The figure is an improvement but the taxman still is owed €5.5 billion in VAT from last year which, plus uncollected income tax and corporation taxes, adds up to €13.5 billion.

The tax take rose in 2014 to record levels, in part due to increased VAT collections, but the year-end national accounts show a gaping hole in the country’s financial position despite the Tax Authority's increasing use of coercive collection methods which yielded €1.147 million last year.

Money in British bank deposit accounts will be guaranteed only up to a maximum of £75,000 with effect from 1 January 2016.

The announcement was made by the Bank of England and results from EU regulations which fix €100,000 as the guarantee limit. When in 2010 that level was agreed, it equalled £85,000.

Portugal’s weather service predicts air temperatures rising from today to a sweltering 40°C or more in many Algarve locations next week.

In Faro, a rise to 38°C is expected next Friday but for Alcoutim and Portimão the prediction is for a Friday temperature of 42°C (107.6°F).

The living room television as the key entertainment centre in a household is rapidly heading to be included in the category of ‘quaint things of the past’.

More people, particularly younger ones, have been converted streaming TV programmes and video on tablets and smartphones, according to new data from Ofcom, the communications watchdog.

The death of a Caribbean man in police custody in the Netherlands has sparked three consecutive days of unrest in an area of The Hague.

Mitch Henriquez, 42, from the Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba, died from apparent asphyxiation on Sunday. Comparisons have been made to a number of cases in the US where protests have erupted when the police were suspected of the excessive use of force.

A people trafficker apprehended in Italy has been sentenced to 18 years in jail for causing a shipwreck in 2013 in which 366 people perished.

A court in Sicily convicted Khaled Bensalem, 36, from Tunisia, of causing the shipwreck and the deaths as well as aiding illegal immigration, according to a judicial source.

Impoverished Silves council has handed €30,000 to the church in Armaçao de Pêra to help pay for repairs and renovations.

The President of Silves Câmara, Rosa Palma, delivered the check to the parish priest, Fr Joaquim Beato.

Portugal’s Council of Ministers today approved the re-appointment of Carlos Costa for a second five-year term as governor of the Bank of Portugal.

In a press conference at the end of today’s cabinet meeting, the Minister of the Presidency, Luís Marques Guedes, said that the appointment was made following Carlos Costa’s report to Parliament about the Bank of Portugal’s actions prior to the BES collapse, and a report on that hearing having being discussed by the Council.