By David Green, director of Civitas Today we have published An Exchange Rate Target: Why we need one, by John Mills. It argues that the value of the pound should fall. Demand for the pound has been kept artificially high because we have been selling off our businesses and high-end residential properties to overseas owners… [Read More]
The government must decide by May 2014 whether to ‘opt in’ to all 130 EU police and criminal justice measures. The Home Secretary intends to opt out – which legally must be done en masse – before negotiating re-entry to specific measures which fit Britain’s needs. This re-entry right is enshrined in Lisbon. The measures… [Read More]
After two months of being suspended in a political no man’s land, Italy is finally forming a government. This week the re-elected President Giorgio Napolitiano, chose Enrico Letta, of the centre-left Democratic Party, to be Italy’s Prime Minister. It has not been a straightforward process; elections in February were inconclusive, with the centre-left coalition led… [Read More]
If teachers really are excluding covertly, maybe they need some better, legal options. They may already be making up for parents’ shortcomings.
Hopes for greater competition and pluralism in the banking sector were dashed today as The Co-operative Group pulled out of a deal to buy 632 bank branches from Lloyds Banking Group, citing the worsening economic outlook and also regulatory requirements in the banking sector as reasons. The Guardian reports that the deal will be a… [Read More]
Recently, NHS England board chair Malcolm Grant made some comments in the Financial Times that Guardian journalist and King’s Fund fellow Nicholas Timmins described as a “mini-bombshell”: “It’s not my responsibility to introduce new charging systems but it’s something which a future government will wish to reflect [on], unless the economy has picked up sufficiently,… [Read More]
Catherine Ashton, who has never been elected to any post other than Treasurer of the CND, is one of the most powerful women in Brussels. Except, of course, in her role as High Representative for the EU the good Baroness is seldom in Brussels. Instead she acts as a kind of ambassador-without-portfolio for the entire… [Read More]
Last week Croatia held its first ever European elections, with the main opposition party, the centre-right Croatian Democratic Union, winning six of the 12 available seats. Croatia will officially join the EU on 1st July 2013, 40 years after the first ever EU enlargement, which welcomed Britain, Ireland and Denmark into the supranational body. Croatian… [Read More]
A poll conducted by ICM for the National Apprenticeship Service delivered the headline result that former Higher apprentices (with a degree-level qualification and relevant work experience) are the most employable at 7.98 on a ten point scale, followed by university graduates at 7.58. This looks encouraging. The economic and social value of acquiring a skill… [Read More]
Today, while the country’s attention was elsewhere, saw the release of the latest ONS employment figures. The figures are less than inspiring. Compared with last month’s figures, the employment rate has stayed the same at 71.4%, the unemployment rate has increased by 70,000 or 0.2% to 7.9% of the economically active population, and the inactivity… [Read More]