Tag: Featured

    Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, is to land more than £15m from an education business he helped set up, even as he fights an increasingly intense political battle over the NHS’s latest winter crisis. Sky News has learnt that Hotcourses, a listings service set up by Mr Hunt and his business partner Mike Elms in 1996, is expected to announce this week that it has been sold for between £30m and £35m. A deal was said by a legal source to be close to being signed on Sunday evening. Filings at Companies House suggest that Mr Hunt owns approximately 48% of the shares in Hotcourses, meaning a takeover worth £35m would yield a payday for the cabinet minister worth £16.8m. The latest register of MPs' interests says only that he holds more than 15% of the business. The prospective ...

    Meghan Markle's half-brother has reportedly been arrested after allegedly holding a gun to a woman's head following a drunken argument. Thomas Markle Jr was arrested late on Thursday (12 January) in Grants Pass, Oregon. He was taken into custody after an alleged altercation with a woman that escalated into violence. The 50-year-old was charged with menacing, pointing a firearm at another person, and unlawful use of a weapon, according to public police records. Deputy Jill Elardi, of Josephine County Sheriff's Office, confirmed the arrest and charges saying: He was arrested at 11pm on January 12 and released on Friday at 10am. He will be going to court for it. He was released after 3am after his ex-wife Tracy Dooley posted bail of $1,500 (£1,200). "When he called he sounded...

    Two million people were freed from Islamic State rule in 2016, the Defence Secretary has said. Sir Michael Fallon said substantial progress has been made in driving the terror group, which is also known as Daesh, out of Iraq. The city of Mosul, Islamic State's last stronghold in Iraq, is expected to fall to local forces this year. US-backed militias from the Syrian Democratic Forces are also encircling the city of Raqqa, which is Islamic State's de-facto capital. Estimates suggest that about 25,000 IS fighters were killed over the course of 2016, and the group is now in control of less than 10% of Iraqi territory. Officials say IS fighters have become increasingly disorganised recently - with militants resorting to desperate tactics such as hiding in hospitals, and burning...

    The chancellor, Philip Hammond, has said Britain could transform its economic model into that of a corporate tax haven if the EU fails to provide it with an agreement on market access after Brexit. In an interview with the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag, Hammond commented that if Britain was left closed off from European markets after leaving the EU, it would consider leaving behind a European-style social model, with European-style taxation systems, European-style regulation systems and become something different. Asked to clarify his remark, the chancellor told his German interviewers: We could be forced to change our economic model and we will have to change our model to regain competitiveness. And you can be sure we will do whatever we have to do. The British people ...

    The Qur’an reading lead to a backlash with the cathedral saying it had received offensive messages on social media. The leader of the Scottish Anglican church has said he was deeply distressed at the widespread offence caused by a reading from the Qur’an at a service to mark the feast of the Epiphany at St Mary’s Cathedral in Glasgow. David Chillingworth, bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane, and primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, said in a statement: We also deeply regret the widespread abuse which has been received by the cathedral community. He has launched a review of interfaith work. His comments followed a row over the inclusion in the service of passages from the Qur’an read in Arabic from the cathedral’s lectern by a local Muslim student. The cathedral ...

    Theresa May is expected to announce the UK is prepared to leave the single market, the customs union and European Court of Justice. The PM’s willingness to give up membership of the single market will be made clear in a major speech at Lancaster House in London on Tuesday, according to the Sun on Sunday. Her red lines will be an end to free movement from the EU and clearance to hold bilateral trade talks with other countries, which it is thought will not be achievable while still in the single market. A Downing Street source told Sky News: The issue of the single market and the customs union will be answered on Tuesday when the Prime Minister sets out her negotiations. Pro-EU campaigner MP Anna Soubry has described the anticipated move as "grossly irresponsible, if true. T...