Mobile Boost For Channel Tunnel Travellers

Mobile phone services through the Channel Tunnel are to be improved for travellers.

British commuters and holidaymakers will soon be able to boast that they are calling from 100m below sea level when the north tunnel is connected to the mobile network for the first time.

Two UK providers have signed  a 10-year contract to cover the section of the 30-mile tunnel that carries trains from England to France.

The deal brings British phone users up to speed with their French counterparts, who have enjoyed services provided by their three largest networks in the south tunnel since June 2012.

Some 20 million Eurostar passengers passing through the tunnel each year will eventually be able to make calls, send emails and stream music and video.

Eurotunnel said it had received many letters, calls and emails requesting an upgrade in both directions and is in talks with other operators about joining EE and Vodafone in providing the service.

Vodafone and EE expect to have 2G and 3G services up and running by March, with EE promising 4G connections by summer 2014.

For the time being, customers of the other UK networks will have to pay more after manually switching over to Vodafone or EE.

EE's chief technology officer Fotis Karonis said the service would "make a big difference to business workers and people going away on holiday".

There will be no disruption to trains as the work to install mobile radios and cables was carried out to both sections of tunnel in 2011.

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Wall Street Giants To Aid £1bn Travelex Sale

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The foreign currency provider Travelex has enlisted a pair of Wall Street titans to aid a plan that will involve a £1bn sale or flotation during 2014.

Sky News understands that Travelex has drafted in Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan to work on a deal that could value the stake held by the company's founder, Lloyd Dorfman, at £300m or more.

While a transaction is not imminent, insiders said that the appointment of the two investment banks was a signal that one was likely this year.

Apax Partners, the private equity group, has owned a controlling stake in Travelex since 2005 and is keen to offload its stake, on which it will augment an already handsome profit.

City sources said that JP Morgan was focusing on an initial public offering that would see Travelex make its stock market debut, while Goldman Sachs has been asked to field approaches from potential buyers of the company in addition to assisting with a flotation.

Rothschild was brought in last autumn to help evaluate options for the business.

A stock market listing, which would probably see Travelex join the FTSE-250 index of the public companies ranked between 101 and 350 by size on the London markets, remains the company's preferred route, the sources added.

Travelex was set up in 1976 by Mr Dorfman, who remains its chairman and second-largest shareholder. Mr Dorfman is one of Britain's most successful entrepreneurs, and is thought likely to remain on the board if it decides to pursue a listing.

Travelex has been reshaped since Peter Jackson, its chief executive, was recruited from Lloyds Banking Group in 2010, with the sale of its card management and global payments operations for an aggregate total of nearly £1bn.

Mr Jackson said last year that trading during the crucial summer period had been strong, and the business is understood to have continued to perform well since then.

A Travelex spokesman declined to comment.

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German Car Sales Speed Ahead Globally

German-owned premium car brands reached record global sales levels in 2013, according to newly released figures.

The Volkswagen group reported record global sales for Audi the brand and its two luxury stablemates, Porsche and Britain-based Bentley.

Audi global sales were up 8.3%, while Bentley saw a spike of 19% and Porsche garnered a 15% increase.

SUV sales for Audi grew globally by 23.8%, to 438,400 vehicles.

The surge in luxury cars has been put down to increased demand in emerging markets such as China and the Middle East, along with renewed purchasing power in the United States.

Bentley saw a boost in the US of 28%, Porsche 21% and Audi sales accelerated by 13.5%.

Meanwhile, Mercedes-Benz sold 1.462 million cars last year worldwide, an increase of 10.7%.

Sales in the US, the company's largest single market, grew 14% to 312,534 - but its home market of Germany saw a dip of 2.2% for the year.

Mercedes global sales were boosted by the new versions of the E-class and S-Class sedans, with a massive spike of 64% for small cars such as the A-Class, B-Class and CLA coupe.

On Thursday BMW-owned Rolls-Royce, which is based in West Sussex, reported its best-ever sales figure of 3,630 cars being sold in 2013.

Audi also took the crown as the best-selling premium car brand in Britain during 2013, with nearly 400 cars being sold daily.

A total of 142,039 Audis were sold in the UK last year, up 14.9% on the 2012 figure - but its total sales in the EU dropped by 0.9%.

On Tuesday, Britain's motor industry trade body, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, revealed total new car sales soared to their highest level since before the recession.

The data showed Britain's strong sector growth compared to mainland Europe.

A total of 2,264,737 cars were UK registered in 2013, up by 10.8% on 2012, and the highest number since pre-financial crisis 2007.

