Ippr’s Tony Dolphin, a Left Foot Forward contributer, today publishes a new report called, “How to Make Capitalism Better.” The report has a number of findings but perhaps most significant are Dolphin’s conclusions, summarised in his article for Comment Istest
Tax relief on pensions costs more than £36 billion pounds a year according to TUC analysis of Treasury figures. This is heavily skewed towards the well-off – not simply because they pay more into a pension but because the relieftest
The Times report today that, “Labour is funding trade union activity inside Whitehall with millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money.” The truth, as ever, is more complicated. The practice has been in place for years and benefits from workplace representation across the public sector are estimated at £167 to £397 million.
Professor David MacKay – soon to take up post as a key adviser to Energy Secretary Ed Miliband – has poured fuel onto the media fire telling the Today programme that blackouts could be caused from a shortage in power stations around 2016. Looking at the numbers, it is difficult to see how he has come to that conclusion.
Peter Hoskin on Coffee House draws attention to the Economist’s new Global Debt Comparison feature. But the important question is not the level of debt but the cost of paying it back. Despite the fears and scaremongering from the right, the yield from 10-year British Government Securities (gilts) remain low by recent historic standards.
The world’s leading countries remain far away from their emissions targets for 2020
David Cameron mentioned the phrase “debt crisis” eight times in his speech yesterday. On Sunday, speaking on the Andrew Marr show, George Osborne said, “the difference between Britain and countries like France and Germany is that we have an absolutely enormous budget deficit.” But research used by the Conservative Party show that Britain’s debt position is far from in crisis despite their claims.
Some interesting new green noises were among the many issues addressed by Jon Cruddas in his keynote speech to Compass at the LSE yesterday evening. Cruddas, “We need to marry up the core values of the greens and the Labour movement and join the dots between democracy, equality and ecological sustainability.” He called for a reversal of the decision on the proposed third runway at Heathrow and the introduction of new emissions performance standards for power stations.
Last Autumn, at the height of the financial crisis, the Labour Government launched a fiscal stimulus despite falling tax revenues. The Irish responded in the opposite manner by cutting back spending and raising taxes.
While the OECD and other forecasters continue to pump out gloomy assessments of the outlook for the UK economy, most commentators appear not to have noticed that the decline in manufacturing activity ended as long ago as January.
