Martin Lewis issues solar panel savings tips for households
While the average installation cost is around £6,100, solar panels can save up to £350 annually on energy bills, with a typical break-even point of 10 years.
Approximately 1.5 million UK homes now feature solar panels, a significant increase of 500,000 since 2022, with grants available to support installations, particularly for low-income households.
Homeowners with pre-installed solar panels can achieve further savings by understanding their tariff system, which depends on whether the panels were fitted before or after April 2019.
Those on the Smart Export Guarantee (SEG) system (post-April 2019) should shop around for better export rates, while those on the older Feed-In Tariff (FIT) system (pre-April 2019) can switch to SEG for exports while retaining their higher FIT generation rates, potentially earning up to 30p per kWh.
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BreakingNews.ie
23 minutes ago
- BreakingNews.ie
Private family funeral for Brown Thomas businesswoman, Hilary Weston, to be held on Tuesday
A private family funeral for Hilary Weston, the Dublin-born businesswoman and philanthropist who helped build Penneys and Brown Thomas as part of her late husband Galen's family retail empire, who died aged 83, is to be held in the UK on Tuesday. Ms Weston (83) died in London on Saturday where she lived in recent years. It is understood her health deteriorated a week prior to her death. Advertisement The funeral will be for close family members, with a memorial for various charities and organisations which Ms Weston was attached to taking place in London within the next week. In a statement, her family said she died peacefully, surrounded by her loved ones. In keeping with her position as a former lieutenant governor of Ontario, Canada, a state funeral will be held in Toronto early next month. Galen G Weston paid tribute to his mother on Sunday night. 'Our mother lived with unwavering devotion to her family and a belief in the power and importance of community and service," he said. Advertisement "Brilliant, brave, companionate, and beautiful, she brought a touch of magic to everything she did - in her decades of public service, philanthropy and her remarkable business career. Her greatest joy was the life she created for her family and friends - filled with warmth, love, and fun." Alannah Weston Cochrane, her daughter, said: 'Our mother's elegance and high standards were matched by her warmth and sense of humour. She loved a challenge, and brought her innate creativity and style to everything she did. "But it was her vision, coupled with her enormous capacity for hard work that made her a great female leader. Her insight, wisdom and strength as well as her belief in individuals made almost anything possible.' Tánaiste Simon Harris said he was "deeply saddened" to learn of the passing of Ms Weston. Advertisement "Hillary was a very proud Irish-Canadian, who served both Ireland and Canada with distinction and generosity. In addition to her successful businesses and public service in Canada, through her leadership of the Ireland Funds Canada, she made a lasting contribution to Irish-Canadian relations," he said. "I extend sincere condolences to her children Alannah and Galen, and the entire Weston family." Ms Weston was prominent in the early days of Penneys after the family business bought the ailing Todd Byrne's department store and established the budget fashion chain. She is said to have personally overseen the production of clothing for the in-house brand the company introduced early on, Primark, which would ultimately give its name to the wider chain outside Ireland. Advertisement The Dublin native was later prominent in running Brown Thomas for a considerable time after her husband purchased the long-established retailer. In the years that followed she served as vice-chair of Holt Renfrew, the group's luxury retail chain in Canada. She held a variety of other positions in the wider family's interests, which included the conglomerate Associated British Foods, of which Penneys was a subsidiary; Fortnum & Mason; and Loblaws, the largest food retailer in Canada. She also oversaw a major property development in Florida. Hilary Weston Born Hilary Frayne in Dún Laoghaire in 1942, she was the eldest of five children and attended Loreto Abbey, Dalkey. She started to work as a model in the 1950s and was successful at it, working extensively in Ireland and internationally. She met her future husband after he saw her on a billboard advertisement while travelling and had auctioneer Corrie Buckley arrange an introduction. Advertisement By 1965, she and Galen were engaged and on July 23rd, 1966, they married in England. Having initially settled at the Roundwood Park estate in Wicklow, the family moved to Toronto in 1971 and Ms Weston later became a Canadian citizen. In August 1983, the IRA attempted to kidnap Mr Weston at Roundwood but An Garda Síochána had apparently been tipped off. The family was not there and two of the kidnappers were killed, while others were arrested during a gunfight with armed police. The family went on to sell the estate and are said to have become more private afterwards. Mr Weston, who was born in England but brought up in Canada, moved to Ireland in 1962 to establish Power supermarkets. He later took over the Quinnsworth chain before eventually selling the retailer to Tesco in the 1990s. Brown Thomas subsequently acquired the Switzer group of stores and then Arnotts, the Irish operation becoming part of the Selfridges group, which the family sold in 2021 for a price reported to have exceeded €4 billion. Penneys, though, which was established by Arthur Ryan with Galen Weston for ABF in 1969, would ultimately represent the Irish business's greater contribution to the wider group. The company now employs more than 80,000 staff across 17 countries and had sales of close to €11 billion in 2024. The Sunday Times put the wider family's fortune at some £17.75 billion in its most recent rich list. Ms Weston was still involved in various aspects of the business until recent years and played a role in many related charitable foundations which had been established to support a range of causes and made donations running into hundreds of millions of euro over the years. In 1979, she set up the Ireland Fund of Canada, a chapter of Tony O'Reilly's Ireland Fund, to raise money for good causes here. Between 1997 and 2002 she served as lieutenant governor of Ontario, donating the salary to an initiative to help young people from poor backgrounds into employment. She became Ontario's 40th lieutenant Governor and only the second woman to have been appointed to the role in the province. She also authored two successful books on homes and gardens. The mother-of-two was predeceased by her husband, who died in April 2021, and is survived by their two children, Alannah and Galen jnr, both of whom are involved in the family business.
