#FridayFive from the Executive Director: 24 May 2024

In a week when Rishi Sunak announces the #UK general election on the 4th July, here is my #FridayFive across the and for those who celebrated Vesak Day on Wednesday, wishing you and your families, peace, unity and joy.

1. #Maritime Working Group Launch: The Chamber is delighted to have launched a new Green Maritime Working Group to support the shipping/maritime elements of the UK-Singapore Green Economy Framework (GEF). Hosted by the British High Commissioner to Singapore, Kara Owen, and with the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy for Singapore, Lord Aamer Sarfraz, we had a fruitful discussion, covering a range of topics from standards, to fuels, to innovation to financing and skills. This is great news for our member companies and the working group will continue to drive private-sector led opportunities. Lord Sarfraz also kindly spent some time with Damian Adams and Haslam Preeston which we were hugely appreciative for. 💚 🚢

2.      Overseas Welcome: Continuing the theme of maritime – I was really pleased to have welcomed back to Singapore and one of our overseas members, Nicholas Giaever-Enger from Bibby Marine to the Chamber. We’ve been working collectively on a few maritime related opportunities and it was brilliant to reconnect and see how we can further continue the conversations around green shipping. ⚓ 🛳

3.      Voting Rights: We hosted a session between the British Overseas Voting Forum (Bruce Darrington) with the Internationals Schools in our network on Monday to share what options are available for British families on voting in the General Election. There are an estimated 5.6 million UK citizens living overseas and an estimated 3.5 million people entitled to vote in 2024. Previously, people who left the UK more than 15 years ago lost their right to vote. However, this rule has now been abolished under the Election Act 2022. 🤳 ✋

4.      Tax Planning: We held a BritCham Presents with The Sovereign Group talking about Last Chance for Non-Doms, Planning for the tax reforms that impact non-domiciles. A really engaging session with expert speakers including Martin Rimmer @lawrence Lancaster Stephen Hare 💲 💳

5.      Member Support: our LTD and Marcomms business committees had an exciting week. After a number of years, Don Rapley stepped down and handed the stewardship of the LTD committee to Max Holdsworth and Thomas Streatfeild-James . Thanks to Don for his support. Our marketing and communications committee chairs Suzy Goulding and Andrew Clark met with SIX new members (ERM, @Berkeley Group, Unilever, LiveGroup., Control Risks, 8 Wealth Management Limited and Dulwich College (Singapore) ) as we boost our business group brilliance. 👩‍💼 👨‍💼

That’s it for this week. Happy weekends all!