President Barack Obama has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President of the United States.
The widely expected announcement came in the form of a video released by the Clinton campaign on Thursday.
"I'm with her, I'm fired up and I cannot wait to get out there and campaign with Hillary," the President says in the three-minute clip.
The endorsement came within hours of Mr Obama holding talks at the White House with Mrs Clinton's Democratic rival Bernie Sanders.
The Vermont Senator vowed to continue his fight for the Democratic nomination afterward, but also said he looked forward to working with Mrs Clinton during the general election.
Mr Obama had been expected to urge Mr Sanders to call time on his campaign on Thursday in a bid to fully shift the focus of the 2016 election on the upcoming showdown between Mrs Clinton and presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.
Aides to the President have said he is eager to leave the sidelines and join the fray against brash billionaire.
Thursday, June 9, 2016
Republicans Rally As Queen Celebrates Birthday
Anti-monarchy campaigners say they will be using the Queen's 90th birthday celebrations to draw attention to why Britain should scrap its hereditary monarchy.
The group Republic are encouraging hashtags such as #stopthereign and #bornequal across social media.
They are also holding their own people's picnic in Kensington Palace gardens as a weekend of celebrations is planned for her Majesty's official birthday.
Campaigners say they appreciate people will want to mark the birthday, but they don't believe it should be used to promote the Royal Family and an unelected head of state.
Lifelong republican Alastair Campbell wrote a book about some of the world's most successful people and couldn't avoid adding the Queen.
He told Sky News: "I think there are still republicans, people who want to get rid of the Monarchy, but I think she's seen them off for a generation and more.
"I think a lot of that is about her ... not just the longevity but the fact that she is who she is and done what she's done.
"And it's worth remembering it's not that long ago that they were in a bit of trouble. What's more, they thought they were in a bit of trouble and they had to strategise, plan and adapt their way out of it.
"I think she personally has been a very big part of that."
Dympna Messanger is a member of Republic and regularly goes out leafleting to get people talking about the inequalities of a hereditary monarchy.
Explaining why she joined the group, she said: "This lot (the Royal Family), we're stuck with them forever, it just seems to me grotesquely unfair that this family are born into this immense privilege and wealth.
"I just don't see how it can be justified."
Republic say they currently have 5,000 paying members, with 35,000 registered supporters. Events like the Queen's birthday often help to boost those numbers.
However, a recent poll from Ipsos Mori found 86% of people were satisfied with the job the Queen does as Monarch, with 76% happy with the role carried out by Prince William and 71% supporting what Prince Charles does.
A Sky Data poll also revealed strong support for the monarchy.
Outlining the results, Sky data analyst Harry Carr said: "Some 72% of young people aged 18-34 support the monarchy, compared with 66% of those aged 55 or over.
"One in five Britons would like the UK to become a republic (22%), while 5% say they don't know and 2% say they would not vote in a referendum on the subject.
"Scots are markedly less likely to support the monarchy than the rest of the country, however, and would narrowly vote to retain the monarchy 47% to 41%."
Graham Smith from Republic admits respect for the Queen, who last year became Britain's longest reigning monarch, does at times make their campaigning more difficult.
He said: "Most people are sympathetic to the Queen and that is an obstacle that we have to get over, but it doesn't make it a particularly tough job because there are a lot of other issues around the Monarchy: secrecy, misuse of public money, the power of the politicians that they draw from the Crown, a lot of things that we can campaign on."
Campaign group Labour for a Republic, which is allied to Republic, is organising a people's picnic on Sunday in Kensington Gardens.
The free event is being put on as an alternative to the Patron's Lunch, which also takes place on Sunday afternoon - the largest-ever street party to be held on the Mall to celebrate the Queen's charity work.
:: Sky Data interviewed a nationally representative sample of 1,009 Sky customers by SMS on 9 June 2016. Data is weighted to the profile of the population. For full Sky Data tables, please click here.
The group Republic are encouraging hashtags such as #stopthereign and #bornequal across social media.
They are also holding their own people's picnic in Kensington Palace gardens as a weekend of celebrations is planned for her Majesty's official birthday.
Campaigners say they appreciate people will want to mark the birthday, but they don't believe it should be used to promote the Royal Family and an unelected head of state.
Lifelong republican Alastair Campbell wrote a book about some of the world's most successful people and couldn't avoid adding the Queen.
He told Sky News: "I think there are still republicans, people who want to get rid of the Monarchy, but I think she's seen them off for a generation and more.
"I think a lot of that is about her ... not just the longevity but the fact that she is who she is and done what she's done.
