Honours scandal: Firm boasted it could get ‘damehood for £80k’

A firm boasted it could win a gong for a celebrity author for £80,000, the Daily Mail reveals. Leaked emails expose a cynical offer to help Barbara Taylor Bradford become a dame by getting direct feedback from ‘the people that matter’. The brazen messages stated: ‘Basically our fee is 80K plus VAT… we bill half … Read more

ALEX BRUMMER: Enjoy it while you can… we cannot live on Rishi Sunak’s giveaways forever

No Chancellor in modern times has faced the looming horror of mass unemployment that scarred this country and the world economy in the 1930s. But this is precisely what Rishi Sunak’s unprecedented measures yesterday were designed to stave off. As what has been called the ‘first phase’ of the pandemic comes to an end, the … Read more

Slash National Insurance and VAT to get the economy back on its feet, says ex-chancellor Sajid Javid

Former chancellor Sajid Javid heaped pressure on successor Rishi Sunak to cut taxes to help Britain recover from coronavirus today as he called for reductions in National Insurance and VAT. Mr Javid, who quit in February after a bruising clash with Boris Johnson and his aide Dominic Cummings, called for a  ‘significant temporary’ reduction in NI … Read more

Widow discovered her business partner of 15 years stole £75 000 while she care for her dying husband

A heartbroken widow has vowed to bounce back after her thieving partner drained their business of cash as she cared for her dying husband. Karen Pritchard, 55, from Southport, Merseyside, thought the jeweller’s shop she ran with her trusted pal, Carl Gilroy, was in good hands when she took time out to look after husband, … Read more