Reeves beats Kwarteng to ‘worst chancellor’ in new ranking Politics Just months after her exit from Number 11, Rachel Reeves has been given the dubious honour of being voted “worst chancellor”, in a new survey. According to an AJ Bell survey, Reeves was the least popular of the last five chancellors, and even ranked below Kwasi Kwarteng, who held the role for just over a [...]
The Capitalist: Slow and steady wins the race at the Bloomberg Square Mile relay Opinion Cigars at Quaglino's, a cricket-playing PM and diplomacy at the Bloomberg relay; catch up on the latest shenanigans in The Capitalist.
Frozen tax thresholds to hold back Brits for ten miserable years Economics In March 2021 Chancellor Rishi Sunak described it as “a tax policy that is progressive and fair.” In November 2022, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt extended the policy, describing it as necessary and fair. In October 2024, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced an end to the policy, saying extending it beyond 2028 “would hurt working people.” Alas, a [...]
London cannot afford an ‘Autumn of Discontent’ of Tube strikes September 21, 2026 The RMT has voted for further Tube strikes because TfL has offered them the wrong kind of four day week. It's normal Londoners that suffer.
Rishi Sunak calls on PM Andy Burnham to restore £35m pledge for cricket domes September 18, 2026 Former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has urged current PM Andy Burnham to reinstate the £35m funding commitment to building all-weather “cricket domes” he made when he was in No10. Sunak pledged the sum in 2024 to create 22 of the facilities around the country but the Labour government scrapped the funding, labelling it “fantasy”, after [...]
Government admits Burnham’s Whitehall shake-up leaves tech policy in limbo September 11, 2026 Nearly two months after Andy Burnham abolished Britain’s technology department, ministers have admitted parts of the former department still have nowhere to go. A long-awaited breakdown of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) carve-up revealed a “small number of policy areas” are yet to be allocated, while some staff are still waiting to [...]
Forget Burnham, what will Starmer do next? July 16, 2026 The end of a premiership means finding an epilogue, so what will Keir Starmer’s be, asks John Oxley Around the summer parties of Westminster, the key conversation is “What will Andy actually do?” The presumptive PM has always been something of a political enigma (or weathervane, depending on your perspective). He has been out of [...]
What if Andy Burnham had become Labour leader in 2015? June 24, 2026 On his third try, Andy Burnham looks all but certain to become Labour leader. But what if he had taken the reins of the party eleven years earlier? Matt Kenyon imagines an alternative timeline… 2015 It’s a world that looks a lot like our own. There’s just one, seemingly minor, difference: A cluster of well-meaning [...]
Beware a desperate Prime Minister in search of a legacy June 18, 2026 From Theresa May to Rishi Sunak and now Keir Starmer’s, Prime Ministers have long sought to ban things just before leaving Downing Street, says Tom Harwood Is it too soon to write the Prime Minister’s obituary? As Keir Starmer returns from his latest bout of wining and dining with world leaders in Évian-les-Bains by Lake [...]
The Debate: Is Britain’s minimum wage too high? May 27, 2026 Rishi Sunak has confessed minimum wage hikes he oversaw were too high. But is raising wages during a cost of living crisis really so bad?