Business

Britain’s broadcasting regulator is under mounting pressure to investigate a GB News interview with Donald Trump, after critics claimed the channel failed to challenge a series of misleading and inaccurate assertions made by the US president.

The interview, aired in November and billed by GB News as a “world exclusive sit-down”, featured Trump repeating long-disputed claims that human-induced climate change is “a hoax”, alongside assertions that London contains police “no-go areas” governed by “sharia law”.

Campaigners and media experts argue that these claims were either left unchallenged or actively reinforced by the interviewer, Bev Turner, raising questions about compliance with UK broadcasting rules on accuracy and due impartiality.

The controversy has prompted multiple formal complaints to Ofcom, including three detailed submissions co-signed by tens of thousands of viewers. While Ofcom officials are understood to be reviewing the complaints, the regulator has yet to confirm whether a formal investigation will be launched.

Among those urging action is Chris Banatvala, Ofcom’s founding director of standards, who described the broadcast as unprecedented for a UK-licensed domestic channel.

“I have never seen anything comparable on a British broadcaster,” he said. “While this style of interview may be common on US partisan outlets, it represents a serious test of the UK’s impartiality framework.”

Banatvala warned that a failure to investigate would signal a retreat from established broadcasting standards. “If Ofcom chooses not to act, it risks sending a message that impartiality rules no longer apply.”

One complaint was submitted by Bob Ward of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, focusing on Trump’s climate change remarks. During the interview, Trump claimed that climate change was fabricated and that wind power was “the most expensive energy you can get” — assertions contradicted by a substantial body of scientific and economic research.

Ward said the interview represented “one of the most blatant examples of a British media organisation allowing misinformation to be broadcast without challenge”.

Other complaints focus on Trump’s claims about crime and policing in London, including assertions that police avoid entire areas of the capital. These statements were not disputed during the broadcast. At one point, Turner responded by saying: “It’s true … it feels much safer [in the US].”

Campaign group 38 Degrees has also submitted a complaint alleging a lack of due impartiality, pointing to repeated praise of Trump by the presenter, including describing one of his speeches as “one of the greatest moments at the UN”.

GB News has increasingly positioned itself as a platform for figures associated with the Trump administration. The network has been publicly praised by Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, and has featured multiple US conservative voices in recent months.

Critics argue this raises further questions about editorial balance, particularly given UK broadcasters’ legal obligations to avoid materially misleading audiences.

GB News declined to comment on the complaints.

An Ofcom spokesperson said: “We are assessing the complaints against our rules, but have not yet decided whether to investigate.”

As scrutiny intensifies, the case is shaping up to be a significant test of the regulator’s willingness to enforce long-standing impartiality and accuracy standards in an increasingly polarised media landscape.

Read more:
Ofcom urged to investigate GB News Trump interview over accuracy concerns

A lack of commercial understanding inside government is making it harder for companies to operate and is actively holding back economic growth, according to the boss of Iceland.

Richard Walker, executive chairman of the frozen food retailer and a newly appointed Labour peer, has warned that too many politicians fail to grasp how businesses actually function — particularly those operating on tight margins and employing thousands of people across the country.

“I’ve met a lot of MPs over the years,” Walker said. “Very few understand how a business actually runs. There’s still a mindset in parts of government that treats profit like a dirty word, when profit is precisely what allows businesses to invest, employ people and pay tax.”

Walker argued that political suspicion of profit misunderstands how sustainable growth is created. For large employers such as Iceland — which operates in every region of the UK — margins are slim and policy decisions can have immediate, real-world consequences.

“Without profit, you don’t have reinvestment. You don’t have job security. And you certainly don’t have tax receipts,” he said. “Yet too often policy is designed as if businesses are somehow the enemy, rather than the engine.”

While he acknowledged that some politicians are genuinely willing to learn, Walker said too many engage superficially.

“The best ones visit stores, talk to staff and understand the reality on the ground,” he said. “But too many just want a photo opportunity and then disappear.”

Walker’s criticism extended beyond individual ministers to what he described as a structural problem across Whitehall, where departments pursue conflicting agendas with little coordination.

