Blogs

My industry is facing a crisis of unprecedented scale. At first glance, the Green Deal seems to offer a significant opportunity - but in reality it will result in a complete decimation of the loft and cavity wall insulation industry, causing thousands of job losses.

With just two days of the "General Deception" campaign left to run I for one am clear that none of our political parties have done enough to deserve a mandate to govern for the next five years.

As the chancellor wrestles with planning his "budget for growth" he will face one problem over and over again. How does he reconcile the needs to constrain public spending with the need to foster growth, particularly in those sectors which suffered a contraction in Q4 of last year?

It doesn't matter if you work for a merchant, a distributor, a manufacturer or any type of company regardless of industry, when there is a positive and confident outlook running throughout the company, it can have dramatic effect on its fortunes, and will help everyone to perform at a much higher level.

So John Sheehan, an eminent analyst from Dublin stockbrokers NCB thinks that Grafton Group and Travis Perkins should merge.

And so it begins. The news that a family-run independent merchant has gone into administration should come as no real surprise to most people.

So that nice Lord Mandelson has reached into his (our, actually) pockets and brought out a little something to help the poor beleaguered car industry out.

In the last recession, most of the headlines to do with housing were about people who couldn't afford to stay in their homes because the interest rates on their mortgages was taking payments far beyond their reach.

So, according to research by economists LEK, boosting the construction industry could prove the biggest way to boost the UK economy. That's because every £1 spent on construction leads to an increase in GDP of £2.84, as the spending not only creates construction output worth £1, but also stimulates growth elsewhere in the economy worth…

So Ecobuild's come and Ecobuild's gone. What are we left with, apart from sore feet, 'exhibition throat' and bags and bags of printed matter?