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Why women's jokes fall flat in the boardroom
Women often try to use self-deprecating humour to get their colleagues on-side but it raises few laughs Humour is a staple part of any boardroom discussion, as viewers of the BBC's The Apprentice will know. But research reveals that, while men benefit from the use of well-judged banter, the brand of humour used by leading businesswomen often leads to awkward silences and could be undermining their careers. The claim is made by linguistics expert Dr Judith Baxter, who undertook an 18-month study into the speech patterns of men and women at meetings in seven big companies, including two in the FTSE 100. An analysis of the 600,000 words used during 14 meetings, seven led by a woman and seven by a man, found sharp differences between the use of humour by men and women in the boardroom ? and how the jokes are received. Baxter discovered that the majority of male humour (80%) in business meetings takes the form of flippant, off-the-cuff witticisms or banter. About 90% of it receives an instant, positive response, usually as laughter. Yet most female humour during the course of a meeting is self-deprecatory (70%) and more often than not (at least 80%) is received in silence, according to Baxter. Perhaps because of the poor reception accorded to women who used humour, men were also three times more likely to use jokes to lighten the mood in meetings they were leading. Baxter, who is due to carry out further experiments on sex differences for a programme to be aired on BBC2 in September, said she believed the culture of male-dominated boardrooms was a challenge to women. She said: "My research has shown that male managers use humour to demonstrate and display their leadership of a team. Their male subordinates will also use 'display' humour to impress a male boss, because it shows they are on the same wavelength. It is part of leadership 'tribe' behaviour which women find hard to join. When women managers use humour it can misfire. This is partly because it is less culturally acceptable for women to use humour and partly because women haven't traditionally been part of the leadership tribe. It is not that women are less funny: they tend to use humour differently. They are more comfortable with using humour in pairs with a friend and less as a means to manage people. When they do, their humour can appear arch, contrived, defensive or occasionally, just mean. "One type of humour women leaders do use more than men is self-deprecating humour? Women would rather laugh at themselves on the whole than laugh at others because it is the safe option. "What should senior women do about it? They should learn to develop the running gag or light, teasing banter with male and female colleagues at appropriate moments such as the beginning and ends of meetings, passing in the corridor, or while making a cup of tea." Hilary Devey, one of the business leaders on the BBC programme Dragons' Den, who made her name in the haulage industry, said she recognised some of Baxter's findings in her own career but believed humour based around self-deprecation could be a powerful tool. "The humour that I first encountered in the haulage sector was earthy and often confrontational, but by either giving as good as I got, or indulging in self-deprecation, it actually made people take me more seriously: breaking the tension before actually getting down to the real matters in hand. I once read that the British use the word 'sorry' in conversation in over 30 different ways that have absolutely nothing to do with apologising, and so too with self-deprecation: all is not quite what it seems." Devey added: "Don't get me wrong, some people put themselves down all the time, and this goes beyond humour ? they are just racked with self-doubt and probably need to pull themselves together and stop being so needy. However, for most British people, the key weapon in their arsenal of wit is that of self-deprecation: it is unexpected, punctures pomposity, shows humanity, and can often give you the upper hand as a result." Lynne Parker, who organises the Funny Women awards, runs workshops for women in business to give them confidence to use humour in their working day. She said: "The qualities men are supposed to have, we cannot. We are supposed to be submissive. Women are often frightened to use humour and can come across as austere and humourless. I am not expecting women to go into boardrooms to tell one-liners but it is all about timing, knowing when it is appropriate. Good comedians are very cognisant of their environment ? it is about everyday life and what is going on about them. And whether you are a man or woman you should be aware of that in the boardroom." Baxter, author of the study, added: "I am not saying somehow women are deficient. But culturally there are fewer role models out there for funny women too. There are a few, obviously ? Ruby Wax, Sarah Millican is a new one that has popped up, and French and Saunders, for example ? but if you compare that to male comedians there are hundreds more people can think of." Work & careersGenderDaniel Boffey
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Former Farepak board lined up for punishment ? but Glencore's investors are f...
On this week's agenda: disqualification proceedings relating to the collapsed Christmas savings company, and a commodity giant's shares flood on to the market It's either very early, or rather late, for a spot of panto, but the curtain goes up on Thursday on the tale of the posse accused of cancelling Christmas. Playing the roles of the pantomime villains will be seven out of nine former board members at failed hamper business Farepak (and its parent) who are charged with being "unfit to manage a company" by Vince Cable. The business secretary, via the Insolvency Service, is looking to have them disqualified as directors. The list of those being lined up for a public heckling is understood to include Sir Clive Thompson, former chief executive of Rentokil and chairman of Farepak's parent, European Home Retail (EHR). Also believed to be on the cast list is Neil Gillis, once boss of Blacks Leisure and an EHR non-executive. Neither responded to requests for comment. Still, like many Christmas stories, most feel they already know this tale pretty well. Thousands of Farepak customers, mostly on modest incomes, lost savings put into a fund for Christmas gifts when the company went bust in October 2006. There was no happy ending for them, nor for Farepak execs Stephen Hicks and Joanne Ponting. Both have already coughed and have promised not to act as company directors. Roll up for Glencore's big share sell-offIt has taken a year ? but next week may finally see the emergence of a few (forced) buyers of Glencore shares. The commodity trading group floated last year at 530p and investors haven't seen those heady heights since, with the price now testing all-time lows of just below 350p. However, Friday sees the end of the lock-in that prevents staff from selling their shares, meaning a huge rise in the free float of tradable stock theoretically available to the market (Credit Suisse estimates from 16% to more than 51%). That in turn means that the index tracking funds mirroring the market will need to increase their holdings, which in theory should be positive news for the shares (although it doesn't always work like that). If you haven't nodded off yet, you might also like to know that Glencore investors won't be the only lot trying to buoy the price, as analysts working for the scores of banks that advised on the float loyally pushed out glowing coverage as soon as they were allowed. Citi guessed the shares would go to 570p, which looks like a cracking call when compared with the target prices set by Credit Suisse (600p), Morgan Stanley (604p) and UBS (630p). Solid work. M&S investors wait for Marc to reveal allBy all accounts, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley is a striking looking woman and you may have noticed her, as she's appeared in the Marks & Spencer Autograph ad campaign alongside some chap called Ryan Reynolds. Naturally she's a designer now as well, with the Rosie for Autograph collection of luxurious silk lingerie sets, camisoles and French knickers due to hit the stores in the autumn. Yet despite all the hype about the launch (and the City being a shamelessly lecherous place) the gentlemen of the Square Mile appear unmoved. Instead, as Marks prepares to announce its full-year results this week, all the number-crunchers can focus on is what chief executive Marc Bolland is concealing under his own kimono. The expectation is that when the Dutchman peels back the silk, the sight will not be a pretty one. Last year the retailer announced pre-tax profits of £780m (or £714m after stripping out exceptional items) and the guidance is that Tuesday's numbers will show sales of £9.9bn and an underwhelming profit of £694m ? the first slump in three years. That will put Bolland's bonus at risk (but not his £6m golden hello) and leaves the chances of achieving his £11.5bn sales target in two years looking skimpier than a pair of Rosie's new knickers. Fireworks over sparklersUnbelievable as it may seem, General Manuel Hélder Vieira Dias Júnior ? the head of Angola's military ? looks like he might benefit from one of David Cameron's parenting classes. He's tried to instil some discipline into two of his warring associates ? Russian-Israeli businessman Arkady Gaydamak and billionaire diamond tycoon Lev Leviev ? but the boys are not doing as they are told. Gaydamak is suing Leviev after a bust-up over the pair's diamond interests, which court documents say were set up following concerns that illicit trading had funded the Angolan civil war. It sounds like a tale from the film Blood Diamond as does news of the general's futile dressing down ? so the pair head to the high court this week to sort it all out. Well, sort of. Gaydamak will not be travelling and will give evidence via video link. "There is a slight possibility he could be arrested," admits his spokesman, "[on] a small outstanding charge that is being appealed." Corporate governanceRetail industryGlencoreMarks & SpencerAngolaIPOsAfricaSimon Goodley
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While Europe waits for Greece to choose, the flame of fear spreads
There are four weeks to go before the Greek elections ? and, it seems, even longer to wait before a German change of heart on bailing out lenders. But fearful markets, and hard-pressed electorates, may not be patient much longer For battle weary euro politicians, four long, tough weeks lie ahead between now and the next round of Greek elections, which could see recession-hit voters restating their determination to reject the savage austerity measures that are the price of Greece's latest ?130bn (£105bn) bailout. But over the past two years, events have repeatedly been taken out of the hands of Europe's leaders by the markets or a furious public ? and analysts warn that the crisis could spiral beyond their control even before the Greeks get the chance to go to the polls. As another frenzied week in euroland drew to a close, Spanish banks became the latest focus of anxiety as ratings agency Moody's downgraded 16 of them ? including Santander's UK arm ? on Thursday night. In all the eurozone's struggling peripheral economies ? Italy, Greece, Portugal and Spain ? governments and banks are locked together in what Sony Kapoor, of Brussels-based thinktank Re-Define, calls a "dance of death". The weaker each economy becomes, the more bad debts its banks are forced to declare; and the more likely it is that their governments will be forced to set aside fresh resources to recapitalise them. At the same time, much of the banks' capital base ? their safest assets ? are made up of the bonds of their home country's government, which become shakier investments as the governments are forced to stand behind their banks. Madrid announced last week that Spanish banks were sitting on ?148bn of bad loans in March. It was also forced to deny that one bailed-out lender, Bankia, was facing a dramatic run on its deposits. Bankia's share price at one point plunged by more than a quarter. A bank run of the sort that helped bring down Northern Rock in the UK is one of the greatest fears facing Europe's leaders, because once panic-stricken savers take matters into their own hands, their fears can quickly become self-fulfilling. If a "Grexit" did materialise, businesses and consumers could respond by pulling their money out of financial institutions, not just in Greece but also Spain, Italy, Portugal and even Ireland, as they contemplated the possibility that others could follow Athens out of the single currency. Megan Greene, director of European economics at Roubini Global Economics, says: "The biggest risk over the next month is from a bank run." There may not have been queues outside branches, but already deposits in Greek banks are down by almost a third since before the crisis, and central bank governor George Provopoulos said that withdrawals had hit ?700m in a single week. "We're seeing a 'bank jog' in Greece already," Greene says. "People have been withdrawing deposits right, left and centre," agrees Neil Mellor of BNY Mellon. Greene believes European politicians could assuage savers' concerns in the coming days by declaring a Europe-wide deposit protection scheme; but that would fall foul of Germany's opposition to offering blanket support to struggling states. "No one is going to feel very calmed by the Greek government saying 'We're going to backstop all your deposits,'" she says. Danny Gabay, director of City consultancy Fathom, says what Europe faces is fundamentally a banking crisis. "It's not who borrowed: it's who lent," he says. "That's the problem. The people in their tents outside St Paul's were not complaining about the person who borrowed six times their income; they were complaining about the banks, which should have known better." It was severe strains in Europe's banks, and the risk of a full-blown credit crunch, that prompted Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, to pump ?1 trillion worth of cheap loans into the financial sector late last year, though analysts immediately warned that the drastic emergency measure would merely buy time. As the Greek elections approach, European leaders are walking a tightrope. They must try to convince Greek voters that even brutal austerity is better than the dire consequences of being chucked out of the euro, while reassuring the markets and anxious voters in other countries that they could handle a "Grexit". With the latest gathering of EU leaders taking place this Wednesday, the outline is already emerging of a package of pro-growth measures, centred on an expansion of lending to infrastructure projects and small to medium-sized businesses by the EU-backed European Investment Bank (EIB). Greene says that these proposals may provide a modest boost to growth over the medium term, and allow Germany's Angela Merkel and France's François Hollande to adopt a more united political front, but that they do not tackle the underlying problem: that Greece ? and, she believes, ultimately Spain ? are in an unsustainable financial position. "It's not like Europe is in need of infrastructure," she says. Mellor says: "If they do something with the EIB, the market will be content to give it the benefit of the doubt; but it just buys more time." As the storm rages, the keepers of the euro flame have lined up to offer radical ways to rewrite the single currency's rules to make the project more viable in the long term. Jean-Claude Trichet, who stood down as president of the European Central Bank last autumn, made a speech on Thursday night in which he argued that eurozone states should be able to declare fellow members bankrupt, and take over their tax and spending policy ? an idea that the economist Nouriel Roubini rapidly dismissed as "totally undermining national sovereignty". The European Stability Mechanism ? the ?500bn rescue fund that will be able to pay out to help states in distress ? comes into operation at the beginning of July, and the International Monetary Fund has also boosted its resources in readiness to come to Europe's aid. But ultimately, most analysts believe whatever Greece decides in a month's time, the crisis is unlikely to be cauterised until politicians make what Mellor calls a "monumental, megalithic decision": to allow the ECB to freely lend cash-strapped banks as much as they need to stay afloat; and to allow eurozone governments to stand behind each other, come what may. That would mean tackling Germany's deep-seated political opposition to