WORKERS CAPITAL
Pension fund AustralianSuper to invest 8 billion pounds in Britain


Reuters
Mon, 4 March 2024 


LONDON (Reuters) - The British government said on Monday that pension giant AustralianSuper was set to invest 8 billion pounds ($10.15 billion) more in the country, taking its total investment to over 18 billion pounds by the end of the decade.

"This major investment from AustralianSuper will promote growth and strengthen the UK's position as a leading financial centre, creating wealth and helping to fund public services," finance minister Jeremy Hunt said in the statement.

The announcement comes ahead of a budget update on Wednesday that Hunt is hoping will boost Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's flagging fortunes before an election later this year.

Last July, Hunt set out the Mansion House Compact, whereby 10 pension funds, including Aegon, Legal & General and Aviva, voluntarily committed to investing at least 5%, or about 50 billion pounds, in life science, fintech, biotech, clean tech and other types of high growth unlisted British companies by 2030.

"The raft of investment announcements we have seen today show that the UK remains one of the most attractive places to invest in the world," Sunak said in the statement.

"But because of the difficult, long term decisions the government has taken the economy is now turning a corner, and we must stick to the plan."

AustralianSuper, which holds more than 2.5 billion pounds in British-listed equities according to the statement, says on its website that it manages more than A$315 billion ($205 billion) of retirement savings on behalf of more than 3.3 million members.

Private markets overseas, especially debt, are top priorities for Australia's largest pension funds as they look for ways to deploy the rapidly growing A$2.4 trillion pool of retirement savings that is outgrowing the domestic market.

($1 = 0.7879 pounds)

(Reporting by Muvija M, editing by William James and Alex Richardson)

Pension funds have ‘abrogated responsibility to the UK,’ says Peel Hunt

Charlie Conchie
Mon, 4 March 2024 

Peel Hunt has called on pension funds to act after the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced sweeping changes ahead of the budget on Wednesday.

Pension funds have “abrogated their responsibility” to the UK over the past 25 years and should prepare to disclose how much of their cash goes into British firms, one of the UK’s top investment banks has said, after Jeremy Hunt revealed plans for a sweeping shake-up of rules ahead of the budget on Wednesday.

In a note to investors today, London-listed investment bank Peel Hunt called on the FCA to implement rules that would force pension funds to disclose the geographic mix of their investments and told pension money managers to begin getting their houses in order ahead of the change.

The calls come after the Chancellor revealed plans for a major shake-up of rules ahead of the budget over the weekend that would see money managers forced to publish the make-up of their investments.

Under the proposals, underperforming schemes would also be banned from taking on new members in a bid to accelerate consolidation of the UK’s sprawling pension industry market.

The measures are seen as a means of encouraging domestic pension funds to back the British stock market after a drop-off in investment over the past two decades. Just four percent of the British stock market is now held by pension funds, down from 39 per cent in 2000, according to the think tank New Financial.

In a note to investors this morning, Peel Hunt’s head of research, Charles Hall, took aim at funds and said they had a responsibility to back the stock market.

“Pension funds have largely abrogated their responsibility to the UK over the past 25 years,” Hall said. “There are several reasons for this, including risk aversion, tax position and companies’ desire to offload their schemes. Pension funds used to be core investors in listed companies and specifically UK equities, but the latter has diminished from 44 per cent in 1998 to 4 per cent currently.”

While the FCA has set a timeline of three years for implementation, Hall called on funds to begin preparing for the changes now.

However, Hunt’s plans faced some resistance over the weekend from regulators. The FCA has reportedly refused to commit to writing new rules because there was no evidence that consumers or markets were being hampered by the current framework, the Financial Times reported.

The calls are also likely to unsettle some pension industry figures who have claimed that pension fund managers have a responsibility to their members rather than the health of the UK stock market.

One pension boss told City A.M last year that “it doesn’t make any sense to try and wind back to some anachronistic 90s situation where all UK pension funds were investing in UK companies.”

Prior to Hunt’s plans last week, the boss of the UK’s biggest private sector pension scheme, the £73bn Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS), also cautioned ministers over plans for reform.

Carol Young, chief executive of the £73bn Universities Superannuation Scheme, said she would have no problem with disclosures but would have “cause for concern” if ministers were to direct trustees as to where funds should be allocated.

“There’s no question that the primary purpose of [pensions] is to deliver in the members’ best financial interests,” Young told the Financial Times.

The chairwoman of Sweden’s biggest pension fund—which has a track record of awful investments—quits after just 1 week on the job

Ryan Hogg
Mon, March 4, 2024 

Janerikk Henriksson—TT News Agency/AFP/Getty Images


It may be almost a year since the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank set off a short-lived financial crisis across the banking industry, but one of its bigger casualties, a $120 billion Swedish pension fund, is still dealing with the effects of the fallout on its C-suite.

Alecta, which handles the pensions of a quarter of Sweden’s population, announced that its new chairwoman of the board, Carina Åkerström, had stepped down from her role just one week into the job.

"It is regrettable that Carina Åkerström has changed her assessment of her ability to fulfill her assignment as Chairman of the Board of Alecta and has chosen to resign," Kenneth Bengtsson, Alecta’s chair of the nomination committee, said in a statement.

In an unusually cryptic message, Bengtsson said no new information had come to light in the week since Åkerström’s appointment, and that no conflict of interest that “couldn’t be dealt with in the usual way” had emerged.

“During the process, we have of course asked extensive questions to Carina Åkerström about this,” Bengtsson said.

Alecta’s former interim chairman, Jan-Olof Jacke, will return to his role as interim chairperson until the fund finds someone it can keep on a longer-term basis.

A representative for Alecta declined to comment further on the press release.

The abrupt resignation of Åkerström—the former CEO of Swedish bank Svenska Handelsbanken—will do little to quell a widespread crisis of confidence in the embattled fund, which has faced disastrous losses on some of its riskier financial bets.
Alecta still reels from SVB crisis

Alecta has on multiple occasions described 2023 as one of the most turbulent times for the pension fund in its 107-year history.

But the events from the last year would suggest they might still be underselling the level of turmoil inside the fund, which is moving to reduce the risk profile of its bruised portfolio.

Åkerström’s short-lived appointment made her the fund’s first permanent chairperson since October when Ingrid Bonde stepped down in the wake of a crisis sparked by the collapse of SVB last March.

Bonde said there had been “too much focus on my person” in her resignation statement, adding that she needed to “devote my time and energy to my family and my other assignments."

The fund posted a SEKr 16 billion loss ($1.9 billion) last year thanks to its stake in embattled U.S. banks SVB, First Republic, and Signature, all of which became virtually worthless as contagion fears tore through the financial sector.

