Monthly Archives: June 2010

Today’s Guardian reports on some unpublished Treasury documents which estimate the impact of the government’s planned spending cuts. According to these projections, for every public sector job lost at least one will be lost in the private sector too. Remember folks, you … Continue reading →

No, I’m serious. We should send the rest of the government, Parliament and the Civil Service up there with them. There must be an old castle or country house around there that the Queen could use too. The government has said … Continue reading →

I’ve written a couple of pieces before about our obsession with London being the world’s pre-eminent financial centre. It’s a useful shroud for the financial services industry to wave and it plays well in the British press. We used to have … Continue reading →

John Redwood proves today that having a Cambridge degree and a background in banking still doesn’t stop you from talking bollocks about the economy. “Why are there cuts when spending is going up?” he asks, “Running all the key public … Continue reading →

Remember Rose Gibb? She was the hospital chief executive who was given a payoff to quit her job after a Clostridium difficile (C.diff) outbreak in which 90 people died. After she had signed what she thought was a legally binding agreement, … Continue reading →

Hey, the good news (or not, depending on your point of view) is that public spending is going to rise from £696.8bn this year to £757.5bn in 2015-16. (See Page 45 of the budget report.) This seems to have caused confusion … Continue reading →

Unless it’s all a joke and George Osborne is just messing with us, he will be announcing big public spending cuts today. Some of the first people to notice will be those working in the public sector. According to the ONS, … Continue reading →

We’re off to a posh do tonight and this random thought occurred to me as I was getting my stuff together. Managing people is a bit like tying a bow-tie. The theory is beautifully simple. It’s the execution that’s tricky. … Continue reading →

I really want to believe all this stuff about the benefits of splitting up retail and investment banks. I’d love it to be that simple. Split the sober stable retail banks from the crazy greed-driven investment banks and our economy and our savings will be … Continue reading →

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has set up “a strong but streamlined group to drive efficiency across government”. The team, known as the Efficiency and Reform Group, is to be based in the Cabinet Office and will include Peter Gershon, … Continue reading →