The Docklands legacy can help fix London’s chronic housing crisis February 11, 2014 LONDON’S housing crisis is caused largely by a chronic shortage of new homes, which is pushing the average house price in the capital north of £500,000. Only 18,000 new homes were completed last year, barely a third as many as are needed to match population growth and household formation. There is no silver bullet to [...]
Letters to the Editor – 12/02 – Eurozone failings, The praise game, Best of Twitter February 11, 2014 Eurozone failings [Re: Globalisation lay behind the Eurozone crisis – but it has also rescued the euro, yesterday] An interesting analysis, but let’s not diminish the role of economic mismanagement and deep structural issues in the Eurozone crisis. As is shown by the current emerging markets chaos, it can be all too easy to blame [...]
Globalisation lay behind the Eurozone crisis – but it has also rescued the euro February 10, 2014 THE ARCHITECTS of the European single currency apparently paid little heed to globalisation or the rise of China. The Delors Report in 1989, which set up economic and monetary union in Europe, didn’t mention either of them. Nor did the first official European proposal for monetary union, the Werner Plan in 1970. In retrospect this [...]
Of course we blame politicians for everything – they bring it on themselves February 10, 2014 IN OUR age,” George Orwell once remarked, “there is no such thing as ‘keeping out of politics’. All issues are political issues.” This, of course, is mainly because politicians have made it so. Politics is everywhere and politicians have an opinion on everything. In 1998, for example, Tony Blair and William Hague expressed concern about [...]
Diversity is great – but quotas for corporates are not the right answer February 10, 2014 THERE are only ten individuals from ethnic minority groups among the 289 top executives at FTSE 100 listed companies, a study by Green Park Diversity Analytics has found. Chuka Umunna, the shadow business secretary, is accordingly threatening that Labour would introduce quotas to get more minority directors on boards. Given the campaign for more women [...]
Letters to the Editor – 11/02 – White-collar jobs, Best of Twitter February 10, 2014 White-collar jobs [Re: Will the spread of automation mean the end of the white-collar worker?, yesterday] Automation is already a reality in financial services. Banks have automated risks systems in place, and vast amounts of money is generated from electronic and algorithmic trading. But the complete replacement of white-collar specialist roles with robots and machines [...]
Nasty, brutish, short: Why businesses prosper then die at an ever faster pace February 9, 2014 IF THOMAS Hobbes found himself walking down City streets today, he wouldn’t blink an eye. Business life seems to be getting increasingly short and rather nasty. Due to the accelerating rate of technological change, some economists believe we are heading toward a “winner takes all” era of unprecedented competition, enabled by an enormous number of [...]
City Matters: The City and Scotland are natural allies in protecting our global competitiveness February 9, 2014 SCOTLAND’S future relationship with the rest of the UK has once again been making headlines, as we edge closer to the September independence referendum. For Londoners, the “Scottish question” can seem far removed. But having visited Edinburgh and Aberdeen last week, it is clear to me that this relationship is crucial to firms on both [...]
London needs Crossrail Two but the Treasury doesn’t have to fund it February 9, 2014 IT MIGHT seem absurd to be talking about Crossrail 2 when Crossrail 1 has only just hit the halfway mark. But the uncomfortable truth – and I mean this literally for London’s rail users – is that, as soon as it opens, Crossrail 1 will be full to bursting. We are playing a desperate game [...]
Letters to the Editor – 10/02 – No more strikes, Falling giant, Best of Twitter February 9, 2014 No more strikes [Re: Politicians must end tube chaos, Friday] There is another way. In an era when huge ships plough the ocean, and vast aircraft fly the skies under the control of automated systems, just how difficult would it be to automate trains running along fixed tracks? Already US firms are trialling automated cars, [...]