The NHS is to offer rewards to people who walk for half an hour a day, in the first scheme of its kind to pay Britons back for getting active.

NHS England will launch its “marathon a month” challenge early next year, asking participants to walk for around 30 minutes daily. Those who manage it every day will cover roughly 26 miles over the month, the distance of a marathon, logging their progress online or via a phone or smartwatch.

Complete the challenge and rewards follow, potentially including incentives and discounts, although the organising team has yet to confirm precisely what is on offer. Vouchers are one option under consideration, and the presence on the team of Sir Keith Mills, the founder of Air Miles and Nectar, suggests the architecture of Britain’s best-known loyalty schemes will be brought to bear on the nation’s step count.

Crucially for taxpayers, the NHS will not be footing the bill for the rewards. NHS England is covering the initial set-up, but the wider plan is to draw in philanthropic backing from major corporates as the scheme rolls out, with public and private sector partners running the programme. GPs and other health staff will be encouraged to promote it to patients.

The scheme is being developed with Sir Brendan Foster, the Olympic medallist and founder of the Great North Run, who was asked by NHS England to build a campaign to get people walking as part of the government’s 10-year health plan for England.

“I’m known for running, but the ambition here is far simpler. We just want people to walk. Simple,” he says.

The aim is to sign up more than 100,000 people, with daily stats recorded digitally. If the target is hit, Sir Brendan says it would count as the biggest marathon in history. He is banking on “streak” culture, the habit-forming mechanic behind Snapchat and Duolingo, to keep participants going.

The under-25s Business Matters spoke to were broadly upbeat. One said the gamified challenge would push her to be more active, admitting that not wanting to break a streak is a powerful motivator for her and her friends. Another, who already clocks up roughly a marathon’s worth of walking each month, said he would happily take a free reward for something he is already doing.

The numbers behind the initiative are stark. Physical inactivity is associated with one in six deaths, according to official public health guidance, and a person is classified as inactive if they do less than 30 minutes of moderate-intensity activity per week. Sport England’s Active Lives survey showed that in the year to November 2025 nearly a quarter of adults, around 12 million people, fell into that category.

“If someone walks 30 minutes five times a week, they could gain up to four extra years of healthy life,” Sir Brendan says.

For employers, the scheme lands at a moment when workforce health has become a boardroom issue. Business groups have already backed the Keep Britain Working review amid mounting fiscal pressure from economic inactivity, and there has been a marked rise in UK employers using wellbeing strategies to lift engagement and cut absenteeism. A state-backed incentive scheme that nudges staff out of the door at lunchtime may prove a useful, and free, addition to the corporate wellbeing toolkit.

The potential savings for the health service are significant too, at a time when technology is already being deployed to claw back hundreds of millions in NHS costs.

Not everyone believes incentives alone will shift the dial. Sonia Pombo, head of research and impact at Action on Salt & Sugar, says: “Encouraging people to build regular movement into their daily lives can support better health, and making it simple, achievable and rewarding may help more people get started. But we cannot rely on individual behaviour change alone. If the government is serious about improving the nation’s health, particularly for children, it must pair initiatives like this with stronger prevention measures.”

Full details of the scheme, including how to sign up, will be released in the coming months.

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Dabur India expects consolidated revenue to grow in double digits in the June quarter, helped by steady demand in India, strong growth in emerging sales channels and resilience in its international business despite pressure in the Middle East.

The company, in its quarterly update for the period ended June 30, 2026, said consumer sentiment remained resilient despite geopolitical concerns and hyperinflationary pressure in some of its key markets. Dabur said its business trajectory improved sequentially over the previous quarter, and it expects consumption in international markets to improve in the coming quarters as the Middle East situation eases.

In India, both rural and urban markets sustained their growth trend, with rural demand continuing to outpace urban. This is important for Dabur as a large part of its portfolio, including health, oral care, hair care and beverages, has strong rural and semi-urban reach.

The India FMCG business is expected to post near double-digit growth during the quarter. The home and personal care business is likely to grow at a near-teens level, led by strong demand for hair oils and shampoos. Dabur said hair oils and shampoos are expected to deliver high-teens growth, supported by perfumed and coconut hair oils.

