Latest news with #Basildon
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Four south Essex stores at risk as River Island bosses announced restructuring
FOUR popular clothing stores in south Essex could be at risk as River Island has announced closures as part of a radical restructuring plan. The fashion retailer has unveiled a radical restructuring plan in a bid to reverse recent heavy losses due to a slump in trading. Bosses blamed the closures on the 'migration of shoppers from the high street to online' and higher costs to run stores. The family-owned retailer confirmed it is proposing to close 33 of its 230 stores by January next year as a result. Read more Nine stores at risk of closure across south Essex as Poundland sold for £1 Closing date revealed for Basildon town centre Hobbycraft store Poundland customers react to 'ironic' £1 sale as stores face closure A further 71 stores are also at risk, depending on talks with landlords in order to secure improved rental deals. There are four River Island stores in south Essex, with two in Basildon, one at Lakeside Shopping Centre and one in Southend. The list of stores set to close next year is yet to be announced. The retailer, which employs around 5,500 people, was founded in 1948 under the Lewis and Chelsea Girl brand before being renamed in the 1980s. It has reportedly hired advisers from PwC in order to oversee the restructuring process. The proposals are set to go to a vote by the firm's creditors – companies or individuals owed money by the retailer – in August. The deal will result in fresh funding being invested in the business to help fuel its turnaround. 'We regret any job losses as a result of store closures, and we will try to keep these to a minimum.' The retailer is among high street fashion chains to have been impacted by weaker consumer spending and competition from cheaper online rivals, such as Shein. River Island fell to a £33.2 million loss in 2023 after sales slid by 19%, according to its most recent set of accounts.
BBC News
4 hours ago
- Politics
- BBC News
Councillor suspended from Labour over 'offensive' social media
A Labour councillor has been suspended by his local party over social media posts he made more than a decade ago that were deemed racist and supportive of far-right activist Tommy UK highlighted "offensive" posts that they claimed had been made by Ben Westwick - a councillor at Basildon Council in leader Gavin Callaghan said he took the action against Westwick "after I was made aware of social media posts made... before he was elected in 2024".Westwick, who now sits as an independent councillor for Pitsea South East, has been contacted for comment by the BBC. A Twitter/X account belonging to Ben Westwick, which has not had any new posts since 2014, included posts such as one with a sexually explicit image and another that was racist against black people and that included a monkey 2012, his account tweeted "@EDLTrobinson tommy Robinson for prime minister". Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, is a far-right activist who founded the English Defence League (EDL) and has just been released from prison having served a sentence for contempt of said in a statement: "Whilst I accept that Ben was a young man when he posted these comments and that he has changed his views on a number of issues, I do not believe it is right for him to represent the Labour Party on the council at this time."The local Reform UK party has called for Westwick's "immediate resignation" based on what they call his "numerous offensive, racist, and deeply inappropriate comments made across his social media accounts".Having the whip removed means a politician is no longer obliged to vote with his party at council meetings. It also usually means an individual is suspended from the political party they are a member has been contacted by the BBC about Westwick's party there are two by-elections for Basildon Council due to take place over the next is in Wickford Park ward next Thursday, following the death of Wickford Independents' Dave Harrison, and one in St Martins ward on 17 July after Labour's Maryam Yaqub stood down earlier this month. Follow Essex news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
Times
a day ago
- Politics
- Times
Keir Starmer's fate lies with strivers and grafters
There are a few people here you really ought to meet. I know we said this about Stevenage Woman, Workington Man and the others — the guy from Basildon with the Ford Mondeo and that nice working mum from Worcester — but give them a chance. Once you've heard about them you might understand a little more of the government's thinking. You might even recognise yourself. The cabinet, special advisers and civil servants met them recently. If they are working the way Downing Street wants, they'll be thinking of these people constantly: two big groups amounting to about 20 per cent of the electorate. Say hello to the Grafting Realists and Striving Moderates: the two most important segments of the government's new polling model. Sir Keir Starmer won't think he is succeeding until they trust the state again. Both groups have had a hard time of late. Their living standards have been stagnant for so long that they've almost lost hope. The Grafting Realists, a little older and likely resident in what was once called the red wall, were impoverished by inflation. They are working class, mostly white, and have the traditional attitudes those words imply. For the Striving Moderates of Middle England's lower middle class, it was spiking interest rates that proved most painful. Theirs are the houses