Brussels’ health check of member states sharply cuts UK forecast to 1.5% as eurozone enjoys best year since financial crisis of 2007The European commission enters key Brexit talks with the government with the eurozone economy in its best shape for a decade and activity in the UK weaker than expected six months ago.In its half-yearly health check, the commission sharply cut its forecast for UK growth this year and said it was likely to continue struggling in 2018 and 2019 even on the assumption that trade would not be disrupted by its departure from the EU.Related: EC slashes UK growth forecasts but sees best eurozone growth in a decade - business live Continue reading...

Research by IPPR North shows northern regions are more dependent on trade with EU than the south

Bank of England and businesses say firms raising wage offers to find staff, as level of unemployment drops and Brexit vote cuts number of EU workers in UKA shortage of factory workers is starting to push up pay rates but wage rises in the services sector remain rooted at around 2%, according to the latest feedback from the Bank of England’s regional agents.The central bank said its agents, which are based in offices across the country, found that shortages this month across the manufacturing sector were leading to a “slight increase in pay growth” that would take average rate of pay rises up by half a percent, from 2-3% this year to 2.5%-3.5% in 2018.Related: UK firms expect higher pay rises, as Brexit hits investment plans - business live Continue reading...

Heather Stewart is joined by Juliette Garside, Hilary Osborne, Phillip Inman and Nicholas Shaxson to discuss the industrial-scale tax avoidance revealed in the Paradise Papers leak. Plus Mark Wallace of ConservativeHome on the government’s latest week from hellAfter another leak from an offshore law firm, tax avoidance is back on the political agenda this week. The Paradise Papers investigation by the Guardian and others has shone a light on the vast offshore industry based in many of the UK’s crown dependencies. Even the Queen and Prince Charles have been shown to hold offshore investments via their private trusts.Joining Heather Stewart to discuss it all are the Guardian reporters Juliette Garside and Hilary Osborne, the Observer’s economics editor, Phillip Inman, and the author of Treasure Islands, Nicholas Shaxson. Continue reading...

Watchdog warns plans for reduction in tax credits will take heavy toll on households facing cuts in hours or lower wagesWorking families on low incomes will be among the biggest losers when the next recession hits, after their finances were weakened by welfare spending cuts in the wake of the 2008 financial crash.The Institute for Fiscal Studies, a leading tax and spending watchdog, said plans for a reduction in tax credits – which boost the incomes of low paid workers – will take a particularly large toll on households where one or more adults face cuts in hours or lower wages.Related: Families thousands of pounds worse off after years of cuts, study finds Continue reading...

Join our panel discussion on the future of work and take part in our masterclass on creative thinking in London on Tuesday 16 January 2018, 6pm-9pmThe Guardian Business Made Simple events series comes to London with an expert masterclass and panel debate on Tuesday 16 January 2018. You can sign up below.The panel discussion, which will be chaired by the Guardian’s economics editor, Larry Elliott, will explore the workplace of the future. Continue reading...

Tory MP Anna Soubry accuses government of ‘gross contempt’ after Commons motion demanded immediate publicationThe government will take up to three weeks to release dozens of papers detailing the economic impact of Brexit despite a Commons motion demanding their immediate publication, ministers said on Tuesday.The announcement prompted Labour to accuse the government of using “semantics and double-speak” to ignore the will of MPs. It also brought criticism from some Conservatives with one, Anna Soubry, calling the move a “gross contempt” of parliament.Related: Are we happier after the Brexit vote? Only in England, official figures claim Continue reading...

A fierce focus on contracts, competition and outsourcing has leached away the spirit and energy of volunteering and community actionEveryone wants a harmonious relationship between councils and the voluntary sector. The Lords committee on charities, chaired by Michael Bichard, published a report (pdf) in March (which still awaits a response from ministers) hailing a genuine partnership approach. Commentators such as John Tizard, who knows both sides well, continue to produce recipes for collaboration, while Julia Unwin’s inquiry hopes for peace and tranquillity.Related: Charities and Brexit: where are we now?Related: Two-thirds of charities subsidising public sector contracts to surviveThere are endless tales about harsh funding regimes, with smaller organisations feeling squeezed and marginalisedRelated: The best way for charities to spend money is to challenge austerity | Fiona Weir Continue reading...

