Business News

One hundred community projects across the West Midlands, including projects in Birmingham, Coventry, Halesowen, Hereford, Leamington Spa, Lichfield, Stoke-on-Trent, Wolverhampton and Worcester will be helping local people improve their communities after the Big Lottery Fund awarded a total of £2,121,499 to the region.

Comedian Frank Skinner and actor Adrian Lester are among 13 celebrities backing their favourite London bridge in a bid to encourage people  in the West Midlands to sign up for Diabetes UK’s 10-mile London Bridges walking challenge taking place on 11 October, to raise vital funds.

PwC, the professional services firm, has reported revenue growth of 10 percent to £3,083 million for the year ended 30 June 2015, up from £2,814 million the previous year. Profits increased by 6 percent to £818 million as the firm continued to invest heavily in its people, training and skills, infrastructure and technology.

Since their introduction to the UK market as an alternative to smoking tobacco almost 10 years ago there have been calls for e-cigarettes to be better regulated. More recently there has been a shift towards e-cigarettes being a means of helping to quit and smoking cessation, however research continues into their long term use and any associated health effects.

Investment in the city, investment in businesses and investment in the workforce are the key messages of Wolverhampton Business Week, announced today by Wolverhampton’s Economic Growth Board. Business Week will run from Monday, September 28 to Friday, October 2, 2015. Among the events planned by the Economic Growth Board – which is made up of the city’s key public sector organisations and leading business representatives – are the ‘Annual Business Breakfast’ and ‘Meet the Buyer - Investing in Business’.

World Travel Market London 2015, the leading global event for the travel industry, will be opened by David Gill, former Chief Executive of one of the world's most valuable and well known football clubs Manchester United.  Since joining the club as Finance Director in 1997, Gill lead the way to Manchester United becoming one of the world's most valuable football clubs, now valued at $1.98 billion, overseeing four Premier League titles, three League Cups, one European Cup, one Club World Cup and an FA Cup since 2003.

The UK public is being thanked by the Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB) for fighting back against insurance cheats and reporting valuable information they have about insurance fraud to the IFB’s ‘Cheatline’. In 2014 over 500 reports were made to the Cheatline every month by members of the public, 6,347 reports in total for the year, and the IFB attributes the number of reports and the quality of the information to increased public awareness of the issue combined with the realisation that insurance fraud is not a victimless crime.

The number of people working excessive hours in the West Midlands has risen by 10 per cent since 2010, according to a new TUC analysis published recently. The number of employees working more than 48 hours per week in the West Midlands has now reached 249,000 – up by 23,000 since 2010 – following more than a decade of decline in long hours working.

Margaret Corneby, Chief Executive of the Black Country Chamber of Commerce, has recently announced the £6 billion growth challenge for the region. “Our aim is to double the size of the Black Country economy by the end of 2023: from a GVA of £17 billion at the start of 2013 to £34 billion at the end of 2023. If we do nothing, current projections suggest that we will have a GVA of £22 billion, £12 billion less than our aim."

British cherry growers are on course for their most productive season for over 30 years, latest industry figures can reveal. Since the start of the British cherry season in May growers have produced 2682 tonnes - an uplift of 80 per cent on the 1488 tonnes produced in 2014. Even better news for growers is that UK cherries are also in high demand with Tesco seeing record sales of nearly 80 per cent compared with what it sold in 2014.

Times 100 Best Companies winner and Gold Standard Investors in people Swanstaff Recruitment opened a new branch in Birmingham yesterday. Initially the branch, which is based in Church Street, will focus on the industrial, driving and healthcare sectors, where the company has seen a significant increase in demand over the last 12 months.

With both Australia and South Africa playing at Villa Park, UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) is hosting a free event on September 16 at the club to highlight the opportunities for local businesses looking to trade with those two countries and the Commonwealth markets of Canada, India, and New Zealand.

Australia's best travel writers and public relations professionals were honoured at the annual ASTW Awards for excellence at a gala awards ceremony held in the spiritual heart of Australia at the Uluru Meeting Place, Ayers Rock Resort on Saturday evening 5 September. 

The latest biannual survey of 1,000 UK students by Future Finance, the UK’s specialist student lender has shown that a significant number are still resorting to risky and expensive ways of supplementing their finances. Asking 1,000 students from around the UK about their spending habits revealed that one-quarter (25%) have money outstanding to a payday lender of which a staggering 92.4% admitted to incurring late charges with 54.5% admitting to always incurring such charges.

Over three-quarters of women working part-time in Birmingham Northfield earn less than the Living Wage – the highest proportion in West Midlands – according to new analysis published by the TUC to mark Part-time Equal Pay Day. Across the region, over two in five part-time women’s jobs pay less than the Living Wage. But TUC analysis of official figures shows that earning less than the Living Wage is the norm for women part-time workers in 13 of the West Midlands’ Parliamentary constituencies.