Category Archives: Uncategorized

                The unelected President of the Ukraine is not in control of the country he took over with his supporters. He looks weak because he is weak. He is unable to govern the east of his country. He threatens strong action to evict  armed people taking over police buildings and other parts of the administration in […]

The Chancellor believes in the Laffer curve. He accepts that when a tax gets to a certain level, if you raise the rate further you will suffer a loss of revenue, not a gain. He has been trying to get the Treasury to include this effect in their models, as  they have now conceded that […]

  This item about exam reform has been sent out by Michael Gove. I would be interested in your views on it: …..”The last Government utterly failed to provide an exams system that was fit for purpose. Exams were so afflicted by grade inflation and dumbing down that, even though official results soared, our performance […]

  The debate about the future of Scotland raises an even bigger debate – what will be the future of England? More and more people in England feel we are getting a raw deal, as the political classes concentrate on improving the offer to Scotland, and burnishing special arrangements for every part of the union […]

  The Spanish Parliament with the support of the EU has decided that Catalonia will not get a legal referendum on whether to stay in the Spanish state or become independent. The Crimea has just had a referendum which the EU condemns as illegal, and the Ukrainian state with the support of the EU failed […]

  Yesterday we learned that the official figures for inward migration from the EU had been understated in the last decade. An additional 356,000 arrivals have been added to the numbers for the period 2001-10, with 10,000 fewer in 2011. Apparently they undercounted children and people arriving at regional airports. It is always unfortunate when […]

  I spent last year ignoring the forthcoming vote on Scotland’s future, as the opinion polls showed strong support for no change to the current position. More recently I have taken an interest, as the polls have narrowed. I  have also commented that the “Better together” campaign is a bit  negative  in some of its […]

  In 1999 I wrote a book asking this question. I hear that people are reading it again. I stand  by my conclusions then, now tested by 15 years passing.  When I wrote the summary I said “Can the UK survive devolution, European integration, reform of the Lords, slimming of the monarchy, proportional representation? Will […]

             The Commons Environmental Audit Committee is not reknown for its sense of humour. So when they said in their recent Report into HS2 that they would like “the government” to “examine the scope for requiring a reduced maximum speed for the trains until electricity generation has been sufficiently decarbonised” they were definitely not […]

  In recent years there has been an avalanche of new regulations from the EU governing banking, financial services and insurance. I attended a seminar last week to catch up with the latest developments. It was a long meeting. We are witnessing the early developments of regulation from the main European Supervisory Agencies (ESAs). UCITs […]