MORNING MEETING: More female representatives will modernise engineering

DO AN internet search for “world’s greatest engineer” and you will quickly come across that famous picture of a cigar-chomping, top-hatted Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

 Isambard Kingdom Brunel is an outdated face of British engineering [GETTY]

The reality of modern engineering is that it spans heavy industry of the kind Brunel excelled at through to high-tech manufacturing and state-of-the-art electronics.

And while it is no longer a male preserve it still has a problem recruiting young women.

Things are changing though and the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) is leading from the front by announcing its first female president. Naomi Climer, president of Sony Media Cloud Services, will take on the role next October and looks set to make waves.

She began her career as a BBC broadcast engineer and as the current IET deputy president she has been at the forefront of the campaign to encourage women within the profession.

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As the current IET deputy president Naomi Climer has been at the forefront of the campaign to encourage women within the profession

It will be for future economic historians to decide whether quantitative easing (QE) worked.

For the time being the jury is out on the impact of pumping trillions of dollars into the US economy.

This week the US Federal Reserve signalled it was ending QE and yesterday official figures showed the American economy grew at a faster than expected 3.5 per cent in the third quarter.

Is QE the reason? Even if we cannot answer that question now, another that will be answered more quickly is: what happens to the global economy when the money taps are turned off?

Some liken it to taking the punch bowl away from the party and we will soon find out if it leaves a nasty hangover.

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Countrywide and its estate agents are a good barometer for the housing market (see below).

Some experts worry about a new bubble but that looks unlikely.

Countrywide points out house sales are running at just three quarters of the level in 2007 which does not sound like an overheating market.

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