“From business rates to energy policy to food regulation, it’s a mess,” he said. “Defra is saying one thing about sustainability, the Treasury is saying another about taxation, and local councils are all doing their own thing. There’s no joined-up thinking, and businesses are the ones left trying to make it work.”

He said this lack of coherence disproportionately harms employers with national footprints, who must navigate different rules, costs and enforcement approaches depending on postcode.

Walker is due to take his seat in the House of Lords this month, marking a notable political shift. Both he and his father, Iceland founder Sir Malcolm Walker, previously supported the Conservatives, with Walker donating to the party and briefly appearing on its approved candidates list.

However, his relationship with the Conservatives cooled after a disagreement with former prime minister Rishi Sunak, prompting a reassessment of where he felt his voice could be most effective.

“I realised pretty quickly I’d be useless at toeing the party line,” Walker said. “I tend to say what I actually think, which isn’t always compatible with frontline politics.”

Earlier this year, he rated Sir Keir Starmer’s government six out of ten, urging Labour to prioritise what he called “inclusive, everyday growth” rather than headline-grabbing projects.

Walker said the government’s obsession with mega-projects risked missing what really matters to businesses and communities.

“It’s not about HS2 or a third runway at Heathrow, projects that may never happen, certainly not in my lifetime,” he said. “It’s about the cancelled bus route, crime on the high street, the loss of civic pride, the litter, the crumbling town hall.”

For Walker, restoring growth means focusing on the fundamentals that affect ordinary businesses and workers every day.

“That’s where trust is built,” he said. “The politics of the everyday. The politics of the ordinary. Get that right, and growth will follow.”

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Political ignorance of business is stunting UK growth, warns Iceland boss

The world’s richest individuals accumulated a record $2.2 trillion (£1.7 trillion) in additional wealth during 2025, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, with just eight billionaires accounting for around a quarter of the gains.

The surge pushed the combined net worth of the world’s 500 wealthiest people to $11.9 trillion, fuelled by booming equity markets, a rally in cryptocurrencies and metals, and renewed investor optimism following Donald Trump’s election victory in 2024.

While wealth creation was broad-based among the ultra-rich, gains remained heavily concentrated at the very top. Eight billionaires, including Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison and Larry Page, accounted for roughly 25% of total gains among the richest 500.

That figure represents a slight dilution compared with 2024, when the same group captured 43% of overall net worth growth, suggesting wealth gains are spreading marginally wider — though still remaining highly concentrated.

Elon Musk recorded the largest absolute increase in wealth, adding $190.3bn during the year. His total net worth now stands at $622.7bn, making him by far the richest individual in the world.

Larry Ellison gained $57.7bn, taking his net worth to $249.8bn, while continued demand for cloud computing and AI-driven infrastructure boosted technology valuations across the sector.

Meanwhile, Australian mining billionaire Gina Rinehart nearly tripled her fortune, rising from $12.6bn to $37.7bn, driven largely by her exposure to rare-earth metals, which have benefited from global supply chain reshoring and green-energy demand.

A small number of billionaires saw their wealth fall during the year. Among the most notable was Manuel Villar, whose net worth declined by $12.6bn after shares in his property development company, Golden MV Holdings, plunged by 80% following the end of a six-month trading suspension.

Villar’s fortune now stands at around $10bn, according to Bloomberg’s data.

The scale of the wealth gains has reignited debate over global inequality. Oxfam said the $2.2tn added to the fortunes of the world’s richest 500 individuals would have been sufficient to lift 3.8 billion people out of poverty.

“Inequality is a deliberate policy choice,” said Amitabh Behar, Oxfam’s international executive director. “Despite record wealth at the top, public wealth is stagnating or declining, and debt distress is growing across the world.”

As markets head into 2026, analysts say the outlook for billionaire wealth will continue to be shaped by interest rate policy, geopolitical risk and the trajectory of AI-led growth — with further gains likely if financial markets remain buoyant.

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Billionaires added a record $2.2tn to global wealth in 2025

One pub a day closed permanently across England and Wales during 2025, underlining the mounting pressure facing Britain’s hospitality sector as rising costs continue to bite.

Analysis of government data shows that 366 pubs were either demolished or converted for alternative uses in the year to December, equating to an average of one irreversible closure every 24 hours.

