Jump in confidence to drive spending splurge Household and business confidence has rebounded to levels not seen since the start of the pandemic thanks to the rapid deployment of Covid-19 vaccines. The improving sentiment will raise hopes that the economy is poised for a robust recovery when restrictions are largely phased out in the summer. Consumer confidence

With Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s increases set to take the overall tax burden to 35 per cent of GDP by 2025/26 – the highest level since the late 1960s under Labour Chancellor Roy Jenkins – it is clear he is planning to get public finances back on a sound footing. But, in his Budget statement yesterday,

Rishi Sunak’s £400bn balancing act: With the Budget fast approaching, here’s how the Chancellor can raise revenues without wrecking the Covid recovery The last new tax proposed by an economist was the poll tax. That didn’t end well. So it is with trepidation that I put forward suggestions for Chancellor Rushi Sunak, on how to

An estimated 1.8 million businesses could be at risk of insolvency as a result of pandemic-related disruption, including 336,000 that face a high risk of going bust, research has found. The winter wave of Covid-19 has resulted in business sentiment taking a fresh battering in January, with only about one in three companies reporting positive trading conditions,

Telecoms company BT’s Openreach division is accelerating the roll-out of its gigabit-capable full fibre broadband across the UK, with the aim of connecting 20 million households and firms to the network within the next 10 years. Gigabit-capable full fibre broadband provides the fastest and most reliable connection to the internet. As the pandemic and social

My colleagues and I at the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr) are quite optimistic about the pace of the UK recovery once lockdown ends. The accumulated household savings at the end of 2020 had built up to £200 billion and will be more by the time we are let loose in a few

View the full article here. Significant expansion expected in milestone year After a tumultuous year that most people would prefer to forget, what now for 2021? As the new year begins, the pandemic still looms large, with the number of cases continuing to rise sharply in many Western countries. China was the only major economy

View the full article here. China and the US have vied for economic superiority but the pandemic has “tipped the rivalry in China’s favour”. China is set to overtake the US to become the world’s biggest economy five years earlier than previously thought, thanks in part to its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, according to

View the full article here. Britain has retaken fifth place in the rankings of the world’s biggest economies despite suffering one of the deepest recessions in the pandemic. According to the annual league table produced by a leading British economics consultancy, the UK has leapfrogged India and will accelerate away from France in the decade after Brexit.

Research out today claims that shoppers will spend 10 per cent more on presents and other items this Christmas.   However, the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) says that overall spending over Christmas is set to decline by 7 per cent this year with the entertainment and hospitality sectors expected to lose out. Spending on

RAISING fuel duty will crash the economy by over £600 million, cost the nation around 8,000 jobs and hit the White Van Man hardest according to a new report.   Chancellor Rishi Sunak is thought to be mulling over increasing the tax by two to three pence, but the Centre for Economics and Business Research say

Chancellor Rishi Sunak is considering ending a ten-year freeze on the levy It claimed 2p could be added to a duty that has stood at 57.95p since 2011 Change believed necessary to pay for Covid black hole in nation’s finances   A rise in fuel duty will only be of ‘miniscule’ benefit to the nation’s

In 1989 I answered my first mobile phone call on Oxford Street using a brick-sized Motorola borrowed from work. Several people shouted abuse at me from passing cars.   Back then, it was also rare to make a mobile-to-mobile call. If you did, it was the main topic of conversation for the first few minutes:

Le Monde – Boris Johnson et thatchérisme – oct 2020