Alecta had previously fired its CEO Magnus Billing in April after the fund revealed its losses from its holdings in the American regional banks, which it said had massively damaged confidence in Alecta’s asset management operations.
C-suite flip flop

Åkerström’s u-turn is just the latest in flip flops at the executive level that have added to a sense of chaos at Alecta.

The board had initially elected former Denmark central bank chief Lars Rohde as Bonde’s successor as chairperson in January, but within a week it had reneged on this appointment.

Alecta said Rohde had accepted a position on the board of another company that bore too many similarities to Alecta, something it was unaware of during the selection process.

At the time of her surprise appointment, Åkerström appeared far from enthusiastic about being thrust into the position of leading the troubled fund.

Åkerström said her appointment was unexpected, but “sometimes unexpected things happen and I'm used to working flexibly.”

Alecta continues to battle bad bets on its investments. Last week, Alecta announced it was writing down $1.2 billion due to losses in its largest single investment, real estate developer Heimstaden Bostad.

The pension fund said the value of its holdings in the indebted landlord had declined 25% in 2023, as a steep jump in interest rates cut hit property valuations and significantly pushed up borrowing costs.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

NO TAX CUTS! FUND NHS!
Jeremy Hunt warned of £2bn real-term cuts to NHS funding


Sophie Wingate,

 PA Political Correspondent
Mon, 4 March 2024 

Jeremy Hunt is facing warnings of real-term cuts to NHS funding worth £2 billion in the coming financial year as he puts the finishing touches to this week’s Budget.

The already-strained health service could suffer a 1.2% cut in day-to-day spending in England – the largest reduction since the 1970s – according to analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), despite ministers’ promises not to squeeze healthcare.

Critics urged the Chancellor to cancel the “scandalous” spending cuts amid calls for public service funding to be prioritised over tax reductions in his financial statement on Wednesday.

The IFS said the health budget would be 2.4% lower in 2024–25 without further funding of around £2.1 billion.

Without the cash boost, the NHS would be forced to cut staffing, pay or patient services, even as it faces extra costs linked to workforce expansion and a pledge to tackle waiting lists, the think tank said.

Mr Hunt has signalled he wants to move towards a “lower tax economy” in a hint at a pre-election giveaway to voters in the form of a national insurance or income tax cut.

He has been clear that he will not pay for tax cuts with borrowing, meaning a combination of spending cuts and tax rises elsewhere will be necessary for him to keep to his own fiscal rules on debt.

There has been speculation he could shave more off his post-election public spending plans, reducing overall departmental spending – currently pencilled in to rise by 1% per year in real terms after 2025 – to 0.7%.

Rachel Reeves (Aaron Chown/PA)

But experts have already cast doubt on the whether the existing plans are realistic, as they would involve significant cuts to under-pressure unprotected services such as the courts, police and local authorities.

Amid deteriorating forecasts for the public finances, officials have drawn up a range of options for raising money to fund a personal tax cut, potentially including reforms to the non-dom tax status that allows overseas-domiciled individuals to avoid paying UK tax on their overseas earnings.

The policy is a key plank of Labour’s plans and adopting it could lay a trap for Sir Keir Starmer’s party, which would have to find an alternative way to pay for pledges including NHS improvements.

Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves criticised the Tories for “pickpocketing the Labour Party of its policies”.

She told a meeting of Labour MPs on Monday: “(Mr Hunt) is cynically talking up maxing out headroom to pay for pre-election promises. I see through it and so do the British people.”

(PA Graphics)

Other rumoured tax rises include a new levy on vapes and removing tax breaks for second-home owners who rent out their properties to tourists.

Mr Hunt is expected to freeze fuel duty for another year, in a move that will cost the Treasury around £5 billion.

He will reportedly extend the 5p-a-litre petrol and diesel duty cut for motorists and again scrap an inflation-linked rise in the levy.

Speculation ahead of the Budget has suggested the Chancellor could seek to cut 1p or 2p off income tax or – as a cheaper alternative – national insurance, to ease the burden on working households and set dividing lines with Labour ahead of the general election later this year.

Mr Hunt on Monday indicated a more efficient public sector could give him greater scope for tax cuts.

The IFS urged him to deliver more top-up spending for the NHS in Wednesday’s Budget, rather than hold back extra money until later in the year as he has done previously.

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesperson Sarah Olney said: “What this Conservative Government is doing to our NHS is nothing short of scandalous. They have left health services shockingly underfunded and it is patients who are bearing the brunt of their neglect.

“The Chancellor must cancel these planned spending cuts to the NHS at the Budget. To push ahead with them would show that this Conservative Government does not understand the crisis that local health services are in and the unnecessary suffering they are putting patients through.

“The neglect of our NHS is holding back economic growth. Millions of people who want to work can’t as they simply cannot access the treatment they deserve. To fix our economy we must first fix our NHS.”

NHS funding faces biggest real-terms cuts since 1970s, warns IFS


Denis Campbell and Pippa Crerar

The Guardian
Mon, 4 March 2024 

Jeremy Hunt is considering cutting billions more from public spending to pay for further reductions in either income tax or national insurance.Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

NHS funding faces the biggest cuts in real terms since the 1970s, an influential analysis shows, amid growing pressure on Jeremy Hunt to prioritise public service funding over tax cuts in the budget.

It comes as the Guardian has learned that the chancellor is planning to clamp down on the NHS’s annual £4.6bn bill for agency workers who cover for doctor and nurse shortages at the frontline.

Health spending in England is due to suffer a 1.2% cut – worth £2bn – in the new financial year starting next month, despite the NHS facing extra costs from continuing pay strikes and the expansion of its workforce, according to an analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IfS).


The health budget, almost all of which the NHS gets, is to go from £168.2bn in 2023-24 to £166.2bn in 2024-25, after adjustment for inflation, in 2022-23 prices.

Without a government rethink the reduction in funding will force the NHS to cut staffing numbers, staff pay, the services it provides to patients or all three, the thinktank warned.Interactive

Its intervention comes as Hunt is considering cutting billions more from his public spending plans to pay for further reductions in either income tax or national insurance in this week’s budget.

Economists have calculated that such a move would mean taking as much as a fifth out of budgets for certain “unprotected” departments across the five-year parliament covering areas such as justice, home affairs and local government.

There were also reports on Monday night that the chancellor was looking to give motorists a £5bn boost by extending the “temporary” 5p-a-litre cut in fuel duty by another year.

The level of public sector spending pencilled in for the next parliament could mean cuts equivalent to those undertaken by David Cameron’s government during the years of austerity from 2010 to 2015. That has prompted warnings that the next government would not be able to implement them, and would be forced either to raise taxes or borrow more to fund emergency spending.

The Liberal Democrats said the plan to cut the NHS budget was “scandalous”. Doctors’ leaders warned it would harm patients. And hospital bosses said they would struggle if it went ahead because the estimated £2bn cost of 15 months of strikes have left their finances in a perilous state.

