Analysis archive

Thatcher left Britain 'proud, wealthy and free'
Margaret Thatcher was almost alone in refusing to accept the inevitability of Britain's decline and was determined to turn the country around, writes Daniel Hannan MEP

UK in EU 'straitjacket' despite Thatcher's warnings
The yoke of EU regulation has left the UK 'un-free' in a way it was not during the prime ministership of Margaret Thatcher, who warned of the dangers in her famous Bruges speech in 1988, writes Rory Broomfield

Childcare and flexible work key to 21st century feminism
To achieve gender equality, men should work more flexibly, take greater responsibility for caring for their children and do more housework – while the state should offer universal pre-school childcare, writes Richard Darlington

UK's major NHS reforms a 'distraction'
The reforms to NHS commissioning may at best do little to improve British healthcare, but the evidence for the positive role that competition, pluralism and patient choice can play is fairly compelling – writes Elliot Bidgood

The liquidity of gold under proposed EBA tests
Gold performs comparably to equities and fixed income on the relative spread measures proposed by the European Banking Authority - writes Brian Biggs

'Proactive approach' key to improving data protection
To improve data protection in the public sector, government agencies must pursue more proactive action in coordination with internet and cloud services providers, writes Julie Anderson

'All to play for' in public financial management
Will Eurostat's recent report kick-start the step-change in public finance management across Europe that has been called for, asks Paul Mason

'Political virginity' lost amid global upheaval
It can be derived from historical experience that a parallelism exists between political attack and political virginity: the more vigorously a government attack, the more powerfully the victim – society – will react, writes Vahram Ayvazyan

A retrospective of New Labour: the Blair-Brown years
New Labour shows us the nature of so-called political 'projects' where the gap between reality and representation can sometimes open up to an alarming degree – writes Dr Oliver Daddow

David Cameron's EU strategy is built on 'a false premise'
On current trends, the British prime minister will be denied the major treaty change that he seems to be counting on to renegotiate the UK's relationship with the EU - writes Charles Grant

The problem with Facebook 'likes' and data harvesting
Something as seemingly harmless as a Facebook 'like' can be so valuable because is it gives criminals and rogue firms a better insight into citizens as a 'commodity' that can be traded - Nick Besant

Troika's master plan for Europe is 'financial dictatorship'
It is time to resist the Troika's austerity master plan for European governance in light of the unfolding events in Cyprus, argues Marisa Matias MEP

EU's 'abject failure' on carbon capture technology
Global warming cannot be curbed without the use of carbon capture and storage, and much greater political commitment to the technology is needed, argues Chris Davies MEP

Christians in Middle East face dilemma
Only by joining hands with liberal democratic forces – not sectarian or autocratic ones – can Christians in the Middle East remain rooted and secure in their homelands, writes Hassan Mneimneh

New opportunities open for Cyprus and Turkey
Cypriots may come to feel that the price of their international bail-out was worth paying – especially as Turkey's détente with Israel presents a fresh outlook for the whole region, writes Sir Michael Leigh