The figures, analysed by property tax specialists Ryan, show the total number of pubs in England and Wales fell to 38,623, down from 38,989 a year earlier. Crucially, these are not temporary closures: the buildings have been repurposed for housing, offices, nurseries, cafés and other commercial uses, meaning they are unlikely ever to return as pubs.

Alex Probyn, property tax expert at Ryan, said the data painted a stark picture for the sector.

“These pubs have closed permanently, not temporarily,” he said. “Once a pub is demolished or converted, it almost never comes back. This should serve as a wake-up call.”

Nearly 2,000 pubs have disappeared over the past five years, even though the pace of decline has slowed slightly compared with the height of the pandemic. Every region of England and Wales recorded a net loss in 2025, with the East Midlands, North West, and Yorkshire and the Humber seeing the largest falls.

The closures come against a backdrop of rising operating costs. Pubs were hit this year by increases in the national minimum wage and employer national insurance contributions, squeezing margins in a sector already operating on thin profits.

The outlook is expected to worsen from April 2026, when commercial properties are revalued for business rates. While the government has announced tapered relief to soften the blow, many pubs face significantly higher bills under the new valuations.

Probyn said the rating system was increasingly disconnected from economic reality.

“Many pubs survived the pandemic through resilience and community support, only to be pushed to the brink by rising costs and a tax system that no longer reflects how hard it is to trade.”

British Beer and Pub Association chief executive Emma McClarkin said the scale of closures was unnecessary and avoidable.

“The situation is drastic,” she said. “Many of these closures are the direct result of an excessive tax and business rates burden. That’s why a pub-specific business rates relief has never been more vital.”

She warned that without targeted action, communities would continue to lose vital social hubs. “Once pubs are gone, they’re gone for good.”

A Treasury spokesperson said recent budgets had included support for hospitality businesses.

“The £4.3bn support package means bill increases for pubs are capped at around 4%, rather than the 45% they would have faced without intervention,” the spokesperson said, pointing to measures including business rates relief, licensing reforms, continued cuts to alcohol duty on draught beer, and a freeze on corporation tax.

However, industry leaders argue that these measures are being outweighed by rising wage, tax and property costs — leaving many pubs with no viable path forward.

As 2026 approaches, the data suggests Britain’s pub sector is entering another critical year, with business rates reform now viewed by many operators as the deciding factor between survival and permanent closure.

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One pub a day closed permanently across England and Wales in 2025

ITV has agreed to invest up to £3 million in Joe Wicks’s health and fitness platform The Body Coach, deepening the broadcaster’s push into digital consumer brands.

The deal has been struck through ITV’s AdVentures Invest fund and will see The Body Coach advertise across ITV’s linear channels and its streaming platform ITVX, giving the app access to one of the UK’s largest broadcast audiences.

Wicks launched The Body Coach app in late 2020, building on the enormous profile he gained during the Covid lockdowns when his daily home workouts became a fixture for millions of households. The app provides personalised training plans, healthy recipes and access to online communities designed to keep users motivated.

A new television advertising campaign will launch on 1 January, with commercials airing during programmes fronted by Wicks on ITV1 and ITVX.

Wicks said the partnership marked a significant milestone in the brand’s growth.

“I never imagined when I started my bootcamps in the park over 12 years ago that The Body Coach would grow into a brand reaching millions of people,” he said.

“Working with ITV allows us to bring a positive, supportive message about health and wellbeing into homes across the UK at a time when people really need it.”

The investment comes at a pivotal moment for ITV and other public service broadcasters, as traditional television faces mounting pressure from global streaming giants such as Netflix and Amazon, as well as digital advertising platforms owned by Meta and Google.

The backdrop has been further complicated by recent reports that Comcast, owner of Sky, has held talks about acquiring ITV’s broadcasting arm — raising wider questions about the future of UK public service media and domestic news provision.

AdVentures Invest, launched in 2021, is ITV’s answer to these structural shifts. The fund takes minority equity stakes in early-stage and consumer-facing businesses, alongside venture capital investors, in return for long-term advertising commitments on ITV’s platforms.

The Body Coach now joins a growing portfolio of AdVentures-backed businesses, including the location app what3words, online furniture comparison site ufurnish.com, and online estate agency Strike, which later traded as Purplebricks.

