We should not accept a long-term decline in salary-linked pensions December 18, 2013 THIS week, the Institute for Fiscal Studies told people born in the 1960s and 1970s that they will be worse off than their parents when they retire. This was mainly down to falls in income due to the financial crash, and lower savings rates. But another reason is the long-term decline of defined benefit (DB) [...]
Letters to the Editor – 19/12 – Airport debate, Best of Twitter December 18, 2013 Airport debate [Re: It’s time to kick politicians out of the crucial debate on airport expansion, Tuesday] The CBI recently noted that direct flights open doors to new trade. We must act on airports, and Heathrow is the best option. It would be quicker to build, and be cheaper than a new Thames Estuary hub. It [...]
The airport shortlist is out: Politicians must now promise to let Britain grow December 17, 2013 THE INTERIM report of Sir Howard Davies’s Airports Commission, released yesterday, is the perfect wake-up call to our political leaders. Expanding London’s airports is critical to Britain’s future economic well-being. And it can’t wait any longer. Davies’s two key findings are spot on. First, Britain doesn’t have enough runways to meet the demands that will [...]
Against the Grain: Roll on 2014: The last five years have been miserable for the global economy December 17, 2013 THE END of a year is always a good time to take stock. And for the first time since 2007, the prospects for the UK economy for the year ahead look unequivocally good. But looking back, just how bad have the last few years been across the developed world as a whole? And how do [...]
Mutuals will stay high street bit players for many Christmases yet December 17, 2013 MUTUALS and co-operatives have been promoted as the acceptable side of business by both arms of the coalition. Nick Clegg has lauded the Waitrose and John Lewis model. Advisers to David Cameron, as well as Vince Cable, have argued that the banking sector would be more stable if more companies followed the mutual model. But [...]
Letters to the Editor – 18/12 – Airport capacity, End of teaching, Best of Twitter December 17, 2013 Airport capacity [Re: Boris Island misses out on new runway shortlist, yesterday] An airport at the Thames Estuary is the most logical option, and it is disappointing that the proposal was excluded from the Davies Commission’s shortlist yesterday. We need to accept that the alternatives present too many complications. The political and environmental obstacles to Heathrow [...]
It’s time to kick politicians out of the crucial debate on airport expansion December 16, 2013 AFTER reviewing more than 50 airport expansion proposals, Sir Howard Davies’s Airports Commission is releasing its shortlist today. If the government pays heed to its findings, one of these proposals will be given the green light and become a reality. There has been a great deal of speculation about the options Davies is likely to [...]
Why we need to re-think welfare – and it’s about more than saving money December 16, 2013 “IT IS getting to the stage where our government is doing welfare and little else”. That was the verdict of the Institute for Fiscal Studies’s Paul Johnson at a post-Autumn Statement briefing. You wouldn’t think it from media reports, but the welfare state is becoming more significant in scope, if not in absolute size. Although [...]
Ed Miliband’s attack on developers ignores why housebuilding is in crisis December 16, 2013 ED MILIBAND was right to identify the housing affordability crisis as one of Britain’s most important policy challenges in his speech yesterday. Sadly, his mixed bag of proposals (expanding urban council boundaries, a 200,000 annual home-building target and fines for “land hoarders”) does not address the fundamental reasons why developers are not supplying the market [...]
Letters to the Editor – 17/12 – Scrap Davies, Alternative finance, Best of Twitter December 16, 2013 Scrap Davies If you believe that the importance of hub capacity is overstated there is clearly no need to expand Heathrow. If you believe, as I do, that London and the UK needs an internationally-competitive hub airport, we should be clear what that means. It means an airport with four runways and the capacity to [...]