E-gates to grant Britons quick entry to European hotspot
Downing Street anticipates that millions of British holidaymakers will benefit from this technology, following an agreement between Prime Minister Keir Starmer and EU leaders last month.
Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds said that the deal "makes life easier for holidaymakers."
The Prime Minister's spokesman noted that this was a significant development for British holidaymakers, as Faro Airport is a popular destination.
Since Brexit, UK nationals have been unable to use e-gates in most Schengen area countries, leading to potential delays at passport control.
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The Independent
31 minutes ago
- The Independent
Record installations of solar panels, batteries and heat pumps so far in 2025
A record number of solar panels, batteries and heat pumps have been installed in UK homes and buildings in the first six months of 2025, figures show. Data from MCS (Microgeneration Certification Scheme), the quality mark for small-scale renewables, found there were more than 172,000 certified installations between January and June this year. That is up 37% from the same period in 2024 and a third above the previous record high start to the year, in 2023, the figures show. The MCS said the jump in installations was being driven by three technologies: solar panels, electric heat pumps and battery storage. The top technology is solar panels, with 123,000 certified installations in the first six months of 2025 – a record that breaks the previous January-to-June high set in 2012. There were more than 18,000 installations of batteries, which can allow households to capture excess power from solar panels or charge up from the grid when electricity is cheap and then use it at more expensive peak times to cut bills. The figure is more than double the near 8,000 batteries installed in the same period in 2024, the MCS said. Meanwhile, certified installations of highly efficient heat pumps, which run on electricity to draw heat from the air or ground to warm homes and heat water, reached 30,000 in the first half of the year, up 12% on the first half of 2024. The figures also show that there were almost 50,000 renewable installations on newbuild properties, accounting for 28% of the total for the year so far, and significantly up on the first half of 2024, when they made up 21% of the 125,000 installations overall. The MCS said that, with the Future Homes Standard set to mandate solar panels and low carbon heating in newbuild homes from 2027, there was massive potential for growth in the low carbon tech industry as the Government attempts to boost house building. And the organisation said one of the key drivers behind the increasing number of renewable installations was government financial support, through schemes such as the £7,500 grant for new heat pumps to replace boilers in homes. The latest available figures from January to March show that about three quarters of heat pump installations were wholly or partially supported with government funding. Ian Rippin, chief executive at MCS, said: 'Across all renewable technologies, we are seeing a dramatic rise in the number of installations being delivered into homes, helping to reduce energy bills for consumers and drive down emissions. 'Crucially, there are also more MCS certified installers than ever before, which means a growing capacity to deliver high-quality installations at volume into people's homes.' Miatta Fahnbulleh, minister for energy consumers, said: ' People can save hundreds of pounds off their energy bills when installing renewable and low-carbon technologies like solar panels, heat pumps and batteries. 'So, it is no wonder that installations in the first six months of 2025 have broken records, as households recognise it just makes financial sense.'
Times
34 minutes ago
- Times
Anthony Solomons obituary: combative chairman of Singer & Friedlander
Chasing his daughter round the garden of their north London home, Anthony Solomons fell heavily against the wall of the house, fractured his skull and broke his arm in five places. 'I was irritated with him because of a comment he had made,' said Jennifer, 'so I threw a jug of water at him and he slipped as he came running after me.' Solomons had to cancel a driving holiday in France and a trip to the IMF conference in Washington. He was not pleased with her. Solomons, universally known as Tony, took a similarly pugnacious approach to the many hurdles he encountered as the chairman of Singer & Friedlander, one of the last of the City of London's independent merchant banks. One commentator described him as 'forceful and occasionally combative': it appears he was never reluctant to give an errant employee the full benefit of his superior wisdom. 'He was tough and direct to work for,' said a longstanding colleague, John Hodson. 'He had not a lot of obvious softness, but he got results, and was immensely loyal to those around him.' In 1998, the year before Solomons stepped down, The Times said: 'Singer is one of the unsung heroes of British banking. It is no longer just a rather fuddy-duddy merchant bank: banking accounted for less than a quarter of 1997 profits. These days, the core is stockbroking and the future lies with fund management. It is in the nature of Tony Solomons, its entrepreneurial chairman, never to stand still.' Insurance broking and long-term care were other areas that attracted Solomons, and he later diversified into property. But he sometimes made misjudgments, admitting 'we got egg on our faces' through making loans to Peter Clowes, the key figure in the Barlow Clowes scandal, to buy Buckley's Brewery. Barlow Clowes was a financial adviser that promised to invest the savings of mainly retired customers, including ultra-cautious former nurses, teachers and civil servants, in what they had been persuaded was low-risk UK government stock. But he drew them in with promises of unrealistically high interest rates and operated a Ponzi scheme that stole millions of pounds to finance the directors' extravagant lifestyles. It collapsed in 1988 owing £190 million to 18,000 investors. Solomons said he did not expect Singer to lose any money from its involvement. His belief in venture capital made him an early advocate of what is now known as private equity, acquiring, managing and reshaping companies to resell or float on the stock market. That made Solomons a natural supporter of the Thatcher government's 1980s privatisation campaign, but it also landed him in a spot of trouble. In 1985 Solomons was at the centre of a dispute over the British Telecommunications (now BT Group) stock market launch when it emerged that he had made £25,000 from a direct allocation of shares at the special flotation price. 'It was not at all clear that the BT flotation would be a success,' he said. 