Greater London has highest levels of pollution, with Portsmouth ranked best May 21, 2021 Greater London has the worst levels of air pollution, according to Defra’s Daily Air Quality Index, which is set to rise as lockdown restrictions ease and the capital renews itself as a tourism hub. The capital has been ranked a score of 2.84 on the index. While the average score for the UK’s urban areas [...]
Sunday Times Rich List: Who are the UK’s wealthiest women? May 21, 2021 The lack of women in the boy’s club of billionaires was loud and clear in the Sunday Times Rich List released, so where and who are the UK’s wealthiest women? Bet365’s Denise Coates, who leads the online gambling company after re-mortgaging her father’s chain of betting shops to raise the cash to expand her website, [...]
Single-use plastic bag charge to double, with all shops adopting the tariff May 21, 2021 The extra charge for single-use plastic bags is set to double today, as the charge extends to all businesses in Britain. What was a 5p charge for a single-use carrier bag yesterday, will be 10p from today – and comes as pent-up demand pushes shoppers back to high streets. While it used to be only [...]
BoE eyes a climate-conscious corporate bond purchase scheme May 21, 2021 The Bank of England (BoE) has tabled plans to make its £20bn of corporate bonds better aligned with government net zero targets today. Set to begin later this year, the bank will not immediately sell off bonds issued by businesses that have high carbon emissions, such as energy and oil firms. “Divestment is a powerful [...]
Pret A Manger trades city centres for Pret-rol stations May 21, 2021 Pret A Manger is set to open new shops in petrol stations owned by the Motor Fuel Group (MFG), the café said today, in a well-needed boost for roadside stops. Wither fewer people travelling and going to work, petrol stations have suffered a sales slump of 13.3 per cent compared with the same month two [...]
Nationwide customers saved a further £10.6bn over the pandemic May 21, 2021 Customer deposited increased by £10.6bn throughout the pandemic, Nationwide said today, while remote working has made its workforce ‘more productive’ in the year to 4 April. With lockdown restrictions closing high streets and putting a pin in travel, Nationwide found deposits increased by double what they increased by in 2019, as customers stashed cash into [...]
Sunday Times Rich List: Marcus Rashford tops the UK’s biggest givers May 21, 2021 Manchester United football player Marcus Rashford has become the youngest person to top The Sunday Times Giving List this year, which measures philanthropy among the ultra-wealthy. The list highlighted today that the UK saw more new billionaire’s during the pandemic than any other time over the list’s 33-year history. However, this year also saw a record amount of donations, exceeding £4bn [...]
Painkiller maker Oxford Cannabinoid Technologies debuts on London’s market May 21, 2021 Oxford Cannabinoid Technologies (OCT), which makes painkillers using cannabis components, has debuted on the London Stock Exchange this morning, offering £0.01 per share. The UK-based company, a pre-revenue pharmaceutical company developing cannabinoid-based prescription medicines, will begin trading on the capital’s main market at 8:00 this morning. Offering around 960m ordinary shares, OCT is set to [...]
Seven golden ethical principles May 21, 2021 | City Talk The opportunity is now for all leaders to lean into restoring public trust in corporate governance, as we begin to build back better in the wake of a series of corporate failings. The global pandemic and our return to work presents an opportunity for organisations and leaders to re-establish a culture that is built on [...]
Exclusive: Sadiq Khan lags behind Boris Johnson’s housing completions record May 20, 2021 Sadiq Khan has completed just over half the amount of affordable housing in his first five years that Boris Johnson did when he was mayor of London. Numbers from the Greater London Authority (GLA) show Johnson completed 62,387 affordable homes in his first five years, while Khan has completed 34,659 in that same time period. [...]