DEBATE: Is Sadiq Khan right to refuse to expand London’s congestion charge zone? Is Sadiq Khan right to refuse to expand London’s congestion charge zone? Is Sadiq Khan right to refuse to expand London’s congestion charge zone? JOIN THE DEBATE Wes Streeting, Labour MP for Ilford North, says YES When Boris Johnson was mayor of London he promised Londoners: “I am not going to be having any more congestion charges”. Yet now, his government is trying to force exactly that [...]
DEBATE: Should government pay wages to workers affected by coronavirus? DEBATE: Should government pay wages to workers affected by coronavirus? Should the government pay wages to workers whose incomes have been affected by the coronavirus crisis? YES – Sam Bowman, director of competition policy at the International Centre for Law & Economics. This is a very unusual recession. It is self-inflicted, and will hit highly productive and less productive businesses alike. To allow them to [...]
From energy to insurance: How Open Banking could fix the loyalty penalty headache You don’t get to be Prime Minister without having a few political gifts. One of Theresa May’s was her ability to spot the issues that people cared about – even if she found it harder to come up with effective ways of improving them. That was why her maiden speech outside Downing Street was so [...]
Theresa May’s new merger powers would be a hostile takeover by the state October 16, 2018 Back in July 2016, Theresa May launched her campaign for leadership of the Conservative party by promising radical action on foreign takeovers of British businesses. In the wake of Kraft’s takeover of Cadbury and Pfizer’s failed bid for AstraZeneca, May promised to defend workers and local communities from transient shareholders who, she said, were more [...]
Taking Trump literally: The chaotic US visa ban has revealed the new President to be incompetent or malevolent or both January 31, 2017 Peter Thiel, founder of Paypal and libertarian icon, told us last year to take Donald Trump “seriously but not literally”. Trump was playing to the gallery, Thiel suggested, and if elected would govern seriously and competently – and would quietly forget his more outlandish campaign promises. Naively, I and a few others started to hope [...]
As Trump packs his cabinet with leading executives, are business people any good at politics? December 15, 2016 Sam Bowman, executive director of the Adam Smith Institute, says Yes. Well, it’d be hard to do worse than the politicians. And Trump’s appointments make some sense. Exxon’s Rex Tillerson, in particular, is experienced at negotiating with the leaders of tinpot kleptocracies – a useful skill in a secretary of state. Mitt Romney’s business success [...]
As experts forecast a £100bn budget black hole, should the chancellor prioritise deficit reduction in his Autumn Statement? November 17, 2016 Sam Bowman, executive director at the Adam Smith Institute, says Yes. Whatever we borrow today we’ll eventually have to pay for tomorrow. So government borrowing just defers taxation – there really is no free lunch. It’s worse than that, though. Government borrowing crowds out private borrowing, so the more the state borrows for itself, the [...]
Britain’s struggling Border Force is in no state to manage a post-Brexit migration crackdown September 12, 2016 When we leave the EU, we may bring in work permits or some other way of controlling immigration from Europe. The home secretary confirmed that this was on the table this weekend. To do this, however, we will need to overhaul our Border Force. In a new report released this week, I outline the deep [...]
Is Lord Lawson right that Britain should not try to negotiate a special trade deal with the European Union? August 31, 2016 Grace Lievesley, research manager at Global Britain, says Yes. The UK is the fifth largest economy in the world and now, following our decision to leave the declining European Union, we should aspire to become the fourth or third largest economy. To do this, we need to expand our business in fast-growing markets while holding on [...]
As calls for the chancellor to apply some fiscal stimulus grow, do we really want more public spending? August 8, 2016 Scott Corfe, director at the Centre for Economics and Business Research, says Yes. The UK economy is set to slow drastically over the coming quarters, with the Centre for Economics and Business Research expecting GDP growth to decline from about 1.5 per cent this year to less than 0.5 per cent in 2017. A recession – [...]
