Business News Round Up (09/11/2021)
Top UK cities to start a new business in 2021
The pandemic has definitely disrupted the global economy and it is uncertain when things will get back to normal. While 2021 might not be the best year to start a new business, the entrepreneurs in the UK seem not to have missed the chance. Many entrepreneurs have used the pandemic crisis to launch their ideas and turn them into a reality. Making this evident, there is a record 12.3 percent increase in the number of new businesses in the UK in 2020. Given the growth in the number of new businesses, it is vital to choose the right location for the same. When this decision is taken right, there will be great benefits. To help aspiring entrepreneurs in the UK, Fasthosts has conducted a new study to reveal the top 15 cities in the UK for start-ups. The study has analysed these cities based on business birth and death rates, average download speeds, five-year survival rates, average working productivity, and office renting costs.
Almost half of Scottish workers plan to change career in next 12 months
Around half of workers (49%) in Scotland plan to make changes to their careers in the next 12 months, according to research from Aviva. However, this is a reduction of 4% since February, when 53% of Scottish workers were intending to make changes. At 49%, Scottish workers are actually the least likely to be planning changes, compared to other regions across the UK. In London 76% of workers expect to make changes to their careers in the next 12 months, while the UK average across all regions is 65%. Findings were taken from a survey of 4,003 UK adults, carried out by Censuswide Research on behalf of Aviva in September. The intended changes vary greatly, ranging from reducing hours, to moving roles within an organisation, to choosing a different career path completely.
https://www.insider.co.uk/news/almost-half-scottish-workers-plan-25388584
Close to half of UK’s FTSE 350 ‘damaged’ by Brexit
Almost half of FTSE 350 companies described post-Brexit trading arrangements with the EU as “damaging” but nearly all remained optimistic about their own prospects and the wider economic outlook, according to an analysis backed by the Financial Times. Other issues raised by respondents to the latest FTSE 350 Boardroom Bellwether survey included challenges on executive hiring due to pandemic-related pressure to restrain pay and slow progress in adopting net zero carbon strategies. Twice as many FTSE 250 companies felt that there had been some damage from Brexit compared to those in the FTSE 100, showing that the impact has been felt most keenly by more domestically focused smaller businesses rather than the large international groups that typically occupy the top tier of the stock market. The impact of the new UK-EU trading relationship highlighted the importance of unrestricted global trade and free movement of labour for many businesses. “Companies have been affected in a number of ways,” said Peter Swabey, policy director at the Chartered Governance Institute, which carried out the survey with the FT of company secretaries’ views.
https://www.ft.com/content/0b45c038-02d1-44a1-81dc-bfca9e2b16d2
High quality employment key to levelling up, argues expert group
The government’s ‘levelling up’ agenda needs to address employment inequalities between regions, within regions and between people if it is to be effective says ReWAGE, the new independent think-tank based in the Institute for Employment Research at Warwick University. The Levelling Up sub-group of ReWAGE has produced a policy briefing, which has been submitted to the government’s Levelling Up Taskforce and HM Treasury. Putting employment on the levelling up agenda argues that regional ‘levelling up’, which will be a key objective in the UK Government’s upcoming White Paper, also needs to focus on getting people into, and progressing to, better jobs. The paper also recommends that a set of metrics should be developed to measure progress on employment levelling up. These metrics should enable the measurement of progress in increasing employment opportunities and outcomes amongst people and places. Whilst specific actions will be shaped by local priorities, the metrics set up to measure progress should be standard and underpinned by data.
https://aboutmanchester.co.uk/high-quality-employment-key-to-levelling-up-argues-expert-group/