Sarah Olney, the Lib Dem’s Treasury spokesperson, said: “What this Conservative government is doing to our NHS is nothing short of scandalous. They have left health services shockingly underfunded and it is patients who are bearing the brunt of their neglect.”

She urged Hunt to cancel the planned cut in the budget he will present to MPs on Wednesday.Interactive

Meanwhile, hospital doctors voiced alarm that, with the NHS already in “an eternal crisis” in which it cannot meet the growing demand for care, pressing ahead with the planned cut could be “terminal” and would harm patients.

Dr Tim Cooksley, the immediate past president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said: “On this background, rumours of a funding cut could be the final straw for many colleagues and would undoubtedly cause severe harm to large numbers of patients.

“There is consensus that the situation in the NHS has never been so challenging. Funding is only part of the solution but a crucial one. A reduction at this stage could be a terminal event.”

David Phillips, an associate director at the IFS who carried out the analysis, said: “Existing [government spending] plans entail real-terms cuts of around 1.2% in [NHS] day-to-day spending [in 2024/25] – the largest reduction since the 1970s following the 1976 IMF crisis, except for the last two years as temporary funding related to the Covid-19 pandemic expired.

“A real-terms reduction in health spending would require some combination of reductions in staffing, pay and service provision.”

Phillips also disclosed that the government had to give the Department of Health and Social Care an emergency injection of £4.4bn of extra Treasury funding during the course of the current financial year to ensure that it – and the NHS – did not bust their budgets. The DSHC had not publicised that.

The NHS is thought to have received about £4bn of the £4.4bn, which was to cover staff pay rises, the costs of industrial action, schemes to help the service cope with winter and also its share of the health surcharge that migrants, or their employers, pay to cover the cost of their NHS care.

The DHSC’s budget for 2023-24 was originally due to be £164.2bn. However, it rose to £168.2bn as a result of ministers giving it what health economists call an “in-year bung” of about £4bn, to avoid a shortfall.

The department was and remains due to be handed a budget of £166.2bn for 2024-25. However, the £4.4bn top-up received this year meant that, as a result, next year’s budget was on course to be £2bn less than this one, prompting the IfS’s intervention, Phillips explained.

Julian Hartley, the chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents health service trusts, said: “These figures will ring alarm bells for trust leaders who are already struggling to provide patient care in a hugely challenging financial environment.

“Fifteen months of strike action have landed the NHS with an eye-watering bill due to income lost from delayed operations, scans and procedures and providing cover for striking staff.

“With worries that industrial action looks set to continue into the next financial year, trust leaders are rightly worried that these costs could continue to mount. Given the extra pressure industrial action is putting on NHS budgets, it’s vital the Treasury funds trusts’ strike costs in full.”

Hunt also plans to announce a clampdown on the money the NHS gives to employment agencies – £4.6bn across the UK and £3.5bn in England alone – as a result of a Treasury review of productivity across the public sector. He is set to cap the amount the service as a whole can hand them.

Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, labelled the chancellor “hypocrite Hunt” because the DHSC last year raised the annual cap for such spending by £450m. Streeting also pointed out that in 2015, when Hunt was the health secretary, he announced a similar crackdown on agencies which charged “extortionate hourly rates which cost billions of pounds a year”.

Streeting said: “Taxpayers are paying a heavy price for 14 years of Conservative failure.

“The Conservatives refused to train the doctors and nurses our NHS needs, leaving the health service to rely on rip-off recruitment agencies. Then they forced doctors and nurses out on the worst strike in the history of the NHS, leaving patients waiting longer and taxpayers picking up the bill.

“Expecting hypocrite Hunt to fix the mess he’s made is like expecting the arsonist to put out the fire they’ve started – it’s not going to happen.”

The DHSC was approached for its response.

UK

Nurses should have student debt written off in return for NHS work – poll

Ella Pickover,

 PA Health Correspondent
Mon, 4 March 2024



Nurses should have their student loans written off in return for NHS work, leading nurses have said.

A new poll shows that the majority of UK adults also back a loan forgiveness scheme for nurses who work in the NHS and wider public services.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said that writing off the student debt of nurses would help “attract and retain” more nurses.

A poll for the college, conducted by YouGov, found that three quarters (76%) of 2,100 UK adults backed such a measure.

This includes 73% of Conservative voters, 89% of Labour voters and 79% of Liberal Democrat voters, according to figures shared with the PA news agency.

The removal of the nursing training bursary in 2017 led to a fall in the number of people choosing to study nursing as would-be nurses face tuition fee loans of more than £9,000 each year, the RCN said.

The latest Ucas data shows that the number of people applying to undergraduate nursing courses in the UK fell this year.

In England, there were 24,680 nursing applicants to higher education providers in January 2024, down from 27,370 applicants 12 months earlier and 33,410 in 2022.

As a result the RCN called on ministers to introduce a package of measures to support recruitment in the profession.

There are almost 35,000 vacant nursing posts in England alone, the RCN said.

The poll also saw people asked about the Chancellor’s priorities ahead of Wednesday’s Budget.

Some 62% said they wanted Jeremy Hunt to prioritise the NHS ahead of tax cuts and other issues.

RCN general secretary and chief executive Professor Pat Cullen said: “There is an undeniable consensus for the Chancellor to act at the Budget on Wednesday.

“A loan forgiveness scheme for nurses working in the NHS and public services can stop students being shackled with debt and help attract and retain more nurses – it has huge support among the public too.

“The Chancellor has repeatedly said that he plans to deliver tax cuts in the upcoming Budget, but the public don’t agree with his priorities.

“They want investment in the NHS above all else. That is a message that needs to be heard loud and clear before Wednesday.”

Rachel Hewitt, chief executive of MillionPlus, the Association for Modern Universities, said: “That a fee loan forgiveness scheme for nurses who choose to work and remain in the NHS has such overwhelming backing from the country is unsurprising and vindicates a long-held MillionPlus position.

“The cost to the Treasury pales in comparison to the long-term economic and social benefits brought about through improved staff retention and should be viewed in Westminster in the same way that this polling suggests the people of Britain do: as a vital investment in Britain’s future.

“Nurse educators, nurse leaders and now the public are speaking as one – the Chancellor must heed them.”

Dr Billy Palmer, senior fellow at Nuffield Trust, said the poll shows more support for writing off student debt of healthcare professionals, adding: “The NHS is failing to keep valuable staff in the health service – a student loans forgiveness scheme is an instant and affordable way to increase the number of applications to clinical courses as well as reducing the numbers leaving during training or early in their career.”

A Government spokesperson said: “Nurses play a vital role in the NHS by providing high-quality, compassionate and safe care.

“Nurses can access a training grant of £5,000 per academic year from the NHS through the Learning Support Fund, and qualified nurses received a 5% pay rise last year as well as two additional bonuses worth over £2,000 on average.”

