By: Maria Ward-Brennan

Professional Services Editor Maria Ward-Brennan is the Professional Services Editor at City AM, focused on law, Big Four, and other management and accounting consulting firms. She was previously a litigation reporter at The Lawyer. Contact her via email at maria.ward-brennan@cityam.com or X (Twitter) @MariaW_B.

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Employment Rights Act: Business braces for shorter strike notices, stronger unions

February 18, 2026

The first batch of reforms, following the passage of the Employment Rights Act, came into effect on Wednesday, granting employees new trade union powers. As of Wednesday, measures under the legislation kicked in, including the repeal of most of the Trade Union Act 2016 and the introduction of protections against dismissal for taking industrial action. [...]
BAE Systems rides defence wave to dividend boost and record results

February 18, 2026

BAE Systems shareholders are set for a pay bump as the London-listed group has benefited from the wave of increased global defence spending. Sales at Europe’s largest defence contractor rose 10 per cent to a record £30.7bn, while underlying profit grew 12 per cent to £3.3bn. The group saw its total order backlog reach a [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Inflation falls to near year-low; BAE leads stock rally

February 18, 2026

Good morning and welcome back to the City AM liveblog. Inflation has fallen to a near year-low this morning hitting its slowest pace since March and fuelling hopes that the Bank of England will take the chop to interest rates next month. New data from the Official for National Statistics showed rose the Consumer Price [...]
Employment Rights Act changes could cost Premier League clubs millions

February 18, 2026

Premier League clubs could be forced to pay millions in player dismissal fees when Labour changes to the Employment Rights Act come into force next year. It comes as the UK’s unemployment rate reached a near five-year high on Tuesday morning. The Employment Rights Act, a brainchild of former deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, will [...]
Businesses to rush redundancies ahead of new Employment Rights changes

February 17, 2026

Businesses plan to carry out a “clean up” of redundancies by the end of the year in anticipation of the Employment Rights Act coming into force next January. The government’s plan to remove the unfair dismissal cap in its Employment Rights Act will lead to more claims, especially among higher-earning employees. To avoid expensive layoffs [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Unemployment rises; Debenhams’ £35m raise

February 17, 2026

Good morning and welcome back to the City AM liveblog. The UK unemployment rate has risen again this morning, with fresh data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showing the rate had surged to 5.2 per cent in the three months to December 2025. This was up from 5.1 per cent in the latest [...]
Winter Olympics 2026: How insurance keeps Milano Cortina on track

February 17, 2026

Every four years, the world’s greatest athletes fight to take gold, but it’s the unseen safety nets, drafted by insurers, that keep the Winter Olympics running smoothly. German-based Allianz became the exclusive insurance partner of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 2021, with coverage until the 2032 summer games in Brisbane, under the oversight of [...]
KPMG partner fined for using AI to cheat on internal training

February 16, 2026

A partner at the Big Four firm KPMG has been fined $10,000 (£7,200) for using AI to cheat in an internal training course meant to test knowledge of the technology. KPMG Australia has forced an unnamed audit partner to redo a test after they uploaded training materials to an AI platform to help answer AI-related [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Zurich and Beazley £8bn deal gets time; Defence and bank stocks rally

February 16, 2026

Good morning and welcome back to the City AM liveblog. The first round of 2026 tech wobbles kicked into action last week and revived fears of an AI bubble. When Anthropic released a new AI tool designed to help in-house legal teams triage agreements and draft routine responses, the reaction trickled down through law firms straight into [...]
Exclusive: RPC to lose Mike Ashley’s ‘rainmaker’ lawyer

February 13, 2026

City law firm RPC is set to lose one of its highest-billing lawyers, who represents the retail titan Mike Ashley. Long-term partner Jeremy Drew will leave the firm after nearly 20 years in the solicitor’s retail and commercial department, which he also co-led. The star lawyer has been a long-term adviser to Mike Ashley, the [...]

Wizz air urges Brits to ‘book with confidence’ despite rising fuel fears

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By: Maria Ward-Brennan

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