Careful now
“The reasons for thinking property taxes will fail to deliver reduced volatility are a melange of some reasonable points, some basic economic theory, some casual empiricism …and a massive dose of street-fighting politics.” Alex Marsh takes issue with the latest report from Policy Exchange.
The path to the precipice
“We are blithely rushing along a path towards a fundamental change in our welfare system that will have far-reaching social and fiscal consequences. There is a perfect storm of a poorly contracted Work Programme, political rhetoric, and short-term accounting practice.” Richard Johnson looks at the debate on the next round of welfare reform.
Frontline Friday 4th October 2013: Our favourite frontline blogs this week
Here’s our list of ten frontline blogs we’ve particularly liked from the week of 30th September 2013 – from welfare reform and legal aid, to the Conservative Party conference and the Daily Mail.
Shouldn’t “Policy Exchange” be honest? “Propaganda Exchange” is more accurate
“I’m SICK of half truths and misleading sentences. Sick of cherry picked data that uses random figures to paint false pictures. Sick of assumptions about the labour market and fraud that just aren’t true.” Sue Marsh takes aim at a new report from Policy Exchange.
Empowered and free? Not me, Mr Gove!
“Michael Gove delivered a speech at The Policy Exchange, London yesterday (5th September), in which he championed both teachers and teaching. For a short while afterwards I felt a nice, warm glow of something approaching relief.” cazzypot points out the differences between the rhetoric and reality of the Coalition’s plans to empower teachers.
The political class: The alternative think tank of the year awards 2013
The Prospect magazine Think Tank of the Year Awards - the so-called ‘Oscars of the think tank world’ - were announced this week. As a guide to what the political class thinks they’re quite revealing, and a bit odd in places. Here we offer our alternative think tank awards for 2013 - the ‘Guerillas’, if you will.
The political class: think tanks and public opinion
Think tanks claim to influence the ‘climate of opinion’ - but do they, and how publicly? In the latest in our series on the political class, we look at the public profile of think tanks - or in some cases, their relative lack of profile.
How can social media enable citizens to take robust crime prevention action?
Tom Winsor is in many news bulletins today with such statements as: The primary role of the police is to prevent crime, not catch criminals, the chief inspector of constabulary for England and Wales has said (BBC News) Well, of course, we all know this and Sir Robert Peel knew that too: The basic mission for […]
Privatisation round up
The right-wing thank tank Policy Exchange held a conference recently on Payment by Results and how the Probation Service was to be privatised. Attended by all the usual suspects and addressed by both Chris Grayling and Jeremy Wright, news has been filtering out ever since. It would seem that Margaret Hodge, chair of the Public […]
Squaring the circle
“Unfortunately the big contracting boys, G4S, Serco, Amey etc all hate it. So how can the circle be squared? How can the contractors be reassured that they can make lots of money without fiddling the payment measure?” Jim Brown responds to a Policy Exchange report on how payment by results is introduced in criminal justice, and senses a commercial agenda at odds with the supposed Holy Grail of public service reform.
Housebuilding - another great failure from the Coalition
“The Government is floundering about, trying to talk up housebuilding whilst adopting policies that will reduce it further and failing to act on the real barriers to development.” Red Brick argues that the Coalition’s approach to housebuilding is focused on failed policies and misses the real issues.
Exchange policy for common sense
The month of August used to be referred to as the “silly season” by journalists owing to the fact that most of the movers and shakers who affect who we are, what we are, how rich or poor we are etc etc were holidaying that month in some place that used to be called Biarritz […]
Old wine in new bottles
“Old wine in new bottles. The practice of taking something old and dressing it up to look like something new.” The Custody Sgt criticises Policy Exchange’s latest report on policing for rehashing old policy proposals rather than understanding the reality of today’s policing.