Rachel Reeves, our frazzled Chancellor of the Exchequer, is scrambling around for additional sources of tax and excise revenue.  Her options are dwindling as we come closer to Budget day on 26 November.

UK buildings in the 1960s and 70s were made to look ugly.

There’s a version of the world in which those wise people in government - That Man in Whitehall Who Knows Best - survey the realm and decide upon what should happen.

If UK growth is to be achieved, lower energy costs for business and industry could play a significant part in bringing that about. It would involve a reform of energy market structures.

The homelessness charity Crisis is going to become a landlord for the first time in its 60-year history, saying the housing crisis in the UK has reached a “catastrophic scenario”.

If we introduced an additional investment scheme whereby people put 3% of their wages or salary into a passive private investment scheme (but could opt out), it would add to investment and growth. 

On the other hand, the experience of the past quarter of a century shows that increasing the productivity of the public sector is painfully difficult.

Chesterton’s Fence is, at heart, the observation that until we know why the past did the things they did we should not change those things the past did.

While this scientific reality should dominate discussions at Cop30, history tells us that polite incrementalism and political kowtowing will prevail.

If Zohran Mamdani implements policies that cause corporations to leave New York, high-income residents to move to low-tax states like Florida and Texas, and strong rent controls that lead to rental shortages and deteriorating housing stock, then based on known economic patterns and historical precedents, several things might happen.

It is always a grand error to actually take politicians seriously but just for the giggles let us do so with the new Leader of the Green Party, Zack Polanski. His insistence is:

There has been discussion about a possible UK exit tax targeting wealthy individuals who leave the country, with reports mentioning something like a 20 percent tax on unrealized gains rather than a direct confiscation of assets.