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]
Though the Department of Health budget was nominally ‘ring-fenced’, the NHS currently faces perhaps the biggest funding challenge in its history, as the service tightens its belt and the cost of the current reorganisation and long-term cost pressures (ageing, obesity, drugs & technology) bite. It is against this backdrop that The King’s Fund and IPSOS-MORI… [Read More]
A new Civitas publication highlights the contradictions in David Cameron’s Bloomberg Speech. All but hardened Eurosceptics tend to feel that whatever the EU’s problems, the single market is an international boon. This may not be the case.
The death of Margaret Thatcher this week has brought on a plethora of tributes and articles about how her staunch policies drastically changed the landscape of British politics. Her premiership, from 1979-1990, saw vast changes in Britain’s economic policy, the curtailing of trade union power and the reduction of state intervention in the lives of… [Read More]
Some forms of anti-social behaviour appear to be decreasing, but drunken rowdiness is still a concern. How much it troubles you depends in part on which newspaper you read.
In all the discussion of Margaret Thatcher’s legacy since her passing, few have commented on the discrepancy between rhetoric and action during her time in government. Whether it is viewed with whole hearted approval or utter disdain, it is commonly assumed that Thatcher’s economic policy involved nothing but rapid privatisation, deregulation, tax-cutting and a stoically… [Read More]
An interesting piece in the GP magazine Pulse today, written by former GP and integrated health expert Jonathan Shapiro, argues the case for better integration between acute and community care in the NHS – “as long as the funding streams of hospital and community care are handled separately, and the incentives for the preferred outcomes… [Read More]
In the EU’s Council of Ministers there has been a longstanding “gentlemen’s agreement” between Britain, France and Germany that the majority would not collude to force through regulations which are clearly against the minority’s key interests. Germany and Britain let France lead on the Common Agricultural Policy. Britain and France follow the Germans when it… [Read More]