For ITV, the strategy is designed to generate new revenue streams beyond traditional advertising, while helping consumer brands scale quickly through television — still one of the most powerful brand-building tools in the UK market.

As for Wicks, the partnership cements his transition from lockdown fitness phenomenon to a fully fledged digital health entrepreneur, with one of Britain’s biggest broadcasters now backing the next phase of The Body Coach’s growth.

Read more:
ITV backs Joe Wicks with £3m investment in the body coach app

As a sustainable business owner, I’ve always believed that every choice we make, from the suppliers we trust to the packaging that carries our products, reflects our values.

But the conversation around packaging sustainability is evolving quickly, and 2025 is shaping up to be a defining year for anyone in this space.

The EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) will soon change how every business that uses wood or paper packaging operates. Whether you export into the EU or source materials that pass through European supply chains, you’ll soon need to prove exactly where your wood came from, right down to the plot of land where the tree grew.

On paper, this is a hugely positive step. It’s designed to prevent deforestation and ensure that every pallet, crate, box, or sheet of paperboard comes from responsibly managed forests. But for small and medium-sized
sustainable businesses like mine, this new legislation brings both validation and significant Challenges.

For larger corporations, compliance may simply mean hiring dedicated teams or investing in advanced traceability systems. For smaller businesses, the impact is more personal and more complex.

Many packaging suppliers, particularly those sourcing globally, aren’t yet ready to provide the level of GPS traceability that EUDR demands. As buyers, we’re several steps removed from the original forest.

That makes collecting origin data extremely difficult. The reality is that small businesses don’t have the same resources as large corporations.

Gathering, verifying, and documenting the source of every piece of packaging takes time, money, and capacity that many SMEs simply don’t have. Even for companies like mine, built on sustainability from day one, the administrative burden is significant. There’s also a clear imbalance of power.

When small businesses ask large suppliers for detailed traceability information, we’re often met with delays and a lack of data, yet we’re still held to the same legal standards as much larger companies.

The scale of work involved in becoming compliant is immense. Every box, tag, and piece of paper now requires a documented chain of custody which for a packaging company means the majority of our products. For a small business, this isn’t just a quick compliance exercise, it’s an ongoing operational project that touches almost every department.

Teams that were once focused on creative design, marketing, or customer experience now find themselves deep in due diligence, spreadsheets, and certification systems. It’s exhausting work, but it’s necessary if we want to maintain the integrity of our sustainability commitments and continue to trade responsibly in the years ahead.

At Tiny Box Company, we’ve been reviewing what the EUDR will mean for us for months now. We’re working closely with our suppliers to ensure the data we need is being captured at source, and we’re doing our best to gain information that is verifiable.

It’s a huge effort, and at times it feels like we’re trying to rebuild the foundations of something we already thought was sturdy. But we also know that doing this groundwork now will set us up for a stronger, more transparent future.

Despite these challenges, the EUDR represents a powerful opportunity for businesses like ours. It’s a chance to demonstrate what we’ve been advocating for years: that transparency and traceability are not just ideals, but achievable and necessary goals.

For those already committed to sustainability, this regulation provides a platform to prove it. Having verifiable data about our packaging doesn’t just satisfy compliance requirements, it builds trust with our customers, who increasingly care not just about what a product is made from, but where it came from.

The EUDR is also encouraging more meaningful conversations between businesses and suppliers. To meet these requirements, we’ll need closer collaboration and greater openness, which can ultimately strengthen relationships and lead to more resilient supply chains. Over
time, this transparency can help shift the market, rewarding those who operate responsibly and pushing lagging suppliers to catch up.

Another positive outcome is that it’s forcing all of us to reconsider how much packaging we really need. When every gram of wood or paper must be traced to its origin, using less suddenly makes both environmental and financial sense for a lot of businesses.

At Tiny Box Company, we’ve already begun rethinking our designs and processes to reduce complexity, choosing materials that are easier to trace and verify. It’s a continuous process to improve what we’re doing and how we work.

It’s easy to see why some small businesses might feel overwhelmed- the paperwork, the data management, the coordination across global suppliers. But once these systems are in place, the benefits will start to show. We’ll have cleaner data, fewer weak points in our supply chains, and greater confidence in the materials we use.

