Are you a civil servant in search of new policy ideas? Here are 116 ideas for you. Sign up to a free sub and I will give you a complementary upgrade so that you can read them all. timleunig.substack.com/p/my-policy-...

paging @markpackuk.bsky.social

@torstenbell.bsky.social is spot on - and I wrote a column in the @theobserveruk.bsky.social on what his government could do about it! observer.co.uk/news/busines...

Really? By their deeds shall you know them...

I wish the UK were rich enough to be able to afford to pay for people to study for degrees as a retirement hobby, but we are not...Government should therefore have an age restriction on student loans for university fees. Sensible from @timleunig.bsky.social. timleunig.substack.com/p/student-fe...

"Trump’s new world order is now very much a reality. It has no obvious rules, no real allies, celebrates the jungle and is almost always about money. There is a lot of wealth under Venezuela’s soil. Trump is now committed to extracting it." My column. Free to read. as.ft.com/r/08b22b7a-4...

The company is still liable, however, if you do something wrong, so I don't think this can be it. @missmc.bsky.social @rmappleby.uk

When I was in DHSC I thought we could change the law to reduce or eliminate a lot of this tick box training. Found out there is no law requiring it. No DHSC policy either. Or NHS-England policy. It has just become commonplace - people think it is required, so they arrange it, but it isn't.

On the 34th anniversary of the collapse of the Soviet Union, I am deeply thankful to the generations of Finns before me who fought courageously to ensure that Finland was never part of the inhumane, deadly experiment that was the Soviet Union

One of my jobs at the Environment Agency was to get the Treasury to pay to fix the navigations we ran. I think it’s fair to say that England’s waterways are not in a great state of repair, and that this could be quite a big headache…

Still great value: no one in the private sector is offering it more cheaply. Well done DfE!

And presumably the U turn cost money, so forcing the government to take other tough decisions in future...

Worth reporting, @schoolsweek.bsky.social !

It basically doesn't matter so long as enough gets built!

If any entrepreneur thinks they can offer schools insurance more cheaply they can do so. Otherwise the government scheme remains what it always has been, outstanding value for money.

Glad you like the paper, but cross sectional UK evidence suggests next to no effect of house prices on family size.

Air passenger duty is a terribly designed tax - my substack this week (£/free trial) sets out how to sort it out timleunig.substack.com/p/air-passen...

UK not the only ones to self-harm just as the US is creating a new market for foreign students: dub.uu.nl/en/news/econ...

Explore how other OECD countries spend their budgets: ourworldindata.org/grapher/gove...

Excellent and important look at the Scottish government's new approach to disability benefits and how it is performing compared to Personal Independence Payments thus far:

Last week I wrote my new @nestauk.bsky.social Economics Edit column on falling world food prices. Today ONS says UK food prices fell, lowering inflation and (probably) leading to an interest rate cut. If you want to read all about it before it happens, sign up here: www.linkedin.com/posts/nesta_...

Oops they did it again! More evidence of the craziness of UK VAT rules as court rules AFTER 13 YEARS that Morrisons rotisserie chicken is kept hot (by the packaging) and is therefore liable to VAT. www.ft.com/content/d8d0... 1/2

HMT are recruiting new Director for Financial Services. It is a senior job - in the top 40 HMT civil servants. Salary £100,000. Which is a way of saying "don't apply if you have ever had a senior position in finance". #NotSensible. www.civilservicejobs.service.gov.uk/csr/jobs.cgi... to apply

my regular reminder to myself that ONS search results are actively, imaginatively bad: they must surely be programming it to ensure that "ASHE survey" immediately brings back *2012's* results, just for lolz

Not content with writing a weekly policy ideas substack (free/£), not content with writing a fortnightly piece for , I am now writing "the economics edit" fortnightly for @nestauk.bsky.social. It is free - you can sign up here: mailchi.mp/a6c78a1be69a...

You are wrong on child poverty @stephenkb.bsky.social. There is no plan to get it back to 2010 levels, for example. Only a decision that it would not get even worse under Labour.

This man doesn't just lead from the rear. Slava Ukraini!

Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity <<< Simon Johnson & Daron Acemoglu's book is 99p on kindle today. Bargain! www.amazon.co.uk/Power-Progre...

Of all the policy ideas I have written up since leaving government, my plan to reduce and eliminate smoking is the one I would most like to see government take up - timleunig.substack.com/p/smoking

Brexit's "great success": £850 million loss a week. That's a number to put on a bus, and a bargain of the century according to @timleunig.bsky.social: pay £350 million - get £850 million. shows.acast.com/the-economic...

TIL that @timleunig.bsky.social — as economic adviser to ChX during COVID — advocated for blanket purchase of Netflix for British households to make lockdown more bearable.

I did indeed argue for the govt purchasing a national sub to @netflix.com during lock down - and I still think it would have a good think to have done!

Over to Monaco🇲🇨 where we have exclusive footage of bollards saving lives. #WorldBollardAssociation

I claim my prize for reading all of them. Most coherent summary of your strategy yet.

The covid inquiry is looking at the government's economic response. I was asked (aka required) to submit evidence. There were over 80 questions, each typically having 8 sub-questions. In total I submitted 89,650 words, plus an annex containing many email chains. 1/3

Interested in my take on the Budget? You can read it for free in the Observer - observer.co.uk/news/politic...

Like all too many children in the UK today, I grew up poor. I am no longer poor, and I am delighted to pay higher taxes to reduce - or ideally eliminate - child poverty. 1/3

The abolition of the two-child benefit cap, which punishes children for their parents' circumstances, is the best part of the budget, potentially lifting almost half a million children out of poverty. It may also be the part that comes under fiercest attack. So it needs celebrating and defending.

Even by his own high standards, this piece but @stephenkb.bsky.social is very, very good.

It's Budget Week - so this week I have set out in my substack the one big thing I am looking for - timleunig.substack.com/p/what-shoul... (£/free trial)

Good FT summary by MalcolmMoore on @johnfingleton.bsky.social review of why nuclear is so expensive to build, and never gets built. Same is true for housing. Solution: Do fewer surveys, spend more on the environment and build more! www.ft.com/content/467b...

Particularly fine article by @tomwhipple.bsky.social - www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...

The relative tax treatment of the employed and the self employed is simply not fair. Action should be taken.

Cuting VAT on fuel is a bad policy for so many reasons. If @teamlabouruk.bsky.social / Rachel Reeves chooses this option we will know that this is not a serious government.

New free link on.ft.com/4r7ILgO

The Home Secretary says "we have become the destination of choice in Europe, clearly visible to every people smuggler and would-be illegal migrant across the world" That is a factually untrue claim: the Home Office shows that the UK is fifth, getting 1/10 claims, while Germany gets 1/5 claims

Has any government ever taken notice of a knight threatening to return their knighthood?

On any average day in the last 35 years, about 115,000 people left extreme poverty behind. But based on current trends, progress against extreme poverty will come to a halt. Important slow news story on @ourworldindata.org ourworldindata.org/end-progress...

Over the last couple of years I have produced policy ideas on a wide range of topics. This week I propose two near costless ideas that would improve air safety. @boeingdefence.bsky.social @airbus.com timleunig.substack.com/p/how-to-mak... (Free to read)

Hence my preference for a qualitative fiscal assessment...