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Large parts of Britain have ground to a halt after the biggest strike to hit the country’s railways in 30 years began in the early hours of Tuesday with disruption to passengers expected to last all week. Members of the RMT union officially launched the industrial action by not turning up for night shifts that

Strikes will spread across the UK unless the government acts on its promise to create a high wage economy, the leader of the country’s main movement for organised labour has warned. Frances O’Grady, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, said that workers all over the country were supporting striking rail employees and would in

The UK’s biggest rail strike in a generation will “punish millions”, a government minister has warned, as union leaders said industrial action could be extended to other parts of the economy this summer. A six-day walkout will begin on Tuesday, involving 40,000 Network Rail staff and workers for 13 train operators, which is expected to

Bitcoin’s price has broken below the key threshold of $20,000 for the first time since November 2020, risking triggering a fresh wave of selling and deepening the crisis gripping the digital asset sector. The largest cryptocurrency, which acts as a benchmark for the broader crypto market, plunged to under $19,000 on Saturday morning, a fall

Shares in Asia followed Wall Street lower after the UK and Switzerland raised interest rates, adding to concerns that tighter monetary policies from central banks could undercut a global economic recovery. Japan’s benchmark Topix index and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 both shed 2 per cent, while South Korea’s Kospi fell 1.7 per cent. China’s CSI 300

The Bank of England raised interest rates by 0.25 percentage points on Thursday and warned it expected inflation to climb above 11 per cent before the end of the year. The increase — the fifth time the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee has tightened policy in back-to-back meetings — takes the BoE’s benchmark rate to 1.25

The European Central Bank has called an unscheduled meeting of its rate-setters, sparking speculation it could announce measures to tackle surging borrowing costs in weaker eurozone economies. The ECB said: “The governing council will have an ad hoc meeting on Wednesday to discuss current market conditions.” The meeting is scheduled to start at 11am CET.

The Federal Reserve is this week set to discuss whether to increase the pace of its monetary tightening in the face of worsening inflation. The Federal Open Market Committee will convene on Tuesday for a two-day gathering just days after two economic reports suggested that price pressures have become more relentless than expected. Before data

US stocks slid sharply at the start of trading on Monday with the benchmark S&P 500 opening in bear market territory, as a sell-off sparked by high inflation and the prospect of aggressive central bank tightening rippled across global financial markets. Wall Street’s S&P 500 index fell 2.4 per cent, pushing it more than 20

British unions have warned transport secretary Grant Shapps that his plan to legislate to allow agency workers to provide cover for striking rail workers was impractical and would be fiercely resisted. The RMT union is planning the worst disruption on the railway network in 30 years later this month over wage levels. But Shapps said

US defence secretary Lloyd Austin accused China of stepping up coercive behaviour towards Taiwan as he stressed that Washington would maintain its military capacity to resist any force that threatened the country. Speaking at the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue defence forum in Singapore, Austin said China was engaging in provocative behaviour across the Indo-Pacific region that

US consumer price growth resumed its rapid rise in May, accelerating 1 per cent during the month as rising inflation in the services sector added urgency to the Federal Reserve’s plans to aggressively tighten monetary policy. The monthly rise in the consumer price index, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, was significantly

The European Central Bank has paved the way for a series of rate rises, starting with a quarter-percentage point move in July and raising the prospect of a bigger half-point shift in September. The ECB said in a statement on Thursday that its governing council “intends to raise the key ECB interest rates by 25 basis

Economic growth in the UK will grind to a halt next year with only Russia, hobbled by western sanctions, performing worse among the G20 leading economies, the OECD forecast on Wednesday. The Paris-based organisation’s forecast highlighted the effects of high UK inflation still squeezing household and corporate incomes in 2023 alongside a further round of

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said a stalemate in the war with Russia was “not an option for us” as he once more appealed for western military support to restore his country’s territorial integrity. “We are inferior in terms of equipment and therefore we are not capable of advancing,” he said. “We are going to suffer

Boris Johnson is facing a vote of no confidence in his leadership on Monday evening in a dramatic escalation of tension between the prime minister and his own MPs. Conservative MPs will vote in a secret ballot from 6pm to 8pm on whether they want Johnson to carry on as prime minister. Downing Street said

Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff on Sunday hit back at remarks by Emmanuel Macron in which the French president said it was important not to “humiliate” Russia over the war in Ukraine. In an interview with French regional newspapers on Saturday, Macron said maintaining dialogue with Vladimr Putin was crucial “so that the day when

Ukraine has warned that the world faces a critical food shortage unless Russia lifts its Black Sea port blockade, as improvements to other transport options would only enable it to deliver a fraction of its total grain stockpile. Oleksandr Kubrakov, Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, told the Financial Times that “all of our activity won’t cover even

Global investors are returning to China’s stock markets after a widespread sell-off earlier this year triggered by draconian Covid-19 restrictions, the geopolitical implications of Russia’s war in Ukraine and the lingering effects of regulatory crackdowns. The country’s CSI 300 stocks index started 2022 with the worst quarterly drop since the popping of a debt-fuelled bubble

Saudi Arabia has indicated to western allies that it is prepared to raise oil production should Russia’s output fall substantially under the weight of sanctions, according to five people familiar with the discussions. The kingdom has resisted calls from the White House to accelerate production increases despite oil prices trading near $120 a barrel, the