Debates

Debates

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Debates
  • Tony Blair on Trial, with Tom Bower and David Aaronovitch

    When Tony Blair became prime minister in May 1997, he had a landslide majority, an approval rating of 93 per cent, and he went on to become Labour’s longest-serving premier. At his last PMQs he got a standing ovation in the chamber of the House of Commons. How things have changed. Nowadays all we...

  • Debate Is The West Fundamentally Racist With Kehinde Andrews and Jeremy Black

    On March 29 2021, Kehinde Andrews, academic and self-described Black radical, and Jeremy Black, eminent historian, came to Intelligence Squared to debate the question 'Is the West fundamentally racist?'

    The West, Andrews will contend, prides itself on being founded on the three great revolutions...

  • Debate: Let Them Come - We Have Nothing to Fear From High Levels of Immigration

    When the EU's transitional immigration rules expire on 1st January 2014, numerous Bulgarians and Romanians will be heading for Britain. And we should put out the welcome mat. Yes, it's true that there has been a huge fuss about this in the press, but then xenophobia sells newspapers. The truth is...

  • Debate: The West Should Pay Reparations for Slavery

    They are the crimes for which no one has ever made amends. The transatlantic slave trade enslaved between 10 and 12 million Africans. Historians estimate that 15 to 25% of the men and women packed into the slave ships died before they reached the Americas. The only people ever to be compensated? ...

  • Debate: There is Nothing Wrong With Rearing and Killing Animals for Consumption

    Fancy a nice juicy steak? Most of us do from time to time, and we don’t trouble our consciences too much with the rights and wrongs of eating meat. Others, while vaguely aware that we ought to go vegan, just can’t face the rest of our lives denying ourselves bacon, beef, butter etc. But once we s...

  • Too Many People go to University

    Filmed at the Royal Geographical Society on 30th January 2007.

    Speakers for the motion: Claire Fox, Anatole Kaletsky, Jenna Nicholas
    Speakers against the motion: Baroness Onora O'Neill, Mary Ann Sieghart
    Chair: Sir Clement Freud

  • Ian Fleming vs John le Carré

    They are the titans of the spy novel, who have elevated thrillers to the level of literary fiction. Much imitated, much adapted by the big and small screens, Ian Fleming and John Le Carré have painted our picture of post-war espionage: Fleming through the dashing figure of James Bond, with his lu...

  • Jeremy Corbyn Is Unfit To Be Prime Minister

    When Jeremy Corbyn won the Labour leadership he was shrugged off as an unelectable oddball in a scruffy suit who would doom Labour to certain defeat. But last year’s shock election result forces us all to consider the real possibility of a Corbyn-led government – a prospect which has some jumping...

  • Crypto vs The Environment, with Lyn Alden and Alex De Vries

    The global bitcoin network currently consumes about 110 terawatt-hours of electricity annually through mining, roughly equal to what is consumed by the nation of Argentina. That statistic sounds frightening but is it? A historical study from Our World in Data found that of the greatest contributi...

  • The robots are coming and they will destroy our livelihoods

    They are coming to an office near you: job-gobbling robots that can do your work better and more cheaply than you can. One in three jobs could be taken over by a computer or a robot in the next 20 years. Most at risk are less skilled workers such as machine operators, postmen, care workers and pr...

  • Debate: Sanctions Against Russia Won’t Work

    Since Russia invaded Ukraine last February the West has ramped up sanctions against Russia to an unprecedented level. Both Russia and the West are feeling the pain, but are the measures having the desired effect?

    Unquestionably, say sanctions supporters. A report by Yale University shows that t...

  • Don't give them what they want: Terrorists should be starved of publicity

    Why do they do it? Again and again, after every attack, our media react by giving the terrorists exactly what they want – maximum publicity. Of course, the public should be told that an atrocity has taken place. But each attack dominates the news for days at a stretch. The TV networks go into ove...

  • Modern Architecture is Still All Glass Stumps and Carbuncles

    Filmed at the Royal Geographical Society on 30th June 2008.

  • Debate: We Should All Go Vegan

    From the McDonald’s McPlant made with a Beyond Meat® patty to Sheese Dairy-Free Cheddar Style, there is a plant-based alternative for almost every food you can think of, making it easier than ever before to go vegan. No wonder the number of people in the UK following a plant-based diet has risen ...

  • Return or Retain? The Parthenon Marbles Debate, with Noel Malcolm and Ed Vaizey

    For almost 40 years, the Parthenon Marbles, or Elgin Marbles as they are also known, have been at the centre of the great restitution debate. Taken from Greece in contested circumstances by Lord Elgin in the 19th century, the marble sculptures that were part of the Parthenon and other structures ...

  • Debate: Save Our Private Schools!