Hecklers have interrupted the chancellor’s speech at the Labour conference as they appeared to call for a halt to arms sales to Israel and for action on the environment.
Rachel Reeves was telling the conference in Liverpool how proud she was to be the UK’s first ever female chancellor when shouting came from the hall.
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A young man in the middle of the audience stood up and could be heard shouting: “We are still selling arms to Israel, I thought we voted for change Rachel, climate breakdown is on our doorstep.”
Others shouted: “Free Palestine.”
Shouts of “stop oil” were also heard from around the audience.
Another man in front of the first heckler appeared to be trying to roll out a banner but an audience member in front of him grabbed it.
Security guards in the hall ran to the men and bundled them out quickly as the audience shouted “down, down”.
Ms Reeves appeared stony-faced as she responded by declaring Labour has become “a party that represents working people, not a party of protest”.
She was cheered by the audience, who gave her a standing ovation.
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Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been urged to impose a pay-per-mile scheme on British drivers to avoid a “black hole” from lost fuel duty revenue.
Public transport charity Campaign for Better Transport (CBT) is proposing that drivers of zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs), such as electric cars, should be charged based on how far they travel, claiming it would have public support.
Under the plan, drivers with a ZEV before the implementation date would be exempt, incentivising the switch to electric vehicles.
Image: Rachel Reeves. Pic: Reuters
Duties levied on petrol, diesel and other fuels generate around £25bn a year in revenue for the Treasury.
This figure is expected to reduce as more drivers transition from traditionally-fuelled cars to ZEVs.
But previous governments have found the prospect of introducing per-mile charges – known as road pricing – to be too politically toxic.
Silviya Barrett, CBT director of policy and campaigns, said: “The new Chancellor faces a looming black hole. She can avoid it, in a way which is fair and which garners broad public support. But she should start now, as this issue will only get more pressing.
“It should be cheaper to drive a zero-emission vehicle than a more polluting vehicle, but it’s only fair that these drivers should pay a share, and a pay-as-you-drive model can achieve this.”
Ms Barrett wrote a letter to Ms Reeves stating that “ZEV drivers should fairly contribute towards vehicle taxation” and calling for a “simple charge” based on “regular odometer readings”.
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“We fully appreciate that such a change would be perceived as difficult and criticised by the opposition and by certain representative groups,” she added.
“However, our research demonstrated the general public supports such a move.”
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Labour has committed to reverse then-prime minister Rishi Sunak‘s decision in September last year to delay banning the sale of conventionally fuelled new cars from 2030 until 2035.
Ms Reeves will deliver her first budget on 30 October.
Oxford is one of the best universities in the world.
The very best, according to the current edition of Times Higher Education, or the third best behind the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Imperial College London, according to the international QS World University Rankings.
Either way, it is la crème de la crème of the UK’s higher education sector, one of the few areas of international competition where this country can claim to be truly “world-beating”.
This means that being the figurehead representing the university as its chancellor is one of the most desirable berths for a senior member of the British establishment, including former prime ministers and political leaders.
Now there is a vacancy following the decision of Lord Chris Patten to retire at the age of 80 after 20 years as chancellor.
Applicants, including some household names, have just a week until 11.59pm on Sunday 18 August to get their nominations in.
However politely this election will be fought out behind the scenes, the battle for the job will do more than pitch rival “retired” politicians against each other.
Woke will come up against anti-woke, many would-like to see the first female chancellor and there is a strong tide among the academics who work at the university to install one of their own rather than the statesmen who have presided over them since Tudor times.
Image: Lord Chris Patten welcomes former Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi to the university in 2012. Pic: AP
Technology allows for a more open contest
The chancellorship dates back exactly 800 years. Oliver Cromwell, the first Duke of Wellington, and prime ministers Lord Salisbury and Harold Macmillan are some of those who have occupied the post.
This contest will be more open than ever because for the first time all members of the so-called “convocation”, including more than 250,000 graduates of the university, will be able to vote online.
Until now voters had to turn up at the Sheldonian Theatre, suitably gowned, to cast their ballot in person. Less than 6,000 turned out at the last two elections.
In 1987 Roy Jenkins, the former Labour chancellor of the exchequer and home secretary, founder of the Social Democratic Party and president of the European Commission beat Sir Edward Heath, the former Conservative prime minister.
