Daily business briefing in under two minutes - March 28 - video Dailymotion

Watch Daily business briefing in under two minutes - March 28 - Insider Media on Dailymotion

Transcript

00:00Hello and welcome to the latest business bulletin on Friday the 28th of March.

00:04WHSmith has agreed to sell its UK high street business to hobby craft owner Medela Capital.

00:10The deal's worth £76 million and stores will eventually rebrand as TG Jones.

00:15It excludes WHSmith's travel sites and does not include the WHSmith brand itself.

00:21In other retail news, retail sales volumes jumped unexpectedly in February.

00:26It was partly down to a sharp increase in selling from hardware stores,

00:29food sales fell back slightly but a jump in sales in other categories

00:33pushed the overall figure up by 1%.

00:37The UK economy grew slightly in the final quarter of last year too.

00:41GDP was up by 0.1% between October and December.

00:45That follows zero growth in the third quarter.

00:47The most recent data from the ONS shows GDP dipped by 0.1% in January.

00:53The Prime Minister said US President Donald Trump's decision to slap a 25%

00:58import tax on cars is very concerning.

01:01But Sakhir Starmer has confirmed the UK will not be jumping into a trade war with America.

01:05The tariff on vehicles imported to the US will come into effect on April 2nd

01:10in a blow to the UK car industry.

01:12And critics have warned the government's new workers' rights legislation is anti-business

01:16and will undermine economic growth.

01:18Shadow Business Minister Lord Hunt argued that Labour's 299-page Employment Rights Bill

01:24should be called the Unemployment Bill.

01:26The proposed new law includes a right to guaranteed hours, cracking down on zero-hour

01:31contracts without the offer of work, as well as introducing new restrictions on fire and

01:35rehire processes.

01:37That's all for today.

01:38More next week.