Week in pictures

A $14bn (£10bn) bail-out package for the struggling US car industry collapsed when Republicans in the Senate demanding union wage cuts refused to back the bill. The breakdown left the car industry - which employs 3 million people - in limbo Photograph: David McNew/Getty

W is for Woolworths: Woolworths' 99-year history came to an ignominious end, with all 807 shops closing by early January. It fell into administration in November after last-ditch attempts to rescue the chain failed. Deloitte, administrators of the chain famous for its pick'n'mix, confirmed on 18 December that all Woolworths stores would close, with the loss of 28,275 jobs, after failing to secure a buyer for the business as a going concern Photograph: Christopher Thomond/Guardian

£393.60 for every man, woman and child in the UK Photograph: Ann Pickford/Rex Features

David Ross, one of the co-founders of the Carphone Warehouse, has quit the company after admitting that he had secretly used a large slice of his holding to guarantee personal loans. He was later forced to step down from the boards of National Express and Big Yellow and from Boris Johnson's Olympics advisory team Photograph: Martin Argles/Guardian

Professor David Blanchflower has decided not to renew his tenure on the Bank of England's monetary policy committee when his current three-year term expires next May, the chancellor, Alistair Darling, announced Photograph: James M Patterson/Rapport

Steelmaker Corus announced cuts of 2,500 UK jobs at Llanwern, Scunthorpe, Port Talbot (pictured), Rotherham and Teesside Photograph: Scott Barbour/Getty

Daw Mill colliery near Nuneaton is expected to produce more coal this year than any other in the history of an indigenous industry that began with the Romans Photograph: Christopher Thomond/Guardian

The value of UK commercial property will have more than halved by the end of the decade as rental demand continues to wane, according to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty

The EU should offer the incoming administration of US president-elect Barack Obama a transatlantic economic pact to combat the global recession, Jose Manuel Barroso, European commission president said Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP

Struggling sports retailer JJB, which is fighting to meet debt repayment deadlines, has revealed a further sharp fall in sales and warned that if it does not have a bumper new year sale it will miss profits forecasts Photograph: Newscast