Across the UK, millions of people rely on the railways to travel. From 2024 to 2025, there were 1.7 billion passenger rail journeys, of which 1.08 billion were completed within a single region. And yet all too often, local rail has been neglected, with funding prioritised for London and the South East. As a result […]
There was as much doubt about Labour’s leadership nominations as there was at the Accession Council in September 2022. Like the Privy Counsellors before them, Labour MPs have declared Andy Burnham leader with ‘one voice and consent of tongue and heart’. Although he won’t officially be declared Labour’s new leader until July 17, by securing […]
For many people, there is a brilliant piece of music or an inspiring novel that changes their life. For a freak like me, it was obviously a documentary. And of course it was a documentary about Margaret Thatcher. Released just after she died, ‘Margaret, Death of A Revolutionary’ set me on the path of believing […]
Andy Burnham said this morning how seriously he takes Alan Milburn’s review of youth unemployment. If that’s true, he should pay close attention to one of its most important findings: the cost of employment is standing in the way of businesses hiring young people. Since Labour came to power they have put up the cost […]
It’s only on the basis of truth that power should be won – or indeed can be worth winning. Margaret Thatcher, 1996 It is a hundred years since Margaret Thatcher was born in Grantham. Fifty years since she took over the Conservative Party. Almost 35 years since she was forced from office. Today’s voters are […]
Keir Starmer says he is fighting to stay. The problem is that is all he is doing. Last week’s King’s Speech was written to save his skin, not to fix anything. Take the spiralling welfare bill, which even his own Chancellor recently admitted desperately needs gripping. But there was no Welfare Bill in the King’s […]
Below is a transcript of a speech delivered by the Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride at an event hosted by the Centre for Policy Studies on May 19, 2026. . Today, our country is paying more to borrow than any other major western economy. The yield on 10-year gilts is now sitting consistently above 5%. Meanwhile, average yields […]
I was in a field in Kent as the local election results came in. As an unapologetic adherent of the metropolitan elite, it’s not my natural environment. But over the weekend it became increasingly clear that I’m not the only Londoner who’s out of touch with the rest of the country. The capital is now […]
In leisure centres and town halls across the country, the cheers of the victors can be heard alongside the half-hearted claps of the vanquished. Democracy at its most local – and for the people involved, most personal – is being played out in over 130 English councils, including every borough in London. Few beyond the […]
Britain stands at a rare strategic inflection point, embrace AI or continue on a path of sluggish economic growth for the foreseeable future. The International Monetary Fund recently forecasted that the energy shocks from the Iran war will hit the UK the hardest of the world’s advanced economies, cutting its estimates for UK growth this […]
The following is an edited transcript of Lord Wolfson’s keynote speech at the 2026 Margaret Thatcher Conference on Prosperity, organised by the Centre for Policy Studies, in which he argues that replacing Britain’s failed planning system would be the first step towards a freer, faster-growing economy. My father actually worked for Mrs Thatcher as her […]
Economic comparisons have been made in recent months with the 1970s, with fears of an energy crisis and talk of stagflation. But it’s worth focusing instead on the Thatcher revolution of the 1980s and the sea-change that then gripped the economy, with enterprise, home ownership, risk-taking and a can-do attitude to the fore. While many […]
This is the transcript of a speech delivered by the Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions during the Commons debate on the Pension Schemes Bill on April 15, 2026. Who knew that the Pension Schemes Bill would become so controversial? It is a Bill on which there was so much consensus; a Bill […]
This week saw Labour’s key benefits reforms come into force. Ministers and their outriders in the press and social media have been arguing that measures like abolishing the two-child benefit cap will cut poverty. But everybody else sees people who work paying higher taxes to fund benefits for those who don’t, with senior journalists like […]
In the year we celebrate the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith, we must also celebrate the idea that the wealth of nations and the free, fair exchange of goods and services are intricately connected. This idea is what made Britain one of the wealthiest countries in the world and – with one in three pounds […]
Nearly three years ago I launched Next Gen Tories (NGT), a pressure group to focus the Conservative Party on winning back voters under the age of 45. For too long, the Conservatives had ignored the growing problem that younger generations weren’t achieving the key milestones that might make someone feel like they have a greater […]
‘Who governs Britain?’ asked Ted Heath in the February 1974 general election, only to receive an answer he neither liked nor expected. But today, when a Prime Minister with a majority of more than 150 seats is said to be fighting for his political life; when a Cabinet Secretary departs after barely fourteen months; when […]
How times change. It was only last autumn when I outlined here in CapX how an already-sleazy new Government needed an integrity reset to clean up politics and save its own reputation at the same time. Now it is increasingly clear that we are facing a growing integrity crisis in UK politics – and the […]
How can people without capital be expected to believe in capitalism? This is the challenge of our age, as ‘own nothing and be happy’ hardens into a new dividing line in Western politics. Westminster risks ignoring the emerging political economy of housing, even as public anger grows. Green Party leader Zack Polanski is already courting […]
Britain is stuck in a growth ‘doom loop’. Public spending has ballooned, taxes are at a 70-year high and the same pattern repeats each year. The result is a country that works harder, pays more and gets less. It’s a policy environment that is hitting business hard at all levels, and is toxic for young […]
Britain’s economic debate rests on a dangerous assumption. Debt crises are things that happen elsewhere. Greece, perhaps. Argentina, certainly. But not the United Kingdom – a mature economy with its own currency, deep capital markets and centuries of institutional credibility. History offers little comfort to countries that think this way. Countries rarely enter fiscal crisis […]
Governments generally use Christmas and the New Year to bury bad news, hoping no-one will notice while they’re distracted by paper hats, mince pies and brandy butter. But this year Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook decided to ring the changes by swapping the traditional Scrooge costume for announcing glad tidings of comfort and joy instead. The […]
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