By: Maria Ward-Brennan

Senior Reporter Maria Ward-Brennan is a senior reporter focused on law and professional services. Contact her via email on maria.ward-brennan@cityam.com or X (Twitter) @MariaW_B

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Political uncertainty leaves British businesses only planning year-to-year

February 4, 2026

Businesses are seeing political change and regulatory uncertainty as a barrier to long-term workforce planning, making it harder for leaders to implement effective workforce strategies. Nearly 80 per cent of employers find themselves unable to look beyond a 12-month horizon, according to a survey of nearly 700 employers by law firm Lewis Silkin. Lucy Lewis, [...]
AI-driven workforce fuels private equity surge in sports

February 3, 2026

The influx of businesses investing in AI is a key factor driving the surge in private equity (PE) within the leisure and sports sector, as sports is the new luxury. Cleary Gottlieb partner Tihir Sarkar explained to City AM, “With day-to-day activities being taken over by AI, there’s going to be a lot more time for participation [...]
Yoghurt giant Muller takes on HMRC over corporation tax in legal battle

February 3, 2026

The makers behind Muller Corner and Muller Rice are taking the UK tax authorities to court over a long-running dispute about corporation tax. Muller UK and Ireland Group, Muller Dairy UK, Robert Wiseman and Sons, and TM UK Production are in a battle with HMRC over whether a company can claim tax breaks on ‘goodwill’ [...]
ICO opens probe into Elon Musk’s Grok AI over sexualised content

February 3, 2026

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has opened investigations in relation to the Grok AI system and its potential to produce harmful sexualised image and video content. The probe into the tech tool owned by Elon Musk’s Internet Unlimited Company (XIUC) and X.AI comes after the chatbot made headlines last month over the generation of explicit, [...]
Mandelson eyes ‘outsider’ role after quitting Labour over Epstein fallout

February 3, 2026

Lord Peter Mandelson had declared a “sea change” in his career after resigning from the Labour Party following the latest batch of Epstein files released last week. Speaking to The Times, Mandelson, freshly departed from Labour after 40 years at the top, said he now wants to “contribute ideas that enable Britain to strengthen and [...]
EY avoids judgment in £2bn case as Alvarez & Marsal reach ‘confidential agreement’

February 2, 2026

The mammoth legal fight against the Big Four giant EY over its auditing of a former London-listed health giant that collapsed amid fraud allegations has been withdrawn following a settlement. Private hospital operator NMC Health Plc collapsed in April 2020 after being placed into administration, and was delisted from the London Stock Exchange in the [...]
Chair of elite law firm Paul Weiss made personal requests to Jeffrey Epstein

February 2, 2026

The chairman of one of the most prominent law firms in America, Paul Weiss, was included in the US Department of Justice’s latest round of bombshell revelations in relation to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein. One of the US’s leading litigators and corporate advisers, Brad Karp has been Paul Weiss’s chairman since 2008. Paul Weiss is [...]
CBI board member Peter Hogg to lead Arcadis’ UK and Ireland business

February 2, 2026

The CBI’s senior council chair, Peter Hogg, has been appointed as Arcadis’ country director for the UK and Ireland, City AM can reveal. Hogg is a 28-year veteran of the global design and consultancy firm and will succeed Simon Bimpson, with a focus on leveraging Arcadis’ position in sustainable design to deliver infrastructure that improves [...]
Hundreds of Treasury jobs at risk in civil servant cost-cutting shakeup

February 2, 2026

Rachel Reeves wants to slash about 300 of her department’s roughly 2,100 staff by 2030, as HM Treasury plans to offer officials up to £100,000 to take voluntary leave.The proposed cuts to the Treasury are part of a wider drive to reduce Whitehall’s administrative costs by 16 per cent, according to the Financial Times. The [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Miners lead stock fall as gold rout deepens

February 2, 2026

Good morning and welcome back to the City AM liveblog. There’s one big event the City is looking towards this week but all signs point to zero surprises. On Thursday, the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee will meet for the first time this year and decide whether to take the chop to interest rates. [...]

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Barbican Centre: the brutalist landmark weaving art into everyday London life.

By: Maria Ward-Brennan

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