The TV puppet Roland Rat also threw his cap into the ring.
Conservative Party chairman Mr Patten was elected chancellor after Mr Jenkins’s death in 2003.
Mr Patten won the 1992 election for John Major but lost his own seat, before being appointed the last governor of Hong Kong. While at Oxford, Mr Patten pulled off a remarkable establishment double as chairman of the BBC.
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Image: Oliver Cromwell was elected chancellor of the university in 1651. Pic: AP
High profile names rules themselves out
Well-known names who have been touted in the frame this year include former prime ministers Tony Blair, Boris Johnson and Theresa May and former cabinet ministers William Hague, Peter Mandelson, and Rory Stewart as well as former Pakistan prime minister and cricket captain Imran Khan.
All of them happen to have gone to Oxford, although this is not a requirement to be chancellor.
It is not the done thing to campaign openly. Would-be candidates are supposed to make their interest known quietly and then hope the required 50 members of the convocation sign their nomination papers.
Former Tory leader William Hague and New Labour master of the dark arts Peter Mandelson have both publicly expressed an interest.
Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rory Stewart have all pulled out before the starting line. Voting will be done on the transferable list system and it is likely they would have been either too controversial or lowly rated to beat the other two.
Tony Blair ruled himself out of running from the outset.
There will also be some fringe candidates: the Reverend Matthew Firth of the so-called Free Church of England plans to stand on an anti-woke ticket.
Image: Roland Rat once had hopes to become the university’s chancellor. Pic: Steve Meddle/Shutterstock
The same can be said of the Reverend Nigel Biggar, former regius professor of moral philosophy at the university, whose book Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning was praised by many traditionalists on the right of British politics.
While Maxim Parr-Reid’s main qualification appears to be representing his college, Trinity Oxford, on University Challenge.
None of the political names above are favoured by the university establishment of academics.
Earlier this year the university bureaucrats were accused of attempting a “stitch-up” when they set up a committee to “vet” candidates “with due regard to the principles of equality and diversity”.
This was interpreted as an attempt to hobble the chances of the white male politicians who have been chancellor so far.
In May, The Times welcomed the university’s decision to drop pre-vetting as “a victory for fairness and common sense”.
Undaunted, many who work at the university are gravitating to a favoured candidate of their own. She is Lady Elish Angiolini, a distinguished lawyer and former solicitor general of Scotland.
She is a Dame Commander of the British Empire (DBE) and Lady of the Order of the Thistle and has conducted independent inquiries for governments, including into the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving police officer.
Female, Scottish, of Irish Catholic descent and a graduate of Strathclyde University, she would certainly be different.
Lady Angiolini is also an Oxford insider. She has been principal of St Hugh’s College, Oxford since 2012 and a pro-vice-chancellor of the university.
Image: Lady Elish Angiolini could become the university’s first female chancellor. Pic: PA
She is certainly running, although it is not clear how she gets round the regulation that “the chancellor cannot be an employee of the university”. Perhaps it is acceptable for her to resign if elected, but not as a candidate.
Members of “elected legislatures” are also barred from applying. So Mr Mandelson and Mr Hague are good to go.
So is Mr Khan, currently in prison and disqualified for political office. It is not clear if not-being British could rule out a candidate, although one fringe aspirant, Nigerian Onyeka Nwelue, thinks it probably does.
Oxford academics guard their control of the university jealously. Famously the so-called “congregation” made up of every professor and lecturer voted not to award Margaret Thatcher an honorary doctorate even though she was Britain’s first woman prime minister and a graduate of Somerville College Oxford.
Given Oxford’s high standing in global academia, many would argue if “it’s not broken, why fix it”.
But Oxford’s great achievements are, at faculty and institute level, almost in spite of the intricate and self-policing college and university governance systems.
As a result, there have been a number of scandals, including most recently a successful attempt to drive out an outsider appointed as dean of Christ Church, which cost the college many millions of pounds.
Prominent academics of my acquaintance express delight when they move on from Oxford.
Image: Former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan. Pic: AP
The governance of Oxford is not like most other universities – or indeed public companies – which have a board made-up of executives and non-executives, presided over by a chair.