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Rolls-Royce Considers Producing Its First 4x4

Luxury car maker Rolls-Royce is considering producing its first four-wheel drive vehicle as it reports its fourth year in a row of record sales.

Chief executive Torsten Mueller-Oetvoes told Sky's Jeff Randall Live programme that if they decide to go ahead with the plan, the new vehicle could be in showrooms in four years' time.

"It's a very interesting segment, and I'm also convinced that we will see in that segment a part of luxury, and for that reason we are currently looking into that," he said.

"There are no firm plans on our hands so far. We have time, our company is basically on the edge of full capacity, and for that reason there's no need to rush."

He said Rolls-Royce is now selling cars in 40 countries. Its biggest markets remain China and the US, but it is also seeing "remarkable growth" in Japan.

The BMW-owned company plans to hire another 100 employees at its Goodwood plant in West Sussex to meet the extra demand - taking the total workforce to 1,400.

But Mr Mueller-Oetvoes denied the firm - which is celebrating its 110th anniversary this year - would need to open a manufacturing plant overseas to further increase production.

"Rolls-Royce belongs to the UK and will always be produced in the UK," he said.

Rolls-Royce has seen a ten-fold increase in sales in the past decade, from 300 cars in 2003 to 3,630 last year.

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Record Online Xmas Sales Boost Festive Figures

Increasing use of tablets and smartphones and speedy delivery times are the major factors behind a sharp rise in online shopping before Christmas.

Web sales growth accelerated to 19.2% compared with the same month in 2012 - the fastest rate for more than three years.

However, overall UK retail sales grew by just 0.4% on a like-for-like basis.

The data from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) survey carried out by KPMG showed online trade represented 18.6% of total non-food sales in December, up from 16.5% the year before.

BRC director general Helen Dickinson said: "More of us clicked into Christmas than ever before, with online non-food sales growth putting in its best performance since March 2010 and accounting for nearly 20% of spending.

"The surge in the use of tablets and smartphones last year, together with the ever-faster delivery times achieved by an increasing number of retailers, has provided a new spur of growth to online shopping."

David McCorquodale, KPMG head of retail, said: "Whilst store sales continue to flatline, online sales remain the main driver of growth for the sector, contributing nearly three quarters of the uptick in non-food sales in the last quarter of 2013.

"The winners this Christmas were those retailers with slick multichannel operations, who could offer consumers the flexibility to shop how, and when, they wanted to."

In clothing, online purchases represented 21.2% of sales in December, up from 18% in 2012, while furniture and flooring products bought on the internet represented nearly a third of all sales, at 32.4% - though this was down a little on 32.6% last year.

The figure for electrical goods and toys was 14.4%, up from last year's 11.9% but a fall on the 15.5% who shopped online for these goods in November.

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Heathrow Slams Price Cap Put On Airline Fees

The operator of Heathrow airport has slammed a price cap limiting how much it can charge airlines to use the west London site.

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has imposed a far greater price cap on the amount it can charge airlines than it originally proposed.

From April, prices can only rise by 1.5% below the retail prices index (RPI) measure of inflation at Britain's busiest airport.

Heathrow, whose owners include Spain's Ferrovial and the sovereign wealth funds of Qatar, China and Singapore, described the cap as draconian.

Its chief executive Colin Matthews said: "We want to continue to improve Heathrow for passengers.

"We will review our investment plan to see whether it is still financeable in light of the CAA's settlement."

The CAA said the -1.5% cap would mean prices would fall for passengers and service for customers would be improved.

Heathrow said the CAA's final decision includes "aggressive operational, commercial and passenger forecasts".

Gatwick was hit by severe delays over the Christmas period

The company said it required reductions in operational expenditure by more than £600m and stretches commercial revenue targets by in excess of £100m, which includes revenues from retail and car park charges.

It said the settlement leaves little spare resource available to manage the consequences of potential disruption at Heathrow.

The CAA also released new regulation details for London's other key airports - Gatwick and Stansted.

The regulator said it supports more diversity in what Gatwick - which suffered significant delays over the Christmas break - offers to its various airlines, so passengers receive a tailored service.

It said travellers would be protected if there was a reduction in service that was not in their interests.

For the first time, there will be a requirement for Heathrow and Gatwick airports to put in place robust plans to ensure they are better prepared for disruption and can manage it effectively when it does occur.

Because Stansted's status is below the other two airports it would not be economically regulated by the CAA from April onwards.

