EQ Weekly Roundup 13-12-18

This week’s roundup includes news that Theresa May has survived a no confidence vote over her handling of Brexit, two of the UK’s biggest supermarkets are still determined to push through with a merger and nearly half the weight of your Christmas chocolates could be made up of packaging!

This week’s roundup includes news that Theresa May has survived a no confidence vote over her handling of Brexit, two of the UK’s biggest supermarkets are still determined to push through with a merger and nearly half the weight of your Christmas chocolates could be made up of packaging!

May survives no confidence challenge

Prime Minister Theresa May has survived a no confidence vote after several pro-Brexit Tory MPs rebelled over her controversial Brexit deal.

Winning 200 votes to 117, a majority of 83 votes, May has now secured her role as Prime Minister for at least 12 months. However, before the ballot result was released, May did announce she would not stand in any upcoming general election.

May has now travelled to Brussels to continue work on her Brexit deal, the Parliamentary vote on which being pushed back to at least 21 January 2019 after failing to gain enough support from MPs and resulting in a number of cabinet resignations.

The EU has already claimed there is no further room for negotiation on the deal so the onus is on May to gain parliamentary approval for the deal.

Sainsburys and Asda challenge regulator over merger

Sainsbury’s and Asda are seeking to take the competition watchdog to a judicial review, claiming they have not been given enough time to argue the case for their merger.

The planned tie-up between Britain’s second and third biggest supermarkets has been referred for an in-depth investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).

On Wednesday, Sainsbury’s said that the two companies felt the current timetable “does not give the parties or the CMA sufficient time to provide and consider all the evidence given the unprecedented scale and complexity of the case”.

Sainsbury’s and Asda are now going to lodge an application with the Competition Appeal Tribunal for a judicial review of the CMA probe.

Wages rise at fastest pace for decade

Wages are continuing to rise at their highest level for nearly a decade, the latest official Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures show.

Compared with a year earlier, wages excluding bonuses, were up by 3.3% for the three months to October, the biggest rise since November 2008.

Average weekly wages are £495 – the highest since 2011, when adjusted for inflation.

The number of people in work rose by 79,000 to 32.48 million, a record high since records began in 1971. The reason both employment and unemployment have increased is a result of the UK’s rising population and more people joining the labour force, such as students and older people.

Christmas chocolates ‘almost half packaging’

The packaging on your Christmas chocolates could make up almost half their total weight.

Ferrero Rocher was found to be the worst for excess wrapping (42%) in a study from the consumer group Which?

Coming in second and third in the report were chocolates from Thorntons (29.4%) and Cadbury (22.6%), but both used mostly recyclable material.  At the other end of the scale Lindt’s Lindor Mix just had 11.5% packaging.

The survey also found many shoppers are confused by the recycling symbols which appear on the packaging.