When I suggested such a system should be applied to the colleges and the university, the professor I was sitting next to at an Oxford high table refused to speak to me for the rest of the meal.
The chancellor of Oxford does not even have the powers of a chairman of the board and is side-lined into ceremonial and PR functions.
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That said, the male politicians who have been chancellor until now have generally done well by the university. Giving an outsider of proven achievement more of a say would be beneficial, even for the best university in the world.
The final candidates will be not known for another week.
The choice looks likely to be whether the university keeps its face turned outward – as it always has in the past – or whether the academics take back even more control.
The many thousands of graduates – most of whom have long got over their university days – have the power to decide, provided they know there is an election on and register to vote, deadline being 18 August.
Voting takes place on 28 October, with a second round if, as seems unlikely, there are 10 or more qualifying candidates.
The new chancellor is likely to be there for at least 20 years – unless the university succeeds in its bid for term limits.
May the best person, Oxford or non-Oxford, male or female, win.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has promised to “fix” the “mess” the Conservative government left in the economy, amid reports of a £20bn “black hole” in the public finances.
Ms Reeves, who is currently on a visit to the G20 in Brazil, told broadcasters she aimed to tell the world that the UK “is open for business” and the new government “want private investment into the UK economy”.
The chancellor, who is set to deliver a speech on Monday about the state of the UK’s finances, was also asked about reports of a £20bn “black hole” in the UK’s economy.
“I have been honest during the election campaign and in the last three weeks about the scale of the inheritance that this government would have to pick up,” she said.
“The Conservatives have created this mess. But let me be very clear. I will fix it.”
Meanwhile, Paul Johnson, the head of the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), told Sky News that the £20bn gap was “almost exactly the cost of the National Insurance cuts that Jeremy Hunt introduced this year”.
Read more: IMF warns UK and Hunt over NI cuts Labour rules out increases to NI and income tax Reeves to woo Canadian pension funds
There has been speculation Ms Reeves could scale back spending or implement tax rises in this autumn’s budget.
Mr Johnson said: “Reversing [the previous cuts] and getting back to where we were last autumn in National Insurance would actually deal with a large part of the problem.
“It looks like Labour have ruled that out.
“That leaves them with much more difficult, sorts of tax changes, quite technical changes to capital gains tax – that perhaps needs to happen to be fair – and to inheritance tax.”
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However, Mr Johnson threw some cold water on the new government’s pronouncements that it did not know how bad the books were prior to being elected.
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He said: “I think that at a high level, the new government was well aware they were coming in facing a really difficult position in terms of the scale of problems facing the public services.”
“But there may have been some specifics they did not know about.
“There is no doubt that having taken over at the Ministry of Justice and the Home Office and the Department of Education and so on, they will have seen some things that they didn’t know, and it may well be that things are even worse than they imagined.
“But there’s no question that they knew that things were going to be difficult.”
Shadow Chancellor Jeremy Hunt branded Ms Reeves claims about finding the economy in a worse state than expected “nothing but a fabrication”.
£The reality is she does not want to take the difficult decisions on pay, productivity or welfare reform that would have meant we could live within our means and is laying the ground for tax rises,£ he added.
Alistair Darling, who served as chancellor under then prime minister Gordon Brown, has died at the age of 70.
His family confirmed the news about the Labour peer on Thursday, calling him “the much-loved husband of Margaret and beloved father of Calum and Anna”.
Lord Darling became a household name when Gordon Brown appointed him chancellor after taking the keys to Number 10 back in 2007.
He ran the Treasury throughout the global banking crisis, and stayed in post until Mr Brown lost the election in 2010.
But he was a presence in Tony Blair’s government from the start, beginning as chief secretary to the treasury in 1997 following Labour’s landslide victory, and going on to run a number of departments – including work and pensions, transport and trade.
He was a member of parliament from 1987 until he stepped down in 2015.
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There will be a lot of positive talk from the chancellor when he delivers his autumn statement on Wednesday, but this will be a fiscal event full of illusory gains.
The government is on track to borrow less than previously forecast, which will give rise to a fantasy that Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has more space to slash taxes than he actually has.
It’s a fantasy because these gains on borrowing are largely the product of high inflation, which has bolstered tax receipts. The government hasn’t admitted it yet, but inflation will inevitably drive up spending too.
