Will Rachel Reeves end up being a right-wing Chancellor by accident? March 10, 2025 With poor growth and pressure on defence spending, Rachel Reeves faces having to make welfare cuts the likes of which haven’t been since the days of Nigel Lawson. But unlike Lawson, her spending plans are not being driven by a programme of reform, but by panic, says Eliot Wilson Rachel Reeves cannot have expected it [...]
Government to hit regulators with performance targets to drive innovation March 10, 2025 Regulators will be slapped with new performance targets in an effort to stimulate technological innovation and drive investment in the UK. According to Lord Patrick Vallance, the science minister, the benchmarks will be designed to accelerate innovation. Lord Vallance has suggested that this drive for innovation could result in commercial delivery drones, self-driving vehicles, and [...]
More than 300,000 businesses plan job cuts as Reeves’ Budget starts to bite March 10, 2025 More than 300,000 businesses are expected to lay off workers, as a flurry of data reveals a jobs market slowdown following the government’s Budget measures on employment. The £25bn rise in national insurance contributions (NICs) announced by the Chancellor in October is set to kick in next month, while businesses are also reportedly spooked by [...]
Harriet Harman appointed UK special envoy for women and girls March 8, 2025 Labour grandee Baroness Harriet Harman has been made the new UK special envoy for women and girls. The former minister will “co-ordinate efforts across the globe” to push for the protection of rights over reproductive health, access to education and freedom from gender-based violence, the Foreign Office said. But concerns have been raised in the [...]
Employment reforms “highly damaging” to investment, warns CBI chief March 7, 2025 The government’s proposed reforms to employment law would be “highly damaging” to business investment in the UK, according to CBI president Rupert Soames. Writing in The Times, Soames argued that this week’s U-turns on more controversial aspects of the legislation – from changes to statutory sick pay, to tweaks to protections for agency workers and [...]
Chancellor facing £10bn headache in Spring Statement March 6, 2025 Rachel Reeves faces a tax and spend nightmare at the Spring Statement, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) think tank. In a lengthy report, the IFS says Reeves is snookered between the realities of a bleak economic environment and her own self-imposed fiscal rules, resulting in what could amount to a £10bn tax [...]
Starmer throws weight behind 2035 Fifa World Cup bid March 6, 2025 Prime Minister Keir Starmer has thrown his weight behind a United Kingdom bid for the 2035 Fifa Women’s World Cup. The bid would combine stadiums from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and, if it is successful, would see the Home Nations host the showpiece women’s event for the first time ever. Starmer said the [...]
Pension death tax will punish millions of savers, says advisory firm March 5, 2025 Planned government changes to pension taxes must be dropped, according to City experts. Advisory firm Blick Rothenberg has slammed the move as a “poorly conceived policy change [that] penalises prudent savers and their loved ones through double taxation.” The pension reforms – announced in October’s Budget and set to kick in from April 2027 – [...]
UK business confidence in crisis, new report says March 5, 2025 More than three quarters of bosses have low confidence in the UK business environment, according to a survey by the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) think tank. The ASI Business Confidence Survey took the temperature of 192 business leaders, who between them represent 100,000 employees – from sectors including finance, retail and manufacturing. It paints a [...]
Chancellor lining up billions in spending cuts as fiscal headroom wiped out March 5, 2025 The Chancellor Rachel Reeves is preparing to announce “major measures” including substantial spending cuts to a number of government departments – including welfare – in the Spring Statement. According to BBC News, sources said that “the world has changed” since the Budget, and that £9.9bn in fiscal headroom projected by the Office for Budget Responsibility [...]