The weeks that followed the Conservative party’s election victory have been filled with comment and input on the question of renegotiating Britain’s EU membership. Most of these interventions have been from business lobby groups or individual company leaders. We have heard from JCB, Dyson, Airbus, the Confederation of British Industry and Deutsche Bank. In addition,… [Read More]
David Cameron arrived in Riga, Latvia this morning for his first EU summit since his re-election. Although ongoing tensions in Ukraine will be high on the agenda, many will be expecting him to start making his case for reforming the EU, before the British public vote in a referendum. Among the demands at the top… [Read More]
As ministers mull over where they are going to find another £12 billion of welfare cuts, they could do worse than have a read of a new report by Citizens Advice and the New Policy Institute on the state of the private rented sector. Above and beyond the usual horror show of high rents, poor… [Read More]
In Leo Tolstoy’s short story, The Death of Ivan Ilyich, we meet a man who is suddenly confronted with his own impending death, at a time well before he would have anticipated…the consequence of an injury sustained, of all things, while hanging curtains. Because Ivan had never expected his death he was completely unprepared for… [Read More]
The Northern Powerhouse strategy could be a very positive legacy of this Conservative government, particularly for the Chancellor – if they can get it right. At its core is devolution of powers to northern cities and connecting them up to create a power which can compete internationally. The first part rights a thirty year wrong. Centralisation began… [Read More]
As we begin to consider the EU referendum in earnest, the international context of trade and sovereignty must not be forgotten. This has been highlighted in US media by President Barack Obama’s battle to get ‘fast track’ powers from Congress. The deal he wants to rush through is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The TPP is… [Read More]
It is the morning of the General Election and in Tottenham, a classroom of pupils not yet old enough to vote are taking the political future of this country seriously. Their teacher, seizing the opportunity to give her Citizenship class a sense of urgency, has turned the classroom into a polling station. There is a… [Read More]
After riding high on an unexpected majority victory in the general election last week, Prime Minister David Cameron must now deal effectively with the uncertainty that looms over the UK’s relationship with the EU. Political uncertainty is bad for business, and Bank of England Governor Mark Carney warned this week that it would be better for… [Read More]
In the debate about private rents and whether we should re-introduce some form of regulation there is a great deal of anxiety about the impact that such a regime would have on landlords. The starting point tends to be: we wouldn’t want to scare off all the people who are making large and much-needed investments in… [Read More]
The European Commission yesterday published its plan to address the complex issues of asylum seekers dying while attempting to cross the Mediterranean and the distribution of migrants across European countries. In correspondence with tackling this humanitarian crisis, the Agenda on Migration aims to address both the long-term root causes of the migration crisis and to… [Read More]