Category Archives: Business

Spanish shipbuilder Navantia in exclusive talks to buy Harland & Wolff

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Deal to rescue owner of four UK shipyards, including Belfast shipyard that built the Titanic, could save up to 1,000 jobs

Spanish shipbuilding firm Navantia is in exclusive negotiations to buy Harland & Wolff, the owner of the Belfast shipyard that built the Titanic, in a deal that could rescue up to 1,000 jobs.

It is understood the group could take control of the group’s four yards – in Belfast; Appledore, Devon; Arnish on the Isle of Lewis; and Methil, Fife – as early as next month.

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Budget could include rise in employers’ national insurance, minister suggests

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Jonathan Reynolds says Labour pledge not to increase NICs applies to employees and does not rule out other changes

The business secretary has said Labour’s manifesto pledge not to raise national insurance applied to employees but he did not rule out raising employers’ contributions in the budget.

Speaking on Sky’s Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, Jonathan Reynolds was asked if the pledge applied to employees’ and employers’ national insurance contributions (NICs).

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Business Council blames slow local decision-making for feeding Australia’s housing supply crisis

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Peak business body proposes deadlines to ‘speed up’ local councils, saying delays are making developers reluctant to invest

Local councils would be forced to set deadlines for deciding on housing development applications and lose approval rights if they cannot stick to them, under a proposal from the national peak body representing big business.

The Business Council of Australia (BCA) is urging state governments to force local councils to consult housing development proponents and set agreed deadlines, case by case, for ruling on their applications – then be held accountable for meeting them.

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BHP to face 620,000 claimants in Mariana dam collapse trial in London

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Claimants seeking damages from Anglo-Australian mining company over 2015 environmental disaster in Brazil

The mother of a seven-year-old boy who was torn from the arms of his grandmother and drowned in one of Brazil’s worst environmental disasters is among more than 620,000 claimants who will have their case heard this month in the largest group claim in English legal history.

Gelvana Aparecida Rodrigues da Silva, 37, lost her son Thiago on 5 November 2015 when the Fundão dam, near Mariana in eastern Brazil, collapsed, releasing about 50m cubic metres of toxic waste.

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Starmer steps into cabinet row over P&O to rescue global summit in London

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The PM has backed transport secretary Louise Haigh after she called ferry firm a ‘rogue operator’, threatening investment summit

Keir Starmer expressed his full confidence on Saturday in the transport secretary, Louise Haigh, after an explosive cabinet row cast fresh doubt over his Downing Street operation and threatened to overshadow a key international investment summit in London.

Government sources said the prime minister and Haigh had spoken and made up on Saturday after Starmer appeared to rebuke her on Friday for branding P&O Ferries a “rogue operator” in a statement and then calling for customers to boycott the company in a subsequent media interview.

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Stop pushing heat pumps or face major backlash, green energy magnate tells Labour

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Party donor Dale Vince warns that urging homeowners to switch to clean-power technology risks political storm bigger than Ulez

The government risks a huge political backlash if it keeps pushing the public to install heat pumps to replace their boilers, one of Britain’s leading green entrepreneurs has warned.

Dale Vince, a major Labour donor and renewable energy advocate, called on Keir Starmer to rethink national programmes, championed by Boris Johnson, pushing the technology. Vince argued that Whitehall should explore alternatives to the devices, which he said were expensive, caused serious disruption and could end up increasing energy bills for some people.

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Calls for investigation of Uber Eats and Deliveroo after raid on Bristol caravan camp

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Migrant workers accuse Home Office of targeting the victims of labour exploitation rather than companies profiting from them

Migrant workers living in a caravan encampment raided by immigration enforcement officers have accused the Home Office of targeting the victims of labour exploitation rather than companies profiting from the hidden economy.

The Observer reported in August that about 30 mainly Brazilian delivery riders working for large companies such as Deliveroo and Uber Eats were living in dilapidated caravans in the centre of Bristol. Many claimed they were, in effect, earning below the minimum wage and could not afford to rent in the city.