Oral care is also expected to report near double-digit growth. Dabur said growth was broad-based across the segment, with the new herbal franchise and Meswak recording strong double-digit growth. Its flagship Red Toothpaste and Lal Dant Manjan brands also continued their upward trend.

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The healthcare business is expected to show sequential improvement, with mid-single-digit growth. Key brands such as Hajmola, Pudin Hara, Dabur Honitus, Isabgol and the health juices range are expected to deliver robust double-digit growth. Dabur Glucose, which was affected in the early part of the quarter, recovered sequentially later.The food business continued to grow at a high double-digit pace. Badshah is expected to deliver high-teen growth, while the beverages portfolio recovered during the quarter. Dabur said Real Activ juices and coconut water recorded strong double-digit growth.

The company’s emerging channels, including e-commerce, quick commerce and modern trade, are expected to report strong double-digit growth. General trade also improved sequentially, with growth seen across urban and rural markets. Dabur said Project Saksham, its distribution and route-to-market optimisation initiative, is showing early positive signs.

The international business is expected to grow in the high teens in rupee terms, even with severe pressure in the Middle East. Egypt, Turkey, Bangladesh and the UK each recorded strong double-digit growth in rupee terms.

Dabur said elevated inflation during the quarter, especially in hair care, was managed through calibrated price hikes, helping maintain stable operating margins. Profit after tax is expected to grow at a double-digit level. The company said detailed financial results will be announced after board approval.

The London Metal ​Exchange has approved ​the Adani Copper brand for ​delivery against its copper contracts, the exchange said on Friday.

Warrants for the ‌brand can ⁠be ⁠issued from July 10, although the ​LME-registered warehouses holding Adani Copper metal must include ​the brand in their off-warrant stock reports with immediate effect, the LME ​added.

The brand ⁠is produced ‌by Adani Enterprises-owned Kutch ​Copper, one ​of India’s largest copper ⁠smelters, with annual production capacity of ​500,000 metric tons. The company applied ​for LME registration in August 2025.
According to Adani, this $1.2 billion Kutch Copper facility in the western state of Gujarat ‌is the world’s biggest single-location plant of its type, expected ​to ​reduce India’s reliance ⁠on imported copper.
India imported 238,080 tons of refined copper in 2025, down ​18% from a year earlier, according to Trade Data Monitor data, with Japan remaining the country’s largest supplier. (Reporting by Polina Devitt; Editing by Louise Heavens)

German employees will be required to visit a doctor in person and obtain a sick note on the first day of illness, under tough new rules unveiled by Chancellor Friedrich Merz as part of a sweeping package to revive the country’s stagnant economy.

The measure scraps the current system, under which workers could secure a certificate over the phone and did not need one at all until their third day off. It is a marked contrast with Britain, where employees can self-certify for a full seven days before a fit note is required.

“The number of sick days is too high,” Merz told journalists. “We are creating a set of tools that will enable those involved, both employees and companies, to correct this. We know this is a tough decision. But we can no longer afford the competitive disadvantage caused by prolonged absences from work.”

Germans take an average of roughly 15 working days of sick leave a year, according to figures from the Federal Statistical Office, lower than France and most Nordic countries but well above Sweden, the Netherlands, Denmark, Poland and Italy. By comparison, the latest Office for National Statistics data shows around 149 million working days were lost to sickness or injury in the UK last year, some 2 per cent of all working hours, or just over four days per worker. British absence rates have nonetheless been climbing, with UK sick days recently hitting a 15-year high, driven in large part by mental health conditions.

While employers’ groups welcomed the German move, it has infuriated the country’s powerful trade unions. Frank Werneke, head of the services union Verdi, accused Merz of fostering “a culture of distrust of employees”.

Doctors are equally unimpressed, warning the requirement will overwhelm general practice with appointments that serve no clinical purpose. “Our practices would be flooded with patients who don’t need in-person care and would be better off in bed,” said the German Association of Family Physicians, which branded the measure “an absolute catastrophe”.

