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Many national retailers have complained about increases in business rates tax bills since the 2017 revaluation. What impact has the 2017 business rates revaluation had on independent high street retailers in market towns in the north of England? The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The study uses Valuation Office Agency rating list data to determine rateable value and business rates payable for independent high street retailers in eight northern market towns either side of the 2017 rating revaluation. The data were analysed using business rates matrices to reveal the impact of the new rating list on independent retailers in the eight locations.

Analysis reveals that the majority of independent retailers in the northern market towns sampled have experienced reductions in both the rateable value of their premises and business rates payable. Increase in the rates relief threshold has extended relief to almost half of the independent retailers in the study, most of whom receive 100 per cent relief.

Charity shops receive at least 80 per cent rates relief which means they are able to afford to pay higher rents. This “sets the tone” for landlords setting market rents in that location which are then used as comparable evidence by the VOA when determining rateable values at revaluation further polarising the gap between rate payers and those to are exempt.

Focussing on independent retailers on high streets in markets towns in north of England, this study provides an alternative perspective to the orthodox view of business rates revaluations having a negative impact on retailers.

Given pressures both to share and to protect personal information in inter‐agency service provision, this article reviews the ways in which policy and legal influences shape interorganisational information exchange and highlights key developments in government guidance that are designed to promote better information sharing.

IN a system like that of the Public Library, which is yet in the evolutionary stage, it is but natural—as it is also a sign of vitality —that there should be conflicting opinions on many questions of administration. On one general principle, however, librarians are unanimous. It is that the Public Library should be conducted upon sound business methods. Yet, strange to say, although it is generally conceded that sound business principles are essential to success in librarianship, that a lack of business acumen is fatal to efficiency, one of the cardinal points of modern business has been almost altogether overlooked. Systematic advertising, the key‐note of modern business, which forms the chief difference between the new methods and the old, is the point to which we refer. That advertisement, the real secret of success, has been overlooked, is not wholly the result of accident, but is rather due to the fact that many librarians are haunted by a fear of degrading their profession by employing this means of reaching the public. They fear that, if they advertise, they may be classed with the vendors of Black's Pills or Green's Ointment; but, after all, the Public Library is a business institution—it may not be a commercial institution, but it is certainly a business one. It is here—if we may be allowed a short digression to illustrate our point—that British and American libraries differ so radically. The successful American librarian is not a librarian as we know one. He is a business man. Granted that it is a part of his business to know the ins and outs of technical librarianship; yet, unlike his British contemporary, he does not consider it his whole business. He has a trained staff to whom he can leave the technical detail, while he devotes himself to running the library on the most approved business lines. The result has been that, instead of the American librarian being degraded, he has risen very highly in the estimation of the public. And if the status of the American librarian can thus be raised, why not that of the British? It is not necessary to use startling handbills or aggressive posters to achieve the desired end. It is absolutely true that in many towns possessing excellent and old‐established libraries, there is a large percentage of the population to which the library is a dead letter, or is altogether unknown. On examining the figures in the Annotated Syllabus, which have been compiled from the returns of most British libraries, we find that the percentage of possible readers is fifty, while the percentage of actual readers is twenty. This leaves the large percentage of thirty, representing people who must be reached through advertising.

In recent years, school districts have faced numerous questions surrounding accommodations of transgender students. Strong objections to accommodations have been voiced in public argument and litigation, primarily in the areas of athletics, bathrooms, and dress codes. As younger transgender students express their gender identity at school, however, the existing objections are weakened by considering the context of elementary rather than high school students. Greater numbers of young transgender students will likely encourage accommodation of trans students of all ages, as well as challenge the gender binary unconsciously taught in school.

The purpose of this research is to examine whether personality and motivational driver differences exist across three generations of working Australians: Baby Boomers, Gen Xs, and Gen Ys.

Using the Occupational Personality Questionnaire and the Motivation Questionnaire, the study examined cross‐sectional differences in personality and motivational drivers across three generations.

The results are not supportive of the generational stereotypes that have been pervasive in the management literature and the media. Specifically, few meaningful differences were found between the three generations. Moreover, even when differences have been observed, these have related more to age than generation.

One of the key limitations is the use of cross‐sectional data. To further explore this issue, it would be interesting to undertake a longitudinal study to assess personality preferences and motivational drivers of the different generations, when the participants are at the same age or the same point in their career.

The research emphasizes the importance of managing individuals by focusing on individual differences rather than relying on generational stereotypes, which may not be as prevalent as the existing literature suggests.

Managers and HR professionals may find the lack of differences across generations interesting and refreshing, in contrast with the popular management literature.