"And it's worth remembering it's not that long ago that they were in a bit of trouble. What's more, they thought they were in a bit of trouble and they had to strategise, plan and adapt their way out of it.
"I think she personally has been a very big part of that."
Dympna Messanger is a member of Republic and regularly goes out leafleting to get people talking about the inequalities of a hereditary monarchy.
Explaining why she joined the group, she said: "This lot (the Royal Family), we're stuck with them forever, it just seems to me grotesquely unfair that this family are born into this immense privilege and wealth.
"I just don't see how it can be justified."
Republic say they currently have 5,000 paying members, with 35,000 registered supporters. Events like the Queen's birthday often help to boost those numbers.
However, a recent poll from Ipsos Mori found 86% of people were satisfied with the job the Queen does as Monarch, with 76% happy with the role carried out by Prince William and 71% supporting what Prince Charles does.
A Sky Data poll also revealed strong support for the monarchy.
Outlining the results, Sky data analyst Harry Carr said: "Some 72% of young people aged 18-34 support the monarchy, compared with 66% of those aged 55 or over.
"One in five Britons would like the UK to become a republic (22%), while 5% say they don't know and 2% say they would not vote in a referendum on the subject.
"Scots are markedly less likely to support the monarchy than the rest of the country, however, and would narrowly vote to retain the monarchy 47% to 41%."
Graham Smith from Republic admits respect for the Queen, who last year became Britain's longest reigning monarch, does at times make their campaigning more difficult.
He said: "Most people are sympathetic to the Queen and that is an obstacle that we have to get over, but it doesn't make it a particularly tough job because there are a lot of other issues around the Monarchy: secrecy, misuse of public money, the power of the politicians that they draw from the Crown, a lot of things that we can campaign on."
Campaign group Labour for a Republic, which is allied to Republic, is organising a people's picnic on Sunday in Kensington Gardens.
The free event is being put on as an alternative to the Patron's Lunch, which also takes place on Sunday afternoon - the largest-ever street party to be held on the Mall to celebrate the Queen's charity work.
:: Sky Data interviewed a nationally representative sample of 1,009 Sky customers by SMS on 9 June 2016. Data is weighted to the profile of the population. For full Sky Data tables, please click here.
House Prices Expected To See Short Term Dip
House prices are expected to see a short-term fall over the next few months for the first time in nearly four years, according to a poll of surveyors.
The report from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) pointed to uncertainty around the EU referendum and a recent hike in stamp duty tax for landlords as weighing on the market.
Shares in house builders such as Taylor Wimpey, Berkeley, Persimmon and Bellway fell in the wake of the survey - the latter despite an update in which it said it had seen a "positive trading environment" with no noticeable effect from this month's poll.
According to the RICS poll, for the first time since November 2012 a majority of members questioned expected that prices over the next three months would fall.
However, most still saw an increase over a 12-month horizon.
It follows a warning by Chancellor George Osborne last month that house prices could be dragged lower by a Leave vote.
RICS chief economist Simon Rubinsohn said that for now the group's members were only forecasting a temporary dip in prices, which have surged by as much as a third in the past five years.
He added: "Sadly, for the many young people looking to enter the property market, it is unlikely that we are seeing the emergence of a more affordable market.
"Instead, it appears to me that what we are looking at is a short term drop caused by the uncertainty resulting from the forthcoming EU referendum coupled by a slow-down following the rush to get into the market ahead of the tax change on the purchase of investment properties.
"There is not at this point a sense that a fundamental shift is taking place in the market."
RICS said its headline house price balance for changes over the previous three months fell to its lowest since February 2015 at +19 for May, down from +39 in April and below forecasts.
Sales dropped at the fastest rate since August 2008, and new buyer inquiries declined at the sharpest pace since June 2008.
Brexit Would 'Tear Apart UK' - Former PMs
Sir John Major has warned that Brexit could "tear apart the UK" and trigger instability in Northern Ireland.
Speaking alongside Tony Blair in Northern Ireland, Sir John said it would be a "historic mistake" to do anything that would undermine the peace settlement.
In a significant moment in the campaign, with the two old adversaries alongside each other, the former Conservative prime minister said relations had never been better and he worried about a British exit that would "leave Ireland on the other side of the table" in negotiations between Britain and the European union.
He added that if the UK voted to leave it would have a huge impact on the economies of both Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Speaking to students at Ulster University, Sir John made an impassioned plea to young people to stay in the EU, saying: "Europe is not for the elites, it is for you, for your generation ... We're not going to be around."
