Author: Blake Anderson

This article is an on-site version of our Inside Politics newsletter. Subscribers can sign up here to get the newsletter delivered every weekday. If you’re not a subscriber, you can still receive the newsletter free for 30 daysGood morning. The big policy story today is the government announcing a new national inquiry into grooming gangs after Louise Casey, who conducted a “rapid audit” of the evidence on the nature and scale of group-based child sexual abuse, concluded that despite what she had previously believed, there is value in a further inquiry.I continue to be sceptical: the British state hasn’t implemented…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.UK ministers ordered British Steel to give them 24-hour access to the country’s last blast furnace facility when they seized control of it, a sign of the high concern that its Chinese owner Jingye would break a requirement to keep the site operational. The government in April passed emergency legislation to take control of British Steel and the two blast furnaces at its flagship Scunthorpe site after Jingye said it intended to shut the plant because it was losing £700,000 a day.…

Bank of England rate-setters already grappling with unpredictable US trade policy and unreliable UK data now face a fresh oil price shock as they meet this week to set borrowing costs in the wake of Israel’s air strikes against Iran. The potential for prolonged conflict and disruption to energy supplies would make the BoE’s Monetary Policy Committee even more inclined to caution at a meeting where it was already widely expected to hold interest rates at 4.25 per cent, economists said. Fallout from the air strikes on Friday would also make it even harder for the committee — deeply divided since its…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Millions of patients will be granted direct access to clinical trials under the expansion of the NHS app as part of the government’s long-awaited 10-year plan for the UK health service.Health secretary Wes Streeting on Monday said the National Institute for Health and Care Research, a public funder of health research, would integrate a “Be Part of Research” platform with the NHS app, allowing “millions” of Britons to search for and enrol in clinical trials. The NHS 10-year plan, to be presented…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Rachel Reeves will this week announce what she claims will be a £725bn ten-year infrastructure plan for Britain, starting with a new programme to repair crumbling bridges, flyovers and tunnels.Allies of the chancellor say she will commit to increasing the infrastructure budget to at least £725bn over the next decade, pre-committing part of the capital budget ahead of the next spending review in 2027.A priority for Reeves will be to accelerate projects that bring quick results, as she attempts to leverage an…

Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the Utilities myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.The UK government should explore different models of ownership in the embattled water industry, including the potential renationalisation of privatised companies, a cross-party group of MPs said on Monday.In a highly critical report, the House of Commons environment, food and rural affairs committee called for “root and branch” reform of the sector and urged ministers to consider bringing Thames Water under temporary state control. “We see merits in the argument that the current models of ownership in the water industry may not be…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The US has fallen out of the top three growth markets for UK manufacturers for the first time in nearly four decades, according to an industry survey that highlights the impact of higher tariffs.In May, just 18 per cent of British manufacturers expected “positive demand conditions” in the US over the next three months, less than 56 per cent for Europe, 23 per cent for the Middle East and 20 per cent for Asia, according to a quarterly survey by manufacturers association…

Blaise Metreweli has been appointed the new chief of MI6, the UK Secret Intelligence Service, becoming the first woman to lead the agency that recruits spies overseas since its foundation more than a century ago.Metreweli is currently SIS head of technology — a role known as “Q” after James Bond’s mastermind gadgeteer — and has previously held operational posts across the Middle East and Europe. She will take up her new job in October when current head Sir Richard Moore steps down after a five-year term.Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, who held interviews with the two final candidates, praised Metreweli’s…

This article is an on-site version of Free Lunch newsletter. Premium subscribers can sign up here to get the newsletter delivered every Thursday and Sunday. Standard subscribers can upgrade to Premium here, or explore all FT newslettersWelcome back. This week, I turn to “creative destruction”. The concept was popularised by Austrian political economist Joseph Schumpeter in the 1940s, and describes how old ideas, technology and businesses are displaced by new ones. If creation is the primary protagonist of economic growth, destruction is a necessary evil. In tandem, they enable people, capital and other resources to be redeployed more efficiently in…

The US Federal Reserve appears likely to keep interest rates steady when it meets next week, despite pressure from President Donald Trump for a cut, leaving investors to focus on what chair Jay Powell says about the strength of world’s biggest economy.The Fed is set to meet on Tuesday and Wednesday, and investors are pricing in almost no chance of a reduction in rates from their current 4.25-4.5 per cent range. Markets expect two cuts by the end of this year, with September likely to be the earliest that rates resume their downward path. Investors are betting that Powell will continue…