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ENERGY bosses are to be publicly grilled by MPs on the powerful Business and Enterprise Select Committee which has launched an investigation into “power price-rigging”.

THE appointment of a new Labour general secretary is set to be a photo-finish between a “party candidate” and Number 10’s favoured runner.
Party officials and members of the National Executive Committee reduced the applicants to a shortlist of three this week in advance of the appointment by secret ballot at a special meeting of the NEC on March 10.

PRESSURE from arms giant BAE Systems and the Saudi government – including threats of “another 7/7” – led to the dropping of a corruption investigation into the company, the High Court heard last week.

AN ATTEMPT by Gordon Brown to impose a City whiz-kid as Labour’s new general secretary has opened a battle of wills between the unions and Downing Street.

RICH African countries have been accused of “squandering their wealth” instead of using it to help prevent millions of children dying. That is the hard-hitting conclusion of a new report by the aid agency Save the Children.

LIBERAL Democrat leader Nick Clegg has signalled a ground-breaking pact with the Tories which would deny Labour a fourth term in power.

THE British National Party may gain the “balance of power” in the London Assembly if Londoners do not turn out in record numbers, a leading black equality campaigner has claimed this week.

ETHNIC minority voters could be drawn away from extremist groups if more black and Asian MPs are elected, according to a controversial report commissioned by Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman.

Gordon Brown is to preside over the final transformation of Labour’s annual conference into a United States-style rally under new proposals to revamp the event. Party officers have put forward a blueprint – accepted in principle by the party’s National Executive Committee – to ensure the conference will “build to a crescendo, climaxing with the leader”.

UNIONS representing BAA staff have reacted with anger after an executive reportedly said the company had a strategy of sidelining unions at Heathrow Airport.
The comments of Veronica Kumar, head of people and change at Heathrow’s new Terminal Five, appeared this week as the company prepares to open the £4.3 billion terminal at the end of March.