Chancellor George Osborne at the EU finance ministers meeting in Brussels last week: construction firms, the IMF and ratings agencies seem underwhelmed by his cunning plan to fix the economy. Photograph: KeystoneUSA-ZUMA / Rex Features Like Baldrick, George Osborne has a cunning plan. It... 

Lord Browne said he was happier now he had finally come out. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images It hasn’t been a great few weeks for those who dare to believe that we are living in enlightened times. It had been looking likely that Dr Jeffrey John, the highly regarded dean of... 

Head of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, said activity dropped in the second quarter. Photograph: Ramin Talaie/EPA Alistair Darling’s one-off bank bonus tax cost Goldman Sachs $600m (£395m), the Wall Street bank said today as it revealed that its wage and bonus bill reached $9.2bn in... 

Countries must do ‘some soul-searching’ over the spending of Aids donations, Bill Clinton says. Photograph: Ronald Zak/AP Bill Clinton yesterday called for Aids charities to use donations from wealthy countries more efficiently and warned that too much was being spent on bureaucracy,... 

Sir Alex Ferguson believes Wayne Rooney will become a ‘complete’ player despite his disappointing World Cup. Photograph: Kamil Krzaczynski/EPA Sir Alex Ferguson has accused the Football Association of handicapping England at the World Cup through its failure to introduce a winter...