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Christian May

Christian May

City A.M.

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Heathrow’s story goes up in flames

The North Hyde electrical substation which caught fire. Picture date: Friday March 21, 2025. PA Photo. Jonathan Brady/PA Wire Every weekday morning...

previous day 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Reform present Tories with chance to rebuild economic credibility

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage speaks during a press conference in Westminster, London. Picture date: Tuesday May 27, 2025. PA Photo. Ben Whitley/PA...

previous day 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Starmer plays a risky game on welfare reform

Rightly or wrongly, Labour decided that the first signal they should send as a new government was that they wouldn’t duck tough economic decisions....

wednesday 8

City A.M.

Christian May

Paris vs London: which city comes out on top?

Our front page story yesterday on Paris surging ahead of London in the rankings of tech sector hotspots got people talking, reigniting an ancient...

23.05.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Reeves takes comfort in the promise of future growth

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves speaks at a reception for UK and EU businesses in Downing Street, London. Picture date: Monday May 19, 2025....

22.05.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Starmer sends his critics into a spin – but will Brexit deal deliver?

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at a press conference at the end of the UK-EU Summit at...

21.05.2025 4

City A.M.

Christian May

China could gatecrash Starmer’s diplomatic party

Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire File photo dated 18/11/24: Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer during a bilateral meeting with President Xi Jinping of China, at...

16.05.2025 20

City A.M.

Christian May

UK jobs markets suffers a fainting fit…will the patient get worse?

Commuters and people travelling to and from Waterloo Railway Station, via the main entrance. (photo by Mike Kemp/In Pictures via Getty Images) We now...

15.05.2025 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Starmer’s just the latest to be shaped by UK’s immigration debate

Immigration has shaped UK politics for the past 20 years, often in ways that surprised at the time but which appear in hindsight to make perfect...

14.05.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Only radical thinking can break Britain out of its doom loop

Andy Haldane addressed the City AM Awards While the lucky few left Tuesday night’s City AM Awards with a gleaming trophy, the evening’s other...

09.05.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Tories take note: Reform will come at Labour from the left

(Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) As the dust settles on the local elections, party leaders will be busy trying to identify the right lessons. For...

07.05.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Tony Blair is right to call for ‘reset’ of ludicrous Net Zero debate

If energy secretary Ed Miliband still believes that critics of his dash to Net Zero are peddlers of “nonsense and lies” he has a new name to add...

01.05.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Ed Miliband’s reckless Net Zero ideology

Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband Rumours persist that Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, could be shunted out of his role when the Prime Minister...

30.04.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Employment Rights: ministers refuse to listen – and we’ll all pay the price

Entrepreneurs know better than anyone just what it takes to get an idea off the ground, and to keep it alive. The common phrases associated with...

30.04.2025 5

City A.M.

Christian May

The government is facing a wave of summer strikes – how will it respond?

Public sector strike action is always tricky territory for Labour politicians to navigate, particularly when the party is in opposition. When strikes...

18.04.2025 7

City A.M.

Christian May

China’s out to destroy our steel industry? We can do that on our own.

No laughing matter: Net Zero policy needs cooler heads The two remaining furnaces at the Scunthorpe steel plant, known as Anne and Bess, have blasted...

16.04.2025 8

City A.M.

Christian May

If you think this government is pro-business, let me sell you Tower Bridge

As the government continues to develop its response to Trump’s tariffs and the changing global economic order, the Prime Minister’s muddled...

10.04.2025 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Trump’s trade war is a test for Starmer – I fear he’ll fail it

Keir Starmer declared yesterday that we’re now living “in a completely new world.” He’s not wrong; Donald Trump has cut to shreds the...

09.04.2025 2

City A.M.

Christian May

Tesla pays the price for Elon Musk’s politics

People do strange things when passions are running high. Take the brave protester in Bristol, who last month felt he had to take a stand against the...

04.04.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Are we all just winging it, all the time?

There aren’t many decade-old Guardian articles that still resonate with me, but I can recall (and often revisit) a 2014 column by Oliver Burkeman....

03.04.2025 7

City A.M.

Christian May

The Spring Statement takes us back to square one

It might not have been a Budget, but the Chancellor may well wish that it had been. Constrained by her fiscal rules and her own insistence that...

28.03.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

If the world really has changed, Chancellor, then drop your tax hikes

Rachel Reeves delivered her Spring Statement on Wednesday afternoon. Rachel Reeves has one of the most demanding, high profile and exhausting jobs...

27.03.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Reeves crosses her fingers and hopes for growth

Ahead of last October’s Budget, ministers allowed months of speculation as to what would be unveiled, and the never-ending drumbeat of doom and...

26.03.2025 6

City A.M.

Christian May

Do we need to rethink Brexit’s impact on UK-EU trade?

With the weekend approaching, allow me to furnish you with a classic conversation starter for the pub or a dinner party; have you heard that the OBR...

21.03.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

PM’s growth rhetoric does not match reality

Jonathan Brady/PA Wire Stirring words from the Prime Minister in today’s City AM , with Keir Starmer vowing to unleash the “animal spirits”...

19.03.2025 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Will Starmer’s chainsaw be Black & Decker or Fisher Price?