In time, the hours invested now could translate into reduced risk, smoother audits, and a stronger story for customers who value transparency. The EUDR may feel daunting, particularly for small sustainable businesses that are already trying to do the right thing.

But it’s important to see this as an opportunity to align values with verifiable action. It’s a reminder that sustainability is something that can be measured, proven, and improved upon.

Knowing where our packaging comes from isn’t just about compliance. It’s about integrity and accountability, about running a business that truly understands what it’s selling and where its products come from.

Read more:
The EUDR: A Challenge and an Opportunity for Small Sustainable Businesses

For many UK small and medium-sized enterprises, time is one of the most valuable, and most wasted, resources. While digital tools have streamlined accounting, marketing, and sales, one area still quietly consumes hours every week: meetings and documentation.

Internal meetings, client calls, training sessions, and project updates generate vast amounts of spoken information. Yet much of it is never properly captured, shared, or reused. Notes are rushed, details are missed, and valuable insights disappear once the call ends.

Increasingly, UK SMEs are turning to AI-powered transcription tools to change this.

The Hidden Cost of Meetings in Small Businesses

Meetings are essential, but they are also expensive. A one-hour meeting involving five people doesn’t cost one hour—it costs five. Add the extra time spent writing notes, following up on action items, and clarifying misunderstandings, and the true cost multiplies quickly.

For small teams with limited resources, this creates real problems:

Important decisions are poorly documented
Follow-ups rely on memory rather than records
Admin time increases without adding value

In a challenging economic climate, SMEs are looking for practical ways to reduce this overhead without cutting collaboration altogether.

Why AI Transcription Is Gaining Traction Among UK SMEs

AI transcription tools convert spoken audio or video into written text automatically. What once required manual note-taking or outsourced transcription can now be done in minutes.

For SMEs, the appeal is straightforward:

Speed: Conversations become written records almost instantly
Accuracy: Key points and action items are captured consistently
Efficiency: Teams spend less time on admin and more time on execution

Instead of treating meetings as temporary conversations, businesses are beginning to treat them as reusable assets.

Common SME Use Cases for Audio-to-Text Tools

1. Internal Meetings and Team Updates

Weekly meetings often contain decisions, deadlines, and responsibilities—but these are easily forgotten. Transcription creates a shared reference point, reducing confusion and follow-up emails.

Teams can search transcripts, highlight key sections, and ensure everyone stays aligned, even if they couldn’t attend the meeting live.

2. Client Calls and Sales Conversations

Sales and client-facing teams rely heavily on calls, yet many SMEs still depend on handwritten notes. AI transcription allows teams to review conversations objectively, extract requirements accurately, and maintain better records.

Using audio to text transcription tools helps ensure that no commitments or details are missed, which can significantly improve customer satisfaction and reduce disputes.

3. Training and Knowledge Sharing

Training sessions are often recorded but rarely revisited. Transcribing these sessions turns them into searchable documentation that new hires can use at their own pace.

For growing SMEs, this supports consistency and reduces the burden on managers to repeat the same information.

4. Video Meetings and Recorded Presentations

With remote and hybrid work now standard, many businesses rely on recorded video meetings. Converting video content into text makes it easier to summarise outcomes and share insights across departments.

For SMEs working with recorded briefings or webinars, using an MP4 to text free solution allows them to extract value from existing video content without additional cost or complexity.

SoundWise: A Practical Tool for Busy SMEs

Among the growing number of AI transcription platforms, SoundWise offers a straightforward approach designed for real business workflows rather than technical users.

SoundWise enables SMEs to convert both audio and video files into accurate text quickly, helping teams reduce manual documentation and improve information sharing.

Its core strengths include:

Support for common business formats such as MP3 and MP4
Fast turnaround without complex setup
Clean, readable transcripts suitable for internal records

For SMEs that want to experiment with AI without investing in complex systems, SoundWise provides an accessible entry point.

How SMEs Typically Use AI Transcription in Practice

The adoption process is often simpler than expected:

Record meetings or calls using existing tools such as Zoom or Teams
Upload the audio or video file to the transcription platform
Review and share the transcript with relevant stakeholders

This approach removes the pressure of real-time note-taking and creates a reliable written record that can be referenced later.

