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A list of central government’s most important contracts, also showing up to four relevant Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for those contracts, and the performance of the vendor against those KPIs.

Notice of Final Order relating to the rights and interests conferred to Emirates Telecommunications Group Company PJSC under the Strategic Relationship Agreement with Vodafone Group PLC.

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Libraries are already associated with providing endless amounts of knowledge at the ends of your fingertips, making them a great place to establish a new ‘supporting entrepreneurs’ programme.  

Partly funded by the UK Shared Prosperity fund through a grant administered by greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), ‘Build a Business’ is a new project that is due to hit libraries in and around the northern city.

The programme is set to offer in-person workshops, one-to-one support and connect people to local networking events, offering a wealth of expertise to help develop their ideas and turn them into profitable business ventures.

Originally rolled out in September 2021, the new scheme was introduced across eight of Greater Manchester’s localities and by December 2023, more than 1,400 people had attended at least one workshop, with almost half of these individuals identified as being a racially minoritised community.

Now, the scheme will be launched in Rochdale and Wigan, meaning even more people can benefit.

‘Greater Manchester is filled with creative, enthusiastic and inspiring entrepreneurialism and I’m proud that our city-region is leading such an innovative scheme offering access to resources that some of our smaller businesses and residents may not otherwise have access to,’ Cllr Bev Craig, leader of Manchester City Council said. ‘Build a Business offers a wide range of support in a convenient location, which will prove helpful to those wanting to expand their reach and scale up their businesses.’

Cllr Craig added: ‘I’m really pleased that we’re now able to welcome Wigan and Rochdale into the programme and we look forward to the new businesses we can help to develop, further adding to Greater Manchester’s thriving and vibrant economy.’

One example of a project that was helped to launch through the new entrepreneur scheme is ‘My Sen Den’, a sensory toy hire company which was launched by two Stockport-based mums.

As parents of children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), Emily Brookes and Claire Cunliffe are passionate about providing a unique service making children’s parties more inclusive, while also stimulating development and meet varying sensory needs. 

Both women said: ‘The workshops and advice we have received has been invaluable in helping us to build a strong base for our business.

‘It has allowed us to navigate essentials like trademarking, provided us with legislative knowledge and advice and gave us access to a wealth of databases which would have been financially inaccessible otherwise.’

Image: Brooke Lark

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Daniel Austin is CEO and co-founder of ASK Partners, a boutique real estate finance company that provides diverse and flexible funding solutions across the capital structure. 

Whilst buy-to-let investors are benefitting from double digit increases in rents across the UK, the cost of higher interest rates and the increased tax burden, means we’d expect many private investors continue to exit the market. In addition, we have seen the closure of many open and closed-ended property funds which have suffered from the issue of a liquidity mismatch. This will strengthen the appeal of investment in real estate debt which can give investors the chance to build a varied portfolio and the opportunity to buy in and out of investments when it suits.

Which sectors will debt providers be backing?

The UK continues to face a shortage of housing infrastructure, which will continue to support property prices, despite the higher costs of borrowing. Widespread predictions of a major slump in residential prices linked to higher borrowing rates seem to have been overstated, and with many private investors continuing to exit the market we will see a further reduction in the supply of rental stock which will continue to fuel residential rent rises, currently running at a year on-year increase of approximately 12%. There is both the opportunity and liquidity within the Build to Rent (BTR), Private Rented (PRS), Purpose-Built Student Accommodation (PBSA), and Co-Living spaces which will continue to see growth from a rise in demand that build rates can’t match.

We are able to serve the needs of developers operating in those sectors with flexible loan terms such as no interest coverage ratio, which has been a difficult restriction for those with built stock looking to exit or refinance.

We’d expect that the prime London market will be insulated from price drops given the city’s economic strength and appeal to international as well as wealthy UK buyers, although political uncertainty in an election year and higher taxes will weigh on values.

We would also expect life sciences to continue to see a rise in investment. It remains a nascent sector in the UK but its appeal is broadening based on ageing demographics, increased healthcare spending, the advances of robotics and AI and an R&D revolution which is fuelling lab space demand from numerous small start-ups rather than big pharma.

