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A woman clears the snow from her driveway in Rowley in County Durham as the winter weather returns to the UK with snow, ice and strong winds sweeping into the east coast
A woman clears the snow from her driveway in Rowley in County Durham as the winter weather returns to the UK with snow, ice and strong winds sweeping into the east coast
Experts have warned that Britain could be shivering in temperatures colder than Siberia over the next few days.
Customers relying on home deliveries face an anxious wait, with hauliers warning that thousands of items could still be stuck in warehouses on Christmas morning.
Temperatures are expected to drop to -15C (5F) in the coming days, leaving Britain colder than the North Pole, the Arctic and Alaska.
It is feared that shops which have already been severely hit by freezing conditions in January and November will not be able to cope with a third spell of bad weather. Yesterday Amazon became the latest retailer to bring forward its final order deadline for guaranteed Christmas delivery while the shopping channels QVC and Ideal World said they could not guarantee that orders placed now would arrive in time for Christmas.
Douglas McWilliams, the chief executive of the Centre for Economics and Business Research, said: "As many as 800 or 900 businesses could go bankrupt which otherwise wouldn't have, because this is the straw that breaks the camel's back."
