UK News

Thames Water said US private equity giant KKR has pulled out of plans to invest in the utility and it is now progressing talks with senior creditors for an alternative to stabilise its finances. The heavily indebted supplier – Britain’s biggest water supplier with 16 million customers – said the investment firm indicated it would not be in a position to proceed with a bid and that its status as […]

Ministers are being pressured to take urgent action over illegal so-called ghost number plates. The plates have a reflective coating, which prevents them from being identified by police cameras. The British Number Plate Manufacturers Association (BNMA), which represents companies producing the vast majority of plates in the UK, wants tougher regulation of the sector. In a letter to the Government, it claimed that a number of suppliers that have not […]

New searches by German police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann are expected to begin in Portugal on Tuesday. Madeleine, then aged three, disappeared in 2007 while on holiday with her family in the resort of Praia da Luz after her parents went out to dinner and left her sleeping in a room with her toddler twin siblings. According to The Sun, the new searches will involve radar equipment that […]

Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds is set to meet US officials on Tuesday as the UK aims to set a timeline for its exemption from President Donald Trump’s tariffs. Sir Keir Starmer and Mr Trump announced the broad terms of an agreement last month that would exempt the UK from some of the US president’s tariffs on steel and cars while increasing market access for other goods. The Prime Minister hailed […]

Ryan Mason has left Tottenham to take over as West Brom head coach on a three-year deal. Mason quickly emerged as a leading candidate for the Championship club after they dismissed Tony Mowbray on April 21. Spurs’ roller-coaster 2024-25 campaign – in which they secured Europa League success – only ended on May 25 and forced West Brom to bide their time but Mason, after a short holiday, decided to […]

The public has “every right to be angry” about small boats crossing the English Channel, Sir Keir Starmer said after more than a thousand migrants made the journey in a single day for the first time this year. The Prime Minister suggested he was “angry too”, after Home Office data showed 1,195 migrants arrived in 19 boats on Saturday. But Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch described Sir Keir’s words as “rubbish”, […]

The number of people reported injured after a car drove into crowds at Liverpool’s victory parade has risen to more than 100, police have said. Four people remained in hospital on Monday, a week on from the incident which happened on Water Street, in the city centre, just after 6pm. In an update, a Merseyside Police spokesman said: “The number of people reported to have been injured currently stands at […]

Vodafone has completed its £15 billion mega-merger with Three UK in a deal creating a “new force in UK mobile”. The mobile phone giant said the merger of the UK network businesses officially completed on May 31, nearly two years after it was first announced. VodafoneThree – now the biggest mobile phone network in the UK with around 27 million customers – pledged to invest £11 billion over the next […]

The UK manufacturing sector shrank again last month but may be “turning a corner”, according to new figures. Factories saw the recent downturn linked to trade tensions, US tariffs and higher costs slow down during May but highlighted that confidence was still “subdued”. The S&P Global UK manufacturing PMI survey, watched closely by economists, showed a reading of 46.4 in May, up from 45.4 in April. Any reading above 50 […]