ONS detects small rise in England for life satisfaction, wellbeing and happiness but Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland stay flatThe UK has become a happier place since the Brexit vote, according to official figures, but the country’s bonhomie is entirely driven by an uptick in England’s mood as wellbeing in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland stayed flat.Key barometers of happiness and wellbeing measured by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed small improvements over the year to the end of June – the first 12-month period since the EU referendum.Related: Business Today: sign up for a morning shot of financial newsRelated: They voted for Brexit in a cry of pain – what happened to the left-behind? | John Harris Continue reading...

Economy is facing significant risks which could be exacerbated by unexpected developments, says National Audit Office reportPhilip Hammond, the chancellor, has been warned by Whitehall’s spending watchdog that continuing uncertainty over Brexit could jeopardise the public finances.In a report released on Tuesday, the National Audit Office (NAO) says high levels of government borrowing since the financial crash meant there are already significant risks to the UK’s finances.

Allowing the very richest to secede from the rest of society and choose the jurisdiction they operate under has led to an astonishing rise in global inequalityThe millions of leaked files in the Paradise Papers once again shine a bright light on where the uber-elite stash their cash. Until very recently the hidden web of investments made by the super-rich operated in the comforting darkness offered by secretive tax shelters. The disinfecting sunlight provided by whistleblowing-led investigations since 2013 has fundamentally altered how the world looks at, and regulates, tax affairs. Last year’s Panama Papers cost the leaders of Iceland and Pakistan their jobs. More than a dozen nations have changed their laws and the offshore law firm at the heart of the Panama Papers closed offices in tax havens. It is work that is both necessary and brave: one of the journalists involved in investigating the Panama Papers was blown up by a car bomb last month.This latest dump of data centres around the Bermudian law firm Appleby, a 119-year-old operation favoured by the global super-rich and big corporations, as well as the Singaporean company Asiaciti Trust and the mostly opaque company registries of 19 tax havens. The first stories have already generated global headlines: about why millions of pounds from the Queen’s private estate went into an offshore portfolio which included an investment in the retailer BrightHouse, criticised for exploiting poor families with high-interest loans to purchase white goods; and about why anti-poverty campaigner Bono has so much money he didn’t know some of it bought a piece of a Lithuanian shopping centre via a tax haven. Continue reading...

Native English speakers can’t simply rely on the rest of the world’s desire to learn their language, say Gabrielle Hogan-Brun and Jennifer Jenkins, while Jane Sjögren quotes Nelson Mandela on the importance of linguistic skills and Trevor Stevens says learning a foreign language should be compulsory at GCSEThe UK is not only “mired in the relegation zone of European linguistic proficiency” (Editorial, 4 November); there is also an enormous cost to British businesses from reliance on English. Government figures show that the UK economy loses about £50bn a year in failed contracts because of a lack of language skills in the workforce. Yet studies abroad show that GDP can increase by about 10% if native bilingualism is exploited. But that is not all that is lost. In the words of Richard Hardie, senior adviser of the investment bank UBS: “A deep understanding of foreign languages is often essential to the combination of cajolery and seduction many companies require in their international negotiations.”Native English speakers cannot simply rely on the rest of the world’s desire to learn their language. Just as monolingual Britons will not grasp the subtleties of interactions in international business, they will not know what gets lost in translation either. After Brexit, trade agreements with China, Russia and other developing markets will lead to missed deals for the UK if negotiations are only conducted in English. Continue reading...