offering open-ended bailouts to countries it believes have behaved irresponsibly ? something that still looks highly unlikely, despite growing evidence of a change of mood in other European countries. Meanwhile, the Bank of England and the Treasury in the UK, and hundreds of firms across Europe, will continue hurriedly drawing up contingency plans as they watch the euro "tearing itself apart," as Sir Mervyn King put it last week. EU trade commissioner Karel de Gucht caused a flurry of excitement in the markets on Friday by apparently admitting in an interview with Belgian newspaper De Standaard that the commission itself was working on contingency plans for Greece leaving the euro. A spokesman for commission president José-Manuel Barroso later denied it, but most experts believe it would be irresponsible for Europe's institutions not to be preparing for the worst. While Alexis Tsipras, the leader of Greece's anti-austerity Syriza party, talks tough in the runup to the election, some senior EU figures seem to have begun to comfort themselves with idea that they could contain the consequences of a "Grexit"; but Gabay says the term itself gives the misleading impression that the crisis would centre on Athens. "The Greeks already have a word for exit: it's Exodus. And the point about Exodus was the consequences were pretty damned painful. I'm not saying there are going to be rivers of blood or 40 days in the wilderness, but it's very dangerous to think this is just about Greece." Eurozone crisisEuroEuropean monetary unionEuropean UnionBankingEuropean banksFinancial crisisFinancial sectorEconomicsEuropeHeather Stewart
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It's not rocket science ? maybe Sunday papers sell fewer because they cost more
Roy Greenslade and other commentators may analyse the ABCs, but maybe sales disparities boil down to the change in our pockets Professor Roy Greenslade (like other academic commentators before him) broods over the disparity between Saturday and Sunday newspaper circulations, as revealed by new ABC sales audits. What's so soggy about British Sunday sales? he asks, running through a gamut of changing social habits. But sometimes you don't need rocket science at all. Sometimes simple cash chinking on shop counters counts, too. I bought the total package of Saturday nationals yesterday for £10.80. Today's equivalent Sunday bundle will cost £2.80 more (and £3.30 the moment the new Sun stops its launch promotion). Newspapers don't like to talk about cover prices. It's not supposed to be a suitable topic for conversation in polite society. But that doesn't mean that even hard-working university professors don't need to count every penny. Tweet nothings
Ten million Twitter users in Britain. John Prescott celebrates. But something called the Portland Communications NewsTweet index shows 80,000 fewer tweets from journalists in the first three months of this year, almost 25% down. As for Sky News, the Guardian and the Telegraph, their tweets have slumped nearly 40%. What's gone wrong? Boredom, overwork, stress, changing fashions, the beginning of the end? Or perhaps the realisation that no contender, however dogged, can out tweet the unstoppable and clearly under-employed Baron P. Newspapers & magazinesABCsNewspapersPeter Preston
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Britain's got talent, but the Daily Mail seems short of prescience
The Mail prophesied the end of Simon Cowell when Britain's Got Talent was being outperformed by The Voice. So much for the power of the press to influence events The supposed power of the press? Here's a chastening example from everyday life, one without a smidgen of politics on display. Begin at the end of March as Britain's Got Talent and Simon Cowell are caught in the headlights of a supposedly omnipotent Daily Mail. Look back and see The Voice from the BBC "soaring" as BGT fails. Oh what "a blow for Cowell"! His "reign as the king of Saturday night TV" is looking vulnerable. Maybe "Television's Mr Nasty has a made a fortune but lost his soul". Maybe his "botched botox" job is the final humiliation. "Will Simon Cowell have the courage to put himself out of his misery?" Thus, as May crept onto our screens, the Mail's diagnosis couldn't have been clearer. Cowell was washed up. His show was getting walloped in the ratings. His new press adviser (hired from the Daily Mail, as it happens) didn't stand a chance. The Voice was the winner, loud, clear and thumping. Except that, of course, it wasn't. The Voice's audience plunged to below 6m. Cowell's Got Talent wound up on 11.9m. "If there's a happier, more family-friendly TV show, then I missed it," cooed the Mail's Jan Moir. God bless Simon, and Alesha, and David Walliams, and the incredible dancing Pudsey. It's a 180-degree turnaround. And caused, power-mongers please note, by nothing more complex than ordinary viewers in their millions flicking a remote from one channel to another. Simple is as simple does. Just one finger does it. Daily MailBritain's Got TalentThe VoiceSimon CowellNational newspapersNewspapers & magazinesTelevisionEntertainmentPeter Preston
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From M&S to whisky ? China's middle class snap up western goods
British food and drink producers and retailers are proving there really is a market for selling tea to China British favourites such as baked beans and cream of mushroom soup have proved an unlikely hit with Chinese shoppers at Marks & Spencer's flagship store in downtown Shanghai. But it doesn't stop there ? shoppers are also stocking up on frozen salmon or cod fillets, ready-made frozen curries, chocolate-chip cookies and porridge oats. Everything is shipped in from Britain. There is even a bakery selling rebaked bread ? rolls and pastries that are brought in frozen from the UK. "We're even selling tea to the Chinese ? they like the more interesting infusions," says Stephen Rayfield, country manager for China at M&S. UK food and drinks manufacturers, along with supermarkets, are queuing up to tap into China's burgeoning taste for western food. At a time when British brands such as Weetabix are being gobbled up by Chinese companies, a growing number of UK businesses hope to grab their own slice of the booming Chinese grocery market. They have the full support of the UK government. As part of David Cameron's "march of the makers", the government in January announced a drive to boost British food and drink exports to countries like China. Agriculture and food minister Jim Paice flew to Dubai to tout British produce the following month, and is now touring China. Food and drink is one of the biggest sub-sectors of Britain's manufacturing industry, which makes up a tenth of the economy. "In so many cases the Chinese have taken over our manufacturing base, but with British food they can't do that," says Lance Forman of H Forman & Sons, the last smokery still operating in east London. The firm, founded by a Jewish immigrant from Russia at the start of the last century, has been exporting smoked salmon to Hong Kong for the last 30 years and now wants to break into China. "One hundred years of history ? the Chinese can't copy that," he adds. Chinese eating habits have started to mimic those in the west ? the growing middle class has started having cereal for breakfast rather than rice; chocolate, crisps and biscuits as special treats; and using teabags rather than traditional leaf tea. This brings mixed blessings: nutrition experts warn that obesity is already growing among the younger generation in big cities. China recently overtook the US to become the world's biggest market for grocery shopping, underpinned by an expanding population, a shift to more expensive foods and strong economic growth. It is predicted to grow twice as fast as the US to be worth almost £950bn by 2015 ? from £609bn at the end of 2011 ? according to industry researchers IGD. Tesco already has more than 100 stores in China, and Sainsbury's is believed to be in talks with a potential partner about entering the Chinese market. Its team in Shanghai has conducted a thorough feasibility study, following consumers in and out of shops and traditional markets. A spokesman said: "We do not see international expansion as part of our short-term plans but we are exploring other possibilities for growth in the medium to long term." Sainsbury's