One of the daftest sayings I hear regularly is “you can’t rewrite history”. History is continually in the process of being re-written. Each generation writes its own history books and it looks afresh at the past. They find new perspectives, new sources, new ideas. As new events unfold we look differently at older ones, for… Read More Woke, Statues, and History | My family and the slave trade
Dominic Cummings has been giving evidence to the Commons Science and Technology select committee. He remains unshakable in his belief in his own genius, even though it is obvious to everyone that the Government has performed loads better since he left. The Government won’t hold an inquiry into Covid until next year at the soonest,… Read More Dominic Cummings and the NHS | Do we believe him? | Does it matter?
The usual 12 multiple choice questions, plus 5 bonus questions on Eurovision
This weeks Queens Speech introduced us to another bad idea. Voter ID. On the surface this seems pretty straight forward – why not force people to show ID to vote? Most people have ID, and lots of people (including me) carry it with them every day. Whats the problem? To understand why it is such… Read More Voter ID | A disaster waiting to happen
This is Boris as a newly elected PM 18 months ago telling the world that he had a plan to fix the crisis engulfing residential and domiciliary care for older people. Since then we have had no plan, and now there is an announcement in this weeks Queens speech that “Proposals on reforms to social… Read More Social Care Crisis | No plan, no clue
The Greensill scandal isn’t going away with further revelations about lobbying and inquiries. There are still some big questions that stick in my mind; What was Greensill’s actual business? How did they plan to make money? Warning: Contains full frontal accountancy Greensill liked to describe themselves as a fin-tech company, but their business model was… Read More Greensill P2 | Credit Crunch economics
The usual format. 12 questions each with a selection of vaguely familiar sounds answers. The worst thing you can do is double guess yourself. Or is it?
This weeks Daily Mirror covers the evolving mess that is Kickstart – the Government’s £2bn flagship scheme to help young people who are out of work. Of course you read it all here first: We are still not allowed to join Kickstart, and I believe that thousands of other small businesses are in the same… Read More Kickstart | More failure, less accountability
Yet another blog about hapless hospital botherer and haunted dishcloth Matt Hancock This week the Government announced an inquiry into the relationship between Greensill Capital, David Cameron and Boris Johnson’s Government. Most of the questions the press are asking are about the relationship between Cameron, Rishi Sunak and Greensill over Covid loans. But there is… Read More The real threat to the NHS | Greensill, Topwood and Matt Hancock
It’s one year since Keir Starmer became leader of the Labour Party, and newspapers have been full of lengthy profile pieces trying to work out if he is doing badly. I haven’t changed my view that I set out at the start of the year: Starmer has by far and away the biggest problem in… Read More Starmer | One year on, no way back