Andy Burnham should show London he cares by funding this one transport project July 23, 2026 The ascendancy of the ‘King of the North’ has spooked London. James Ford outlines that this can easily be fixed by greenlighting the West London Orbital Railway London is anxious. The new Prime Minister is not just something of an unknown quantity, but – worse still – he is (whisper it quietly) Northern. Now, we’ve [...]
Business will be the judge on whether Andy Burnham can “regain stability” July 23, 2026 If Andy Burnham is serious about being a friend to business he should commit to no new business taxes, says Alan Vallance When every new government begins – and there have been a few in recent years – the goodwill they start with is already a diminishing return. Businesses understand that no Prime Minister can [...]
Aspire’s David Collyer: my curry catastrophe at the Cinnamon Club July 23, 2026 Square Mile and Me: We dig into the memory bank of the City’s great and good. Today, David Collyer, global senior vice president at Aspire, on being a Ferrari fan and a curry catastrophe What was your first job? A paper round – I used to dread Sundays because of the broadsheets but it’s where [...]
Sovereign AI is no longer a nice to have, and with open source, more achievable than ever July 22, 2026 Driven by rising costs and concerns over data sovereignty, enterprises are increasingly pursuing “AI sovereignty” by diversifying their AI supply chains with open-source alternatives, says Lewis Liu “Every single enterprise in this country… these people are livid. They’re saying: ‘I am paying for tokens that create no value. These people are stealing the weights and [...]
Stop peer pressuring young people into the student debt swindle July 22, 2026 One in four graduates will end up worse off than they would have been had they not gone to university, but that’s not just down to imperfect information, it’s down to expectations that need to change, says Paul Ormerod The holiday season is now in full swing. Relaxation for most, but in many households tensions [...]
A pragmatic plan for Thames Water July 22, 2026 Public ownership of utilities is a long-held aspiration for Labour’s soft-left, but economic reality dictates it cannot be achieved without derailing the rest of Burnham’s prime ministerial agenda, says Mark Field Andy Burnham’s first priority as Prime Minister must be to stamp his authority over the role – something that’s proved impossible for his five [...]
Let the machines do the grunt work, so that we can do the great work July 22, 2026 AI is spectacular at the boring, mundane, repetitive grunt work, data entry, first-pass research, formatting, scheduling and summarising. It can execute those tasks faster and, frankly, better than most of us. Good. Let it. Because the moment you free a talented person from grunt work, they do what machines cannot: build relationships, exercise judgment, tell [...]
The Debate: should Andy Burnham have made a woman his Chancellor? July 22, 2026 Rachel Reeves was proud to be Britain’s first female Chancellor but the Labour party have still never had a female leader. So should Burnham have put a woman in the finance brief? Two writers go head to head… Yes: economic leadership should reflect the economy it serves Labour doesn’t need a female Chancellor simply for [...]
Manchester was Burnham’s rehearsal – now get ready to pay the bill July 22, 2026 Burnham has asked to be judged on Manchester – where his record is more spending, more borrowing and higher taxes, says Gareth Davies Andy Burnham walks into Downing Street with a simple pitch: judge me on Manchester. I am happy to take him up on it. Start with tax. In 2018, Mr Burnham created a [...]
Brazen Burnham should call an election and put his ten year plan to the voters July 21, 2026 Plenty of people were staring at their phones outside the Calais terminal of the Eurotunnel on Monday afternoon, but I sensed I was the only one watching Andy Burnham’s Downing Street address. We left for France under one Prime Minister and came back under another. That’s just how it is these days. My first reaction [...]