is still smarting from its disastrous foray into Egypt in 1999. It pulled out in 2001 after running up losses of more than £100m in just two years in the country, which had no tradition of supermarket shopping. Sainsbury's then chairman, Sir Peter Davis, admitted the company had gone in "too far, too fast". M&S has four fashion-and-food stores in Shanghai after opening the first one, measuring 5,000 sq metres, in 2008, as well as three others in the smaller cities of Ningbo, Changzhou and Wuhan. It got off to a rocky start but intends to focus on Shanghai, where a rapidly growing new strata of Chinese society ? the urban rich ? has developed a taste for western brands from Prada to Gucci, along with French wine, Spanish olive oil and British biscuits and beer. Shanghai is the world's fastest-growing city economy, with a population of more than 20 million. Chinese food importer Gorden Wei, chairman of Shanghai Ted Enterprises and vice-president of the Shanghai Import Food Enterprises Association, says Chinese consumers are "quite conceptual". That is to say, they associate wine with France (in particular Château Lafite Rothschild from the Bordeaux region), chocolate with Belgium and whisky with Scotland. He worries that Chinese shoppers are not sophisticated enough to remember more than a handful of western brands. "We're doing a missionary job; we're educating people about other brands," says Wei. He also warns British exporters not to expect to sell in big volumes, arguing that goods such as Campbells Shortbread are regarded as a "high-end product" in China. But this does not worry Rayfield at M&S, who has seen "made in Britain" food and drink fly off the shelves in the six months he has been in Shanghai. Some 17,000 packs of crisps and nuts were sold in the last quarter, more than double the level a year ago, as well as 35,000 pieces of frozen fish, up 26%. Much of the western food available, such as biscuits and chocolate, is bought by consumers as gifts for others or treats for themselves. "We're at the top end of the market," says Rayfield. "The Chinese customer sees us for that as well. They come in to top up, to buy a treat from us. We're not going to be an everyday supermarket." That doesn't come as a big surprise after a quick look at the high price tag. Similarly, in the City Shop adjacent to the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Shanghai ? part of a local supermarket chain ? a box of Dorset Cereals muesli is priced at 104 yuan ? roughly £10. A pack of PG Tips is 78 yuan. This shop caters mainly for expats, but a new, bigger City Shop has now opened in downtown Shanghai to lure in Chinese shoppers. Different taste buds are another challenge. For example, Chinese customers found Cadbury's chocolate too sweet initially, recounts Elina Wen, purchasing director at importer Pinlive (Shanghai) Foods. As in other countries, Tesco has adapted its ranges to cater for local tastes. For example, it stocks lots of bulk rice, many different types of live fish and has a dim sum counter. It also offers a wide range of baby products ? formula milk, disposable nappies, strollers and bikes ? because China's one-child policy means that families spend a lot of money on their only child. Tesco has opened more than 100 hypermarkets along the Chinese east coast since its launch there in 2004. It has also developed its own shopping malls, branded "Lifespace", which are anchored by a Tesco store. At last count sales in the country had reached £1.3bn. Tyrrells crisps, made on a farm in Herefordshire, have also found their way to China through a big Shanghai-based distributor, Sinodis, which also distributes Weetabix, Haribo and Dr Oetker. "If you want a little bit of England, Tyrrells is for you," says the firm's marketing director, Oliver Rudgard. "The Chinese market is very similar to India: it has not reached its full potential. The large retail brands only have tens of outlets. As they grow, we grow with them." Food & drink industryChinaMarks & SpencerRetail industryTescoSupermarketsJ SainsburyJulia Kollewe
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A Tory at the BBC? It wouldn't be the first time
Boris Johnson was as outspoken as ever about political placement at the BBC. But rare is the chairman of board or trust who has not been affiliated to one of the main parties Boris, in full blond bulldozer mode, tells the BBC where to find its next director general: "We need a Tory, and no mucking around." Watch lips purse, hear sharp intakes of breath. The people appointed to run British broadcasting must surely be "independent" ? not party nominees. The gabby mayor has boobed again. But (just to remind) let's not get too sanctimonious about perfect Portland Place propriety. The BBC already has a former Conservative party chairman as its supreme trustee-cum-governor. He succeeded a former Labour councillor, who (after a spasm of trust transition) succeeded a former Tory chief whip, who succeeded the banker husband of the human dynamo who ran Gordon Brown's office. The chairmen of the governors before that were an active Conservative local politician (and Bow Group chairman), the retired MD of the Times and the brother of a Conservative cabinet minister. And remember who appoints DGs. The chair of the trust takes the lead. Chris Patten is doing it again right now (as gossip about Ed Richards, ex-aide to Blair in No 10, moving over from Ofcom accelerates). And the thought that whoever emerges from the process will somehow be free of party connection is plain illusion, not born out by even the most cursory glance at history. Is the BBC itself actually independent? For the most part, yes: because its staff in their thousands hang on to such freedom. Those are the people who safeguard its reputation. But politicians and sundry advisers? They've been poking their fingers in the pie through the decades: and we ought grimly to acknowledge as much. Over at Leveson you could sense the same sands shifting as the lord justice and Gus O'Donnell, the last cabinet secretary, played a cosy little game. Gus wanted regulation made "independent and compulsory" under a "truly independent chairman" appointed by "fair and open competition" with "a panel that would have credibility". It would need "to be quite a strong body", he added. And "not in any sense government-led or government-controlled," chimed in LJL ? "either expressly or implicitly, so that it is seen to be independent in the true sense, not merely in its appointment but its operation." They went on to discuss Gus's idea, based on his fleeting experience of American newspapers, of "segregating fact and comment" so that ? "as with the code that civil servants operate to" ? there could be strong belief in "honesty, objectivity, integrity and impartiality" imposed as a "kind of rule of thumb". Maybe someone like the information commissioner could have a role here, he suggested. At which point, listen for a scream of brakes. Before he was cabinet secretary, Gus ran No 10 press relations for John Major. So, after him, did another career civil servant, Sir Christopher Meyer, who went on to be our ambassador in Washington before becoming chairman of the Press Complaints Commission. Saintly O'Donnell, soiled Meyer? It's a ridiculous distinction ? as ridiculous as saying that Charles Anson (once press secretary to the Queen), Judge Jeremy Roberts, Michael Grade (once chairman at the BBC) and Julie Spence (former chief constable of Cambridgeshire) are also unfitted for the duty they exercise at the PCC. What did Christopher Graham, the present information commissioner, do before he arrived at the ICO? He was director general at the Advertising Standards Authority ? just like Mark Bolland, the first director of the PCC. Independence isn't some adjective-rich device that pops down the Whitehall slipway on demand. Look at "fair and open competition" when it comes to choosing who'll run the BBC and hoot with laughter. Look at the tradition of British newspaper life over three centuries and laugh again. Think of a retired judge or a retired permanent secretary deciding what's fact, what's opinion and what pages they shall go on. It would all be in the cause of press freedom, of course. No participant in the present debate would dream of saying otherwise. But even Boris would know what to call it: just mucking around. On message? Who knows?
