China growth fears hammer mining shares June 29, 2010 SIX of the FTSE 100’s top ten fallers yesterday were mining companies as traders took fright from a sharp downwards revision to a leading economic index for China. Natural resources stocks and cyclical plays plunged as the US Conference Board moved its April indicator for the Asian powerhouse from 1.7 per cent to just 0.3 [...]
Time to embrace carbon trading opportunity July 25, 2010 REDUCING carbon emissions is a long-standing objective within the European Union for obvious reasons. But, given the current economic climate, policy makers are now stressing the need for the UK to move to a low carbon economy not only to protect the environment but also to foster long-term, sustainable growth to help our country recover [...]
Austerity hits house prices June 20, 2010 SEVERE austerity measures and an uncertain economic climate will kill off the recovery in house prices, property website Rightmove will warn today. Revealing in its monthly survey that home asking prices only rose 0.3 per cent in June on the previous month, Rightmove said that the pace is slackening and the market is beginning to [...]
Marathon effort for green pioneer February 18, 2010 TO DO this job, you must be an optimist first and foremost, says Steve Mahon, founder of Low Carbon Accelerator, the venture capital firm that specialises in green technology investment. Set up in October 2006, it was the first green technology fund to list on Aim. Attracting institutional investors was a lengthy battle: “The investment [...]
CBIcalling for global carbon trading plan December 6, 2009 BUSINESS body the CBI is set to call for a global carbon trading scheme today, as the UN’s climate change talks kick off in Copenhagen. The group will argue the case for a scheme to cap emissions, and to allow firms worldwide to buy permits for carbon – like the EU Emissions Trading Scheme – [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING February 16, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES YOUNG GENERATIONS FACE WEALTH DEFECIT Baby boomers hold so much of Britain’s wealth that a prosperity gap is opening between the generations, with people born after 1970 unlikely to acquire the wealth their parents enjoy, a Conservative shadow cabinet member has warned. David Willetts said in a speech to the London School of [...]
Trade unions set to fight public sector pension reforms June 21, 2010 A NUMBER of the UK’s largest trade unions spoke out yesterday against the government’s plans to review public sector pension schemes. Unison, Unite and rail union RMT warned the government ahead of today’s Budget that plans to cut public sector pensions could be damaging. Dave Prentis, general secretary at Uniso, demanded that the review body [...]
Trade unions set to fight public sector pension reforms June 21, 2010 A NUMBER of the UK’s largest trade unions spoke out yesterday against the government’s plans to review public sector pension schemes. Unison, Unite and rail union RMT warned the government ahead of today’s Budget that plans to cut public sector pensions could be damaging. Dave Prentis, general secretary at Uniso, demanded that the review body [...]
Lawson sets up think-tank on the climate November 23, 2009 EX-CHANCELLOR and climate change sceptic Lord Lawson launched a cross-party global warming think-tank yesterday, which will have an ex-senior policy adviser to the Prime Minister and a former deputy chairman of Barclays on its board. The Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which is being launched just a fortnight before the United Nations’ (UN) climate change [...]
A COPENHAGEN WISH LIST FOR BUSINESS November 17, 2009 TIM BAINESNORTON ROSE LLP PRESIDENT Obama may have decided that there is little prospect of a binding agreement coming out of next month’s Copenhagen conference. He spoke yesterday about an “accord” that has “immediate operational effect”. Against this, many leading businesses have called for an ambitious and robust global deal. So what should business wish [...]