How can you be worried about interest rises when you’re issuing fixed interest rate securities? Isn’t that sort of the point of fixing the interest rate?
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My Mum sent me this postcard after she had walked across Spain. It is an illustration from a Russian Fairy story, “Feather Of Finist Falcon” by Ivan Bilibin.
I am reading Robert MacFarlane‘s, “The Old Ways, A Journey On Foot”. I love …
History will judge that the near 50-year relationship between the UK and Europe has been good for both. Best to forget the rancorous ending
Now that a deal has been done, the end of Britain’s life as a member of the European Union can be decently mourned. As funeral orations go, the one William Shakespeare put into the mouth of Mark Antony in Julius Caesar is, well, world-beating: “The evil that men do lives after them,/ The good is oft interred with their bones.” Before we throw the last handful of earth on the corpse of Britain’s membership of the European Union, we might briefly disinter the good things about the relationship.
A bad ending gets projected backwards. A messy divorce obliterates the years of reasonably happy marriage. Brexit has projected into the future a sour story of resentment and rancour. Almost 50 years of history are squeezed into a deterministic story of irreconcilable incompatibility. The evil lives on; the good rots in the earth.
Continue reading...How exactly does an FX transaction works in a floating currency rate environment? Read on to find out
When the real world is just too much, sometimes it feels good to dip into the fantasy world of celebrity gossip. Gossip is an ancient human impulse; it’s as old as a roaring campfire around which our caveman ancestors would gather…
2020 was, it must be said, an extraordinary year for food. Food has been a constant source of nutrition and inspiration in our human story, but this year was quite different, and food was also impacted by these differences. As…
If there’s one thing we saw a lot of in 2020, it was controversy. “Controversy” is defined as “arguments” or “fights,” but really it’s something much more serious: It’s a schism between what one person believes to be right and what…
As a wise man once said: “2020 … a year to remember.” As this year draws to a close, we must all agree it was one for the history books. We saw wonderful triumphs as well as unfortunate tragedies, and sometimes it…
Money is created in the UK by order of HM Treasury. Here’s how it works
I don’t have an all-new 2021 calendar, this year. Time was short, and also, shipping is such a mess this year that I didn’t make a big merchandise push. If you’ve ordered something from me recently, rest assured that it’s on its way…but packages in the hands of the post office have been taking very […]
December 4th was the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and its Defective by Design (DBD) campaign's fourteenth International Day Against DRM (IDAD), and we couldn't have done it without your help. Given that we were unable to organize in person this year, the international response of people who digitally stood up against Digital Restrictions Management has been nothing short of inspiring. We were able to come together for a common goal and voice our opposition against DRM.
If you look at the roster of the Biden-Harris transition team, it’s quickly apparent that the incoming administration is tech-forward. Given the systematic dismantlement of the federal government over the last four years, and the significant logistical and scientific needs underpinning a large-scale vaccine roll-out, it is unsurprising to hear that the new team is […]
I’ve just written a report for Employment and Social Development Canada on the current recession’s likely long-term impact on homelessness in Canada. An overview of the report can be found here.
Those who claim a ‘win for Britain’ want to distract us from the government’s incompetence and cronyism
They had to go and ruin it, didn’t they? Here is a great moment for humanity: lovely people getting a vaccination against a deadly virus that has been developed with breathtaking rapidity. And what is the image that has been injected into our brains where it will lodge like a parasite? Matt Hancock pretend-crying on Good Morning Britain like a no-hoper auditioning for clown school.
The health secretary staged his bizarre pantomime presumably because the simple emotions that any sane person might be feeling – relief, hope, a tinge of wonder at the extraordinary ingenuity of which our species is capable – are not enough. Another layer of sentiment must be slathered on.
Fintan O’Toole is a columnist with the Irish Times
The Calgary Homeless Foundation has just released a 12-city scan of homelessness planning during COVID. It’s a national study (which I authored). My ‘top 10’ overview of the study can be found here.
‘Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan’ explores the life and career of The Pogues’ frontman. Magonlia Pictures... Read more »
The post WATCH THE TRAILER FOR ‘CROCK OF GOLD: A FEW ROUNDS WITH SHANE MACGOWAN’ appeared first on Shane MacGowan.
This food timeline started as a way to explore the revolution in Australian food that has occurred during the baby-boomers’ lifetime, but has since expanded to include more about the previous decades (and century) as well. Also included are overseas events and trends that had an impact here. The entries are brief, but there are lots of links if you want more information.
Page 221 of the Department for Education’s 2019/20 financial statement contains the note reproduced above. The sale programme for “pre-2012” student loans was cancelled in March. But DfE looks like it will be paying out over £30million per year for the next few years to financiers anyway. Total liabilities are booked above at over £220million.
I’ve written a report for the Institute for Research on Public Policy about social assistance—specifically, about social assistance for employable single adults without dependants. A ‘top 10’ overview of the report can be found here.
Today I shall listen to the news and the football scores and the tally of the dead. Intermittently, I shall pick at the crossword and the biscuit tin, and stare out of my back window at a squirrel as he scurries along my fence. Later, there may be a film to watch. But for now…
By Crikey, it is a warm day here in Broken Hill today. We have the evaporative cooler ducting it’s breeze through the house but it’s still pretty warm. Outside the ground is too hot to walk on and the corrugated iron that encases everything in this town sizzles …