Alistair Darling News

Swingeing penalties of up to 200% of unpaid tax will be levied on anybody opening a new offshore bank account in "uncooperative" tax havens and failing to declare their offshore tax liabilities.

The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee Thursday said it would hold bank interest rates at 0.5 percent.

Ministers are planning a fierce pre-election onslaught against the Tories on VAT after Gordon Brown won his battle with Alistair Darling not to raise it above 17.5 per cent.

Beleaguered home owners who are struggling to pay their mortgage will see an extension of a Government scheme designed to help them avoid repossession.

Alistair Darling trod a fine line last week between pressing the nuclear button on London's continued status as a global financial centre and being seen as a vigilante leading the war on bankers' greed.

Dec. 10 -- U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling talks with Bloomberg's Andrea Catherwood about a tax on bank bonuses and cuts to public spending.

New taxes on middle-income earners and a clampdown on public sector pay caught the headlines after the Pre-Budget Report.

Labour played politics with the pre-Budget report rather than addressing the debt crisis.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, has kept quiet on possible tax breaks for the videogames industry in his Pre-Budget Report , released today.

The Bank of England stuck to its plan to buy as much as 200 billion pounds in bonds as officials seek to ensure the economya s escape from the longest recession on record.

High earners are being advised to make contributions to their pensions now, before higher rate tax relief is scaled back further from 2011.

HALF of all Westcountry workers face painful new tax hikes as Alistair Darling admitted the recession has been worse than he feared.

Alistair Darling must have been hoping that he might get away with the impression that the pre-Budget report was good news for small businesses.

British Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling's plan to levy a 50 percent tax on bonuses will make banks choose between punishing shareholders or employees.

Dec. 10 -- Former Bank of England policy maker David Blanchflower talks with Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker and Deirdre Bolton about the U.K. government's plan to levy a tax on bankers' bonuses.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy is considering a tax on 2009 banker bonuses exceeding 27,000 euros , following the U.K. governmenta s introduction of a similar levy, said two French government officials.

Alistair Darling performed a difficult task with economic and political skill yesterday in delivering a tricky Pre-Budget Report.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling imposed a 50 percent levy on banker bonuses and said he will increase income taxes after elections next year as the worst recession on record drives up U.K. government borrowing.

Rita Young is 74 and lives in a housing association bungalow in Peterborough. The most significant announcement to come out of the chancellor's speech for her was that the basic state pension will increase by 2.5%. It comes in spite of the fact that the retail prices index, to which state pensions are pegged, stood at -1.4% in September this year, ...

U.S. lawmakers already wary of expanding the governmenta s role in running financial companies probably will avoid matching the U.K.a s tax on banker bonuses.