City Matters: Companies must work with schools to fix Britain’s growing skills shortage March 30, 2014 THE KEY factor behind the success of any business – or indeed city – is its people. The capital is an international business hub, home to hundreds of different nationalities. But it must also demonstrate the local benefits for “ordinary” Londoners, especially young individuals looking to get their first foothold on the employment ladder. That [...]
A worrying drop in trust is endangering business March 30, 2014 TODAY marks the start of Responsible Business Week, Business in the Community’s annual initiative to inspire and equip businesses to do more to meet the world’s most pressing challenges. As society faces up to demographic changes, resource scarcity, the shift in economic power, and accelerating urbanisation, business has a powerful opportunity to make a positive [...]
Letters to the Editor – 31/03 – Energy market, Best of Twitter March 30, 2014 Energy market City AM’s suggestion that Ofgem has given in to politicians by proposing that the energy market is referred to the Competition and Markets Authority for investigation is completely untrue. The competition assessment was carried out by three independent regulators, Ofgem, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and the Competition Markets Authority. Ofgem’s decision [...]
City & Gild: Does low cost have to equal low expectations? March 28, 2014 Easyjet has announced that it is cutting its expected pre-tax losses, with CEO Carolyn McCall attributing its success to “progress against strategic priorities”. One of those key priorities is allocated seating, introduced by the budget airline in November 2012 and very well-received by its customers. I have the frequent displeasure of flying Ryanair and have [...]
Letters to the Editor – 28/03 – Crossrail 2, Virtual future, Best of Twitter March 28, 2014 Crossrail 2 [Re: London will come to a standstill if we delay Crossrail 2, yesterday] Far from demonstrating a lack of political will on Crossrail 2, the mayor has long been the driving force behind getting this vital project moving. He strongly believes it is critical to boosting capacity and galvanising economic growth, which is [...]
Don’t just blame energy giants: Government is blunting competition March 27, 2014 IT IS not entirely unwelcome that the energy industry has been referred to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) by Ofgem. It may lance a festering boil; it may do some good. However, this will only be the case if the investigation is handled correctly. Too often, competition inquiries have created huge uncertainty and disruption. [...]
How one man battled the bureaucrats to save a billion lives March 27, 2014 THE 1960s was a decade of explosive change, but the most important revolution wasn’t sexual: it was green. While Western intellectuals looked the other way, lost to well-meaning doom-mongering, one visionary saved a billion lives. Private foundations supported his work; rich governments’ aid programmes often thought it was wrongheaded. But Norman Borlaug (it’s pronounced Bor-log), [...]
Pensions freedom is at risk – from the regulators March 27, 2014 AS COMMENTATORS digest the liberal reforms to pensions announced in the Budget last week, questions are starting to arise about just how the proposals will be implemented. To be clear, we welcome the reforms; it is right that people should be empowered to make their own choices about how they access a pension fund which [...]
Letters to the Editor – 27/03 – No green jobs, Cost of government, Best of Twitter March 26, 2014 No green jobs [Re: The green myth: Why renewables destroy jobs, yesterday] Matthew Sinclair’s excellent article, on why investment in costly green energy should never be advertised as creating jobs, merely stated what should be obvious. And yet it has become a political mantra that “green investment” is good for the economy. Politicians need to be [...]
Why the real global debt crisis is bigger than you think March 26, 2014 HERE IS a very easy economic forecast. Public debt will be the number one economic issue on the planet over the coming decades. Hugely indebted governments will get even more indebted, and politicians will remain behind the curve in terms of finding a solution. Governments will find it even more difficult to attain and maintain [...]