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British households face paying tens of millions of pounds in administration costs for the government’s controversial scheme to reduce energy bills by £200 in October. The energy bills support scheme has been widely criticised by opposition parties and consumer groups because the £200 discount will have to be repaid by consumers in annual instalments of

If Elon Musk thought that casting himself as Twitter’s saviour would win widespread backing for his $43bn hostile takeover bid, he was in for a rude awakening. The world’s richest man laid out some sweeping claims for this week’s unsolicited approach. Shareholders, he promised, would “love” the rich premium he was offering. He would bring

Covid-19 cases are once more on the rise in the US, but this time there is little impetus for new restrictions or funding to help combat them. The number of daily new cases in the US has increased by 14 per cent since the beginning of April, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University, reaching

Olga Rudenko, editor of The Kyiv Independent, has had a punishing six weeks. Faced with the prospect of trying to run her publication from a bomb shelter with unreliable internet and fearing Russian soldiers would target journalists, she fled the capital for western Ukraine the day after President Vladimir Putin’s invasion began. Yet while the

The industrial zone and sprawling lorry park in the small Dutch town of Oss give almost no indication of the opulent yachts being built inside nine covered dockside sheds, or of the identity of their clients or owners. But Heesen, the local shipyard that boasts of “producing some of the finest superyachts in the world”,

Memphis Milano, the design movement beloved of ’80s obsessives, shows no sign of going away. And why would it? With its playful shapes and primary colours, its daring, positivity and spirit, we are still irresistibly charmed. Founded by Ettore Sottsass, who brought together the collective of designers and makers known as the Memphis Group in 1980, the gang first showed together

Your browser does not support playing this file but you can still download the MP3 file to play locally. This week, we bring our classic Life of a Song series to your ears, with the dramatic story behind ‘Bam Bam’, Sister Nancy’s reggae dancehall classic. Despite being one of the most sampled reggae tracks of

Anglo American’s annual shareholder meeting next week will mark the end of an era as chief executive Mark Cutifani steps down after almost a decade at the top of one of the world’s biggest mining groups. The affable but pugnacious Australian has turned the London-listed miner from an industry laggard to a leader that many

Welsh designer Bethan Gray did something she hadn’t done for some time during the enforced hiatus of 2020: she started to paint. Choosing Chinese calligraphy brushes, she began to create freeform lines in ultramarine ink on a canvas laid on the floor of her studio. It was a spontaneous act, but what emerged was progress

When legendary designer Philippe Starck met Spanish investment banker Pedro Gómez de Baeza 30 years ago in Madrid they bonded through their quickfire, raucous sense of humour. The occasion was the opening of Starck’s transformation of a dilapidated old theatre into Teatriz, a restaurant with dramatic decor and an experimental menu. “Madrid had seen nothing

Jean Prouvé (1901-84) was not only an extraordinary engineer, architect and industrial designer but an extraordinary man. As a member of the French Resistance during the second world war, he operated under the codename Locksmith and, according to his daughter Catherine (the youngest of his five children), organised five escape routes from his apartment in Nancy,

The Biden administration will restart oil and gas leasing on federal lands as it comes under increasing pressure to bring down high petrol prices, backing away from a freeze that had riled industry executives. Around 144,000 acres of public lands will be put up for sale next week, the interior department said on Friday, marking

Twitter has launched a poison pill takeover defence to fend off a $43bn hostile bid from billionaire Tesla chief executive Elon Musk. In the first sign that the social media company plans to fight Musk’s bid, Twitter said on Friday that its board of directors had unanimously adopted a year-long shareholder rights plan to “enable

In his “Rich People’s Problems” column (FT Money, April 2), James Max laments the poor choice of electric vehicles available to someone of his standing. Fords, Peugeots and Vauxhalls are for those who “work in a shop”; Volvos are chosen by people with “no personality or self-esteem”; a BMW is for the likes of “an

It was a quintessentially New York nightmare. At the height of the Tuesday morning commute a mumbling madman riding a subway train in Brooklyn donned a gas mask, detonated two smoke grenades and then fired 33 shots from a semi-automatic pistol at fellow passengers. Ten were wounded. The city was traumatised. But Eric Adams, the

“Let them eat cake” could become an enduring metaphor for this government. With the prime minister and chancellor under fire for raising taxes while families struggle with energy and food bills, their police fines for being at an impromptu birthday party during lockdown have brought the ghost of Marie Antoinette to British politics. There are

For James Morley, the news that prime minister Boris Johnson and his chancellor Rishi Sunak had been fined for breaking coronavirus rules only confirmed his worst suspicions. “The PM is not beyond reproach — he is not above the Queen, he’s not above the law,” said the 34-year-old who runs a games shop in the

Home secretary Priti Patel has overridden objections from civil servants to press ahead with contentious plans to send migrants who seek asylum in Britain on a one-way ticket to Rwanda. Patel took the rare step of issuing a so-called ministerial direction to enable her to overrule officials’ concerns that the plans would not offer value

Two photos taken during the Ukraine crisis seem to sum up the relative positions of Russia and the western alliance. The first is of Vladimir Putin at his now famous long table — his physical distance from visiting leaders symbolising Russia’s isolation. The second image is of Joe Biden in the middle of a group

Russia’s ministry of defence threatened to increase the scale of missile strikes against the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, a day after the sinking of the Moskva, the flagship of its Black Sea fleet. Igor Konashenkov, the ministry’s spokesman, said on Friday that Russia would intensify its attacks on targets in Kyiv in response to any further

The writer is author of ‘Left Bank: Art, Passion and the Rebirth of Paris 1940—1950’ and ‘Notre-Dame: The Soul of France’ France is a country in flux. And for the third time in 20 years, it faces a stark choice between electing a leader from the political mainstream or one from the far-right. In 2002,