Today Nick Clegg announced plans for new spending on "green infrastructure". The party argues that they have found £3 billion in savings that can pay for investments in renewable energy, increasing the energy efficiency of the housing stock and transport projects of some kind. Similar plans have been announced by... Read more...
Although ignored by those arguing for continued high government borrowing "to prop up the economy", borrowing unfortunately costs money. And under the government's current deficit spending plans, the average household will soon be shelling out more in taxes to pay interest on the National Debt than they are paying interest on their... Read more...
There are some interesting points in Martin Wolf's new article on the deficit: "The second qualification is that the country is not living beyond its means, to any significant degree; the government is. Not only is the current account deficit modest, but the UK’s net liabilities were only 13 per... Read more...
Ed Conway has a very important article in the Telegraph about the current situation in Greece. It is worth reading the whole article, but here is the conclusion: "Though the EU'stechnocrats deny it, it is quite feasible to imagine Greecedefaulting, or –to use lawyer-friendly jargon – restructuring its debt, over... Read more...
In an article in today's Financial Times titled "Only rebalancing will revive Britain's precarious economy", Martin Wolf looks at what is needed to deal with the huge crisis in the public finances. This is the critical paragraph: "The decisive fact about the UK economy, then, is that it has to... Read more...
Many more public sector jobs on the Guardian site today, with the vast majority sitting in around the £30-£50k salary mark. Under the ‘regional development’ category we have adverts for an ‘Excellence Network Co-ordinator’ and a ‘Cultural Broker’ but it’s back to local government for this week’s non-job of the... Read more...
With the country facing a fiscal crisis, one way to cut back on public spending would be to scrap the Regional Development Agencies (RDA). Taxing businesses too much and then handing some of the money back to selected organisations hurts fair and productive competition, and research shows that they haven’t... Read more...
A Freedom of Information (FOI) request sent by Richard Taylor about cycle routes on the Transport Direct website – run by the Department for Transport (DfT) – has brought some interesting facts to light. Transport Direct is a government run service that claims to be the “only website that offers... Read more...
The media has been full this morning of news of the employment tribunal of Corporal Tilern DeBique, and the judgement severely threatens the future efficient running of the Armed Forces. Corporal, now ex-Corporal, DeBique has won her case and is now apparently hoping to be awarded a reported £100,000 for... Read more...
The Birmingham Post have reported that four West Midlands police forces spent a staggering £2.4m on media relations last year – with budgets rising 72% in the last five years, and though Chief Inspector Mark Payne, head of West Midlands Police’s Press & PR Department said that press releases have... Read more...
There are some interesting facts in the Institute for Fiscal Studies briefing that followed the Labour manifesto launch yesterday. First, bear in mind that we now have the second highest structural deficit - borrowing adjusted for the economic cycle - in the developed world, behind Ireland, according to projections from... Read more...
VisualsOn April 1st the TaxPayers' Alliance released the Town Hall Rich List. It's the most comprehensive guide to executive pay in councils across the UK and is often cited as a source long after its publication. To make it even easier to see data in most regions, a geographical 'heat-map'... Read more...
Ruth Lea - a leading economist who recently spoke at the TPA's post-Budget briefing - and Jeremy Nicholson - Director of the Energy Intensive Users' Group - have released a new report for Civitas about the impact of climate change policies on industrial employment. The report makes a number... Read more...
More revelations this morning on the pay of top public sector bureaucrats: "Chief executives of foundation trusts — the top band of NHS trusts — earned £157,500 in the year to March 2009 and had a 7.8 per cent salary rise. The report, from Incomes Data Services (IDS), showed... Read more...
Most of the price you pay at the pump for petrol is tax. Wat Tyler sets out some of the details. DECC statistics show that around two thirds of the pump price is the result of taxation. Those taxes are currently being hiked quite sharply, Jennifer Dunn wrote about the... Read more...
James Cameron (Vice Chairman of Climate Change Capital) has an articlein today's Times in which he completely misrepresents the reality ofwho pays for the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). The problem startswith the article's title: "Use polluters’ cash to create a green bank",in reality it is middle to low income... Read more...
The TPA's focus in the next couple of weeks is going to be on government borrowing and the national debt, with the launch of our new Debt Clock. Britain is running one of the highest budget deficits in the developed world, the IMF's projection for this year is that we... Read more...
During the Copenhagen conference, Gordon Brown said that - as part of a global deal - the Government would be willing to pledge to cut Britain's carbon dioxide emissions by 42% by 2020. At the time, we looked at what that pledge could mean if the economy grew at the... Read more...
The starting gun has been sounded and now we have a month of politicians dashing around the country, trying to secure our votes. This is the season when politicians will promise you the earth, but at this election there is one question everyone needs to ask: How are you going... Read more...
Britain isn't Greece. We have all sorts of advantages in running big deficits without getting into a fiscal crisis, as a long history of our governments acting relatively responsibly means we have built up a certain amount of good will and trust in international markets. The Greeks were caught misleading... Read more...
With general election fever in full swing it is not just the political parties that are finalising their policy platforms for the election and beyond. The National Union of Teachers (NUT) voted at their conference in Liverpool to joint industrial action with the Public and Commercial Services Union. The joint... Read more...
Today Gordon Brown is expected to confirm that the new general election will take place on 6 May, after going to Buckingham Palace to ask the Queen to dissolve Parliament. Over the next few weeks we should be seeing British democracy in the raw and the parties should be putting... Read more...
Yesterday George Osborne made a very welcome election promise. He told us there would be “no further tax increases in the emergency budget... We’ve set out our plans, they don’t involve an increase in VAT.”If the Conservatives win the election, in three months time he will have to deliver on this promise, while... Read more...
Includes full data for every council Most comprehensive guide to top pay in UK local councils - detailed breakdowns for each council included. Record 1,250 council staff earned over £100,000 in 2008-09 - up 14% on 2007-08. Average pay rise for senior staff was 5%, despite the recession.... Read more...