with mortgages a little too big for comfort and a financed car on the drive that's now a burden. (Starmer surely sees something of himself in both.) No wonder they can't quite trust the government. For five years, whoever happens to lead it has let them down. Covid, partygate, Liz Truss, runaway inflation, soaring immigration figures, a broken NHS: prime ministers either seemed indifferent, incapable, or downright dangerous. The government's data doesn't write them off as a lost cause – you might chalk up their trust in the state at anything between four and six out of ten — but those Grafting Realists and Striving Moderates are deeply dissatisfied people. I say 'the government' rather than 'Labour' because this is not a party political enterprise. This is polling of trust in government, not electoral preference. It's informing the choices the Cabinet Office's New Media Unit make as they communicate policy announcements — be that the immigration white paper or the spending review — to different demographics on social media. Of course, renewed trust in the government's ability to get things right is likely to pay dividends for its incumbent management. It's also true that the Grafting Realists and Striving Moderates are the people who make the difference in elections. That, however, is secondary to the point many people in Westminster are still missing. The Conservative Party in particular struggles on under the misapprehension that voters are preoccupied with gradations of left and right. We might say the same of grumblers who'd like the Labour Party to be loud and proud with its progressivism. Really what is at stake is far more profound than whether Robert Jenrick ends up sounding as tough on migration as Rupert Lowe or the tone Starmer takes when he talks about welfare reform. If the public cannot be convinced to trust mainstream governments to deliver, then the show is likely to be over for conventional politics. What one No 10 aide perhaps unfairly calls 'the politics of anger' will take its place. Starmer knows this. He knows, too, that Nigel Farage knows it — hence the prime minister's decision to treat him as the true leader of the opposition and elevate him to heights no leader of five MPs has ever known. Earlier this week I watched Angela Rayner fill in for Starmer at Prime Minister's Questions with Chris Ward, his parliamentary private secretary and longest serving aide, in the Times Radio studio. Ward, liberated in Starmer's absence from his weekly obligation to prep the PM, said something revealing. Parliamentary arithmetic has frozen in aspic a political reality that no longer exists. It makes little sense for Starmer to treat each Wednesday lunchtime as an exercise in beating Kemi Badenoch, or answering her questions at any length. Instead he hopes to 'speak over the chamber's heads, and directly to country'. The Grafting Realists and Striving Moderates will be in his mind's eye. Will they be listening? In No 10, aides are cautiously optimistic. But Farage is speaking to the same people too: simply, directly, and more and more substantially. On Monday, I'm told, he will vow to 'restore the social contract between the rich and poor' in his most expansive speech on economic and social policy yet. (One luxury of opposition is not having to supervise the slide into World War III.) 'It's very Robin Hood,' says one adviser. The logic of that language suggests Reform's internal discussions on a wealth tax could be concluding in a surprising way. How would Labour oppose that? In the meantime, there will be concrete and costed proposals — detailed in a ten-page policy paper whose very existence reflects Farage's new awareness that his sums must add up — to 'put money straight into the pockets of the poorest workers in the society'. Note that language: workers. Farage told me in the weeks before the local elections that he believes his natural constituency is 'the respectable working class', synonyms for which obviously include 'grafters' and 'strivers'. He will lionise them as 'the people who set their alarm clocks in the morning'. On a recent trip to Budapest, Reform officials sought advice from aides to Viktor Orban, the Hungarian prime minister, on welfare policy, and are enthused by one of their suggestions: lifting the two-child benefit cap only for working mothers. For Labour, pigeonholing this stuff is difficult. Many of its MPs struggle to resist the impulse to write it off as fantasy politics from the radical right. What is emerging from Reform is more omnivorous, syncretic and, for all Farage's stridency, full of confounding nuance. When Richard Tice, Reform's deputy leader, told me of his plans to dial back Bank of England independence last week, I saw shades of Peter Shore, the Labour maverick who said the same in the 1990s. A streak of statism coexists with the anti-bureaucratic nationalism of Pierre Poujade, the populist whose movement of overtaxed shopkeepers shook French politics before General de Gaulle returned to save the republic in 1958. Farage's strategists would prefer all this to be sold by outsiders — like Luke Campbell, the Olympic boxer turned Reform mayor of Hull – as their heroes in Italy's Five Star Movement did. It's easy for a government to say none of this would work, or dismiss it as 'nostalgic', as one cabinet minister did when we spoke about last week. But if Starmer's Grafting Realists and Striving Moderates can't believe him, he'll go the way of the other prime ministers who squandered their trust. As his gaze turns to the Middle East, he shouldn't forget the audience that matters most. Farage won't.