DEI

Fair representation of disabled people ‘lacking in media and advertising’


Rebecca Speare-Cole, 

PA sustainability reporter
Mon, 4 March 2024 

Disabled people need fairer representation in media, advertising and marketing content, campaigners have warned.

The Business Disability Forum asked more than 6,500 British adults, including more than 2,300 who identified as disabled, about the representation of disability in content they had recently seen, watched or read.

The poll, conducted by Ipsos and released on Tuesday, suggested that many disabled people do not feel represented by images used in media, advertising and on TV.


A third of respondents (32%) said they had not seen disability represented in content they had seen, watched or read during the last six months at all.

Respondents without a disability were significantly less likely to see disability represented in images than people with disabilities at 40%, compared to 17% of respondents with a disability, the research found.

It also suggested that uncertainty still exists, with 17% of respondents not knowing if they had seen disability represented in any images they had seen in the last six months.

Elsewhere, less than a quarter of people with a disability (23%) agreed that images of disabled people used in content reflected their own experience.

The campaign seeks to look beyond stereotypes (Business Disability Forum)

Images of wheelchair and mobility scooter users are the most likely to have been seen in content representing disability – by 26% of respondents.

This comes despite Disability Sport’s findings that less than one in 10 disabled people use wheelchairs in real life and disability covers a broad range of conditions, many of which are less visible.

The research has been published as the Business Disability Forum launches its “Changing the image of disability” campaign, supported by Paralympic gold medallist Kadeena Cox MBE, model Kelly Knox, and inclusion advocate Sinead Burke.

The organisation is calling on businesses and the media to increase representation as well as create a more authentic view of disabled people in their content.

Alongside the poll, it published free guidance on portraying disability and a collection of 50 disability-smart images for the media, created with disabled people as models and advisers.

A bank of 480 free images have also been created for the forum’s business members, it said.

In its research, the Business Disability Forum cited the Equality Act definition of disability as a condition or impairment that has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on the individual’s ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities.

Ms Cox, who had a stroke in 2016 and was later diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, said: “Just because my disability is less visible, it doesn’t mean that it has less of an impact on my life.

“We need to change how disability is viewed and that’s why I am supporting Business Disability Forum’s ‘Changing the image of disability’ campaign.

“I hope it will encourage more people to look beyond the obvious and the stereotypes and to see that disability is something that can affect anyone.”

Campaigners have called for more – and better – representation (Business Disability Forum)

Ms Burke, chief executive of accessibility consultancy Tilting the Lens, said: “For too long, images of disabled people have been clinical, and without reflection of community or disability pride.

“Stock imagery can reiterate exclusionary narratives, making disabled people objects rather than subjects or protagonists.

“Visibility alone cannot be a metric for systemic change, but this campaign and its library of images for businesses and media is a key milestone.”

Lara Davis, Business Disability Forum’s head of communications, said: “Our view of the world is influenced by the images we see in media and advertising.

“Too often disabled people are either missing from that content or are represented in an unrealistic way, reinforcing unhelpful stereotypes and leaving disabled people feeling overlooked and misunderstood.”

Older people’s mental health needs being overlooked due to ageism, report says

Aine Fox, PA Social Affairs Correspondent
Mon, 4 March 2024 



Older people’s mental health has too often been disregarded due to systemic ageism, according to a report.

Disregarding their needs is discriminatory and has consequences for the older person, families, communities and public services, the Centre for Mental Health said.

Its report, commissioned by Age UK, concluded that there is a “pervasive sense of pessimism and inevitability that normalises poor mental health” among older people, and argued there is a “pressing need to tackle ageist assumptions and expectations about mental health in later life”.

The report, published on Tuesday, comes after a Resolution Foundation study out last week found that younger people with mental health problems can have their chances of a good education blighted and can end up out of work or going into low-paid jobs.

The authors of this latest report said there needs to be similar focus on older people’s mental health.

Andy Bell, chief executive at the Centre for Mental Health, said: “Recent reports have pointed to a deeply worrying rise in poor mental health among young people.

“We want to see similar concern for older generations, so that their experiences of poor mental health are no longer dismissed as an inevitable part of ageing.”

The authors said they based their research on existing evidence, but that findings “are limited by the paucity of research and policy development that is specific to our mental health during later life”.

They said there is no national strategy or blueprint to help public services prevent mental ill health in later life, to intervene quickly to stop problems from escalating, or to meet the needs of people with mental health problems in later life “effectively and holistically”.

Because the population is ageing, the mental health of this population is “therefore going to be increasingly important for health and care services to address effectively”, they added.

The report stated: “The invisibility of older people within mental health services and policymaking are a major concern.

“Older people are too easily overlooked, from the design of prevalence surveys to the commissioning of mental health support.”

Mr Bell said ageism is “deeply entrenched and systemic, and it is causing people to miss out on a mentally healthier later life”.

He added: “The absence of later life from successive national mental health plans means there has been little investment in support for older people’s mental health. This is a form of discrimination that leaves older people without effective help.

“Our briefing paper sets out some immediate changes that could make a difference. Future mental health strategies must treat older people equitably.”

Paul Farmer, chief executive at Age UK, said: “We are just as likely to experience poor mental health in later life as at any other age, but it is not an inevitable part of ageing.

“There is a paradox at the core of mental health support for older people: under-recognised on the one hand and low mood and depression treated as ‘just your age’ on the other.

“In either case, the outcome is the same, too many of us going without the care we need to maintain good mental wellbeing as we age.

“Given the many challenges being experienced by older people at the moment, it is more important than ever that society, and the services we all rely on, finally take older people’s mental health seriously. We welcome the Centre for Mental Health’s contribution to this vital topic.”

The report called for research funders to prioritise projects looking at mental health in later life, urged integrated care boards (ICBs) to review their provision of mental health support for older adults, and said there must be efforts in staff training to address ageist attitudes.

It also called for NHS England to review the effectiveness of the 2019 Community Mental Health Framework for Adults and Older Adults (NHS, 2019) and ensure that any successor to the Long Term Plan includes specific provisions for mental health care in later life.

The report said the plan must “challenge deeply entrenched and ingrained ageism across health and care services, creating a new narrative that values mental health in later life”.

NHS England has been contacted for comment.

Cancer warning after big rise in people smoking pipes, shisha and cigars in UK

THREE OF MY FAVORITE THINGS 

NO CHAIN SMOKING LIKE CIGARETTES

Tobi Thomas
Mon, 4 March 2024

Tobacco is estimated to be directly linked to 54,300 cases of cancer a year 

in the UK.

Photograph: David Jones/PA

The number of people smoking pipes, shisha and cigars in the UK has risen fivefold over a decade, and experts say this could lead to a rise in smoking-related cancers such as mouth and lung cancer.

