Stewart takes SPF reins
More than 500 guests at the Scottish Property Federation’s annual dinner welcomed Chris Stewart, chief executive of the Chris Stewart Group, as the new chairman of the organisation.
Scotland’s communities secretary Alex Neil was among the gathering at Edinburgh’s Sheraton hotel on 29 October where Stewart stepped officially into the role held previously by John Hamilton of Winchburgh Developments.
At the glittering event, which raised more than £6,000 for the Scottish property charity SPIFOX, Stewart told the audience how government initiatives such as the planning review, land and buildings transaction tax, energy efficiency regulations and land reform had the potential to affect Scotland’s global competitiveness.
Last week, the British Property Federation hosted more of property’s movers and shakers at its annual dinner, with Lord Peter Mandelson the guest speaker.
He decried Labour’s and the Conservatives’ efforts to boost the country’s housing supply and argued that, in the case of a Brexit “we would survive but we wouldn’t thrive”.
The BPF annual dinner raised £4,290 for LandAid.
Leslau honours Holocaust survivors
A gala dinner hosted by Nick Leslau and his family has raised £500,000 to support a UK facility for Holocaust survivors.
The event, held on the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the German concentration camps, saw 350 guests gather at the Grosvenor House Hotel to celebrate what Leslau described as “mankind’s indomitable spirit, as manifested through the lives of those with us 70 years after the liberation”.
The money will be donated to the Holocaust Survivors Centre in Hendon, Middlesex. Leslau discovered the centre last year when one of its 300 members, 86-year-old Auschwitz survivor Rene Salt, gave a powerful talk about the Holocaust to the Saracens rugby club, of which Leslau is a director.
Guests were shown a film by UK film director Paul Weiland that tells the story of four of the centre’s members. Watch it here
Tune up voices for LandSec festival
Land Securities will hold a carol concert and Christmas market at Westminster Cathedral at Victoria, SW1.
Downton Abbey’s Daisy Lewis and Masterchef legend Loyd Grossman will join the Westminster Cathedral Choir and a local choir for readings and a rousing sing-a-long.
The concert takes place on 2 December at 7.30pm. Tickets cost £12, with proceeds donated to homelessness charities The Passage and Cardinal Hume Centre. Ticket holders will get a free glass of sherry from Iberica at a reception at Cardinal Place, SW1.
Click here for details.
