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Whisper it quietly, but there were a few glimmers of hope hidden away in the Bank of England’s latest interest rate decision.

Don’t get me wrong: there was plenty in there which will continue to concern households – especially those with mortgages.

The Bank‘s Monetary Policy Committee voted to increase its official interest rate by another half a percentage point, bringing it up to 3.5%. That’s the ninth consecutive increase – one every meeting since this time last year – and it won’t be the last.

The committee said that “should the economy evolve broadly in line with the November Monetary Policy Report projections, further increases in Bank Rate might be required for a sustainable return of inflation to target”.

Moreover, while there were two members of the nine-person committee who voted for no increase, another member, Catherine Mann, voted for an even bigger increase, up by 0.75 percentage points.

It’s worth taking a step back to ponder just how big a sea change this has been for monetary policy.

Yes, interest rates have been higher than this – as recently as 2008. But not since 1989 have interest rates increased this much in a single year. And given those households with mortgages today are considerably more indebted than back then, the net effect of these changes could be even tougher.

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That being said, as the Bank’s own analysis showed earlier this week, there are fewer and fewer households with those mortgages. This will be very tough for some, but not for everyone.

And the coming year is clouded in uncertainty. Given the main thing pushing up inflation has been energy prices and given no-one knows what Vladimir Putin will do next, trying to predict the future remains especially difficult.

But here’s where the glimmer – or rather glimmers – of hope come in.

• The first is that inflation seems to have peaked (bearing in mind those provisos). The Bank of England isn’t the only central bank slowing down its pace of rate increases; the Federal Reserve did precisely the same thing yesterday, raising US rates by half a percentage point.

• Second, the Bank reckons that the extension to the Energy Price Guarantee should help bear down on inflation next year, meaning it may not need to raise interest rates quite as much as it might have.

• Third, the economy is actually doing a little better (or rather, less badly) than it had previously expected. Yes, we are still probably in recession. But in the third quarter, gross domestic product shrank by 0.2% (the Bank had expected -0.5%). In the fourth quarter it previously expected a fall of 0.3%, but now it thinks -0.1% looks more likely.

It’s hard to cast this as good news, but perhaps altogether they may constitute a glimmer somewhere off at the end of the tunnel.

Inflation peaking… growth surprising on the upside… They may not add up to full-blown Christmas cheer but after the year we’ve just had, it’s better than nothing.

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Jaguar Land Rover to ‘pause’ US shipments over Donald Trump tariffs

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Jaguar Land Rover to 'pause' US shipments over Donald Trump tariffs

Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has said it will “pause” shipments to the US as the British car firm works to “address the new trading terms” of Donald Trump’s tariffs.

The US president has introduced a 25% levy on all foreign cars imported into the country, which came into force on Thursday.

JLR, one of the country’s biggest carmakers, exported about 38,000 cars to the US in the third quarter of 2024 – almost equal to the amount sold to the UK and the EU combined.

Follow live updates: Trump’s baseline 10% tariff kicks in

In a statement on Saturday, a spokesperson for the company behind the Jaguar, Land Rover and Range Rover brands said: “The USA is an important market for JLR’s luxury brands.

“As we work to address the new trading terms with our business partners, we are taking some short-term actions including a shipment pause in April, as we develop our mid- to longer-term plans.”

The company released a statement last week before Mr Trump announced a “baseline” 10% tariff on goods from around the world, which kicked in on Saturday morning, on what he called “liberation day”.

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JLR reassured customers its business was “resilient” and “accustomed to changing market conditions”.

“Our priorities now are delivering for our clients around the world and addressing these new US trading terms,” the firm said.

Trading across the world has been hit by Mr Trump’s tariff announcement at the White House on Wednesday.

All but one stock on the FTSE 100 fell on Friday – with Rolls-Royce, banks and miners among those to suffer the sharpest losses.

Read more: A red wall on Wall Street – but Trump seems to believe it will work out

Cars are the top product exported from the UK to the US, with exports worth £8.3bn in the year to the end of September 2024, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.

For UK carmakers, the US is the second largest export market behind the European Union.

Industry groups have previously warned the tariffs will force firms to rethink where they trade, while a report by thinktank the Institute for Public Policy Research said more than 25,000 car manufacturing jobs in the UK could be at risk.

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Two people die after caravan fire at holiday park in Lincolnshire

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Two people die after caravan fire at holiday park in Lincolnshire

Two people have died following a fire at a caravan site near Skegness, Lincolnshire Police have said.

In a statement, officers said they were called at 3.53am on Saturday to a report of a blaze at Golden Beach Holiday Park in the village of Ingoldmells.

Fire and rescue crews attended the scene, and two people were found to have died.

They were reported to be a 10-year-old girl and a 48-year-old man.

The force said the victims’ next of kin have been informed and will be supported by specially trained officers.

Officers are trying to establish the exact cause of the blaze.

“We are at the very early stages of our investigation and as such we are keeping an open mind,” the force said.

Two fire crews remain at the scene.

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Boy dies after ‘getting into difficulty’ in lake in southeast London

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Boy dies after 'getting into difficulty' in lake in southeast London

A 15-year-old boy has died after “getting into difficulty” in a lake in southeast London, police say.

Officers and paramedics were called shortly after 3pm on Friday to Beckenham Place Park in Lewisham.

The Metropolitan Police said a boy “was recovered from the lake” at around 10.42pm the same day.

“He was taken to hospital where he was sadly pronounced dead. His death is being treated as unexpected but not believed to be suspicious,” according to the force.

The boy’s family has been told and are being supported by specialist officers.

The force originally said the child was 16 years old, but has since confirmed his age as 15.

In the earlier statement, officers said emergency services carried out a search and the park was evacuated.

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google street view inside Beckenham Place park, Lewisham where a 16 y/o boy is missing after getting into difficulty in a lake
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Emergency teams were called to Beckenham Place Park on Friday afternoon

Beckenham Place Park, which borders the London borough of Bromley, covers around 240 acres, according to the park’s website.

The lake is described as 285 metres long, reaching depths of up to 3.5 metres.

It is designed as a swimming lake for open-water swimming and paddle boarding.

A London Ambulance Service spokesperson said on Friday: “We were called at 3.02pm this afternoon to reports of a person in the water.

“We sent resources to the scene, including an ambulance crew, an incident response officer and members of our hazardous area response team.”

Emergency teams have not explained how the boy entered the water, or whether he was accompanied by others.

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