Simon Jenkins's Blog, page 67

Once children were birched at school. Now they are taught maths | Simon Jenkins

Modern education’s obsession with rankings blights the lives of intelligent pupils – never more so than at exam time

I used to long to be a child again. Not any more. British children seem under perpetual assault from the three horsemen of the apocalypse: obesity, social media and the manic gods of examination. Of these the most needless, and clearly dangerous, is the exam. The signs of stress are blatant. One in 10 schoolchildren now has a “clinically diagnosable mental illness”. Rates of tee...

Trump’s vulgarity could be the one diplomatic style Kim Jong-un understands | Simon Jenkins

With North Korea backed into a corner, Trump must pander to Kim’s vanity. The meeting could redefine international relations

A battered phoenix is struggling to rise from the ashes of the G7 fiasco. It is diplomacy, Trump-style. The American president in Singapore today appears determined, against all odds, to cut some sort of deal to denuclearise North Korea. To him, the G7 summit in Canada was a pointless gathering of political toffs. North Korea is different. He has made it his own. Having...

Heathrow airport’s polluting new runway is a macho folly | Simon Jenkins

This go-ahead is the worst decision taken by a UK government in modern times

The building of a third runway at Heathrow must be the worst decision taken by a British government in modern times. There is nothing in it but private profit for a Spanish company that appears to have the British cabinet in thrall. That a rich European city should expand rather than contract a major airport in a built-up area defies belief.

For half a century successive governments have refused to contemplate such exp...

Sajid Javid’s counter-terrorism plans risk Britain’s freedom | Simon Jenkins

The new home secretary is close to capitulating to terrorism’s prime goal – undermining the liberties and dignities of the state

The home secretary, Sajid Javid, has made an astonishing proposal among his raft of strategies to be unveiled today. It is that personal information possessed by MI5 on some 20,000 British “suspected” citizens be declassified and shared with local authorities, police “and others”. This is in order to “counter terrorism”. There is no way such material can possibly sta...

How not to revive a northern British city: relocate Channel 4 there | Simon Jenkins

This is a fairy godmother approach to narrowing the north-south divide. In fact it’s universities that hold the magic wand

There is nothing more gauche than Whitehall “being nice” to the provinces. Its attempt to force Channel 4 to move north from London has felt akin to the Victorian church sending missionaries overseas to civilise the heathen. As austerity descends over museums and theatres across the land, the culture department wants to dispatch a few television executives to live amo...

Skyscrapers wreck cities – yet still Britain builds them | Simon Jenkins

Around 500 towers are proposed for London. They’re not just ugly: they symbolise Britain’s greedy pandering to developers

I love towers and hate towers. I love those of Siena and San Gimignano and the skyscraper clusters of Manhattan and Dubai. I admire the design of London’s Canary Wharf, and of the Shard, if only it had not been dumped on Bermondsey. I do not love the ugliness now being scattered at random along the banks of the Thames or the squalor of London’s skyline. As art historia...

As a feminist, why should Meghan settle for being a dutiful royal wife? | Simon Jenkins

The Duchess of Sussex has been described as a ‘political animal’. Could we see her in the White House one day?

So much for chapter one, a glorious display of British romantic ceremonial at its best. Now for chapter two. I predict that this will not be about the obvious “mixed marriage”, but about a different one. This is between a Briton and an American, and between two people with starkly different career trajectories.

Related: Michael Curry’s royal wedding sermon will go down in history | Di...

I’m a libertarian, but still I say betting curbs are long overdue | Simon Jenkins

Fixed-odds betting terminals are gambling’s answer to crack cocaine. But online betting is even worse

• Maximum stake for fixed-odds betting terminals cut to £2

The most cynical sign I know hangs in my local betting shop. It reads, “When the fun stops, stop.” The sign is sponsored by a consortium of William Hill, Ladbrokes Coral and Paddy Power, and is meant to imply their “awareness” of gambling addiction. What it really means is: when the fun stops, profit starts. It reminds me of the d...

David Miliband is back – and mapping the only sane path towards Brexit | Simon Jenkins

Theresa May must show some guts – and join the former Labour MP in calling for membership of the European Economic Area

When David Miliband fled to New York to run the International Rescue Committee, he cannot have imagined his old country would be most in need of his services. Britain now needs all the help it can get, even from superannuated expatriate politicians. By the autumn the government will have had to choose between the devil of a messy but feasible hotchpotch of soft Brexit and the...

The couple who teach us to talk across the political divide | Simon Jenkins

They are from opposite ends of the political spectrum, but they are happily married because they obey the oldest rule of politics – courtesy

Caroline Sommerfeld is very right wing. Helmut Lethen is very left wing. Both are German academic writers. She regards him as fixated on hating Nazis. He regards her as a racist bigot. They are in the news because they love one another and are happily married.

Related: Fining universities for no-platforming denies the idea of academic freedom | Simon Jenk...