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Private equity barons lean on Rachel Reeves to water down proposals for higher taxes

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With the budget and Starmer’s investment summit approaching, the industry’s lobbyists are in full cry over ‘carried interest’

When the future deputy prime minister Angela Rayner walked the floor of a bespoke kitchen outfitter’s warehouse in October 2022, she was doing more than gladhanding local workers in her Greater Manchester constituency.

The real reason Rayner had been invited to tour Goyt Kitchen Fabrications in Ashton-under-Lyne was not to see how the firm had fared through the Covid pandemic, but to be sold the benefits of private equity. Goyt’s bosses had taken a £200,000 investment from Welsh-government-backed FW Capital.

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Woman who did not get leaving card loses UK employment claim

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Karen Conaghan brought 40 complaints to tribunal including for sexual harassment and victimisation

A woman who sued her former employer over not being given a leaving card lost her case when it was revealed it had been hidden from her after only three people signed it.

Karen Conaghan claimed that the “failure to acknowledge her existence” at IAG, the parent company of British Airways, was a breach of equality law.

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Insurance is failing hurricane survivors: ‘People thought they were covered’

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Flooding is separate from typical US home insurance and many homeowners are not adequately covered

As millions of US residents begin working to file insurance claims on their homes in the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, many could be denied, particularly if their homes were damaged by flooding.

A quirk in the US home insurance market is that flood insurance is separate from typical home insurance, which usually covers wind damage from hurricanes but not flooding. Homeowners must purchase flood insurance separately if they want their homes protected against flooding.

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Monster pickup trucks accelerate into Europe as sales rise despite safety fears

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A Dodge Ram 1500 is bigger than a Panzer I tank and campaigners say heavy trucks are ‘lethal’ in collisions

The engines rev, the guitars thrum and a gruff narrator lays out why the vehicle occupying the driveway is more than just a machine. “A truck is a tool,” he says, “but a Ram – a Ram is life.”

So begins an advert for the Ram 1500, a pickup truck slightly bigger than the Panzer I tanks of Nazi Germany and almost as heavy. It is growing in popularity in Europe, with the number of Rams arriving on the continent up 20% in 2023 from the year before, according to registration data from the European Environment Agency. Road safety and environmental campaigners in the UK and Europe are aghast as the latest, most extreme cases of North American car bloat – giant pickup trucks – are increasingly crossing the Atlantic.

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Tesla’s value drops $60bn after investors fail to hail self-driving ‘Cybercab’

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Analysts criticise lack of detail about the ‘robotaxi’ showcased by CEO Elon Musk

Tesla shares have fallen by 8%, wiping about $60bn (£45bn) from the company’s value, after the long-awaited unveiling of its so-called robotaxi failed to excite investors.

Shares in the electric carmaker fell to $219.40 in early trading on Friday after an event in Hollywood, where the chief executive, Elon Musk, revealed a much-hyped driverless vehicle.

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Poacher turned gamekeeper: the gambler who turned tables on bookies and lobbies for UK tax rise

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Multimillionaire Derek Webb, a Labour donor, goes all-in with support for levy on online casinos and bookmakers

As a former professional poker player, Derek Webb is used to rising from the table holding more chips than he started with.

Vanquished opponents are left scratching their heads, wondering how they have been bested by a softly spoken, bespectacled septuagenarian with a Derby accent.

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Labour considers up to £3bn tax raid on gambling firms

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Treasury weighing proposals as chancellor attempts to plug £22bn hole in public finances

Ministers are considering a tax raid of up to £3bn on the gambling sector as Rachel Reeves casts around for funds to shore up the public finances.

Treasury officials are understood to be weighing up proposals, put forward by two influential thinktanks and backed by one of the party’s top five individual donors, to double some of the taxes levied on online casinos and bookmakers.

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Tanya Plibersek defends Aboriginal heritage order blocking ‘irreversible damage’ of goldmine tailings dam

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Financial impact on mining company does not outweigh ‘permanent loss’ to cultural sites, environment minister says

Tanya Plibersek has defended her decision to issue an Aboriginal heritage protection order for the site of a proposed goldmine near Blayney, saying the financial impact on the mining company does not outweigh “irreversible damage and permanent loss” to Aboriginal cultural heritage sites.

