LDN Weekly – Issue 274 – 28 June 2023 – Holding Our Nerve
HOLDING OUR NERVE
“The last time rising interest rates and high inflation caused governments problems, the Berlin Wall was crumbling, Margaret Thatcher was in her final year in office and it only cost £28 to get into Glastonbury*.
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Nick Bowes, Managing Director, Insight We hope you enjoy this edition and if you don't already, do follow us on Twitter, Instagram and Linkedin. You can also visit our website for more information on LCA’s team, services, and clients. And finally, a technical note: If you like hearing from us, make sure to add ldn@londoncommunications.co.uk to your contacts or ‘safe sender’ list – this will help ensure our news bulletin lands in your inbox. MORTGAGE MELANCHOLYRising mortgage payments are turning up the political temperature. Following the Bank of England’s decision to increase interest rates to 5%, borrowers reaching the end of their fixed-rate mortgage are seeing eyewatering amounts added to monthly bills. For renters, landlords impacted by increased borrowing costs are passing this on to tenants through rent rises. With two-year fixed-rate mortgages reaching a seven-month high of 6.23% on Monday, and lenders withdrawing products, it’s little surprise that this is spilling over into discontent with the Government. The Prime Minister has urged the public to ‘hold its nerve’, while the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, after meeting the country’s biggest lenders, produced a new charter for mortgage holders enabling them to access guidance and transfer onto other mortgage products without impacting credit scores, as well as measures increasing repossession holidays to 12 months. While the Governor of the Bank of England has come under some pressure for the handling of inflation and interest rates, so far Sunak continues to offer public statements of support. BOUNCE BACKThe latest Transport for London (TfL) data has shown that the capital is bouncing back after a few difficult years. Passenger numbers have now reached 88% of pre-pandemic levels, with TfL projecting that this will reach 94% by the end of 2023, with fare revenue reaching the highest level since 2020. London’s businesses, however, are pushing for more support for the capital. They are calling on the Government to change the current immigration system to ease recruitment difficulties, while there are also renewed calls to reintroduce VAT exemption for visitors. On a related note, might London soon follow the lead of Manchester and introduce a ‘tourist tax’ on hotel stays, something which the Scottish Government has also just launched a consultation on? While it has previously been discussed for the capital, currently London lacks the powers to levy such a tax. However, it could be that Mayoral hopefuls make fighting for the power a key pledge in the run up to May 2024. While the capital is generally experiencing a bounce back, Canary Wharf is feeling the impact of changing demands for office space since the pandemic. HSBC has now announced is to leave its 45-storey tower to move to a new home in the City, following in the footsteps of a number of other banks which have said that they are to downsize their offices or leave the area entirely. KHAN AGAIN?The clock is ticking as London draws ever closer to the next Mayoral election. For incumbent Sadiq Khan, another win would mean a historic third term for Tooting’s own. Naturally, many politicos and experts have begun their analyses of Khan’s offer to London, with new polling from Redfield & Wilton the latest window into how Londoners view their Mayor. Overall, Khan holds an impressive approval rating (53% approving of his performance, 26% disapproving). On standing for a record third term, twice as many Londoners back this (half, versus 25% opposing). Keeping Team Khan on their toes will be the revealing finding that a majority of Londoners (56%) would support the Mayor standing aside and a new Labour candidate contesting the election. Interestingly, 58% of Londoners would also support a two-term limit to the Mayoral office, but this leaves us wondering if this is because people think there’s already a term limit! LONDON PLANNING ROUNDUP
PEOPLE NEWS
STANDARD DEVIATIONSpeaking of people moves… Dylan Jones has only been editor of the Evening Standard since 5 June but he’s already got a few punchy front pages on ULEZ, cost of living, Keir Starmer and the Tory mayoral selection under his belt. With the paper historically a major influence on the city’s political agenda (particularly the 2008 Mayoral contest), seasoned politicos and campaigners will be watching to see if Jones’s arrival heralds a broader change in the stance of the Standard. Before Jones took over, the paper had backed Sadiq Khan on one of the most controversial issues of the moment, the expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and City Hall will no doubt be hoping this continues. Yet, with circulation figures down from 0.9m in 2014 to 0.3m in June this year (and down 30% in just the last twelve months), driven by changing working and commuting patterns and competition from other sources of news, the question will be whether the Standard’s opinion hold as much sway as it once did. An interesting test will be whether the endorsement of the Standard in next May’s battle for City Hall is as highly prized as in past elections. DLUHC LATESTWith Parliament heading towards summer recess, Michael Gove and his team have been quietly tinkering at policies. With the DLUHC capital budget locked tightly by the Treasury, it’s given ministers the space to focus on modest changes instead of groundbreaking announcements. Here are just a few of the Department’s recent stories:
