Sajid Javid weighing up tax raid on high earners February 8, 2020 Sajid Javid is considering a tax raid on higher earners in his March budgets to help fund Boris Johnson’s plan to “level up” the economy. The chancellor is said to be committed to making the tax system “fair and efficient”. Insiders have told the Financial Times, Javid is weighing up reforms that would hit the [...]
Trump fires two impeachment witnesses February 8, 2020 US President Donald Trump has removed two senior officials from their posts after they testified against him at his impeachment trial. The US Ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, issued a statement on Friday saying he had been recalled from his post by the president. Sondland, who was a Trump political donor before being [...]
China tells Trump ‘no effort spared’ on fighting coronavirus after doctor’s death February 7, 2020 Chinese President Xi Jinping told his US counterpart that everything possible was being done to contain the spread of the coronavirus following an outcry over the death of a doctor who had warned of the impending epidemic. The death toll currently stands at just under 650 people, including Dr Li Wenliang, who had been threatened [...]
Landlord row forces House of Fraser to close another store February 6, 2020 Sports Direct boss Mike Ashley has been forced to close another House of Fraser store after being served notice by the landlord. The branch in Dundrum, near Dublin, will close within the next three months after the property’s landlord agreed a deal with Brown Thomas and Primark. Ashley warned in December that it was likely [...]
Republicans acquit Donald Trump in impeachment trial February 6, 2020 President Donald Trump was acquitted yesterday in his Senate impeachment trial, saved by fellow Republicans who rallied to protect him nine months before he asks voters in a deeply divided America to give him a second White House term. The businessman-turned-politician, 73, survived only the third presidential impeachment trial in U.S. history – just like [...]
Trump’s peace plan has shifted the Palestinian direction of travel February 5, 2020 History is usually a cruel mistress to its losers, particularly in the case of peoples attempting to create new nations who failed in their aspirations. Not much is heard today of the Republic of Biafra, for example, an attempt led largely by the Igbo people to create an independent state carved out of Nigeria’s eastern [...]
Champion of free trade? Prime Minister Boris Johnson must match rhetoric with action February 5, 2020 For believers in free trade, Boris Johnson’s speech in the Painted Hall on Monday was, in many ways, highly encouraging. The Prime Minister emphasised the role that free trade has played in lifting some of the poorest people on the planet out of poverty, name-checked Adam Smith and his invisible hand of the market, and [...]
Michael Gove doesn’t know how much charging points will cost UK February 4, 2020 Michael Gove has failed to say how much it will cost the government to build charging points to support the widespread use of electric cars by 2035. The Prime Minister today pushed forward the date by which all petrol, diesel and hybrid vehicles will be replaced by electric cars to 2035 at the latest. That [...]
The PM’s posturing and fighting stance could upset trade talks before they’ve even begun February 4, 2020 The tears of joy and sadness seen on Brexit Day had barely dried before the UK and EU were at each other’s throats again ahead of trade talks set to last until the end of the year. Yesterday, both the UK and EU set out their negotiating positions, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson blithely stating [...]
Boris Johnson’s disastrous Huawei decision is an act of national self-harm February 3, 2020 Powerful US Republican senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas put it best. Letting the state-sponsored Chinese technology firm Huawei build even a portion of Britain’s 5G network — as the Prime Minister nonsensically decided to do last week — is quite a bit like letting the KGB construct the British phone systems in the 1980s. At [...]