As many as 250,000 British expat pensioners have failed to claim all of their pension benefits.

The average amount to be collected ranges from £2,000 to £30,000 a year, with tax-free lump sums worth between £500 and £40,000 also unclaimed.

The 15-year cut-off date that prevents an estimated one million overseas British from voting in UK parliamentary election has been scrapped.

The Votes for Life bill was announced in the Queen’s speech today but those keen to vote in the European in/out referendum remain disappointed.  

Following the announcement by Swiss and US investigators of criminal proceedings against FIFA for alleged money laundering in connection with the 2018 and 2022 World Cups and allegations of “systematic” corruption in the United States and Latin America, Transparency International has said Sepp Blatter must now stand down and upcoming presidential elections suspended.

In a statement, Cobus de Swardt, Managing Director of Transparency International said:

A number of top Fifa officials have been arrested in Zurich on corruption charges brought by the United States Justice Department.

More than a dozen Swiss policemen swept into the five star Baur au Lac hotel in the early hours of the morning, where several officials were believed to be staying ahead of this week's Fifa Congress meeting.

The Nogueira Group, which paid €26 million for the insolvent AliSuper chain of convenience stores in 2012, is selling off 18 of its shops, the first nine are going to Intermarché for €5 million.

Negotiations are continuing for further store sales with interest from the Jerónimo Martins Group, owner of Pingo Doce.

A report from the Consumer Protection Association, Deco, today said what most water customers already know, water tariffs in Portugal are "incoherent" and "continue to be guided by inequality."

According to Deco, "from north to south and from the coast to the interior, tariffs continue to be guided by inequality."

The Inspector General of Finance has confirmed that there was indeed a VIP Taxpayers list and calls for some sort of disciplinary action to be taken against those officials involved in drawing up the list whose existence was denied at senior level until uncovered by media investigation.

The Inspector Generral's report concluded that within the treasury there indeed was a system to monitor and protect access to the data of various big-wigs, using an "unfounded, arbitrary and discriminatory" scheme.

The executive director of the Portuguese Association of Resorts said today that delays in the Golden Visa application process, apparent since November last year, has led to a loss of foreign investment of €185 million.

"We are very concerned about the delays that have been occurring since about November. From the data that we have seen, up to November there were about 150 Golden Visa being issued each month on average ... and the average in the five months subsequent to November has fallen by half," according to Pedro Fontainhas, director of the association.