Isabel Hardman on the Nightmare Awaiting the New Prime Minister
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How the West sees Muhammad Tom Holland The glory of garden centres Susan Hill 8 june 2019 ❘ £4.75 www.spectator.co.uk ❘ est. 1828 Taking over Isabel Hardman on the nightmare awaiting the new prime minister BAHRAIN BD3.20. CANADA C$7.50. EURO ZONE €6.95. UAE AED34.00. SOUTH AFRICA ZAR84.90. USA US$7.20. FRONT COVER 08.06_08 June 2019_The Spectator 1 05/06/2019 13:16 T:420 mm S:400 mm Big thinkers don’t work on small canvases. At BHP, it’s our job to supply the iron ore big thinkers need to make bridges stand, buildings rise and planes fly. It’s a job that never ends. So we’re always S:250 mm T:276 mm discovering more sustainable ways to extract this precious resource. And you can’t do that by thinking small. For details, visit bhp.com/BigThinkers. ADVET - BHP_06-Jun-2019_The Spectator 2 04/06/2019 11:28 F:210 mm F:210 mm 1 07536_BHP_420x276mm_m1a.indd Saved at 4-16-2019 4:32 PM from MS-208-Moj-Tim by Timothy.Cozzi / Timothy.Cozzi Printed At None Job info Approvals Fonts & Images Job 07536 Art Director CW Fonts Client BHP Copywriter DB Graphik (Medium, Regular) Media Type Color Magazine Account Mgr CK Live 400 mm x 250 mm Studio Artist TMC Images Trim 420 mm x 276 mm Proofreader LS BHP_GGbird_4c133ls_v2.tif (CMYK; 298 ppi; 100.57%), bhp_orn_4cp_c_pos.eps (37.69%) Bleed 426 mm x 282 mm Pubs The Spectator Notes Inks Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black, BHP ORANGE 1 (166C) 7 UK T:420 mm S:400 mm Big thinkers don’t work on small canvases. At BHP, it’s our job to supply the iron ore big thinkers need to make bridges stand, buildings rise and planes fly. It’s a job that never ends. So we’re always S:250 mm T:276 mm discovering more sustainable ways to extract this precious resource. And you can’t do that by thinking small. For details, visit bhp.com/BigThinkers. ADVET - BHP_06-Jun-2019_The Spectator 3 04/06/2019 11:28 F:210 mm F:210 mm 1 07536_BHP_420x276mm_m1a.indd Saved at 4-16-2019 4:32 PM from MS-208-Moj-Tim by Timothy.Cozzi / Timothy.Cozzi Printed At None Job info Approvals Fonts & Images Job 07536 Art Director CW Fonts Client BHP Copywriter DB Graphik (Medium, Regular) Media Type Color Magazine Account Mgr CK Live 400 mm x 250 mm Studio Artist TMC Images Trim 420 mm x 276 mm Proofreader LS BHP_GGbird_4c133ls_v2.tif (CMYK; 298 ppi; 100.57%), bhp_orn_4cp_c_pos.eps (37.69%) Bleed 426 mm x 282 mm Pubs The Spectator Notes Inks Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black, BHP ORANGE 1 (166C) 7 UK ADVERT - Smart Energy_06-Jun-2019_The Spectator 4 04/06/2019 11:32 established 1828 Playing chicken hy is it that free trade, which of any trade deal, Gove said that they could mer employee Simon Stevens is now chief almost everyone agrees is good ‘kiss goodbye’ to a trade deal with Britain. executive of the NHS. Kaiser Permanente, Wwhen conducted with other Euro- No trade negotiation is going to result in a not-for- profit healthcare group based in pean countries, suddenly becomes some- the NHS being dismantled. Trump was try- California, has for years been held up by thing to be feared when it is proposed with ing to be friendly: when questioned about reform-minded doctors as a model for the the United States? What is it about Amer- whether the NHS would be on the table, NHS. But the Tories are too nervous of criti- ican chicken which means that Britons he thought the implication was that Brits cism to explore the possibilities. who eat it happily enough when they are wanted it to be there so he said yes. As so As for chlorinated chicken, the supposed on holiday are supposed to fear it when it often, he was not quite sure what he was health risks have long since been exposed is imported? And if Americans can offer as a scare story. UK consumers ingest far world-class, well-priced medical services to UK consumers ingest more chlorine more chlorine drinking water than they ever Britain through the National Health Ser- drinking water than they ever would would by eating American chicken: indeed, vice, how is that a threat to our social fabric? by eating American chicken UK salads are routinely chlorine-washed, On his state visit to Britain this week, yet we do not hear Gove talking about President Donald Trump reiterated his desire saying. Theresa May had to explain to him them. In fact, once we are out of the EU, to do a ‘comprehensive’ trade deal with Brit- what NHS stood for, and once he realised lifting the ban on chlorine-washed chicken ain. Given that we are leaving the EU in the sensitivity he said that America did not is something we should consider doing even order to make our own way in the world, seek to pull apart any British public service. without a trade deal with the US. On this this is a prospect that ought to be welcomed. But NHS care is not provided by the issue, and many others, it will