Closing summary
Annual energy bills will fall by £117 for millions of households from April after Rachel Reeves’s plan to cut £150 a year from bills was partly foiled by rising costs.
The energy regulator Ofgem’s quarterly cap will fall by 7% a year for the three months from April to £1,641 for the average combined gas and electricity bill in Great Britain, from £1,758 under the current January-March cap.
The cut, which will provide some relief to stretched household finances, follows the November budget, in which the chancellor shifted some green energy costs away from household bills and into general taxation.
However, the fall is smaller than the £150 cut in April promised by Reeves, as her cuts were partly offset by the increased cost of maintaining and upgrading the UK’s energy networks.
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Thank you for reading. We’ll be back tomorrow. Take care (and enjoy the sunshine if you can!) – JK
US tariffs could rise to 15% or more after supreme court blow, trade representative says
The US tariff rate for some countries will go up to 15% or higher from the newly-imposed 10%, Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative, said on Wednesday, without naming any specific trading partners or other details.
“Right now, we have the 10% tariff. It’ll go up to 15 [%] for some and then it may go higher for others, and I think it will be in line with the types of tariffs we’ve been seeing,” Greer said in an interview on Fox Business Network’s Mornings with Maria programme.
The US president suffered a defeat at the hands of the US supreme court last week which struck down his sweeping “liberation day” tariffs imposed last year. But in response Donald Trump announced a 10% global tariff.
According to a notice from the US customs agency: “an additional 10% ad valorem duty on imported articles of every country” has been imposed for a period of 150 days from Tuesday, unless specifically exempt.
Trump has also previously threatened to raise the level to 15% via social media posts.
Separately, FedEx sued the US government on Monday, seeking a refund for the tariffs after the supreme court decision.