Unless urgent changes are made to increase benefits and tax credits, and reform universal credit, the impact on poor families will be devastating, says Mike Stein. Meanwhile, David Higdon is shocked to find a woman at the checkout in tearsThe Institute for Fiscal Studies research predicting increases in child poverty to 37% over the next five years lays bare the current role of fiscal welfare in exploiting the poorest members of society through punishment, deterrence and regulation (Benefit cuts to leave 5m children in poverty, 2 November). Unless urgent changes are made to increase benefit and tax credit levels and reform universal credit, the impact on poor parents will be devastating. Research from the Nuffield Foundation has shown that pressures of poverty are associated with more children being placed on child protection plans and removed from their families. The impact of these benefit cuts will be greatly intensified by the severity of the government’s austerity measures, including reductions in essential services to support vulnerable children, families and young people.

Alan Partridge | Celtic’s undefeated run | Adam Smith Institute | M&S fashion | Dirty-old-men-ocracy? | Theresa May at churchPeter Bradshaw’s timely reminder about the re-emergence of Alan Partridge in Brexit Britain (The revenge of Alan Partridge, G2, 6 November) is underlined by the inclusion in recent TV schedules of such absurd real-life programmes as The Ganges with Sue Perkins and Gordon Ramsey on Cocaine, which might have been dreamed up by the great man in a previous television incarnation. Alan’s previous suggestions of Youth Hostelling with Chris Eubank and Monkey Tennis are surely now ripe for production.

British exporters could lose billions after two-thirds of EU firms saying they expect to move part of supply chain out of UKBritish exporters have been put on notice that they could lose billions of pounds worth of business after almost two-thirds of EU businesses who work with UK suppliers warned they expect to use more firms inside the single market after Brexit.The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS) said 63% of the EU companies surveyed last month said they planned to move some of their supply chain out of the UK as a result of the decision to leave the single market and customs union. The results represent a large increase on a survey in May, when 44% of EU businesses said they were preparing to switch.A hard Brexit would take Britain out of the EU’s single market and customs union and ends its obligations to respect the four freedoms, make big EU budget payments and accept the jurisdiction of the ECJ: what Brexiters mean by “taking back control” of Britain’s borders, laws and money. It would mean a return of trade tariffs, depending on what (if any) FTA was agreed. See our full Brexit phrasebook.Related: Business Today: sign up for a morning shot of financial newsRelated: UK firms want a Brexit transition deal by March Continue reading...

Economics is gripped by its own mystery drama: why are central banks setting interest rates on the basis of a seemingly broken economic model?As mysteries go, it doesn’t rank with Murder on the Orient Express or the identity of Gerald the mole in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy but the economics profession is currently gripped by its own drama.This story won’t make it to the silver screen with starring roles for Kenneth Branagh or Judi Dench, but a lot depends on how it ends. For central banks, in particular, the question of Who Killed the Phillips Curve? is a nail-biter. They badly want to know how it ends.Inflation is when prices rise. Deflation is the opposite – price decreases over time – but inflation is far more common.Related: Business Today: sign up for a morning shot of financial newsRelated: Struggling Brexit Britain can barely afford this rise in rates Continue reading...

Ten years of austerity has put the UK in the doldrums: that fact, coupled with the referendum, means there is scarcely a need to dampen things down furtherYou can look at it two ways. After ten years of inertia, Bank rate has doubled. Or: after 10 years of inertia, Bank rate has been raised by one quarter of one per cent, to half of one per cent. Big deal!Of course, for most businesses and individuals, the official rate is meaningless. It is the rate to which everything else is geared, but everything else is usually a lot higher than 0.25% or 0.5%. We read reports daily of how so many desperate borrowers find themselves struggling to pay the usurious interest rates associated with credit card debt. Continue reading...

