Shoe shop chain Barratts Priceless makes 1,600 staff redundant

 The high street gloom deepened on Friday as more than 1,600 workers at shoe chain Barratts Priceless were made redundant and 400 jobs were put at risk following the collapse of toy chain Hawkin's Bazaar. Barratts' administrators Deloitte said the 1,610 full- and part-time staff who manned its 371 concessions in stores such as Dorothy Perkins would be paid up until the end of Saturday. The Bradford-based shoe group collapsed this month when...

Spain sets out 8.9bn euros of new austerity measures

 Spain's new conservative government has outlined 8.9bn euros ($11.5bn, £7.5bn) in new spending cuts and tax rises to lower the country's borrowing. The announcement is the first in a wave of austerity measures, with a total of 16.5bn euros to be cut in 2012. It also said Spain's 2011 deficit will be about 8% of its output - higher than the 6% seen by the previous government. The Popular Party last month ousted the Socialists from power at...

600,000 people kick the habit in first year of Spain's extended smoking legislation

More than 25% of the Spanish still smoke howeverEFE archive Around 600,000 people have given up smoking since Spain’s tougher smoking legislation, which bans smoking in all closed public spaces, came into force on January 2, 2011. The CNPT National Committee for the Prevention...

Spanish Monarchy reveals budgets and costs for the very first time

This year the global cost was 8.43 million €.The Spanish Royal Family - Photo EFE The budget for the Spanish Royal Family has been published and placed online for the very first time in a new effort of transparency and shows the global cost of the Royal Household in 2011 was...

Minimum wage in Spain to be frozen for 2012

The wage will remain at 641 €Photo EFE Unions sources say that the Government is to freeze the minimum wage for 2012 at 641 €. The inter-professional minimum wage in Spain is one of the lowest in Europe. For 2011 the minimum wage for 12 monthly payments in Euros, according...

Man arrested for domestic violence murder in Sevilla

The victim is his ex partner and Spain's 60th victim of domestic violence this yearThe building in Marchena where Inmaculada D. was killed - EFE Domestic violence in Spain claimed the year’s 60th victim on Tuesday night when a 29 year old woman, Inmaculada D., died at the...

Blanco faces charges of influence peddling and bribery

Ex Minister for Development, José Blanco - EFE The Supreme Court has opened a criminal process against the ex Development Minister, José Blanco, in the so-called Campeón Case. Blanco faces charges of influence peddling and bribery in the case which comes out from the investigations...

Spanish Royal Family pose for the press at the Marivent Palace

The Spanish Royal Family on the steps of the Marivent Palace in Mallorca today - Photo Ballesteros/EFE This year the traditional summer photo has a new arrival - the Infanta Sofía In what some people consider to be the most awaited photographic moment of the year, the complete...

Iñaki Urdangarin has been indicted

The Duke of Palma will appear in court on February 6Iñaki Urdangarin - Photo EFE Iñaki Urdangarin, the Duke of Palma and son in law of King Juan Carlos has now been indicted and called to declare to the court in Palma de Mallorca on February 6. Judge José Castro is investigating...

Corrupt judge allowed back into the judicary

Francisco Javier de Urquía has been found guilty of accepting bribesFrancisco Javier de Urquía - Photo EFE The Supreme Court has decided to rehabilitate the Judge, Francisco Javier de Urquía, despite him being found guilty on two occasions of accepting bribes when he was the...

Employee has his hand chopped off during a robbery in Fuengirola

Surgeons were operating to try and reattach the hand on TuesdayEFE archive Police are investigating a savage attack on a member of staff during the course of a robbery in Fuengirola on Monday night, when an Argentinean waiter at a local pizzeria, the Pizzería Miramonte on...

WRITER who moved to Dorset after falling victim to the property boom in Spain has drawn on his experiences for his first novel.

Christopher Doveton-Gerty, 74, was tempted by the warmer climate of the Costa Del Sol back in 2002 only for his dream to turn into a nightmare.He has now penned a thriller using his own experiences and others he knew who were lured in by the Spanish property boom.Mr Doveton-Gerty, who has lived in Weymouth and Poundbury and wrote the book while living in West Stafford, said he took the decision to repatriate to the Moorish town of...

The toast as they sip their sangrias in the sun at the Malaga golf club must be David Cameron and George Osborne

:Text may be subject to copyright.This blog does not claim copyright to any such text. Copyright remains with the original copyright holder.Winter fuel payments to British expatriates in Europe’s hottest countries have almost doubled in five years. Pensioners in sun spots including...

Spain is clearly a vulnerable area. If that happens, one of the things that will happen in a crash of that kind, is that the banks would close their doors.

EMERGENCY evacuation plans for Brits living in Spain and Portugal are being drawn up amid fears of the euro collapsing. The drastic proposals emerged as a former Security Minister warned expats could be left stranded and destitute by the break-up of the single currency.Brits who invested their savings in their adopted countries may not be able to withdraw cash and could even lose their homes if banks call in loans, worried ministers are warning.The...