How shall we know when Delivering Quality First at the BBC has been, well, delivered? The idea ? now fully endorsed by the trust ? is to pare away here and there so that only the most attentive viewer and listener can spot that the money has gone. Blue Peter banished to CBBC? One presenter at a time on the BBC news channel? Fewer Radio Three3 concerts? Eight hundred newshounds out to grass? Somehow you feel a shrunken service may survive, though ? if it can get over the stringent upheaval about to be wreaked on BBC4's service contract in the following, cherishable trustspeak: "Wording changed from 'it should record and broadcast performance from the nations and regions' to 'it should provide a platform for local celebrations in the nations and regions and should also create occasions that bring people together.'" Delivering incomprehensibility later, perhaps? Lord PattenBBC TrustBBCTelevision industryPeter Preston
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Saving the euro won't solve the crisis. Losing it won't either
The vast imbalances in trade, and yawning gaps in competitiveness, between European states will continue to cause problems whether they share a single currency or not The governor of the Bank of England was closer to the basement of the Bank than the rooftops when he complained last week that "our biggest trading partner, the euro area, is tearing itself apart without any obvious solution". The following day, David Cameron further endeared Britain to its partners across the channel with the admonition that the eurozone "either has to make up or it is looking at a potential break- up." For Sir Mervyn, approaching his last year of office and speaking out even more, the problem is not "eurozone survival good, eurozone collapse bad", but the huge trading imbalances, balance of payments deficits, vast differences in competitiveness and still-defective European banking systems. "The survival of the euro is not the problem," he said. What we are witnessing is a potentially cataclysmic conjuncture of the continuing crisis of modern finance capitalism and the inherent defects of the eurozone as originally conceived. There are many paradoxes and ironies about this crisis. The whole idea behind the European Union was to ensure that there were no more wars in Europe. Closely associated with this aim was the desire to avoid the levels of unemployment and social unrest that caused the rise of extremist rightwing political parties. (Does a day go by without a reference to Hitler in the press or on the radio?) In championing the exchange rate mechanism and then the eurozone, the French wanted to ensure that economic policy in Europe was not dominated by the Germans. Yet the latter continue to be more obsessed by folk memories of Weimar inflation than by the unemployment that led to extremism. This is a battle that has certainly not been won by the French ? indeed, when my friend Jean-Claude Trichet became president of the European Central Bank, he was widely accused of having "gone native". The result of the French election shows that François Hollande is now being expected to take up the cudgels. Optimists ? there are still some around ? point to some apparent concessions by German policymakers on the subject of the asymmetry of eurozone economic policy. For instance, if southern members of the eurozone are ever going to narrow the gap in their price competitiveness with Germany, then the Germans should actively aim at a higher inflation rate. There is also wider recognition of the need for major infrastructure projects. My more leftwing friends are hoping that the turn of events not only in France but also in state elections in Germany heralds the beginning of something big. I wonder. With unemployment high, and a manifest deficiency of demand in the eurozone as well as the UK, there is still far too much emphasis by policymakers on structural reforms ? in the workings of the labour market, for instance. The weakness of this approach was well captured many years ago by the economist James Tobin, he of the famous Tobin tax on financial transactions, much favoured by President Hollande. (Tobin, whom I had the privilege of meeting, had the distinction not only of winning a Nobel prize for economics, but also of having been the model for a character in Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny). Tobin wrote: "Despite the dire science-fiction prophecies that accompany every period of high unemployment, revival of aggregate demand has always created jobs in numbers vastly beyond the imagination of the pessimists ? Structural labour market policies can make only marginal improvements." Indeed, another distinguished prize-winning economist, our own Tony Atkinson, suggested at a conference organised by the Resolution Foundation thinktank last week that the way structural reforms have been introduced in the UK has had a perverse impact on job incentives. But let us return to those imbalances. The irony here is that the European Monetary System (EMS), the precursor of the euro, was set up to provide "a zone of monetary stability" after the breakup of the old Bretton Woods system in 1971-73 had led to a period of widely fluctuating exchange rates. But whereas the Bretton Woods system was one of fixed but adjustable exchange rates, under the single currency there is no adjustability other than painfully slow attempts to reduce costs in economies that have become uncompetitive vis-a-vis Germany. There was a time when, under the auspices of the OECD, various "working parties" of officials would analyse events and recommend adjustments to countries' economic policies, including towards exchange rates. But in those days costs were seldom as out of line as they have become within the eurozone. The good news is that thanks to Sir John Major's opt-out, and Gordon Brown's refusal to opt in, the British economy has been able to adjust its exchange rate. The bad news is that, as the prime minister and chancellor keep telling us, we may be badly hit by an implosion of our main export market anyway ? although less badly than if we had signed up to the euro. But the government is being disingenuous in blaming all our current economic problems on the eurozone: George Osborne has made a significant contribution via his excessively deflationary policies. Eurozone crisisEuropean UnionEuropean monetary unionFinancial crisisEuroEconomic policyEuropeEconomicsWilliam Keegan
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The investors on the trail of a British Facebook
London has become the scene of a big-money race to find an internet firm with potential to be as profitable as the US social networking site Davor Hebel, a Croatian-born and US-educated partner at Fidelity Growth Partners Europe, a £100m fund, is explaining where venture capital (VC) investors fit into London's technology ecosystem. It all boils down to the question of whether you back the jockey or the horse. Angel, "seed" or early-stage investors tend to back the jockey ? the entrepreneurs themselves ? in the knowledge that their idea will undergo a number of iterations before a winning formula is found. A VC, by contrast, usually takes a rather more cool-headed approach. Yes, he or she will assess the team's credibility, but ultimately they will back the horse. "Not every company needs venture capital investment, of course," says Hebel. "They can grow at a certain rate without us." He leans forward, flashing a Colgate smile, to emphasise his next point. "But when you raise VC investment, the VC will want you to go for a huge exit ? that's an exit of £100m plus. They will want you to hit the ball out of the park." There are three things you get used to if you spend time talking deals with VCs such as the affable Hebel. First, they talk in telephone-number sums. Even the European minnows (by comparison with Silicon Valley's breed of great whites) run funds comprising breathtaking amounts of cash. A fund of less than £100m is considered small ? or in the words of one investor, "boutique" ? while the biggest European players, such as Accel Partners, a global powerhouse that has backed both Facebook and Groupon, has a kitty of $1.5bn (£946m) to invest in entrepreneurs on this side of the Atlantic. Second, technology venture capital in Europe is a very small world. Most of the VCs, who raise their own cash from pension funds and wealthy individuals or families, seem to know each other well. This is because they've often scoped the same deals and worked the same rooms at events packed with twentysomething techies with promising businesses. Third, they pepper conversation with the word "disrupt" ? as in: "This company is going to disrupt the social gaming/alternative finance/pedigree pet-grooming world." And by "disrupt" they don't mean "mildly unsettle" or "interrupt". They mean "turn upside down". Arguably, however, it is the VCs themselves, alongside other investors, who are currently doing much of the disrupting. Eighteen months after the prime minister expounded, at a venue in Brick Lane, his vision for east London's transformation into a global technology hub, "Tech City", as it is known to some, ("Silicon Roundabout" to others), is the scene of increasingly cut-throat competition between investors. The once familiar refrain that, compared with the US, talented startups with a breakout idea struggle to get capital investment in the UK is increasingly rarely heard. Indeed, the (bespoke, hand-sewn) shoe is now very much on the other foot: it is frequently the investors who must do much of the fawning and pitching. "The best startups not only always get funded, but there is real competition to fund them from a growing number of angels, accelerators [growth hothouses] and VCs," says Robin Klein, venture partner at Index Ventures, whose out-of-the-ballpark UK investments include Lovefilm (acquired by Amazon for "close to £200m"), Mind Candy and TweetDeck (sold to Twitter for around £25m). "The availability of capital here far exceeds that of any other European centre. London is now the European technology hub." Indeed, so intense is the competition for the outstanding startup ideas that VC investors are having to elbow their way in much earlier in the game. Where once they could leave the early stage or "seed" investing to friends and family (often derided as "fools and family"), tech incubators/accelerators and angels, today they have to scour tech networking events, meet-ups and demo days (at which startups pitch their businesses) to catch entrepreneurs before they have proven business models ? or else risk missing out on the next Facebook or Wonga. "This is because the costs to get tech companies up and running are decreasing," explains Tom Hulme, design director of IDEO and angel investor in GoCardless and retail "gamification" platform Fantasy Shopper. "Startups can use cloud services to scale [up] or can tap into social networks to market [themselves]. So whereas VCs used to have to wait until businesses were bigger, you see a lot starting to invest at an earlier stage." One such firm is Mangrove Capital Partners, a Luxembourg-based ?100m (£80m) fund, which focuses on Europe and emerging markets. Its VCs invest before a product launch and, if viable, follow up with further backing (totalling ?15-?20m) later. "We want to build up a reasonable stake in companies at an early stage because that allows us to have success in our funds," says Mangrove partner Michael Jackson, formerly chief operating officer of Skype. "The mathematics of our funds mean we need generally large companies to be created reasonably fast. Typically, we invest in between 30 and 50 companies per fund, of which we're hoping one will be fantastic." Jackson explains that the best small funds ("typically ?50-?200m") have all had one or two large successes. "If one company is going to pay back, say, a ?100m fund, which is what we all dream of, it means the VC has to have 10% of a billion-dollar company when it's sold for it to work. What tends to happen if you have 30 companies is that you have one success, if you're lucky, which puts the whole thing into profit and then you have two or three others that do pretty well as well, which delivers some solid extra returns for people who invest in us." The investors vying for a slice of the action, high valuations and acquisitions such as Facebook's $1bn (as yet uncompleted) purchase of photo-sharing service Instagram ? especially when set against Europe's struggling "real" economies ? have led some to speculate that we are in the throes of another dotcom bubble. But that theory finds little sympathy from VCs such as Klein, who says that, unlike 2000 ? the year of the last dotcom crash ? the fundamentals of the tech boom are very strong indeed. "Internet adoption continues to grow and smartphones accessing the web means that many more people have access for longer periods and in different situations. Building companies has never been cheaper. Platforms such as Facebook, iPhone and Android are facilitating wide, global distribution; Google gives consumers easy access via search to goods and services; and technology becomes simpler and more intuitive every day." Pointing to his portfolio of companies, he says: "We are seeing 50%-plus year-on-year growth. Clearly this is not happening in other parts of the economy." Technology startupsFacebookAmazon.comTwitterInstagramInternetTechnology sectorInvestingFinancial sectorJames Silver
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Burtynsky: Oil ? review
Photographers' Gallery, London In 1997 Edward Burtynsky had what he now calls his "oil epiphany". Having just filled up his car at a petrol station, it came to him that, as he puts it, "the vast, human-altered landscapes that I pursued and photographed for over 20 years were only made possible by the discovery of oil and the mechanical advantage of the internal combustion engine". His work ever since has been about oil: its production, transportation and myriad uses as well as the environmental cost engendered by the same. Burtynsky's series Oil is a vast undertaking, more than a decade in the making. Alongside Mitch Epstein's equally epic project American Power, it is one of the key visual documents of our time. The book of the same name was published in 2008, and that same year Burtynsky was nominated for the Deutsche Börse Prize, hosted by the Photographers' Gallery. It seems a little odd that the newly refurbished space should revisit that work for its (re-)opening show, but then again if you wanted a big-profile artist making work on a hugely ambitious scale, Burtynsky is an obvious if safe choice. Oil takes up the top two galleries of the redesigned five-storey space, and the series is divided under three thematic headings: Extraction and Refinement; Transportation and Motor Culture and, most intriguing and ominous of all, The End of Oil. Like the work of Epstein and other more conceptual practitioners such as Andreas Gursky and Thomas Struth, the book format doesn't really prepare you for the scale and extraordinary detail of these large format images. To give you some idea of the ambition, both formal and technical, of Burtynsky's work you need only look at a photograph entitled Highway #5, Los Angeles, California. Though its dimensions are 1.6 metres by 1.98 metres, it encompasses the vast sprawl of Los Angeles from the complex intersection of freeways in the foreground all the way to the high-rise buildings of the downtown district and beyond to the mountains. The photograph was taken from a tripod-mounted camera in an open-sided helicopter hovering above the freeway, but there is no sign of camera shake here. Indeed, the digitally recorded detail is so extraordinary that you can pick out several McDonald's arches amid the low-rise urban sprawl, as well as the Hollywood sign way off in the hills, everything lit and somehow heightened by the unreal Californian sun. There are several equally astonishing photographs in the exhibition, the most dramatic being Burtynsky's aerial view of a burning oil pipe on a drilling platform, which is being doused by water hoses in the midst of a vast stretch of water that looks like solidified tarmac. Titled Oil Spill #5, Q4000, Drilling Platform, Gulf of Mexico, 2010, it is perhaps the single most potent image of the environmental fallout of that now infamous manmade ecological disaster. Burtynsky's photographs, though, do not evince an overt political or ecological message. They are documents that suggest a much bigger narrative: our reliance on, and uneasy relationship with, this most valuable of natural resources. One of the key subtexts here is America's car culture and its semi-mythic resonance in a vast continent where mobility, whatever the ecological cost, is still synonymous with freedom. He captures the vast crowd at the Talladega speedway track and the rows of pristine Harley Davidsons parked outside an open-air Kiss concert, as well as the micro-economy of fast-food joints that has sprung up around a freeway truckstop in Breezewood, Pennsylvania. This is Walker Evans's vernacular roadside America updated for the postmodern age: an overcrowded landscape of signs that is nothing less than a microcosm of an increasingly homogenised ? and branded ? country. Most haunting of all is the section entitled The End of Oil. In the darker fourth-floor gallery the images of shipbreaking sites on the beach of Chittagong, Bangladesh, are both beautiful and disturbing. This is where outdated oil tankers come to die, dismantled by hand by an army of low-paid workers who work in often life-threatening conditions. The rusting, umber hulls of the vast ships seem like marooned skyscrapers against the soft light of the setting sun. On the opposite wall another Ballardian landscape shows the shells of old jet planes arranged in rows that stretch off into the desert's horizon. Against the often dramatic images in the upper gallery these photographs seem more elegiac. They hint at the biggest subtext of all in Burtynsky's work: what happens when the oil runs out? PhotographyWalker EvansOilSean O'Hagan
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Hilary Devey: 'Politics is probably my next career move'
The Dragons' Den star talks about sexism at work, being raped as a teenager and her political ambitions You've written your autobiography. Your life was pretty eventful from early on, wasn't it? It wasn't the usual childhood. My dad was very spontaneous: it was: "Come on kids, we're going on holiday." "No, Arthur, you can't, they're at school tomorrow." "Sod it, they'll learn more with me." Or, 11 at night, "I think I'll knock that wall down." The following morning, we'd get up and the wall would be gone. It was a rather different childhood. But you also reveal some extremely traumatic times, particularly being raped when you were a young adolescent. How did it feel to write about it? It was emotionally stressful. Things I suppose that you suppress over many, many years, that are not even thought about for many, many years, actually came to the pen. I've never told a soul; even my family are going to get a shock when they read that. And we get a glimpse of the embryonic dragon. You got the bug early, didn't you? I've always loved business, since being a kid. Even from working on a stall on the market. I could take dictation in shorthand and type the letter by the age of 11. It must be inbred. I love the cut and thrust of getting the deal. You've had a very successful career in the freight industry and brought a son up on your own. How did you manage that? I had to go back to work two weeks after my son was born, but those two weeks I had with him were probably the happiest of my life. But I had to feed him, clothe him, house him. I'm totally independent. It