Alphawave agrees £1.8bn takeover by America's Qualcomm
Qualcomm is offering to pay 183p per share in cash for London-listed Alphawave, which is a near-96% premium to its closing price before the takeover interest was revealed.
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The Independent
12 minutes ago
- The Independent
HMRC failure to notify MPs sooner about £47m phishing scam ‘unacceptable'
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) has been warned by a committee of MPs that its failure to report details of a breach affecting around 100,000 taxpayers is 'unacceptable'. The Treasury Committee said it was only alerted to the information when a notification was published on the HMRC website on the same day as a live session. On June 4, it emerged that HMRC had lost £47 million after a phishing scam breached tens of thousands of tax accounts. Senior civil servants at HMRC told the Treasury Committee that 100,000 people have been contacted, or are in the process of being contacted, after their accounts were locked down in what they said was an 'organised crime' incident which started last year. On Tuesday, the committee published a letter from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) stipulating that it had not discussed the phishing incident with HMRC and was not aware of it prior to the hearing on June 4. The committee also published a letter sent via email from its chairwoman Dame Meg Hillier to John-Paul Marks, chief executive, HMRC. The letter said: 'I am alarmed that it was never deemed necessary to inform Parliament about an issue which affected such a vast number of taxpayers and led to the loss of £47 million of public money. 'To discover this information during a session from press reports and without adequate time for the committee to review the information in detail is unacceptable.' The letter said the committee is seeking responses from HMRC as to 'why was Parliament not notified earlier about the loss of £47 million of taxpayers' money, whether through a written ministerial statement and/or public or confidential letters to the Treasury Committee and the Public Accounts Committee?' The committee is also seeking responses over why the update was published on the day of the committee hearing on the work of HMRC and who else in Government was told about the incident and when. It also wants to receive a timeline of how the incident unfolded and find out what measures HMRC has put in place to ensure that such incidents do not happen in future. The letter asked for a reply by June 24 2025. Meanwhile, the letter from Glenn Collins, head of technical and strategic engagement, ACCA, to Dame Meg, dated June 5, said: 'While we regularly engage with HMRC, including earlier in the year about issues relating to agent account access, we have not received any communication from HMRC on the issue of taxpayer account breaches until yesterday. 'We have highlighted to HMRC our frustration that HMRC has not been transparent or timely in its communication over this important issue.'
The Independent
27 minutes ago
- The Independent
Nephews locked in court battle over dementia-stricken aunt's £400k estate
Two nephews are locked in a £400,000 fight over the fortune of a widow, who disinherited one side of her family after they suggested she go into a care home. Doreen Stock, who did not have any children, died in 2021 aged 86. She left her entire estate to her nephew, Simon Stock, and his wife Catherine, who lived close to her south London home. Mr Stock claimed he had been like a son to Doreen – but the will is now under challenge in court after Doreen's great-nephew, 39-year-old Ben Chiswick, launched a bid to inherit it himself. Ben, a propulsion engineer who is based in Michigan, US, had been due to inherit her fortune under a previous will written in 1986 when he was a baby, but was dramatically disinherited by his great-aunt a year before her death after his parents suggested Doreen spend time in a care home. He is fighting to reinstate the previous will, claiming Doreen, who he says was a 'fixture in his childhood', was too stricken by dementia to properly understand what she was doing when she changed her wishes. However, the Stocks are fighting the case, claiming Ben – who has lived in the US since 2017 – had no "meaningful relationship" with Doreen beyond his early years. Simon, meanwhile, had been 'the nearest thing to a son she had', they said. Sitting at Central London County Court, Judge Jane Evans-Gordon heard that "independent" and occasionally "stubborn" Doreen had a deep emotional attachment to her home in Charminster Road, Mottingham, having shared it with her husband Samuel until his death in 2001. Doreen's first will, made in 1986, ultimately left her estate to Ben, the son of her niece Patricia Chiswick and husband Brent. The estate principally contains the Mottingham house, which is valued online at about £400,000. The court heard Doreen had had a good relationship with the Chiswicks, who helped her with her shopping and visited her regularly. She even made a lasting power of attorney in their favour, but before she died she revoked the document and changed her will, leaving everything to a nephew on her husband's side: tax advisor Simon Stock and his wife Catherine. Challenging the will, Ben Chiswick claims that his great-aunt's dementia in her final years means there is serious doubt whether she had the necessary capacity to make the changes. He said the fact there was no discussion with his side of the family about the new will suggested "something not right" about her change of mind. "Doreen and I had a really happy relationship and she understood that leaving her estate to me would make a massive difference to my life," he said in his evidence. Barrister James McKean, for Simon and Catherine, told the court that Doreen had also been close to Simon, contributing to his school fees as a child. Although she previously had a close relationship with Ben's parents, that was ruined when they suggested she go into a care home in 2019, the court heard. To make matters worse, Patricia had then arranged for a "capacity assessment" for her aunt, which the barrister said led to Doreen fearing her independence was being threatened and ultimately changing her will. There had been "building resentment" with the way her power of attorney was being administered, which "finally boiled over in the summer of 2019 when the Chiswicks made an ill-judged – though perhaps well-intentioned – suggestion to Doreen that she spend a period in residential care'. 