Keir Starmer resigned this morning. Andy Burnham is now the overwhelming favourite to replace him and could be in office within weeks. For those working in development, cost consultancy and investment, it is worth being clear about what that means commercially. Burnham is not anti-development. His record in Greater Manchester is evidence enough: house prices rose 63% over the past decade against London's 7%, and major schemes like Victoria North and Mayfield were delivered on

Most people assume the value in project monitoring shows up when something goes wrong. A contractor in difficulty, a programme slipping, a cost plan that no longer adds up. That is when the reports matter, obviously. But the work that makes those reports useful happens much earlier. The initial review is the part we take most seriously. A drawdown pack arrives, often with pressure to turn it quickly, and the temptation is to skim, tick the boxes and move on. We do not do that

NatWest's £250m Section 106 loan fund, matched by Homes England, takes the total available for S106 acquisitions to £500m. It is good news for a market that has badly needed it. Around half of England's affordable housing is delivered through the S106 cross-subsidy model. When registered providers stopped buying, whole sites stalled. Private plots sat behind unsold affordable phases, and housebuilders mothballed schemes that were viable on paper but couldn't clear the afforda

Geography has become an excuse in this industry. Firms carve the country up between them as though expertise were a local resource, and everyone calls this discipline when really it is just habit. The result is a market that limits itself for reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of advice on offer. Spending time in Leeds for UKREiiF brought this into focus. It is a brilliant city with real energy, particularly around Kirkgate, and a good reminder that the best wor

How AI is affecting projects for SME developers.

Every construction project begins with a clear idea of what it should become. Yet for many SME builders and developers, the journey from vision to delivery is where challenges start to appear. Rising costs, unclear scopes and misaligned professional teams can quickly derail even the best intentions. At Axo, we work with SMEs who want the benefits of experienced commercial support without the overhead of a full-time in-house team. Our goal is simple: to help you deliver projec