6 – Change the insolvency laws so those who legitimately run a business which eventually fails will not lose their home. At present any self-employed person has to incorporate (become a Limited company) to prevent business failure turning into eviction. This puts many people off and increases the paperwork involved in running a small business.

7 – Provide free, but mandatory, training on topics such as book-keeping, principles of tax, and marketing. This won’t stop businesses from failing but it’ll give those with little business experience a chance to avoid common startup mistakes.

I’ve spoken to someone that has agreed to design & build a website for me in return for writing, which is easy, as it is a straight swap. Some deals can be complicated, but service provider to service provider deals are usually pretty simple.

Thanks

Grant

The challenge with it, I found, is finding an equally beneficial exchange. I ended up doing loads of work for a barter deal which cost me more than what I got out of it.

Cheers,
Karl

The real problem lies with local authorities allowing the supermarket giants to have ‘Express’ stores where the local community is already well served. The local Councils claim it’s about creating jobs but usually money actually flows out of the local community and the jobs creation is a zero sum game against jobs lost in small local businesses.

So if tesco, why not sainsbury?

and then what about carphone warehouse? or a branch of john lewis, or any big store? I can support other businesses, but local people decide what they buy. The boundaries seem unclear, and not well defined, as to why just tesco .. on what principle should they be singled out?
I buy from local markets, but that has nothing to do with making Tesco ‘wrong’

Gordon Brown was borrowing record amounts as far back as early 2005, effectively mortgaging our economic future in an effort to make it look like they were ‘investing’ in public services. However, he was doing this with money he didn’t have and wouldn’t have to pay back during his tenure. Effectively he made decisions that succeeding governments were going to have to fix later. The banking crash merely brought that whole economic fix forward by a few years.

The banking situation was a result of bad policy decisions and so-called ‘light touch’ regulation on banking. What Gordon Brown and Ed Balls ignored was the whole of banking history. They failed to appreciate that if there is room for outrageous speculation in the name of profits then the banks have always acted on the side of greed and taken a mile when an inch was intended. Time and time again the banking industry has proved that it’s incapable of proper self-regulation but policy makers seem quite willing to ignore this fact.