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Peter Hitchens (born 28 October 1951 in Sliema, Malta GC) is a British journalist, author and broadcaster. He was a reporter on the Daily Express, where he was Moscow and then Washington correspondent, leaving to join the Mail on Sunday in 2001 shortly after the Express was bought by the pornographer Richard Desmond.
A former Trotskyist, Hitchens now espouses conservative values. He advocates the restoration of capital punishment and staunchly opposes United Kingdom membership of the European Union, Prime Minister Tony Blair's constitutional reforms, and the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which he regards as a 'sell-out' to the Provisional IRA. He has denounced the decline of religious faith and family life, progressive teaching methods, the influence of television on children, the 'permissive society', multiculturalism and the metrication of Britain's weights and measures. However, he has often been at odds with fellow conservatives, opposing the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and the privatisation of Britain's railways. He is frequently dismissive of the modern British Conservative Party and has spoken of his desire for a new conservative movement to take its place.
Hitchens is the author of The Abolition of Britain (1999) and A Brief History of Crime (2003), both critical of changes in British society since the 1960s. A compendium of his Daily Express columns was published under the title Monday Morning Blues in 2000. An updated edition of A Brief History of Crime, re-titled The Abolition of Liberty and featuring a new chapter on identity cards, was published in April 2004.
Christopher Hitchens, also a journalist, author and critic, is his older brother. Christopher's views on most issues are to the left of those of his brother.
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