Best of the Spectator

Is the Online Safety Act protecting children – or threatening free speech? Michael Simmons hosts John Power, who writes the Spectator's cover piece this week on how the Act has inadvertently created …

Lionel Shriver on Trump’s vendetta, Mamdani’s ‘stupid’ ideas & sentimental immigration

Deputy US editor Kate Andrews is joined by author and Spectator columnist Lionel Shriver to assess Donald Trump’s…

First: the new era of censorship

A year ago, John Power notes, the UK was consumed by race riots precipitated by online rumours about the perpetrator of the Southport atrocity. This summer, there have…

Sam Leith is joined for this week's Book Club podcast by Gary Shteyngart — whose new novel Vera, or Faith is set in a near-future America whose politics seems to be less science-fictional by the day.…

Charlotte Ivers is the restaurant critic for the Sunday Times; most recently she reviewed Lupa, Fenix and Home SW15. Charlotte started her career as a media adviser in Theresa May’s Number 10, before…

Douglas Murray on conspiracy America, lawfare & the new age of suspicion

Donald Trump promised to release the Epstein files – so why hasn't he? Spectator columnist Douglas Murray joins Kate Andrews to…

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Ian Thomson on what the destruction of the Hotel Oloffson means for Haiti (00:54); Patrick Kidd analyses Donald Trump and the art of golf diplomacy (06:43); Mike Co…

Did Condé Nast shape the world? 

In this episode of Americano, Freddy Gray speaks with New York Times writer and debut author Michael Grynbaum about his new book Empire of the Elite, a sweeping histor…

The soul suckers of private equity, Douglas Murray on Epstein and MAGA & are literary sequels ‘lazy’?

First up: how private equity is ruining Britain

Gus Carter writes in the magazine this week about h…

My guest in this week's Book Club podcast is the biographer Frances Wilson, whose new book Electric Spark: The Enigma of Muriel Spark was recently lauded in these pages as "mesmerising" and "a revolu…

What's left of the Tories?

The Commons is closing down for the summer, but Kemi Badenoch has treated us to a shadow cabinet reshuffle. At the beginning of the year, Badenoch’s team were keen to stress…

Is Epstein the new Russiagate?

Freddy Gray is joined by Spectator writer Roger Kimball. They delve into the Epstein claims, the media's handling of the story, Trump’s economic agenda, and whether the …

Will AI have rights?

Freddy Gray speaks to Spectator writer Paul Wood about his piece this the latest edition of Spectator World on AI and whether it will soon have rights. This first came about when …

The strange death of Tory England has been predicted before. But never has the ‘natural party of government’ faced a greater challenge to survive. The Conservatives are facing attacks on all fronts f…

Trump has said he's "very, very unhappy" with Russia, and threatened severe tariffs against them if there's no deal on Ukraine within 50 days. He's also sending more weapons to Ukraine in coordinatio…

First up: how the Bank of England wrecked the economy

Britain’s economy is teetering on the brink of a deep fiscal hole, created by billions of pounds of unfunded spending – never-ending health promis…