Last year there were about 772,800 exclusive non-cigarette tobacco users, compared with 151,200 in 2013, according to a study published in the journal Nicotine and Tobacco Research.

The figures are based on research by UCL academics, who surveyed a representative sample of about 1,700 adults a month on their smoking habits between 2013 and 2023.


The research found that the greatest increase in the use of non-cigarette tobacco was among young adults, with 3% of 18-year-olds using these forms, compared with 1.1% of 65-year-olds. The study also found the prevalence to be higher among men and current vapers.

In 2022-23, one in 10 smokers used only non-cigarette tobacco, such as in cigars and shisha pipes. Cigars, shisha, cigarillos and pipes are non-cigarette forms of smoking and can be more harmful than cigarettes.

A person smoking a shisha pipe for between 20 and 80 minutes can inhale the same amount of smoke as someone smoking more than 100 cigarettes, according to the British Heart Foundation. The charity said tobacco-free shisha still produced dangerous toxins from the smoke.

The study said possible reasons for the stark rise could include people believing these forms of smoking may be less harmful than cigarettes, as well as financial reasons.

The study noted that the ban on menthol cigarettes in May 2020 did not include these forms of smoking. This could mean that people who preferred the flavour may have turned to other products not included in the ban, such as shisha and cigars.

Tobacco is estimated to be directly linked to 54,300 cases of cancer a year in the UK. Ministers are considering legislation that would mean anyone born on or after 1 January 2009 would not legally be able to buy cigarettes in England at any point during their lives, as the smoking age would be raised by one year every year.

Dr Ian Walker, the executive director of policy at Cancer Research UK, said: “Tobacco kills one person every five minutes in the UK. Research like this shows that the issue of smoking isn’t just about cigarettes – all tobacco products are harmful and cause cancer, no matter what form they come in.

“That’s why it’s crucial that the government’s age-of-sale legislation applies to all tobacco products. If implemented, this policy will be a vital step towards creating a smoke-free UK, preventing future generations from ever becoming addicted to tobacco.”

Dr Sarah Jackson, the lead author of the paper, based at UCL’s Institute of Epidemiology and Health, said: “This 10-year-long study captures the shift in trends of non-cigarette tobacco use and paints a concerning picture. Although rates of cigarette smoking have fallen, our data show there has been a sharp rise in use of other smoked tobacco products, particularly among young people.

“It’s vital that smoking cessation services are adequately funded and available across the UK so that the around 772,800 people who use non-cigarette tobacco products, and the millions who use cigarettes, are given the support they need to quit.”

‘If we can’t fish any more, we’re going to die’: the volunteer sea patrols protecting precious Philippine water



Sofia Quaglia in Zamboanguita,

 Negros Oriental, the Philippines

THE GUARDIAN
Mon, 4 March 2024

The small fishing community in Negros Oriental, where local 

volunteer groups have to guard the waters against illegal fishing

Photograph: Marla Tomorug/Edges Of Earth

It is midnight on a beach in southern Negros Oriental, a province in the central Philippines, and everything is dark and silent. Except, that is, for the scene playing out in front of a small guardhouse made of bamboo. There, seven people have congregated: one middle-aged man is splayed on a bench, a man and a woman in sports vests hug their knees to their chest while chatting, and others walk back and forth barefoot with torches and green laser pointers shining out beyond the sand. All eyes are set on a portion of the ocean loosely cordoned off by some white buoys.

These are the Bantay Dagat, the sea patrol, a team of village-appointed volunteers who take turns staying up all night to guard their waters. They fend off any local people trying to illegally fish in the community marine sanctuaries, and any commercial fishers trying to trespass into municipal waters within 15km (nine miles) of the coastline.

“The only chance for us to survive is to police among ourselves,” says the 48-year-old Antonio “Toni” Yocor, who helped found the local Bantay Dagat in 2005 and has spent thousands of nights on watch ever since, searching for the telltale glare of underwater lights. Just the night before, they had to chase eight intruders off into the darkness.

The ocean surrounding the 7,641 islands of the Philippines is one of the world’s most abundant in marine biodiversity. With a reef system that spans more than 22,000 sq km, it is the crown jewel of the Indo-Pacific Coral Triangle.

But this underwater treasure has been steadily depleted due to warming and acidifying seas, chemical and plastic pollution and, crucially, intensive overfishing and destructive harvesting techniques. Throughout the decades, commercial fishers have trawled and scraped through entire coral beds with superfine-mesh nets destroying everything in their wake.Interactive

For the 1.1 million Filipinos fishing in these reefs and, for the main part, living in poverty, the sea has just been thought of as a means to an end for eating and sustaining their family. “People are thinking about how to get as much fish as they can, but they don’t think about sustainability,” says Ceasar Ruiz, who was brought up in a small fishing village.

While fish were once so abundant they seemed to jump on to the hooks, fishers began to find their catch getting smaller.

To counter the trend, in the 1970s, the government introduced marine protected areas (MPAs) – no-fishing zones. MPAs, also known as marine sanctuaries, would not only protect precious coral reefs from further destruction to preserve biodiversity but also act as nurseries for juvenile fish.

Filipino waters are now home to more than 1,500 MPAs but while some of them are overseen and funded by the national government, more than 90% of sanctuaries are small and community-managed, relying heavily on local government and village volunteers for enforcement.

And getting local communities on board with the sanctuaries hasn’t been easy, with MPA boundaries frequently being vandalised or ignored. Even authorities turned a blind eye to any wrongdoing because the fishers were often “their compadres”, says Yocor.

When Yocor started the patrol team, many family members and neighbours saw him as a traitor who’d turned his back on the town’s food security needs. He says he would routinely take a gun to his Bantay Dagat night shifts in case tensions rose and encounters got “nasty”.

Today, MPA intruders are less frequent and less violent, and mostly local poachers who are trying to sneak in for a large catch of fish just when their family has nothing to eat or a big debt to pay off. “It’s a very hard encounter, they are desperate. I understand, I’m a fisherman too,” says Yocor. The wardens flash their lights at the intruders, chase them away on foot or by boat, and sometimes manage to apprehend and fine them according to the powers they’ve been given.

Data on the progress of the wildlife in these MPAs is collected by citizen scientists from the nonprofit organisation Marine Conservation Philippines (MCP), who come out to the MPAs daily to survey the corals, invertebrates and fish. MCP also provides a large part of the funding needed to support the Bantay Dagat and other volunteer efforts, such as the team of 35 bantay women who safeguard the island’s mangrove forests, which are fundamental for flourishing ocean ecosystems as fish use them to spawn.

“People don’t care about the mangroves, they say their fishing nets get stuck in the mangroves, but preserving them will benefit the whole community living in this area, and all coastal areas,” says Evelyn Buca, who heads the volunteer project, as she looks out on to the mangroves she has been watching over since she was 11 years old.

