THE UK will slide into deflation this week as factors such as competition in the grocery sector, cheaper petrol, lower air fares and cheaper water bills drive prices down.
Official figures due on Tuesday will say the consumer prices index dipped below zero in April, reports in the weekend press stated.
However, The Sunday Times suggests inflation will not remain in negative territory for long thanks to rebounding oil prices and rising wages.
The same newspaper reports that talks have opened up between the Treasury and the Bank of England to water down moves to split the big banks' retail and investment operations. It comes amid concern within the UK Government that HSBC will relocate its headquarters overseas, following reports the proposal will force it to sell its retail business in the UK.
The Co-operative Group faced significant opposition to its remuneration policy at its annual meeting on Saturday, including the £2.7m package of chief executive Richard Pennycook. More than a third of the 114,000 members who voted declared their opposition to the remuneration report, or abstained, The Mail on Sunday said.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article