Beyond Time-Saving: Better Decisions and Accountability

While saving time is the initial motivation, many SMEs discover additional benefits after adopting transcription tools:

Clear accountability through documented decisions
Improved compliance and record-keeping
Better onboarding and knowledge retention

Over time, this leads to more structured operations and fewer misunderstandings—both internally and with clients.

Final Thoughts

UK SMEs are under constant pressure to do more with less. AI transcription tools are not about replacing people or eliminating meetings; they are about making existing conversations more useful.

By turning spoken information into searchable, shareable documentation, businesses can reduce admin overhead, improve clarity, and make better decisions—without adding complexity.

For SMEs looking to improve productivity in a practical, low-risk way, AI-powered transcription is becoming less of a novelty and more of a necessity.

Read more:
How UK SMEs Are Using AI to Save Time on Meetings and Documentation

American men have lost their work ethic and increasingly feel entitled to a comfortable life without applying themselves, according to Wilbur Ross, who served throughout Donald Trump’s first term.

Ross, the Wall Street investor once dubbed the “king of bankruptcy”, said younger generations have been “coddled” by growing up in a wealthy society, weakening the drive to work that underpinned previous generations and threatening long-term economic growth.

“It used to be that the mantra for any young person was work hard and you can make progress and do better than your parents did,” Ross said. “It never occurred to anyone to not work, at least not anyone I knew. There’s been a whole change in that.”

He argued that a combination of state benefits and parental prosperity had created a sense of entitlement. “I think all these [benefits] programmes, and also the relative prosperity of the current generation’s parents, have created a feeling that they’re entitled to a nice lifestyle, independently of whether they perform any kind of meaningful work,” he said.

“If you’re an able-bodied person who’s not willing to even seek a job, why should you prosper?”

Overall labour force participation among Americans aged 25 to 54, the so-called prime-age workforce, fell sharply during the pandemic but has since recovered to 83.8 per cent, one of the highest levels in nearly a quarter of a century. However, Ross and other economists say that headline figure masks a profound long-term shift among men.

Prime-age male participation has been in structural decline since the 1960s, even as female participation has surged to record levels. The divergence is especially pronounced among younger workers.

Analysis by the Brookings Institution shows that labour force participation among 25-year-old men has fallen in every successive generation since 1969. For men born in the late 1990s, participation at that age stands at about 84 per cent, down from 93 per cent for those born roughly 45 years earlier.

By contrast, participation among women of the same age has climbed steadily, rising from 66.3 per cent to 76.6 per cent over the same period.

Ross said the trend among men was particularly damaging for economic prospects. “I think there are a lot of men who just don’t want to work that hard,” he said.

Workforce participation, he added, was one of the three critical drivers of economic growth. “One is growth in the population of working-age people — that’s something you have no control over in the near term. The other two are productivity and workforce participation. And of the two, for the moment, workforce participation is probably the more important.”

Economists have pointed to several factors behind the decline in male participation, including the loss of industrial jobs, the rise of service-sector roles traditionally dominated by women, higher incarceration rates leaving many men with criminal records, the expansion of disability benefits, and persistent weaknesses in education and skills training.

Together, they warn, these forces risk leaving a growing cohort of men disengaged from work — with long-term consequences for productivity, public finances and social cohesion.

Read more:
Men have lost their work ethic, says Trump’s former commerce secretary

Britain remains stuck at the bottom of the G7 for overall investment, despite Labour’s pledge to inject billions of pounds into public spending over the next two years, according to international data.

Figures from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development show that total investment, combining both public and private spending, stood at just 18.6 per cent of GDP in the third quarter of the year. That leaves the UK trailing all other G7 nations, including the United States, Germany, France and Japan.

The data underlines a long-running weakness in the British economy. The UK has recorded the lowest investment rate in the G7 in 23 of the past 31 years, a factor widely blamed for poor productivity growth and weak long-term economic performance.

By comparison, Japan recorded the highest investment rate among the G7 at 27 per cent, while Germany, despite being in a two-year recession, invested around 20 per cent of GDP over the same period.

Labour has made boosting investment a central plank of its economic strategy, pledging to increase public capital spending on infrastructure, transport and housebuilding. Economists at PwC estimate that public investment will rise by £13 billion in 2026–27, marking the largest two-year increase since the 2008 financial crisis.

