Keith Stackpole obituary
Vodafone whistleblowers warned executives about plight of high street store staff
Whistleblowers warned a series of senior Vodafone executives – including the current chief executive, Margherita Della Valle – that scores of its franchised store owners faced financial ruin about two years before a high court claim accused the company of “unjustly enriching” itself.Vodafone employees made repeated complaints to their superiors about the company slashing commissions paid to the small businesses running the company’s high street retail network, according to a string of current and former Vodafone employees. The cost-cutting tactics resulted in a group of 62 of about 150 Vodafone franchise operators filing a £120m-plus legal claim last December.The telecoms company, which is valued at about £17bn on the London Stock Exchange, has said: “We refute the [legal] claims but will be fully engaging in [a mediation] process with a view to resolving this commercial dispute.”However, the emergence of warnings to senior management reveals for the first time how some of the mobile operator’s own staff appeared to support the franchisees over their own employer
US food delivery app DoorDash offers to buy UK rival Deliveroo for $3.6bn
DoorDash is offering to buy its UK-based rival Deliveroo for $3.6bn (£2.7bn), Deliveroo said on Friday.Deliveroo said that its board was in talks with DoorDash over the offer and that a firm offer had not been made, according to statement sent to the Guardian. Should a firm offer of £1
Trade war fears hammer US consumer expectations; FTSE 100 in longest winning run since 2019 – as it happened
Ouch! US consumers’ economic expectations have slumped at the fastest rate since the 1990s recession.A closely-watched poll of consumer morale, from the University of Michigan, has found that economic expectations have fallen by a “precipitous” 32% since January, which they say is the biggest three-month drop since the economic downturn 35 years ago.The survy also found that consumer sentiment fell for the fourth straight month in April, plunging 8% from March, driven by a tumble in expectations.The final April sentiment index fell to 52.2 from 57 in March
Stunned resignation and foreboding: a week in Trump’s shadow at IMF
Kristalina Georgieva’s favourite film, the International Monetary Fund boss told the audience at a packed panel event in Washington on Thursday, is Tom Hanks’s cold war romp Bridge of Spies.In one of the stranger digressions in a frequently strange week, Georgieva recalled the moment when Hanks’s character, a US lawyer, tells the Soviet spy he has been appointed to defend that he will probably be executed. “You don’t seem alarmed,” Hanks says to him; to which the spy – played by Mark Rylance – replies, “Would it help?”Georgieva mentioned the vignette to underline the fact that this week’s spring meetings of the IMF and World Bank were not swept up in panic, despite the mayhem emanating from the Trump administration.Instead, the reaction to the uncertainty of many of the hundreds of policymakers present has been a kind of stunned resignation.Trump was barely mentioned by name at the scores of public events where policymakers chewed over how to respond to the challenges thrown up by his chaotic tariffs
Reeves holds ‘positive and upbeat’ trade talks with Bessent
Rachel Reeves discussed what she called a “prosperity deal” with the US treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, in a meeting her team claimed was “upbeat and positive” on Friday.“Today I met with Scott Bessent to discuss the UK-US economic prosperity deal and our goal of reaching an agreement that is in both our national interests,” Reeves said, after meeting the treasury secretary.The UK has been negotiating hard in the hope of securing exemptions from some of Donald Trump’s harshest tariffs, including the 25% levy on car imports, but Reeves left Washington without being able to claim any tangible progress.The US has made fresh demands in recent days, including calling for tariffs on car imports to the UK to be cut; and the chancellor was forced to concede earlier in the week that she was “not going to rush a deal”.UK Treasury sources said trade negotiators from the two countries would continue to work hard on a deal
Marks & Spencer pauses online orders as firm struggles with cyber-attack fallout
Marks & Spencer has halted all orders through its website and apps as the retailer continues to battle the fallout from a cyber-attack that began on Monday.The company apologised to shoppers for “this inconvenience” and paused digital orders “as part of our proactive management of a cyber incident”.“Our experienced team – supported by leading cyber experts – is working extremely hard to restart online and app shopping,” it said.The retailer said shoppers could continue to browse online and shop in its physical stores using cash or card.The website closure comes after several days of problems in stores where contactless payments and the collection of online orders were hit from Monday
Apple ‘aims to source all US iPhones from India’, reducing reliance on China
Elon Musk’s xAI accused of pollution over Memphis supercomputer
Google reports strong earnings amid DoJ antitrust lawsuits and Trump tariffs
Ofcom accused of prioritising interests of tech firms over child safety online
What are the Ofcom measures to protect children online – and will they work?
Ofcom announces new rules for tech firms to keep children safe online