Catchy title, I know. But a little cache of letters I found recently, dating from 1965, raised the question of political responsibility. And it was a jolt to realise how far we have come- gone- in terms of direct engagement between the governed and the government. My...

Spare a thought for a moment for the hapless policy wonk. I don’t really speak as a representative of the guild, so to speak – I am far too opinionated. But I have enough policy wonk in my genes to know what they are going through, and two weeks from a general...

I wrote earlier this week about selling social housing to tenants, and the circumstances where it could be a radical idea again, as perhaps it was in 1980. Of course, what we didn't know then was that local authorities would be forced to hold onto the money they made...

Last Monday the Sweets Way occupiers and protesters got another week from a pleasant County Court judge in which further to prepare their arguments as to why they should not be evicted from their homes on Sweets Way in the London borough of Barnet. The judge heard...

I’ve always believed that fairy tales have a role in understanding the contemporary world, and therefore of politics. This sounds a little sceptical or satirical, but I don’t mean it like that. You can use fairy tales as a positive way of extracting the underlying...