Strikes, Olympic boycotts and obesity league tables — it’s a dreary set of newspaper front covers this morning. But none of them are quite so dreary as the Telegraph’s, which speaks of ‘The return of recession’. According to their story, the OECD has told ministers that its latest set of forecasts, released on Monday, will
A more recent gem from the archives than we would normally mine, but with the forthcoming government report into the riots — and with Fraser’s and David’s recent posts — we reckoned you might care to (re-)read Harriet Sergeant’s piece from this summer. It formed the centrepiece of an issue largely dedicated to those fiery
There was a time when Nick Clegg was the most agile and persistent defender of the coalition’s deficit reduction programme. But now — although he’s still got it in him — he is more often wheeled out to announce some spending wheeze or other. A couple of weeks ago, it was the next instalment of
Politics is often a messy squiggle, but this morning’s Resolution Foundation event did much to reduce it to a binary choice. Do we follow the US into a decades-long stagnancy around low-to-middle-income earners? Or do we not? James Plunkett explained the basic dilemma on Coffee House earlier, but more was said by a group of
Remember when Saif Gaddafi was the Anointed One of those who wanted a freer, more liberal Libya? Now, he’s at the mercy of militiamen in the city of Zintan, having been captured today. It leaves Abdullah al-Senussi, the former intelligence chief, as the most infamous member of the old regime still on the run. The
Should GPs determine whether people on long-term sick leave are too ill to work? Perhaps not, according to the draft copy of a government-commissioned review into sickness absence. It proposes setting up a new, separate and independent body to assess those on long-term sick leave, on the grounds that doctors have no incentive — nor,
In the latest issue of the magazine, a flock of politicians, commentators and economists offers George Osborne some advice for growing the economy. There are ten contributions in total, but here are three for CoffeeHousers’ consideration: Arthur Laffer Chairman, Laffer Associates Cut the 50p tax Reducing the burden which government places on the economy, through
‘Sir Richard Branson set to buy Northern Rock.’ So read the headlines in November 2007 — and now they’re finally true. It has been announced this morning that Virgin Money is going stump up £747 million to return the bank to the private sector. This, says George Osborne, ‘is an important first step in getting
The Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year Awards bash took place this evening, CoffeeHousers, and a jubilant time was had by all. We shall be putting out a supplement celebrating the event, and Parliament’s most preeminent performers, in tomorrow’s issue of The Spectator. But, in the meantime, here’s the list of all the winners from tonight:
The simmering feud between Brodie Clark and Theresa May has boiled over today. Speaking to the home affairs select committee earlier, the former border official didn’t just repeat the substance of his resignation statement from last week, but ramped it up into a rhetorical assault on the home secretary. ‘I never went rogue and I
Don’t whip out the cava just yet, CoffeeHousers. Inflation, in both its CPI and RPI incarnations, may be down on last month’s figures, but the latest numbers are hardly cause for jubilation. At 5.0 per cent in October, CPI is still over double the Bank of England’s target figure, and it’s far outpacing the average
How goes the lending part of the government’s Project Merlin accord with the banks? Judging by the figures released by the Bank of England today, neither brilliantly nor terribly. The amount loaned to small and medium enterprises fell to £18.8 billion in the third quarter of this year, from £20.5 billion in the second quarter.
You know, having read through Douglas Alexander’s Guardian article a couple of times now, and listened to his appearance on the Today programme earlier, I’m still not sure how Labour’s new stance towards Europe is particularly different from the official Tory one. The shadow foreign secretary tries to suggest that Dave and George’s position is reckless
A change of pace, that’s what David Cameron offers in an article on schools reform for the Daily Telegraph this morning. A change of pace not just from the furious momentum of the eurozone crisis, but also in his government’s education policy. From now on, he suggests, reform will go quicker and further. Instead of
How generous of Ed Balls to publish a transcript of his interview on the Politics Show earlier, so that we can amble through it on a Sunday evening. It contains, as you’d expect, more disagreeable parts than agreeable, and nothing more so than his comments about the national debt, deficit and all that. Two of
And the most eyebrow-raising story of the day has to be this one in the People. It’s their account of what Patrick Mercer is supposed to have said about David Cameron whilst being taped at a party last weekend — and it makes for perversely hilarious reading, whomever’s side you take. CoffeeHousers have probably
To mark last year’s Armistice Day, we republished The Spectator’s editorial reponse to the end of the first world war. This year, here is the editorial from the end of the second world war: A world at peace, The Spectator, 17 August 1945 The world is at peace. That assertion is possible at last. The
One letter, that’s all it takes. After 38 City types wrote a letter to the Daily Telegraph this morning, urging George Osborne to drop the 50p rate of income tax, Westminster types have been chirruping on about it ever since. All three party leaders have had their say, except, so far as I can tell,
PMQs, 9 November 2011
The markets, it seemed, wanted Berlusconi to go. Berlusconi duly announced his resignation yesterday. And now what? The interest paid on Italian ten-year bonds has just hit 7 per cent. The eurocrisis is hastening ever onwards, with our without the departing Italian PM. 7 per cent, as you will be reminded frequently today, is the