Britain's defence industry should sign up to a new industry code of conduct and raise its ethical standards in order to avoid the sort of reputational damage done by the international row over BAE Systems' dealings with Saudi Arabia, Business and Enterprise Secretary John Hutton warns today.

European pharmaceutical companies - led by GlaxoSmithKline - outperform their US peers in efforts to make medicines available and affordable to the poor, according to an analysis to be released today.The Access to Medicines Index, which ranks the companies based on an independent assessment of eight aspects of their activity, is a first attempt to quantify the rhetoric of corporate responsibility and allow comparisons between them.

Alistair Darling will this week signal the biggest shake-up in Britain's financial architecture in a decade, admitting that the system put in place by Gordon Brown is showing its age.The chancellor will tell a City audience that the Northern Rock collapse was a warning and that reforms to the so-called tripartite system - set up by Mr Brown in 1997 - will go further than initially expected.

Plans to make it easier for the public to make damages claims against companies involved in price-fixing have been delayed amid disagreements over how far reforms should mirror the consumer-friendly US system.

Saudi Arabia will raise oil production to record levels within weeks in an attempt to avert an escalation of social and political unrest around the world.

London Mayor Boris Johnson, the telecoms group BT and 40 MPs have demanded that Gordon Brown introduces legislation to make big companies report their carbon emissions.

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