How your business can produce the next Ada Lovelace October 11, 2016 Ever wondered why you struggle to hire women? This is a question often thrown in our direction at GeekGirl Meetup UK. It’s still not good enough that, according to Deloitte, women make up 18 per cent of the UK’s tech industry. There are numerous reasons why you may struggle to hire women in tech and why [...]
Business rates that hit London need reform October 11, 2016 Business rates are a blunt instrument, one which is set to deliver a heavy blow to London’s retailers, offices and hotels. Rates are due to rise from next April after a revaluation of rateable values for England’s 1.85m commercial properties by the Valuation Office Agency. It is the first such revaluation since 2010. Analysis by [...]
Gatwick gets my vote for a new runway – but why can’t we let Heathrow expand too? October 10, 2016 As Britain begins the challenging process of navigating its way through uncertain times, one thing remains clear: the need for us to continue being a forward-looking trading nation. The latest predictions suggest that London’s airport system will be full in less than 10 years, which means additional airport capacity is more important than ever to show [...]
Theresa May should use Nobel-winning insights – not anecdote – to guide executive pay reform October 10, 2016 The 2016 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics was awarded yesterday to Harvard’s Oliver Hart and MIT’s Bengt Holmstrom for their ground-breaking work on contract theory. Their work has profound implications for contracts in many fields: financing contracts between investors and firms, business contracts between customers and suppliers, and – most topically – employment contracts between [...]
The Single Market battle is the Remainers’ last stand in the Brexit war October 10, 2016 It has all the hallmarks of a last stand. Having abandoned resistance to the referendum result itself, Remainers are rallying to the cause of staying in the Single Market. Re-using the referendum hymn sheet, the same politicians, businesses and pressure groups who predicted doom and gloom from the decision to vote Brexit are now forecasting postponed doom [...]
Should we be worried that politics is getting nastier? October 10, 2016 Rachel Cunliffe, deputy editor at Reaction, says Yes. There’s a chasm between the policies of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, but you wouldn’t know it. In between Trump calling Clinton the “devil”, accusing her of having “tremendous hate in her heart” and threatening to prosecute her, there was precious little time for analysing policy. That’s politics [...]
Trump follies should make Britain count its Brexit blessings October 10, 2016 Investors can breathe a sigh of relief that the biggest Black Swan is treading water. Thanks to one lewd recording – dating back a decade – Donald J Trump’s race to the White House could be in serious jeopardy. The diminishing chances of a Trump presidency have put Europe back in the market’s crosshairs, as [...]
Ire over immigration: Careless policy debates risk damaging Britain October 10, 2016 Sometimes great damage can be caused by a government policy idea that doesn't end up seeing the light of day. Think back to 2013, when the Tory-LibDem coalition announced plans to introduce a visa bond. The idea would have seen arrivals from countries such as India or Nigeria paying a £3,000 bond as part of the [...]
How decadent elites lost control of politics the world over October 10, 2016 To outsiders, Colombia’s recent referendum on ending its 53-year war with the Stalinist revolutionaries of the Farc seemed the ultimate no-brainer. Putting a merciful halt to a conflict that has killed a horrendous 220,000 souls would seem to require little thought. Yet when earnest President Juan Manuel Santos put his peace deal to a nationwide [...]
Britain has a golden opportunity to leapfrog the EU and secure a free trade deal with the Gulf States October 10, 2016 As Britain’s departure from the European Union draws closer, concern over the country’s economic prosperity is mounting. It shouldn’t. Britain has long-standing allies in the Gulf who will work hard to negotiate a free trade agreement that benefits all. The six Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Bahrain and Qatar are part [...]