Quality and location will be more important than sector

The low interest rate environment encouraged property investment purely for yield on cash. We think it is now more crucial to know the sector and back high-quality schemes in the right location. Location and quality have in fact become more important than yield on debt or cost and it is more important than ever to back the right sponsors with enough long-term capital to see them through the cycle. As prices bottom out, we will see opportunistic acquisitions for prime locations.

At ASK we already have a pipeline of loans which will close in Q1 2024 and they cover a variety of sectors. We expect we will see more residential opportunities than others but there are still strong prospects in sectors such as offices, retail, logistics and leisure where requirements are evolving and those able to address market demand will have a credible offering.

2024 brings challenges and opportunities

Whilst the lead up to the Autumn election will perhaps hinder progress, we are likely to see a boost in productivity alongside a fall in interest rates. It is hoped that any new government can address issues at a local planning level to boost construction and help us build our way out of the downturn. Labour’s big plans for social housing could help address this issue.

As a debt provider we will be looking to back the best sites in the best locations with well capitalised sponsors who understand their product. Using this formula, we can support developers’ strategies by taking a flexible approach to our underwriting, and continue to provide opportunities for the rising number of private individuals who are choosing to invest in property debt.

Image: Towfiqu barbhuiya

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Despite serving the world wide web, Google has reinforced its commitment to the UK by building a new data centre in Hertfordshire to cater for growing artificial intelligence (AI) demand.

In a recent blog post, Google announced it will build a new $1bn – the equivalent to £788m – data centre in Waltham Cross, in Hertfordshire, around 12 miles north of central London.

The new site, which will be located on land at Maxwell’s Farm – a plot bought by Google in 2020, is being constructed as the global search engine claims the UK is a ‘key’ market for its business as well as being a ‘pioneering world leader in AI technology and science’.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has recently took to X (formally known as Twitter) and said: ‘Delighted to see this investment from Google. Reflects the success of the UK tech sector, which is now the third largest in the world after the US and China – worth over $1 trillion and double the size of anywhere in Europe.’

https://twitter.com/Jeremy_Hunt/status/1748053326468440078

Over the past decade AI, a term that was originally coined in 1956, has soared in the UK. Research that was published in summer 2023 found that the number of UK AI companies has increased by over 600% over the past ten years and around one in six organisations, totalling 432,000, have embraced it’s use.

Against this backdrop, the first UK-based Google Cloud Platform (GCP) data centre region went live in July 2017, with three availability zones and all of the supporting infrastructure housed in a colocation facility.

The latest development will not only help to enhance Google’s status in the UK and bolster the development of AI, but it will also feature off-site heat recovery technology that will see the facility’s waste heat redistributed for use by the community.

‘The Waltham Cross data centre represents our latest investment in the UK and the wide economy at large,’ Ruth Porat, president, chief investment officer and chief financial officer of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, said. ‘This investment builds upon our St Giles and Kings Cross office developments, our multi-year research collaboration agreement with the University of Cambridge, and the Grace Hopper subsea cable that connects the UK with the United States and Spain.’

Ruth added: ‘This new datacentre will meet the growing demand for AI and cloud services and bring crucial compute capacity to businesses across the UK while creating construction and technical jobs for the local community. Together with the UK government, we are working to make AI more helpful and accessible for people and organisations across the country.’

Commenting on the news, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who saw the announcement as a sign of the company’s confidence in the government’s ambitions to transform the UK into a technology and science superpower, said: ‘The UK is a fantastic place to invest, and Google’s $1bn investment is testament to the fact that the UK is a centre of excellence in technology and has huge potential for growth.

‘Foreign investment creates jobs and grows all regions of our economy, and investments like this will help to drive growth in the decade ahead. I will continue to back businesses to invest and innovate here in the UK.’

Image: Google

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A committee of MPs has said the government must act now to protect tenants from the ‘catastrophic’ impact of poor housing on health.

The report by the Health and Social Care Committee calls on the government to proceed without delay in updating the Decent Homes Standard for social housing tenants, and set out a timetable for its extension to cover the private rented sector.

More than three years after the government first committed to review and then extend the Decent Homes Standard to the private rented sector, no legal minimum quality standard exists to protect tenants in private rentals. The Decent Homes Standard has not been updated since 2006.

