Thursday newspaper round-up: Pension gender gap, Angela Rayner, mansion tax
By Michele Maatouk
Date: Thursday 21 Aug 2025
(Sharecast News) - Retired women in the UK in effect go four months of the year without a pension when their income is compared with that of men, union leaders have warned. The TUC said the income gap between men and women in retirement was 36.5%, equivalent to a shortfall of £7,600 a year on average. As a percentage this was more than double the gender pay gap, which measures the difference in average earnings from work; it stands at 13.1%. - Guardian
The deputy prime minister, Angela Rayner, has been hit with a legal challenge after she overruled a local council to approve a hyperscale datacentre on green belt land by the M25 in Buckinghamshire. Campaigners bringing the action are complaining that no environmental impact assessment was made for the 90MW datacentre, which was approved as part of the Labour government's push to turn the UK into an AI powerhouse by trebling computing capacity to meet rising demand amid what it terms "a global race" as AI usage takes off. - Guardian
Rachel Reeves has been warned that a "mansion tax" risks backfiring and could raise little or even no money. The Chancellor is reportedly considering charging capital gains tax on the sale of homes worth more than £1.5m, as she scrambles to fill a hole in public finances that economists fear could be as large as £50bn. However, Andrew Wishart, an economist at Berenberg Bank, said a raid on wealthy homeowners could ultimately fail to raise the money she needs. - Telegraph
British semiconductor companies should brace for massive US tariffs, the government has warned after President Trump has threatened levies of up to 300 per cent. In a letter to UK chip businesses, seen by The Times, Whitehall's semiconductor policy unit said it was awaiting an executive order from the United States "which will provide clarity" on reports of plans to impose "significant tariffs" on chip imports. - The Times
The government should abolish the Office for Budget Responsibility and replace it with a new forecasting body to "unshackle" the chancellor from a constant pressure to raise taxes or cut spending, a think tank has said. The New Economics Foundation, a left-leaning think tank, has urged Rachel Reeves to overhaul her fiscal framework, abolishing the independent watchdog that was set up by George Osborne in 2010. - The Times
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