Royal Mail paid £4.5m to its executives in the last financial year, £500,000 less than in the previous 12 months, according to new figures.

Stress tests on all nuclear plants in the EU will be carried out by the end of the year, the European Commission said this afternoon.

Thousands of postal workers in the UK started a second day of strikes today, with a fresh wave of action set to be held next week in an escalation of the bitter Royal Mail dispute.

National strikes by British postal workers will go ahead tomorrow and Friday after hopes of reaching a last minute deal collapsed.

A walkout by British postal staff in the capital was starting today amid the spectre of a much more crippling national strike.