Vicky Pryce,  Senior Fellow, BCU centre for Brexit Studies Concerns about possible ‘dumping’ of Chinese products has been rising for some time The belief is that in an effort to stimulate the economy after the severe problems in the property sector, the Chinese govt had engineered a sharp manufacturing expansion through cheap loans and other subsidies which left it with many goods, particularly electric vehicles(EVs) which they couldn’t sell to a struggling Chinese consumer. There has also been concern about China’s increasing penetration of other goods markets such as batteries and ..read more

Dr. Steven McCabe, Associate Professor, Birmingham City University In my blog a couple of weeks ago (McCabe, 2024), I speculated on what would happen in the elections held last week to elect representative for 107 councils, eleven mayorsin England and Wales, 33 Police and crime commissioners inEngland and the by-election in Blackpool South.  Consistent with almost all other political commentators, these elections, the first large-scale test for Sunak since he became leader of his party following the ..read more

Vicky Pryce, Senior Fellow, BCU Centre for Brexit Studies Rachel Reeve, the Shadow Chancellor, in her latest speech accused the government of ‘gaslighting’ Britain over the state of the UK economy. Interestingly just as elections for a number of councils across England, metro mayors and police commissioners were taking place on May 2, the latest forecasts from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) flashed on our screens . Most people on their way to the polls will have missed it which is lucky as it didn’t make pretty reading.  Yes we knew about only slow recove ..read more

Ferry Biedermann It just beggars belief at this point, how consistently and madly the issue of migration continues to twist politics and international relations. The latest example being the, overblown and largely manufactured, row between the UK and Ireland over the return of asylum seekers from the Republic to the UK. Dublin is claiming to have seen an increase in the number of asylum seekers crossing the open border from Northern Ireland in the wake of the new British Rwanda law. That piece of legislation could see asylum seekers flown to that East-African coun ..read more

By Dr. Bertha Dzifa Kumodji BBA, MBA, Ph.D., MBAM, MIoL, ASSOC MAPM, MSHRM, MCIPD, FCIHRM, CMgr MCMI HR & Recruitment, Workforce and Organisational Development, The Royal Orthopaedic Hospital NHSFoundation Trust, Birmingham – UK Researcher, Centre for Brexit Studies, Birmingham City University Business School, Birmingham – UK In the wake of Brexit and the ongoing pandemic, Britain finds itself at a crossroads, grappling with its identity and direction amid a significant exodus of foreign workers. Despite these myriad of challenges that confront ..read more

Dr. Steven McCabe, Associate Professor, Birmingham City University It’s erroneously believed the proverb, “may you live in interesting times” originated as an ancient Chinese curse.  However, it’s widely acknowledged this is been becauseAmerican politician Frederic R. Coudert referred to a letter he’d received from Sir Austen Chamberlain, son of British statesman Joseph Chamberlain, in 1939 in which he concluded, “Many years ago, I learned from one of our diplomats in China that one of the principal Chine ..read more

 Vicky Pryce, Senior Fellow, BCU Centre for Brexit Studies Latest research by Damien Lyons Lowe of Survation  presented at a recent ‘ Best for Britain’ event suggests that trust in  politicians in the UK is one of the lowest in the world. Indeed, data from the 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer showed that among developed countries the UK is in last place alongside Argentina and Japan with just 39% for the general population trusting in their respective NGOs, Businesses, Governments and Medi ..read more

Dr. Steven McCabe, Associate Professor, Birmingham City University Significantly, in her speech at the annual Mais Lecture that took place at the Bayes Business School in the City of London , shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves made reference to the radical change in policy following Margaret Thatcher’s victory in May 1979 ending five years of Labour being in power: “When we speak of a decade of national renewal, that is what we mean. As we did at the end of the 1970s, we stand at an inflection point. “And as in earlier decades ..read more

Nicholas Hurtado Europe’s post-Brexit political landscape has changed a great deal since 2020. Four years on from the formal divorce, policymakers in the UK and EU appear to increasingly mirror one another in terms of their respective outlooks on an increasing number of issues. This extends prominently to the subject of migration. Recent developments on migration have highlighted how much the UK and EU have arrived at similar points regardless of political affiliation. Despite separating, the British and EU have followed charted mirrored political trajectories that have led them to comparable ..read more

Ferry Biedermann in Amsterdam There’s a great divergence happening between the UK and Europe that very few seem to be aware of but that nevertheless is already having an enormous impact on the nature of the relationship. While Britain keeps getting roiled by Brexit and its ongoing and cumulative effects, be theypolitical, economic, environmental, societal or other, Europe has spectacularly lost interest. A quick scan of media stories mentioning Brexit in Germany and France over recent months shows that they overwhelmingly deal with the debate in the UK, not with Brexit effects in Eur ..read more