Positive thinking

One in five new Tory MPs have worked in lobbying or PR for corporate interests, new openDemocracy research reveals. Opposition politicians have called our findings “deeply worrying”. The new Tory cohort includes a former head of communications for a private healthcare company, a top lobbyist for British bankers, a former staffer at Cambridge Analytica’s parent company, and former employees of firms which have represented the arms industry and the governments of Qatar and Kazakhstan. Four of Britain’s largest lobbying firms – Portland Communications, Grayling, Hanover Communications and Pagefield – now have at least one former employee in parliament. Green MP Caroline Lucas described our findings as “deeply worrying”, adding “in recent years, we’ve seen the representatives of big business take over ever-more of our politics… they will be making decisions which will shape the future of our country through Brexit”. Labour frontbencher John Trickett said: “For too long, too many ...

This week the long-awaited second stage of Brexit finally gets started, as the UK begins its formal trade negotiations with the EU. Tensions are already evident. The UK government made clear in its negotiating mandate published last week that it is refusing to lock in any minimum standards on labour rights, food quality or environmental protection, claiming the UK leads the way in these areas and will not accept “the compulsion of a treaty ”. Campaigners are concerned that these could be eroded after Brexit, especially if the UK bends to lower US standards through a free trade deal. Meanwhile, the EU considers these minimum standards (known as the ‘level playing field) to be a vital pre-condition for an agreement. If the UK won’t sign up to them, the EU insists it will not grant the UK tariff-free, quota-free trade with the bloc. The stand-off is intense and could lead to no trade deal at all if neither side backs down. The picture is no less complex at the national level, as...

Koen Heimeriks, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick and Irina Surdu, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick Dark Waters, starring Mark Ruffalo and Anne Hathaway, launches in Europe on February 28. It tells of the toxic spills scandal that ultimately led to US chemicals giant DuPont paying US$671 million (£516 million) to settle more than 3,500 lawsuits in 2017. The company’s plant in Parkersburg, West Virginia had been contaminating the local water supply with perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), also known as C-8, which is used to make products such as Teflon. The contamination had a “probable link with six illnesses” among the local population, including kidney and testicular cancer. DuPont had used C-8 since the 1950s. It had known since the early 1980s that the chemical was toxic to humans but only agreed in 2006 to phase out its use. Though the company continued to deny wrongdoing, it has become one of the classic cases in which business leaders purs...