To what sorts of things do people have moral rights? That’s a profound question worthy of more than a mere blog post. We could turn to the thirty articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights for inspiration. We’ll see an aspirational list of rights which still, more […]
Where is the revolutionary thinking in economics? That was one of the first questions posed by a speaker at the Festival of Economics held last weekend in a very damp Bristol. It is also one of the most pressing and the most intriguing. I was among the hardy […]
There isn’t a great deal of disagreement about the key problems facing the British housing market. The main issues are high housing costs in both the owner occupied and private rented sectors, with correspondingly high bills for housing allowances. Many households have difficulties in accessing appropriate accommodation, particularly […]
David Cameron’s speech to the CBI today started with a paean to the exporters of UK plc; the manufacturers of strong liquor and powerful weaponry that do us so proud internationally. His objective – apart from flattering various members of the audience – was to make the case […]
Next weekend Bristol will host the Festival of Economics, organised under the auspices of the Festival of Ideas. The programme for the Festival of Economics has been assembled by Diane Coyle of Enlightenment Economics. It brings together economic journalists, applied academic economists, and economists in the think tank […]
[This is the text to accompany my presentation to open the South West Observatory seminar “Welfare reform: challenges, impacts and evidence”, 13/11/12] Where to start? Politicians are prone to hyperbole. The most minor modification to a relatively peripheral policy is portrayed as a groundbreaking initiative. However, in the […]
[Originally posted at Liberal Democrat Voice, 12/11/12] Friday 9th November 2012 could well come to be seen as a landmark date in the history of English housing policy. A key change introduced by the Localism Act 2011 came into effect. The Liberal Democrats are part of the Government […]
Participation in representative democratic processes at local level is on the wane. Not just in Britain but in several other western democracies. There is plenty of cause to reflect on why that might be, and what might be done about it. How can more local people become engaged […]
I’m having trouble getting this morning’s Andrew Marr Show out of my head. This is not pleasant. There are two causes of this affliction, both relating to the interview with Iain Duncan Smith. The first is the rather extraordinary approach taken by Marr. To call it the interviewer’s […]
What’s missing from the story of Britain’s ongoing housing crisis? From the Government we’ve had the usual market fundamentalist refrain that the root of the problem is planning and regulation. So we’re presented with various proposals to deal with the problem. First, the Government invited representatives of the […]
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