‘Graduates need to be earning about £66,000 before they start tackling the actual debt and not just the interest.’ The student loan system is an unsustainable, irrational, immoral and classist system that’s been ignored by politicians for far too long. thetimes.com/money/family-f…

— Franz Kafka, 1912

Eat like a Roman

The story for the frontier of the UK economy should be that we are tripling GDP in the Ox-Cam Corridor by 2050. Its already one of the most innovative stretches of land on the planet. 1/n

x.com/i/article/2009…

I was reading Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground with a group of 9th graders. One student announced, "There is no way someone could actually feel like this on the inside." A classmate replied: "I feel like this every day." The first student was stunned. His understanding of

Fantastic that a new Birmingham - Manchester rail link has been announced, vindicating the work Andy Burnham & I led with the private sector. But it’s just wrong to make the Midlands wait ‘decades’. The upgrade is needed now, and I hope our region can win that argument.

Tolkien knew the purpose of the light was eternal struggle against the darkness. When Théoden asks Gandalf for advice, Gandalf says: "To cast aside regret and fear. To do the deed at hand. If we fail, we fall. If we succeed - then we will face the next task."

I know what I’m doing soon

This is a fantastic breakdown that is worth reading in full.

A tour de force by one of the 20th century’s greatest historians. This richly layered work demands rereading due to the depth and nuance of his arguments. Braudel shines in this book not only as an economic and political historian, but as a first-rate cultural historian.

We can’t fill in potholes. The British State is not running at this level, I’m afraid to say.

Military precision executed by a commercial fishing industry, its purpose need not spelling out.