Latest news with #Labour government
BBC News
3 hours ago
- Business
- BBC News
Costs to fix cladding wipe out Taylor Wimpey's profit
Higher than expected costs to remove cladding from Taylor Wimpey's buildings in response to the Grenfell fire tragedy have wiped out its profits, the housebuilder has company made a loss in the first half of this year after putting aside an extra £222m to fix fire safety defects in homes it has Wimpey's share price sank early on Wednesday as it also revealed a slow down in sales, with first-time buyers struggling to get on the housing ladder. The Labour government has made boosting housebuilding a priority, though analysts say private firms are less likely to build due to higher interest rates. Jennie Daly, Taylor Wimpey chief executive, said that affordability remained "constrained, particularly amongst first-time buyers", but that banks and building societies were still "committed" to lending for mortgages because of firm said its UK sales rate for July had fallen compared to the same period last year, while the average sales price for its UK homes had dropped to £313,000 from £317, buyers have struggled to get a foot on the housing ladder since interest rates began rising in 2022, with the average borrowing term for first-time buyers rising to 31 years as they try to keep monthly repayments as low as well as a drop in sale prices, Taylor Wimpey also recorded £92m pre-tax loss for the first six months of the year largely due to "exceptional charges" from cladding 2022, large housebuilders agreed to pay to fix cladding problems on homes they had built following pressure from the government and campaigners in the wake of fire in the west London tower block killed 72 people in 2017. As part of a refurbishment, combustible cladding and insulation had been fitted on the outside of the building, and in less than 20 minutes the fire climbed 19 storeys to the top of the tower, fuelled by the flammable inquiry found all their deaths were Wimpey, who did not fit the cladding on Grenfell, said "defects" which were not visible before it started fixing some of its buildings with cladding on had pushed up its costs, along with increased construction costs and new fire engineer firm has now put aside £435m in total for cladding remediation work after the £222m rise.
Arab News
a day ago
- Politics
- Arab News
Britain tries to tackle youth knife crime crisis
HINDHEAD: A year after one of Britain's most harrowing knife attacks, the government is urging young people to drop off bladed weapons at 'amnesty' bins or mobile vans in a month-long campaign — part of efforts to control knife-related violence, particularly when it involves youths. On July 29, 2024, teenager Axel Rudakubana, who was obsessed with violence and genocide, attacked a Taylor Swift-themed children's dance event in the northern English town of Southport, killing three girls and stabbing 10 other people. Since then, Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour government has pledged tougher age checks for knife buyers, warned social media firms they could face fines for failing to curb sales and promotion of weapons, and banned zombie-style knives and ninja swords. Starmer launched a coalition in September last year aimed at tackling youth knife crime. Actor and anti-knife campaigner Idris Elba joined the conversation at a meeting this month, alongside King Charles. Charities and experts interviewed by Reuters call the government's efforts a step forward but say they largely fail to address the root causes. Some charities involved in classes and workshops aimed at young people are urging the government to make such education part of the national curriculum. Overall, knife crime in England and Wales has risen 87 percent over the past decade, with 54,587 offenses last year alone, a 2 percent rise from 2023 and among the highest rates in Europe, figures from Britain's interior ministry show. It did not provide a breakdown of knife crime offenses by age group. But data from the justice ministry showed that in the year to March 2024 there were just over 3,200 knife or offensive weapon offenses committed by children (aged 10-17) resulting in a caution or sentence. Of the 262 people killed with a knife or sharp object in the 12 months to March 2024, 57 were under 25. Kitchen knives were the most commonly used weapons. A public inquiry into the Southport murders that opened this month will begin by looking into the specifics of Rudakubana's case before a second phase examines the wider issue of children being drawn into violence, an increasing concern for British authorities. Amanda Marlow, from the youth charity Safety Center, which runs knife crime awareness workshops in schools, says young people carry knives for a range of reasons. These include seeing it as a 'quick fix' to make money when growing up in poverty, trying to gain status among peers, or being drawn into the wrong crowd, such as gangs, where they are often exploited. Some police forces have launched dedicated knife crime units. In the West Midlands, one of the country's worst-hit areas, the Guardian Taskforce focuses on reducing knife crime among under-25s. In June alone, officers patrolled for over 3,000 hours, carried out 366 stop-and-searches, and seized 57 knives or offensive weapons. 'Every knife seized is a life saved,' Inspector Kate Jeffries of the taskforce said in a statement. After surviving the Southport stabbings, Leanne Lucas launched the 'Let's Be Blunt' campaign, calling for safer, rounded-tip kitchen knives instead of pointed ones. POVERTY AND MENTAL HEALTH Jade Levell, a researcher at the University of Bristol who studies masculinity, vulnerability and violence, said anti-knife crime efforts should focus on early intervention, such as mental health care, rather than short-term fixes like amnesty bins. 'Some boys see their only option is to be afraid or to make others afraid of them,' Levell said, referring to those growing up with violence, poverty or discrimination. Some 4.5 million children are growing up in poverty in the UK, according to charities. In 2023, about 1 in 5 children and young people aged 8 to 25 years had a probable mental disorder, according to the National Health Service. The government announced funding this month for hubs offering mental health and career support for young people at risk of gang involvement, violence or knife crime. The scheme, focused on high-risk areas, is starting with eight such centers and aims to have 50 open in the next four years. EDUCATING YOUNG PEOPLE The violent death of his son two years ago prompted Martin Cosser to found a charity dedicated to educating young people about knife crime, one of several such initiatives around the country. Charlie's Promise, named after 17-year-old Charlie who was stabbed multiple times in the chest by another teenager at a packed end-of-term party, has spoken to 41,000 young people in schools and elsewhere. 'Nothing brings my little boy home,' said Cosser, adding that far more must be done to stop the knife crime crisis spiralling out of control. 'We need to understand the emotional drivers behind why people pick up knives.' Charity Safety Center delivers workshops in schools, specifically designed for children aged 9 to 12. At a recent session in a school in the southern English town of Milton Keynes, staff from the charity explained what knife crime is and the dangers it poses, encouraging active participation through questions and games. Safety Center and Charlie's Promise are among several groups calling for such education to become a mandatory part of the national school curriculum. Amani Simpson, who survived being stabbed in 2011 and now shares his story as a youth coach, believes societal pressures and some forms of entertainment such as violent video games also play a role in spawning knife crime. 'Young people feel displaced and disengaged ... those things need to be uprooted,' Simpson said after a talk at TCES North West London, a special education school, emphasising the importance of helping them believe in their own potential so they make better choices. 'Hope for me is the missing piece,' he said.