ATTENTION has been repeatedly drawn to certain drawbacks in the library profession which tend to hinder progress in many ways, and recently some discussion has taken place concerning the long hours and short pay of library assistants. Some years ago there appeared, we believe, in one of Mr. Greenwood's valuable Library Year Books, an analysis of the hours of work in a large number of British Municipal Libraries, and it was made plain from this that a majority of assistants had to work considerably more than forty‐eight hours weekly. Conditions may have changed since then, although it is open to doubt, but the fact remains that too many assistants, and a considerable number of librarians in small places, are now working so long, and in such broken spells, as to preclude any possibility of attaining self‐culture or reasonable recreation. The case of the small town librarian is particularly distressing. In some instances he is a man who has been well‐trained in a large town library, and inspired by a mistaken ambition, elects to attain a position of independence by accepting the chief librarianship in a library of which he afterwards finds himself the sole officer. He is responsible for the cleaning, as well as the ordinary work of a librarian, and his efforts to convert a miserable library rate of a few pounds into an engine of immense efficiency (as expected by the local authority) are enough to make the financial operations of even an American millionaire seem petty in comparison. We have had several cases like this brought to notice within a few weeks, and they give added point to any plea for reform which may be advanced. One young man, well‐educated and well‐trained, undertook the charge of a small municipal library, chiefly because it happened to be near London, and he wished to be in touch with that great and attractive centre. He very soon discovered that the hours of the library were so arranged as to occupy his whole time and keep him employed all day, from 9 a.m. or earlier, till 10 p.m., with two short breaks which did not suffice for a visit to London. On Sunday he was too tired to think of London, apart from which, the institutions which interested him were closed, so that it is possible this librarian has not yet seen the longed‐for London of his cherished anticipations ! There are cases like this in the smaller libraries all over the country, where one official has to perform all the work in an unlimited number of hours. If, as is done in some places, the hours of opening are greatly curtailed in order to give the librarian his deserved and well‐earned rest, then the public suffer. On the other hand, a library administered by a single officer and kept open from nine to ten hours daily, is rather of the nature of a slave‐compound, in which an official is kept prisoner in the interests of the omnipotent ratepayer. Wherever small staffs are kept, there exists this tendency towards long hours, and a consequent eterioration in the efficiency and educational qualifications of assistants. A standing complaint among those who are engaged in the educational work of the Library Association is that so many candidates are deficient in the most elementary subjects, such as composition, spelling and arithmetic. This is undoubtedly caused by the employment of imperfectly educated assistants, who are afterwards tied so fast to their library duties that they are unable to find any time for study and reading. In libraries where small staffs and long hours of opening are found together, it is almost certain that the work‐hours of the assistants will be excessive, and the efficiency of the service impaired.

The purpose of this paper is to provide new evidence, made possible by human capital data that became available after IFRS adoption, on the productivity of intellectual capital and its components. These productivity measures are modelled to determine their value-relevance in the share market, and the modelling is extended to comparative productivity measures for the book-value of assets.

Financial data are sourced from financial databases and company annual reports on a sample of 160 Australian listed firms over a five-year period. Panel regression analysis is used to test five models built from Riahi-Belkaoui's (1999) general price model of the value-relevance of accounting numbers.

The results show that the productivity of human capital, structural capital and intellectual capital are each significantly positively related to share price (i.e. have value-relevance), whereas the productivity of total assets at book-value is non-significant and tangible assets is inversely significant.

This study constructs a new improved method of computing the amount of structural capital, and uses recently available financial statement data to provide first-time evidence on human capital and its inclusion in the determination of the amount of intellectual capital. These new models and data enable a direct comparison to be made between the value-relevance of intellectual and the book-value of assets.

It is hard to find good news stories about disasters. Disasters seriously damage an organisation’s health. Of businesses that experience a disaster, 40 per cent never reopen and 30 per cent close within 2 years. Perhaps because of this, over 80 per cent of UK facility managers in a recent survey now report that they maintain a Business Continuity Plan which most of them review at least once a year. An increasing number, however, now find themselves responsible for a portfolio of international facilities spanning continents and time zones. This paper looks at some real life implications of global business recovery planning. In the wake of September 11th, one can hardly do less. This paper provides strategies and justifications for international emergency planning procedures and processes. Practitioners will gain valuable information from actual events and case studies to validate the concepts offered as a model. It may seem that some of the information and processes which are outlined in this paper are obvious; but that is the point. The obvious can be overlooked, and excuses can be made for the lack of implementation of emergency plans. But those excuses will not stand in the light of real disasters and cataclysmic events.

THE following list of contracts placed by the Air Ministry during December is extracted from the January issue of The Ministry of Labour Gazelle :—

To assess changes in advertising the British children’s annual, Chatterbox, over the first three decades of the twentieth century.

The products/firms involved were identified and the advertisements classified into product groups. The advertising content was examined in terms of the intended audience and the five longest-running advertisements were analysed to gauge trends at the single-product level. Attention was also given to long-term changes at the product-group level, the effects of the Great War and the roles of the publisher, editor and advertisers.

In total, 457 advertisements were documented over 1900-1930 representing about 80 different products/firms. They were classified into 10 distinctive groupings with Food Ingredients, at almost 26 per cent of the total, being the most abundant. Overwhelmingly, the advertisements were directed at middle-class women/mothers (∼75 per cent of the total), then children (∼15 per cent) with men/fathers essentially being ignored. The five longest-running advertisements (over 25 per cent of the total) showed little evidence of change but there were significant trends at the product-group level, in marketing to children and in average advertisement size, particularly during the last two decades of the study period, partially reflecting gradual social and technological changes.

Comprehensive quantitative analysis of advertising in children’s magazine literature over several decades is problematic because of the difficulty in accessing sufficient source material. The present study is exhaustive and establishes a reference point for the assessment of advertising in similar publications in the post-Victorian era.