Business News Round Up (22/02/2022)
Scottish consumer confidence holds steady, but cost of living headwinds gather
Scottish consumer confidence remained steady at -11% in the fourth quarter of 2021, in line with the rest of the UK, which experienced a drop of 1% over the same period. Overall personal expenditure in the final quarter increased for 45% of consumers in Scotland, up from 37% in the third quarter, according to the latest Deloitte Consumer Tracker. Of these, 68% revealed it was due to rising prices. The tracker is based on a survey carried out online by YouGov with a nationally-representative sample of 3,177 UK adults. Overall consumer confidence is calculated as an aggregate of six individual measures: job security, job opportunities, household disposable income, level of debt, children’s education and welfare, general health, and wellbeing. Of these seven measures, sentiment around the state of the economy dropped 7% points in the fourth quarter. This fall in sentiment among consumers is in contrast to business executives across the UK, who intend to make increased capital investment a priority for the year ahead.
https://www.insider.co.uk/news/scottish-consumer-confidence-holds-steady-26296503
Almost 40% of UK FTSE 100 board roles now held by women
Nearly 40% of the board positions at the UK’s biggest companies are now held by women, a government-backed review has found. The FTSE Women Leaders Review found 414 women held company board roles at FTSE 100 firms last year, up from 374 in 2020. But the review also exposed a lack of women in executive director roles. Just 13.5% of the executive director positions were held by women in 2021, down from 14.2% the year before. The government suggested that the findings demonstrate a “major sea-change” in “attitudes to getting women leaders to the top table of business”. Although 4 in 10 of UK FTSE 100 board positions were held by women in 2021, the report found that 45.7% of these positions were in non-executive roles, such as senior human resource positions. Out of the 414 women in board roles, 385 were non-executive positions. Just 29 women held executive director positions at the UK’s biggest firms last year.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60430198
£80m handed to local councils to help small firms
Local councils in Scotland have been allocated £80 million from the funding package received from the UK government to help small businesses tackle Covid and cost pressures. Councils will have the flexibility to use the Covid Economic Recovery Fund to target existing business schemes and to support low income households. In addition, a further £3 million has been allocated to the City Centre Recovery Fund, which helps drive footfall to businesses hit hard by the pandemic. The Scottish Government will tomorrow publish a revised Strategic Framework which will set out an updated approach to managing and recovering from COVID-19. First Minister Nicola Sturgeon met business owners in Edinburgh to discuss how support provided to date had helped them and how this latest funding could support the recovery.
Grants scheme opens to help SMEs on their net zero journey
A £400,000 grant scheme has been unveiled to help North West small firms achieve net zero status. Eco-I North West is a £14m research and development programme which opens the door to SMEs to link up with six of the region’s universities – Lancaster, Central Lancashire, Cumbria, Liverpool, Liverpool John Moores and Manchester Metropolitan – and access their research facilities and skills. Businesses, charities, and social enterprises can get up to 60% of funding towards projects worth £25,000. More than 100 businesses have worked with universities since the scheme’s launch two years ago to test their ideas which range from water supply and quality to waste, energy, and resource efficiency, as well as air quality and food security. Andy Pickard, manager of the Centre for Global Eco-Innovation, which delivers the Eco-I NW programme, said: “Eco-I NW opens up such a huge academic regional resource to SMEs. It offers the opportunity for the North West to create an ecosystem which accelerates our transition to a low carbon economy. This is a scheme which should allow businesses to access grants quickly and try new things.”