soon be time When Trump was asked about the NHS, he state alone. Today, one in every 14 NHS to think for ourselves again. said simply that ‘everything will be on the treatments is carried out by private-sector Conservative ministers have been far too table’ — to cries of horror from a lot of Tory hospitals and clinics. Sceptics might point quick to appease protectionists whose agen- ministers (and leadership candidates) who to the exorbitant price of medicine in the da is to keep US competition out of their should know better. It seems to have sent US, but nobody is suggesting we import the cosy European markets. With that attitude, ‘global Britain’ Tories into a protectionist whole flawed American healthcare system. we are not going to get very far towards a spasm. Jeremy Hunt, Matt Hancock and On top of the direct treatments carried trade deal with the US — or with any other Sam Gyimah were furiously declaring that out in the private sector, the NHS spends country, for that matter. Trade negotiations under no circumstances would our health £15 billion a year buying drugs, and billions require concessions. This depends on the service be opened up to US firms. more buying other equipment and services. government being prepared to look at the When Tony Blair was prime minister, he It rents clinics and surgeries from the private bigger picture and accept that, overall, free spent a good deal of time thinking of ways sector. Some of that money is spent with US trade is a benefit. The protectionist finds it to lure US health giants to come to Britain firms. There is nothing sinister about the easy to forget that free trade is an exchange, and open treatment centres to help the NHS US healthcare sector — parts of which are a form of mutual co-operation that can only clear its waiting lists for knee operations world-beating and more innovative than the take place when each side profits. and hip replacements. Under a supposedly NHS — wanting to access these markets on In a few weeks’ time, Britain will have a Tory government, these same companies the same footing as European companies. It new prime minister, charged with deliver- are treated not as welcome investors but is the very principle of free trade. ing the benefits that come from decoupling as a threat. This fits a trend. Two years ago, For years, US companies have been our economy from the EU. It’s often said Michael Gove shot down the possibility of helping to strengthen the NHS. United- that it would be bad for the Tories to fail to allowing chicken that has been washed in Health Group, one of the biggest compa- deliver Brexit. It would be worse for them to chlorine (a common practice in the US poul- nies in America, offers services such as achieve Brexit only to discover that, due to a try industry) on to the UK market. Were US medication management and the negotiat- lack of imagination and courage, they do not officials to try to make chicken a condition ing of contracts to the NHS. United’s for- know what to do with it. the spectator | 8 june 2019 | www.spectator.co.uk 5 Leader_08 June 2019_The Spectator 5 05/06/2019 13:28 Puerile protests, p16 Don’t you love them, p11 A pug called Trump, p34 THE WEEK BOOKS & ARTS 5 Leading article 14 The in-tray of horrors BOOKS Theresa May’s successor will inherit 32 8 Portrait of the Week Tom Holland a hideous pile of unfinished business Faces of Muhammad, by John Tolan 11 Diary The glory of garden centres Isabel Hardman Susan Hill 34 Wynn Wheldon 15 Could a recession be next? The Animal’s Companion, 12 Politics A crowded contest There are troubling economic signs by Jacky Colliss Harvey James Forsyth Ross Clark Clinton Heylin 13 The Spectator’s Notes 16 Children of the revolution This Searing Light, the Sun and In memory of my father Political protests are so infantile Everything Else, by Jon Savage Charles Moore Tanya Gold 35 Tom Smalley 19 How to save the Tories Rod Liddle 20 ‘People underestimate me’ Surrender, by Joanna Pocock 21 Seduction Will Jeremy Hunt be the next PM? Ancient and modern 36 Mark Bostridge and the Boris bus Katy Balls Passionate Spirit, by Cate Haste 23 The trouble with 21 Lionel Shriver John Greening 37 John Burnside ramping up rhetoric ‘After the Interval’: a poem This Storm, by James Ellroy 24 Juncker’s perks, 22 Barometer Hands free 38 Andrew Taylor atheist beliefs, football vs cricket A new kind of abstinence movement Shadowplay, by Joseph O’Connor 26 How I was Cosmo Landesman Matthew Parris 39 Katrina Gulliver very nearly scammed 24 Protons and cons Wild Sea, by Joy McCann The jury’s still out on proton therapy 28 Letters Vote Gove, get Corbyn Cassandra Coburn 40 Carolyne Larrington 29 Any other business Network Rail Epic Continent, by Nicholas Jubber and the case against nationalisation 41 Amanda Craig Martin Vander Weyer Mother Ship, by Francesca Segal Diana Hendry Lux, by Elizabeth Cook Cover by Morten Morland.