Getting rid of business rates won’t fix Britain’s high streets December 5, 2025 The decline of the UK’s high streets has been well-documented over the past decades, with the finger variously pointed at structural and policy changes. At the 2025 Labour Party conference, the Prime Minister said that the UK’s high streets are “struggling against the tide of decline”, promising to replace the business rates system and level [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Unilever demerger; House prices hit record high December 5, 2025 Good morning and welcome back to the City PM liveblog. The Autumn Budget started nearly an hour earlier than expected on 26 November after the fiscal watchdog leaked its forecasts for the UK and with it all the Labour government’s economic policy for the next year. But start as you mean to end rings true [...]
Investec Champions Cup: How Prem Rugby can beat Top 14 budgets December 5, 2025 It seems to come around quicker every year; not Christmas but the Investec Champions Cup. Some criticise the competition – whether it is because of the inclusion of the South African United Rugby Championship teams, its availability being restricted to Premier Sports or its odd pool format – but it is the very best of [...]
Britain must invest in defence AI to secure its future December 5, 2025 The UK has the talent and industrial base to compete in defence tech, but leveraging these effectively will require more than investment.
Football regulator to investigate bad club owners from next week December 5, 2025 Time is ticking for poor football owners as the Independent Football Regulator will be able to investigate unsuitable club bosses from next week. The Independent Football Regulator was set up following the passing of the Football Governance Bill in Parliament earlier this year, with Richard Monks and David Kogan tasked with being chief executive and [...]
Cyberattacks decaying Western economies, expert warns December 4, 2025 The global cyber environment has become a “society wide crisis”, where a recent slew of attacks are threatening the foundation of Western economies, an expert has warned. A year-long avalanche of detrimental attacks on British retailers; Co-op, M&S, and more recently, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR); has pointed to a far deeper concern, Charl van der [...]
Stride criticises FCA for not investigating Treasury December 4, 2025 Shadow Chancellor Mel Stride has criticised the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)’s decision to hold back from launching an investigation into whether the Treasury engaged in market manipulation before the Budget, adding that there was a risk of a “precedent” being set where confidential information is leaked “without consequence”. Earlier on Thursday, FCA chief executive Nikhil [...]
Government climate tsar picks up enough air miles for six trips around the world December 4, 2025 The government’s climate envoy has totted up more than 150,000 airmiles since she was appointed by Labour, in trips to conferences such as COP 30. That’s more than six times the circumference of the earth. Rachel Kyte reports directly to energy secretary Ed Miliband and foreign secretary Yvette Cooper. The role of climate envoy had [...]
Relief for fintech startups as government plans new short-term FCA licences December 4, 2025 Fintech startups could be about to start trading much sooner after the government signalled plans to issue temporary licences in advance of getting full accreditation. Startups often suffer delays of months or even over a year as they wait for regulators at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to grant them authorisation, during which they burn [...]
Bank of England launches groundbreaking private credit stress test December 4, 2025 The Bank of England has launched its first ever stress test of the fast-growing private credit industry, in a bid to establish how the opaque sector would respond to a range of economic and financial shocks. The undertaking, called a ‘system-wide exploratory scenario exercise (SWES)’, will work with some of the industry’s biggest players to [...]
