Nice piece of turnabout by Ian Black on Russia’s veto of the Syria motion at the UN these days. China’s decision has got a bit less attention. The thing is, the PRC has vetoed six Security Council motions since its...

Lenders appear to be becoming less amenable to extending company loans when they hit a sticky patch, which could see a surge in corporate failures

An unavoidable choice: More or less EU control over UK policing and criminal law

A man is no less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years - Lysander Spooner...

Yesterday Antoine and I visited the Pompidou Centre. Follow the link above for the usual Pompidou Centre pictures. Here's a less usual picture of the thing, in the form of a picture of a model of it that we encountered inside: I was glad to visit this building, if only to go somewhere out of the cold, which has been extreme (and made much worse by the wind) but which may now be abating a...

Michelle, Ann, Carol and Karen work to make their husbands seem less wooden; Callista, a third wife, has sparked controversy

MEPs voted by a wide margin today (2 February) to ditch a European Commission plan for giving food producers new choices to promote products as having less fat, sugar or salt. More »

Euro MPs block changes to food labels that would have allowed claims such as "now contains 15% less sugar".

MEPs voted by a wide margin today (2 February) to ditch a European Commission plan for giving food producers new choices to promote products as have less fat, sugar or salt. More »

The think-tank says that, painful as the squeeze has been so far, it amounts to less than a 10th of what is planned by the 2016-17 fiscal year