Bloomberg
a day ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
London's Housebuilding Collapse Is a Huge Problem
Homebuilding in London has all but ground to a halt. The capital is on track to deliver less than 5% of its annual target of 88,000 homes with half the year gone, by far the worst performance in two decades. Such a collapse in the UK's largest and richest city would be a poor omen for economic growth and productivity at the best of times. For this to be occurring under a one-year-old Labour government that arrived in office promising a generational uplift in housing supply is extraordinary. The figures almost defy belief. Housing starts have fallen by more than 90% compared with the financial year ended in 2023, official data from the Greater London Authority show. Across two-thirds of the capital's boroughs, there were zero starts in the second quarter on developments with more than 20 private homes, according to researcher Molior London. Sales, meanwhile, are running at their weakest rate since 2009 with just 3,950 new homes purchased in the first half of 2025, the company said.
Telegraph
4 days ago
- Business
- Telegraph
Britain cannot afford to keep Rachel Reeves any longer
How bad does Britain's economic performance have to be before Sir Keir Starmer fires Rachel Reeves from the Treasury? Ever since she sat crying on the Treasury Bench three weeks ago the data have become worse. She ought to be crying a lot more. The Government's Labour Force Survey shows that the number of payrolled employees has fallen by 178,000 in the last year, and by 41,000 in the last month alone, since the Chancellor's higher National Insurance contributions for employers took effect. How many more unemployed must be created before the Government admits that higher taxes drive formerly productive people out of the workforce, creating more claimants on an already tottering welfare state? Vacancies in the last quarter also fell, by 56,000, with openings decreasing in 14 of the 18 industrial sectors denominated by the Government. The UK economy contracted in May for the second consecutive month, by 0.1 per cent after falling 0.3 per cent in April. The fall was mainly caused by lower industrial output and less work in the construction sector. Inflation rose to 3.6 per cent. The Chancellor seems to have no conception of the link between the supply of money and the rise in inflation; the Government's failure to keep its promise to cut the welfare bill – which the Prime Minister himself described as a 'moral' question – will further increase borrowing, the cost of debt and prices. Labour governments always do this, and appear unable to snap out of it. And if the effect of taxing people more heavily to create jobs is proving disastrous, the effect of taxing the very rich, who can with ease leave and pay their taxes elsewhere, is to drive down the tax take and force yet higher borrowing. On what appears to be a point of principle, Labour will not reduce the tax burden on those who create jobs and wealth. As a result, there are fewer jobs, and fewer people to tax. As a result the choice of whom to tax will narrow, until Labour's 'working people' – who usually cannot afford to flee abroad – end up paying more and more, as the Government avoids the obvious course of cutting its extravagant public spending programmes on what the Victorians called 'the undeserving poor'. The word is that Sir Keir will hold a reshuffle after the summer recess, which starts this week. He has implied that Ms Reeves's job is safe; but if she cannot, or will not, implement policies that help create wealth rather than destroy it, she simply becomes a dead weight dragging down an already deeply unpopular administration. Also, the more articles such as this, suggesting she is not up to her exceptionally demanding job, appear in the media, the more Sir Keir will dig in his heels and seek to avoid sacking her, uttering the old mantra that he will not allow his administration to be chosen by political commentators. Even someone with so few natural political instincts as he possesses must realise that he, and the country, cannot go on like this. You cannot on the one hand pontificate about growth and then take every possible measure to eliminate it, by driving people out work, companies out of business and the rich out of the country. Ms Reeves seems to find all of those things entirely acceptable. Eventually reality will force Sir Keir to conclude that there will have to be changes, both of personnel and of policy, or the money will run out. What he must try to decide is what constitutes the point of no return for his inept Chancellor.
Bloomberg
5 days ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
UK Faces Significant Challenges to Growth Plan, IMF Says
The International Monetary Fund has warned that the UK must overcome 'significant challenges' to its growth and investment agenda in the face of rising global trade tensions and fiscal constraints. The Labour government's budget last October should be growth-enhancing, the fund reiterated in the final publication of its Article IV annual health check on the economy, as it hailed ministers' 'bold reforms.' But it left its growth forecast unchanged at 1.2% for this year and 1.4% in 2026.