Starmer won’t get very far with that On Monday I used this column to ask who, if anyone, will have the courage to take a chainsaw to the British...

14.03.2025 4

City A.M.

Christian May

Labour’s growth agenda? Necessary but not sufficient.

Labour offers some welcome reforms but the plan is nowhere near radical enough if we’re to enjoy good growth in the future Ministers will be deeply...

12.03.2025 8

City A.M.

Christian May

Watch the Week in Business: Tax Blame Game

Play Video You can hear the spin a mile away; as the Chancellor’s team prepares for the Spring Statement the political groundwork is...

07.03.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Reeves is gearing up for a blame game

You can hear the spin a mile away; as the Chancellor’s team prepares for the Spring Statement the groundwork is being laid. Despite the fact that...

07.03.2025 30

City A.M.

Christian May

Net Zero: weak economic growth, high energy prices and stagnant productivity?

No laughing matter: Net Zero policy needs cool heads How many times have we heard the argument that there is no trade-off between pursuing Net Zero...

06.03.2025 6

City A.M.

Christian May

A win on the world stage masks mounting trouble at home

Prime Minister Keir Starmer Keir Starmer has won plaudits for his decision to increase defence spending (albeit by less than the amount he’s given...

05.03.2025 2

City A.M.

Christian May

Week in Business: Will more defence spending mean higher taxes?

Play Video Cutting the international aid budget to boost defence spending – sounds like a fair exchange in a time of war and hazard...

28.02.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Budget policies coming home to roost

(Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) With each passing day, the government’s insistence that economic growth is its “number one priority” sounds...

19.02.2025 20

City A.M.

Christian May

Labour has sucked the confidence out of wealthy Brits

The government defines a high net worth individual as someone with an income of at least £170,000 and net assets of more than £430,000. Such people...

14.02.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

BP’s Net Zero push has crashed into reality

BP seems poised to row back from recent pledges on Net Zero I remember when I first encountered a hard copy FTSE 100 annual report. I was a first...

13.02.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Week in Business: Growth hammer blow means Reeves must change course

Play Video If the Chancellor was still on a high from last week’s big growth-focused speech, the Bank of England has just pulled her...

08.02.2025 7

City A.M.

Christian May

Is Reeves heading for a fiscal car crash?

Boxed in: the Chancellor faces tough choices Rachel Reeves has a deep respect for officialdom and institutions and was aghast at the way Liz Truss...

07.02.2025 20

City A.M.

Christian May

Trump’s tariffs reveal reality of Dealmaker-in-Chief

It’s Trump’s world now and the rest of us are just living in it Things happen quickly in Trump’s America. On Saturday, the US President...

05.02.2025 7

City A.M.

Christian May

The Week in Business: is Reeves right to be an optimist?

Play Video This was the week when Barclays became the latest big employer to tighten up its work from home policies, now requiring...

01.02.2025 4

City A.M.

Christian May

Politicians should drop their obsession with Silicon Valley

Successive British politicians have reached for Silicon Valley – or the idea of Silicon Valley – every time they’ve wanted to project a vision...

31.01.2025 2

City A.M.

Christian May

Glaring contradiction at heart of government growth agenda

Growthbusters: Starmer and Reeves have embarked on a contradictory growth agenda In the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act of 2013 (stay with me)...

29.01.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

The Week in Business: Reeves tries to rescue the non-doms

Play Video It’s a funny old world when the pleas of pensioners, farmers and shopkeepers fall on deaf ears but a Labour chancellor...

25.01.2025 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Going for growth is a game of risk that ministers must embrace

In the words of the Lord Mayor of London, “the only way you get growth is via risk.” Alastair King made this observation early in November last...

22.01.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Reeves has dodged a bullet but she’s surrounded by landmines

Chancellor Rachel Reeves. Isabel Infantes/PA Wire After all the excitement of a ministerial resignation, it’s time to check in on the...

17.01.2025 5

City A.M.

Christian May

Tulip mania was only ever going to end one way

A short-lived ministerial career Yesterday, I asked whether Tulip Siddiq would still be the City minister by the end of the day, and just as the sun...

16.01.2025 4

City A.M.

Christian May

Disastrous school reform agenda is a solution in search of a problem

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson (Photo by Richard Pohle – WPA Pool/Getty Images) A long time ago I got...

10.01.2025 4

City A.M.

Christian May

Zuck rediscovers love of free speech – just in time for Trump 2.0

Mark Zuckerberg outside Meta HQ (Source: MZ FB) Will Mark Zuckerberg’s drastic policy changes tempt me back to Facebook? Nope. I quit the platform...

09.01.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

With expectations so low, Starmer might just carve out a win

(Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) From a news perspective, the Christmas break was more Deck the Halls than Silent Night. Keir Starmer ended last...

08.01.2025 3

City A.M.

Christian May

Starmer’s diplomacy downplays “epic scale” of Chinese spying

Yang Tengbo insists that he is not a spy and that he would “never do anything to harm the interests of the UK.” He was speaking yesterday after...

18.12.2024 10

City A.M.

Christian May

Growth is easier to destroy than to build

Labour’s policy changes have already had a clear negative impact on the economy Missions, milestones, foundations and pledges; Keir Starmer has...

17.12.2024 4

City A.M.

Christian May