BBC News
a day ago
- BBC News
E-scooter thrown in Basildon bin causes refuse lorry fire
Part of a refuse lorry caught fire after an e-scooter was incorrectly disposed into a wheelie bin and caught workers called 999 after noticing flames as they drove along Church Road in Basildon, Essex, on Thursday station manager Jason Gould said crews managed to remove the burning material before it spread throughout the urged people not to dispose of lithium-ion batteries or items containing them in their general waste. Follow Essex news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Automotive
- Yahoo
CNH's agriculture design excellence recognized with Case IH brand's Red Dot Product Design win
Case IH Quadtrac 715 Case IH Quadtrac 715 CNH's agriculture design excellence recognized with Case IH brand's Red Dot Product Design win Basildon, June 18, 2025 CNH (NYSE: CNH) is proud to announce that the 2025 Red Dot Design Awards has recognized our Case IH brand's Quadtrac 715 tractor in two categories. Red Dot is one of the world's largest design competitions with over 18,000 entries from 70+ countries recorded for this edition. The Red Dot Label is internationally sought after as a mark of quality for good design. The Case IH Quadtrac 715 was included in both the 'Commercial Vehicles: Product Design' and 'Innovative Design' categories. The jury panel of design professionals cited its fusion of aesthetics, ergonomics, and innovation as exemplary of world-class industrial design. 'This award recognizes the work of our in-house design team – who skillfully melded strikingly purposeful design with practical style, while implementing advanced engineering such as the new Heavy-Duty Suspension,' said David Wilkie, Head of Industrial Design at CNH. This high-horsepower tractor is a flagship model for the Case IH brand – founded in 1842. It is part of an iconic line-up that was first introduced in 1996, breaking new ground in agriculture as the first tractor to operate with our patented four-tracked wheel system. The 715 Quadtrac model sets a new benchmark with its 778 horsepower and signature Case IH styling. It was the first in this new series lineup to debut CNH's new Heavy-Duty Suspension system, engineered for improved comfort and productivity. These latest awards add to the 715 Quadtrac's growing list of international accolades and highlight our commitment to delivering product excellence to farmers everywhere. (NYSE: CNH) is a world-class equipment, technology and services company. Driven by its purpose of Breaking New Ground, which centers on Innovation, Sustainability and Productivity, the Company provides the strategic direction, R&D capabilities, and investments that enable the success of its global and regional Brands. Globally, and supply 360° agriculture applications from machines to implements and the digital technologies that enhance them; and and deliver a full lineup of construction products that make the industry more productive. The Company's regionally focused Brands include: , for agricultural tractors; , a leader in digital agriculture, precision technology and the development of autonomous systems; , a leading designer and manufacturer of high-precision satellite-based positioning, and heading technologies; , specializing in tillage and seeding systems; , manufacturing application equipment; and producing a wide range of mini and midi excavators for the construction sector, including electric solutions. Across a history spanning over two centuries, CNH has always been a pioneer in its sectors and continues to passionately innovate and drive customer efficiency and success. As a truly global company, CNH's 35,000+ employees form part of a diverse and inclusive workplace, focused on empowering customers to grow, and build, a better world. For more information and the latest financial and sustainability reports visit: For news from CNH and its Brands visit: Media contacts: Rebecca Fabian Alex Ellis North America United Kingdom Tel. +1 312 515 2249 Tel. +44 (0)758 106 1696 mediarelations@ Attachments 20250618_PR_CNH_CIH_Red_Dot Case IH Quadtrac 715 Case IH Quadtrac 715Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
