A general election. The backdrop a flat lining Economy Millions struggling with the cost of living and polling indicating the Conservative Party is lagging far behind the opposition. Not to mention Financial Markets on edge for anything that might worsen the uks finances. The memory of Prime Minister liz truss s disastrous Tax Cutting Budget no doubt not far from mr hunts mind. So lets remind ourselves what he came up with. The rate of National Insurance paid by employees and the self employed, will be cut again by 2 pence in the pound. That comes on top of an earlier 2p cut mr hunt announced in the autumn. In april, full Child Benefits will be paid to households, where the highest earning parent is getting up to £60,000. The current limit is £50,000. And the non dom tax break for wealthy uk residents whose permanent home is overseas, is to be scrapped raising £2. 7 billion a year for the government. That announcement is highly controversial as it was a key pillar of labour policy.
Last month. But so far, the houthi havent been deterred. These are pictures of the forces actually seizing a ship in november, the iranians back group which controls most of Northern Yemen had been targeting ships in the area for months, and protest at offensive in the gaza strip. This latest action is a major escalation, the ship hit by Houthi Yesterday was the envy true confidence that the ballcarrier was selling with the crew of 20 who are mainly filipino nationals. The attack happened about 15 nautical miles from the yemen port. The ship was travelling from china to saudi arabia. The us condemned the attack saying it went way beyond disruption to navigation and international seas. ,. , seas. Not ust endangered seafarers seas. Notjust endangered seafarers but seas. Notjust endangered seafarers but now, seas. Notjust endangered l seafarers but now, tragically killed a number of them so we will continue to hold them accountable and we call on government to run the will to do the same.
welcome to bbc news broadcasting to viewers in the uk and around the world. it s seven in the morning in singapore, and in manila where there s been a big strategic development in the pacific rivalry between the us and china, with america sealing a deal to greatly increase its military presence in the philippines. it s seven in the morning in singapore, and in manila the agreement was signed off by the us defence secretary lloyd austin, after talks in the capital of the philippines. it represents a change in approach by president marcos. previous adminstrations tended to weaken their ties to washington. the deal gives the us access to four more military bases in the philippines, which will make a total of nine. neither country has said exactly where the new locations would be although it has been acknowledged that washington has requested access to bases on the northern land mass of luzon, the closest part of the philippines to taiwan, and on the island of palawan, facing
with mortgages, credit card debt and other borrowng. the rise by half a percentage point to 4% is to yet another attempt to control inflation. 0ur economics editor faisal islam reports. the squeeze continues. an official interest rate of 4% should not feel huge, but it does, and notjust here in nuneaton forjoanne, who runs a furniture and gift shop. the mortgage on the business has increased, gas and electric have increased, wages have increased and are due to go up again, so there s a lot of things that i have to think about on a daily basis to ensure that the business will be sustainable for the future. but could there be some relief from the bank of england? some strong hints today that this should be one of the last, even the very last, of these ten rate rises. is the central message of today s decisions in the report that we may be beyond the worst point of this crisis, with energy? well, i very much hope so, but we ve onlyjust begun to turn the corner in my view, so it s too