The environment minister made a partial declaration under section 10 of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act in August, blocking a proposal by mining company Regis Resources to build a tailings dam for its $900m McPhillamys gold project in the headwaters of the Belubula River. The declaration did not cover the rest of the proposed mining area.

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Australia news live: QLD LNP leader says end of coal before 2030s ‘fanciful’; patients at Sydney GP given less-effective vaccines

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The LNP leader, David Crisafulli, appears to be walking away from a commitment to 75% emissions reduction by 2035. Follow today’s news live

Rowland questioned on gambling ad ban

Michelle Rowland was also asked why it has taken 16 months for the government – as yet – to make no decision on gambling ads. The communications minister said the government has “been working diligently in this space” but action “should have been taken on this some 10 years ago”.

We’re working very closely with the states and territories because the vast majority of recommendations in our late colleague Peta Murphy’s report go to issues that go across commonwealth and state jurisdictions.

We’re also working very closely to ensure that there are no unintended consequences here and it’s actually effective.

We have every anticipation that we will be able to respond comprehensively this year and that’s what we’re working towards as a government.

We will be taking advice on the appropriate form in which that can be done. Legislation is obviously an option because there is an interactive gambling act at the commonwealth level, which enables some of these approaches to be implemented.

There will be penalty for the platforms just as they are now in the Online Safety Act … These penalties will be drafted and, as I said, we’re currently reviewing the Online Safety Act because the penalties as they stand … the maximum penalties are less than $1 million for some offences.

They are being challenged but, at the same time, the industry does understand the need to comply here and, by and large, does comply with the rules under the Online Safety Act.

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Green energy firms promise more than £24bn of new investment in Britain

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Industry bosses to meet prime minister before government’s international investment summit next week

The leaders of the world’s biggest green energy companies have promised more than £24bn of new private investment across Great Britain ahead of a meeting with the prime minister on Friday.

Keir Starmer is expected to meet the green energy bosses on the sidelines of the first Council of Nations and Regions in Edinburgh to discuss the multibillion-pound projects just days before the government’s international investment summit next week.

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Portugal pauses audacious plan for decade of tax breaks for young people

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Measure designed to stem brain drain is pulled from budget at last minute amid conflict between coalition partners

Portugal has paused plans intended to stem the country’s brain drain by offering young people a decade of progressive tax breaks that would have seen them paying nothing at all in their first year of work.

The proposal, advanced by the centre-right minority government of Luís Montenegro, had been one of the most eye-catching schemes in Portugal’s 2025 budget.

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Unilever sells Russian business after pressure from campaigners

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Dove maker’s deal with local manufacturer Arnest Group includes four factories

Unilever has sold off its Russian operations to a local manufacturing group after pressure from campaigners who claimed that the presence of the Dove and Ben & Jerry’s owner in the country was supporting the war in Ukraine.

Arnest Group, a Russian manufacturer of perfume, cosmetics and household products will take control of Unilever Rus, which includes four factories, as well as the group’s interests in Belarus. Arnest is owned by the businessman Alexey Sagal and bought the brewer Heineken’s business in the country last summer.

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Australia politics live: Richard Marles tells question time ‘I feel very sad that events have got to where they have’ after chief of staff’s bullying allegations

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Follow today’s news live

The opposition communications spokesperson, David Coleman, is speaking to ABC radio RN, criticising the government’s legislation designed to keep the NBN in public hands.

He is having trouble saying whether the opposition will support the bill, or whether a future Coalition government would want to sell the NBN.

We’re not going to just sort of immediately jump at some silly theatrical statement from the government. The adults in the room will review this in a normal way.

We’ve got no intention of changing the ownership structure of the NBN. Nobody does. And frankly, because the NBN is going so badly, there’s not exactly a lineup of people [wanting to buy it].

Parents are crying out for a degree of certainty, they’re crying out for government guidance, a lot more rule that people can follow. That doesn’t mean there won’t be challenging but at least provides a starting point for parents. It gives them a tool about how to address this and parents who have gone through all this and all the pain that social media can place upon their children, they’re the ones I think are the most powerful advocates for this reform.

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