This is an authoritative and up-to-date analysis of the `credit crunch', Northern Rock and the banking crisis in the UK. All the major economies have been affected, but this analysis focuses on how and why the UK economy got into the crisis from which it is now struggling to escape, and on what is needed to avoid a similar problem in future.
Written by a leading supporter of market-based policies, After the Credit Crunch argues against the frequent claims by the Labour Government that the UK is an innocent casualty of a set of problems created in the US. John Redwood illustrates how a series of policy and regulatory errors combined not only to help create the crisis but to deepen its effects. He sees the current crisis as in many ways an extreme example of an old-fashioned boom-and-bust cycle. Far from abolishing these, he argues, the policies of the UK Labour government of the last eleven years, coupled with the actions of too many people and too many institutions, have actually reinforced the effect.
After the Credit Crunch examines the global context in which the UK must compete, and Redwood argues that we need to understand and adjust to the changing balance of power between the commodity producers on the one hand, and the manufacturers and consumers on the other. He reviews all the key policy areas that contribute to national competitiveness, including taxation, regulation, energy, transport, regional development and education and skills. He offers a strong defence of the importance of market-based policies in addressing the challenges of competitiveness.