Yes, agree there is a talent deficit across the political spectrum

The UK political situation is widely seen as is the most chaotic & depressing since the late 70s. It is worse than that. At the end, the 70s Labour gov’t had some very distinguished figures - Callaghan, Healey,Williams, Benn, Owen. No-one of that calibre in the Sunak gov’t.

Good points.

Humza Yousaf and Rishi Sunak face similar problems - heading parties which have been in power too long and have run out of ideas, lost public suppprt and made many mistakes. In both Westminster and Holyrood, a change is coming - it is just a matter of when and how.

Agree Bill. CMA should get involved. We need a full-blown inquiry. But in the meantime, OFCOM could step in on the communications issue and require these broadband/TV/phone suppliers tom inform their customers properly on price increase when they occur.

My broadband/phone/TV services supplier Virgin Media 🐐 has increased its prices by nearly 9pc - totally unjustified increase nearly 3x CPI inflation (3.2pc). Worse, I’ve received no notification from Virgin that this price rise was coming. When will Ofcom stop this profiteering?

The Tory party front benches look very grumpy at PMQs foday. Understandable as quite of a few of them will need to find alternative careers after the coming General Election.

Oliver Dowden is a useless Deputy PM. Angela Rayner runs rings around him at Deputy PMQs.

Friend of mine commented in the 1990s “if you want to know what the Tories will do next, take Labour policy and divide by 2.” No need to divide by 2 these days. Tories are adopting Labour policies wholesale - on non-doms, defence, etc. Clear sign of a gov’t heading for defeat.

A timely article by David Smith given this is exactly what’s happening with yesterday’s announcement on defence spending increases as well as earlier tax cut announcements ahead of the election

Very sad to hear of the death of Frank Field, distinguished Parliamentarian and campaigner for welfare reform to help the most disadvantaged in society. I was privileged to work with him on the “Dahrendorf Commission” in the 90s. He’ll be sorely missed in Westminster and beyond.

Interesting that the most recent long downward slide in defence spending as a share of GDP took place under the Tories in the 80s and 90s.

After the Bernanke report, #MPC members should be cautious about making forecasts. Not so exTreasury official Dave Ramsden who expects inflation to be around 2pc for next 3 years. Ramsden and co’s recent record does not inspire confidence in this forecast! ft.com/content/4b9acf…

The U.K. and French authorities could stop the small boats crossing the Channel if we chose to do so with co-ordinated action. With U.K. outside the EU this co-operation does not happen. And UK’s Rwanda policy does not help!

As David Smith argues in the Sunday Times today, some key measures of inflation are still 2-3 times the 2 pc target - including services prices, unit labour costs, GDP deflator, RPI and 'core' CPI. Stubbornly high inflation is set to delay expected interest rate cuts.

Another good article from David Smith today - arguing that persistent above-target inflation will delay interest rate cuts, quite rightly in my view.

Andrew Sentance The key problem with the model is that the BoE/MPC are duplicitous about it. They use it to signal expertise and authority [see, the model]; but at the same time they invoke maximal judgement so that it does not bind them at all. I don't know how you can address this.

UK CPI inflation for March published today was 3.2 percent but other inflation measures range from 0.6pc (factory gate prices) to 6pc (CPI services) and most are higher than CPI. An average of 10 measures, including RPI (4.3pc) and the GDP deflator (5.1 pc) comes out at 3.6pc.

Quarter point cut in UK interest rates not fully priced in by financial markets until late this year. Today’s inflation and yesterday’s wage data is making investors more cautious about rate cuts.

UK Inflation (Mar)

CPI (YoY): 3.2% vs. 3.1% exp. (prior 3.4%)

CPI (MoM): 0.6% vs. 0.4% exp. (prior 0.6%)

Core CPI (YoY): 4.2% vs. 4.1% exp. (prior 4.5%)

CPI Services (YoY): 6.0% vs. 5.8% exp. (prior 6.1%)