Tuesday newspaper round-up: Minimum wage, OPEC, Yahoo, Sports Direct

George Osborne’s decision to raise the minimum wage sharply next year will cost private-sector employers about £1bn, according to a watchdog. The Regulatory Policy Committee, an independent public body that scrutinises government proposals, said the policy would affect 1.7m employees and cost businesses about £804m in direct wage and non-wage costs such as national insurance contributions. – Financial Times

Whitehall budget cuts and a growing risk of serious flooding are set to stretch the environment department’s budget thinly, a committee of MPs has warned. George Osborne, chancellor, cut day-to-day funding for the department by 15 per cent over the next four years in last month’s Spending Review, to £2bn a year. This came on top of a budget reduction of about a quarter over the course of the last parliament. – Financial Times

Opec will be forced to call an emergency meeting within weeks to stabilize the market if crude prices fail to rebound after crashing to seven-year lows of $35 a barrel, two of the oil cartel's member states have warned. Emmanuel Kachikwu, Nigeria’s oil minister and Opec president until last week, said the group is still hoping that the market will recover by February as low prices squeeze out excess production from US shale, Russia and the North Sea, but nerves are beginning to fray. – Telegraph

Yahoo is facing shareholder pressure to pursue other alternatives besides a complex spin-off of its internet operations while chief executive Marissa Mayer struggles to revive the company's revenue growth. The demands from SpringOwl Asset Management and Canyon Capital Advisors reflect shareholders' frustration with Ms Mayer's inability to snap the company out of a financial downturn after three-and-half years in the top job. – Telegraph

The crisis at Sports Direct escalated once again on Monday as the retailer was rounded on by MPs during an urgent parliamentary debate and the company was deserted by some of its leading City cheerleaders. Former shadow business minister, Chuka Umunna, branded the retailer as “a bad advert for British business” and said it had “a culture of fear in the workplace that we would not wish to see repeated elsewhere”. - GuardianAccountancy watchdogs decided not to conduct a full investigation into the auditing of HBOS before they received all the information about the near-collapse of the bank, MPs have been told. - Guardian

During evidence given at the Treasury select committee on last month’s report into HBOS, MPs were also told it was obvious that Andy Hornby, the former chief executive who now holds a senior role at bookmakers Gala Coral, should have been investigated. - Guardian

An £11 billion plan to install 50 million smart meters in homes in England, Wales and Scotland by 2020 has been thrown into chaos by proposed EU reforms to Britain’s electricity market. Many of the two million meters that have already been installed may have to be removed or reprogrammed under the scheme, experts warned. – The Times