PM Starmer asked to back £500m Alexandra Palace darts injection February 11, 2026 Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been called upon to contribute to a £500m, one-off private-public cash injection to keep darts at Alexandra Palace. The north London venue first hosted the World Darts Championship in 2007 but a move away from the venue has been touted by tournament organisers Matchroom, with the sport exploding in popularity [...]
Real Madrid decision sounds death knell for European Super League February 11, 2026 Real Madrid have become the final club to abandon the ailing European Super League project in a move that effectively kills off any prospect of a breakaway football competition in the foreseeable future. It follows talks between Real Madrid, governing body Uefa and influential umbrella group European Football Clubs leading to an “agreement of principles”, [...]
Lloyds to close 95 more bank branches across UK February 11, 2026 Lloyds Banking Group is set to make a further full to its branch network with 95 sites face the shutter. The FTSE 100 banking giant announced the fresh closures on Wednesday, which will affect Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland sites. The closures will take place between May 2026 and March 2027. Lloyds will take [...]
Landlords ‘underestimated’ scale of business rates overhaul February 11, 2026 The architect of Labour’s business rates overhaul has blamed the political backlash to the controversial policy on landlords and industry chiefs not fully understanding that a pandemic-related subsidy was coming to an end. Treasury minister Dan Tomlinson told MPs that business owners were taken off-guard by the scale of their tax rise because they weren’t [...]
British Gas boss: Electricity bills to top Ukraine war heights February 11, 2026 Electricity bills will be higher in 2030 than in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the boss of British Gas has warned, as the government pushes through major upgrades to the UK’s grid infrastructure. Chris O’Shea, chief executive of British Gas-owner Centrica, said the UK was playing catch-up after years of underinvestment, and [...]
Tiktok parent Bytedance joins race to build in-house AI chips February 11, 2026 China’s Bytedance is stepping up its own silicon push with plans to produce at least 100,000 AI chips this year. The move comes as tech giants scramble to cut their reliance on market leader Nvidia, and lock in scarce computing power. The Tiktok creator is reportedly in talks with Samsung Electronics to manufacture the processor, [...]
CVC’s Global Sport Group to announce deal with Gordon Brown-linked Pimco February 11, 2026 CVC Capital Partners’ new sporting arm Global Sport Group is set to announce a deal with Gordon Brown-associated asset management group Pimco. The deal will see the firm which manages around $2 trillion in assets heavily involved in debt financing, according to Sky News’ Mark Kleinman. The senior debt financing is set to be worth [...]
Starmer only cares about victims ‘to save his skin’, Badenoch blasts February 11, 2026 Sir Keir Starmer faced a brutal grilling at Prime Minister’s Questions on Monday where Kemi Badenoch accused the Prime Minister of only caring about victims of sexual abuse “to save his skin”. In a fiery exchange that was highly party-political but light on policy, the Labour leader said he had “accepted responsibility and apologised for [...]
Mind the G: Guinness takes over tube platforms in TfL brand deal February 11, 2026 Commuters with sore heads and a creeping sense of dread may fear they’ve seen a mirage when alighting from the Northern Line platforms at Tottenham Court Road for the next week. Eleven tube route maps in the station have been temporarily resigned to mimic a pint of Guinness in Transport for London’s (TfL) latest advertising [...]
Make toilets beautiful again! February 11, 2026 Britain is in the midst of a public toilet crisis. Roderick Bates makes the case for making toilets plentiful - and beautiful again.