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The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

The purpose of this paper is to investigate apprenticeship developments in two National Health Service (NHS) organisations since the introduction of the apprenticeship levy in April 2017 and considers potential impact on social mobility. This is a pilot for a broader exploration of implementation of government apprenticeship policy in the NHS.

Following ethical approval, semi-structured interviews were conducted with two key informants with responsibility for education and training in their respective organisations. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. Thematic analysis was undertaken to identify major and sub-themes of the interviews.

Four major themes were identified – organisational readiness, the apprenticeship offer, opportunities for further development and potential problems with implementation. Both organisations were actively seeking opportunities to spend their levy and had developed local strategies to ensure this. The levy was being used to develop both new and existing staff, with leadership and management being particularly identified as an area of growth. Similarly, both organisations were using levy monies to develop the bands 1–4 roles, including the nursing associate. The affordability and bureaucracy of apprenticeships were seen as potential problems to the wider implementation of apprenticeships in the NHS.

Although the apprenticeship levy is being spent in the NHS, there are some challenges for employers in their delivery. The levy is offering new and existing staff the opportunity to undertake personal and professional development at a range of educational levels. This has the potential to increase and upskill the NHS workforce, improve social mobility and possibly lead to larger cultural and professional changes.

This paper offers an early insight into the implementation of apprenticeship policy in a large public sector employer such as the NHS.

Since its introduction in South Africa during 2009, the ability of vehicle emissions tax to reduce CO₂ emissions has been questioned, but not yet assessed. The purpose of this paper is to attempt such an assessment by considering tax designs to reduce passenger vehicle CO₂ emissions.

In this exploratory study, the authors reviewed literature on tax designs to reduce CO₂ emissions, and compared the design of current taxes on passenger vehicles in South Africa to the tax designs most advocated in the literature to evaluate the effectiveness of the current South African design for this purpose.

Tax designs refer to the stage when taxes are levied (purchase/ownership/usage taxes) – levying taxes at one stage may more effectively reduce emissions than levying them at another. The current tax focus on consumers may indeed affect taxes' ability to reduce emissions, and in the current tax mix, taxes on passenger vehicles may not be the most effective way of reducing emissions. The investigation of a “feebate” policy as an alternative initiative to address increased passenger vehicle CO₂ emissions is recommended.

Only anecdotal evidence questions the ability of the vehicle emissions tax to reduce CO₂ emissions. This study is intended to elicit further discussions on other fiscal reform initiatives aimed at reducing CO₂ emissions by passenger vehicles in South Africa.

Whereas proposals made by the Food, Drink and Tobacco Industry Training Board for the raising and collection of a levy have been submitted to, and approved by, the Manpower Services Commission under section 7 of the Industrial Training Act 1964 (“the 1964 Act”), as amended by section 6 of and Schedule 2 to the Employment and Training Act 1973 (“the 1973 Act”) and have thereafter been submitted by the said Commission to the Secretary of State under section 7(1C) of the 1964 Act as inserted by the 1973 Act;

The Secretary of State after approving proposals submitted by the Agricul‐tural, Horticultural and Forestry Industry Training Board for the imposition of a further levy on certain employers in the agricultural, horticultural and forestry industry and in exercise of his powers under section 4 of the Indus‐trial Training Act 1964 and of all other powers enabling him in that behalf hereby makes the following Order:—

The Secretary of State after approving proposals submitted by the Paper and Paper Products Industry Training Board for the imposition of a levy on employers in the paper and paper products industry and in exercise of her powers under section 4 of the Industrial Training Act 1964 and of all other powers enabling her in that behalf hereby makes the following Order:—

The Secretary of State after approving proposals submitted by the Food, Drink and Tobacco Industry Training Board for the imposition of a levy on employers in the food, drink and tobacco industry and in exercise of her powers under section 4 of the Industrial Training Act 1964 and of all other powers enabling her in that behalf hereby makes the the following Order:—

The Secretary of State after approving proposals submitted by the Agricultural, Horticultural and Forestry Industry Training Board for the imposition of a further levy on certain employers in the agricultural, horticultural and forestry industry and in exercise of his powers under section 4 of the Industrial Training Act 1964 and of all other powers enabling him in that behalf hereby makes the following Order:—

The Truncated Levy Flight (TLF) model has been successfully used to model the return distribution of stock markets in developed economies and a few developing economies such as India. Our primary purpose is to use the TLF to model the S&P 500 and the firms operating in the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE).

We assess the predictive efficacy of the TLF model by comparing a simulation of the Standard and Poor's 500 (S&P 500) index and that of firms in the stock market in Ghana, using data from the same time period (June 2007–September 2013).

We find that the Levy models relatively accurately models the return distributions of the S&P 500 but does not accurately model the return distributions of firms in the Ghana stock market.

A major limitation is that we examined stock market data only from Ghana, while there are over 29 other African stock markets. We suggest that doctoral students and faculty can compare these stock markets either on the basis of age or the number of firms listed. For example, the oldest stock market was set up in 1883 in Egypt, while the more recent ones were set up in 2012 in the Seychelles and in Somalia.

Scholarly inquiry about the stock markets in Africa represents a rich area of research that we will encourage doctoral students and faculty to go into.

There has been little research done regarding the TLF model and African stock markets and this research has much utility and high level of originality.

A Workplace Parking Levy (WPL) scheme represents a major transport demand management intervention which raises a levy on private non-domestic off street parking provided by employers to employees, regular business visitors and students. It therefore increases the average cost of commuting by car and stimulates a contraction in the supply of workplace parking places. Under UK legislation the revenue from such a scheme is hypothecated funding for further transport improvements. As such it is potentially an important mixed policy instrument available to transport authorities to tackle traffic congestion and create extra transport capacity by using the additional funding such a scheme provides. At present, in the United Kingdom, only Nottingham City Council has implemented such a scheme and thus an understanding of how that scheme was implemented, how it operates and the outcomes after a full year of operation are of importance to transport academics and other local authorities considering utilising a similar approach.

This chapter presents an overview of the WPL scheme in Nottingham. The legislation, implementation experience, monitoring framework and outcomes for this scheme after the first year of full operation are discussed by drawing on current literature, documentary evidence and monitoring data.

The Nottingham WPL scheme was fully implemented in April 2012. The gap between the provisions of the underpinning legislation and the functioning scheme has necessitated the formulation of policy in line with the spirit of the legislation. Acceptance by the business community and the public were further barriers to implementation which were mitigated by a consultation process and a Public Examination. However acceptance remains a concern until the scheme has been shown to meet its key objective of reducing congestion. To date there is no evidence that the scheme has had a negative impact on business investment and, while there is as yet no evidence traffic congestion has reduced, it is still early for such impacts to be identified especially as the majority of the associated public transport improvements are yet to be implemented. However the WPL has already raised £7 million in net revenue in its first year of operation which is hypothecated for public transport improvements which may help encourage inward investment and reduce car travel.

At present the Nottingham WPL scheme has only been operational for a short time and a limitation to the research presented here is that the major public transport improvements part funded by revenue hypothecated from the WPL are not yet in place. It will be necessary to wait at least a further 3 years before more definite conclusions as to the success of the WPL package can be drawn.

As the first of its kind in the United Kingdom or indeed in Europe, the WPL scheme in Nottingham provides a unique contribution to the literature, comparing and contrasting implementation and outcomes with those in Australia and Canada. Geographical and cultural differences between the United Kingdom and these countries mean that conclusions drawn concerning existing schemes in other continents are not necessarily transferable to the United Kingdom. This chapter provides evidence in a UK framework to assess if the approach could be suitably applied more widely.