The sick note crackdown forms part of a broader reform programme negotiated between Merz’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union and its coalition partner, the centre-left Social Democrats. Alongside a promised bonfire of red tape, the retirement age could rise gradually from 67 to as high as 70 in the coming decades, while tax cuts for lower and middle earners will be funded by higher rates on incomes above €250,000 (£215,000).

For UK business owners watching from across the Channel, the episode is a reminder that absence management remains a live policy battleground, and that handling staff sickness fairly and lawfully is as much about trust and process as it is about cost. It also underlines how seriously Germany’s slowdown is being taken in Berlin: sluggish growth in Europe’s largest economy is one of the factors expected to shape the continent’s economic pecking order through 2040.

Carsten Brzeski, an economist at Dutch bank ING, said the reforms were overdue but should not be oversold. “It may have taken longer than many hoped, but Germany’s long-awaited summer of reforms has finally arrived,” he said. “It is not a package that will morph a stagnating economy into a booming economy overnight. But it is a package that could create the preconditions, the framework, for future growth.”

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Business owners could face fines even when they pay their PAYE and VAT in full and on time, simply for using the wrong payment channel, under new rules being consulted on by HMRC.

The government is seeking views on plans to require businesses to pay their PAYE and VAT return liabilities by Direct Debit, with the aim of reducing late payment, limiting the flow of debt and simplifying the payment process to cut errors. The consultation runs until 16 August 2026.

Responses from the business community and tax agents will, HMRC says, help determine the scope of any changes, whether safeguards are needed, and which taxpayers should be excepted from the requirement. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales notes that exceptions are proposed for those without UK bank accounts, the digitally excluded and payments above £20 million.

The sting, however, is in the enforcement. If Direct Debit becomes mandatory, a penalty could apply where a payment is made through another channel, even if the tax is paid in full and on time. That has raised eyebrows among accountants and business owners, not least because late payment already carries interest and penalties under the existing regime.

Harvey Dhillon, founder and chief executive of small business accountants Zmartly, said the underlying move was, “for once, a sensible fix”.

“The late-payment penalties I see are rarely from firms that cannot pay, but from a wrong reference or the right money hitting the wrong period, and Direct Debit quietly ends that. That part is genuinely good,” he said.

But he questioned the prospect of fines for those who pay on time by other means: “When did paying your tax in full and on time become something HMRC could fine you for? That is the oddity in this consultation. A charge that can land even when the tax is paid in full and on time, purely because it went by bank transfer, is a fine for using the wrong envelope.

“The one caught is the careful business that always pays, not the debtor this is meant to chase. So before 16 August, set up the Direct Debit, but tell the consultation that method is not the same as payment.”

Tony Redondo, founder of Newquay-based Cosmos Currency Exchange, warned the switch could cause cash flow problems for firms that time their payments deliberately, a discipline that matters given the consequences of missing a tax or VAT deadline.

“HMRC frames it as efficiency, and cutting the tax gap caused by manual errors. But businesses use Faster Payments and CHAPS deliberately for cash flow control. A mandatory Direct Debit hands HMRC a preferred creditor’s schedule, not yours,” he said.

“Worse, HMRC is consulting on penalising businesses that pay in full and on time, simply for using the ‘wrong’ channel. That flips compliance on its head. You’re punished not for failing to pay, but for failing to use their preferred technology. It treats SMEs like errant children.”

There is a further wrinkle for the many owners who pay their tax by card. Rob Burgess, founder of London-based Head for Points, said the changes would be “very handy for HMRC and very inconvenient for those of us who don’t want the trouble of ensuring the right sum is in the right bank account on a specific day”.

“Another tranche of people it will affect are those who choose to earn rewards points and other benefits on card payments, plus those using certain credit cards also enjoy a period of interest-free credit,” he added.

“If you are currently earning points from paying VAT or PAYE via a card, you should complete the consultation questionnaire with good reasons why Direct Debit is not suitable for you and similar businesses.”

The government says it recognises that some businesses may face challenges in paying by Direct Debit, such as managing cash flow and adapting to new processes, and stresses that consultation feedback will directly inform its approach. Given that more than a million taxpayers already fall foul of HMRC deadlines each January, business owners may conclude it is a consultation worth responding to.

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