Australia shouldn’t get too smug about Donald Trump Jr’s tone-deaf Halloween tweet. We have our own capitalist idiocyOn becoming New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern said that capitalism was a blatant failure, and in light of the deluded positions taken by proponents of capitalism and free markets this week it is hard not to agree.Ardern’s comments are revealing in how she framed the question. She suggested, “If you have hundreds of thousands of children living in homes without enough to survive, that’s a blatant failure. What else could you describe it as?”Related: Donald Trump Jr schooled on Twitter after Halloween 'socialism' tweetRelated: If greedy bosses have broken capitalism, who will fix it? | Hugh MuirRelated: Unions seek dramatic pay increases to ensure minimum ‘living wage' Continue reading...

Falling profits and increasingly tough high street trading fuels expectations of a much bolder restructuring plan from M&SMarks & Spencer is expected to ramp up its store-closure plan next week as a result of falling profits and tough trading conditions on the high street.Last year M&S announced it would close 30 stores as part of an overhaul designed to slash by 10% the amount of shopfloor space devoted to its struggling clothing arm. But industry sources suggest M&S’s chief executive, Steve Rowe, has been working on a bolder restructuring plan with the new chairman, Archie Norman, before its first-half trading update on Wednesday.Related: New M&S chairman faces tough task turning round high-street institution | Shane Hickey Continue reading...

Richard Kozul-Wright and Dianna Barrowclough of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development on industrial strategyYour report (UK-wide official pledge on ‘basic infrastructure’ urged, 1 November) outlines an independent commission’s call for the British government to provide “universal basic infrastructure” for every citizen as part of an ambitious new industrial strategy. The commission’s report supports Unctad’s broader argument across many countries and contexts. Industrial strategy needs to be embraced as a long-term plan, managed strategically and embedded through government.Within hours of the report’s release, critics fretted about governments’ abilities to “pick winners” and eagerness to abuse the public purse. But with chancellor Philip Hammond’s forthcoming budget promising to boost productivity, it is timely to recall how industrial policies galvanised structural transformation in other times and places, from the Tennessee Valley Authority in the 1930s to China’s ambitious Manufacturing 2025. Continue reading...

Flurry of orders appears to bolster Bank of England decision to raise interest rates, pushing stock market index to new record highShares in Britain’s top 100 companies reached an all-time high on Friday, after buoyant sales across the services sector last month showed the economy remained resilient following the post-Brexit vote slump.A flurry of orders that appeared to bolster the Bank of England move to raise interest rates this week, helped send the FTSE 100 index to 7,560, beating the previous end of day high of 7,556 on 12 October.Related: US jobs rebound strongly in October, while FTSE 100 reaches new record close - business liveLenders have already bumped up the cost of fixed rate mortgages ahead of the Bank of England’s decision to raise base rate from 0.25% to 0.5%, and mortgage borrowers on tracker and variable rates will see their monthly payments become more expensive in the coming days. ​ Continue reading...

America’s closely watched non-farm payrolls report shows a 261,000 jobs rise in October after hurricanes triggered a sharp fall in September

Poorer families and unemployed will be especially badly hit, says thinktank report calculating cost of walking away from EU without trade dealHouseholds face increases of up to £930 in their annual shopping bills if Britain walks away from Brexit talks without a trade deal, according to new research that reveals a disproportionate impact on poorer families and the unemployed.

Jerome Powell is a sane and sober choice to succeed Janet Yellen – but he must uphold the Federal Reserve’s independenceWith the appointment of Jerome Powell as the next chair of the United States Federal Reserve, Donald Trump has made perhaps the most important single decision of his presidency. It is a sane and sober choice that heralds short-term continuity in Fed interest rate policy, and perhaps a simpler and cleaner approach to regulatory policy.Although Powell is not a PhD economist like current Fed chair Janet Yellen and her predecessor, Ben Bernanke, he has used his years as an “ordinary” governor at the Fed to gain a deep knowledge of the key issues he will face. But make no mistake: the institution Powell will now head rules the global financial system. All other central bankers, finance ministers, and even presidents run a distant second.Related: Trump names Jay Powell to replace Janet Yellen as Fed chief Continue reading...

