Running on empty
The government has no ideas and no direction
The flaw in Labour’s economic attacks
Labour avidly disagrees with the Tories’ plan to fill budget gaps by hiking National Insurance. So what would they do…
The Covid blame game
Are you ready to relive 2020? That’s what Adam Tooze is offering as he tells the story of Covid-19 through…
Tories scrap mandatory vaccine passports
On BBC One’s Andrew Marr show Sajid Javid confirmed that plans for domestic vaccine passports in England were on the…
Covid pingdemic takes its toll on Britain’s economic bounce-back
The arrival of ‘freedom day’ on 19 July enabled people to return to concerts, festivals, and ditch social distancing, but…
Hitting homes
The government’s social care reform plans are all wrong
Boris could pay a big price for his flawed social care shake-up
Boris Johnson pledged to ‘fix the crisis in social care’ over two years ago. Next week, the Prime Minister is…
The Bank of England’s new monetary hawk
Andy Haldane’s departure from the Bank of England opened up one of the most influential roles in guiding UK monetary…
Vaccine efficacy and the case for living with the virus
How fast does Covid vaccine protection wear off? New data from the Zoe Covid Study, published today, tries to quantify…
Biden risks undermining America’s moral authority
Joe Biden is facing what will likely be the defining event of his presidency. The gains made in Afghanistan are…
America’s surprisingly disappointing GDP growth
America’s economy has officially recovered to its pre-pandemic levels, as Q2 GDP figures saw an annualised increase of 6.5 per…
Vaccine passports could threaten the employment recovery
Alongside the UK’s latest step in reopening, optimistic forecasts have been rolling in concerning the economy’s timeline for returning to…
Whitehall’s Covid gloom could harm our economic recovery
As the government continues to put forward an extremely cautiousnarrative about re-opening, more evidence emerged today that the economy issurging…
The jab age
Party time depends on following the party line
What the NHS pay rise says about Boris Johnson’s priorities
Well, that didn’t take long. Two days ago, a leaked report revealed that the government was considering using a national insurance…
Who’s the boss?
In the post-pandemic economy, workers have the upper hand
Britain is ill-prepared to deal with rising inflation
Inflation is on the rise again. For the third consecutive month, the Consumer Prices index outpaced the forecasters’ consensus, landing at…
Follow the science – it’s time to unlock
Shortly before Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer were slugging it out in PMQs — debating whether the mass-lifting of restrictions…
What is the purpose of test and trace?
At yesterday’s press conference, Boris Johnson announced that his government was shelving plans for domestic ‘Covid certificates’ (i.e. vaccine passports),…
The party elite
Politicians made the rules – so they know how to bend them
Hancock has made a mockery of his own rules
How much trouble is Matt Hancock in? The Sun splashes this morning on the Health Secretary’s affair with aide Gina…
The QE hangover
Andy Haldane on the true cost of cheap money
Delay, data and the need for transparency
Boris Johnson delayed 21 June, he said, because the data did not merit a full reopening. The specific data government…
I miss my messy, unpredictable life
If you ask people what they’ve missed out on since the pandemic, they’ll probably lament their cancelled plans. Weddings postponed,…
The hidden costs of the G7 tax deal
Calls to reform corporation tax are nothing new and don’t just come from the left. The inefficient and bureaucratic nature…