It means Hunt’s room for manoeuvre is actually limited if he wants to meet his target of getting debt falling as a proportion of gross domestic product (GDP).
Although interest rates, which have been higher than expected, will weigh on the public finances, the windfall from higher taxes bolstered by inflation and wage growth will more than offset this. The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) will likely show that the government’s headroom against that target has grown from £6.5bn to around £13bn.
Jeremy Hunt will want to claim this as a victory, while also tempering expectations for tax cuts. His message will be that the public finances are improving under this government but they are in too poor a shape to allow for any tax cuts.
This is where the political infighting begins. Many MPs within his own party want him to use that headroom to cut taxes. They are perturbed by the fact that a Conservative government has overseen growth in the tax burden to its largest in the post-war era.
Among the most egregious of these tax rises is the freezing of thresholds, a stealth tax which will see taxpayers pay £40bn a year more by 2028. It has dragged millions of public sector workers, including teachers and nurses, into the higher band of tax.
Tensions over taxation have been simmering in the party and will likely flare up again because Hunt is unlikely to make any big giveaways. The government is insistent that the priority must be to bring inflation down because any tax rises could drive inflation higher. However, with the target to halve inflation now met, MPs will be asking when the tax cuts can begin.
Image: Jeremy Hunt will deliver his autumn statement on Wednesday
Both Hunt and Rishi Sunak are sensitive to this and will probably throw a bone or two. Downing Street has been looking for options that are relatively inexpensive and less likely to increase inflation.
There are a number of policies under consideration, including the scrapping of inheritance tax, or a reduction in the rate from 40% to 20% on estates above £325,000. The government could also cancel a planned increase on stamp duty. Together, these policies would cost about £5.2bn. The chancellor is also expected to cancel the planned 5p increase in fuel duty from April next year, which will cost £6bn.
So, any giveaways would quickly swallow up the headroom, at a time when government spending will inevitably have to rise. Departmental budgets are set in cash terms and high inflation means that the cost of paying prison guards and running courts has gone up. Without substantial increases, public services face real-terms pay cuts.
On current plans, unprotected departments would see their spending power cut by 16% between 2022-23 and 2027-28, which would be a similar pace of cuts to those implemented by George Osborne in the early 2010s. The Resolution Foundation, a left-leaning think tank, described this scale of the cuts as a “fiscal fiction” that is “undeliverable”.
Read more: Jeremy Hunt signals tax cuts as lower inflation means economy has ‘turned a corner’ David Cameron’s official peerage title revealed Hunt contradicts PM on Rwanda flight take off position
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Chancellor on ‘next part of economic plan’
The opposition will be keeping a hawk eye on this and will be quick to decry any signs that the country is returning to a period of austerity. It will also be quick to attack any of the government’s tax-raising plans – and there will be a number of them.
Tax thresholds will probably remain frozen into 2029, a policy that could raise another £6bn. The Treasury will also be cracking down on benefits, uprating them in line with October’s inflation rate of 4.6% instead of September’s figure of 6.7%. That could save £2bn. A tweak to the triple lock calculation for pensions could net £600m.
So, for all the large upward revisions to the numbers coming out of the OBR, it’s a fiscal event that is unlikely to inspire. There will be some tweaks around the edges and some big talk on plans to boost economic growth.
However, the government will probably want to keep its powder dry for the budget in March. Unfortunately, that may not be enough to satisfy Tory MPs, who are hungry for tax giveaways now.
Rachel Reeves will promise to speed up planning processes to revive the economy as she branded the Tories the “single biggest obstacle” to the economy.
The shadow chancellor will pledge an overhaul of the UK’s “antiquated planning system” in order to “get Britain building again”.
Business and the economy is set to dominate the second day of Labour conference in Liverpool and as the party looks to capitalise on the Conservatives’ controversial decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 to Manchester.
Read more: Union boss criticises ‘bland’ offering from Sir Keir Starmer – Labour conference latest
Sir Keir Starmer will charm businesses by gathering hundreds of company bosses at the Labour conference in a meeting the party described as the biggest of his kind.
Microsoft, Ikea and Octopus are among the attendees at the business forum, which will be addressed by Ms Reeves and the shadow business secretary Jonathan Reynolds.
