6:39 am, March 10, 2023
HS2 leg to be delayed and road projects slowed to make savings
The construction of the Birmingham-to-Crewe leg of HS2 will be delayed by two years and services of the high-speed rail line may not now enter central London until the 2040s.
Transport secretary Mark Harper announced a series of setbacks also affecting key road projects under cost-saving measures. The high-speed line was due for extension from the Midlands between 2030 and 2034 to help boost transport in the north of England.
The A27 Arundel project and A5036 scheme for Princess Way in Liverpool were being put back along with other road initiatives. The Lower Thames Crossing connecting Kent and Essex is being delayed by two years.
Councils say pothole funding is 32 times below budget per mile for major roads
Government funding for maintaining England’s motorways and major A-roads was 32 times higher per mile than for repairing local roads last year, according to new figures.
The Local Government Association, which conducted the analysis, urged the Treasury to use next Wednesday’s Budget to provide more money to councils to fix their pothole-plagued roads.
It said government-owned company National Highways spent £192,000 per mile on maintaining its network of motorways and major A-roads last year versus councils receiving just £6,000 per mile for fixing potholes on local roads.
‘Very serious questions to answer’ amid beef fraud investigation, says Labour
Labour has said there are ‘very serious questions to answer’ about how a UK supermarket has become embroiled in a major beef fraud investigation.
The National Food Crime Unit, part of the Food Standards Agency, hasn’t named the supermarket but said pre-packed meat and deli products from South America and Europe have been supplied to the retailer and labelled as British.
The investigation involves the review of about 1.3m documents with products being sold to customers as ‘best British beef’, Farmers Weekly reported. Shadow environment secretary Jim McMahon said in response: ‘There are clearly very serious questions to answer.’ All affected products have now been removed from the retailer’s shelves.
Family doctors facing ‘insurmountable’ pressures, warn leading GPs
GPs are facing ‘insurmountable pressures’, experts have said as they warned that the NHS ‘will not survive’ without general practice.
A new report into GP pressures suggests one in four staff fear their practice is in danger of closing because of unmanageable workloads and rising demand.
The document, from the Royal College of GPs, says general practice is ‘in crisis’, and makes a series of calls to help ease pressures and stop the growing number of GPs from quitting.
UK’s ‘gold standard’ Covid-19 infection survey to stop collecting data
The UK’s long-running weekly Covid-19 infection survey, recognised worldwide as the ‘gold standard’ for measuring levels of coronavirus among the population, is to stop collecting data.
The survey, which is based on a sample of tests from households across the country, will be ‘paused’ from March 31, health officials have said. Any new surveys will be announced ‘in due course’.
Multiple people dead in Jehovah’s Witness hall shooting in Germany
Several people were killed and wounded in a shooting incident inside a building used by Jehovah’s Witnesses in the northern German city of Hamburg yesterday evening, police said.
‘We only know that several people died here. Several people are wounded, they were taken to hospitals,’ police spokesperson Holger Vehren said of the shooting in the Gross Borstel district of Germany’s second-biggest city.
He said he had no information on the severity of the injuries suffered by the wounded. Police didn’t confirm German media reports, which named no sources, of six or seven dead. A fatally wounded person found upstairs may have been the gunman.
WhatsApp boss warns service could be blocked in UK if Online Safety Bill is passed
The head of WhatsApp has said he would sooner British users were stopped from using the popular messaging app than let the government require it to impinge on their privacy.
Will Cathcart said the company wouldn’t comply if the new Online Safety Bill forced it to scan messages for child abuse material, the BBC reported.
The messaging app uses encryption to ensure that even it cannot read users’ messages. The Bill aims to help clamp down on online trolling and illegal forms of pornography by placing more responsibility on the platforms that internet users use.
More than 40,000 plant species now stored in Kew Gardens’ seed bank
The Millennium Seed Bank is celebrating a major milestone after storing more than 40,000 different plant species in an effort to preserve rare, threatened and important wild plants.
Dubbed the Noah’s Ark for plants, the MSB holds the Guinness World Record for the largest seed bank facility on Earth.
It stores 98,567 seed collections from 190 countries and territories across all seven continents, nine biogeographic regions and 36 biodiversity hotspots.
Nissan aiming for traditional petrol and hybrid cars to cost same by 2026
Nissan has announced a new approach to electrified powertrains that aims to see more sharing of parts on its hybrid vehicles and EVs to make them cheaper.
It wants to standardise the key components of electrified vehicles. The joint approach means electric and hybrid models can be made on the same assembly line, cutting the cost of powertrain production by ‘approximately 30 per cent’ versus 2019 levels, it claims.
The key advantage for consumers, says Nissan, is that it’s aiming to reach ‘price parity’ between vehicles fitted with internal combustion engines and its e-Power hybrid models by 2026.
Yesterday’s headlines on Car Dealer you might have missed
- Consumers will decide success of agency sales, says ‘curious’ Mark Lavery at Car Dealer Live
- ‘Arrogant’ used car dealer Cazoo was ‘naive’ and ‘got what it deserved’ as independent dealers say online disruptors ‘don’t know what they’re doing’
- BYD plans to have up to 100 UK sites by the end of 2025
- Ferrari from Tom Hartley to form part of funeral cortege for tragic supercar fan
- Judge slams ‘breach of trust’ as she jails ex-Charles Hurst employee who stole tyres from dealership
- Ray Chapman Motors Malton scoops national Volvo retailer title for third year running
- Industry experts want Budget help for auto sector ahead of 2030 ban on new petrol and diesel sales
- WR Davies to add Nissan to Rhyl site and double the capacity of Ford workshop
- EVs may only manage up to two-thirds of claimed range in winter, reveal tests
Market movements
The FTSE 100 closed down 49.94 points yesterday to end on 7,879.98. The Cac 40 was down 8.88 points at 7,315.88, the Dax was up 1.34 points at 15,633.21 and the Dow Jones was down 543.54 points at 32,254.86.
Weather outlook
Rain, sleet and snow will gradually clear eastwards today, leaving brighter skies for many and the occasional snow shower this afternoon, says BBC Weather. There’ll be frequent showers in northern Scotland later.
Tonight will be mainly clear, dry and cold for most. The far north of Scotland will have scattered snow showers, while the far south-west will experience hill snow and rain by the end of the night.
Saturday will start bright for most, but it’ll gradually turn cloudy from the west. The north will see snow and rain moving in, while the south will have patchy rain.
