Author: LoveWorld UK

Mercedes expect to start contract talks with Lewis Hamilton in the next few days now the Briton has clinched a record-equalling seventh Formula One world championship, team boss Toto Wolff has said. The 35-year-old Hamilton’s current deal ends next month. “Flying back from a seventh drivers’ championship, you can’t talk about a contract. It wouldn’t do justice to the achievement,” the Austrian told the BBC. “We’re going to give it a few days then we are going to talk about it.” Wolff told reporters jokingly after Hamilton won Sunday’s Turkish Grand Prix to clinch the title, and equal Ferrari great…

Major insurance companies told the UK Supreme Court on Monday that thousands of small companies battered by the coronavirus pandemic were not eligible for business interruption payouts and to suggest differently was “reverse engineering”. On the first day of a four-day appeal of a test case brought by Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) against insurers, industry lawyers told top judges that businesses could not claim for losses stemming from nationwide lockdowns to curb the virus. Gavin Kealey, a lawyer for insurer MS Amlin, said that only business losses related to COVID-19 infections within a 25-mile radius of insured properties were…

Britain will consider its options to help repair the country’s public finances, housing minister Robert Jenrick said on Tuesday, after media reports that ministers were considering a temporary cut to its aid spending. The Times newspaper said the government had drawn up plans to reduce the proportion of Britain’s gross national income spent on aid from 0.7 percent to 0.5 percent to make savings after spending hundreds of billions to fight COVID-19. Asked whether the government would make the cut on aid, Jenrick told LBC radio: “The Chancellor (finance minister) will have to think very carefully about whether this is…

Fifteen Asia-Pacific economies signed what could become the world’s largest free trade agreement on Sunday, covering nearly a third of the global population and about 30% of its global gross domestic product. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) will progressively lower tariffs and aims to counter protectionism, boost investment and allow freer movement of goods within the region. WHO HAS SIGNED? RCEP includes China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and the 10 members of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN): Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines. India was involved in early…

Saudi Aramco 2222.SE this year extended the maturity of two revolving credit facilities it took in 2015, meaning those loans worth a total of $8 billion (6.05 billion pounds) will be available through March 2022, a bond prospectus showed. Aramco said on Monday it plans to issue multi-tranche U.S. dollar-denominated bonds, as the world’s largest oil company seeks to raise cash amid weak global oil demand and lower oil prices. The prospectus showed that in June this year the oil giant amended certain agreements regarding one of the two revolving loans, a $6 billion conventional credit facility, to incorporate a $2 billion…

Britain and the European Union have a week to 10 days to find a way to unlock trade talks, Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said on Monday, after both sides called on the other to move their position on two of the most troublesome areas. The trade talks resume on Monday in Brussels after there was little movement on the most contentious areas — so-called “level playing field” fair competition rules and fisheries –last week when the two sides missed the latest mid-November deadline. The United Kingdom left the EU in January but the sides are struggling to clinch a…

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he was perfectly well after coming into contact with someone with COVID-19 and will drive the government forward via Zoom while he self-isolates for two weeks in Downing Street. Johnson’s latest brush with COVID comes after a tumultuous week in which his most senior adviser, arch Brexiteer Dominic Cummings, was ousted after clashing with a rival faction led by his fiancée and his new spokeswoman. From a flat above Downing Street, Johnson will have to grapple with Europe’s deadliest COVID-19 outbreak and master the delicate diplomacy needed to clinch a last-minute Brexit trade agreement within…

A group led by privacy activist Max Schrems on Monday filed complaints with German and Spanish data protection authorities over Apple’s AAPL.O online tracking tool, alleging that it allows iPhones to store users’ data without their consent in breach of European law. It is the first such major action against the U.S. technology group in regards to European Union privacy rules. Apple did not immediately reply to a request for comment. The Californian tech giant says it provides users with a superior level of privacy protection. The company had announced it would further tighten its rules with the launch of its iOS…

The cost of British finance minister Rishi Sunak’s decision to extend his COVID furlough programme until March should be “quite a bit lower” than the roughly 40 billion pounds spent so far, a Treasury official told lawmakers on Thursday. Asked about a possible further 40 billion-pound cost, Beth Russell, director-general for tax and welfare at the Treasury, said the number of claims were likely to be lower than earlier in 2020. “We wouldn’t expect it to be as high as that. Given the restrictions in the spring, and the restrictions that we are now expecting for the next few months,…

England manager Gareth Southgate said he could hand Borussia Dortmund teenager Jude Bellingham his first cap when they host Ireland on Thursday, making him the third-youngest player to represent the country. The 17-year-old midfielder was called up after James Ward-Prowse and Trent Alexander-Arnold withdrew due to injury. Only former skipper Wayne Rooney and Theo Walcott were younger than Bellingham when they made their England debut. “If we can get him on the pitch and he gets some match minutes as well, that will be a bonus,” Southgate told a news conference on Wednesday. “My initial conversation with him was that…