Open Europe, the independent think tank backed by some of the UK’s leading business people, has produced the first independent report estimating of the cost and wider effects of the EU’s new package of climate change measures, currently still under negotiation.
Many conservative leaders are in a quandary about the financial crisis. They approve of de-regulated markets but these selfsame institutions seem to be in need of regulation. Many people in the financial services industry have behaved without regard to the good of others and even without reference to the interests of their own companies. Their… [Read More]
The Conservatives’ plan to encourage social entrepreneurs, charities and parents’ co-operatives to establish new schools in our poorer areas is a promising idea that deserves the praise it has been getting. But it has a potentially fatal flaw that could undermine any advantages it might bring. Above all, the new Tory academies lack the independence… [Read More]
At last week’s Tory party conference, shadow education secretary Michael Gove committed his party upon their return to power to restoring the teaching of narrative British history in schools. He reportedly said: ‘Instead of being taught about the Magna Carta the Glorious Revolution and the heroic role of the Royal navy in putting down slavery,… [Read More]
Last Friday, Gordon Brown’s latest attempt to appear at “getting on with the job of running the country” saw him reshuffle EU Trade Commissioner, Peter Mandelson, back into the UK cabinet.
This blog last Thursday wrote about whether or not the government was pushing the public health agenda too far without proper debate on the implications for civil liberty. Apparently, this doesn’t seem to matter a jot to the Department of Health.
One minute America’s seemingly riding the crest of an economic boom we are told will never end. The next moment it’s 1929 all over again. What’s going on and who has brought us to this current sticky pass? Those in search of an explanation of the economic turmoil will find little help from Britain’s mainstream… [Read More]
In an interview held with the The Sunday Times yesterday, former Tory leader William Hague emphasized that, should the Tories win power in 2009 or 2010, a ‘Conservative government could still hold a referendum on Europe, even if the Lisbon Treaty had already been ratified.’ Considering a national ballot on Britain’s EU membership may seem… [Read More]
While New Labour’s aim in education has been to generate greater equality, a damning report from the OECD written up in this week’s Times Education Supplement, states that the UK education system ‘still seems to perpetuate rather than break the cycle of inequality’.
Ealing PCT’s new campaign to ‘help’ smokers quit goes to the heart of a debate too-often ignored: the proper limits of state intervention in the name of public health.