UK

Introduction The US is on the move and the geopolitical scenario has moved quickly away from the certainties of the last ten to fifteen years. Oil could come down to a price well below US$50-per-barrel, with prices for other petrochemical products falling in concert. That would spark an economic upswing in the USA, lowering prices […]

  The United Kingdom’s prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, visited Beijing last week, leading a delegation of top British business people for meetings with President Xi Jinping. The prime minister stated “China matters,” leaving room for interpretation. A similar visit was carried out by French President Emmanuel Macron in December, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz […]

Introduction The UK government’s November 2025 Budget supplied ample corroboration of our report published by IREF in October 2025 (‘the report’), showing that the governing Labour Party plans to greatly expand the state’s direction of the UK economy.1 The means-of-control will be a decade-long programme of spending on Net Zero, industry, and infrastructure, partially funded […]

Introduction The new UK government elected in July 2024 has promised a ‘decade of national renewal’, realised through its Industrial Strategy, its Infrastructure Strategy, and the transition to Clean Power. The state’s footprint on what is meant to be a free market economy will be substantially expanded. The costs of this ‘renewal’ will test the […]

It is about the plans of the UK government to launch a decade-long programme of ‘investment’ in industry, infrastructure and Net Zero, greatly expanding the state’s role in the economy. The programme is to be funded entirely with new debt of £1.64 trillion: the same amount as the spending programme. This is 58% of the […]