UK on track for 300-year tax high, shows CPS analysis
Following Rachel Reeves’ Budget on Wednesday, a new report from the Centre for Policy Studies shows that state spending will sit at an astonishing £1.5 trillion by 2029/30 Labour is also choking off growth, with the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) predicting another five years of mediocre growth and squeezed living standards. Instead of topping… View Article
CPS Director responds to the Budget
Responding to the Chancellor’s Budget, CPS Director Robert Colvile said: ‘Labour came into power promising to secure the highest sustained growth in the G7. And the Chancellor opened her Budget by saying that the route to growth was to ‘Invest. Invest. Invest’. But by hammering the private sector, she has delivered a Budget which –… View Article
Left-leaning bias ‘commonplace’ in AI powered chatbots, shows new report
In just a few short years Artificial Intelligence-powered Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT and Gemini have moved from the realms of science-fiction to the screens of our smartphones As people shift from traditional search engines, which provide a range of results, to LLMs which provide what may appear to be a definitive summation,… View Article
Labour’s tax changes could cause UK tax competitiveness to plummet
The UK ranks a dismal 30th out of 38 OECD countries in the 2024 edition of the International Tax Competitiveness Index, published today by the US-based Tax Foundation This extremely poor ranking – below countries like Hungary (7th), Czechia (8th), and Germany (15th) – undermines the UK’s attractiveness to investors, and the Government’s stated aim… View Article
Government urged to fix ‘infrastructure inertia’
One of Britain’s most pressing problems, as the new government has acknowledged, is how difficult it is to build the infrastructure we need. Infrastructure in Britain is much harder to build than it was historically or than it is today in continental Europe Notoriously, the Lower Thames Crossing has spent 15 years in planning, at… View Article
Net zero costing ‘billions of pounds more than it needs to’, says former Conservative minister
British energy bills are inflated with extra costs imposed by clunky old rules about how power is generated, regulated, traded, stored and transmitted With modernisation, energy bills could be cheaper, subsidies could be lower, British manufacturing could be more competitive, and the country would be on a much cheaper path to Net Zero A new… View Article
CPS responds to Reeves’ conference speech
Responding to the Chancellor’s speech to Labour Party conference, CPS Research Director Karl Williams said: ‘The Chancellor has rightly put growth at the heart of her speech today but she seems blind to the impossibility of achieving the growth this country needs while talking down our economic performance and bracing the country for a painful… View Article
Britain’s real black hole is far larger than £22bn – and far harder to close
Rachel Reeves has warned of a £22 billion ‘black hole’ in the public finances. But the reports published today by the Office for Budget Responsibility and Lord Darzi show that the real black hole is far larger – and driven by the cavernous gap between Britain’s spending commitments and its growth rates. The Office for… View Article
Britain’s growth does not depend on the EU says leading economist
All major parties acknowledge that achieving sustained economic growth is key to the country’s success but disagree on how to achieve it The Government is seeking a new deal with the EU, with the Prime Minister talking of resetting relationships at the recent European Political Community conferenceIn some quarters, Brexit is still blamed for recent… View Article
CPS responds to Labour housing announcements
Responding to the announcement of a draft new National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), CPS Director Robert Colvile said: ‘This announcement contains some overwhelmingly positive changes, many of which the Centre for Policy Studies and others have been calling for for some time. Reviewing green belt land, streamlining planning, forcing local authorities to have up-to-date local… View Article
CPS: Labour is paving the way for tax rises
Responding to the Chancellor’s statement following a review of the public finances, CPS Director Robert Colvile, said: ‘The war of words between Rachel Reeves and Jeremy Hunt should not obscure the most important consequence of what we heard – that Labour is set to increase taxes at the October Budget. ‘The Chancellor is presenting this… View Article
CPS responds to King’s Speech housing announcements
Responding to the planning reforms announced in the King’s Speech this morning, Samuel Hughes, CPS Head of Housing, said: ‘Britain needs a huge increase in housebuilding, focussed in the places where it is needed most, like London and the South East. It is therefore welcome to see the Government being ambitious in its proposals, but… View Article
CPS welcomes Chancellor’s focus on planning reform
Responding to the new Chancellor’s speech this morning, Robert Colvile, CPS Director, said: ‘Rachel Reeves is absolutely right to focus on the need for growth, and reforming the planning system as key to unlocking that growth. The devil will be in the detail, but today’s announcements on speeding up infrastructure delivery and holding councils’ feet… View Article
CPS warns of UK’s ‘first deepfake election’
With voters heading to the polls in just a matter of weeks, a new report warns that this could become the UK’s first deepfake election A number of deepfakes have already appeared online in recent weeks aimed at spreading election disinformation A deepfake video purported to show Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting calling Diane Abbott… View Article
Tax cuts for parents ‘extremely welcome’ says CPS Director
Responding to the Conservatives’ pledge to cut taxes for parents, CPS Director Robert Colvile said: ‘The Conservatives’ decision to tackle the unfairness of the high-income child benefit tax charge is extremely welcome. As the CPS identified in its recent paper ‘Family-Friendly Taxation’, this is a hugely unfair measure which results in parents paying higher marginal… View Article
CPS welcomes migration proposals
In response to the Conservative Party’s announcements on immigration policy, CPS Research Director Karl Williams said: ‘The Conservatives’ announcement of an annual migration budget, voted on by Parliament, is a welcome step in the right direction. That is why an annual migration budget was one of the core recommendations of the CPS’s recent report on… View Article