THE proposal to give every patient using health and social care services a unique identifying number for their lifetime is a sensible step towards improving patient safety and avoiding hospital cock-ups that can put lives at risk.

MAD. Absolutely, barking mad. And, when I say ‘barking’, I really mean it, as we will see. The madness I speak of concerns the new Fiat 500C, which has been given the once-over by in-house tuning legends, Abarth.

Private healthcare giant BUPA posted a rise in annual revenues and profits today.

Economic uncertainty overshadowed a peaceful and early transfer of power in Iraq today, cutting off a rally and leaving stocks modestly lower while investors fretted about the Federal Reserve’s imminent decision on interest rates.