IfG Events

Former International Development Secretary and Conservative MP for Penrith and The Borders (2010-19) Rory Stewart was standing as an independent candidate for Mayor of London when early cases of Coronavirus appeared in the UK. He was one of the earliest public figures to call for a lockdown to combat the pandemic in Britain. Here he talks to Bronwen Maddox, Director of the Institute for Government...

Like member states, the European Parliament will play a key role in deciding the outcome of UK-EU negotiations. Last week, it published a draft resolution highlighting its priorities for the future relationship – and warned that MEPs would not be drawn into negotiating a last-minute deal with the UK.   David McAllister, the Chair of the European Parliament’s UK Coordination Group and close ally of...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. On 1 July Germany took over the rotating six-month presidency of the Council of the EU, the grouping of the 27 EU governments. During this time, it will need to help broker an agreement on the multiannual EU budget and the proposed €750 billion Coronavirus recovery fund, as well as forging a new relationship with the UK. Germany has also promised to...

Governments across the world have invested huge sums to prop up incomes during the COVID shutdown. But as a new IfG paper shows, some countries including the UK have relied more heavily on in-work wage subsidies while others like the US, Canada and Ireland have increased support to those who have lost their jobs. What will these Coronavirus-related labour market policies have on businesses, employ...

Economist and Nobel Prize Winner Professor Joseph E. Stiglitz joins IfG Director Bronwen Maddox to discuss how the Coronavirus pandemic will change the shape of economies around the world. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Coronavirus pandemic has put the relationship between Westminster and the devolved bodies to the test. After close coordination in the early phase of the crisis, devolved administrations increasingly formed their own plans for leaving the lockdown. First Minister of Wales, the Rt Hon MARK DRAKEFORD MS has argued that Boris Johnson has not consulted devolved governments enough over his exit str...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. With UK-EU negotiations intensifying, the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish administrations have a strong interest in any future agreement – particularly in contentious areas like fisheries. Implementing parts of the deal or preparing for no deal in devolved areas will be their responsibility. And in Northern Ireland, any UK–EU agreement will have...

With six months to go until the end of the transition period there’s still no sign of a UK–EU deal. Following the high-level conference between the Prime Minister and the Presidents of the European institutions (the Commission, the Council and the Parliament) on 15 June 2020, Boris Johnson says his ambition is to agree a deal by the end of July. IfG Senior Fellow Jill Rutter convenes the Institute...

Throughout the Coronavirus outbreak, the Government has said that it will be “led by the science”. But who decides the agreed scientific view, and what happens when it changes? How does expert scientific advice shape political decision making? And what happens when Government ministers decide to ignore, or overrule, scientific advice? To discuss these issues Jill Rutter, Senior Fellow at the Insti...

Crises such as war, terrorist attacks, floods and pandemics place huge tests on government. Vital decisions must be made fast under intense pressure – and the wrong decisions can have grave consequences. The Cabinet Secretary, the UK’s most senior civil servant, plays a vital role in coordinating the machinery of government, advising the Prime Minister and ensuring that the Civil Service delivers....

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event: Fisheries has been a major area of contention between the UK and EU during the Brexit process. Both parties are under pressure to reconcile their divergent positions and reach a fisheries agreement by July – but both admit that an agreement is unlikely. How important are fisheries to negotiations? What are the UK and EU positions? Can a deal can be...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. While the UK Government’s response to Coronavirus has been widely-criticised, Taiwan has seen fewer than 500 cases of COVID-19 and only seven deaths. For this special IfG Live event, the Taiwanese Digital Minister Audrey Tang explains how the country contained the virus so successfully without a nationwide lockdown. How did Taiwan's strength in digi...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. The speed and scale of the Government’s COVID support for business was unprecedented in peacetime. How effective has the design and implementation of these measures been? How has government worked with the private sector to understand what was needed and refine the policies? What new difficulties arise as the government tries to lift restrictions? A...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. The UK and EU are in the middle of their toughest negotiation yet – agreeing their future relationship. With the clock ticking, we talk to Stefaan de Rynck, Senior Adviser to Michel Barnier and Head of Task Force for Relations with the UK, about the EU’s ambitions for future relations with the UK, and some of the challenges and opportunities that li...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. It was always a challenge for the UK to create a post-Brexit trade strategy that takes down barriers with the wider world while putting up new ones between the UK and its biggest trade partner. Coronavirus has made this more complex. As countries espouse the virtues of shorter and more local supply chains, the UK’s strategy of distancing itself from...

Coronavirus has transformed the activity of government, but the immediate crisis won’t last forever. Big choices for citizens and government lie on the horizon. How have citizens’ expectations of public services changed? Will they have more or less trust in government, and what might that mean for the size of the state and any digital legacy? Will the public demand better evidence-based policy-mak...

With the Government’s Coronavirus communications strategy under heavy criticism, we ask an expert panel, including two former No.10 Directors of Communications, what it is getting wrong and what it needs to do to get things right. How successful are the daily press conferences? Has the Government shown a willingness to engage with the media? And is it right to rebut critical press reports so stren...

This is an audio recording of an IfG Live Event. Better use of data is key to more effective government. Across government, teams are doing fascinating work with data. But those projects don’t get the attention they deserve. At this event, our speakers presented their data projects in an exciting, quickfire format. Each speaker had eight minutes, followed by eight minutes of questions from the aud...

How well is the intense cooperation over COVID-19 between Westminster and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland working? Is Coronavirus demonstrating the strength of devolution, or does it highlight the need for central government to take a strong lead? What can we learn from cooperation in past crises? And what does all this mean for the Union and the debates around...

In the week that local and mayoral elections were due to take place across England, before being postponed due to the Coronavirus pandemic, we discuss the state of English devolution. What have metro mayors and combined authorities achieved? What should happen next with the devolution process? How has the Covid-19 crisis has affected the debate, and what role have the devolved bodies played in res...

How will the government ease the lockdown restrictions? What choices and trade-offs will ministers need to make in order to get the country moving again? How can it communicate these complicated messages while also retaining public support? We explore these questions – perhaps the hardest to face any peacetime prime minister – at a live online event with panel of IfG experts: Alex Thomas, Programm...

HM Inspector of Constabulary Wendy Williams led the Independent Review into the Windrush Scandal, which concluded that “hundreds, and possibly thousands of people” in the Windrush Generation suffered because of failures in every element of modern government. The review further exposed fundamental issues within the UK’s immigration system and wider failures of policy making, bureaucracy, law and po...

As the UK parliament begins its unexpected experiment with digital democracy, the IfG is delighted to convene an expert panel to discuss democracy in the age of coronavirus. From online select committee hearings to parliamentary questions by Zoom, we explore how Westminster is adapting to the need for social distancing, the risks and benefits of the two Houses’ chosen approaches, and what the long...

The COVID crisis is affecting every aspect of the economy, and, uniquely, it’s hitting every country in the world hard at the same time. What can government do in a crisis without a rulebook? Andy Haldane, chief economist at the Bank of England, joins Bronwen Maddox to discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the UK economy. Is the authorities’ economic response sufficient to support businesses during th...

Can the UK and EU reach a deal by the current deadline of 31 December 2020 now that COVID-19 has set many governments’ plans into disarray? Lead negotiators Michel Barnier and David Frost are both currently self-isolating and they have yet to set a date for the next round of talks. The clock is ticking.  The UK and EU have until the 1 July 2020 to decide whether to extend the transition period, an...