5 important things happening in the UK today

Here are 5 important things happening in the UK today, 19 August 2025.

Labour Review could put the State Pension age on course to hit 70: Labour is paving the way for the state pension age to be raised to 70 as a review considers tying future increases to life expectancy. Suzy Morrissey, who has been commissioned by Liz Kendall, the Work and Pensions Secretary, to review the official retirement age, said she would examine the “merits” of automatic increases to help bolster the public finances. [Telegraph]
Reeves eyes new property taxes: Chancellor Rachel Reeves has ordered Treasury officials to examine reforms to the UK’s system of property taxation as she seeks ways to raise cash and boost the economy, according to people familiar with the discussions. Officials are looking at a host of possible ideas for improving and simplifying the country’s tax system, including by overhauling levies on housing, as the chancellor seeks to lift lacklustre GDP growth and address a looming gap in the public finances that could exceed £20 billion. [Financial Times]
Major travel disruption expected over bank holiday weekend: Holidaymakers in Britain have been warned they could face delays when travelling this weekend as the weight of almost 18 million car journeys and widespread rail engineering works are expected to cause disruption over the August bank holiday, celebrated in England and Wales. [Guardian]
UK urged to go after VPNs: The government needs to stop children using virtual private networks (VPNs) to bypass age checks on adult sites, the children’s commissioner for England has said. Dame Rachel de Souza told BBC Newsnight it was “absolutely a loophole that needs closing” and called for age verification on VPNs. VPNs can disguise your location online – allowing you to use the internet as though you are in another country. It means that they can be used to bypass the requirements of the Online Safety Act, which mandated platforms with certain adult content to start checking the age of users. [BBC]
On Tuesday, Oil was trading flat at $65.18. The pound is trading at $1.35, €1.16, and ¥9.70.