Bank of England’s raised cost of borrowing, from 0.25% to 0.5%, may add £22 a month to average variable interest rate loansMillions of homeowners face higher mortgage payments after the Bank of England said it could no longer tolerate the inflation level and announced the first increase in interest rates in more than 10 years.Despite weak growth and mounting uncertainty over the terms of Britain’s exit from the EU, Threadneedle Street increased interest rates to 0.5% from 0.25% on Thursday, reversing emergency action taken immediately after the Brexit vote.Related: Bank of England raises UK interest rates for first time since 2007Related: UK rate rise: BoE governor Carney defends decision, pound sinks - as it happened Continue reading...

The Bank of England cut rates last year to deal with a Brexit downturn that didn’t happen but it raised rates now when the risks feel more immediateYou wait 10 years for a rise in interest rates and, when the moment finally arrives, the timing feels completely arbitrary.An easier moment to make the move would have been the start of this year. The August 2016 cut from 0.5% to 0.25% was presented as an emergency measure to prevent a post-referendum recession. When the downturn didn’t arrive – GDP growth in the final quarter of 2016 was a strong 0.7% – it would have been logical to revert to 0.5%. The Bank of England could have declared a minor victory and said it would remain vigilant on all fronts, looking for both inflationary breezes and Brexit headwinds.Related: Bank of England raises UK interest rates for first time since 2007Lenders have already bumped up the cost of fixed rate mortgages ahead of the Bank of England’s decision to raise base rate from 0.25% to 0.5%, and mortgage borrowers on tracker and variable rates will see their monthly payments become more expensive in the coming days. ​Related: BT to slash landline charges for 1 million customers Continue reading...

Threadneedle Street increases cost of borrowing from 0.25% to 0.5%, reversing emergency action after Brexit voteReaction to the interest rate riseThe Bank of England’s 0.25% rate rise sent the pound tumbling on foreign exchanges as gloomy forecasts for growth appeared to rule out the prospect of steep increases in the cost of credit before 2020.Related: What the interest rate rise will mean for youLenders have already bumped up the cost of fixed rate mortgages ahead of the Bank of England’s decision to raise base rate from 0.25% to 0.5%, and mortgage borrowers on tracker and variable rates will see their monthly payments become more expensive in the coming days. ​Related: UK interest rates raised for first time in a decade - business live Continue reading...

The Bank of England has voted to hike borrowing costs for the first time since July 2007

It might be a capitalist desire to squeeze the last remnants of humanity from its workforce, but today we have electoral tools to fight itSophia told ABC radio that robots deserved more rights than humans. It’s a statement that would be of concern should your mum announce it, yet disappointingly unremarkable if uttered by some right wing think-tanky person defending job automation on a panel show.But as Sophia is a robot herself, and one of a new robot technology generation guided by artificial intelligence that’s increasing in sophistication, the words are more than a little perturbing. Sophia is the product of Hong Kong based Hanson Robotics, and her notoriety exists not merely on the basis of her interview tactics, but because the government of Saudi Arabia has granted her citizenship rights after her recent local visit to a tech show. Many have noted that as she was provided a platform there without a male chaperone, she perhaps already has more rights than a Saudi woman. Continue reading...

The Bank has done everything to keep the failing economy moving. But this rise shows the problem lies with the government’s continued fiscal austerity

Inflation at 3% is not too convincing an argument to raise rates. More important is that the BoE’s credibility was on the lineIt’s been a long, long time coming. The last time the Bank of England raised interest rates in July 2007, Sir Mervyn King was in charge at Threadneedle Street, Barack Obama had only recently said he would run to be US president and Gordon Brown had finally replaced Tony Blair as prime minister.

