Author: Blake Anderson

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.It has long been the job of the pub landlord to listen as regulars drown their sorrows. Now, it’s the publicans themselves who need a sympathetic ear: people are drinking less while running costs for establishments, notably taxes, have rocketed. But, as drinkers well know, it is always darkest just before opening time. Over the past 10 years, shares in each of the five listed UK pub groups have lost ground. If a brave investor had backed the same groups in the…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The UK government’s promise of an extra £1bn to help disabled people into work is not matched by new money from the Treasury, casting doubt on ministers’ ability to deliver divisive welfare reforms while still tackling other priorities such as youth unemployment. Ministers have framed unpopular cuts to sickness and disability benefits as a “moral mission” to help people into fulfilling work rather than consigning them to a life on benefits. They say that by 2029-30, there will be £1bn of new funding per…

Sensors dotting an actor’s black suit transpose his movements on to an animated creature. A huge monster curls his paw over a ruined church wall, seamlessly blending the virtual and the real. A curved screen surrounds the audience with a lifelike range of mountains and forests.These are digital sets at Belfast’s new £72mn Studio Ulster, one of the most technologically advanced virtual production centres in the world, which is pitching itself as a one-stop shop for moviemakers, game designers, animators and film editors.Northern Ireland’s film and TV industry made its name with medieval fantasy blockbuster Game of Thrones, shot on…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.A British citizen has been arrested for allegedly spying on behalf of Iran near a UK air base in Cyprus, which serves as the RAF’s main hub for Middle East operations. Cypriot authorities said on Saturday that they had detained a man on “terrorism and espionage” charges. People in the UK familiar with the arrest did not dispute local Cypriot media reports that the alleged spy was suspected of working for Iran.He is alleged to have monitored the UK’s Akrotiri base on…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Are you a points nerd? If you’ve been waiting eagerly since April for British Airways and American Express to announce how frequent flyers can earn “tier points” on credit card spending, then we can safely assume the answer is yes. Even those who don’t compete in the peculiar sport of gaming airline loyalty schemes may recall the furore when BA announced sweeping changes to its frequent flyer club. Since the rules changed in April, it has become harder to achieve gold, silver…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Facilities outsourcer Mitie has just completed the first year of its shift from traditional facilities management to a “facilities transformation” model. This involves moving towards tech-driven services such as robotic cleaning, remote monitoring and drone-based security, which promise higher margins than purely manual and labour-intensive services.The pivot comes after a troubled few years for the company. Between 2017 and 2020, its shares tumbled by 80 per cent due to profit warnings, pandemic uncertainty and audit issues tied to a lossmaking healthcare business…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Sir Keir Starmer has launched a new drive to bring freethinking innovators into the heart of Whitehall, echoing efforts by the arch-disrupter Dominic Cummings to hire “weirdos and misfits” to redesign government.Salaries of up to £200,000 a year are being offered to potential recruits, in a highly selective process intended to bypass career civil servants in favour of “elite technical talent” drawn from industry and academia.Cummings, former prime minister Boris Johnson’s chief of staff, famously went out in search of outsiders to…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The UK’s burst of strong economic growth at the start of the year is beginning to fizzle out as the jobs market weakens, the trade shock bites and higher taxes dampen business optimism, analysts warned. If the slowdown continues, 2025 would mark the fourth year in a row in which the British economy fails to sustain its early momentum after an auspicious start to the year. While GDP growth was strong at 0.7 per cent in the first quarter, analysts polled by…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The writer is chief executive of Hospice UKThe vote by MPs to pass the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill represents a seismic milestone for death and dying in England and Wales. Views on assisted dying are varied, largely irreconcilable and passionately held. Yet the debate has been characterised by deep conviction and deep empathy on both sides.The introduction and passage of Kim Leadbeater’s bill threw into the mainstream a question we often avoid, as individuals and as a society. What…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Ministers must urgently tackle the “unacceptably long” waiting lists for ADHD services in England as the rise of unregulated private clinics has created a “two-tier” care system, an independent task force has warned.“Significant growth” in the use of private clinics had created “one [system] for those who can pay and another for those who cannot”, the body set up by the NHS said in its interim report published on Friday.The task force said the NHS needed to “shift rapidly” to a new…