Michael Simmons is The Spectator's economics editor
The Chancellor’s black hole is getting bigger and tax rises are coming. That’s the judgement of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) whose model of the UK economy has forecast she must find £50 billion of revenue or cuts if she’s to return to the £9.9 billion of fiscal headroom she left
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Is the Online Safety Act protecting children – or threatening free speech? Michael Simmons hosts John Power, who writes the Spectator’s cover piece this week on how the Act has inadvertently created online censorship. Implemented and defended by the current Labour government, it is actually the result of legislation passed by the Conservatives in 2023
12 min listen
John O’Neill and Sam McPhail, the Spectator’s research and data team, join economics editor Michael Simmons to re-introduce listeners to the Spectator’s data hub. They take us through the process between the data hub and how their work feeds into the weekly magazine. From crime to migration, which statistics are the most controversial? Why can’t
27 min listen
On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Michael Simmons argues that Trump is winning the tariff war with China; Kapil Komireddi reviews Robert Ivermee’s Glorious Failure: The Forgotten History of French Imperialism in India; Margaret Mitchell watches a Channel 4 documentary on Bonnie Blue and provides a warning to parents; David Abulafia provides his notes on
Stockholm This week, the fate of the global economy could have been decided over a Mongolian barbecue in a Stockholm tourist trap. On Tuesday, just 50 yards from Sweden’s seat of government, Rosenbad – where the US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and the Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng had been wrangling over trade negotiations –
Stockholm, Sweden The United States and China have concluded two days of trade negotiations in Stockholm without reaching an agreement to extend the truce in their ongoing trade war. Shortly after the talks ended, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who led the American delegation, told reporters that any decision to extend the current 12 August
The UK has finally signed a free-trade deal with India after three-and-a-half years of negotiation. The agreement will open up trade for cars, whisky, clothing and food products, with ministers claiming it will boost the British economy by £4.8 billion. For Keir Starmer, it offers much-needed economic and political good news. For Indian prime minister
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As MPs depart Westminster for parliamentary recess, The Spectator’s political sketch writer Madeline Grant joins Natasha Feroze and economics editor Michael Simmons to talk about how to sketch PMQs and why Keir Starmer makes for the best sketches. Also on the podcast, Michael Simmons looks at the promising FTSE at record high following Trump’s trade
Britain is continuing to chuck billions onto our mounting pile of debt. Figures just released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that last month the state had to borrow just under £21 billion. That was £6.6 billion more than in June last year and the second-highest June borrowing total since records began 32 years ago.
Deep fried prawn balls, chicken chow mein, crispy shredded beef and a Ponzi scheme could be about to win the Chancellor a decent chunk of her headroom back. If Reeves does press ‘sell’, she will be accused of ‘pulling a Gordon Brown’ As Rachel Reeves starts sketching out her autumn Budget, most of the focus
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First up: how the Bank of England wrecked the economy Britain’s economy is teetering on the brink of a deep fiscal hole, created by billions of pounds of unfunded spending – never-ending health promises, a spiralling welfare bill and a triple lock on the state pension, which will cost three times as much as originally
Unemployment has hit 4.7 per cent – its highest level for four years after the Chancellor’s taxes on business caused jobs to slump. The figures, published this morning by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), also show payroll jobs down by 178,000 in the 12 months to June and by 41,000 between May and June.
In February 2020, a few weeks before Britain was thrown into lockdown, Sajid Javid resigned as chancellor of the exchequer over a bust-up with the prime minister’s chief adviser, Dominic Cummings. The fight was thought to be over Cummings’s attempts to dictate who could and could not work in No. 11. In fact, it was
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Last night, Rachel Reeves was the headline act at the Mansion House dinner. In her speech, she made the case that ‘Britain is open for business’ and that we must ‘stay competitive in the global economy’. Critics would say it is hard to claim to be open for business while having also overseen a £25
The rate of inflation climbed to 3.6 per cent in June – up from 3.4 per cent in May. That’s well above the 2 per cent target that the Bank of England consistently misses. It begs the question why the Bank’s governor, Andrew Bailey, spent the weekend talking up rate cuts, when as one former
Rachel Reeves wants Britain to become a shareholder democracy. In her annual Mansion House speech to the City’s bankers, accountants and financial advisors, she said ‘for too long, we have presented investment in too negative a light’. She’s right. These changes are unlikely to unleash the ‘big bang’ of prosperity and tax revenues the Chancellor
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Tomorrow Rachel Reeves will deliver her big speech in the City. The annual Mansion House address is a chance for the Chancellor to set out her vision for the British economy. But amid a gloomy set of economic indicators (including two consecutive monthly GDP contractions) it is difficult to see what good news she can
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As Labour looks to get a grip on public spending, one rebellion gives way to another with the changes to the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) system threatening to become welfare round two. On this week’s Saturday edition of Coffee House Shots, Lucy Dunn is joined by The Spectator’s Michael Simmons and former Ofsted
15 min listen
On today’s podcast: sacré bleu – we have a one-in, one-out migration deal with France. In a press conference yesterday, Keir Starmer and President Macron announced a deal they hope will curb Channel crossings. But, as ever, the devil is in the detail, with some key concerns about the numbers and the time frame. Digital
The string of bleak economic updates continues. First we had the dire report by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) into fiscal risks, which showed how we’re hurtling towards financial disaster. Now we’ve got figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) that reveal the economy shrank in May – the second month in a