Therese Raphael

Earlier this month, the UK’s opposition Labour Party broke its three-month silence over Brexit to accuse the government of hiding evidence by not publishing an economic impact assessment. Shadow Cabinet Office minister Rachel Reeves cited Office for Budget Responsibility estimates that leaving the…

Opposition to Boris Johnson’s go-slow plan for reopening the economy and his too-vague plan for domestic vaccine passports has been growing in his Conservative Party. There are many arguments raised, but what really bothers some conservatives (small and big C) is the suspicion that his policies…

The European Union’s approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine Thursday will come as a relief to many governments. Britain will have vaccinated half its adult population by the end of this week, administering 40 vaccine doses per 100 people, while the EU average is around 12. The gap has become…

Until Tuesday “Global Britain” was a slogan and little more. Just over a year ago Prime Minister Boris Johnson delivered a punchy speech in Greenwich where he likened post-Brexit Britain to superman. The UK, he said, was “ready to take off its Clark Kent spectacles and leap into the phone booth and…

Sir Robert Peel, the father of modern policing and London’s first proper police force, said that policing succeeds when it prevents crime while gaining the public’s trust and partnership. Last week, the Met Police, as London’s force is known, failed on both counts. As perhaps the world knows by…

The downslope of the Covid crisis is proving to be its own bumpy ride — and there’s no telling yet how long it will last. We’ve learned a tremendous amount about the disease itself, but in terms of grasping the impact of lingering post-Covid Syndrome, or Long Covid as it’s often called, we’re just…

Trade deals, like peace agreements, aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on without good faith vested in their implementation. Just weeks after the Brexit trade agreement entered into force, intentions over the part of the deal that applies to Northern Ireland have been called into question by…

The European Union and the UK concluded a post-Brexit trade deal last year, but things haven’t gotten off to a smooth start. There have been trade frictions, vaccine nationalism and a simmering dispute over the Northern Ireland Protocol. At least Britain’s cabinet ministers are all singing from…

Prime Minister Boris Johnson is due to provide a roadmap out of England’s lockdown restrictions on Feb. 22, but those in his party who want the curbs lifted are growing impatient. The UK government is on track to reach its target of vaccinating the top four priority groups by the middle of the…

This won’t come as a shock: New research shows that the pandemic is disproportionately impacting children and young people’s mental health. But the nuances bear thinking about. The older the child, the greater the chance of being affected; and girls are suffering more than boys. Most aren’t getting…