Equity investment in small UK businesses increases to £8.8bn in 2020 despite Covid-disruption and Brexit June 16, 2021 Equity investment into smaller UK businesses grew by 9 per cent last year despite the combined headwinds of Covid-19 and the UK’s departure from the European Union. The total of £8.8bn is the highest recorded since the British Business Bank started tracking the data ten years ago. The Bank also revealed that it had supported [...]
British music exports grow to record high as streaming hits the right note June 16, 2021 The value of British music sales and streams surpassed half a billion pounds for the first time last year thanks to the growing popularity of streaming services such as Spotify. Global consumption of British music generated £519m in export earnings in 2020 — a six per cent increase year on year and the highest figure [...]
Government taskforce calls for easing of UK finance regulations to ‘unlock’ £100bn in investment June 15, 2021 A government taskforce has urged Boris Johnson to shed a range of UK regulations on finance post-Brexit to “unlock” more than £100bn of investment in small businesses and high-growth tech firms. The Taskforce for Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform (TIGGR), led by former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, called for changes to allow pension funds to easier invest in high-risk, [...]
€229m drop in April: Imports from Britain to Ireland continue downward slope June 15, 2021 Irish imports from Great Britain in April decreased 20 per cent from a year ago. Imports have continually fallen since Brexit, according to a Bloomberg report. Ireland’s statistics office today reported imports from Britain fell by €229m compared with April 2020. The greatest decreases were in the imports of “Food and live animals” and “Chemicals and related products”. Goods [...]
Treasury and LSE call on EU for more co-operation on financial services post-Brexit June 15, 2021 The Treasury has called on the EU to engage more deeply with the UK government on the future of financial services post-Brexit. Katharine Braddick, the Treasury’s director of financial services, said today that both parties need to “get on” with outlining the post-Brexit relationship between the UK and EU on financial services. It comes as [...]
Brexit exodus: UK construction staff shortage leads to project delays and fewer new homes June 15, 2021 Construction industry experts warn that an exodus of skilled EU workers is increasingly leading to serious staff shortages and therefore damage the sector and delay a range of projects, primarily as a result of Brexit as well as Covid-19. The ONS said recently that the non-British resident population declined in the year through June 2020, [...]
New Standard Contractual Clauses approved by EU – and what they mean for UK businesses June 15, 2021 The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) made headlines when introduced in 2018, and led to significant changes to how UK businesses handle data. This year – and even though the UK has left the EU – there are new EU data rules coming in, to which UK businesses may need to respond. The latest [...]
First summer post-Brexit: Panic among desperate UK farmers as hundreds of thousands of fruit pickers stay away June 15, 2021 Farmers across the UK are in panic mode as the busiest season of the year is about to start but they are faced with a shortage of hundreds of thousands of European workers. In fact, there is such a “massive whole” in the number of available fruit and vegetable pickers that it is putting farmers [...]
US and EU near truce in long-running $11.5bn trade war June 15, 2021 The US and EU are set to announce a five-year suspension of tariffs over aircraft subsidies, marking an end to a trade dispute that has lasted 17 years. The two sides have agreed to pause the world’s largest corporate trade dispute and focus on the threat posed by China’s nascent commercial aircraft industry, sources told [...]
City watchdog vows Big Tech crackdown over scam adverts June 15, 2021 The City watchdog has pledged to use post-Brexit powers to crack down on tech giants such as Google over online fraud. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has warned platforms they must do more to block scam adverts following a surge in cases during the pandemic. The regulator added it would not hesitate to take tough [...]