Ed Miliband’s populist policies will make the UK’s bad position worse October 1, 2012 OUR political climate currently mirrors our economic situation – bleak and shockingly uninspiring. At a recent breakfast for business leaders in London, a veteran newspaper journalist spoke of the challenge faced across the West as one of “unpopular governments and unconvincing oppositions”. The polls in Britain bear this out. A ComRes poll for the Independent [...]
OBITUARY: SIR DEREK WANLESS May 29, 2012 SIR Derek Wanless, a former chief executive of Nat West and director of Northern Rock at the time of its collapse, has died aged 67. Wanless, the son of a storeman at a Tyneside cement works, was born on 29 September 1947. His talent as an arithmetician saw him win a scholarship to Newcastle’s Royal Grammar School. [...]
All the West End wonders July 5, 2012 CHARIOTS OF FIRE Celebrate one of this country’s greatest ever sporting achievements this summer as Chariots of Fire, a new play, lights up the West End at the Gielgud Theatre. Adapted from the Oscar-winning movie, and featuring the original Vangelis score, this is a moving tale of rivalry, and determination in the face of prejudice [...]
Treat your career as a professional journey September 12, 2012 AS GRADUATE entrants prepare for their first weeks in the City, some might wonder whether they’ve signed up for a job or a profession. We assume that law and medicine are professions – life-long career choices with strict knowledge requirements, and professional bodies sitting in judgement over the actions of their members. Wrongly, we don’t [...]
Treat your career as a professional journey September 12, 2012 AS GRADUATE entrants prepare for their first weeks in the City, some might wonder whether they’ve signed up for a job or a profession. We assume that law and medicine are professions – life-long career choices with strict knowledge requirements, and professional bodies sitting in judgement over the actions of their members. Wrongly, we don’t [...]
Forget the dancing and eat July 16, 2012 RESTAURANT DSTRKT 9 Rupert Street, W1D 6DG www.dstrkt-london.com FOOD **** SERVICE **** atmosphere *** Cost per person without wine: £50 DSTRKT didn’t sound like my kind of place at all. It’s part nightclub and I hate those – I particularly don’t feel like clubbing after dinner. What with its club, its fancy cocktails, its caviar [...]
Virgin is ready to take on high street banks July 15, 2012 AIRLINE owners are known for being colourful characters. They have to be, given the lengths they go to make money from air travel amid surging costs, awkward regulations and fears about damaging the planet. In the current climate, the same could be said about bank owners. But Sir Richard Branson is excited at the prospect. [...]
All aboard the magnificent Orient Express August 19, 2012 ITALY’S in debt, you say? Well, I’m on the Orient Express headed straight to Venice – fiddling while Rome burns, you might say – and there’s no sign of the Italian economy crashing here. As if to prove my point, the flamboyant Massimo shows me another popular purchase from the train’s on-board shop. “These diamond [...]
An alternative paradise August 5, 2012 IT is raining on Dominica, and this is no passing shower. I’m soaked to the skin, I’ve lost the sole from my shoe and I’m covered in a reddy brown mud. Dominica, known as the “nature island”, is already turning all my preconceptions about a Caribbean “paradise” on their head. Not famous for its white [...]
Entrepreneur makes a £25m offer for station April 23, 2012 Former City worker Ajit Chambers has been in touch to say that he is being partnered by a billionaire investor to make a £25m offer for the disused Brompton Road railway station in west London. Chambers left the City to set up the Old Underground Company with a mission to make something of London’s disused [...]