News

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor  At 6pm at offshoreleaks.icij.org. 200,000 more account details from the Panama papers leak became available. This data dump will show how some of the most affluent firms and high net worth individuals use offshore organisations to avoid paying tax. The database belong to Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca, and the source of the leak is only know as “John Doe.” "John Doe" has issued a statement citing "income equality" as his reason for sharing this...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor Three hundred leading economists have said that tax havens serve no useful purpose and only increase inequality. The charity Oxfam organised the open letter and has been released ahead of an anti-corruption summit this week in London. In the letter to world leaders the economists, including the Cambridge economist Ha-Joon Chang, say that tax havens “undoubtedly benefit” rich individuals and multinational corporations, but this benefit is at the expense of the rest of society. The...

By Oliver Ward With dark clouds gathering Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton look set to be the two presidential nominations. Like the rest of the world I have been watching the race with a kind of suspended belief. Even when states began toppling into the abyss like Eisenhower's dominoes in an effort to make "America hate/great again", I still didn´t quite make the connection that this means that the next president will have to be picked from these two rather...

There has been a lot of scaremongering about a Brexit eventuality in the press of late, but we've got a humdinger. Economy, security and borders aside, the prospect of a Boris Johnson / Michael Gove-led Conservative government is surely the most frightening outcome if Britain votes 'out' in the EU referendum. Boris is the 11/4 favourite to lead the Tory party if David Cameron resigns, according to Betway odds, with other prominent Brexiteers Michael Gove (6/1) and Priti Patel (14/1) in...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor Around ten million pounds will be paid to 250 construction workers who had been “blacklisted” by building firms. Construction giants like Sir Robert McAlpine and Balfour Beatty are among the companies who are liable and have agreed to compensate union members who they denied work to. The final payout from the out of court deal by the Unite union on behalf of nearly 800 workers could be as high as £75m once all claims have...

By Abeer Sharma Soon after midnight on Saturday morning, Labour’s Sadiq Khan vanquished his Conservative rival Zac Goldsmith and became the next Mayor of London. Khan’s comprehensive victory was the denouement in what ultimately proved a procession of a mayoral race. This was in no major part down to Zac Goldsmith's dire campaign, a case study in how to destroy your hopes of the London mayoralty and alienate people. How on earth did it all go so badly? Well… His...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor It has been claimed by Greenpeace that the new Hinkley power station will be the most expensive object on Earth. The environmental group believes the total cost of the controversial project will cost up to a colossal £24bn, eighteen time more the world’s tallest building, which is in Dubai. But while Hinkley C may well be the most expensive object on Earth, it doesn't touch the International Space Station, which cost £77.6bn. Greenpeace claim that...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor A medical expert has said that Jeremy Hunt might be “trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist,” regarding increase weekend death claims. Prof Peter Rothwell laid into Hunt in the Mirror for not carrying out “due diligence” in a report which dismissed his claims that more NHS patients die at the weekend. Rothwell called for an urgent investigation by MPs into "flawed" data behind the top Tory's claims. Mr Hunt has often quoted studies...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor A new range of British army fighting vehicles will be constructed abroad, even though the PM hailed the £3.5bn deal as a huge boost to UK manufacturing. According to the Mirror, there will be a hundred of the Ajax fighting vehicles will be “fully manufactured and assembled” in Spain, the Ministry of Defence has admitted. The hulls for almost 500 more will be made in Spain before the vehicles are transported to the UK for...