'And there was a great deal of arm-twisting about taking underwriting. Singer & Friedlander was offered five times the normal amount, and I took 50,000 shares.' Most public applicants were offered only 800. He sold the shares soon afterwards, and gave the profits to charity. While Solomons stressed that he had acted fairly and honestly throughout, Singer admitted an error of judgment in allocating BT shares to its directors, and said internal rules had been changed to prevent a repetition. The bank went through several owners before regaining its independence in 1987. Solomons stepped down from Singer in 1999, and the bank was finally sold six years later to Kaupthing Holdings, an Icelandic financial group. But Kaupthing collapsed as a result of the 2008 global financial crisis and Singer was wound up. An Isle of Man-based compensation scheme was not closed until last Nathan Solomons was born in London in 1930, the elder son of Leslie Solomons, a wholesale tobacconist, and Leslie's cousin, Susie Schneiders. They had a younger son, Kenneth, who went on to own a garage firm. Leslie died in 1938, and when war broke out the brothers were sent to prep school in Devon. Uncles kept an eye on them while Susie ran the carpool for the London branch of the Women's Voluntary Service. Tony and Kenneth went on to Oundle School in Northamptonshire, where Anthony remembered 'the food was awful and the rugby good'. Bizarrely, it being wartime, the boys were made to sing classical German lieder. Tony postponed National Service to qualify as an accountant with the firm Wilkins Kennedy. He joined the Dorset Yeomanry as a second lieutenant and was sent to Korea for the last three weeks of the war there. He was a keen marksman and reckoned to have paid for his mess bills with winnings from poker dice. He returned to live with his mother and brother in Hampstead, north London, working for an oil company, Lobitos, where he became chief accountant, played rugby and tennis, and joined the Young Conservatives. There he met Jean Golding, whom he married in 1957. They had two daughters, Nicola, a lawyer, and Jennifer, a public relations executive. Jean developed Parkinson's disease and died in 2018. In 1958 Solomons switched from oil to merchant banking. His uncle Barnett found him a job with Singer & Friedlander, where he became the chief executive in 1973 and the chairman three years later. A keen collector of watercolours, he established the Sunday Times/Singer & Friedlander watercolour competition, intending that it would be a source of pictures for a corporate collection at Singer. For several years it became a leading showcase for that style of painting. After the bank folded, the Royal Watercolour Society took over the sponsorship until the competition ended in 2020. Solomons's other passion was horse racing, and he was part of a consortium that made a failed bid for Epsom racecourse in 1994. He was a regular at the Cheltenham Festival, placing a £200 bet each year with the pledge that any winnings would go to the Injured Jockeys Fund. It was a while before he let Jennifer forget the water jug incident. 'I was not too popular at home,' she said, 'nor at the bank. I kept a low profile, leaving early in the morning and getting back late. They'd never seen so much of me at my office.' Anthony Solomons, merchant banker, was born on January 26, 1930. He died on July 3, 2025, aged 95
Times
34 minutes ago
- Times
Rachel Reeves ‘must find £50bn' in tax rises or spending cuts in budget
Rachel Reeves is facing a £50 billion black hole in the government finances and economists are warning that she will be forced to break Labour's manifesto pledge on tax in the autumn budget. The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) said higher-than-expected public sector borrowing and weaker economic growth had left the chancellor with an 'impossible' choice between cutting spending or raising taxes to balance the books. Under present estimates, it said, Reeves would need to find £41.2 billion to cover the costs of weaker economic forecasts and tax reversals, plus a further £9.9 billion, if she was to have the same headroom as she had at the time of her last financial statement in March. Other economists said their projections also suggested that Reeves would have no choice but to 'pull the lever' of increasing income tax, VAT or employee national insurance to cover the shortfall. This would breach Labour's manifesto commitment to not raise taxes on working people. NIESR's latest economic outlook also found that the government's fiscal situation had sharply deteriorated since Reeves' statement in March. It found that total government expenditure was £14.3 billion higher than in the spring. The government's failure to pass its welfare reforms and its U-turn over winter fuel payments further increased spending by £15.2 billion. It also said that weaker output and employment growth compared with the Office for Budget Responsibility's (OBR) forecast in March implied lower tax revenue and higher welfare payments by 2028-29. NIESR's estimate for the fiscal shortfall is higher than estimates from City analysts who expect Reeves to face a shortfall of between £20 billion and £25 billion. However, even at this level the chancellor is likely to be forced to raise one of the main tax rates to make up the shortfall. This is likely to include freezing income rate thresholds for another year, pulling more people into the higher 40 per cent rate of tax. Stephen Millard, of NIESR, said that Reeves faced an 'impossible trilemma' between breaking her fiscal rules, breaching an electoral promise not to raise taxes on working people or hitting the government's spending targets. 'Can she fill that gap without breaking the manifesto commitment to raising taxes on working people? I think the quick answer to that is no,' he said. 'Fiddling at the edges won't do the job.' • Should Rachel Reeves raise income tax? Economists at Deutsche Bank think Reeves faces a narrower £20 billion gap that could be filled by extending the freeze on income tax thresholds beyond 2028 — raising about £7-£10 billion. The government could also announce no real-term spending growth at the end of the decade, raising an additional £5 billion, Sanjay Raja, UK economist at Deutsche Bank, said. He said: 'With growth at only 1.3 per cent and inflation above target, things are not looking good for the chancellor, who will need to either raise taxes or reduce spending or both in the October budget if she is to meet her fiscal rules.' Ruth Gregory, chief economist at Capital Economics, said they expected Reeves would miss her targets by up to £25 billion, but the figure could be larger if the OBR downgraded its growth forecasts for the UK economy. 'If the budget deficit is larger than £20 billion, Reeves will have to pull one of the big tax levers like VAT, income tax or employee national insurance to make up the difference,' she said. 'Given that the chancellor decided to increase the tax burden on businesses in the last budget by raising employer national insurance contributions, we would expect that this time the burden will fall on households.'