Sex and Brexit obsess us, while the poverty revealed in the new IFS figures is seen as normal. Yet it’s not normal – it’s a shameful political choiceSoon more British children will be poor than since records began, back in 1961. In four years, progress will be reversed and all the good that was done undone. Over a million more will be plunged below the decency threshold.For 37% of children to be brought up poor is a national humiliation. Any politician boasting pride in “British tolerance” should include our remarkable tolerance of poverty, which exceeds all similar European countries. This is who we are and what we expect, so today’s chilling report from the Institute for Fiscal Studies didn’t make it into this morning’s BBC news bulletins. Sex and Brexit obsess us, while poverty is just normal Britishness.Osborne and Duncan Smith targeted the poorest, and the same families were struck down by cuts time and againRelated: Child poverty in Britain 'set to soar to new record' Continue reading...

A couple who bought a two-bed flat this year say they have few immediate concerns thanks to their fixed-rate dealThe size of mortgage taken out by first-time buyers Kieran Ellis, 32, and Jordan Stefanov, 29, will send shudders through many people. The couple borrowed about £450,000 in June to buy a £490,000 two-bed flat in Crystal Palace, south London – but they are relatively relaxed about the rise in interest rates.A 0.25% rise in rates adds £54 to the monthly payments on a £450,000 loan. But like the majority of young buyers Kieran and Jordan have taken out a fixed-rate mortgage – in their case pegged at just 1.8% for two years – so the rate rise has no immediate impact on their repayments, which come in at a bit below £2,000 a month.Related: What the interest rate rise will mean for you Continue reading...

The Bank of England has increased its base rate after a decade – here’s how it will affect homeowners and saversThe 0.25% rise in Bank of England base rate to 0.5% may be small, but it marks the first rise in borrowing costs for a decade. Many mortgages will rise in cost, but savers will be looking forwards to better returns.Related: 'We have a £450,000 mortgage – but we're relaxed about the interest rate rise' Continue reading...

Increase from 0.25% to 0.5% looks imminent in wake of latest good news from Britain’s manufacturing sectorThe Bank of England is on track to raise interest rates for the first time in more than a decade on Thursday after data from manufacturers strengthened the case for an increase.The industrial sector is reporting that it remains in rude health as companies benefited from strong sales in the UK last month and new export business driven by the weak pound. Combined with high inflation and record low unemployment, the figures pointed to the Bank raising the cost of borrowing from 0.25% to 0.5%. Continue reading...

IFS forecast that 37% of children will be in relative poverty by 2022 would see all progress made in the last 20 years undoneThe number of children living in poverty will soar to a record 5.2 million over the next five years as government welfare cuts bite deepest on households with young families, a leading UK thinktank has said.New research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies predicts an increase of more than a million in the number of children living in poverty, more than reversing all the progress made over the past 20 years. Continue reading...

Gender parity ‘shifting into reverse’ as World Economic Forum adds 47 years to time needed to reach workplace equalityWomen around the globe may have to wait more than two centuries to achieve equality in the workplace, according to new research.

British manufacturing strengthened in October, but the City faces up to 75,000 job losses after Brexit

Government should guarantee access to transport, schools, hospitals and digital access, says industrial strategy commissionBritain’s north-south divide should be tackled by a government pledge in its new industrial strategy to provide every citizen with decent transport, schools, hospitals and digital access, an expert body says.The independent industrial strategy commission on Wednesday urged ministers to tackle Britain’s regional imbalances by committing to universal basic infrastructure – a guaranteed standard for the whole of the UK.Related: Surge in UK consumer borrowing fuels likely interest rate rise Continue reading...

Thinktank says it is ‘almost certain’ leave vote has damaged living standards as it scales back economic growth forecastsBritish households are each more than £600 a year worse off following the vote to leave the European Union, according to one of the UK’s leading economic forecasting bodies.The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) said it is “almost certain” the leave vote has damaged living standards and hit the growth potential of the economy. The thinktank also scaled back its expectations for growth in the UK for the next three years.