Daily Mail
23 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Trump claims Jaguar Land Rover is in 'turmoil' after rebrand
Donald Trump has claimed Jaguar Land Rover is in 'absolute turmoil' after the company's 'totally disastrous woke ' rebrand. The US President labelled the British car maker's recent advert, which featured brightly dressed models, as a 'total disaster' and 'stupid'. Trump was scathing of Jaguar as he compared the firm's fortunes to those of clothing brand American Eagle in a rant on his social media platform Truth Social. ' Sydney Sweeney , a registered Republican, has the "HOTTEST" ad out there. It's for American Eagle, and the jeans are "flying off the shelves",' he wrote. 'Go get 'em Sydney! On the other side of the ledger, Jaguar did a stupid, and seriously WOKE advertisement, THAT IS A TOTAL DISASTER! The CEO just resigned, and the company is in absolute turmoil. 'Who wants to buy a Jaguar after looking at that disgraceful ad. Shouldn't they have learned a lesson from Bud Lite, which went Woke.' Trump ended the post by saying that 'being woke is losers'. It was announced last week that Jaguar Land Rover CEO Adrian Mardell is to retire at the end of this year. Mardell, 64, has been at the company for more than three decades including the last two years as chief executive during one of the most transformative periods in the firm's recent history. Arguably his biggest involvement has been his role in Jaguar's controversial 'woke' rebrand and shift to an electric-only premium car brand from 2026. Last month JLR said it was axing 500 management roles , which are going as part of a voluntary redundancy programme for managers in the UK. A spokesman said: 'As part of normal business practice, we regularly offer eligible employees the opportunity to leave JLR through limited voluntary redundancy programmes.' Sales of the luxury car manufacturer appear to have nose-dived following its controversial move to scrap its iconic 'growler' big cat logo in November. The firm's rebrand saw it replace the well-known badge in favour of a geometric 'J' design - which lovers of the brand raged looked like the logo on a handbag clasp. And as the firestorm surrounding the famed car maker's change continues to engulf it , sales at Jaguar Europe have plunged a staggering 97.5 per cent. But the British car marque has insisted the reason for the freefall in sales is not because of a lack of support or an image overhaul - but because it has stopped making older models as it focuses on its relaunch with an all-electric offering. Defending the news, the firm said it was 'pointless' to compare figures for 2024 and 2025, as 'Jaguar is not currently on sale in the UK' while it goes through its 'sunset period' of radical change. A spokeswoman for Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) said: 'Jaguar's transformation towards a new portfolio of pure-electric vehicles was announced as part of the Reimagine strategy in 2021. JLR always envisaged a period when the current range would "no longer be on sale" before the introduction of the new Jaguar collection. 'Production of XE, XF, F-TYPE, I-PACE and E-PACE all came to an end in 2024 as part of that transition. This strategic "sunset" of the product range is going to plan and will allow Jaguar to transform and reposition the brand for the future. 'Comparing Jaguar sales to 2024 is pointless as we are no longer producing vehicles in 2025 with low levels of retail inventory available. Jaguar's rebranding is not related to a sales decline.' Jaguar has not announced an official date for when its new fleet of high-end electric motors will hit the forecourt. It stopped sales of current Jaguars on November 11 as it prepared for its next generation of luxury vehicles to arrive. Defending the campaign late last year, JLR's Managing Director Rawdon Glover told the Financial Times: 'If we play in the same way that everybody else does, we'll just get drowned out.'
BBC News
23 minutes ago
- BBC News
Honours system gets new role to make awards more inclusive
Business leader Moni Mannings has been appointed to a new role to make the honours system more inclusive and reach a wider range of communities.A new "diversity and outreach committee" has been created by the Cabinet Office, which will have Ms Mannings as its independent chair for a five-year from the BBC earlier this year showed that only 6% of higher awards went to people in the north of England and only 4% to people from working-class backgrounds."The honours system is one of our nation's most visible mechanisms, not only for celebrating individual contribution but also of promoting our society's values," said Ms Mannings. "Recognising excellence from all walks of life isn't just a symbolic act - it is how we tell our national story."I would be privileged to play a role in ensuring that the honours system reflects and celebrates the full richness of our society."Ms Mannings is an independent director for the Co-operative Group and the Land Securities Group, and was a founder of the Empowering People of Colour business network. She has talked about the challenges as a senior leader in her own business career: "There were very few women, there were certainly no women of colour. "But even more than that, so few people from working class backgrounds, which actually felt like an even bigger barrier."The new committee will encourage a wider range of nominations from regions of the country and parts of society which might currently be under-represented. It will give advice to the other honours committees and the analysis of the New Year honours list found that more than 60% of beneficiaries of "higher" awards, such as Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and knighthoods and damehoods, lived in London and south-east England, which accounts for 27% of the UK population. There had been accusations of unfairness about specific gaps, such as the lack of any knighthoods for rugby league, unlike rugby union and other sports where former stars had been was resolved in this year's King's birthday honours in June, when Billy Boston became rugby league's first knight in 130 years of the sport, after a campaign that had accused the honours system of snobbery against a northern, working class sport."It is a historic wrong that a sport, which is the backbone of so many communities, has waited so long to receive this honour," Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said at the time of Boston's new role for Ms Mannings will support Sir Keir's strategy of making the honours system more representative of the "length and breadth of the UK" and to be "awarded based on merit, regardless of background". Sign up here to get the latest royal stories and analysis every week with our Royal Watch newsletter. Those outside the UK can sign up here.
