Photo by Stock Birken on Unsplash Some 70 years before Benjamin Franklin borrowed the phrase, English playwright Christopher Bullock in 1789 wrote in his comedy The Cobbler of Preston: “T’is impossible to be sure of anything but Death and Taxes.”. In the UK as in most European countries both certainties can happen together, with tax on inherited wealth…
Photo by Parker Johnson on Unsplash The practice of politics always has challenges. Such challenges are magnified when confronted with the optics: the perception of the people. Not all political Leaders seem to realise this…. While more UK small businesses are going bust than any year since the financial crisis of 2009, with mortgage interest doomed to remain…
Photo by Yaopey Yong on Unsplash The Old Testament of the Christian Bible derives from the 24 books of the Hebrew Tanakh, transcribed by Jewish scholars around two thousand years ago. In Exodus were the words: “I will bring you to the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to…
Photograph by Robert Linder on Unsplash History has a habit of repeating itself, and the latest announcement of the scrapping of most of the proposed UK High Speed rail network is just the latest example. It is…
Photo by Andy Newton on Unsplash In 2020 the UK finally left the EU, three years after the referendum and nearly fifty years since it joined what was then called the European Economic Community. Nigel Farage confidently forecast that other Member States would soon follow suit, and that “after Brexit, the EU will no longer exist”. As…
Photo by Ian Dooley on Unsplash It is said that the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Former Prime Minister Winston Churchill clearly endorsed this when he sent back to the kitchen a dull dessert, complaining that the pudding had no theme. It raises the question as to which pudding best represents the…
Photo by Irina Iriser on Unsplash So, finally, the UK Government has stopped dithering and agreed to rejoin the EU Horizon programme. Hailed by researchers as vital to help make the UK a science superpower, it has taken nearly three years for Sunak to negotiate a deal so that he could claim some sort of victory at the…
Photo by Mollie Sivaram on Unsplash In 2021 the UK hosted the COP26 summit, designed to agree practical steps to implement the Paris Climate accords. Both India and China joined other key players in making significant commitments, and there was general agreement that real progress was being made – and widespread acknowledgment that the UK was providing a…
Photo by Ravi Sharma on Unsplash Over the past century the UK has had a proud record of accepting refugees and asylum seekers. Just like today there were often loud voices against, but the Prime Ministers of the time had the courage of their convictions and made them welcome. After the second world war and the resettlement of…
Photo by Sam Balye on Unsplash The USA and China have agreed to set up working groups to discuss specific issues, with at the same time President Biden issuing carefully targeted curbs on US firms investing in Chinese tech companies. This twin-track approach should be seen as a sensible and practical development. Western nations have struggled to establish…
