The Conservatives and Labour have made defence and national security core planks of their election campaigns. The Prime Minister and Keir Starmer have told the public that we are all living in a more dangerous and volatile world – with war in Europe, crises in the Middle East and an epoch-defining challenge in Asia. An […]
In February, our Civitas paper Inadvertently Arming China? revealed the widespread sponsorship of scientific research centres in UK universities by conglomerates and elite universities linked to the Chinese military. Some of the Chinese firms that sponsor our universities produce weapons of mass destruction including intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads; others produce strike fighter engines, military […]
Boris Johnson’s government is already accused of using Covid to sideline Parliament. But the Government’s plans are much more troubling than most people realise. Amid the disturbing “new normal” of mass surveillance, government will today push a bill through the Commons whose implications are chilling. The Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Bill would authorise […]
In London last week, NATO leaders discussed for the first time “the challenges and opportunities posed by China”. There is every reason China discussions are moving from narrow trade forums to hard power organisations that are not even traditionally focused on the Pacific. What James Mann of Johns Hopkins University has called the “soothing scenario” […]
Britain’s housing crisis is unique in the Western world: in the 1970s, the average buyer needed under three gross annual salaries for a house. Now they need over seven. In my recent book Raising the Roof, co-authored with Jacob Rees-Mogg, one of the central theses is that the cause of this housing crisis is found in […]
Britain’s housing crisis is uniquely severe. We build houses more slowly than anyone else, we have seen a fastest house price rise than any developed country, and our homes are the most expensive houses compared to the average salary. Quite a record. Britain’s unique inability to build houses and our unrivalled centralisation is not a […]
This week CapX is republishing some of our favourite articles of the year. This piece first appeared on August 21. Living on our planet is more enjoyable than it used to be in almost all respects. We live longer, we are healthier, we learn more, and we enjoy greater comfort. The one exception is what […]
Living on our planet is more enjoyable than it used to be in almost all respects. We live longer, we are healthier, we learn more, and we enjoy greater comfort. The one exception is what we see. From the Stone Age to St Mark’s Square, human beings spent millennia learning to make more beautiful things. […]
In a few short weeks, Britain will begin negotiations with the EU on how we will trade in the years ahead; in the next three years, the return of Britain’s capacity for self-government will give us the chance to trade freely with the rest of the world once more. To grasp these opportunities will require […]
Just over a hundred years ago, in the early years of the 20th century, tens of thousands of people gathered at a series of rallies. Their cause was free trade; they were there to commemorate Richard Cobden and John Bright’s successful campaign to abolish the Corn Laws. These tariffs on imported grain had kept the […]
