Unilever, mad cow disease, Dyson Awards, Cobalt airlines, EU farm workers: your commercial news round-up
updated on 18 October 2018
‘Commercial awareness’ needn’t be a frightening phrase that law firms throw around to bamboozle you. It’s broadly about understanding that lawyer advise clients who operate in the business world – plus a law firm is a business too. One way to show that you really get this is to have a sense of the commercial stories that might be affecting what law firms are worrying about, talking about, and potentially advising on. Here are a few from this week to get you started:
- Unilever – the firm behind a range of household products from Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to Dove soap – has reported bumper sales figures with a 3.8% rise for the third quarter of 2018. Despite the success, which has been put down partially to the hot summer across Europe, shares in the FTSE 100 company fell 1.5% as investors remained unimpressed.
- A new case of mad cow disease, also known as Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), has been confirmed on a Scottish farm in Aberdeenshire. More than four million cattle were slaughtered in the UK in the 1990s after widespread outbreaks of the disease. The Scottish government has confirmed that movement restrictions have been placed on the farm while further investigations are carried out.
- A range of sustainable innovations have been nominated for the annual James Dyson award, including biodegradable cutlery made from potato peelings and a robotic pipe cleaner that can clear pollution in rivers, lakes and canals. The overall winner will be announced in November and will receive a prize of £30,000.
- Cypriot budget airline Cobalt has suspended operations and cancelled all of its flights from midnight on Wednesday. Cobalt has been operating flights from Cyprus since 2016 and flies to 23 destinations in Europe, including Heathrow, Stansted, Gatwick and Manchester.
- British farmers shouldn’t have “privileged” access to low-skilled, low-paid EU workers after Brexit, says Alan Manning who chairs the Migration Advisory Committee. Manning commented that fruit and vegetable growers would probably “go backwards” after the UK leaves the EU. The government has already said that high-skilled workers will be prioritised after Brexit – that’s people who earn more than £30,000 a year and a “tiny” number of highly-skilled, low-paid individuals such as musicians and dancers. Farms who might typically employ low-skilled workers from Eastern and Central Europe will be impacted by this policy, although seasonal agricultural workers have been noted as a special case.
Be sure to check the News every Thursday for this weekly commercial news round-up. Follow @LawCareersNetUK on Twitter and like us on Facebook for instant business news updates.
