HLAS

Andrew Griffith, the UK City of London minister, has stated the UK government’s intent to revamp the regulation of the investment and insurance sectors. Earlier this month he unveiled over 30 reforms “to unlock investment and turbocharge growth in towns and cities across the UK”. Last week the Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, set out plans to repeal and replace EU retained laws governing financial services. This will establish a new regulatory framework for the UK with the aim of making it more agile, less costly, and more responsive to emerging trends. These plans included a commitment to make substantial legislative progress [...]

If you are looking for some new business ideas, then ask us for a copy of our guide called “57 Ways to Grow Your Business”! Our publication is packed full of bright ideas for the Serious Entrepreneur and starts with the four basics of growth. All the ideas in this guide ultimately revolve around four basic insights about growing a business: Increase the number of customers, Increase the number of times each one does business with you, Increase the average value of each transaction, and Increase your own effectiveness and efficiency. Here are some other business principles that we explore in [...]

Making tax digital (MTD) for income tax self-assessment (ITSA) was originally scheduled to start in 2018 and was then put back to 2023 and then 2024. It was announced just before Christmas that the new system of submitting digital information quarterly to HMRC has been delayed yet again! The start date will now depend upon the gross business receipts of the individual. Self-employed individuals and landlords with annual gross receipts above £50,000 will need to follow the rules for MTD for ITSA from 6 April 2026. Those with annual gross receipts between £30,000 and £50,000 will be mandated into the [...]

Creative Catalyst, run by Innovate UK, provides end-to-end innovation support for high-potential businesses in the creative sector. The first £10 million funding call opened on the 5 December 2022. UK registered micro and small businesses in the creative industries sector will be able to apply for funding up to £50,000 with a package of support to grow their business. To be eligible, proposals must: be from the creative industries or support the creative industries; demonstrate clear benefits for the UK creative industry and the wider UK economy; focus on a clear opportunity and the proposed innovation which addresses it; and [...]

The Prince’s Countryside Fund Farm Resilience Programme (FRP) offers free business skills training to family farmers across the UK. The programme is open to dairy and livestock family farm businesses and takes a whole-farm and whole-family approach. Workshops include: Business Health Check, Benchmarking, Practical cost management, Getting to know your finances, Managing your farmed environment, Planning your future, and Business planning and managing change. See: Farm Resilience Programme - The Prince's Countryside Fund (princescountrysidefund.org.uk)

The Green Home Finance Accelerator (GHFA), part of the UK Government’s Net Zero Innovation Portfolio (NZIP) will provide up to £20 million grant funding to support the design, development and piloting of a range of finance propositions which encourage domestic energy efficiency and low carbon heating retrofits in the owner-occupied and private rented sectors. The UK Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) wants as many UK homes as possible to reach Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) C by 2035. Private investment, alongside government support, will be essential to meet this target – and the green finance market can play [...]

The way in which UK organisations responsible for packaging must carry out their recycling responsibilities is changing. If you are affected by the new Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) for packaging (including reforms to the Packaging Recycling Note (PRN) system), you need to start to collect the correct packaging data from 1 January 2023. Collection of your packaging data won’t become mandatory until March 2023, and you will need to start reporting this data from July 2023. These regulations will apply to larger organisations that handle and supply packaging to businesses and consumers. This may also include products imported from outside the UK and online marketplaces. See: How to [...]

Businesses that use Royal Mail's services are urged to plan ahead as strike action is expected to take place this winter. If you use Royal Mail to deliver your goods you should be aware of planned industrial action that is due to take place on: Wednesday 14 December 2022 Thursday 15 December 2022 Royal Mail's services will be affected by delays to mail posted the day before, during, or in the days after any strike action. See: Royal Mail strike updates | Royal Mail Group Ltd

In response to a public consultation earlier this year, the government has confirmed that the Network and Information Systems (NIS) Regulations will be strengthened to protect essential and digital services against increasingly sophisticated and frequent cyber-attacks, both now and in the future. The UK NIS Regulations came into force in 2018 to improve the cyber security of companies providing critical services. Organisations which fail to put in place effective cyber security measures can be fined as much as £17 million for non-compliance. But high profile attacks such as Operation CloudHopper, which targeted managed service providers and compromised thousands of organisations at the same time, [...]

Millions of employees will be able to request flexible working from day one of their employment, under new government plans to make flexible working the default. Flexible working doesn’t just mean a combination of working from home and in the office – it can mean employees making use of job-sharing, flexitime, and working compressed, annualised, or staggered hours. The new measures will give employees greater access to flexibility over where, when, and how they work, and the government hopes will lead to happier, more productive staff. Flexible working has been found to help employees balance their work and home life, [...]