The MPs concluded that the less well-off and those living in less well-off neighbourhoods are much likelier to develop life-limiting health conditions and to die prematurely from the effects of those conditions.

The most serious housing hazards include fire and electrical risks, excess cold, excess heat, damp and mould, and air pollution. In 2020, two-year-old Awaab Ishak died from a respiratory condition caused by mould in a housing association property.

A determined focus on developing “healthy places” that can prevent ill-health for those most at risk is vital to ease pressures on the NHS and build a sustainable service for future generations, the committee said.

Committee chair Steve Brine said: ‘Poor quality homes can have a catastrophic impact on the health of the those who live in them. The death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak from a respiratory condition caused by mould in his home should leave ministers in no doubt that tenants in both the social and private rented sectors deserve greater protection by law.

‘The government has dragged its feet on updating the Decent Homes Standard for the social rented sector and in extending it to cover the private rented sector. We’re calling on the government to set out its timetable for doing so without delay.

‘Our report welcomes the government’s plan to introduce Awaab’s law for tenants in the social sector. We urge swift action on the outcome of the consultation, but the government must also consider safeguards for tenants in the private sector where risks of damp and mould can pose an immediate danger to health.

‘Creating healthy places to live to prevent ill-health among the population must take priority for ministers. Not only will that reduce pressures on the NHS but will save vast sums spent each year on treating people with preventable illness.’

Responding to the report, Conor O’Shea of campaign group Generation Rent said: ‘Damp and mouldy homes are dangerous to our health and can even kill. Awaab’s law was rightly brought in to social housing last year, giving tenants the security of knowing that action must be taken in a certain timeframe when it is found. The UK’s 12 million private tenants however are offered no such protection.

‘Awaab’s law must be extended to cover private homes as soon as possible. Issues of damp, mould, fuel poverty and poor insulation are worse in private homes than any other tenure type. Not giving landlords fixed deadlines to deal with potentially deadly issues leaves private tenants the most exposed and least protected.

‘We urge the government to correct this to stop people from falling ill and dying in their homes. There is also more they can do. Introducing a higher minimum energy efficiency standard to private rented homes – which was ditched in the autumn – would lead to warmer, dryer homes, stopping mould developing in the first place.’

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Homes England has warned that more younger people look set to live with their parents longer as the cost of buying a house isn’t due to decrease anytime soon.

The government’s housing accelerator, Homes England, has quoted Census statistics which forecast the UK population soaring to more than 60m by 2045. With affordable properties already hard to come by in England, the government body has predicted that younger people will be forced to live with their parents for longer as the cost of properties will continue to skyrocket as a result of high demand.

Against this backdrop, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) has recently revealed the cost of a home is rising quicker than earnings with affordability ratios increasing from 4.92 in 2002 to 8.28 in 2022.

In addition, Homes England has quoted ONS data exposing the cost of a home is increasing quicker than people’s earnings. Back in 2022 the average house price in England was £102,000 and the average salary was £20,739. However, if we skip to 2022, the price climbed to £275,000 with the average salary rising to £33,208.

London was the least affordable place to live with the average house price more than trebling to £525,000 in 2022 compared with an average house price of £174,000 in 2002.

In their latest factsheet for The Need for Homes, Homes England said: ‘Many young people cannot afford to buy homes in their local communities where they have grown-up, due to worsening affordability.’

Echoing a similar tone, Steve Turner, executive director of Home Builders Federation, stated: ‘Amidst an already acute housing shortage in this country, housing building is falling sharply. Whilst the government may say it wants to be building 300k homes a year, the policy environment is resulting in us getting further away from that target.’

The housing sector have previously criticised the government over an anti-development planning system, lack of support for house buyers and under-resourced council planning departments.

‘Planning for housing is just one part of the puzzle because we also need to infrastructure to support good placemaking, and this means greater land use,’ Rico Wojtulewicz, head of policy and market insight at the National Federation of Builders said. ‘Unfortunately, the government has played planning politics for far too long and this has cost the British public affordable and enough housing, better jobs, regional connectivity and levelled up places.’

Image: image4you

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