Geeks and hackers are transforming healthcare and saving our economy July 23, 2013 THE future of healthcare is taking shape. But it’s not being invented in drug company labs or planned by the NHS. Amateurs, obsessives and hackers are leading the charge. It’s a movement that will help us live longer – and could save the economy. It’s all happening through a combination of new gadgets, the power [...]
An era-spanning masterpiece August 15, 2013 THEATRE THE PRIDE Trafalgar Studios | By Xenobe Purvis Four Stars ALEXI Kaye Campbell’s award-winning The Pride gets a powerful revival as part of Jamie Lloyd’s Trafalgar Transformed season at Trafalgar Studios. The play’s protagonists Oliver, Philip and Sylvia exist in two time periods, the 1950s and now, and respond to the social pressures encountered [...]
The rapid rise of the food bank can’t just be blamed on government austerity June 12, 2013 FOOD banks are a rapidly growing phenomenon in the UK. A few years ago, they barely existed, but an estimated half a million people now make use of them every week. On the face of it, it seems that poverty has sadly become endemic since the financial crisis, with many families unable even to feed [...]
What the other papers say this morning February 21, 2013 FINANCIAL TIMES Twitter tries new tool to unlock ads Twitter has unveiled a new automated advertising technology that promises to unlock the moneymaking potential of the microblogging site. The development of a Twitter ads API, or “application-programming interface”, satisfies a long-awaited desire of advertisers to increase and improve the reach of their marketing messages to [...]
Households expect even worse squeeze on finances is coming February 17, 2013 HOUSEHOLD budgets dipped once more in February, and look set to get even worse in coming months. Markit’s headline household finance index was stuck at 37.7 in February, the same level as January and deep below the 50 threshold that indicates no change in households’ situations. And the economics consultancy’s outlook index, which focuses on [...]
Babies born today can expect a long expensive future November 15, 2012 BRITAIN faces many challenges, but none more daunting than our ageing society and the financial challenges it will create for future generations. There were 807,766 live births in the UK in the past year, and the Office of National Statistics (ONS) predicts that one in three will live to be 100 years old. Today there [...]
The real reasons why living costs are still going up October 31, 2012 ED MILIBAND is said to want to fight the next election on the issue of living standards. This week a report by the Resolution Foundation gave him the intellectual ammunition he needed. It highlighted how income growth for middle and low income households will be constrained by technological and global pressures and the continued structural [...]
Zombie firms, tax hikes and HS2 all dragging the UK down January 28, 2013 THERE is much that the coalition has done that is helping the economy. Its reforms to education and welfare will, over time, improve the workforce’s skills and reduce the number of people trapped in dependency. Cutting the top rate of tax, which kicks in in April, and the increases to the personal allowance, which have [...]
End universal benefits and cut tax to rebuild UK future March 15, 2013 THE pre-Budget period is often typified by a cacophony of measures, ranging from the incisive to the interesting to the idiotic. But a focus on individual measures can cause us to lose sight of more fundamental themes. As such, I want to talk about the “why” in the economic debate, not only the “how”. Our [...]
The coalition’s lack of purpose has ruined our freedom to fail or thrive January 6, 2013 A SOCIETY must provide its people with certain basics, including security, food and shelter. A civilised society should also provide freedom. There is no precise definition of the term, but it is basically a status that allows people to do what they want, provided they do not interfere with the freedom of others. A market [...]