News

Complacency about productivity improvements is holding back UK businesses compared with most of their G7 counterparts, according to a business survey. A poll of more than 4,000 G7 business leaders by the government-backed charity Be the Business revealed a stark gap between the confidence of small and medium-sized UK companies and their actual capabilities.  The

Jacques-Louis David’s painting of Napoleon crossing the alps. The enduring achievements of the former French leader are largely bureaucratic, not military, successes To judge by the trailer, Ridley Scott’s biopic of Napoleon will entertain, inspire and extravagantly miss the point. But then so did the paintings of the same subject by Jacques-Louis David. Napoleon wasn’t,

The author is a member of the House of Lords, chairman of geopolitical advisory for Rothschild & Co and a former UK national security adviser Last week’s Nato summit had three tasks: consolidate support for Ukraine; strengthen the alliance’s military capabilities; and deepen ties with Pacific allies in facing the common challenge of China. Did it

Tesla co-founder JB Straubel’s battery recycling start-up is in talks to raise $700mn in a deal that would value it at almost $5bn and help fund the company’s first major plant in Nevada. Straubel established Redwood Materials in 2017 to reshape the supply chain for electric vehicles by recycling the materials in batteries and reducing

Saudi Arabia and Turkey are seeking to broker a deal to repatriate Ukrainian children taken to Russia and held in children’s homes or adopted by Russian families, according to four people familiar with the talks. Officials in Kyiv and Moscow are compiling lists of the thousands of children moved to Russia since President Vladimir Putin’s

UK grocery price inflation eased for a fourth consecutive month in July to the lowest rate this year, according to research published on Tuesday. The annual pace of grocery price growth eased to 14.9 per cent in the four weeks to July 9, down from 16.5 per cent in the previous month, according to research

European stocks rose slightly on Tuesday, as investors turned attention to company earnings and US retail sales data, as they hope to gauge how the corporate world had fared after more than a year of rising global interest rates. Europe’s region-wide Stoxx 600 added 0.2 per cent, recouping losses from the previous session, while Germany’s

One of China’s most populous provinces has deleted mortality data that offered an indication of the heavy death toll from Beijing’s relaxation of Covid-19 controls at the end of last year. The statistics reported by Zhejiang province on Thursday showed the number of cremations in the wealthy coastal region during the first quarter of the

Thames Water’s biggest investor slashed the value of its stake last year, raising questions about how easy it will be for the indebted UK utility to persuade shareholders to inject much needed equity.  The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System, one of Canada’s biggest public sector pension funds, owns a 31 per cent stake in Thames

Rows of cars stretched in every direction from a customs office building on the outskirts of Gyumri, Armenia’s second city. Many were missing a bumper; some had squashed fenders or doors taped up with plastic bags. Young Russian men roamed between the vehicles. For them, this corner of the Caucasus has become a key stop

Economists have spent a lot of time lately thinking about the implications of “excess savings”: money that households built up during the pandemic when they were locked down with nothing but Netflix and sourdough kits to spend their cash on. But it’s worth remembering that not everyone could stay at home and a large number

The writer is president of Queens’ College, Cambridge, and an adviser to Allianz and Gramercy Excessive wage increases are increasingly being framed as the sole cause of a UK inflation problem that is causing mortgage difficulties and forcing families to make tough choices with their shrinking purchasing power. While this message gained traction recently due

British government ministers are fond of reminding voters that the UK has the second-most Nobel laureates of any nation and four of the world’s top 20 universities. It is a comforting counter-narrative in an era when the country seems to be struggling to keep up with developed-country peers on everything from productivity growth to healthcare

7/18/2023, 12:22:14 AM Australian state cancels Commonwealth Games hosting over spiralling costs Nic Fildes in Sydney The Australian state of Victoria has cancelled plans to host the 2026 Commonwealth Games due to the event’s spiralling costs. Daniel Andrews, Victoria’s premier, said the budget had blown out to A$7bn ($4.8bn) from an initial forecast of A$2.6bn.

The International Energy Agency has warned Europe could still face a very difficult winter if Russia cuts its remaining gas supplies to the continent and if the region experiences cold weather. The IEA said that even if Europe’s gas storage sites are filled close to 100 per cent of capacity before October — the expectation

The UK’s financial regulator and information watchdog will warn banks that they cannot hide behind data protection rules if they fail to alert savers to better deals. Under pressure to pass on the benefits of higher rates, banks told the Financial Conduct Authority at a meeting earlier this month that they could not tell certain

The UK’s financial regulator has proposed new guidance governing how financial products can be marketed on social media platforms to limit what it described as “significant consumer harm” from unsuitable and illegal promotions. In a consultation that began on Monday, the Financial Conduct Authority said its new consumer duty — which requires banks, insurers and

The writer sits on the Civil Justice Council and the UK Ministry of Justice’s senior data governance panel ChatGPT, the technology that launched a thousand quandaries, has now reached the attention of the most senior judges in the UK. This month, the House of Lords constitution committee heard evidence from the president of the Supreme Court.

Moscow-installed authorities in Crimea have halted traffic on the bridge connecting the occupied peninsula to Russia after a Ukrainian attack that caused parts of it to collapse early on Monday, killing two people. A Ukraine intelligence source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said the SBU — the country’s

What would a press secretary in a Russian embassy in the west be forwarding to the Kremlin these days? The question was posed to me by a German official early in Ukraine’s counteroffensive. I was reminded of this during the Nato summit last week — and even more so after the revelation of talks between

Microsoft will next week face its first formal EU antitrust investigation in 15 years over claims the US tech giant is unfairly tying its video conferencing app Teams with its popular Office software. The push from the European Commission, the EU’s executive body, comes after Microsoft’s concessions to appease competition concerns proved insufficient, four people