July Newsletter: Heatwaves, Heathrow, and Holidays

Dearest friends,

July brought sun, weddings, and fond farewells. Not one but two CBP’ers tied the knot. Huge congratulations to our Chief Economist, Pedro, and our Head of Energy, Ed. We’re delighted for you both — may your marriages be as structurally sound as your policy analysis.

Goodbye and thank you to Sam Currie, who has been part of the CBP team over the last few months, working on AI policy and industrial strategy. He’ll be missed in the office, but we look forward to continuing to work together on future papers.

We’re very sorry, too, to see Matt Clifford step down from his position as the Prime Minister’s advisor on AI. A great friend of British Progress — and an early friend of CBP — Matt has been a lodestar for ambition in UK tech policy. Thank you for everything you’ve done to build the future in Britain, Matt!

💫 What we’ve been up to

It’s been a busy month for CBP – there’s something for everyone in our latest batch of policy papers.

• Reforming the Alan Turing Institute: The UK's national AI institute has lost its way. Major reform is needed to turn it into a vital asset for defence and national security. This paper is already starting to move the dial – read relevant coverage and announcements in The Telegraph here, Research Professional News here, and our paper here.
  

• Air Conditioning: Saving Lives and Accelerating Net-Zero. In this paper, we explore how air conditioning can save lives, boost productivity and help the UK achieve net zero, all while keeping us all cool. Currently, government regulation all but bans it. This paper was covered on the front page of The i Paper. Read the paper here, and the article here.
  

• Getting Britain Off the Ground: Britain needs a new runway at Heathrow, the world's most capacity-constrained airport. Building in Britain can be slow: this paper sets out the options for the Government to speed up infrastructure delivery. This proposal was also discussed in The i Paper – read that coverage here, and our paper on the subject here.
  

• The Rules of the Game: Using Mechanism Design to Deliver a Better, Fairer Britain: A new toolkit for the Government to shape markets and crowd in investment. Read it here.

A Summer of Progress: the Centre for British Progress Rooftop Party

We hope everyone had as wonderful a time as we did at our breezy rooftop summer party. A little rain only added to the atmosphere as we sipped progresso martinis and NIMBY sours, overlooking the Thames and the greatest capital city in the world.

We are grateful to have heard optimistic speeches by the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Peter Kyle, and from Matt Clifford, as well as our cofounders Julia and David. See our post-party thread (with photos) here. For announcements of more fantastic events like this one, subscribe!

Speed, Supersonics, and Strategy

This month we also had our first CBP team away day at Brooklands Motoring and Aviation museum. Amongst the plotting and team-building, we visited the Barnes Wallis-designed Stratosphere Chamber, the aircraft factory, and Julia cried over a video of Concorde's last flight, set to Don't Stop Me Now. We recommend the place highly!

The Centre for British Progress Bookshelf

Here’s what’s been fuelling our thoughts this month:

• Two calls to action from the Labour Growth Group: Britain faces a revolutionary moment. Labour must respond, and Labour grossly underestimated the problems of government – and is now paying the price. We were pleased to see CBP mentioned in the this push for ambition for the government:
  
  “This will not be a dry review or an endless discussion exercise. It is a deliberate and provocative act in developing political economy involving leading policy organisations – the Centre for British Progress, Britain Remade and Labour Together among others – as well as thinkers from across the political spectrum.”
  

• Our head of science Ben has published a new substack, pondering what actually counts as interdisciplinary research? He identifies bridging papers that act as super-connectors between different research fields, and finds that these are disproportionally supported by philanthropic and charity funders, and under-supported by the UK government. Well worth a read!
  

• While fellow Andrew Bennet published a short piece on A New Sovereign Consensus. In his own words, “Every few decades, as the old consensus falls away, a new settlement is required.” Andrew argues that the time is now. The piece explores where Britain finds itself, where we need to be, and how we can get there.
  

• Julia recommends an episode of The Economics Show podcast, Has Argentina’s Milei proved his critics wrong? It might provide some food for thought for governments around the world struggling with high deficits.
  

• David has been searching for immortality through science, and recommends Lifespan by David Sinclair, which explores the rapidly progressing science of ageing, and what we can do to live longer, healthier lives.
  

• And also this Clearer Thinking podcast which asks: How much does global population decline matter? And counters the common view that the world is headed towards inevitable overpopulation.
  

Thanks for reading – stay cool, stay curious, and keep bending the arc of British progress.

With love, from our beautifully air conditioned office,

The Centre for British Progress Team