Sir John said that in 1973 the UK was called the "sick man of Europe" and was now on track to be the biggest economy on the continent because of its membership of the EU.
Mr Blair said Europe was an "important part of the context" in which the UK was able to broker peace in Northern Ireland and that people there faced a "seismic decision" on 23 June.
The former Labour leader said that people advocating Leave did so in broad terms but when the detail was pointed out they "waved them away".
Mr Blair claimed the problems of reinstalling hard borders between the UK and Ireland were "immense" and would have a huge impact on people's daily lives and on relations between Northern Ireland and Ireland.
He said Leave faced "fundamental questions" about the common travel area that the people of Northern Ireland needed to see answered before the referendum.
And he accused Leave of "ignoring" Northern Ireland in the debate about leaving the EU.
Northern Ireland Secretary and Out campaigner Theresa Villiers accused the former prime ministers of being "irresponsible" with their claims.
She said: "Support for the peace process in Northern Ireland is rock solid.
"The vast majority of people in Northern Ireland believe their future should only ever be determined by democracy and consent and not by violence.
"I very much hope figures who played such an important role in the peace process would not suggest that a Brexit vote would weaken that resolve in any way.
"Whatever the result of the referendum, Northern Ireland is not going back to the troubles of its past and to suggest otherwise would be highly irresponsible."
She said the common travel area would continue if there was a Leave win, even though the border would become the frontier between an EU member and a non-EU nation.
A poll for the Belfast Telegraph suggests that Northern Ireland would vote to Remain in the EU - with 56% opting for 'In' and 35% to Leave.
New M&S Boss Seeks To Ditch Bolland Legacy
New M&S boss Steve Rowe has slated the legacy of predecessor Marc Bolland, saying that the high street retailer has been "giving customers too many reasons not to shop with us".
Mr Rowe set out a series of reasons why shoppers were unhappy with stores and clothing ranges and said that from now on it would no longer be "slavishly following catwalk trends".
The chief executive set out the criticisms in the group's annual report - which also revealed that Mr Bolland's annual bonus had climbed 4% to £622,000, as first revealed by Sky News.
It was roughly a third of the maximum bonus he could have achieved.
Mr Bolland left in April after years of struggling clothing sales, to be replaced by long-serving M&S executive Mr Rowe, who began his career in its Croydon store at the age of 15.
Mr Rowe has already said that he will cut prices and put more staff in stores as he sets out to revive general merchandise sales, which remain "not satisfactory".
In a strategic update published in the company's annual report, he said: "We have a lot more to do. We have been giving customers too many reasons not to shop with us.
"They tell us that we have not got the balance between fashion and style right and that we don't offer enough choice.
"They say that we are sometimes too expensive and that our stores are too difficult to shop.
"We will put increased emphasis on contemporary styling rather than slavishly following catwalk trends, and will focus on innovations that are genuinely useful to our customers."
Last month, M&S reported an 18% fall in pre-tax profits to £489m for the year to the start of April as one-off costs relating to its ailing international business and insurance mis-selling weighed on its bottom line - though underlying earnings stripping out these charges rose.
The company's annual report showed that Mr Bolland's total pay for the year fell 3% to £2.04m as his performance share plan awards fell.
It revealed that the value of his annual bonus was reduced from 80% of salary to 64% of salary to take into account the company’s "mixed" performance over the year.
France Prepares For Uneasy Start To Euro 2016
The 15th European Football Championships begin on Friday, the largest-ever and the most anxious.
No previous edition of the continental cup, and perhaps no other major sporting event, has had to contend with the security challenges that provide the inescapable backdrop to what was supposed to be a month of football en fete.
Security is a staple narrative of sport in the modern era of mega-events, from the World Cup to the Olympics, but it has never been more relevant or real than at Euro 2016.
The hosts will kick-off against Romania tomorrow night in the same national stadium attacked by three suicide bombers last November, and with the nation under an extended state of emergency.
The Stade de France attack was the beginning of the 13 November atrocity and though the least deadly - a Portuguese bus driver was the only person among 130 killed that day to die at the stadium - it has shaped preparations.
Jacques Lambert, president of the organising committee, admitted as much this week.
"We want to lift ourselves out of the negative spiral around security that was imposed on us," he said.
The crowds of young, care-free supporters who gather at stadiums and fanzones are what give tournaments their colour.
They are also a security nightmare, a soft-target for terrorists who have demonstrated their capacity more than once in Europe in the last 18 months.
So preparations are in place.
The police and army personnel deployed this month would not fit inside the Stade de France.
There are 90,000 on duty but they are exhausted, with millions of hours of unclaimed overtime after more than a year on high terror alert and after a spring of civil discontent in France.
