Melanie McDonagh

Query: which of the uncle-nephew pair that is Prince Andrew and Prince Harry makes the heart sink faster and sooner? The very words “close confidant of the Duke of York” on the news this morning made a nation think, “uh-oh” before we even learned that the confidant in question was a) one of Andy’s inner circle and b) associated with the Chinese Communist party and c) is now excluded from the UK (having lost his appeal in court against that judgment) as a risk to national security. Another of the Duke’s little lapses of judgment, one of a series that began, I would say, with his marriage to Sarah Ferguson in 1986.

There’s still time to escape to the Eternal City for a classy Christmassy weekend. Melanie McDonagh on where to stay and what to see

You see it every day: cyclists ignoring red lights and pedestrian crossings and pedalling furiously on their way as if the lights don’t apply to them. A cycling colleague yesterday witnessed two cyclists colliding at right angles, having run the lights from separate directions. He observed with some gratification that they were both taken to task by an infuriated pedestrian.

by Melanie McDonagh Dec 16, 2024 4 minutes Save for Later Save OPINION - Why Is London Suddenly Full Of Homicidal Cyclists? For Later

It would be cheek and impudence on my part to instruct the head of the Church of England about the True Meaning of Christmas but when has that ever stopped a journalist? I have in mind the news all over the papers that the Duke of York is being “urged to stay out of sight for Christmas”. That is, the carefully planted stories are saying, he should do the decent thing and miss the Buckingham Palace Christmas lunch for 50 on Thursday and stay away from the Sandringham Church Christmas Day service. Poor Prince Andrew; demoted to, as The Sun puts it, “The Banned Old Duke of York”.

It would be cheek and impudence on my part to instruct the head of the Church of England about the True Meaning of Christmas but when has that ever stopped a journalist?

by Melanie McDonagh Dec 16, 2024 3 minutes Save for Later Save OPINION - Which Of Prince Harry And Prince Andrew Is Worse?

Query: which of the uncle-nephew pair that is Prince Andrew and Prince Harry makes the heart sink faster and sooner? The very words “close confidant of the Duke of York” on the news this morning made a nation think, “uh-oh” before we even learned that the confidant in question was a) one of Andy’s inner circle and b) associated with the Chinese Communist party and c) is now excluded from the UK (having lost his appeal in court against that judgment) as a risk to national security. Another of the Duke’s little lapses of judgment, one of a series that began, I would say, with his marriage to Sarah Ferguson in 1986.

It did not, I have to say, take long for my sympathy for the woman who had her designer handbag stolen from a changing room in Oxford Street to

It did not, I have to say, take long for my sympathy for the woman who had her designer handbag stolen from a changing room in Oxford Street to evaporate into thin air. And that was when I read the headline to the story: “The moment an influencer had her £10,000 handbag stolen while shopping for designer clothes”.