Reeves must back defence investment plan or be sacked, says Unite union boss
The head of Britain’s largest trade union has demanded that Rachel Reeves be sacked as chancellor if the Treasury continues to hold up a multibillion-pound defence investment plan.Sharon Graham, the general secretary of Unite, said tens of thousands of jobs were at risk from political dithering and called on ministers to “back British industry” by signing off on future defence contracts.“If Rachel Reeves can’t grasp that concept and doesn’t care where things are made then she should go,” Graham said “Actually, you have to have a vision for Britain.You can’t just be in government, you can’t just say today’s a new day.”She also called on Keir Starmer “to do what he said he would do” after the prime minister promised in February last year to increase annual spending on the military to 2.
5% of GDP by 2027,Subsequently, Starmer promised to increase it further, to 3,5% by 2035, an extra £30bn in real terms, but few new contracts have followed,Concerns are most acute for the Leonardo helicopter factory at Yeovil, the sole bidder on a stalled £1bn manufacturing contract,It employs 3,300 people on an average salary of £58,000 a year, and its Italian owner has said it will have to close down unless it is awarded the work before 1 March.
Adam Dance, Yeovil’s Liberal Democrat MP, said jobs across the town would be affected if the factory closed,He said a local hotel had told him it would probably have to shut, and the uncertainty was already affecting the local housing market,“Staff don’t want to commit to new purchases,” he said,Graham was speaking to the Guardian outside Downing Street where Unite had organised a protest in response to the government’s failure to publish the defence investment plan amid Treasury resistance to its high cost,“Labour is supposed to be in for workers in the working class.
I’m seeing very little evidence of that,” Graham said,She argued this was a problem not just in terms of creating defence jobs but across the government,The defence industrial plan had been expected to be published in the autumn, and then just before Christmas, but has been delayed to March or April,It is intended to set out funding for £67bn of commitments from last summer’s strategic defence review,The Treasury has raised concerns about the affordability of the overall package, while the Ministry of Defence has indicated it needs an extra £28bn over the next four years to meet its forecast costs.
WPP to merge ad agencies and cut jobs in radical shake-up to counter AI threat
The beleaguered advertising group WPP has announced a radical restructure to counter the threat posed by the AI revolution, including merging its ad agencies and cutting jobs.Aiming to be “a simpler, lower-cost, AI-enabled business”, the London-based company laid out plans to achieve £500m of annual savings by 2028, at a cost of £400m over two years.A significant proportion of the cost cuts are expected to come through cutting jobs. The company did not specify how many roles would be cut.Since its inception in the mid-1980s, the steepest cuts WPP has made were 7,200 jobs as a result of the global advertising recession in 2009, and 7,000 in 2020 because of the impact of the Covid pandemic
Nvidia fails to impress investors with blockbuster results, as AI adoption ‘skyrockets’ – business live
Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.What’s a tech firm gotta do to get a share price bump these days?Nvidia may be asking that question after reporting strong earnings last night, alongside a solid growth forecast, only to receive a shrug from Wall Street.The chip-making firm certainly had another extremely strong quarter – it posted record quarterly revenue of $68.1bn for October-December 2025, up 20% compared with the third quarter of last year and a sizzling 73% more than a year earlier.The company said sales were being driven by accelerated computing and AI, with customers scrambling to get their hands on its high-powered Blackwell chip
Twenty-year-old to testify at US trial about harm from social media addiction
For the first time, a jury will hear testimony this week from a young woman who alleges social media companies intentionally create addictive products, harming children. The witness taking the stand, known by her initials KGM, is the lead plaintiff in an expansive lawsuit against Meta – which owns Instagram and Facebook – and YouTube currently at trial in Los Angeles.KGM, who is now 20, alleges that she became addicted to social media apps before she was 10 and would spend hours every day scrolling through photos and videos. This led to years of mental health issues, according to her lawyers and court documents.KGM is expected to testify about how her constant use of social media led to depression, anxiety and body dysmorphia
Nvidia quarterly earnings show immunity to AI bubble fears as it cashes in on data center boom
Nvidia released its quarterly earnings on Wednesday, with the chipmaker revealing higher than expected revenues and extending its yearslong streak of surpassing Wall Street’s sky-high expectations.The company receives the vast majority of its revenue from its data center business, which has been buoyed by the tech industry’s immense investment into AI infrastructure. On Wednesday, Nvidia reported 75% year-over-year growth of this vertical to $62.3bn. The world’s most valuable publicly traded company, Nvidia has dominated the chip market as its processing units have become the backbone of the artificial intelligence boom
US hockey star Hilary Knight responds to Trump’s ‘distasteful joke’ about women’s team
Hilary Knight, the captain of the US women’s ice hockey team, has responded to comments made by Donald Trump after the Americans won gold at the Winter Olympics, calling the president’s quip a “distasteful joke”.After the US men’s ice hockey team won gold on Sunday, Trump called into the locker-room celebration and invited the players to be his guests at Tuesday’s State of the Union address.“I must tell you, we’re going to have to bring the women’s team,” he said. “You do know that. I do believe I probably would be impeached [if the women’s team wasn’t invited]
Saracens’ salary cap penalty under scrutiny over conflict of interest claims
Saracens will consider their position over an alleged undeclared conflict of interest at the centre of the disciplinary process into the 2019 salary cap scandal. The club were fined an unprecedented £5.36m for salary cap breaches over the previous three seasons and were relegated to the Championship, but the punishment has come under fresh scrutiny with these new allegations.Saracens point to an allegation made about the accounting firm Saffery Champness and claims that the level of fine handed down was “largely based upon advice provided to PRL”.According to the Daily Telegraph, Saffery Champness was auditor for Sale Sharks at the same time that it gave “impartial expert advice” about Saracens
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MPs back UK broadcasters in push to expand sport’s free-to-air ‘crown jewels’
The US men’s hockey team at the State of the Union showed proximity to Trump is never neutral
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