Budget blunders come back to haunt chancellor George Osborne October 22, 2015 On 25 November, chancellor George Osborne will stand up in the Commons and deliver what is, in effect, his fourth budget of the past 12 months. In under a year, the Treasury will have published an Autumn Statement (December 2014), a Budget (March 2015), another Budget (July 2015), and now a bumper combination of a [...]
EU referendum: The City’s voice must be heard on Europe October 20, 2015 Mark Carney’s intervention in the Brexit debate today will have nothing like the impact his remarks before the Scottish referendum had last year. Arguing that the SNP’s plan to keep sterling would require “some ceding of national sovereignty”, while pointing to chaos in the Eurozone, he swept aside the misplaced belief that independence could be [...]
London property prices: Business bears the cost of the government’s housing failures October 20, 2015 London's housing crisis is a human tragedy. The London Poverty Profile, released today, shows that housing costs are the major driver of a big increase in the number of Londoners who are in work but still living in poverty. But the housing crisis is also an economic tragedy. It is damaging the competitiveness of businesses, [...]
Technological breakthroughs will make fossil fuels unburnable – not bureaucrats October 20, 2015 The governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney courted the wrath of the fossil fuel industry in a speech at the end of last month. He argued that investors in the sector face “potentially huge” losses. Actions by governments to try to head off climate change could make most reserves of coal, oil and [...]
Super-SMEs created three times more jobs than the FTSE 100 last year – but they can do better still October 20, 2015 Not all businesses in the UK provide the same bang for their buck, and one group in particular punches well above its weight. We call them high-growth small businesses (HGSBs). According to the latest Octopus High Growth Small Business Report, released last night, there are only 22,470 of them across the country – with 6,500 [...]
With Canada’s new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pledging to run a deficit, are Anglosphere countries drifting apart? October 20, 2015 Michael Martins is an economic analyst at the Institute of Directors, says Yes National economic policies respond to global economic forces. But they are shaped by domestic political ones. In the downturn, budget deficits were needed to keep economies ticking over. But global debate about the merits of government borrowing has diverged sharply. To the [...]
As David Cameron vows to raise issue of Chinese steel with Xi Jinping, what are his options? October 19, 2015 Britain’s industrial towns are facing an uncertain future as job losses in the steel industry continue to mount. Calls from those affected to “do something” are understandable. But the truth is that, under current government policies, this once iconic industry (like coal before it) is becoming increasingly unviable. So in the case of SSI, whose [...]
President Xi Jinping’s UK visit: How Britain can truly become China’s best partner in the West October 19, 2015 As the Queen welcomes the President of China to Buckingham Palace today for a state visit, both leaders can reflect on the significant progress made in UK-China relations. Indeed, much has changed. The Chinese economy, despite its slowdown, has grown massively in recent decades; it is eight times larger today than in 1999, when the [...]
Brexit debate: As cabinet ministers demand to campaign for No, will Cameron’s authority collapse because of EU referendum? October 19, 2015 Chris Rumfitt, founder and chief executive of Corporate Reputation Consulting, says Yes Since John Major lashed out at his own cabinet back in 1993, Europe has divided the Conservatives like no other issue. From being a minority pursuit back then, hardline euroscepticism is now the mainstream position within the party. But some cabinet ministers want [...]
Ofsted chief Sir Michael Wilshaw reminds government that apprenticeships need to be worth the effort October 19, 2015 Politicians love apprenticeships. The current government is committed to delivering three million of them in the next five years and ministers’ speeches on the topic tend to have a ring of Stalin’s tractor production statistics. It’s easy to see why politicians are attracted to the lever marked ‘apprenticeships’. With hundreds of thousands of school leavers [...]