MORE LABOUR POLICYWith the latest polling giving the Labour Party a 25-point lead over the Conservatives, the Shadow Levelling Up Secretary has been setting more of her Party’s offer to the electorate. In an interview with The Telegraph, Lisa Nandy said that a Labour Government would boost housebuilding by asking combined authorities to identify and declassify ‘poor-quality’ parts of the green belt so that they can be used to deliver housing, without compromising ‘green open spaces’. She also said that the delivery of new homes would be facilitated by the creation of more development corporations. Speaking this morning at the Housing 2023 conference, Nandy spoke about her Party’s ambition to ‘jump-start’ housebuilding by reinstating those targets scrapped by the Prime Minister at the end of last year. Nandy also reiterated Labour’s commitment to retaining Right to Buy, giving first time buyers ‘first dibs’ on new properties, while she also signalled that in Government they would not introduce rent controls, calling them a ‘sticking plaster’, which risks opening up a major policy difference with the Mayor of London (and his Manchester counterpart), both of whom have called for more powers to introduce controls in their areas. LONDON CLIMATE ACTION WEEKWhile the latest annual report from the Climate Change Committee provides a worrying view of a future without adequate climate action, in the capital regional and international stakeholders assemble at the Guildhall to share knowledge and build understanding of the challenges facing London. The creative worlds of art and culture and fashion have also hosted exhibitions across the city to harness the visual world in an effort to support LCAW. Meanwhile, at City Hall, the Mayor of London used his position as Chair of the C40 Cities Network to announce a $30m programme to tackle air pollution in global cities. Backed by UN Special Envoy on Climate Ambition and Solutions, business leader Michael R. Bloomberg, the programme aims to improve research, engagement and knowledge sharing to improve air quality and public health. For the built environment sector, the impetus for integrating climate change policy into development has never been more important. This is also the view of the UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) who have issued new guidance to empower the industry to reduce emissions and embodied carbon. LONDON CULTUREGLA Economics has produced a report on London’s culture sector finding that the Arts Council England funding changes are ‘significant and potentially damaging’. The report found 25% of organisations in London are to lose their grant funding, while 10% will have to leave the capital to survive and moving organisations outside London does not necessarily contribute to ‘levelling up’. The Mayor has called on the Government to ‘ensure that meaningful support is made available nationwide’. In positive news, the highly anticipated reopening of the National Portrait Gallery is receiving plaudits. The new-and-improved Gallery includes a redisplayed collection, new public spaces and a new learning centre, as well as a new entrance and forecourt. Meanwhile, Wandsworth Council has announced that it will bid to be London Borough of Culture 2025. The initiative, launched by the Mayor of London in 2017 to celebrate culture and bring communities together, providing funding for the winning borough to run a year-long programme. THE DAVIDSON PRIZEThe theme of this year’s Davidson Prize, ‘Somewhere to call home’, asked multi-disciplinary teams to come up with the design for a home community for people who have experienced homelessness and housing insecurity. The winning team is Helping Hands, a coalition of organisations and individuals led by architects Studio MUTT and researchers Neighbourhood. Their proposals include using vacant land in Liverpool to provide a ‘nurturing communal landscape’ as well as shared accommodation geared towards young people who have just left the care system, and individual homes for those who want a greater sense of independence. The Davidson Prize is an annual competition named after Alan Davidson, pioneering architect and founder of Hayes Davidson, who died in 2018. LDN CONTRIBUTORSRobert Gordon Clark, Senior Advisor and Partner Nick Bowes, Managing Director, Insight Emily Clinton, Account Manager, Insight Daniel Reast, Insight Executive LCA prides itself on its intelligence-led approach to PR and communications and our dedicated insight team monitors London politics, news and issues as it happens. If you would like to know more about LCA or anything in this edition of LDN – London in short please get in touch.If you have received LDN Weekly indirectly and would like to subscribe to receive it every week, please click here to register your details.LDN is put together by a dedicated team at London Communications Agency. The content for each edition is developed from news drawn from the last week from every London local paper as well as the regional and national press, from intelligence gathered by monitoring local, regional and national government activity and from the insight and expert knowledge of the entire LCA team. |