The axe will have to fall on Britain’s runaway public spending October 22, 2025 Rachel Reeves likes to insist that she will “never play fast and loose with the public finances.” It’s a phrase she deploys quite often, not least when it looks as if the bond market could do with a bit of reassurance, and it means that she won’t breach her “cast iron” fiscal rules. Adherence to [...]
Performance, not privilege, should determine success in financial services October 22, 2025 Financial services leadership is still too dominated by a privileged few, says for Lord Mayor Vincent Keaveny When I served as Lord Mayor of London, I often heard the City described as a meritocracy. Yet, behind the polished façades and success stories, I saw the hidden barriers that still shape who truly gets ahead. That [...]
Labour is finding that renationalising rail doesn’t make trains come on time October 22, 2025 Since returning to public ownership, delays and cancellations on our commuter trains have got worse, not better. So why is Labour doubling down? Asks Thomas Turrell When Labour took South Western Railway into public ownership earlier this year, they promised passengers a new era of punctuality, reliability and accountability. They have failed. Within just a [...]
Rachel Reeves is in a hole, but she just keeps digging October 22, 2025 Only the Conservatives have a plan to turn the economy around by abolishing stamp duty, cut welfare spending and get Britain back to work, says Andrew Griffith Rachel Reeves’ much-dreaded Autumn Budget is now just over a month away. And with each passing week there is a crescendo building. It’s made up of voices from [...]
AI bubble will burst unless businesses can grow 25 times the size of Amazon October 21, 2025 When numbers get large enough they cease to make sense, and the scale of investment in AI is already dwarfing the dotcom bubble, says Chris Clothier Scarcely a day goes by without a new announcement of a huge sum of money to be spent on AI. In early October, Open AI, the company behind ChatGPT, [...]
AI slop is a feature, not a bug, and your brand is the next casualty October 21, 2025 Brands that succeed in the age of AI will be those that make trust an operating system, says Paul Armstrong Google, Meta, OpenAI, LinkedIn, TikTok and the rest of the attention cartel are not drowning in AI slop by mistake, they’re selling the lifeboats. The only way out (to be seen) is to buy ads. [...]
On this day: Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar October 21, 2025 On This Day, 21 October 1805, Britain’s greatest ever naval hero proved conclusively that Britannia rules the waves… and died in the process, writes Eliot Wilson Today, 21 October, in 1805. It is a Monday, shortly after 5.30am, 25 miles off the coast of southern Spain. As dawn breaks, the skies are mostly clear, the [...]
Are super clubs dead? October 21, 2025 With young people now opting for smaller, cheaper and more intimate venues, the days of the super club look numbered, writes Sacha Lord.
UK needs a minister for drones to prepare for modern warfare October 21, 2025 As autonomous warfare spending edges towards a quarter of the MoD’s budget, it makes sense to appoint a dedicated minister for drones.
Labour’s alarmed by the Green surge? So am I. October 21, 2025 Spare a thought for Keir Starmer; he seems to have been so busy fighting a monster on the right, in the form of Nigel Farage, that he hasn’t noticed another deadly enemy emerging on the left. At least, that’s the concern expressed by some Labour MPs alarmed by the rise of the Greens and, specifically, [...]