Tesco’s festive TV ad featuring Santa Claus bearing a Covid vaccine passport has prompted more than 1,500 complaints, making it the most complained-about advert of the year. The advert, titled “This Christmas, Nothing’s Stopping Us”, shows the public determined to enjoy a proper Christmas with family and friends after lockdown restrictions prevented gatherings last year. However, in...
Primark owner, Associated British Foods, has set out ambitious expansion plans as it bets on a strong sales rebound from the Covid-19 pandemic, with customers returning in large numbers in countries where vaccines have been rolled out. The fast-fashion retailer is planning to open more than 100 new shops over the next five years, as it...
The US drugmaker Pfizer has lifted its 2021 forecast for revenues from its Covid vaccine to $36bn (£26.3bn), after bumper sales in the third quarter. The Covid jab, called Comirnaty and developed with Germany’s BioNTech, contributed $13bn of revenues in the three months to 30 September. That was more than half of Pfizer’s total revenues of $24bn...
The UK’s competion regulator is investigating Motorola over concerns that it has “cashed in” on its monopoly over mobile networks for the UK emergency services. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said on Monday that it would launch a market investigation into the Airwave network that is used by police, fire and other emergency services to communicate securely. The...
Domestic flights should be banned and long-distance train fares subsidised, transport campaigners have urged, highlighting the relative environmental and financial costs of air and rail travel. The Campaign for Better Transport (CBT) called on ministers to outlaw internal UK flights if an equivalent train journey took less than five hours and to resist calls for any cut...
When Fabien needed to have a decayed tooth removed in May, his dentist told him that he would have to wait up to three years to have it done on the NHS. In disbelief, the 27-year-old from Edinburgh rang 50 dental practices but without any luck. He had no choice but to go private. Having lost...
Business groups reacted with dismay to the government’s national insurance hike and surcharge on dividend income to boost health and social care spending from next April, calling it a tax on jobs and a blow to the economic recovery. The British Chamber of Commerce (BCC) said the extra financial burden from higher tax charges ignored the damage...
Ryanair is to stop all flights from both Belfast international airport and Belfast City airport, in a further blow to connectivity between Northern Ireland and the rest of Europe. The airline blamed government passenger duty and the absence of any Covid recovery incentives for the two airports. “Due to the UK government’s refusal to suspend or reduce...
Rail fares in England and Wales are on track to rise at their fastest rate in a decade unless ministers decide to prevent steep price increases to encourage commuters back on to trains. Annual increases in rail fares are usually governed by the July retail prices index (RPI), plus another 1%. The Office for National...
The UK’s low carbon economy is now worth more than £200bn, four times the size of the country’s manufacturing sector, with growth expected to accelerate in the coming years, according to new analysis. Despite what experts say has been lacklustre and patchy support from central government, the analysis found more than 75,000 businesses from wind turbine...