Rose Anne Yocor, Toni’s niece, runs MCP’s coastal plastic-collecting programme. The Philippines is the one of the world’s largest ocean plastic polluters, and her team collects an average of 400kg of plastic every day from the water and beaches.

These collective efforts have helped change the narrative about how all ocean-safeguarding efforts are interconnected and fundamental for the sake of food security. “Everybody has started understanding that we need to conserve and protect our marine environments because it’s the last frontier, if we can’t fish here any more, we’re going to die,” says Mario Neil Montemar, the president of the local Fisherfolks Association and a former member of one of the Bantay Dagat chapters. “Fisherfolk are the poorest of the poor.”

But the issue of illegal fishing “will go on and on” if central government doesn’t provide proper resources, says Montemar. “The Bantay Dagat also needs to eat, they are fishers who also need to give their family food on the table.”

More than 20,000 commercial vessels entered Philippine municipal waters in 2023. When these ships encroach and rake in hundreds of thousands of kilos of fish – the second type of infraction Bantay Dagat need to look out for – a couple of volunteers sailing out on a small bangka (the boats used to fish and get around many Philippine islands) is not a very effective deterrent. Montemar once went face to face with a big commercial fishing operator and was told his life was worth less than the 5,000 pesos (£70) the mogul would pay to have him killed.

Even if all the municipal water restrictions were robustly enforced, Philippine law mandates that 15% of municipal waters be designated as no-fishing zones – but fewer than 1% of them are.

Related: Nomads of the sea: stateless Bajau face up to a future on land – photo essay

The Philippines would benefit from a network of connected and well-maintained MPAs with support from central and local governments, says Rene Abesamis, a marine biologist at the University of the Philippines and a leading expert on MPAs.

Bantay Dagat should also become professionalised, trained, and paid like the rangers on the Great Barrier Reef, says Abesamis, something that’s being discussed in the national parliament. “We may have a chance if we get things right,” he says.

At midday on another beach in southern Negros Oriental, wind chimes made of shells and coral branches tinkle in the wind, and a man and woman sit on the makeshift porch of a bamboo guardhouse looking out to sea. Spotting illegal fishers during daylight is a little easier: 64-year-old Carmen Pajula, who spearheaded the Fisherfolks Association before Montemar and has spent her fair share of days and nights patrolling MPAs, says she sees only one way forward for her people – molampos, which means “to prosper”.

What we know about suspected chemical leak in Manchester

One person has been taken to hospital following a chemical leak in Trafford Park, Manchester that has since been contained.


Connor Parker and James Hockaday
Updated Mon, 4 March 2024 

Emergency services were dispatched to the site of chemicals firm Lanxess on Tenax Road in Trafford Park, Greater Manchester. (MEN Media)

One person has been taken to hospital after a "major incident" was declared at a business site in Greater Manchester following a chemical leak on Monday morning that has since been contained.

Emergency services, including fire and ambulance crews, were sent to the scene near the site of chemicals firm Lanxess on Tenax Road in Trafford Park, with several vehicles seen parked outside.

A dozen people were assessed by paramedics, and North West Ambulance Service initially said no one required further treatment. On Monday afternoon, Lanxess said one of its employees was "taken to hospital for observation as a precaution", with one unconfirmed report claiming they had "breathed in chemical vapour".

The leaked substance was confirmed to be phosphorus oxychloride, which can cause serious illness if inhaled and, in some cases, can be fatal.

Paramedics at the scene on Monday morning. (MEN Media)
What we know

At around 9am Monday, Greater Manchester Police were called to reports of a “hazmat incident” at a business site in Trafford Park, in the town of Stretford.

Officers cordoned off the site as fire crews and ambulances were also sent to the scene.

No injuries were initially reported, and everyone at the affected business in in Tenax Road had been accounted for, emergency services said on Monday morning. North West Ambulance Service said: “Very quickly, we have been able to account for all potential patients, assessing more than a dozen people. Nobody has required further treatment.”

Lanxess said in a follow-up statement on Monday afternoon: "One person was taken to hospital for observation as a precaution. The cooperation with emergency services and authorities went smoothly."

Residents living near the 300m cordon were advised to keep their windows and doors closed. Yahoo News spoke to one business across the street from the plant, which took an independent decision to evacuate.

Surrounding businesses have not been ordered by authorities to evacuate, it is understood, with some telling Yahoo News they had opted to carry on as normal. A member of staff from a nearby crane hire centre said it was "business as usual" for them, adding that the only updates they were receiving were from reading the news.

Manchester Police had said a "number of surrounding roads have been closed as a precaution". Nearby Metrolink tram services were partially disrupted due to the incident but subsequently returned to normal.

Several emergency vehicles were seen parked outside the Lanxess site after a 'major incident' was declared. (MEN media)

In a statement, Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue said: "Just before 9am this morning 12 fire engines from across Greater Manchester were called to reports of a suspected chemical incident at an industrial site on Tenax Road, Trafford Park.

"Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus are working alongside site staff and other emergency services to contain the incident and keep the area safe.

In a statement issued at 11:55am, Lanxess said the situation was under control.

A spokesperson for the German chemicals firm said: "During the unloading of a supplier's tanker truck, a chemicals leak occurred on the factory premises in Trafford Park, Manchester at around 9am on March 4.

"Meanwhile, the leakage has been stopped. The leaked substance is phosphorus oxychloride. Residents are advised to keep windows and doors closed."

Later in the afternoon, the company said: “The safety of our employees and local residents is our top priority. We have started to investigate the incident thoroughly and regret the inconvenience caused.”

Lanxess opened in Trafford Park 1939 to manufacture phosphate-based plasticisers. Through the years, the research facility at Trafford Park developed a wide range of new products in fine chemicals and pharmaceutical intermediates, plastic additives and flame retardants

An ambulance decontamination officer at Trafford Park. (MEN Media)

What we don’t know

According to the Manchester Evening News, the leak is believed to have been caused by a faulty valve on a tanker - though this has not been confirmed.

While the situation appears to have been contained, it is not clear how emergency services are expected to stay in the area for.

It is also unclear how long nearby residents will be advised to keep their windows and doors closed for, and how long Tenax Road is expected to be cordoned off for.

While a report by MEN said an employee had been taken to hospital after "breathing in chemical vapour", this has not been confirmed.

It is unclear what has happened to this employee and what condition they are in.

What is phosphorus oxychloride?

Phosphorus oxychloride is a clear, colourless to yellow, oily liquid that has a pungent odour.

It is used to manufacture a variety of products, including flame retardents and some pharmaceutical, textile and agricultural chemicals, according to chemicals firm Solvay.

Phosphorous oxychloride is corrosive and highly toxic, and can cause severe irritation or burns with symptoms of redness, itching, welling and severe pain if it gets on the skin or eyes, Lanxess says, warning that "permanent damage" is possible.

