Friday newspaper round-up: Hinkley Point, HICL/TRIG, Heathrow

(Sharecast News) - Rachel Reeves has been warned that her plans for tax rises and spending restraint in the run-up to the next general election resemble a work of "fiscal fiction", as MPs expressed concern about the impact of her budget on their constituents. A day after the chancellor's statement, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said Reeves had chosen a high-risk strategy by backloading the squeeze to just before voters go to the polls in 2029. - Guardian

The troubled Hinkley Point C nuclear power station will add �1bn annually to UK energy bills as soon as it's switched on, official figures show. The money will be taken from consumers and handed to the French owner EDF to subsidise operations, making it one of the UK's most expensive sources of electricity. A further �1bn will be added to bills by a separate nuclear levy, supporting construction of the Sizewell C nuclear power station in Suffolk, also led by EDF. Campaigners branded it a "nuclear tax on households". - Telegraph

Swiss prosecutors have been urged to open a criminal bribery investigation into executives including the boss of Rolex after they lavished gifts on Donald Trump while lobbying him to cut tariffs. In Switzerland, a group of Left-wing politicians have written to the country's federal prosecutor's office about a meeting in the Oval Office on Nov 4. At the meeting, up to half a dozen Swiss businesspeople gave the US president a Rolex table clock and a 1kg gold bar engraved with his name. - Telegraph

One of the City's most influential fund managers has joined other rebel shareholders in HICL Infrastructure, the investment trust, calling on it to abandon a planned �5.3 billion merger with The Renewables Infrastructure Group, also known as Trig. M&G, which has a 3.4 per cent stake in HICL, is the best known shareholder to come out against the deal, joining the wealth managers TrinityBridge and W1M and the Capital Gearing Trust, boosting the ranks of those publicly calling for a rethink to 12.7 per cent. - The Times

Heathrow airport faces a rise in its business rates bill of as much as �145 million by the end of this parliament after changes to the regime announced in this week's budget. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has introduced a "super multiplier" for business premises valued at more than �500,000 in an attempt to balance the books for rates discounts for small businesses. - The Times