DWP mandarins racked up £96,515 in expenses over just three months, with 517 claims filed by 65 officials between October and December last year. They spent nearly £11,000 on away days alone, and one official checked into hotels for roughly 25 nights in a single quarter. Almost an entire month…
The single biggest claim was £1,072 for a “Transformation Workshop” in London, of which £859 was spent on transport alone via a private car and train tickets. One official claimed £660 for a single night’s stay at a conference in St Andrews. Another topped the spending chart at £6,798 across 37 claims, with £4,631 on hotels and meals. Wasn’t this government supposed to crack down on this kind of spending?
Business activity in the UK is getting whacked as we approach the end of the quarter, according to figures published today. The S&P Global Flash UK PMI composite output index – which gauges activity in the privately-held manufacturing and services sectors – fell to six-month lows. Chris Williamson, chief business economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence, said:
“The war in the Middle East has hit the UK economy in March, stalling growth while driving inflation sharply higher. The acceleration in cost growth in the manufacturing sector was especially severe, being the sharpest since the depreciation of sterling following Black Wednesday in 1992.”
A weak Labour government, at times like this, depresses activity yet further…
Rachel Reeves has gone through a Damascene conversion on energy bills. As of today, her position is the Truss-era universal cap was a “mistake” because it benefitted the wealthy and added to the national debt. She is right: the taxpayer should never be paying to heat millionaires’ swimming pools. She didn’t say this in opposition.
In fact, here is what she said in 2022 when the then-Chancellor Jeremy Hunt cut the Energy Price Guarantee from two years to six months:
“Today, the Chancellor has scaled back help with energy bills for families and pensioners. It prompts the question yet again: why will the Government not bring in a proper windfall tax on energy producers to help foot the bill for consumers, and when will the current Chancellor publish in full the Government’s estimates of the windfall profits of the energy giants over the next two years?”
When the cap was set to rise to £3,000, she also went on the attack. Apparently under a Labour government, it would have stayed at £2,500. At no point did she criticise the universal rollout. To stand at the despatch box and attack a policy she previously claimed did not go far enough is astonishing. Or at least it would be, if it wasn’t the usual routine nowadays…
It looks like ‘plan’ was the wrong word…
The summary:
• Inflation could hit 3-3.5% over coming quarters due to the Iran war.
• Boasted about government investment in renewables for energy security, while claiming domestic oil and gas must “play a role for decades to come”. Still no drilling in the North Sea…
• Committed to speeding up nuclear energy expansion.
• Exploring government-backed indemnities for critical energy projects so construction continues even if legally challenged. Sure…
• Aims to reach a Sanitary and Phytosanitary agreement with the EU this year, which she insists will lower shop prices.
• Meeting supermarket and bank bosses later this week to discuss supporting customers.
• CMA has “stepped up” monitoring of fuel prices and launched a market study into heating oil.
• CMA to be given new “time-limited, targeted powers” under an “anti-profiteering framework” to crack down on ‘price gouging’.
• Said the government is looking at means-tested support rather than universal. No specifics yet, because they haven’t actually worked it out.
Robert Colvile is stepping down as Director of the Centre for Policy Studies after more than eight years in the top job. Another big departure in wonk world…
Colvile said today:
“It’s been the honour of my life to lead the CPS, and in particular to help see it through its 50th anniversary. I’m hugely grateful to Maurice Saatchi and Michael Spencer for, respectively, giving me the job and letting me keep it – and to all those I’ve worked with over the years. It’s with a very heavy heart that I’ve made the decision to step down, but I look forward to continuing to be involved with the CPS, and to seeing it continue to flourish.”
Colvile is staying in post while the board hunts for a successor, and will continue working with the CPS on a new policy programme on business and enterprise. Guido wishes Robert the best. Another runners and riders post is due…
New polling from More in Common shows Green voters are far more likely to back Iran over Israel and the US, with 38% taking the Iranian side compared to just 4% backing the Americans and the Israelis. 40% back neither side and 6% judge both equally. The Green support for the Iranian side is more than twice as high as any other voting group…
As the chart above shows, Reform voters are far more likely to back the American position. Overall, however, most Brits sympathise with neither side at all…
Sarah Pochin at Reform Scotland’s manifesto launch event: “I really wanted to come on in a Reform tartan burka, but apparently I wasn’t allowed… One day let’s do one of these events not live-streamed. We’ll do all the naughty stuff…”
