Rebecca Allison

Tax avoidance: how to change corporate behaviour

guardian.co.uk — Last week, I was waiting in the queue at the butcher while an elderly lady was being served. Clearly, she was not that well-off and chose the cheapest cuts of meat. When she was done, the butcher asked the assistant serving her how much the bill came to.

Be Awesome: Modern Life for Modern Ladies, by Hadley Freeman - review

guardian.co.uk — Anyone who professes to hate the Daily Mail while being addicted to its "sidebar of shame" (the celebrity-packed right-hand feed on its website) will feel very at home with this book. The Nora Ephron opening quote, "Be the heroine of your life not the victim", sums up the style and the theme.

Sir Mervyn King: don't demonise bankers

guardian.co.uk — The outgoing governor of the Bank of England has called on the British people not to "demonise" bankers for the financial crisis. Sir Mervyn King said on Sunday that the failings of the financial and regulatory system were the root cause of the turmoil which struck the world economy almost six years ago.

Cannes 2013: Inside Llewyn Davis - first look review

guardian.co.uk — Cannes audiences just heard a clean, hard crack: the sound of the Coen brothers hitting one out of the park. Their new film is brilliantly written, terrifically acted, superbly designed and shot; it's a sweet, sad, funny picture about the lost world of folk music which effortlessly immerses us in the period.

EU decision to lift Syrian oil sanctions boosts jihadist groups

guardian.co.uk — The EU decision to lift Syrian oil sanctions in an effort to aid the opposition has accelerated a scramble for control over wells and pipelines in rebel-held areas and helped consolidate the grip of jihadist groups over the country's key resources.

Eurosceptics running protection racket in Tory party, says Lord Mandelson

guardian.co.uk — Tory Eurosceptics are running a "Soprano-style protection racket" in the Conservative party in which they are threatening to burn down the house unless David Cameron caves into their demands, Lord Mandelson has claimed. As the former Tory chancellor Lord Howe warned that the prime minister is losing control of his party over Europe, Mandelson described the Eurosceptics as the "provisional wing" of the Tory party.

This is a new, farcical low and David Cameron is losing control

guardian.co.uk — Unfortunately, last week's events in the House of Commons have brought the debate on Europe within the Conservative party to a new, almost farcical, low. Having previously opposed the introduction of legislation in this parliament to hold a referendum in the next one, the prime minister suddenly allowed a free vote among backbenchers, with the government abstaining, on the extraordinary basis that the party had no policy on the issue.

Ukip donor brands women 'hostile' for wearing trousers

guardian.co.uk — Nigel Farage is facing fresh embarrassment over a Ukip supporter after it emerged that one of the party's most generous donors believes that women are guilty of "hostile behaviour" by "deliberately" wearing trousers to make themselves unattractive to men.

Ukip: the battle for Britain

guardian.co.uk — Susan McCaffery lives in Billericay, in Essex. She's 72 and, thanks to the UK Independence Party, a member of the local town council. It's a hot Wednesday afternoon and she is talking to me in her sitting room, where there's an organ in one corner and a few piles of bumf from the Pentecostal church of which she's an enthusiastic member.

Nigel Farage's fascist barrage

guardian.co.uk — The irony police were quickly on the scene this morning after Ukip's leader, Nigel Farage, went on BBC Radio Scotland to denounce the demonstrators who disrupted Thursday's impromptu press conference in Edinburgh's Old Town as "fascist scum." It's the kind of mindless labelling which will probably fill both sides with righteous indignation.