The BBC reports that today David Cameron is inviting many of the country's biggest employers to Downing Street and urging them to take on more staff. Many of the firms attending - from Morrisons to Microsoft - have pledged to employ thousands more staff as they grow in the economic... Read more...
One of the great pleasures of recent years has been driving round a city on a Sunday, enjoying the way urban life used to be before the explosion of parking restrictions, just the sensible single and double yellow line rules. When controlled parking zones were first introduced where I used... Read more...
The TaxPayers' Alliance today reacted to the news that David Chaytor has been sentenced. The former MP is the first to be sentenced for criminal charges for expense claims he made in parliament, a number of others are being investigated or tried. After failed attempts to appeal that MPs should... Read more...
In October, we issued a report on unnecessary jobs in councils. We identified a number of posts that could be abolished, and one of those 'non-jobs' was that of a political advisor/assistant. This is what we said about it in our report: These are employees who are hired to provide political... Read more...
Our friends over at Left Foot Forward have a post about requiring more honesty in the Net Neutrality debate. I can’t agree with them more; however the way Chris Tarquini arrives at this conclusion is a bit flawed and will worsen the confusion over exactly what Net Neutrality is. This requires a... Read more...
Councils throughout the country are working out how they are going to balance the books following the comprehensive spending review last year. Yesterday, I received a copy of the draft budget from Hull City Council that is now going out for public consultation. The council has to find savings of... Read more...
The head of UK Trade & Investment, the Government’s trade promotion quango, has urged staff to dream up ways of spending more taxpayer’s money, according to the Daily Mail. In an email to the quango’s executive team, chief executive Sir Andrew Cahn reported that Foreign Office officials were worried that... Read more...
Tony Blair said in his autobiography that the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act was one of his greatest mistakes. It wasn’t. It was his biggest legislative achievement. It has allowed taxpayers to get information on how their money is spent, and how their public services are run. Before the election... Read more...
The news that Network Rail is building a new 400,000 Sq Ft Headquarters in Milton Keynes, moving its base from Euston station out of the capital, is not in itself particularly shocking. It is a matter for the different bids to establish whether the more affordable locale will offset the... Read more...
In November, I highlighted a Reward (Pay & Benefits) Manager vacancy in the London Borough of Hillingdon, as our non-job of the week. I was surprised when looking at the website, jobsgopublic.com, to see this post re-advertised! It appears that none of the people applying for this 'non-job' were suitable,... Read more...
The FT reports today that BT is rolling out a new offering called Content Connect to its wholesale customers – typically smaller Internet Service Providers (ISPs) – who use BT lines to deliver their services. Content Connect will allow for streaming live and on demand video to be delivered to... Read more...
The shortage of housing in parts of the UK is a really serious issue. While only an unfortunate minority can't easily afford to feed and clothe themselves these days, shelter - another of those vital building blocks at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs - is often much more... Read more...
In their response to our report about the empirical claims contained in The Spirit Level, the authors have distorted the evidence. Once again, their claims do not stand up to scrutiny, for that reason this article provides a comprehensive response of our own to their response. One particularly stark example... Read more...
Value Added Tax (VAT) goes up today, increasing the price we pay for most goods by 20 per cent instead of 17.5. If retailers pass this on to consumers, prices in the shops will rise by 2.1 per cent. But it could be worse than that for consumers. Prices tend... Read more...
Download the new report The global push to extend and tighten regulation of financial services could backfire and intensify the severity of future banking crises, a new report from two respected research institutes warns today. The paper, jointly published by the Legatum Institute and the Taxpayers’ Alliance, says that policymakers... Read more...
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced yesterday that it will enforce the principles of net neutrality in the US. In a statement they said that they will enforce net neutrality based on the three rules of transparency, no blocking, and reasonable traffic management. Net neutrality is a confused term that... Read more...
Click here for the full press release Click here for the full report As the UK is blasted by snow and icy weather, the TaxPayers' Alliance has compiled a list of how much local councils have spent on road salt (not "grit", see details in the full report) in the... Read more...
Last night I attend a Silicon Roundabout event. David Willets MP along with Anthony Brown from the Mayor’s office were invited to Techhub to answer questions asked by small tech startups and businesses. The questions ranged from venture capital funding to recruiting to education and everything in between. By the... Read more...
Campaigners are planning to protest outside Topshop, Barclays and Vodafone branches tomorrow as part of the UK Uncut 'Pay Day' event. The group claims various organisations are underpaying tax by £25bn. Most alarmingly, they do not accuse the "tax thieves" of breaking any laws and accept that the disputed figures... Read more...
It has been announced today that a number of Arts organisations throughout Wales have received a substantial increase to their funding. This comes on the same day that it has been announced that the two main coast guard stations covering the Irish sea are to close. It has come to... Read more...
Two weeks ago, our non-job of the week was a Future Shape Programme Manager in North-East Lincolnshire Council. This week the media caught up and it hit the headlines. I have been interviewed for local radio and television in the BBC Humberside area. The role has also been condemned by... Read more...
This morning, Chris Huhne has told the Today programme that the idea climate change policy will drive up electricity prices by £500 is "absolutely bonkers". That estimate comes from the price comparison website uSwitch, which argues the £200 billion in investment needed will put £500 on top of current bills... Read more...
Today the details have been announced of the British Government's loan to Ireland, the Press Association have reported them. It will be £3.25 billion over eight payments and used to shore up their banks and sovereign debt. The spin is that it isn't such a bad deal because they will... Read more...
The government’s Localism Bill was published this week and is packed with measures which will change the nature of local government. But for all the sensible changes in the Bill, they have dodged the big issue: money. As we noted in the TaxPayers’ Alliance localism research note, the case for... Read more...