Nick Clegg came under renewed pressure over his tuition fees u-turn at Prime Minister’s Questions today as 50,000 students marched on parliament in the biggest protest against the government since it came to power. However, violent scenes at Millbank Tower, home of the Conservative party, cast a pall over the demonstration.
In his opening remarks at the press conference to launch the report, Mervyn King, the Bank’s Governor, highlighted how these uncertainties mean that inflation could turn out higher than forecast (for example if commodity prices continue to increase at a rapid pace or if inflation expectations rise) or lower than forecast (if wage increases remain low and import price inflation fades).
Nick Clegg writes in today’s Guardian about welfare reform. But his claims on jobs, incentives for work, the welfare bill, and poverty do not stack up.
If the sad truth is that Cameron simply doesn’t care about Britain taking a lead in developing a more multilateral economic approach then so be it. But by doing so he’s shutting the UK out of the game – with the US, the G20 and the EU.
The annual cost of studying for a degree will double by 2012 – having already risen 300 per cent since 1988, through a combination of grant cuts, rising living costs and tuition fees, which the government last week confirmed would increase to a maximum £9,000 per year. The news comes as thousands of students prepare to march on Westminster today to protest the coalition’s “looming, savage education cuts”.
Government projections show there will be more than 250,000 new households every year over the decade to 2020, the result of growth in the number of single person households, increasing life expectancy and net migration. Building 110,000 new homes in 2009 clearly falls far short of this.
Independent research commissioned by the housing charity Shelter from the University of Cambridge today shows that the number of London neighbourhoods that will be affordable to people claiming local housing allowance will halve by 2016 as a result of government cuts.
Today is the official launch of an independent inquiry into high pay. The aptly named High Pay Commission has been established by Compass and is supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust. To mark the launch the commission conducted private polling with YouGov which had some remarkable results.
Fast-growing small businesses are the latest group to speak out against the immigration cap, saying the restrictions on hiring non-EU migrants are forcing them to turn away work because they are unable to hire the right people. The news follows twin criticisms of the cap last week from the prime minister’s election speechwriter and the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee.
Our guest writer is Tom Yates, a working NHS doctor Last month, health minister Andrew Lansley said his Department would “tell Parliament in due course” whether it intends to implement measures, contained in the 2009 Health Act, banning cigarette vendingtest