However, there are growing concerns that this surge in government spending will not be matched by the private sector. PwC’s chief economist, Barret Kupelian, warned that private investment is expected to stagnate due to weaker business confidence and slower profit growth.

“There will be a much stronger focus on domestic growth levers from the government, particularly public investment picking up at a record pace,” Kupelian said. “But private investment is unlikely to respond as strongly in the near term.”

The scale of the challenge is stark. EY estimates that up to 1,000 major investment projects are planned to start or complete by 2040, with government-backed capital spending on track to reach £1.1 trillion. Yet even this would leave a significant funding gap.

According to EY-Parthenon, meeting Labour’s wider ambitions, including defence spending rising to 3 per cent of GDP by the end of the decade, would leave an investment shortfall of £583 billion. If defence spending increases to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035, the gap could widen to £817 billion, placing further strain on the public finances.

Mats Persson, global leader of EY-Parthenon, said the UK faces mounting pressure from overlapping investment demands. “The government has made progress in unlocking capital for infrastructure, but the long-term funding requirements across energy, defence, health and transport are rising rapidly,” he said.

Economists have long argued that Britain’s low investment levels are a major drag on productivity. Business investment drives innovation and technology adoption, while public investment provides the housing and transport networks needed to support growth.

Louise Haigh, the former Labour transport secretary, said the problem reflected decades of short-term policymaking. “Underinvestment has plagued the UK economy for half a century,” she said. “Our five-year political cycle doesn’t give businesses the long-term certainty they need to commit capital.”

Reform UK’s deputy leader, Richard Tice, accused the government of creating a hostile climate for investors. He said uncertainty and tax changes had pushed capital elsewhere and claimed his party would prioritise deregulation and incentives for wealth creation.

With private investment faltering and public spending under pressure, economists warn that closing Britain’s investment gap will require more than headline funding commitments — and a sustained effort to restore confidence across the business community.

Read more:
Britain stuck at bottom of G7 for investment as private spending stalls

A third of British businesses are planning to invest in artificial intelligence in 2026 as firms sharpen their focus on productivity, skills and technology in an increasingly competitive market.

Research from Lloyds Bank shows that AI is becoming a central pillar of growth strategies, with companies looking to automate processes, improve efficiency and strengthen long-term competitiveness.

The Lloyds Business Barometer, based on a survey of 1,200 firms, found that productivity improvement is the top priority for businesses heading into the next year. Alongside AI investment, 35 per cent of companies said they plan to invest in team training in 2026, recognising that new technologies require new skills to deliver real value.

Paul Kempster, managing director for commercial banking coverage at Lloyds Business & Commercial Banking, said the findings highlighted a shift towards more strategic, future-focused investment.

“These are priorities that will support businesses’ long-term growth,” he said. “They help firms not only capitalise on opportunities in the year ahead, but also build strong foundations well beyond 2026.”

Earlier research from Lloyds underlines why AI is attracting growing attention. In a study published in June, 82 per cent of businesses using AI said it had boosted productivity, while 76 per cent reported an improvement in profitability. Retailers reported the strongest productivity gains, while manufacturers were most likely to see a positive impact on profits.

Despite the momentum, barriers remain. Businesses cited the cost of AI tools, shortages of specialist skills, data privacy concerns and energy usage as factors slowing adoption. Even so, 56 per cent of firms said they intend to make new AI investments over the next year, while a quarter of those yet to adopt the technology said they plan to do so.

The barometer also points to a modest improvement in sentiment. Overall business confidence rose by five points in December to 47 per cent, up ten points over the course of 2025. Optimism about the wider UK economy climbed to a four-month high, with many firms expecting price pressures to continue easing.

However, caution remains evident on the consumer side. Early indicators suggest weaker high-street performance ahead of Christmas, with in-store footfall on the final Saturday before Christmas down almost 7 per cent year on year.

Taken together, the data paints a picture of businesses looking inward, investing in technology and people to drive efficiency, while remaining alert to fragile consumer demand and ongoing economic uncertainty.

Read more:
A third of UK businesses plan AI investment in 2026 as confidence ticks up