The number of people leaving Britain hit a record high last year – driven by Eastern European workers returning home, new figures have revealed.

But the number of new arrivals rose, with more than half-a-million people coming in, official statistics showed.

Arrivals from Eastern Europe were down by nearly a quarter in the year to March as job prospects were hit by the recession.

People seeking a new life here have been left disenchanted as they struggle to get on the property ladder and endure worse accommodation than in their native countries.

Others complained that their health had deteriorated since moving to Britain, the world’s largest study of expats found.

Almost half (49 per cent) of people said that they quality of food in the UK was worse than at home, while the British ratings for education and childcare, family life and the pursuit of hobbies were also significantly lower than international averages.

THE EU Court of Justice has ruled that airlines passengers who suffer delays of more than three hours have the right to compensation equivalent to those whose flights are cancelled, as it has considered that the loss of time and other problems caused by such a delay are the same as in the case of a cancellation.

The board of Spanish national airline Iberia have agreed in principle to the terms of the merger offered by UK airline British Airways. The general terms are 55% of the new company will belong to BA and and 45% to Iberia.

The stock of both companies has rocketed on the stock market.

A joint report by both companies has been issued to British and Spanish market regulators informing them of the advance in the plans to merger.

The High Court has upheld the law that allows UK employers to force workers to retire at the age of 65.

In the UK, a worker can see their employment end at the age of 65 without any redundancy payment – even if they do not want to retire.

However the judge in the case said there was a compelling case for the compulsory retirement age to rise.

Expat families planning to repatriate back to the UK in autumn 2010 should be looking at schooling options now. The window for applications to state schools will open this autumn, with places being offered in spring 2010.

But returning families should be aware that there may be some challenges ahead.

In a bid to attract tourists, Southern Railways has tried to compare the city – recently described as one of the most “depressed” in the south of England by Boris Johnson – to the sun-kissed Mediterranean island. Posters put up at all 169 stations run by the operator depict various destinations covered by its services.

It calls London ‘the New Europe’, Brighton in East Sussex ‘the new Barcelona’, and dubs Chichester, West Sussex, ‘the new Copenhagen’.

The Premier League saw its revenues soar by 26% in the 2007/08 season to nearly £2bn ($3.15bn; 2.2bn euros), a report into football finances has said.

The revenues of top-flight English sides were £1.93bn, up from £1.5bn a year earlier, Deloitte said.

Despite the downturn, 11 of the 20 top league clubs made an operating profit in 2007/08, from eight a year before.

British authorities have launched a campaign in the popular tourist destinations of the Costa del Sol and the Canary islands urging residents to call a dedicated hotline to report suspected benefit thieves.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) claims that so-called “abroad fraud” costs the UK taxpayer £63m a year. Officials do not know how many people are making illegal claims or where they all live, but they believe the majority are in Spain, where an estimated one million Britons have homes.

Two south coast resorts are joining the eurozone to cash in on the boom of more British and foreign visitors this summer.

Tourism bosses believe that the stay-at-home Brits who normally travel abroad will have spare euros tucked away from previous holidays that they won’t be using this year.

And rather than it going to waste, they can spend it in hotels, restaurants and tourist attractions in Bournemouth and Poole in Dorset.

The budget hotel chain Travelodge is offering rooms for as little as £9 per night in an effort to keep Britons travelling during the economic downturn.

From Thursday morning it will cut the price of 50,000 rooms across the country to £9 per night, while a further 100,000 rooms will go on sale for £19.

The UK-based operator is the latest hotel chain to announce a sale as Britain’s accommodation industry comes to terms with the effects of the recession.

An estimated 10 million people were on the move in the UK over Easter with two million travelling abroad.

Those travelling by rail will have to contend with the closure of the West Coast Main Line between Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire and Rugby in the West Midlands until noon.

Services in and out of London’s Liverpool Street and Waterloo stations will also be disrupted by engineering work, although 64,000 train services were running over the holiday period – around 5,000 more than last Easter.

The 2008 annual survey recorded and removed some 385,659 items of rubbish including plastic bags, sanitary items, fishing nets, cigarette butts and cotton bud sticks from beaches across the UK.

The average amount of rubbish found was 2,195 items per kilometre (0.6 miles) – more than two pieces for every metre (3.3ft) of beach, and more than double the 1,045 items per kilometre picked up during the first annual survey in 1994.

The Department of Health is warning Britons travelling to the islands, which include Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney, Sark and Herm, that from April 1 they must ensure that they have adequate travel insurance.

Last year, more than 550,000 Britons travelled to the Channel Islands and that figure is expected to rise in 2009. According to Expedia.co.uk, an online travel agent, searches for holidays to the islands in February doubled compared to the same month last year.

Boris Johnson, the capital’s mayor, is reported to be considering varying the price drivers pay according to the time of day.

It could see the charge increasing from the current £8 a day for those who come into the zone during the rush hour while a discounted rate would apply at other times.

The ideas are based on the successful implementation of congestion charging in Sweden, which has even been endorsed by a referendum.

Several British hotel chains could fail this year, industry analysts predicted this week.

In a poll of 143 hotel executives by DLA Piper, a law firm, 95 per cent of respondents predicted bankruptcies in the next 12 months, while a quarter said that they expected at least 10 hotel chains to go into administration.

The survey adds weight to the growing concern over the future of Britain’s hotel industry, with recent reports showing a sharp decline in business travel and overall demand for rooms.

The UK’s compulsory retirement age of 65 is not in breach of EU legislation, according to a ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

The case was brought by Age Concern, which wanted to know whether it was legal for UK employers to force workers to retire at the age of 65.

But the ECJ said the practice was legal if it had a legitimate aim related to employment and social policy.

The Bank of England has cut interest rates to 0.5% – a fresh all-time low – and says it will now boost the money supply to help revive the economy.

Interest rates have now been reduced six times since October, and the latest half a percentage point cut from February’s 1% had been expected.

The Bank said it would expand the amount of money in the system by £75bn in an attempt to boost bank lending.

The Bank of England is expected to cut interest rates to a fresh all-time low and start increasing the money supply in an attempt to revive the economy.

Most analysts believe the Bank will cut rates to 0.5% from 1%. An announcement is due at 1200 GMT.

As rates get closer to zero, the Bank runs out of room to cut the cost of borrowing to stimulate the economy.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown took aim at tax havens suggesting they should be outlawed just a few weeks before he hosts the G20 summit in London.

“You are also restructuring your banks, so are we,” Brown said in a landmark address to the US Congress Wednesday highlighting moves to tackle the financial crisis.

“But how much safer would everybody’s savings be if the whole world finally came together to outlaw shadow banking systems and outlaw offshore tax havens?”