A strong performance by France has helped the euro area post its strongest annual growth since the debt crisis in 2011

The incoming head of the New Economics Foundation on how the radical thinktank’s moment has come to lead the fight against inequalityMiatta Fahnbulleh, a former academic turned policy wonk who has worked for three prime ministers and the Labour party, is not your typical thinktank chief.Related: Corbyn: Hammond right to say Labour threatens whole economic systemWages have flatlined. It means you have these huge divides in wealth – and people are feeling poorer, year after year Continue reading...

The government is refusing to release 58 studies of the economic impact of leaving the EU. It is undemocratic to keep British people in the darkBrexit, we’re regularly reminded, is the will of the people. We had a referendum and the result was clear. Question the wisdom of the decision and you show yourself to be anti-democratic and out of touch, a member of a cosseted, globalist elite that fails to understand the concerns of ordinary folk.Never mind that 48% of voters represents rather a large “elite” by any normal measure. Nor that the people most enthusiastically pushing this line – among them Nigel Farage, Rupert Murdoch and several senior politicians – are themselves both privileged and powerful. The attack lands, in part, because it contains a kernel of truth. Prominent remainers sometimes have spoken about leave voters in sneering, snobbish terms. There really is an unwillingness among some affluent, metropolitan Europhiles to acknowledge that material factors contributed to the result. It doesn’t seem to occur to them that showing contempt for mass democracy could have lasting social and political repercussions – potentially fuelling more extreme rightwing populism.Related: Government refuses to release details of studies into economic impact of BrexitA hard Brexit would take Britain out of the EU’s single market and customs union and ends its obligations to respect the four freedoms, make big EU budget payments and accept the jurisdiction of the ECJ: what Brexiters mean by “taking back control” of Britain’s borders, laws and money. It would mean a return of trade tariffs, depending on what (if any) FTA was agreed. See our full Brexit phrasebook. Continue reading...

Barclays’ appetite for blind risk and greed in the midst of financial crisis is an intriguing tale – somebody should now spill all the beansGordon Brown is not alone in thinking errant British bankers got off lightly in the 2008 financial crisis. We should also be worried that the former prime minister thinks the new criminal offence of reckless misconduct that causes a financial institution to fail, which was introduced after the crisis to address the perceived legislative weaknesses, may not be up to the job.Related: Gordon Brown: Bankers should have been jailed for role in financial crisis Continue reading...

Ex-PM warns failure to take tougher stand has made it inevitable that rogue bankers will again gamble with public moneyGordon Brown has claimed bankers should have been jailed for their fraudulent and dishonest behaviour during the financial crisis that led to Britain’s deepest post-war recession and his defeat in the 2010 general election.The Labour former prime minister used the second extract from his memoirs to warn that the failure to take a tougher line with wrongdoing – as pursued by other countries – has made it inevitable that rogue bankers will again gamble with public money.Related: Gordon Brown memoirs: Barclays' RBS bid in 2008 is a staggering revelation Continue reading...

People on the building society’s variable rates would see a 0.25% increase in their monthly bill, if the Bank raises the base rate to 0.5%Nationwide has paved the way for an across-the-board increase in mortgage costs by announcing that a 0.25% interest rate rise would be passed on in full to its 600,000-plus variable-rate home loan customers.The building society said that if, as is widely expected, the Bank of England lifts the base rate by 0.25% to 0.5% on Thursday, it would increase both of its variable rates by 0.25%. Continue reading...

Weak productivity and Brexit uncertainty make it hard for chancellor Philip Hammond to see tax cuts or spending increases in next month’s Budget

The 9.9% annual growth figure further adds to concerns of unmanageable debt among UK householdsA near-double-digit increase in lending to households in the year to September has left the Bank of England on track to raise interest rates on Thursday, amid concerns that consumers are creating an unmanageable mountain of unsecured debt.The pace of annual consumer credit growth was 9.9% last month, according to figures from the central bank, as borrowing on credit cards, overdrafts and unsecured loans jumped.Related: Average UK debt at £8,000 per person (not including the mortgage)Related: Consumers appear loth to spend. Is it a blip, or Brexit beginning to bite? Continue reading...