Evan Davis

Someday we'll look back on this moment and plow into a parked car. ”

Now undoubtedly, we face some very British challenges when it comes to infrastructure. We rightly cherish our back yards and green spaces, and we'll defend them passionately when projects are announced. We live in a democracy, and we like to debate these things, often for many years. ”

All socio-political phenomena in the U.K. come laden with the baggage of a class-based theory or two attached to them. In the case of gay Tories, there is one particularly silly variant of the category, which asserts that gayness is bred in public schools and thus fits with Conservatism like hand in glove. ”

It is no wonder that bank capital is regulated. When borrowing and lending is profitable, it is tempting for banks to scale up their operations and to borrow and lend too much in relation to their capital, in effect reducing the effectiveness of the potential capital cushion. ”

For industry to settle in a country, you first need electricity; for electricity, you need some trained workers; for trained workers, you need some schools; for schools you need some money; for money, you need some industry. ”

Being funny, it turns out, is like being a bank. It's a confidence trick. As long as everyone believes in you, you are fine. ”

I rarely come away from presenting the 'Today' programme without some sense of regret. There is always some question that I should have asked, or some point that I should have made. This is annoying but not surprising. Perfection is hard to achieve in a three-hour live programme. ”

Although being economics editor sounds impressive, it does not mean I actually edit anything. It mainly reflects two decades of title-inflation at the BBC, which has given ever more status to senior reporters, presumably because it is cheaper to do that than to offer higher pay. ”

I don't particularly like going on about being gay or making a big thing about it, but I think it's a bit of a pain to be secretive about it. ”

Historically, the British have always been rather wary of grand engineering projects - perhaps understandably, given that many of them have been delivered late and over budget. ”