Inhaling the chemical is corrosive to the respiratory system, with symptoms including coughing, burning, sore throat, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath, weakness, ulceration and pain.

Ingestion of phosphorus oxychloride is corrosive to the digestive tract and can cause symptoms such as coughing, burning, ulceration, abdominal pain, shock or collapse.

Exposure at high levels may be fatal, and the effects of exposure may be delayed. Pre-existing respiratory, skin and eye disorders may be aggravated by overexposure, Lanxess adds.

Prolonged or repeated exposure to phosphorus oxychloride may result in adverse effects including coughing, tightness of the chest, shortness of breath, bronchitis (inflammation of lung tissues) and pulmonary edema (fluid buildup in the lungs).

Files.libcom.org

https://files.libcom.org/files/Bookchin%20M.%20Our%20Synthetic%20Environment.pdf

Our Synthetic Environment - Libcom.org 

Our Synthetic Environment. Murray Bookchin. 1962. Table of contents. Chapter 1: THE PROBLEM. Chapter 2: AGRICULTURE AND HEALTH. Chapter 3: URBAN LIFE AND HEALTH.

House Of Lords Inflicts 5 Defeats On Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda Bill

Graeme Demianyk
Updated Mon, 4 March 2024 

The House of Lords (left) and home secretary James Cleverly and Rwandan minister of foreign affairs Vincent Biruta signing a new treaty in Kigali, Rwanda in December.AP

The House of Lords has inflicted five defeats on the government over its controversial Rwanda scheme.

In another headache for Rishi Sunak, the unelected upper chamber voted by a majority of 102 to back a move to ensure the proposed legislation is fully compliant with domestic and international law.

The first defeat on the Safety of Rwanda Bill was followed by four more – including insisting parliament cannot declare Rwanda to be a safe country until the treaty with its promised safeguards is fully implemented, and a vote in favour of establishing a monitoring mechanism for the UK-Rwanda pact.


It paves the way for a back-and-forth between the elected Commons and the Lords, which is often referred to as parliamentary “ping-pong”, meaning MPs can overturn the changes at later stages in the process.



The Safety of Rwanda Bill is designed to overcome legal challenges to past attempts to send asylum seekers with a one-way ticket to the east African country.

The bill would compel judges to regard Rwanda as safe, and give ministers the power to ignore emergency injunctions.

The policy is central to the prime minister’s hopes of convincing voters he can “stop the boats” crossing the English channel.

The government hopes once the bill passes flights will be able to take off by the spring, but that timetable now looks in disarray.

Dick Newby, Liberal Democrat leader in the Lords, said: “For months this Conservative government has been pushing this policy that does nothing to solve the asylum backlog.

“This bill has cost hundreds of millions of pounds, and doesn’t combat dangerous Channel crossings or create safe, legal routes.

“By declaring Rwanda safe when it is clearly anything but, and excluding the courts, the bill also undermines the rule of law. It is the product of a morally and politically bankrupt government.”

Speaking in the Lords, Conservative grandee Lord Tugendhat, whose nephew is security minister Tom Tugendhat, accused the government of behaving like the ruling party in George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984.

“This country is no dictatorship, it is a democracy,” he said. “If this bill goes onto the statute book in its present form, Rwanda will be a safe country regardless of reality until the statute is repealed.”

Conservative support falls to lowest level on record, poll finds


Christopher McKeon, PA Political Correspondent
Mon, 4 March 2024 

The Conservatives have hit their lowest polling score on record after a torrid start to the year for Rishi Sunak.

The poll published by Ipsos UK on Monday suggested just 20% of the public would vote for the Tories at the next election, down seven points since January and the lowest score recorded by the party since Ipsos started its regular polling in 1978.

The figure is even lower than the 23% recorded in December 2022, shortly after Mr Sunak replaced Liz Truss as Prime Minister, and puts the Conservatives 27 points behind Labour, who are on 47%.

(PA Graphics)


Ipsos’s previous lowest score for the Conservatives was 22%, recorded by John Major in December 1994 and May 1995, only a few years before Tony Blair’s landslide win in 1997.

The slump in Conservative support follows a series of bad headlines for Mr Sunak at the start of 2024, with confirmation that the UK had entered a recession at the end of last year, two large by-election defeats in Wellingborough and Kingswood, and an Islamophobia row over comments by now-suspended Tory MP Lee Anderson.

Monday also saw former minister Paul Scully announce that he would leave Parliament, adding to an exodus that has seen more than 60 Tory MPs say they will not fight their seats at the next election – the highest total since 1997.

Mr Scully said: “Fuelled by division, the party has lost its way and needs to get a clear focus which I hope the Budget can start to provide. It needs a vision beyond crisis management which can appeal to a wider section of the electorate including younger people.

“If we just focus on core vote, eventually that core shrinks to nothing.”

Warning against abandoning the political centre ground he said: “The standard deviation model is true in politics. Most people are in the middle.

“We can work with the bell curve or become the bell-ends.”

Another poll published by YouGov on Friday also had the Conservatives on 20% and gave Labour a lead of 26 points, further compounding the Prime Minister’s woes.

Labour, meanwhile, appeared to be weathering the storm caused by the Rochdale by-election, when it was forced to withdraw support for its candidate over his remarks about the Israel-Hamas conflict, paving the way for George Galloway’s victory last week.

Despite this setback, Labour’s polling figure was only down two points on the start of the year in a survey that, if replicated at the general election, would see the party win a landslide victory.

The poll saw a significant rise in support for Reform UK, doubling from 4% to 8% since January in a development that will further alarm some Conservatives.

The Liberal Democrats and the Greens saw their positions improve slightly, reaching 9% and 8% respectively.

Keir Starmer’s personal ratings have weakened, but his party remains well ahead of the Conservatives (Jane Barlow/PA)

Ipsos also noted an apparent “enthusiasm gap” opening up, with only 62% of Conservative supporters saying they were certain to vote, compared to 76% of Labour supporters.

Monday’s poll, based on a survey of 1,000 British adults between February 21 and 28, also saw Mr Sunak score his lowest net approval rating so far.

Just 19% of people said they were satisfied with the Prime Minister’s performance, while 73% said they were dissatisfied.

Satisfaction with Sir Keir Starmer has also fallen since January, despite Labour’s overall position holding up. Some 55% said they were dissatisfied with the Labour leader, up seven points since January, while 29% said they were satisfied.

(PA Graphics)

Gideon Skinner, head of political research at Ipsos, said: “The historical comparisons continue to look ominous for Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives.

“The Ipsos Political Monitor series started in the late 70s and has never recorded a Conservative vote share this low – and the job satisfaction trends for the Prime Minister and his Government since he took office are also heading downwards.

