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Changes to stamp duty announced in the Autumn Statement by Chancellor George Osborne have helped stimulate the housing market, according to solicitors and estate agents. Mr Osborne said 98% of people in England and Wales will now pay less duty when buying a property. Only those buying homes worth more than £937,000 will be worse
The government has announced that a £2m fund is to be spent on initiatives aimed at reducing the gender pay gap. The funding will go towards training, events and monitoring programmes for women to help them move from low paid, low skilled work to jobs that are high paid and high skilled. The measures will
A leading accountancy firm has estimated that companies and organisations in the UK could be losing up to £200m as a result of ‘shadow insolvencies’. A ‘shadow insolvency’ is a term for when a company becomes insolvent but doesn’t disclose any assets when it enters liquidation. This means there is no money to pay to
More than one million people are running the risk of leaving their partners with nothing when they die, because they haven’t made a will stating what should happen to their estate. As the law stands, if somebody dies intestate – without a will – then their assets will be inherited by their spouse or civil
House prices rose by 12.1% in the year to the end of September, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Prices increased by 0.5% on a monthly basis between August and September this year. The statistics only include homes that were bought with a mortgage. The increases mean that prices have been rising faster
The government has set up a £2m scheme to help women into better-paid and higher-skilled jobs. There is a concern that despite more women being in work than ever before, some are still not being given the training or opportunities that are afforded to men in the same position. Closing the gender pay gap has
The Court of Appeal has ruled that a university was not negligent when it commenced disciplinary proceedings against a senior lecturer. The lecturer had written an employment reference for another employee who had gone on to find employment at another university. The employee didn’t perform as well in his new job as the employment reference
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has provided a ruling which offers some valuable guidance for employers taking on apprentices. Unless certain conditions are met, apprentices should be treated as fully fledged employees and paid accordingly. The case involved a riding school and livery business which took on a number of apprentices. They carried out tasks such
Five company directors have been disqualified from trading for a combined total of 39½ years after repeatedly using sales tactics that breached consumer legislation. The directors worked for SAS Fire and Security Systems Limited. The company sold fire and burglar alarms. It was investigated by Trading Standards in 2013 for its aggressive sales approach. The
The Court of Appeal has ruled that a commercial tenant was not entitled to a refund of prepaid sums after exercising a release clause. The tenant had a commercial lease which was due to expire in 2018. The terms included a break clause that offered the tenant the option of terminating the lease in either