb Charleton & Natasha Feroze Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Penny Junor is a journalist, biographer and author of several books. She began writing at the Evening Standard. Soon into her career, Penny was given an opportunity to write a book about Princess Diana which led to several more books about the Royals – The Firm: The Troubled House of Windsor and Charles: Victim or Villain? Aside from that, Penny has penned books on key political figures including...

James Heale is joined by Kate Andrews and Sebastian Payne to discuss Rishi Sunak’s radical shift to the left. Also on the show, Quentin Letts on the navel gazing civil service; Esperanza Aguirre on the Spanish snap election; Douglas Murray on why we shouldn’t talk about Philip Schofield and Harry Pearson on British folk sport. 00:00 Welcome from James Heale 02:11 Has Sunak become a socialist? With...

On this week’s episode: Price caps are back in the news as the government is reportedly considering implementing one on basic food items. What happened to the Rishi Sunak who admired Margaret Thatcher and Nigel Lawson? In her cover article this week, our economics editor Kate Andrews argues that the prime minister and his party have lost their ideological bearings. She joins the podcast, together...