Editorial: Businesses deserve credit for what are very big decisions February 28, 2022 Politicians sometimes resemble managers of struggling football teams; bad results are often written off as bad luck and outside of one’s control, but when the ball bounces in off somebody’s backside for a much-needed 90th minute winner they are, per the man in charge, often the result of some training ground masterstroke. So it is [...]
Editorial: Business should be just business, until it’s much more than that February 27, 2022 ONE assumes it wasn’t supposed to play out quite like this for Vladimir Putin. The Russian President surely anticipated a quick and easy military incursion into Ukraine – a military horribly overmatched, an inexperienced leader, and with the west unwilling to support. It is still so very early, but it does not appear that Putin [...]
Comparisons to the thirties are by no means overblown – and the City must react February 25, 2022 In his address to the nation yesterday, Boris Johnson made a reference both unimaginable just a few weeks ago and one that is now all too relevant. “This is not some faraway country of which we know little,” he said, a reference to Neville Chamberlain’s verdict on the Sudetenland as he readied for appeasement with [...]
Editorial: Make no mistake – Putin would turn the clock back to the Cold War February 21, 2022 Vladimir Putin did not just signal his intentions to recognise two breakaway Ukrainian republics last night, nor did he only lay the groundwork for a coming invasion of at least those territories. In a speech ostensibly to the Russian people but very much to the world, he declared, simply and clearly – the Cold War [...]
Time to build some houses for the sake of London’s future February 21, 2022 Some years ago, a small group of twitter warriors coalesced around a single campaign slogan – build some bloody houses. As ever with social media trends, the energy and enthusiasm has now lagged, but the point is as relevant as ever. Last year the average house increased in price by around the same as the [...]
Editorial: Truss lets the cat out of the bag on ruinous NI hike February 16, 2022 Lest there had been any suspicion about the feline characteristics of the four-legged creature in the sack, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss confirmed what we had all suspected last night. The cat, as they say, is out of the bag. In a radio interview with LBC yesterday Truss – when asked about the coming National Insurance [...]
Editorial: Can buy now pay later firms be blamed for consumers’ poor decisions? February 15, 2022 It is tempting to think of buy now, pay later as financial innovation. In truth it is not; it’s merely a new adaptation of an unsecured credit agreement. For all the adverts and branding, buy now pay later operators offer you the chance to pay in three instalments, rather than one. Firms make money from [...]
A matter of when not if for the Met Commissioner February 11, 2022 In truth it was a matter of when, not if. Dame Cressida Dick simply had to go – her force long ago lost the faith of Londoners. For some, it began with the heavy-handed response to the vigil for Sarah Everard, when the force violently broke up a peaceful protest at the murder of a [...]
Bailey should leave the commentary to the commentators February 6, 2022 It used to be said that the Governor of the Bank of England could keep the City of London on an even keel with the slightest flicker of an eyebrow. Andrew Bailey took a different tack last week – raising the entire nation’s eyebrows with a somewhat ill-advised suggestion to the nation’s workers that they [...]
Editorial: This really isn’t that complicated: Less fiddling, lower taxes February 4, 2022 As the calendar flipped over to 2022, we asked on our front page – could it really be a happy new year? In truth we should have seen the bad news, delivered yesterday in a double whammy by the energy regulator and the Bank of England, coming. A combination of wholesale gas prices spiking, an [...]
