| NEWS IN BRIEF Complied by SW and EB.
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PROFITS RISE.
Working to re-equip the UK forces in Iraq and Afghanistan has helped profits soar.
The UK’s largest defence firm made a pre-tax profit of £657 million compared to £378 million a year earlier.
HEARTBREAKING.
AVIVA, the owners of Norwich Union Insurance reported an 8% fall in profits for the six months to 30th June 2007, down to £31.56 billion from £31.7 billion.
MISNAMED - ‘CARE’ HOMES.
Ninety percent of Care Homes are run by the private sector. This means that residents do not have protection from abuse under the Human Rights Act.
GIVE US A RING.
The BBC are villains for ripping off the children via their revenue sharing telephone lines. But it appears to be sound commercial practice for the Customer Service departments of government agencies and energy companies et al. to do the same thing while keeping the ‘plebs’ on the line and giving them an earful of taped music.
PENSIONS.
Pensioners are still suffering from the “Maxwell Syndrome”. The Government is imploring workers to save and invest in pension funds, and is now planning to teach such to school children. At the same time it allows rapacious predators to gobble up the likes of Woolwich and Friends Provident, thus permitting the directors to cream off large slices of the dividends that should belong to the existing policy owners. Which part of the money chain will the children learn about? Will it be the ‘Get Fat Cat’ Barclays and Phoenix end, or the scrimp and save and be ripped off end?