The Bank of England has cut its forecasts for UK growth over the next two years.

It also warned that a no-deal Brexit would hit the economy and trigger a further drop in the value of the pound. The Bank left interest rates unchanged at 0.75% against a backdrop of weaker global growth and ongoing trade tensions between the US and China.

It said the UK economy was expected to grow by 1.3% this year, down from a previous projection of 1.5% in May. The Bank also cut its outlook for growth in 2020 to 1.3%, from a previous projection of 1.6%. The forecasts are based on the assumption that the UK leaves the EU with a Brexit deal – however it suggested growth could be much slower in the event of no deal.

The Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) that sets interest rates said the UK was likely to have stagnated in the three months to June. Its quarterly Inflation Report predicted only modest growth in the coming months due to ongoing uncertainty over the UK’s future relationship with the European Union.

It said there was a one-in-three chance that the economy will shrink at the start of next year, with global trade tensions also weighing on the UK outlook. And it said there had been a “material and broad-based slowdown” in world growth since the end of 2017.(BBC)…[+]

DETROIT– Democratic presidential front-runner Joe Biden and rival Kamala Harris battled over healthcare and came under attack from other candidates on their criminal justice records in a contentious and sometimes angry debate yesterday.

On the second of back-to-back nights of debates among Democrats seeking the chance to face Republi-can President Donald Trump in the November 2020 election, Biden and Harris were at the center of a growing fight over healthcare that has split the Democratic Party and dominated the first candidate encounter in Detroit on Tuesday.

Biden, who struck a sharper and more aggressive tone than in the first debate, ridiculed Harris’ contention that her recently unveiled healthcare plan would not require a middle-class tax increase or eliminate private insurance plans. “You can’t beat President Trump with double-talk on this plan,” Biden told Harris. “The plan no matter how you cut it costs $3 trillion. It will require middle-class taxes to go up, not down. Thirdly, it will eliminate employer-based insurance.”

Harris rejected Biden’s description as “simply inaccurate” and ripped into his proposal to build on former President Barack Obama’s healthcare plan, popularly known as Obama-care, and include a government-run option, saying it would leave millions uninsured.(Reuters)…[+]

A ma­jor boost in the po­lice’s an­ti-crime ar­se­nal is ex­pect­ed to un­fold fol­low­ing Wednes­day night’s pas­sage of the Bail (Amend­ment) Bill which was sur­pris­ing­ly sup­port­ed by the Op­po­si­tion. Both sides from the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives came to­geth­er in a rare show of uni­ty to pass the leg­is­la­tion. It was passed around 7.25 pm by a to­tal of 32 votes — 22 Gov­ern­ment MPs and 10 UNC MPs present.

The pos­i­tive out­come came dur­ing the fi­nal stage of Wednes­day’s spe­cial Par­lia­ment sit­ting to de­bate the bill – and af­ter sev­er­al days of lob­by­ing by Gov­ern­ment to sway pub­lic sup­port. The gov­ern­ment had called Par­lia­ment out of re­cess to de­bate the bill.

At the height of the re­cent crime cri­sis, the Po­lice Ser­vice had re­quest­ed the sev­en clause bill to lock away re­peat of­fend­ers blamed for the sud­den spike in gang-re­lat­ed mur­ders. The pro­vi­sion of the leg­is­la­tion re­stricts bail for 120 days if some­one has a con­vic­tion for se­ri­ous of­fences and is charged for one of them again. Bail will al­so be re­strict­ed if some­one is charged for a se­ri­ous of­fence, is out on bail and gets charged for the same cat­e­go­ry of of­fence.(Trinidad Guardian)…[+]