Britain s big four banks amassed more than 200 billion pounds ($277.52 billion) of new deposits last year as customers reined in spending through pandemic lockdowns, far outstripping extra lending to struggling businesses and households. Full-year earnings reported by HSBC, Barclays, Lloyds and NatWest last month revealed the extent to which lenders finances have been upended by the crisis. The banks now face a glut in savings, a Reuters analysis of the banks results show, as domestic customers of the four lenders deposited 221 billion pounds of extra cash. By contrast, despite banks doling out billions of pounds of state-guaranteed finance to companies since the pandemic hit, their net lending growth in the UK overall was 53.4 billion pounds - a quarter of the growth in deposits.
Read more about Britain s Prince Philip in hospital for third night for observation, rest on Business Standard. Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, remains in a London hospital where he was admitted as a precautionary measure
Read more about United Kingdom records coldest February night since 1955 on Business Standard. UK on Thursday recorded its coldest February night across the country since February 1955, reported the UK Met office
Britain and India are committed to an enhanced trade partnership as the first step towards a positive free trade agreement in future and plans are expected to be further formalised during the visit of Prime Minister Boris Johnson to India in the coming months, the UK s Minister for South Asia has said. Lord Tariq Ahmad, who is also Minister for the Commonwealth in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), said the strong relationship between the two countries has been further intensified with the vaccine collaboration to help fight the common enemy in the form of COVID-19. We have been undertaking steps to remove barriers to trade and the hope is that an Enhanced Trade Partnership will lead to a positive free trade agreement (FTA) with India in future, said Ahmad, in an interaction to mark India s 72nd Republic Day celebrations on Tuesday.
The UK government on Monday unveiled new laws to protect England s cultural and historic heritage in the form of statues and monuments to ensure they are not removed at a whim. The move comes in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests in the country last year targeting several historic monuments, including with graffiti on Mahatma Gandhi s statue in Parliament Square in London. Another set of protesters had succeeded in pulling down the statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol and dumping it into the river during UK-wide demonstrations against the killing of 46-year-old African-American George Floyd in the US.