The national minimum wage will increase by 20p an hour to £6.70 from October, the government has announced. The changes will benefit more than 1.4 million workers. The hourly rate for younger workers will also rise, and for apprentices it will go up by 20% – or 57p – to £3.30 an hour. The rates were recommended by the Low Pay Commission but the government has gone further than the 7p an hour increase suggested for apprentices.

The number of people out of work in the UK fell by 97,000 to 1.86 million in the three months to December. The unemployment rate now stands at 5.7% of the adult working population, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said. The ONS said the employment rate, or level of people in work, was 73.2%, its joint highest rate. Average earnings including bonuses were up 2.1% in the quarter compared with a year earlier. Excluding bonuses, earnings rose by 1.7%. CPI inflation was 0.5% in December, and new data released on Tuesday showed the rate fell to 0.3% in January, its lowest level since records began. Employment increased by 103,000 to close to 31 million, the highest since records began in 1971. Over the quarter there was also a drop of 19,000, to 4.4 million, in number of people in self-employment.

Labour would guarantee apprenticeships for every school leaver in England who “gets the grades” by 2020, Ed Miliband has said. The pledge comes as Mr Miliband set out his party’s business policies for the general election. He argued better training and higher wages were key to boosting productivity. Tory MP Grant Shapps said his party had pledged to cap benefits further to fund three million apprenticeships. He said: “Gordon Brown already made exactly the same promise when he was in power and then they failed to deliver it. And secondly we actually have already doubled apprenticeships during this parliament. “We’ve said in the next parliament if the Conservatives are re-elected, we will put three million people onto apprenticeships, that’s a massive increase.” But Labour claim the Tory plan does not offer high enough quality training and in many cases consisted of “rebadged” internal training schemes. Labour is talking about an extra 80,000 apprenticeships, with 33,000 to come from one project alone – the HS2 rail line. The party’s “guarantee” would only apply to young people who gain ‘”level 3 qualifications,” which are equivalent to having two A Levels. Those with two A levels would also qualify but not those who have GCSEs only

The UK government should have known HSBC was helping wealthy clients evade tax in 2010, the whistleblower at the centre of the story has said. Herve Falciani, former IT worker for HSBC, said UK tax authorities would have known about the stolen list of clients of HSBC’s Swiss private bank when it was given to French officials.

HMRC will meet the police and the Serious Fraud Office later in the week.

As part of All Inclusive Training bespoke employability course; the students visited Croydon HSBC bank for some CV writing and application techniques to help them with specifically what banks and other financial institutions look for in your CV and application. It was very helpful and interesting to the students that attended.

“This visit was great! I found it very beneficial I now have more insight about the different jobs within the banking industry and the HSBC recruitment process; specifically what they look for in suitable candidates. The AAT course I am doing can put me in good position to apply for jobs in this industry!” – Fabian McEwen, AAT Level 1 Student.

Ewen Murray HSBC Croydon Branch Manager with student.

Tom HSBC graduate apprentice with All Inclusive students.