Andy Burnham, meet Adam Smith
Plus: Ofcom is coming for your YouTube feed, and equal pay gets madder
How high can you fail upwards? Keir Starmer has rewarded the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan with a peerage in his resignation honours. Some say it could even be the first step to Khan joining the new Burnham Cabinet from the Lords. Just don’t mention his record on housebuilding.
Meanwhile, Starmer’s government has announced today that it is nationalising British Steel. See our Stat of the Day on how much you pay every day to keep Scunthorpe’s blast furnaces going. The Shadow Business Secretary Andrew Griffith had thoughts.
All eyes are on Shabana Mahmood, who is now the frontrunner to be Burnham’s Chancellor. She won’t have much room for manoeuvre. The IMF warned Burnham today that he can’t afford to raise public spending. If he and Mahmood need ideas on what to do instead, James Price wrote for CapX today on why Adam Smith beats Manchesterism – and without the need for new bus liveries or Oasis quotes.
Below you’ll find all the latest pieces from CapX, plus what we’re reading from around the web.
Marc Sidwell
Editor, CapX
Today’s Takes
Fresh thinking from CapX
Forget Manchesterism – try Adam Smith
James Price
‘Burnham and Labour seem biologically incapable of understanding growth.’
Growth manifestos aimed at Andy Burnham’s new government are doing the rounds. These plans are full of convolutions: levies shuffled onto general taxation, cliff edges tapered, new bills, new bodies, new missions. All because the obvious answer to Britain’s stagnation – the state should do less – is ideologically unsayable for the Left. Read More
The regulator shouldn’t rig your YouTube feed
Jack Rankin
‘Ofcom is trying to decide what people see rather than leaving it to normal people themselves.’
Rather than letting people choose between freely-competing broadcasters, Ofcom wants to put a thumb on the scale for favoured ‘trustworthy’ sources, even on third-party platforms like YouTube. Smart TVs are covered too. But this will crush the competition and choice the sector needs. Read More
Stat of the day
Best of the Web
Why Britain's war on obesity isn't working
Christopher Snowdon, The Critic
‘Public health isn’t a results-driven business, and you can avoid awkward conversations about the total failure of every anti-obesity policy to date.’
Britain leads the world in junk food restrictions, and none of them work. In the last 20 years, the government has introduced ad limits, sugar taxes, labelling schemes and promotion bans on HFSS foods, yet the epidemic continues. Now MPs are calling for even more of the same policies, straight from the ‘public health’ playbook. Read More
Can the Tories fake authenticity?
John Oxley, ConservativeHome
‘Andy Burnham’s “authentic” branding has helped him not only return to Westminster but also come back to the top job.’
It was once said sincerity was the key to political success: once you could fake that, you had made it. Authenticity has taken its place. Andy Burnham and Nigel Farage have succeeded by carefully constructing personal brands that come across to voters as ‘how they really are’. Conservatives need to do the same. Read More
Matt Ridley: AI won't fix the Civil Service
The Capitalist: Lilico – why Starmer failed
And if you want more...
– What has the free market done for women? (Past Imperfect)
– The equal pay madness just got madder (Marginal Revolution)
– The torture of watching the big game in Buenos Aires (The Telegraph)
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