was my choice to have him. The fact that his father chose to sod off isn't the state's fault, is it? I was determined I would continue with a career. You describe some traumatic times with your son, Mevlit. How are things now? I'm very positive about my son. Very, very proud of him. He's one in 10 million, 100 million, that comes back from the brink of death as a heroin addict and puts his life back on track, and he's now working, he's happy, he's slowly, slowly becoming an outgoing, humorous person again, with the aid of no drugs whatsoever. Do you think women get a fair deal in the workplace? Is it getting better? There is chauvinism or misogyny in any industry all over the world. Therefore, if a woman's got it in her, then for God's sake, fight for it, go for it, get there. I do feel that having a child, and taking a sabbatical to have a child, and taking two years out of the corporate ladder to care for that child, if you think of a woman's working life now, it's probably 30-40 years, so it's not even a tenth of her career, so why should she be penalised? How does it work in your companies? My middle and senior management within the businesses are a 50/50 split. I do think mixed-gender workforces have more fun and are more innovative. You can have more banter; you can have more tears as well. But, in general, I think you get more out of a mixed-gender workforce. You were an instant hit when you arrived on Dragons' Den. Had you ever thought about going on TV before? No, never. They just said I was a natural. Whether I am or not, I don't know. People respond to being told the truth and I don't believe there's any other way to do it. I was always brought up that, if you've got any bad news to deliver, then you must deliver it face to face and look them in the eyes. And you take compassion out of a commercial decision and then put some compassion in subsequently. That's been my mantra all my life. Why do you think we're so obsessed with shows such as Dragons' Den and The Apprentice? I think everybody's got a dream, and everybody wants to realise that dream. I want to help, but make them aware of what is required from them to make that dream come to fruition. You obviously have a lot of fun getting dressed up for Dragons' Den, don't you? I love doing it. Putting outfits together is my passion and I don't always buy expensive clothes, contrary to popular belief. I buy skirts and a cheap top and dress it up with a really nice jacket and matching shoes and a matching bag, and it looks fabulous, and I'm probably dressed for 50 quid. I actually hate wearing make-up ? or as much as they put on me on TV. If I go out shopping on Oxford Street, it would be tinted moisturiser, a touch of blusher, bit of lippy, bit of mascara. You do complain in the book about having to wear a different outfit for each posh do. I've found that incredibly frustrating, really. I'm not getting value for money, am I? In fact, I am going to wear the same outfits again, and if I get criticised, I'm going to say: "Why be wasteful?" You've suffered some ill-health in the last couple of years. How are you now? I'm OK. I had a stroke; so have millions and millions of other people. It has left its after-effects, which are quite frustrating, but I'm one of the lucky ones, aren't I? I can now move my arm, but I've no feeling in my fingertips so I can't fasten buttons. I can't fasten a bra. I can't put rollers in my hair. I've got a young girl who'll help me with my hair and whatever. I'm very fortunate that a) I can afford it and b) I've got her. I keep saying" "You're my left arm" and she says: "But I'd rather be your right one." So do you take it a bit easier these days? I don't think I've had a holiday in 17 years. Some days, at weekends, I don't get up out of bed, I'm that tired. I have a shower, put clean pyjamas on, go back into bed with my Kindle and that's bliss. Can you ever imagine yourself retiring? I think I'd die when I do. I'll carry on working for as long as I can be effective. Once I start hindering, I like to think I've got enough savvy to say: "Enough's enough." Any other jobs you'd like to have a go at? I'd love to be in politics; it's probably my next career move. I tell you what, I don't think they'd like me very much, whichever party I joined. Bold as Brass is published by Macmillan Dragons' DenBusiness TVTelevisionEntrepreneursAlex Clark
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Facebook is going to need all the friends it can get | John Naughton
Facebook still has a long way to go to make its value credible The interesting thing about the Facebook IPO (initial public offering) is that there was no first-day "pop". In other words, the shares ended the day trading at just about the price at which they had started. Given the advance hype, this surprised many observers and led some to speculate that the underwriters (the banks that handled the flotation) were discreetly buying shares to prop the market up. So could it be that the world is finally wising up to the truth about Facebook? What is that truth? Simply this: Facebook is an advertising business: last year, 82% of its revenue ? about $4 per user ? came from that source. Social networking is really just a means to an advertising end. It is achieved by providing an addictive service for millions of people who spend unconscionable amounts of time freely giving away the thing that advertisers really crave, namely detailed information about their lives and interests. But therein lies a serious contradiction: Facebook cannot easily exploit this bonanza because its users obstinately continue to regard the platform as a private space: in a recent AP-CBNBC poll, for example, more than 50% of respondents said they felt "not safe at all" using Facebook to make purchases. Yet Facebook needs them to make purchases ? lots of them. Those who know about these things think the company needs to make $20 a year from each user to justify the $105bn (£66bn) valuation produced by Friday's IPO. Power, someone once said, is the ultimate aphrodisiac. Maybe. But money runs it close. At any rate, a reality distortion field (RDF) surrounds anyone or anything that has lots of it. Thus the RDF surrounding Facebook's market valuation produced selective amnesia in many observers who should know better. It caused them to forget AOL, for example, which at its IPO in 1992 was valued at $70m, soared to $150bn 10 years later ? and is now worth about $2.5bn. And then there's the RDF surrounding Mark Zuckerberg ? net worth currently $19bn plus ? which seems to have blinded observers to the uncomfortable fact that the shareholding structure of Facebook means that he has total control of the company. There are two classes of share ? A and B. Each class B share carries 10 times the voting rights of its class A counterpart. Zuck owns 27.1% of the class B shares outright and the company's pre-IPO filings to the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed agreements with other owners of class B shares to assign their voting rights to him. The net result is that he has voting control over at least 57.1% of the class B shares. In other words, he's omnipotent. This would be a problem even if Zuck had the brains of Einstein and the wisdom of Solomon. But, alas, he doesn't. He is undoubtedly a smart and talented guy, but he also happens to have a megalomaniacal obsession ? that everything has to be social, ie public. And if you're a Facebook user and don't like that ? well, tough. So we now have another powerful media company with a shareholding structure that renders its charismatic, single-minded founder immune from shareholder pressure. Remind you of anyone? Hint: it begins with "News". FacebookMark ZuckerbergInternet IPOsInternetSocial networkingJohn Naughton
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Why love trumps economics | Victoria Coren
The government harps on about 'priorities', the economy being its first. How very wrong There is a dangerous piece of rhetoric floating around, increasingly popular with politicians, which says the government should forget gay marriage and concentrate on "the things that really matter". Defence secretary Philip Hammond is the latest to thump this tub, explaining: "Clearly [gay marriage] is not the number one priority. If you stop people in the street and ask them what their concerns are, they'll talk to you about jobs and economic growth? The government has got to show that it is focused on the things that really matter." Personally, I never stop people in the street and ask them what their concerns are. I don't know if Philip Hammond does. If so, perhaps this flawed reasoning extends nationwide. Or he's only stopping people in Downing Street. George Osborne said something nearly identical the week before; that gay marriage is "not a priority of the government" because the government is "focused on the really important issues that matter to people". Mr Osborne said that he personally is in favour of gay marriage. What a perfect position he finds himself in, politically: pleasing supporters of same-sex matrimony with his own endorsement, while reassuring opponents that the government's not seriously considering it. Those in his party who are revolted by gay marriage use the same handy argument, that there are "more important things to think about". It's a clever way to reject the issue without screaming: "Ugh, two men at the altar! Probably wearing dresses! And with big moustaches! Big moustaches and dresses at the same time! That reminds me, I must ring my mother." They know better than to reveal the full terrifying vision of social collapse that a gay wedding triggers in their minds: a church full of crop-haired anarchists, most of them speaking foreign languages; teenagers snorting heroin off the altar, most of them on Facebook; women publicly breastfeeding in the pews, most of them bishops; two newlywed drag