Author: Dr Clive Black

Rachel Reeves et al did their utmost to depress the British shopper to excellent effect through 2024 and 2025, manifested in low ongoing consumer confidence, which fed its way into rather subdued domestic consumer markets. The Treasury’s wholesale incompetence  was not the whole story, however, when it came to the what turned out to be… Continue reading Diet ‘suppressance’ has arrived in Britain…?

It is quite hard not despair at the mismanagement of the UK, the foregone economic opportunities as a result of a UK Government under Sir Kier Starmer’s leadership that it is totally and utterly illiterate when it comes to the economy, and its most important components, entrepreneurs and firms, which make up markets. It is… Continue reading The paralysis of leadership failure.

Grandma, Granny, Nan, Nanny, terms of endearment for, more often than not, wonderful people, who very frequently turn out to be the surrogate guardian of their children’s children, Are people of very responsible positions. And so it is unfortunate that ‘nanny’ is used as a rather pejorative term for when the State decides that most… Continue reading What would nanny really think?

Imagine a world, where the British Government was held in high regard by the UK’s food system. Such a thought seems more unachievable and fantastic than thinking there is no heaven above or hell below, above us only sky. It seems an age ago when amongst the true heroes of the United Kingdom were the… Continue reading Imagine.

As one ages it is hard not to think that the two hands of the clock whirl quicker and quicker. And so, with the arrival of September, meteorological autumn, British business braces itself for the next iteration of Labour’s economic policy. On the one hand, it seems that 2025 is passing in a flash, on… Continue reading Hope for the best…

Rachel Reeves, the much-lampooned British Chancellor of the Exchequer, delivered a highly political spending review, which is rightly subject to scrutiny. Indeed, the post-match analysis has been more Roy Keane than Alan Shearer, with some of the most ardent critics of the Tories, such as Paul Johnson at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, basically eviscerating… Continue reading Reeves, the conjurer, may be about to drop her balls

Sir Kier Starmer has built up quite a few air miles in 2025, his position on the international stage looking more comfortable than it is at home not least as he seeks to manage the battle between Red Ange and Rachel from accounts, the latter now learning that bond and currency markets are quite important.… Continue reading Starmer’s trading places

Asda’s trading performance has been a concern for some time. Whilst it is all well and good to ship share to others for a period, it becomes a worry line if that negative momentum persists, like 3Y+, and deepens, not least because stabilisation becomes all the more challenging, potentially costly, and possibly contagious. Has such… Continue reading Going to war?

The new Labour Government, genuinely perceived to be out of its depth after a quite uninspiring first six months or so in office, is at glacial pace starting to think about public health in terms of prevention and not cure. Such a view is welcome, if not a new one, and one senses that Health Minister… Continue reading Bad diets, food affordability & substantive policy

It is really wearing. Business folks are, by definition, competitive people, who want to get on, to build, to create wealth and they tend to flourish when the context, the climate, is positive.  Whilst so, in the main they will battle on when headwinds emerge, often in the hope that when better weather arrives, they… Continue reading Clinical focus amidst the chaos

At the turn of 2023-24, there was a huge level of frustration with the ineffectiveness, incompetence and, not far short of open corruption (e.g., Covid deals), of several years of terrible Conservative rule of the UK. On the horizon, however, in what was going to be the year that the world voted, welcome back Donald… Continue reading Looking for real stability and a new Sir Humphrey.

The post-match analysis of Rachel Reeves’ Budget has been extensive and largely brutal, the comments of the arguably left of centre Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) and Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) worrying for the Government as further tax rises seem likely, not least because cutting expenditure in a bloated and inefficient State appears off the… Continue reading A very tough first Reeves Budget for the food system