No previous edition of the continental cup, and perhaps no other major sporting event, has had to contend with the security challenges that provide the inescapable backdrop to what was supposed to be a month of football en fete.
Security is a staple narrative of sport in the modern era of mega-events, from the World Cup to the Olympics, but it has never been more relevant or real than at Euro 2016.
The hosts will kick-off against Romania tomorrow night in the same national stadium attacked by three suicide bombers last November, and with the nation under an extended state of emergency.
The Stade de France attack was the beginning of the 13 November atrocity and though the least deadly - a Portuguese bus driver was the only person among 130 killed that day to die at the stadium - it has shaped preparations.
Jacques Lambert, president of the organising committee, admitted as much this week.
"We want to lift ourselves out of the negative spiral around security that was imposed on us," he said.
The crowds of young, care-free supporters who gather at stadiums and fanzones are what give tournaments their colour.
They are also a security nightmare, a soft-target for terrorists who have demonstrated their capacity more than once in Europe in the last 18 months.
So preparations are in place.
The police and army personnel deployed this month would not fit inside the Stade de France.
There are 90,000 on duty but they are exhausted, with millions of hours of unclaimed overtime after more than a year on high terror alert and after a spring of civil discontent in France.
Argos Owner Faces £30m Bill For Overcharging
Argos owner Home Retail Group is setting aside at least £30m in compensation after admitting thousands of store card customers were overcharged.
The company has launched a detailed review into the issue, which relates to "buy now, pay later" plans for some of the retailer's 1.5 million store card holders who were charged excess fees for late payments.
Chief executive John Walden said it affected up to 10% of Argos card customers.
They are expected to receive compensation of up to £100 each and Home Retail will write to affected customers in the next few weeks.
The group said it had found that "a more extensive customer redress programme" would be required than first thought when the issue was discovered earlier this year, increasing the likely cost by about £30m.
It said its financial services division had discovered it "had erroneously collected excess fees in relation to the late payment of amounts due from certain customers".
Mr Walden said: "It's not a material number of customers and not a material amount of money per customer.
"But for each customer it matters. We will address it and treat customers fairly."
Home Retail Group had disclosed in its results for the year to the end of February that it had set aside £17m for customer redress, but this mainly related to payment protection insurance (PPI) mis-selling - a separate, long-running scandal across wider financial services that has mainly affected banks.
The new disclosure came in a first quarter trading statement showing that Argos' like-for-like sales grew by just 0.1% in the 13 weeks to 28 May.
The group blamed poor weather and falling prices for the stuttering performance as well as "cannibalisation" of sales from its own stores as it added new space.
Mr Walden said the planned £1.4bn takeover of the group by Sainsbury's was on course to complete in the third quarter of the calendar year. Competition bodies are currently weighing whether to launch an inquiry into the deal.
The chief executive added: "Given the natural distraction that a transaction such as this can be for our colleagues, on top of the recent sale of Homebase, I am particularly pleased with our performance in the quarter."
The company has launched a detailed review into the issue, which relates to "buy now, pay later" plans for some of the retailer's 1.5 million store card holders who were charged excess fees for late payments.
Chief executive John Walden said it affected up to 10% of Argos card customers.
They are expected to receive compensation of up to £100 each and Home Retail will write to affected customers in the next few weeks.
The group said it had found that "a more extensive customer redress programme" would be required than first thought when the issue was discovered earlier this year, increasing the likely cost by about £30m.
It said its financial services division had discovered it "had erroneously collected excess fees in relation to the late payment of amounts due from certain customers".
Mr Walden said: "It's not a material number of customers and not a material amount of money per customer.
"But for each customer it matters. We will address it and treat customers fairly."
Home Retail Group had disclosed in its results for the year to the end of February that it had set aside £17m for customer redress, but this mainly related to payment protection insurance (PPI) mis-selling - a separate, long-running scandal across wider financial services that has mainly affected banks.
The new disclosure came in a first quarter trading statement showing that Argos' like-for-like sales grew by just 0.1% in the 13 weeks to 28 May.
The group blamed poor weather and falling prices for the stuttering performance as well as "cannibalisation" of sales from its own stores as it added new space.
Mr Walden said the planned £1.4bn takeover of the group by Sainsbury's was on course to complete in the third quarter of the calendar year. Competition bodies are currently weighing whether to launch an inquiry into the deal.
The chief executive added: "Given the natural distraction that a transaction such as this can be for our colleagues, on top of the recent sale of Homebase, I am particularly pleased with our performance in the quarter."
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