In her speech Ms Reeves is expected to highlight how decision times for major infrastructure projects have increased by 65% since 2012, now taking four years,.
The reforms she will propose include updating all national policy statements – some of which have not been revised for over a decade – within the first six months of Labour entering Number 10.
Planning applications would be fast-tracked for battery factories, laboratories and 5G infrastructure while the party would also set clearer national guidance for developers on consulting local communities to avoid the prospect of litigation.
Sweeteners and potential incentives such as cheaper energy bills will be provided to encourage local communities to back clean energy projects.
“If we want to spur investment, restore economic security and revive growth, then we must get Britain building again,” Ms Reeves is expected to say.
“The Tories would have you believe we can’t build anything any more. In fact, the single biggest obstacle to building infrastructure, to investment and to growth in this country is the Conservative Party itself.
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“If the Tories won’t build, if the Tories can’t build, then we will. Taking head-on the obstacles presented by our antiquated planning system.
In response, the Conservatives criticised Labour for its recent opposition to government plans to relax environmental rules in order to boost housebuilding.
Party chairman Greg Hands said: “If Labour had any intention of making long-term reform, they would support new building projects – instead, just weeks ago, they tried to block our plans to build 100,000 new homes.
“Labour’s only plan to grow the economy is to borrow an extra £28bn a year, increasing debt and inflation.”
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has vowed to tackle the “vicious circle of ever-rising taxes” by revamping public services and the welfare system.
The cabinet minister argued the state needed to become “more productive”, not bigger, as he pointed to the use of artificial intelligence to realise frontline efficiencies and reduce the burden on the public purse.
He also said the government was looking at welfare changes, with 100,000 people a year moving off work on to benefits “without any obligation” to look for a job.
Mr Hunt made his comments as the Conservative Party annual conference gets under way in Manchester this weekend, with some senior party figures demanding tax cuts.
It follows a report published this week that said the Tories will have overseen, between the 2019 election and the next general election, the biggest set of tax rises since at least the Second World War.
Analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) thinktank said taxes will have increased to around 37% of national income, equivalent to around £3,500 more per household.
But despite the growing pressure, Mr Hunt told The Times newspaper: “We’re not in a position to talk about tax cuts at all.”
He added: “We need a more productive state, not a bigger state.”
“We need a state that doesn’t just deliver the services it currently delivers, but actually improves the services it delivers and recognises that there’s going to be more calls on those services with an ageing population,” he said.
“But we need to find a formula that doesn’t mean that we’re on a vicious circle of ever-rising taxes.”
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Truss ‘tried to fatten and slaughter the pig’
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More than 30 Tory MPs, including Liz Truss, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s short-lived predecessor, and former home secretary Dame Priti Patel, have vowed not to back further tax hikes.
Ms Truss, whose mini-budget 12 months ago triggered market turmoil in response to unfunded tax cuts and ultimately forced her from office, tweeted on Friday: “We should always seek to reduce the tax burden, especially when there’s so much pressure on family budgets.”
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In his Times interview, Mr Hunt also called for a more upbeat tone about the economy and said people needed to “shrug off a bit of the pessimism”.
Mr Hunt, who took over from Ms Truss’s sacked chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, said: “When I started the job there was a lot of doom and gloom about Britain, our prospects.
“What I have realised now nearly a year on is that there is just far too much declinism.
“If you look at the fundamentals of the British economy we have had our setbacks like everyone else, we are the fastest-growing large European country, not just since the pandemic but since Brexit, since 2010.
“That’s a period when we’ve had a once-in-a-century pandemic, a global financial crisis that we were particularly exposed to, and a 1970s-style energy shock. Despite all of that the British economy has been very resilient.”
His remarks came after it was revealed the UK economy grew faster than had first been thought between January and March this year.
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Data published by the Office for National Statistics shows UK economic growth was 0.3% from January to March, better than the 0.1% first announced.
The revision put the country’s economy ahead of both Germany and France in terms of post-pandemic performance but behind allies such as the United States, Canada, Japan and Italy.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has warned that profit increases benefit no one if they worsen inflation.
Mr Hunt said he agreed with remarks by Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey and said “margin recovery benefits no one if it feeds inflation”.
