Britain’s housebuilders are calling for the return of the Help to Buy scheme to light a fire under a slowing housing market and avert a dramatic plunge in the supply of new homes. Trade body the Home Builders Federation (HBF) is writing to the Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, to reintroduce help for first-time buyers at the […]
Rishi Sunak has sacked Nadhim Zahawi for serious breaches of the ministerial code after an investigation found he failed to be honest and open about his tax affairs. Sir Laurie Magnus, the independent adviser on ministers’ interests, said that Zahawi had repeatedly failed to disclose details about an HMRC investigation into his tax affairs. Zahawi […]
Pressure on the Tory Party chairman increases as the head of HMRC says there are no penalties for ‘innocent errors’. Nadhim Zahawi has authorised HM Revenue & Customs to pass details of his tax affairs to the Prime Minister’s ethics adviser – who is investigating if he broke the rules for ministers – as Rishi […]
TSB’s 5,700 staff and executives are to share a 10% bigger bonus pot this year, after rising interest rates pushed the bank’s annual profits to record highs. The high street lender confirmed the pool had risen to £29.8m, up from the £27m distributed a year earlier. For most staff, that will mean collecting bonuses worth […]
NatWest is to shut another 23 branches in England and Wales, adding to a raft of high street banking closures already announced this month. The sites will close in the first half of this year. The bank said the closures were due to more customers moving to mobile and online banking. It comes a week […]
Shell has put more than 2,000 jobs in the UK at risk after launching a “strategic review” of its domestic energy and telecoms supply division. The oil and gas supermajor said on Thursday that it had told staff in Shell Energy, which has operations in the UK, the Netherlands and Germany, that it has begun […]
British taxpayers have become shareholders in a further 53 companies backed by a government rescue funding scheme. These firms include a company that makes carbon negative period products, a firm producing meat cultivated directly from cells without the use of animals, and a “holistic” whisky distiller. The British Business Bank’s Future Fund was set up […]
The chain announced last year that it would be selling nearly 40 of its pubs due to the combined impact of the pandemic and soaring prices. It said more closures would be on the cards in November after sales dropped 1.1 per cent. So far, 11 of the pubs have been sold off, with them […]
The highest taxpayers in the UK include a scrap metal dealer, JK Rowling, the founder of Gymshark, Sting and the Duke of Westminster. When taken together the 100 wealthy individuals or families revealed in this year’s Sunday Times tax list were liable for a total of £5.181bn of UK tax last year. The fifth edition […]
Strike action at Royal Mail has cost the besieged postal company about £200 million, sending it to a large operating loss. International Distributions Services (IDS), the recently renamed parent company, posted operating losses at Royal Mail, its UK business, of £295 million for the first nine months of its financial year as it was laid […]