Dame Deirdre Hutton, chair of the CAA, said: "London's airports have benefited from substantial investment over the past decade, which has created world-class facilities for passengers.

"But prices have risen substantially in that time, with service quality sometimes failing to match the standards passengers have every right to expect.

Stansted is to come under different regulations to the other two airports

"We have focused on putting the passengers' interest at the heart of our decisions and today's announcement means passengers can look forward to lower prices and high service quality from London's busiest airports."

Virgin Atlantic Airways said the Heathrow ruling was "a far cry from the reduction needed to mitigate the incredibly steep price rises customers haveseen in Heathrow charges in the last few years".

The airline added that the CAA had "not gone far enough" at Gatwick, saying the passenger experience at Gatwick "can be improved with a more significant reduction in charges".

EasyJet, one of the airlines that suffered from the Christmas Eve problems at Gatwick, welcomed the decisions over Gatwick and Stansted.

It said it was now "up to Gatwick to show that this more commercial approach can deliver lower charges and improved service for airlines and their passengers".

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China 'Overtakes US' As World's Top Trader

China's annual trade in goods passed the $4trn (£2.4trn) mark for the first time in 2013, official data has revealed, confirming its position as the world's biggest trading nation.

Exports from the world's number two economy rose 7.9% to $2.21trn (£1.34trn), while imports increased 7.3% to $1.95trn (£1.18trn), the General Administration of Customs (GAC) announced.

The trade surplus stood at $259.75bn (£157bn), up 12.8% from 2012.

Total trade came to $4.16trn, an increase of 7.6%, just below the government's 8% target.

The total was a record high and effectively confirmed a historic geo-economic shift, making China the world's biggest trader of physical goods, not including services.

Reports last February said the United States' total trade in goods was lower than China's in 2012, but GAC said due to differences in calculation methods the change happened for the first time in 2013.

Further confirmation of the new status is expected to come when full US data for the year is released.

Customs spokesman Zheng Yuesheng said: "It is very likely that China overtook the US to become the world's largest trading country in goods in 2013 for the first time."

The European Union was China's biggest trading partner, GAC said, followed by the United States, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), Hong Kong and Japan.

Between them, the traditional markets of the EU, US and Japan accounted for 33.5% of China's trade, down 1.7%, suggesting emerging markets' share of business was growing.

China's Xi Jinping has been courted by President Barack Obama

"Generally speaking, the environment for trade to grow in 2014 is likely to be better than 2013," Mr Zheng said, citing improvements in international demand and domestic economic factors.

However, China's trade surplus in December fell 17.4% to $25.64bn (£15.5bn), below expectations.

Exports increased 4.3% to $207.74bn (£125bn) last month, while imports climbed 8.3% to $182.1bn (£110bn).

China's 2013 trade performance came as the economy turned in a mixed performance, slowing during the first half of the year before showing some vigour in the final six months.

A government report last month cited in state media suggested GDP grew 7.6% in 2013, from the 7.7% in 2012, which was the worst performance in 13 years.

President Xi Jinping, who assumed office in March after becoming head of the ruling Communist Party in November 2012, wants to transform the economy to one in which domestic demand is the key growth driver, rather than public investment.

China's yuan currency gained more than 3% against the dollar last year, hitting a series of record highs since Beijing launched its modern foreign exchange market in 1994.

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Tycoon Desmond Gambles On Health Lottery Sale

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The media tycoon Richard Desmond is exploring a sale of the lottery business he launched just over two years ago after receiving a string of approaches from potential buyers.

Sky News has learnt that Mr Desmond, owner of the Daily Express newspaper and Channel 5 television network, is at the early stages of considering a sale of the Health Lottery.

The potential disposal comes as Mr Desmond, one of Britain's wealthiest self-made men, looks set to make a stunning return by offloading Channel 5, which he bought in 2010 for just over £100m.

Among the prospective buyers who have approached Mr Desmond about buying the Health Lottery during the last year are understood to have been Vincent Tan, the controversial owner of Cardiff City Football Club, and Playtech, an Israeli gambling software group.

An unnamed major UK retailer is also understood to have enquired about Mr Desmond's willingness to sell, insiders said on Friday.

The media entrepreneur is understood to believe that a new owner of the Health Lottery would have a ready-made platform for submitting a competitive bid for the National Lottery licence when it enters its next tendering process.

Mr Desmond's business is understood to meet Gambling Commission standards in areas such as player protection, financial soundness, technology operation, fulfilment and risk management

Camelot, which is owned by a Canadian pension fund, has run the National Lottery since its launch in 1994, and in 2012 won a four-year extension to its latest licence, which expires in 2023.