queens high-fiving as a vicar in hotpants says: "You may now fist the bride." No: far better just to say they're more interested in the economy. I don't mean to suggest that my own first reaction to the idea of gay marriage was free from nerves, uncertainty or reflex stereotyping. But, as with most things, my immediate conservative instincts fell away with a bit of proper thought. I won't explain why I'm now in favour, because that isn't the point. I have my opinions and you'll have yours; my worry is the argument, whether you support change or not, that it's "less important" than the economy. Please let's not nod along with this idea until it feels like a truism. It's a dangerous way of thinking. It may even be that kind of thinking that got "us" into economic trouble in the first place. The economy in this country ? the basic, central core of what an economy is ? is extremely healthy. We have an abundant climate, hardy British labour for building and farming and crafting, and brilliant inventive minds at work. If those gambling international speculators, who create nothing and build nothing, with their massive fantasy "derivatives market" and their mind-blowing "trillions of debt", all disappeared tomorrow, we'd still have an economy. We might not have flat-screen TVs with 200 channels ? and City traders might not have private jets ? but we'd still have food and coal and tables and new ideas. Greece is about to default on its debt and opt out of the whole mad lending scheme; perhaps we'll watch that country invent democracy for the second time. We'd also still have love. Stripped of our credit cards, our electronic goods, our super-fast broadband, our international travel ? and even of our welfare system based on cash and paperwork rather than simple sharing ? we'd still have men and women, and men and men, and women and women, who felt joy and safety and hope, making promises and planning futures, because of this free and powerful human instinct alone. The stark revelation, a few years ago, that all of the numbers on all of the screens meant nothing, that there was no gold, that it was all debt, that the emperor had no clothes, made us feel terrified and powerless. It's too much to confront directly, like staring at the sun: the realisation that it's merely empty digits on a screen that entitle some people to helipads and swimming pools, others to dying on a trolley in a hospital corridor. We know now, but we can't seem to change it. The more powerless we feel, the closer we huddle to what we can control: our own promises, to our own loved ones. Those tiny, enormous, emotional contracts between one person and another. If a historically marginalised group of us want to make those contracts formal, in the sight of God, the way it has been done by the majority for thousands of years, how dare anyone say this is "less important" than money? Stand against it if you will, but don't dismiss it as trivial. Thoreau wrote, in 1863: "If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer; but if he spends his whole day as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making earth bald before her time, he is esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen. This world is a place of business. What an infinite bustle! I think there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself, than this incessant business." I have a new daydream, of a parallel world, where our democratic leaders say: "We'll do our best for economic growth, but our priority is to concentrate on the things that really matter to people." www.victoriacoren.com Economic policyEconomicsPhilosophyVictoria Coren
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Europe's new insurgents: rising rebels spurn the era of bling
From France to Greece and Italy, voters are turning their backs on the old guard and austerity politics in favour of a new generation They are arguing for a new political settlement across Europe and for the first time their views are getting a hearing. But for the new insurgents challenging a political consensus that has dominated Europe for 30 years, style is as important as substance, and personal demeanour is almost as vital as the fine detail of opposition to the policies of debt reduction. Welcome to Generation Normal. The leaders of Europe's new anti-austerity movement are accessible and generally insist ? like France's new president François Hollande ? on a certain everyday mundanity. In Greece, Alexis Tsipras, the 37-year-old leader of the leftwing coalition party Syriza ? who rejects the EU austerity programme as "null and void" ? rides a motorbike around Athens. In France, Hollande, despite a property portfolio that suggests a certain financial comfort zone, has insisted on how removed he is from the era of President "Bling-Bling" Nicolas Sarkozy. In the era of "we're all in this together", Hollande, unlike some, has put his money where his mouth is, ordering all his ministers, himself included, to take a 30% pay cut. They are not alone in this. Social Democrat Hannelore Kraft, who delivered a stinging defeat to German Chancellor Angela Merkel in state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia last week, is described as volksnah ? down to earth. She, too, plays up to her image, as some media commentators have remarked, of "Hannelore from the Ruhr" with her local accent from Mülheim, although it is said that her accent becomes somewhat less pronounced in closed-door meetings. The reality is that both in policy and style, something is happening in Europe. It is not simply a rejection of the failed narrative that fiscal austerity can lead to growth ? the policy pushed by the centre-right governments that dominated Europe at the beginning of the global financial crisis and derided by economist Paul Krugman as the "confidence fairy". It is the rejection, too, of a wider European political culture ? facing a perceived crisis of legitimacy ? that has come to be seen as too technocratic and elitist, divorced from the concerns of ordinary voters, where policy is made in the rarefied atmosphere of summits or by the "faceless" bureaucrats in the EU's institutions. Whether or not the likes of Tsipras can lead a real revolt in a Greece going back to the polls on 17 June ? in a country where 80% of voters do not actually wish to crash out of the euro ? the effect of the recent European spring that has brought down governments from Athens to Paris has been to insist that people want politicians to listen to them. Indeed, the new generation of anti-austerity politicians seem to hark back to an earlier postwar generation of European leaders who seemed both more available and more ordinary, not to be found holidaying on superyachts owned by wealthy friends. Tsipras is a case in point. As a Greek civil servant told the BBC, Tspiras's accessibility "reminded voters of the old times when they used to call politicians by their first name, they were approachable and used to answer direct questions". The theme has been picked up by France's new prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, a former teacher and mayor of Nantes ? whose parents were a textile-factory worker and a dressmaker ? who has in the past criticised the "condescension and elitism" of his country's political class. Hollande's new cabinet ? dominated by moderate leftwingers split equally between men and women ? is also remarkable for its number of new faces, signifying his desire for a clean slate. This new continent-wide mood has thrown up wild cards as well as worrying developments including the rise of far-right parties such as Greece's Golden Dawn and Marine Le Pen's National Front. Among the wild cards is the Five Star Movement in Italy whose figurehead is the acerbic anti-euro and anti-austerity comedian and blogger Beppe Grillo and which came from almost nowhere to rack up double-digit gains in Italy's local elections in early May. As in the case of the emergence of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn, the strong showing by Grillo's supporters may be far less significant than the increasing prominence of Leoluca Orlando, the leftwing anti-corruption mayor of Palermo whose Italy of Values party refuses to support the austerity regime of prime minister Mario Monti and represents the polar opposite of the debased Berlusconi era. The elections showed a devastating collapse of public confidence in Italy's established political parties after the corruption of the Berlusconi years ? support for the former prime minister's party collapsed. And while the rise of some of the more extreme parties has drawn more attention, it has disguised the real story: the rise of new leaders who insist on their own ordinariness. If there is a growing tension between electorates and established parties particularly in places like Greece and Italy, it is unlikely to be mitigated by one of the emerging narratives of voters having backed the "wrong" parties. Labour MP Denis McShane, a former minister for Europe, believes that ? excluding the rise of wild cards from the Pirate party to the far right ? the new political leaders mark a move away from an era of "Flash Harry politics" to a desire for more competent, "duller" and attentive leaders. "The generation of politicians who are being pushed from office perhaps over-promised and under-delivered. The new politicians we see emerging are under-promising in the hope of over-delivering. If you look at Hollande, he is a gradualist. It is not like 1981 when François Mitterrand was elected." Their message, he believes, is one that even Merkel is now listening to. But the big question remains unanswered: can Generation Normal really deliver the eurozone from the unprecedented and extraordinary predicament in which it finds itself? European UnionEurozone crisisGreeceFranceItalyEuropeFrançois HollandePeter Beaumont
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