News

The EU have created a blacklist of tax havens, which contain 17 names. Crucially for the UK, the main list excludes a number of British Overseas Territories such as the Cayman Island and Bermuda that were on a previous EU blacklist from June 2015. There is also a “grey” list of a further 47 countries who do not meet the EU tax standards but have pledged to change their rules to improve their tax arrangements. Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, the...

Train companies have announced largest ticket increase for five years, signalling a depressing start to the new year for struggling commuters. Fares for all journeys in 2018 show an average rise slightly below the 3.6% set by the government in August for regulated fares, which include season tickets. Rail operators said it showed the industry was attempting to keep down the cost of travel. It is unlikely that many passengers, dealing with the creaking rail service, will agree with their...

A charity backed by Bake Off winner Nadiya Hussain has staged a colourful tribute to the 800 children whose lives are lost across the globe every day due to dirty water and poor sanitation. Eight hundred buckets were placed alongside the River Thames to raise awareness of the one in nine kids around the world who don't have clean water. Each empty bucket in the display would hold almost enough safe drinking water to last a child an entire week....

Urgent action must be taken to protect vital early years services, after research reveals funding in some areas has been cut by almost 50 per cent since 2010, says Barnardo’s. Department for Education figures reveal children’s centres have had funding cut from £1.2bn to an estimated £0.6bn over the last six years. Barnardo’s is calling on the Government to help financially stricken local authorities find new ways of providing a range of essential early intervention and family support services across...

The humble pigeon is far more intelligent than previously thought and can even have abstract thoughts, reveals new research. Rather than being bird brains, pigeons can understand both space and time, according to the study. Not only can they discriminate these abstract concepts, but researchers found that pigeons seem to use a different region of the brain than humans and primates to do so. In experiments, pigeons were shown a static horizontal line on a computer screen and had to...

Climate change poses the greatest threat to medium sized predators such as foxes as it forces them to spend more time hunting for food, British researchers found. Medium-sized carnivores which generally weigh between one and ten kilograms, are more vulnerable because they spend the most time foraging. As the climate affects their prey they must spend more time hunting to survive, scientists said. And they found failing to diversify their prey could put the species at greater risk of climate...

A deal on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic has thrown up the possibility that Remain areas could be given special measures on Brexit. According to a draft text seen by RTE News there will be no “regulatory divergence” on the island of Ireland following the EU divorce, which means parts of Britain could get special dispensation. Nicola Sturgeon and Sadiq Khan are leading calls for other parts of the UK to be given special measures such as remaining part of...

The potentially catastrophic threat posed to shipping by underwater volcanoes is to be monitored. Most volcanoes erupt beneath the ocean, but little is known about them compared to what is known about volcanoes that eject their lava on dry land. Gabrielle Tepp, of the Alaska Volcano Observatory and the US Geological Survey, believes that with improved monitoring, scientists can learn more about submarine eruptions, which threaten travel and alter the ocean soundscape. She said: "It's very difficult to study underwater...

The UK will concede that there will be no "regulatory divergence" on the island of Ireland, according to a draft text seen by RTE News. Late last week Ireland’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister said he had been in talks with Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist party on the subject, saying a Brexit deal on the Irish border question is “doable”. The government repeated its demand for an assurance from the UK that there would not be any regulatory divergence between Northern...