The government was forced this week to abandon a vote on a timetable for the Lords Reform Bill, kicking reform of the upper chamber into the long grass once more. Why didn't Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg propose a genuinely democratic House of Lords as part of a plan for a clean, strong politic
The challenge for UK firms is a serious one - how to conform to the industry’s best practices which they preach in a country where the standard practice is so poor?
This week, Alex Nunns, campaigner with Keep Our NHS Public, was headhunted for a job at private health firm Care UK. His proposal? A new coporate motto: ‘Providing less, for more’.
As G4S and Serco, both accused of human rights abuses, bid for a contract tendered by two English police authorities, protestors rally to pressure the West Midlands Police Authority to reject the bids on grounds of 'grave misconduct'.
The punitive language of retribution ignores common sense, justice and compelling evidence of what works, and the new language of the market degrades our penal system, demeaning the tens of thousands of people within its walls.
In light of the LIBOR scandal, UK media has paid little attention to the formation of the European Stability Mechanism, an autonomous body which will take over the handling of banking loans from governments across the Eurozone. In a context of interest rate fixing and widespread dodgy accounting,
It’s no joke — the world’s biggest security company is training immigration staff in “Keeping Children Safe”. • G4S "invited" to deliver training without competition. • UK Border Agency executives "delighted" and "couldn't have been more complimentary". • G4S has record of harming children and adu
As the number of families in Britain with at least one working parent fall below the poverty threshold and 'payday loans' show a steep rise, Barbara Gunnell asks : who benefits from the British bargain-basement low-wage economy?
Britain's most senior judges are far removed from the make-up of the general population. The first new appointment to the Supreme Court, Eton-educated Jonathan Sumption, fits the general mould. But more than his astronomical wealth, his beliefs on the proper limitations of the judicial process are
The Euro was the ultimate in supply side economics, designed to perform exactly as it has done in an economic crisis - strip away traditional economic tools of recovery and push states into "internal devaluation", privatisation and attacks on labour rights. It's performing perfectly.
Underpinning the Euro crisis is a collection of mismatches, of cultures, institutions, expectations and norms between varied European actors and, critically, debtors and creditors. Europe will not survive without unification to smoothe and manage these differences, but it need not be as painful or
Bob Diamond, ex-Barclays chief, defends himself by saying he got a nod and a wink from the Bank of England and the Treasury, all of whom were happy to see LIBOR fixing as a "noble lie". It wasn't. The lie just shows how ignoble was the system it sought to uphold.
