Steven Rose

Unfortunately, the country has once again found itself in the midst of another Brexit debate. Perhaps this was inevitable - both the UK and the EU seem to have chosen brinkmanship as their negotiation tactic of choice, both in negotiating the Withdrawal Agreement last year, and in negotiating two party’s parties’ future relationship now. That we’ve reached a similar impasse to that we saw last year is unsurprising. What is more surprising is the way that the situation seems to have followed the logic of a lazy television series. Each successive series finale raises the stakes higher and higher; the action becomes more and more implausible. As last year, we have all of the concerns of lines of thousands of lorries at Dover, damage to just-in-time supply chains, food prices skyrocketing, and harm to businesses and jobs in the UK that rely on trade with the EU. What renders this situation different from that in which we found ourselves last year is the Internal Market bill, a piece of l...

Introduction. Spending commitments. Addressing climate change. Broadband as modern infrastructure investment. Education for life. Regressive policies. Where is the welfare system? Raising revenue. 95% is a good and untruthful line. Corporate tax. Worker’s shares policy is a second corporate tax. The average citizen and tax. Issues of personal interest. Brexit policy. Council tax. Trust on foreign policy. Paternity leave. Conclusion. Introduction. The 2019 Labour manifesto has been met with the support of 160 economists and the adoration of the party rank and file. It is a bold document designed to attack - and attack hard - in order to make up the current gap in the polls between Labour and the Conservatives. Contrast this with the Conservatives, who have chosen to put out a manifesto sparse on content and detail, presumably hoping to ride their current lead through to December 12th.  While the manifesto is clearly radical in the rate of spending increases...