Have you given up alcohol in JANUARY for health reason or cost of living. A report suggests sales have been falling.
This one may be for the economic nerds out there. Do you know much about how the National Debt works.
Pentland View care home in Thurso was transformed into Blue Hawaii to mark what would have been Elvis Presley's 89th birthday on 8 January. It is estimated that Elvis has sold over one billion records worldwide so to honour the undisputed King of Rock & Roll, the staff and residents enjoyed a fantastic day of music, fun and dancing.
Plenty of sunshine today, with milder air bringing rain and snow to central and northern Scotland. Turning milder, wetter and windier into the weekend as Storm Isha approaches.
The Chair of Highland Council's Economy and Infrastructure Committee has thanked the local authority’s roads operations teams as they continue to manage routes across Highland’s large roads network during challenging weather conditions. Cllr Ken Gowans said: "The challenging winter weather over the past week has caused considerable disruption to our communities, schools and businesses.
Unearthed is a Greenpeace web site and their investigation into one water company is very worrying. It begs the question of - Can we trust any of the privatised industries running essential services to tell the truth if it means cutting dividends to shareholders.
A project to increase electricity supply and reduce emissions on a west coast island has been awarded more than £25,000 by HIE. The HIE funding is being used to replace and upgrade high voltage transformers and other associated equipment to enable a major upgrade of the renewable energy supply on the Isle of Muck.
Legislation enabling councils to increase their affordable housing stock without having to pay a tax on additional properties has been introduced in the Scottish Parliament. Under changes to the Additional Dwelling Supplement (ADS), paid as part of Land and Buildings Transaction Tax, the length of time a buyer moving between properties has to sell their original home in order to be able to reclaim ADS would also be extended from 18 months to 36 months.
If you've sold clothes on Vinted or Depop, or something you've made on Etsy, you might have been alarmed or confused by information recently published by HMRC on paying taxes when selling items online. If you've sold clothes on Vinted or Depop, or something you've made on Etsy, you might have been alarmed or confused by information recently published by HMRC on paying taxes when selling items online.
The latest official estimates reveal retail sales plummeted by -3.2% in December, their biggest fall since the height of Covid lockdowns. The home delivery expert ParcelHero says the impact of inflation meant shoppers reduced the amount they bought this Christmas, but there were crumbs of comfort in online sales results.
Weather is still hitting school transport services around the county. Wick Unfortunately we have made the decision to close the school tomorrow, Friday 19th January, due to the ongoing snowfall and hazardous road conditions.
Region's young workforce to take part in pioneering sustainability skills programme. Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE), Zero Waste Scotland and business transformation enterprise Powering Futures have teamed up to provide the fully-funded places on the Highlands and Islands Powering Futures Challenge 2024.
Employees driving their own car for work - so-called grey fleet drivers - are being left out of pocket with current rates remaining unchanged for more than a decade. That's according to research conducted by the RAC Foundation, which suggests the 45 pence per mile (ppm) approved mileage allowance payments (AMAPs) rate should increase by 41% to 63p.
Sharon Pfleger, Consultant in Pharmaceutical Public Health, has sailed to Antarctica as part of a global leadership programme for women in STEMM working on environmental issues. In November, Sharon Pfleger, Consultant in Pharmaceutical Public Health, embarked on the Island Sky ship leaving Puerto Madryn in Argentina and sailed to Antarctica as part of the culmination of a global leadership programme, Homeward Bound, for women in STEMM working on environmental issues.
Marine Management Organisation (MMO) has confirmed that more than 80% of under-12m inshore vessels participated in the I-VMS roll-out programme last year, resulting in £1.3m of European funding being awarded to fishers. New legislation, a statutory instrument (SI), is expected to come into force in April 2024 and will require all under-12m vessels fishing for commercial purposes in English waters to have an active I-VMS device.
As the Post Office Inquiry continues to hear testimony, more and more details are coming to light about who knew what when. Back in 2019, the Post Office spent at least a-hundred-million pounds still defending the Horizon system when more than five hundred subpostmasters won their landmark settlement.
Average UK house prices decreased by 2.1% in the 12 months to November 2023 (provisional estimate), down from a decrease of 1.3% (revised estimate) in the 12 months to October 2023. The average UK house price was £285,000 in November 2023, which was £6,000 lower than 12 months ago.
Retail sales volumes are estimated to have fallen by 3.2% in December 2023, from a rise of 1.4% in November 2023 (revised up from an increase of 1.3%); December's decrease was the largest monthly fall since January 2021, when coronavirus (COVID-19) restrictions affected sales. Looking at the quarterly picture, sales volumes fell by 0.9% in the three months to December 2023 when compared with the previous three months.
A Fujitsu employee called a subpostmaster who was bankrupted by the company's faulty computer system a "nasty chap" in not-seen-before email sent internally in 2003. Peter Sewell, who was in the Post Office Account Security Team at Fujitsu, said that Lee Carrington was a "nasty man" after the subpostmaster had threatened the company with legal action after losing all his money due to no fault of his own.
It is unbelievable but it is now coming to light that present sub-postmasters are still being penalised by the discredited Horizon computer system run by the Post Office. More and more stories are coming out about the plight of current sub-postmasters who are suffering from the faulty Horizon system still run by Fujitsu.