“Combined with Labour taking leads on issues of economic credibility to go with their traditional strengths in public services, this means the Conservatives face big challenges across a number of fronts if they are to turn the situation around.”



There was slightly better news for Mr Sunak in a Deltapoll survey, which suggested Labour’s lead had narrowed to 14 points, excluding those who did not express an opinion or said they would not vote.

The survey of 1,500 British adults conducted between March 1 and 4 put the Tories on 27%, up four points from the pollster’s previous survey between February 23 and 26.

Labour was down three points on 41%, with the Liberal Democrats down two points on 9%.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M
£50million London property empire 'bought by Azeri tycoon via extraordinarily complex money laundering operation'


Martin Bentham
Sun, 3 March 2024 

Azeri MP and businessman Javanshir Feyziyev (Handout)

A £50 million London property empire was bought by an Azeri tycoon and his wife using money brought into Britain via an “extraordinarily complex” money laundering operation involving payments for “nutritious baby food” and fake and fictitious invoices, the High Court has been told.

The National Crime Agency told a judge that it believes that Javanshir Feyziyev, an Azeri MP and businessman, and his wife Parvana acquired 22 homes, mostly purchased jointly, using the proceeds of crime and corruption.

It said the money used to buy the properties – which include two in Belgravia’s Chelsea Barracks development bought for £18.4 million and £8.1 million respectively - had been channeled into this country via a huge network of shell companies in countries ranging from the Marshall Islands, the Seychelles and the British Virgin Islands to Russia and Hong Kong.


It said the scheme also involved the use of forged invoices and other false accounting to mask the vast cash transfers and included transactions labelled as “payment for nutritious baby food”, as well as the deception of banks in Estonia and Latvia, and “corruption and fraud in Azerbaijan”.

Lawyers for Mr Feyziyev and his wife have strongly denied any wrongdoing by the couple and insisted that the politician used his “substantial fortune” generated legitimately by his tobacco, pharmaceutical and hotel businesses among others to fund the purchases.

They are also seeking the removal of court freezing orders imposed on the properties on the basis of the NCA’s claims, arguing that there is no risk of the Feyziyevs disposing of their assets to avoid any future attempt to seize them.

They have further alleged that the orders were “improperly obtained” after “egregious” disclosure failures by law enforcers and the presentation of the “flimsiest of cases” against the Feyziyevs.

At a High Court hearing to decide whether the freezing orders should stay in place, the NCA’s barrister Andrew Sutcliffe KC insisted that there was “compelling public interest” for the properties to remain frozen while law enforcers continued their investigations into the couple and that there was a “good arguable case” that the homes had been bought with the proceeds of crime.

“There is strong evidence that the property freezing order properties have been obtained through money laundering,” he told the court in a skeleton argument submitted to the hearing.

“The .. detailed tracing evidence.. reveals money flows of extraordinary complexity which appear to have been accompanied by inconsistent, false or fictitious descriptions [and] can be traced back, in part, to companies which have been found to have been involved in money laundering [and] remain largely unexplained.”

The document adds: “The transactions are breathtaking. The available banking material records payments made from different entities including Baktelekom, Polux and Hilux through companies in multiple jurisdictions (including the Marshall Islands, Hong Kong, Seychelles, Anguilla, Ireland, Russia, British Virgin Islands, Panama, St Kitts and Nevis, and the Dominican Republic), and with payment descriptions such as “account replenishment”, “payment for medicines”, “fees for licenses to clientbase” and “payments for nutritious baby food”

As well as the two homes at Whistler Square in Chelsea Barracks, which were bought by Mr Feyziyev alone, the properties subject to the court freezing order include 19 properties in the Beaufort Square development in Colindale and a home which cost the Feyziyevs just over £4 million and which cannot be identified for legal reasons.

The court document states that all the properties are held in a trust set up by the London law firm Withers and that the freezing order also covers a bank account in Liechenstein and rental income from the Feyziyevs’ London property empire.

It adds that the “estimated value of the property freezing order properties is over £50 million” and there is a “risk of dissipation” if the orders were to be lifted.

On the alleged money laundering, the document states that “specific examples of transactions that are prima facie fraudulent” include payments which funded the Chelsea Barracks and 15 of the Colindale properties.

It says these payments included “a purported contract for the sale of medicines.. (which does not appear to be genuine)” and “purported payment instructions from Les Laboratories Servier (a French pharmaceutical company which has confirmed that the document is a forgery)”. Other allegedly fraudulent transactions cited in the court document include “a purported loan agreement (which does not appear to be genuine)”.

The skeleton argument submitted by Mr Sutcliffe KC also points out that Mrs Feyziyeva, the couple’s son Orkhan, and Mr Feyziyev’s nephew Elman Javanshir have already been successfully targeted by the NCA in account forfeiture proceedings at Westminster Magistrates which led to a total of £5.6 million being seized from their bank accounts as the likely proceeds of crime.

The court concluded that the forfeited money had entered Britain via a complex money laundering scheme known as the “Azerbaijan laundromat” involving banks in Estonia and Latvia and an elaborate network of shell companies overseas.

In response, Kenneth MacLean KC, representing the Feyziyevs, said the court order freezing the couple’s properties should “never have been granted” and should be removed.

He said this was because there was no “good arguable case” against them and “no real risk of dissipation” and because of “multiple and serious breaches of the NCA’s duty of full and frank disclosure/fair presentation” in securing the orders.

He said Mr Feyziyev was a “respected academic, businessman and (independent) legislator” who had achieved “substantial success in various business ventures over the course of two decades”.

Mr MacLean added: “There is absolutely no evidence that the Respondents [the Feyziyevs] engaged in any unlawful conduct in Azerbaijan or that their funds derived from any such conduct.”

He said Mr Feyziyev also “clearly had sufficient legitimate funds to acquire all of the properties” and accused the NCA of presenting evidence that was “desperate” and “quite extraordinary in its irrelevance” in conduct that was “testament to the weakness of its actual case”.

The judge, Mr Justice Poole, adjourned the hearing and will give judgment on whether the freezing orders over the Feyziyevs’ properties will continue.

The new hearing follows the earlier account forfeiture proceedings involving Mrs Feyziyeva, the couple’s son Orkhan and the couple’s nephew Elman Javanshir.

The court heard then that Mr Feyziyev, who was not a party to those proceedings, was the source of the funds being targeted in the case.

The hearing also led to the later naming of the Tory donor and businessman Javad Marandi as “a person of importance” in the case. Mr Marandi, who owns the Conran Shop, the Emilia Wickstead fashion brand, and a stake in the Anya Hindmarch handbag retailer, had initially secured an anonymity order to conceal his connection to the case and denied any wrongdoing.

But the order, which was opposed at the outset by the Evening Standard was lifted by the High Court in a judgment which said that anonymity should never have been granted.