PLANS for a new concert hall in Edinburgh are to be scaled back after objections by the city's St James cen tre developer.
However, the plans are now "back on track" after the backers of the concert hall and the Edinburgh St James developer reached an agreed way forward, and legal actions is due to halted.
It was agreed that developer IMPACT Scotland will redesign the £45m Dunard Centre at St Andrew Square and submit a fresh planning application and the council and Edinburgh St James will jointly seek the permission of the Court of Session for the appropriate disposal of current Judicial Review proceedings over the previous plans.
READ MORE: New concert hall plan for Edinburgh given green light
Sir Ewan Brown, chair of IMPACT Scotland, said: "Our ambition is to create a world-class concert hall for Edinburgh and Scotland.
"To deliver this timeously we have made significant changes to the concert hall plans in order to reflect the sensitivities of the site and the needs of our neighbours.
"We are hugely encouraged by the positive discussions we have had with Edinburgh St James and the City of Edinburgh Council and look forward to continuing to work with them to deliver a world-class concert hall.”
Martin Perry, director of Nuveen Real Estate said: "We welcome the initiative to substantially reduce the size of the concert hall and we are happy to work with IMPACT Scotland and the City of Edinburgh Council as IMPACT Scotland develops a new design which addresses our principal concerns.
"We hope the new design will better accord with the aspirations for this quarter of the city.”
Adam McVey, council leader, said: “This is an important new venue for our city and in one of the most sustainable locations, with fantastic public transport connections. We will now work with IMPACT Scotland and Edinburgh St James to continue the delivery of the regeneration of the east end of the city centre.”
The family behind fashion giant H&M saw a major windfall as it embarked on a hierarchical shake-up, with chief executive Karl-Johan Persson set to leave his role and fill the shoes of his father, Stefan.
Chairman Stefan Persson will step down after two decades at the head of the company's board, handing over to his son who has been chief executive for half that time, the company announced.
READ MORE: Shell suffers hefty fall in full-year profits
The appointment of the new chairman will be subject to a shareholder vote, but as the Persson family controls 74.7% of those votes, Mr Persson Jr is unlikely to face a serious challenge.
He will be replaced as chief executive of the fashion giant by chief operating officer Helena Helmersson, who started with the business in 1997.
"I feel confident in handing over the CEO role to Helena, who is an experienced and great leader who embodies our values," Mr Persson Jr said.
His father said: "I will continue to be a committed owner, just as today, but from a different position."
The family already saw a huge benefit from the reshuffle on Thursday morning, and the better-than-expected results that H&M presented alongside it.
Shares soared more than 9%, to 207.2 Swedish krona per share.
Fuller's said sales at its pubs and hotels jumped over the Christmas period as it was buoyed by increased political certainty.
The pub group said it saw a "noticeable bounce" after last month's General Election which has continued into the new year.
READ MORE: Tax controversy dismissed as ‘sideshow’ in battle to save Scotland's high streets
The company reported a 4.3% increase in like-for-like sales across its managed pubs and hotels business for the six weeks encompassing Christmas and new year.
Meanwhile, like-for-like sales for the past 42 weeks to January 14 increased by 2.5% as it saw higher sales of food, drink and overnight accommodation.
However, Fuller's' tenanted pub business has seen like-for-like profits decrease by 3% for the period.
imon Emeny, chief executive of the business, said he has been "very pleased" with company's recent trading performance amid a period of transition.
The company has undergone a major transformation after it completed the sale of its brewing business to Japan's Asahi for £250 million last year.
Following the brewing business sale, the company returned some capital to shareholders but has also invested in new pubs through refurbishments and acquisitions.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article