Amol Rajan, whom I have had cause to praise previously, wrote last week about Coca-Cola’s self-serving ‘anti-obesity campaign’. While much of what he writes is refreshingly scathing, I would take issue with the following statement: [Coke] is a massive corporation that exists to make huge profits. This is fine by me, because I like big corporations: […]
We knew the press barons (and they are literally barons, in some cases – as we shall see) didn’t like the proposed arrangements for organising press regulation agreed last month between the three main political parties. This arrangement was in the form of a Royal Charter (an arcane form of legislation introduced not by the […]
As Kawan Patel suggested on LabourList a few days ago, New Labour was founded on the idea that while Margaret Thatcher might not have ‘saved the nation’ as her Conservative supporters claim, there were things she ‘got right’. I believe that this focus on the specifics of the Thatcherite legacy, such as privatisation and reductions […]
This article is on 3 pages, and you can go to the next page you want by clicking on the relevant number at the bottom of each page. The report of the Leveson inquiry into the Culture, Practice and Ethics of the Press is expected to be delivered next week. I am publishing here a fuller version […]
I am publishing here a paper on ‘Welfare Myths and Welfare Facts’ (pdf 65kb). This is a summary, but please read the complete paper. The belief, held by nearly one third of the population according to polling figures, that at least half of welfare claimants are either fraudulent or are refusing suitable work when offered, […]
That’s where the real constitutional debate needs to be – around a radical constitutional option that puts Scotland back into the hands of its people: devo-local, if you like. Trevor Davies, The Scotsman 10/5/2012 [Politicians] see themselves as propping up something which is tottering rather than letting citizens build anew something that is soundly […]
There’s a funny little Panglossian piece by Tory peer and former minister Michael Bates on ConservativeHome. If it’s any indication of the thinking going on among ministers at present, however, it’s deeply worrying. The ex-Paymaster General displays an extraordinary lack of understanding of basic economic accounting and logic. His main idea is that despite the […]
Since my post Leveson, the Press and Labour there have been further developments. The Prince Harry photos episode was hardly edifying for the press or the Royal Family. That the Sun editor could claim that publishing these photos of a silly over-privileged young man was somehow ‘about the freedom of the press’ should re-inforce my main point. The primary […]
This post is on 2 pages. Please click on the appropriate page number at bottom of text to navigate. There’s a very interesting take on UK unemployment trends in the July NIESR Review, written by the NIESR director Jonathan Portes. One should perhaps bear in mind that he has previously worked to formulate employment policy […]
This post was published on LabourList on 16th August 2012, under the title ‘Labour must free the Press’. The first instalment of Lord Leveson’s inquiry report into the Culture, Practice and Ethics of the Press is due in the autumn. It’s vital that Labour are ready to argue for a truly free press. We should […]