'Doreen was, by all accounts, jealously independent. It is little wonder that she found the proposition to be alarming and offensive," the barrister said. 'No doubt Doreen was worried about the prospect of going into a home, then was asked to undergo the capacity assessment, and put two and two together." Within weeks of the assessment, which resulted in a report stating she "lacked capacity", she had begun steps to revoke the power of attorney and make a new will in Simon and Catherine's favour, he told the judge. Quizzing Patricia Chiswick in the witness box, he added: "Doreen loved her home and it had been her and Samuel's home before his death. There was a deep emotional connection to that property. "Saying to Doreen that she should leave that property and spend some time in a care home was offensive to her, wasn't it? "From Doreen's perspective, this must have looked a real threat to her independence." But Patricia denied upsetting the pensioner, insisting that the plan was only ever for a short break in a care home while she and her husband went on holiday. "It was simply a suggestion because we don't usually go away for three weeks at a time, and I think she had been quite unwell and her health was deteriorating in general," she said. "I was concerned about leaving her and I thought it would be quite nice if she could go somewhere where she could be looked after while we were away. "It was absolutely stressed that it was for three weeks. There was no suggestion she was going to stay there indefinitely." The Chiswicks did not visit Doreen again between the capacity assessment in 2019 and her death in May 2021. For Patricia's son Ben, who is the claimant in the case, barrister Simon Lane said that, at the time she made the new will, she was 'vulnerable and was behaving out of character'. The 2019 assessment conducted after the suggestion of a care home move had resulted in an expert's finding that she "lacked capacity", he said. But Mr McKean said the assessment was deficient, with Doreen answering with "prickly hostility" when she was quizzed about things that made no sense to her, such as a fire which never actually happened. Other assessments around the same time had resulted in findings that she did have capacity, although she was suffering with "mild" dementia, he said. "Doreen may have had some memory problems, but capacity and memory are different beasts," he said. "The court will struggle to find any evidence of impaired cognition or reasoning. On the contrary, Doreen's behaviour, values and reasoning were consistent and plausible at all times." He said there was reason for her to decide to change her will, the last being made more than 30 years previously, and that by then Ben – living and working on the other side of the Atlantic – would have been "far from her mind as a beneficiary". He had not seen her again or even spoken on the phone after moving to the US, while most of the evidence of their relationship came from when he was a child. On the other hand, Simon and Catherine had been able to visit her regularly, living not far from her in Eltham, south London, he said. "The court can be surprised neither by the making of the disputed will, nor by Doreen's choice of beneficiaries," he added. The judge is expected to give her ruling on the case at a later date.
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Uber UK trial of self-driving taxis brought forward to spring 2026
Self-driving Ubers are expected to appear on roads in London next year after the government said trials of fully autonomous vehicles would be brought forward to spring 2026. Firms will be allowed run pilots of small-scale taxi or 'bus-like' services for public use – and, for the first time in Europe, without any human safety driver on board or in the driving seat. Uber will partner with UK tech firm Wayve to launch trials of taxis bookable via its app in the capital, its largest European market. A fuller rollout of self-driving taxis, or robotaxis, will come after the Automated Vehicles Act fully takes effect in late 2027. The UK has sped up the process now that driverless taxis have become established in San Francisco in the US and numerous cities in China. Uber rolled out its first driverless taxis with Waymo in Austin, Texas in March this year, where Tesla is also planning to launch a rival autonomous service this month. The Department for Transport (DfT) said the technology would make roads safer and claimed it could create 38,000 jobs and create an industry worth £42bn by 2035. The transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, said: 'The future of transport is arriving. Self-driving cars could bring jobs, investment, and the opportunity for the UK to be among the world-leaders in new technology. 'With road safety at the heart of our pilots and legislation, we continue to take bold steps to create jobs, back British industry, and drive innovation to deliver our plan for change.' The DfT said self-driving vehicles could also improve transport for millions of people – adding new public transport options in rural areas and improving accessibility for those unable to drive. Trials of self-driving vehicles have been taking place in the UK for more than a decade, using technology from Wayve and fellow British company Oxa (formerly Oxbotica). However, so far all road tests of cars or buses have needed a safety driver in the vehicle ready to take over the controls. The Automated Vehicles Act will require self-driving cars to be approved after tests to demonstrate 'a level of safety at least as high as competent and careful human drivers', the department said. Past pledges to bring robotaxis to London have not come to fruition. A driverless bus service launched in Edinburgh in 2023 stopped operating due to a lack of passengers. However, autonomous taxi services in the US have now operated hundreds of thousands of paid trips. It has not been all plain sailing: General Motors abandoned its plans for an autonomous service after a number of incidents, including one where a taxi dragged and severely injured a pedestrian. But early reports suggest self-driving taxis are safer and some customers, especially women, prefer hiring a driverless taxi. Alex Kendall, the co-founder and chief executive of Wayve, said the accelerated trials would put the UK in a leading position for fully autonomous cars, adding: 'These early pilots will help build public trust and unlock new jobs, services, and markets.' Gavin Jackson, Oxa's CEO, said: 'Clear rules will open up the market and encourage transport companies to introduce the benefits of autonomous vehicles across the country. Today's announcement shows that Britain is ready for this technology.'
