For Corbyn and antisemitism, “sorry” still seems to be the hardest word October 30, 2020 One of the markers of genuine leadership is being able to recognise when you have been wrong, to apologise, and to commit to a change of course. This is an attribute that Jeremy Corbyn had multiple opportunities to demonstrate as the Labour party lurched from one antisemitism crisis to the next under his leadership. Each [...]
Scrapping the VAT refund for tourists would be catastrophic for the UK economy October 30, 2020 Retail, hospitality and tourism are three of the sectors that have been hardest hit by Covid-19 and the ongoing lockdown restrictions. Employing close to six million people, job losses in these sectors are expected to be devastating. The government should be doing all it can to support these businesses at this critical time. Instead, it [...]
Has Jack Ma made IPOs a weapon of corporate warfare? October 29, 2020 Ant Group is not a household name. An affiliate of Chinese tech wizard Jack Ma’s Alibaba, it operates the digital payment platform Alipay, which serves more than a billion users and is China’s largest such enterprise. This week, Ant Group announced the pricing of its listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and Shanghai’s Star [...]
Generation Covid are being denied the opportunities we all took for granted October 29, 2020 This week, a new study by the London School of Economics — the most comprehensive of its kind — confirmed our worst fears about the economically divisive impact of the pandemic. Any pretext that we are “all in this together” has been utterly dashed. According to the research, young people have seen their job prospects and earnings [...]
I won’t let the government cancel Christmas — will you? October 29, 2020 It is hard to believe that just weeks ago, there appeared to be light at the end of the tunnel. The autumn sun was bringing people out of the house and back into offices, shops, restaurants and bars. But the period of positive convalescence for the mental, physical and economic trauma this country has been [...]
Death of the middleman? The myth of selling straight to the customer October 29, 2020 This pandemic has driven consumers online at a pace no one could predict, with Covid-19 forecast to generate an additional £4.5bn of UK online sales in 2020. Social distancing has set in motion a dramatic shift in how we shop — our business alone saw a more than 230 per cent growth rate in online [...]
Keep the dream alive, and support a female-led business during lockdown October 29, 2020 When Kiera-Lorelle opened the doors to her new family business — Cinnamon Leaf foodhall in Tottenham, North London — she was full of hope: “It’s been a life-long dream of my mum’s to open a store.” That was back in January. Needless to say, the months since haven’t been easy. But Cinnamon Leaf has carried [...]
DEBATE: Is Sadiq Khan right to refuse to expand London’s congestion charge zone? October 28, 2020 Is Sadiq Khan right to refuse to expand London’s congestion charge zone? JOIN THE DEBATE Wes Streeting, Labour MP for Ilford North, says YES When Boris Johnson was mayor of London he promised Londoners: “I am not going to be having any more congestion charges”. Yet now, his government is trying to force exactly that [...]
Woolworths may not be making a return, but our love of retail is October 28, 2020 Admit it, you did it, I did it, we all did it at least once — pinching from the pick n mix at your local Woolworths. And sadly, all that came to an end in December 2008, when all remaining Woolworths stores were shuttered for good. As a nation we mourned. We mourned the loss [...]
Tough on dirty money? The UK has a way to go October 28, 2020 In 2016, the National Crime Agency estimated that £90bn is laundered via London each year. The UK government’s response was swift, with a commitment to “block dirty money flowing into the City of London”. It unveiled radical plans to “overhaul the approach to tackling economic crime, with greater partnering between the government, law enforcement and [...]