UK examining how to reduce travel quarantine period using tests October 7, 2020 The UK is urgently looking into ways to reduce the 14-day travel quarantine period which applies to some passengers arriving in the country, transport secretary Grant Shapps said. Shapps said that a mixture of Covid-19 testing and self-isolation was promising, and announced the formation of a Global Travel Taskforce to open up international travel, which [...]
Coronavirus: Leading UK scientists urge government to adopt herd immunity approach October 7, 2020 A range of leading UK scientists have joined experts from around the world in calling for a herd immunity approach to the pandemic by forcing the vulnerable to shield while allowing others to return to normal life. Launched in the US, The Great Barrington Declaration urges governments across the globe to scrap lockdowns in favour [...]
City workers committed to the commute despite PM’s working from home u-turn, TfL data shows October 7, 2020 City workers committed to the commute despite Boris Johnson's working from home u-turn, according to new Transport for London
New: More than HALF of UK’s event companies expect bankruptcy by spring October 7, 2020 Stark new figures suggest that some 61 per cent of the UK’s events businesses expect to shut up shop within the next six months. The polling further suggests that 400,000 jobs will be lost in the industry by the end of 2020 without further government support. The survey was carried out by Feast It, the [...]
Workplace stress reaches ‘record height’ during pandemic October 7, 2020 2020 has been the most stressful year in history for the global workforce, according to a new report, as working from home and the threat of redundancy begin to take their toll on employees’ mental health. A survey of more than 12,000 employees, managers, and top executives across 11 countries found that the pandemic has [...]
West Ham install ‘Covid tunnels’ at training ground – could fans be next? October 7, 2020 Premier League club West Ham United have installed sanitisation tunnels at their academy training ground to protect staff and players. The tunnel operates initially as a temperature scanner before misting individuals with a controlled, odourless, water-based solution to disable bacteria and viruses. Taking just three to five seconds in total, the technology could in theory [...]
Bounce Back Loan scheme could cost the taxpayer up to £26bn October 7, 2020 The cost to the taxpayer of the government’s emergency loan scheme for struggling small businesses could be as much as £26bn, a new report has found. According to the National Audit Office (NAO), the cost of the government’s Bounce Back Loan scheme “has the potential to be very high” through a combination of firms being [...]
UK businesses borrowed more in one quarter than in whole of 2019 October 6, 2020 British businesses borrowed 50 per cent more in the second quarter of 2020 than in the whole of the previous year as the coronavirus crisis hammered the economy, new figures show. Businesses borrowed a total of £34.5bn in the three months to the end of June, according to a report by banking lobby group UK [...]
City urges government to rip up ‘fundamentally unfair’ immigration system October 6, 2020 The City of London Corporation has urged the government to shake up its “fundamentally unfair” immigration system to boost the UK economy’s post-pandemic recovery ahead of the Brexit transition period deadline. In a report released today in collaboration with EY, the City body called on the Home Office to “rip up the red tape” and [...]
Allianz boss warns over ‘zombie companies’ reliant on government support October 6, 2020 The chief executive of Allianz has warned there are a lot of “zombie companies” surviving only because of government support, but said that households were proving more resilient than many thought during the pandemic. “We are camouflaging for now the underlying effects, we have a lot of zombie companies now that are just surviving because [...]