Mr Bailey has spoken out against companies raising prices, seeking to recover profits hit during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking at the City of London’s Mansion House on Monday evening, Mr Hunt said the UK’s economic resilience – such as the low unemployment rate and lack of recession – is one of the reasons inflation has remained high.
“[The UK economy] has shown itself more resilient than many predicted, but that resilience is itself one of the reasons for higher inflation,” he said.
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1:42
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt says the UK faces ‘difficult challenges’, but has ‘shown itself more resilient than many predicted’.
The chancellor also outlined ambitions for pension reform.
Corporate profiteering and wage increases were spurring on stubborn inflation, Mr Bailey said last month when the latest interest rate rise was announced.
“We can’t have companies seeking to rebuild profit margins which means prices continue to go up at their current rates,” Mr Bailey said.
“The current levels, I’ll be honest, are unsustainable.”
He has previously suggested that food producers – rather than supermarkets – may be overcharging.
Banks and supermarkets have continued to profit, with some seeing profits increase, throughout the cost of living crisis.
Read more Government explores options to attract pension fund investment for UK projects
A core aim for Mr Hunt is to remedy the fact UK pension funds don’t invest in UK high-growth companies as much as their international counterparts.
The heads of major defined benefit pension schemes – the schemes most people are members of – on Monday signed an agreement aiming to, by 2030, allocate at least 5% of the funds people automatically join to shares in companies that aren’t listed on a stock exchange.
The defined benefit market is “too fragmented”, Mr Hunt said, and there is scope for them to consolidate.
Overall the announcements were said to be “evolutionary not revolutionary”, by Mr Hunt.
Pension schemes which are not achieving “the best possible outcome for their members” will face being wound up by the Pensions Regulator, Mr Hunt added.
There could be real financial benefits as a result of reforms, the chancellor said.
“For an average earner who starts saving at 18, these measures could increase the size of their pension pot by 12% over their career – that’s worth over £1,000 more a year in retirement.”
There will also be benefits for some companies, he added.
“At the same time this package has the potential to unlock an additional £75bn of financing for growth by 2030, finally addressing the shortage of scale up capital holding back so many of our most promising companies.”
Former chancellor Nigel Lawson has died at the age of 91.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said Mr Lawson “was a transformational chancellor and an inspiration to me and many others” as he paid tribute on Twitter.
Mr Lawson was a Conservative MP representing the constituency of Blaby from 1974 to 1992, and served in Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet from 1981 to 1989.
He was appointed chancellor in June 1983 and served until his resignation in October 1989.
Mr Lawson had six children including celebrity chef Nigella Lawson and journalist Dominic Lawson.
Tributes from the world of politics began pouring in following his death.
Former prime minister Boris Johnson said Mr Lawson was “a fearless and original flame of free market Conservatism”.
“He was a tax-cutter and simplifier who helped transform the economic landscape and helped millions of British people achieve their dreams,” he added.
“He was a prophet of Brexit and a lover of continental Europe. He was a giant. My thoughts and prayers are with his family.”
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly called Mr Lawson “a true statesman”, adding: “His contributions to this nation will not be forgotten.”
Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab said Mr Lawson was “a giant who changed the political weather, a lodestar for Conservatives, and a kind man always generous with his wisdom”.
Tory Party chairman Greg Hands said Mr Lawson will be remembered “for his clarity of thinking, commitment to free market economics and willingness to challenge orthodoxies”.
Former Home Secretary Priti Patel called him a “giant of British politics and a strong champion of free market Conservative values”.
She said: “A generation of families and businesses have benefited from the economic freedoms he delivered for our country. He will be greatly missed and my thoughts and prayers are with his family.”
Born in Hampstead, northwest London, on 11 March 1932, the son of the owner of a tea-trading firm climbed his way to the top of British politics after an education at Westminster School and Oxford University.
His political life started at Oxford, where he did Philosophy, Politics and Economics – like so many politicians – but began his working life carrying out national service as a Royal Navy officer.
Lord Lawson, as he was to become, then became a financial journalist for 14 years before entering politics at the age of 42.
He served a number of positions in Mrs Thatcher’s government before she appointed him as chancellor – a position that ensured he would go down in the history books.
