Author: SKYNEWS

Some water companies are instructing bailiffs as they try to recover customers’ debt more than 6,000 times in a single year, new data reveals.The information gathered by a committee of MPs has not been freely available before and reveals huge variations in water companies’ use of the tactic. Wessex Water have not been using bailiffs at all over the last decade, and Welsh Water has used them less than 1,000 times in every year from 2019 to 2025.But Southern Water instructed bailiffs 15,707 times in 2019, more than 6,000 times in 2020, more than 5,000 times in 2023, more than…

For years, geopolitical analysts warned us that among the scariest of all scenarios for the world economy was the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.Well, now, in practice, that is precisely what has happened. Shipping through this narrow channel, the gateway to the Persian Gulf, has dwindled to close to zero. The worst nightmare has materialised. And yet the funny thing is that in certain respects the world seems no different to how it was before. The S&P 500, the benchmark share index in America, has barely budged. The FTSE 100 is down a bit, but is still a bit…

Britney Spears was spotted driving “erratically” before her arrest on suspicion of operating her vehicle under the influence, police say.The 44-year-old star spent the night in the cells after being detained by officers on Wednesday evening, a California Highway Patrol (CHP) spokesperson confirmed. She has been scheduled to appear in court on 4 May.Meanwhile, her Instagram account, on which she frequently shares short videos of herself dancing in her living room, appears to have been deactivated.Searching for the account, which had more than 42m followers, now brings up the message “Sorry, this page isn’t available”. The singer “showed signs of…

Indonesia has become the latest and most populous country to say it will ban social media for under-16s.The country – which has the fourth biggest population in the world – has approved new restrictions designed to protect young people online. And with high levels of internet use among its more than 284 million people, the ban could have a big impact.Since Australia brought in the world’s first ban of under-16s on social media in December, a succession of other countries – including Spain, France, Austria, Denmark, Finland, Greece and Italy – have said they plan to do the same. You…

German media giant Axel Springer is to buy Telegraph Media Group in a £575m deal that will see the Daily and Sunday Telegraph print titles and their online business come under overseas ownership.The deal, which is subject to regulatory approval, will see titles with historic links to the Conservative Party and the British establishment, in the same stable as German titles Bild and Die Welt, along with online specialist media brands Politico and Business Insider. The owner of the Daily Mail had been in talks to buy The Telegraph titles for several months, a deal that would have brought several…

The BBC regrets its “serious mistake” during the BAFTAs broadcast, the corporation’s outgoing director general Tim Davie has said.During the ceremony, as Sinners stars Michael B Jordan and Delroy Lindo were presenting an award on stage, a racial slur was shouted out by Tourette’s campaigner John Davidson, who was there to celebrate a film about his life. The BBC failed to cut the slur from its broadcast of the 22 February event, and viewers could see the offending moment for more than 12 hours before the programme was taken down from BBC iPlayer.In a letter to Dame Caroline Dinenage, chairwoman…

A major VPN service is becoming one of the first to block websites known for hosting child sexual abuse material (CSAM).ExpressVPN is partnering with the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), the UK’s CSAM watchdog, to tackle the “universally despised and despicable” content, according to Dr Peter Membrey, chief engineering officer at the VPN provider. Using a “simple, well-scoped DNS control”, he says user privacy will be protected and there’ll be “no broken encryption”, “no traffic inspection”, “no monitoring”.”It’s deliberately straightforward, because privacy systems lose trust when they become opaque.”The move is less about an impressive technological innovation and more about an…

UK average diesel costs have hit a 16-month high, less than a week after war gripped the Middle East and sent oil costs rocketing.Global energy prices have been the main financial market focus since Tehran launched attacks against Gulf nations in retaliation for the US-Israeli strikes on its country, disrupting production and deliveries of both oil and natural gas. The narrow Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf, between Iran and the United Arab Emirates, is used to more than 80 tankers a day passing through.Money latest: Energy giant imposes exit fees due to ‘super volatile market’ Image: The Strait…

Britney Spears has spent the night in custody after being arrested.The star was detained by highway patrol officers at 9.28pm on Wednesday and released at 6.07am, according to Ventura County Sheriff’s Office. Its online records give Spears’ height as 5ft 5ins and her occupation as “celebrity”.She has been scheduled to appear in court on 4 May.Various US media reports say she was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence in California. Her representative said after the news emerged that her arrest was “completely inexcusable” and the incident “can be the first step in long overdue change that needs to…

People on obesity jabs will regain the majority of the weight they lose within a year of stopping the drugs, a new study suggests.Researchers at the University of Cambridge found that after stopping the jabs for 52 weeks, on average people had regained 60% of the weight they lost. They warned that if the regained weight is mainly fat, patients could “be worse off than before” they started the jabs.How do the drugs work?Weight loss jabs are a class of drugs known as GLP-1 receptor agonists, which work by mimicking the hormone GLP-1 to regulate blood sugar and insulin levels.…