Business Weekly
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 26 December 2020
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week the roads running to the ports in the South East of England turned into a lorry park when continental Europe blocked arrivals from the UK– so Business Weekly takes look at trade and the travails of the global shipping industry. How has this vital sector fared during the pandemic? As France bans discrimination against regional accents we’ll ask whether the way you talk really affects your job pospects. The Chief Executive of the Royal Albert Hall tells us how this historical London venue is coping without box office sales - and we'll hear from the entrepreneurs who set up new businesses in the middle of a pandemic.
Business Weekly is presented by Lucy Burton and produced by Clare Williamson.
(Image: Lorries parked at Manston airpot while port of Dover closed Credit: Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, if a week is a long time in politics, a day is a long time in business at the moment, |
| 0:06.1 | and it can be exhausting trying to keep up with all the latest developments. |
| 0:10.1 | That's why we've interrupted your Business Daily pod feed to bring you Business Weekly, |
| 0:14.4 | a new weekend program which brings you an hour of the most interesting, inspiring, |
| 0:19.8 | and thought-provoking stories you might have missed |
| 0:21.7 | from the BBC's business team. |
| 0:27.8 | Hello, you're listening to Business Weekly with Lucy Burton. Welcome to the programme. |
| 0:32.4 | On the show today, we'll be discussing the merits of a four-day week, meeting the entrepreneurs who started new businesses during the COVID lockdown, |
| 0:40.9 | and I'll be chatting with the boss of London's Royal Albert Hall about how you keep a concert venue afloat when you don't have an audience. |
| 0:47.9 | We're on the brink of signing an agreement to receive a loan, not a grant, but a loan of about £20 million. |
| 0:55.5 | And that will help us remain in business for at least the next year. But we are relying on being able to go back to a |
| 1:01.3 | sort of normal plan of activity by about April, May of next year. And we'll have more from him |
| 1:07.6 | later in the programme. First, though, this week saw a slew of EU countries |
| 1:12.6 | slap a travel ban on the UK as a new, more infectious strain of the coronavirus was discovered |
| 1:17.9 | in the country. The channel ports were closed to both cargo and passengers, leading to a vast |
| 1:23.8 | build-up of lorries at the border and fears of food shortages just before Christmas. |
| 1:29.2 | Germany's Luftanzer airline has been airlifting fresh fruit and vegetables into the country |
| 1:33.9 | in order to bypass the blockade and the British Army has been deployed to swab lorry drivers for the virus. |
| 1:40.5 | Without much in the way of food or hygiene facilities, it's been a really rough couple of days for the drivers who are a long way from home and family. |
| 1:48.7 | Although the trucks are getting going again, some suggested that this was a demonstration of what could happen if a trade deal with the EU wasn't reached. |
| 1:57.9 | But it's not just shipping in the English Channel, which has seen major disruption |
| 2:01.3 | recently. All over the world, container shipping, ports and mariners themselves have been upended |
... |
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