on June 25, 2009
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There are some very differing opinions about how well the economic recovery is going following the OECD‘s publication of its latest economic outlook paper. The Paris-based organisation anticipates a contraction in the UK economy of over 4% year on year. This is significantly less optimistic than the treasury’s latest estimates. Of course, no one actually knows… (Point ii in last post has something on the brass tacks and grimy UK politics of it at present).
Brass tacks – a definition.
UPDATED. 1st July 8pm. Channel 4 News has a Factcheck on some of the competing claims about public spending here.
on June 22, 2009
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In among all the fury and detail of MPs expenses claims last week several other interesting things happened. In no particular order, they were;
i. a key contract about the introduction of national UK identity cards was delayed – or pushed well beyond the date of the next general election. The Financial Times had the first story. The Minister responsible for the ID card programme is now Alan Johnson, widely promoted as one potential successor to Gordon Brown and as leader of what’s left of the Labour party.
ii. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alastair Darling and and Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England had a very public falling out over the future regulation of the UK’s semi-nationalised banking industry. The Independent has a piece about it here. One thing to remember when reading it, is the relative positions of both players. King is on a new five year employment contract and is hard to remove – Darling only narrowly avoided being scalped by his own boss (Gordon Brown) and is facing an imminent general election in which he can probably expect to lose his job and perhaps his seat in parliament too. King is looking to his working future beyond a Labour majority government – and that probably means paying attention to shadow chancellor George Osborne and the Conservatives.
iii. The new Speaker of the House of Commons is to be elected. The BBC has brief details of the hustings (opportunity for the candidates to self-promote) here. We will get the result this afternoon. I’ll update the drawing when we get a result.
UPDATED: 4.40pm. The voting has started for the new Speaker of the House of Commons and there is a liveblog here at Conservative Home.
on June 18, 2009
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Lots of live blogging as people sort through the paperwork they can see. The Telegraph has learned something interesting about former PM Tony Blair’s claim just before he left office.
UPDATED: 9pm. The Guardian has a neat little tool where you can help investigate the 700,000 documents which were released today. These should clarify exactly who was claiming for what and when. A lot of it is ‘redacted’, edited and, or censored by the big black blocks (see above) but it’s the start of something better – with luck.
on June 18, 2009
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A version of MP allowances and expenses is published here by the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The data is redacted, or edited in a different way from much of the recent reporting in The Daily Telegraph.
on June 16, 2009
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Before Digital Britain can arrive, the old analogue powers are going to have to be placated or assured they will be able to keep their traditional share of the money pie. Top-slicing the BBC’s license fee seems to be one of the chosen methods for struggling broadcasters and publishers. More independent and proactive media business people will have had other ideas.
After all, two’s company, three’s a crowd.
UPDATE: 6pm. Reaction from the Financial Times.
on June 16, 2009
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The Guardian newspaper are liveblogging the announcement this afternoon. It will be worth following because the structural changes which may be proposed are going to be key drivers of the UK’s national economy in the next few years. I’m working on a drawing about this today.
on June 15, 2009
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Times are hard so try and enjoy the little things…
on June 12, 2009
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After a busy week, this is great.
on June 10, 2009
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The umpteenth Gordon Brown relaunch starts today with the start of another review, this time on reform of the constitution, or the way we elect those who would govern the land.
Clearly, the PM is keen to move things on from the latest attempt to unseat him.
The constitutional reform issue is interesting however because it provides him with another of the clear dividing lines which politicians like to use to define themselves against one another.
No likely Cameron-led Conservative government is going to agree or vote for constitutional reform this side of an election they expect to win.
Whether Gordon’s big idea is strong enough to compete with the increasingly bad news on UK unemployment is another thing.
on June 8, 2009
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Only idiots could fail to see the symbolic importance of Britain returning its first fascist members to the European parliament after yesterday’s elections.
We have for too long ignored unfashionable but pervasive problems in our political conversation – namely, poverty, the provision of public housing and low-paid, badly regulated employment. These traditional concerns have been mixed with the great economic experiment of globalisation and the free movement of labour, which suited the interests of large industries when capital was also flowing easily. Nobody appears to have thought much about what would happen when times were not so good and the imaginary money supply dried up. We are all going to have to relearn some hard lessons in the next few years. This is why Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s Labour party is now, so firmly jammed in the electoral and economic toilet, frankly, they deserve to be.
UPDATED – 15.40 : Mark Mardell of the BBC has some context on the authoritarian right wing vote in the European elections.
