The Madness of the Khan Review | Edward Kendall
A government-commissioned review, whose findings were published on 9 June, recommends that the legal age for buying tobacco products should rise up a year every year until no one can legally purchase them.
Are students getting an education worth their money which prepares them for the world? | Ojel L. Rodriguez Burgos
As a result, education increasingly offers a muddle of subjects which bare little relation to requirements of the modern economy and civil life. Hence, we have universities offering more and more places on overly niche courses such as the University of Kent offering a MA degree in Stand-up comedy, the University of Plymouth giving a course on Surf Science and Technology and London Met offering a module titled “Forgetting of Air”.
The Online Safety Bill — an analsis | Edward Kendall
This is all very well if the law protects freedom of speech, but gives little satisfaction to those who live in jurisdictions where free speech is not legally protected. This is really the crux of the matter and why the legal protection of free speech is so important. Furthermore, this is why it is so important to make sure that the Online Safety Bill is shelved or at the very least significantly changed, because freedom of speech online is seriously imperilled by this draft legislation.
Easter economics — inflation stagflation | Chris Davies
What goes up must come down apparently but not for a while at least in the case of inflation and it’s nasty cousin, stagflation. The latest economic metrics make for grim reading. Despite the slew of “good news” from the government last week, this week has been politically bruising.
The Great ‘British’ Reset | Chris Davies
I have spent some time of late contemplating the direction of travel of the United Kingdom in the run up to the forthcoming local elections, which will be a timely assessment of the government’s popularity, coming as they do broadly half way through a 5 year term.
I summarise below 6 key issues that I believe will affect voting intentions in the forthcoming local elections
Spring Statement 2022 — an economic analysis | Chris Davies
Along with his Instagram account and his wife’s £12M dividend from Infosys, who continue “business as usual” trading in their Moscow office, Sunak would do well to keep his head buried in the red ink of inflation, energy hikes and resulting falling living standards that are the perfect alchemy for electoral distress for the government at the local elections in May.
Now there’s more interest in economic data | Chris Davies
Whilst it would be churlish to ignore the impact of COVID-19 and it is only reasonable to acknowledge the effect of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it would also be foolish to pretend that the majority of the turbulence the UK economy is suffering and will endure in 2022 does not emanate from government “policy”.
The trouble with suppresing inflation — no energy or interest | Chris Davies
We are living in a period of macroeconomic instability, which combined with the highest level of geopolitical instability since 1945, could have a severe, negative impact on the lives of millions of British subjects.
The government needs to act decisively, ditch Net Zero dogma and restore control over interest rate policy to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whose possession it should never have left.
The canary in the coal mine: the energy crisis and Net Zero | Charlie Goulbourne
While Thatcher’s privatisation of our energy industry had facilitated efficient development of our gas-powered grid, without further change, it began to undo the resilience it had created. Instead of remedying the structural instability, Labour continued their hostility to domestic fossil fuel production and insisted on market-driven energy policy which favoured gas imports. In much the same way as nuclear energy, correction has become impossible.