Iran conflict could have ‘very significant’ impact on UK economy, OBR warns in spring forecast – live updates

Here’s a grim chart from the OBR, showing how growth in GDP per person has been much weaker than if it had followed its rate before the financial crisis.The OBR’s David Miles tells reporters:double quotation markRight now, the level of GDP per person in the UK is around about 30% below where it would have been had there not been a profoundly different trajectory for productivity in the period since the financial crisis.It is not surprising on the back of that that the fiscal situation in the UK remains very challenging.And of course, such forecasts could already be out of date due to the market turbulence this week.As the OBR explain:double quotation markConflict in the Middle East, which escalated as we were finalising this document, could have very significant impacts on the global and UK economies

Stock markets slump amid Iran war as gas prices jump 30% to three-year high

The war in the Middle East has plunged financial markets into turmoil for a second day, with oil and gas prices surging and global stock markets plummeting days after the US-Israel attack on Iran..After a calm Monday, US stocks fell sharply on Tuesday morning, with the Dow dropping more than 1,000 points as concerns over higher gas prices started spooking investors.The London stock market has fallen deep into the red, with the FTSE 100 index losing about 350 points by Tuesday afternoon, falling to 10,420 in a 3.3% drop and leaving it on track for its worst day in 11 months – since Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariff shock of April 2025

OpenAI amends Pentagon deal as Sam Altman admits it looks ‘sloppy’

OpenAI is amending its hastily arranged deal to supply artificial intelligence to the US Department of War (DoW) after the ChatGPT owner’s chief executive admitted it looked “opportunistic and sloppy”.The contract prompted fears the San Francisco startup’s AI could be used for domestic mass surveillance but its boss, Sam Altman, said on Monday night the startup would explicitly bar its technology from being used for that purpose or being deployed by defence department intelligence agencies such as the National Security Agency (NSA).OpenAI, which has more than 900 million users of ChatGPT, made the deal almost immediately after the Pentagon’s existing AI contractor, Anthropic, was dropped.Anthropic had insisted “using these systems for mass domestic surveillance is incompatible with democratic values”, leading the US president, Donald Trump, to call Anthropic “leftwing nut jobs” and directing the federal government to stop using its technology.Despite denials from OpenAI that the agreement allowed for surveillance use, commentators raised the spectre of the Snowden scandal, which broke in 2013, when it emerged the NSA was engaged in mass harvesting of phone and internet communications

Iran war heralds era of AI-powered bombing quicker than ‘speed of thought’

The use of AI tools to enable attacks on Iran heralds a new era of bombing quicker than “the speed of thought”, experts have said, amid fears human ­decision-makers could be sidelined.Anthropic’s AI model, Claude, was reportedly used by the US military in the barrage of strikes as the technology “shortens the kill chain” – meaning the process of target identification through to legal approval and strike launch.The US and Israel, which previously used AI to identify targets in Gaza, launched almost 900 strikes on Iranian targets in the first 12 hours alone, during which Israeli missiles killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.Academics studying the field say AI is collapsing the planning time required for complex strikes – a phenomenon known as “decision compression”, which some fear could result in human military and legal experts merely rubber-stamping automated strike plans.In 2024 the San Francisco-based Anthropic deployed its model across the US Department of War and other national security agencies to speed up war planning

Jon Rahm accuses DP World Tour of ‘extorting players’ by issuing LIV fines

Jon Rahm’s dispute with the DP World Tour has escalated after the Spaniard accused the organisation of “extorting” golfers over fines for competing on the LIV circuit. Rahm’s Ryder Cup future remains in peril with no resolution to the matter in sight, with insiders at the DP World Tour and Europe’s Ryder Cup fans baffled by his stance.Rahm incurred fines and suspensions as a DP World, formerly European, Tour member playing on what are regarded as competing Saudi-backed LIV events. Rahm signed for LIV in 2023 in a deal reportedly worth hundreds of millions of dollars.Rahm has appealed against those sanctions with a hearing to come

England make 12 changes for Italy game as Borthwick swings Six Nations axe

Steve Borthwick has wielded the axe and made 12 changes to his England team to face Italy, picking an entirely different back line as he seeks to salvage his side’s Six Nations campaign with the most radical selection of his tenure.Borthwick has made nine personnel changes as well as moving Tommy Freeman to outside-centre, Ben Earl back to No 8 and Tom Curry to openside. Fin Smith has also been installed at fly-half and with Henry Pollock dropped after just one start.Seb Atkinson, Cadan Murley and Elliot Daly all come into the side to make their first appearances of this year’s Six Nations, while Guy Pepper makes his first start. In a measure of just how radical Borthwick’s selection is, only the captain Maro Itoje and the props Ellis Genge and Joe Heyes are selected in the same position as against Ireland