The Mail on Sunday
BANKS are hesitating to lend new money to Robert Breare's Noble House pubs and restaurant group after a severe downturn in trading.
The slump has forced Breare to postpone plans to float Noble House and he has admitted that his restaurant arm is more than a year late in filing its accounts. Click here to read more on thePublican.com.
THE Laurel Pub Company is understood to be on the verge of signing a £320m sale-and-leaseback deal with property group London & Regional Properties.
Laurel will use the money to invest in its 626-strong managed pub estate, which includes the Hogshead and RSVP brands.
The Independent on Sunday
SFI Group was warned in the spring that it was facing a cash crisis and would have to reign back its ambitious bar opening programme.
The warning, from accountants within the group, came a full six months before the group admitted a financial crisis. Click here to read more on thePublican.com.
ONE of the government's leading drug advisers has called on the Home Secretary, David Blunkett to downgrade ecstasy to a class B drug.
CUSTOMS and Excise is trying to shut down Teatro, the trendy London members club owned by husband and wife team Lee Chapman and Leslie Ash. The club is thought to be facing a crippling VAT bill.
ONE-THIRD of children who try smoking start in primary school, a study has shown. One in five schoolchildren under the age of 16 is a regular smoker according to a study of 6,500 carried out by the British Medical Association.
The Express
SIR George Cadbury has been crowned Britain's greatest-ever businessman in a poll by the Sunday Express. Sir George took a business on its knees and laid the foundations for what is today a global confectionary and drinks business.
Restaurateur Sir Terence Conran is 20th in the list, and Lord Blyth, chairman of Diageo, is 56th.
The Business
LUMINAR, the British nightclub and late-night bar operation, is eying the assets of smaller rival Brannigans, whose parent company Mustard Entertainment was put into receivership last week. Read more on Mustard collapsing into administration on thePublican.com.
THE Hilton Group is planning to raise £336m through a sale-and-leaseback of 10 of its hotels with property partner Bank of Scotland.
CHANCELLOR Gordon Brown is expected to trim his forecasts for UK economy growth by 0.5 per cent to three per cent, for 2003.
The Observer
FORMER Pizza Express boss Ian Eldridge is the secret weapon behind serial entrepreneur Luke Johnson's attempt to buy the troubled retaurant chain.
THE big ITV companies Granada and Carlton will reveal combined heavy losses of about £300m this week due to the advertising slump and hefty write-downs from the closure of ITV Digital.
THE Confederation of British Industry is to lobby the government for euro entry as early as January following a survey of its members' attitudes to the issue.
The Sunday Times
MINISTERS are drawing up plans to save up to £500m a year by raising the normal retirement age for public sector workers from 60 to 65.