“Fatta la legge. Trovato l’inganno.” (A law is made. A way round it is found.) Sicilian in origin, apparently. Fancy that. Still, who could have thought that barely days after the G7 announcement for a minimum global tax rate for large companies, it would be one of the architects of the proposal who, according to this report, is seeking to get an opt-out for financial services because the proposed tax changes might affect affect global banks headquartered in the U.K….
I live in Bedford which over the past few weeks has been singled out as a COVID hotspot and each day, later in the afternoon, I almost always check out the latest data for the borough which is all on the excellent government COVID website. One of the statistics I look at is the total number of deaths which is defined as “Number of deaths of people who had had a positive test result for COVID-19 and died within 28…
Bascially if GE2019 had been fought on these boundaries then BoJo’s majority would have been between 10 and 20 seats larger. This is because, of course, the opposition parties would see a decline at the same level thus increasing the gap by double the Tory seat gain, These probably won’t come into effect until Q3 2023 thus increasing the speculation that there could be an autumn general election in that year. Also the fact that the Tories have this bonus…
No doubt everybody will be looking first for their own seats and the chart above shows the changes by region. Where I live, Bedford, there are no changes in a seat that was narrowly held by LAB a at GE2019 and was Tory target number one. No doubt today we will see some number crunching with a notional result of what would have happened at GE2019 if the election had been fought on these new boundaries. To find detailed changes…
Maybe the weather and COVID trends are making us feel better? The net figure here is calculated by deducting the “get worse” total from the “will improve” and the chart shows how this has noved since 1988. Thus this month just over half (53%) think the economy will get better over the next 12 months (+2 from April), 31% worse (-5), giving a net Economic Optimism Index score of +22. The question now is whether this will be sustained. A…
Later on today every single MP will get a special letter directed to them alone on what is planned to happen to their seats in the new boundaries that will take effect during 2023. It won’t be till some time later that the full report is issued though we are likely to see a lot of information coming from individual MPs. This has been a long time in the making because the current boundaries are based on population returns from…
There is little doubt that the big political story between now and June 21st when the final COVID controls are due to be lifted will be whether there will be a deferment. Smarkets have now got a betting market up with deferment currently at 1.51 and the timetable being followed at 2.26. These are the rules: This market relates to whether all legal limits on social contact in England (in the context of coronavirus restrictions) will be removed on 21…
I love fish & chips so I celebrated on Friday with the God Tier dish that reflects well on my fellow Brits. This YouGov poll from 2019 does invite the following observations though 1) That a chicken tikka masala is considered a classic British food is a shocking case of cultural appropriation or excellent integration of immigrants in this country depending on your viewpoint. 2) The foods we consider God tier is why the French laugh at us and say…