Mr Desmond is said to have invested approximately £65m in the Health Lottery since acquiring it, and has raised £43m for health-related causes, partly thanks to ticket sales buoyed by heavy promotional activity in his other media outlets.

It is understood Mr Desmond is seeking well over £100m from its sale.

Two years ago, Mr Desmond won a crucial legal battle with Camelot, which had argued that the media tycoon was unfairly competing with it.

The defeat represented a significant blow to Camelot, which recently doubled the price of Lotto tickets to £2, the first increase since the National Lottery's launch.

To comply with lottery regulation, the Health Lottery is structured as 51 local society lotteries, with each one representing one or more local authority areas across the country. Insiders said Health Lottery ticket sales had increased "significantly" since the

An indication that Mr Desmond's consideration of a sale of the Health Lottery is at an early stage lies in the fact that he has not appointed investment bankers to run a formal auction.

It is unclear whether any of the parties which have approached him about a deal remain interested in buying the Health Lottery.

If he does sell the Health Lottery and Channel 5, for which analysts say he would receive at least £500m, it would still leave Mr Desmond as a powerful figure in the UK's media sector, with assets including the celebrity magazine OK! as well as the Daily Express and Daily Star newspapers and their Sunday sister titles.

Mr Desmond declined to comment on Friday.

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US Sees Weak New Job Gains In December

The US economy added 74,000 new jobs in December, a level far below analysts' expections.

The figure takes unemployment to a five-year low, but industry experts had expected the US economy to add 197,000 new jobs last month.

The job creation figure, released by the Labor Department, is watched closely as a sign of the economy's health.

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate in the world's biggest advanced economy dropped to 6.7% - because fewer people were seeking work.

Foreign currencies, such as sterling, immediately strengthened against the dollar.

Analysts played down fears that the lower than expected rate of growth was a sign that the economy is stalling.

Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors, said: "I don't think the Fed is going to be panicked by this."

Dan Greenhaus, chief global strategist at brokerage firm BTIG, said: "We stop short of making larger observations based on this number.

"The economy, based on any number of other indicators, has been picking up steam of late which makes today's number ... curious."

The leisure, manufacturing and services sectors all added jobs in December.

But the construction sector shed 16,000 jobs - the biggest drop in 20 months - during a month when much of the country experienced bad weather.

The overall outlook for the US economy remains positive, with recent figures for consumer spending and industrial output strong.

The economy is predicted to grow by 3% in 2014, up on 1.7% last year.

The Federal Reserve responded to recent positive signs by announcing last month that it would start "tapering" its monetary stimulus programme by $10bn, from $85bn to $75bn.

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Teachers 'Should Face Regular Classroom MOTs'

Teachers should be made to have licences and will face the sack if they fail to pass checks on their abilities, the Labour party has said.

Shadow education secretary Tristram Hunt said he wants teachers to be reviewed every few years to improve standards in England's state schools.

A similar proposal was floated by the previous Labour government - and dubbed "classroom MOTs" by former schools secretary Ed Balls - but was opposed by some unions and dropped before the 2010 general election.

Mr Hunt told the BBC: "Just like lawyers and doctors they should have the same professional standing which means re-licensing themselves, which means continued professional development, which means being the best possible they can be.

"If you're not a motivated teacher - passionate about your subject, passionate about being in the classroom - then you shouldn't really be in this profession."

Labour previously said it would insist on all teachers having Qualified Teacher Status, with staff already working in academies given a deadline to acquire a formal qualification.

The plan has not proved popular with teachers. Deputy Secretary General of the National Union of Teacher Kevin Courtney said there had been much reaction on social media.

He told Sky News: "If this turns out to be the same as (previous proposals), that hostility will be there from teachers and won't be supported by the National Union of Teachers.

"We've seen reaction overnight from teachers. There is a large degree of scepticism that Tristram Hunt is going to have to overcome."

A Conservative spokesman said the Government was willing to look any proposals which will "genuinely improve the quality of teaching".

He said: "We have already taken action by allowing heads to remove teachers from the classroom in a term, as opposed to a year previously, and scrapping the three-hour limit on classroom observations.

"We are improving teacher training, expanding Teach First and allowing heads to pay good teachers more.

"Thanks to our reforms, a record proportion of top graduates are entering the profession.

"Fixing the schools system so young people have the skills they need is a key part of our long-term economic plan."

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