Economy

It could be 30 per cent. Or 35 per cent? Or perhaps 39 per cent? Heck, who knows, if Rachel Reeves wants to keep the accountants on their toes, perhaps 39.657 per cent. The Treasury is, according to the latest leaks to the Guardian, looking at an increase in Capital Gains Tax as it scrabbles around for tax rises to fund the Chancellor’s spending plans, while not putting up the amount ordinary people are paying. The trouble is, whatever number she picks it is not going to work – and Rachel Reeves is fast gaining a reputation as a shambolic Chancellor. The list of failed tax rises from the new government

At Prime Minister’s Questions this afternoon, Rishi Sunak took a technical turn. Why is Rachel Reeves considering changing the fiscal rules, he asked the Prime Minister, when just last year she said doing so would be ‘tantamount to fiddling the figures.’ No clear answer followed.  The wisdom during the general election was that borrowing more money – to finance Labour or Tory spending promises – was simply not an option. No one dared to propose anything resembling Liz Truss’s mini-budget saga, which saw her attempt to borrow £100 billion to limit energy price rises for consumers.  Instead, the parties said they would make good on their spending promises by going

The business world was thrilled last week as Springer Nature, the academic publishing giant, floated its shares in Germany, which led to the company being valued at £3.8 billion. But profits should not come at the expense of scholarly integrity and Springer Nature’s record of capitulation to Chinese censorship ought to have raised far greater concerns than it has.  In 2018, the New York Times revealed that the publisher, under pressure from the Chinese Communist party (CCP), blocked access to hundreds of articles on its Chinese website. The censored content covered sensitive topics such as Uyghur Rights, Taiwan, Tibet, elite politics, and the genocide occurring in China – subjects which Beijing deems

Cheap Chinese imports will flood the market. Even more jobs will be lost, and the country’s industrial base will be even weaker than it already is. UK Steel, the lobby group for the industry, has today called for tariffs to stop the last remaining steel mills being wiped out by unfair competition from lower cost rivals. It would hardly be any great surprise if a protectionist, union-dominated Labour government agreed to that. There is, however, just one snag. The steel industry has already long been neglected – and there is no point in trying to rescue it now. It is futile to provoke Chinese retaliation against industries that actually make

How the ground is shifting now that Labour finds itself in government and is actually responsible for UK energy policy. This morning, workers at a glass factory on Merseyside were treated to an unusual visit from the threesome that is the Prime Minister, Chancellor and Energy Secretary. Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves and Ed Miliband had travelled up to announce the latest twist in the government’s energy policy: a £22 billion investment in carbon capture and storage (CCS). This, apparently, is an inspired policy to create jobs, help us accelerate to net zero and boost our economy. It is also extraordinarily similar to an announcement that the previous government made in

Business confidence has plummeted back to the levels last seen in the wake of Liz Truss’s unfortunate mini-budget. Hiring has slowed down as employers worry about all the new rights Labour is about to award their staff. Consumer confidence has fallen, as people worry about the tax rises that will be imposed in the ‘Horror Budget’ set for the end of the month. And the economy, which was growing at a decent clip when the Conservatives left office, has now stalled, with zero growth in the latest quarter. The new Chancellor Rachel Reeves was facing a spluttering economy. But, hey, never mind. It turns out that the Bank of England

So farewell, Ratcliffe-on-Soar: the UK’s last coal-fired power station shut down on Monday, having burned five million tonnes of coal per year since it opened in 1968. Back then, 80 per cent of national power came from coal, our primary energy source since the 1880s; at the turn of this century there were still 25 coal plants in operation across the country. Now there are none – and 36 per cent of our power in the past year came from wind, solar and hydro with 7 per cent from biomass, compared with 24 per cent from natural gas and just 1 per cent from Ratcliffe’s coal. That’s a remarkable transition

Jeremy Hunt is one of the few Tories willing to take the fight to Labour while the Conservative leadership contest drones on. The shadow chancellor gave an on-stage interview at party conference in Birmingham this morning where he continued to attack Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ ‘£22 billion black hole’ narrative. Hunt suggested that not even Labour MPs and members believed that claim, which was why they were having such a big row over the winter fuel payment. ‘We were trounced at the election,’ Hunt said Hunt also warned that Labour was in danger of making decisions based on its own ‘propaganda’, telling Daniel Finkelstein: ‘My worry is that Labour believes its

Did Kemi Badenoch just say that maternity pay in the UK is ‘excessive’? That’s the claim kicking off the first day of the Tory party conference: an affair that is supposed to act as a ‘beauty pageant’ for the four remaining leadership contenders. It’s not great timing for Badenoch – and it’s certainly not how she and her team will have wanted to kickstart her four days in Birmingham, trying to win over grassroot Conservatives. It’s also, however, not really what she said. “There was a time when there wasn't any maternity pay and people were having more babies.”@KemiBadenoch suggests statutory maternity pay is "excessive".@KateEMcCann | @AdamBoultonTABB pic.twitter.com/j21Vaw7nXN — Times Radio (@TimesRadio) September 29,

China’s leaders and economic policymakers – who have been optimistic and confident about the economy for years – are clearly spooked.  Just two weeks ago, Chinese state media was happily insisting that the country was experiencing ‘stable economic growth’. China requires a major rethink when it comes to the economy, something which may be politically impossible for a Leninist government Yet in the last week, Beijing has announced and is expected to approve over £319 billion in new fiscal measures – the biggest monetary policy stimulus since the pandemic. The move is a clear acknowledgement that China has a weak economy with an array of systemic economic and social problems. In another

It takes something when even the Guardian is warning you that your tax rises might end up costing more than they raise in revenue. The paper is reporting today that Treasury officials are becoming worried that the Office for Budgetary Responsibility (OBR) will conclude that plans to abolish non-dom status and its associated loopholes will persuade so many rich individuals to leave the country that, even with higher taxes, the government will be the net loser. If that is what the OBR concludes it will blow a hole in Rachel Reeves’ budget next month. Ending non-dom status was one of the handful of planned tax rises which the government was prepared to