DOG lovers in Estepona have been left horrified after a YouTube video showed a police van dragging a dog by its lead.

The Andalucia animal charity CACMA has now filed an official complaint against the officers involved and Estepona Mayor Jose Maria Urbano is said to be taking it ‘very seriously’.It comes after the incident was filmed by a concerned resident on his camera phone and posted to YouTube where it has been widely viewed.The disturbing video clearly shows the animal being pulled along the middle of the road while the van drives off.“We were shocked and...

Tax authorities in Spain are understood to have begun investigating whether hoteliers in the country are paying the right level of VAT

Tax authorities in Spain are understood to have begun investigating whether hoteliers in the country are paying the right level of VAT following the MedHotels case in the UK.The UK tax office failed to convince a High Court judge this summer that bed bank MedHotels was liable to pay £7 million in VAT on its margin for the period 2004-07. However, the case exposed a tax gap in the sector.Travel Weekly understands Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs...

Cameron had made "unacceptable" demands for exemptions for the UK over financial services.

David Cameron has effectively vetoed an EU-wide treaty change to tackle the eurozone crisis, saying it was not in the UK's interests.Instead a new "accord" setting out tougher budget rules will be drawn up for the eurozone and at least six other EU states which intend to join it.France's Nicolas Sarkozy said the UK PM had made "unacceptable" demands.UK Foreign Secretary William Hague denied the move would leave the UK isolated in Europe.He said signing...

Cameron had made "unacceptable" demands for exemptions for the UK over financial services.

David Cameron has effectively vetoed an EU-wide treaty change to tackle the eurozone crisis, saying it was not in the UK's interests.Instead a new "accord" setting out tougher budget rules will be drawn up for the eurozone and at least six other EU states which intend to join it.France's Nicolas Sarkozy said the UK PM had made "unacceptable" demands.UK Foreign Secretary William Hague denied the move would leave the UK isolated in Europe.He said signing...

Yard detectives investigating Maddie disappearance travel to Spain and Portugal

 SCOTLAND Yard detectives investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann have flown to Spain and Portugal, it emerged yesterday. Three officers met colleagues in Barcelona last month. It is believed the visit was linked to reports Maddie may have been smuggled into the country after being snatched just before her fourth birthday on a holiday in Portugal in 2007. Advertisement >> Investigators hired by parents Gerry and Kate earlier...

Rich Egyptians weigh emigration as Islamists surge

 For decades, Egypt's Westernised elite kept the country's growing religosity at arm's length, but a projected Islamist surge in the first post-revolution polls has driven many to think of moving abroad. Sporting the latest fashions and mingling in upmarket country clubs, Egypt's rich fear a victory for the Muslim Brotherhood and hardline Salafis in the first phase of parliamentary elections presages change ahead. "I hope they don't impose the...

Royal Navy comes to the aid of Spanish trawler under pirate attack

 The British Royal Navy has arrested seven suspected pirates after helping a Spanish fishing vessel which was being attacked in the Indian Ocean. The British Ministry for Defence said the Royal Auxiliary Fleet Ship Fort Victoria, carrying Royal Marines, carried out the rescue on the 28th of November between Somalia and the Seychelles. The RFA Fort Victoria is a stores ship with is designed to carry ammunition, food and explosives to replenish...

Málaga port's new attraction closed after seven hours

 The new Muelle Uno has been closed as building works are continuingThe Muelle Uno development - EFE After much fanfare about the opening of Málaga port to the city, and the opening of the Muelle Uno on Tuesday, the Málaga City Hall decided to order the closure of the new street just seven hours after it opened to the public. A public statement was sent out which said that, for reasons of safety, and because the building work was still continuing,...

Three tons of cannabis seized from Alicante drugs yacht

 The haul has a street value of more than 5 million €A previous haul of cannabis resin .. Three tons of cannabis have been seized and four suspects have been arrested in a joint operation by the Customs Authority and National Police which took place off the coast off Alicante on Tuesday morning. The operation was on the high seas some 70 miles off shore, where a Customs patrol boat intercepted a yacht which was visibly sailing low in the water...

British man dies, strangled in a ponche

 A 32 year old Briton died on Mallorca around 1730 on Wednesday afternoon in a domestic accident in a property in Cami de Son Choix de Lloret, Lloret de Vistalegre. He was strangled when a poncho he was wearing got caught in a generator which he had just started up. 061 emergency services arrived at the scene and found the man seriously injured, but there was nothing they could do to save his li...

British paedophile arrested in Almería

 National Police have today arrested a 66 year old British man who is wanted on four charges of rape and on twelve counts of sexually abusing his step-daughter when she was nine to 13 years old, and then later the granddaughter when aged six. The arrest took place in Los Gallardos, Almería, and the man has been named as L. Morris. The search for him started in July 2010 when the granddaughter finally told her both that she had suffered abuse...