The Critic Show

In this episode of The Critic Show, Tom Jones and Henry Hill are joined by The Critic’s editor, Graham Stewart, to explore the magazine’s bumper Summer Double Issue.

Graham takes us through the issue’s highlights, including a major summer books bonanza, meanwhile over in the sport section, Boris Starling’s looks at what happened to England’s 1966 World Cup heroes.

The issue also features some importa...

This week on The Critic Show, Tom is joined by our online editor, Ben Sixsmith and classics scholar and Antigone editor, David Butterfield, to discuss why ancient Greece and Rome are enjoying a remarkable revival. They examine how classical education became wrongly associated with elitism, and why classical literature is having a renaissance within a culture which is, seemingly, addicted to phones.

The conversation explores the mode...

This week on The Critic Show, Henry and Tom are joined by Seb Milbank to discuss the Home Office’s Research, Information and Communications Unit, otherwise known as RICU, and the growing suspicion that the British state has tried to shape public narratives after acts of violence involving immigrant communities.

Seb gives listeners an insider explanation on explains how the unit operates, and the intricacies of the counter-terr...

This week on The Critic Show, Chris Bayliss and Henry Hill are joined by Emma Schubert of the Henry Jackson Society to ask whether Britain is becoming a sectarian country. Emma discusses her research into the rise of Muslim sectarian politics in English local elections, explaining how she has created a model to help identify some of the predictors of sectarian candidates’ success.

The panel explores Labour’s long mis...

This month Critic wine columnist Henry Jeffreys talks to Daniel Grigg from Museum Wines in Salisbury about The Critic Wine Club’s latest South African selection.

Henry and Daniel discuss why South African wine has changed so dramatically in recent years, from the dull pub reds and insipid whites of old to some of the most exciting bottles now being made anywhere in the world. They explore the country’s new generation of ...

In the first episode of Starling on Sport, Boris is joined by Jack Davey to look ahead to this year’s Tour de France and ask whether anyone can realistically stop Tadej Pogačar. They discuss Pogačar’s astonishing season, and the threat posed by Jonas Vingegaard, as well as turning an eye onto the emergence of French prodigy Paul Seixas.

Boris and Jack also explore the tactics, team dynamics and brutal mountain stages tha...

This week on The Critic Show, Lord David Frost joins Tom and Graham Stewart to mark ten years since Brexit and ask what really went wrong, and ask what might be on the cards next.

Frost challenges the familiar claim that voters were misled in 2016, arguing instead that Brexit was always about Britain’s right to govern itself from Westminster rather than Brussels.

Frost warns that unless the Right makes the case for national ind...

This week on The Critic Show, Henry and Chris are joined by James Crouch, Head of Public Affairs at Opinium, to discuss Britain’s strange new economic settlement: not quite capitalism, not quite socialism, but a system increasingly built around caps, freezes and government guarantees. Drawing on Opinium’s research into public attitudes, they explore why voters now instinctively reach for price controls on energy, counci...

This week, Critic wine writer Henry Jeffreys talks to Olivia Manet from Corney & Barrow about the latest Critic Wine Club selection: three summer wines chosen for freshness, value and drinkability. Olivia explains how she got into the wine trade, Corney & Barrow’s long history, and why great wine does not always have to mean grand cru prices.

Henry and Olivia taste a mountain-fresh Pinot Grigio from Friuli, a pale ...

In this episode of The Critic Show, Tom Jones is joined by Sam Butler, vice chairman of the Future of Hunting campaign, to discuss Labour’s proposed ban on trail hunting and what Butler sees as a wider assault on the countryside. They look back at the 2004 Hunting Act, the creation of trail hunting, and the argument that a new ban would do little for animal welfare while threatening thousands of hounds, rural jobs and the soc...

This week on The Critic Show, Tom Jones and Chris Bayliss are joined by Charles Cornish-Dale to discuss modern masculinity, the rise of the “alpha male”, and the cultural influence of Andrew Tate. Are declining testosterone levels something to be concerned about? What does this mean for our politics?

In our medicated society, the contraceptive pill and SSRIs are ever more common — but what are their effects on ...

This week on The Critic Show, Chris Bayliss and Tom Jones are joined by William Clouston, leader of the SDP, to discuss his paper From an Entitlement State to an Investment State.

Britain has moved from a state that invests in its future to one increasingly dominated by pensions, welfare and benefits. Since the 1970s, public spending has shifted dramatically: investment in infrastructure has fallen, while entitlement spending ha...

This week on The Critic Show, Tom Jones and Chris Bayliss are joined by historian and columnist Dominic Green to discuss his latest piece for The Critic, exploring the conflict between empire and republic.

Dominic argues that it is better to see the United States not as a settled European-style nation state, but as a perpetually evolving republic whose moments of upheaval, from Andrew Jackson to Donald Trump, are a continuation ...

This week, Chris and Tom are joined by Dr Ioannes Chountis de Fabbri, the historian of political ideas, political conflict and the decline of the Royal Navy.

Comparing the Navy of decades past with the Navy we have today, one must ask: how did civil servants, bureaucrats and government bring about its decline? This inevitably leads to the question of the efficacy of the civil service, whether we have too many bureaucrats in the mode...

Tom and Henry are joined this week by pollster and strategist Scarlett Maguire, who explains the Wild West of British political polling.

Like the soothsayers of old, politicians use polling in all sorts of mysterious ways, making claims that may not always stack up with reality. This is how they can claim momentum even when their parties remain unpopular. In unrelated matters, they also discuss Kemi Badenoch and the wider challenges...

May marks the beginning of summer, and this month Tom, Henry and Graham are here to talk you through May’s edition of The Critic, leading with the question of whether Britain has any vision left.

After months of headlines and mistakes, it is hard to understand where the Government might go next, or what it actually wants. Does it want to rejoin the EU, or is this simply a visionless pitch from a Prime Minister who is running o...

This week on The Critic Show, Henry Hill and Chris Bayliss are joined by the Reverend Marcus Walker to discuss the erosion of intergenerational responsibility. From defence and infrastructure to fiscal policy, the Government just keeps getting it wrong, repeatedly prioritising electoral gain over the health and wealth of the country. The question is whether this trend is a recent development or a post-Cold War shift, and how politi...

This week on The Critic Show, Chris Bayliss and Henry Hill are joined by the Anglican priest, historian and ethicist Nigel Biggar.

They discuss the debate around the Church of England’s push towards reparations, and how initiatives like Project Spire and the historical link to Queen Anne’s Bounty have played a role in where we have ended up today.

Many of the assumptions behind reparations, such as Britain’s wealth ...