Virgin Money mortgage holders cry foul over owner Nationwide’s better deals

Some Virgin Money customers are crying “foul” over the fact that Nationwide borrowers are being offered better-value mortgage deals, even though they are now part of the same group.Nationwide bought Virgin Money last autumn, but the brands remain separate and some Virgin mortgage-holders claim that when it comes to moving on to a new deal, they are being treated as second-class citizens.This week, a Virgin customer aiming to get a new mortgage deal from the lender would in some cases have to pay almost £1,000 more than an equivalent Nationwide customer to get the same interest rate, even though they are both part of the same financial “family”.However, according to one mortgage broker, it is standard practice that a borrower is not able to hop from one brand to another where both are part of the same group.For the UK as a whole and across all lenders, about 1

Top winemaker ‘may have to leave its Spanish vineyards due to climate crisis’

A leading European winemaker has warned it may have to abandon its ancestral lands in Catalonia in 30 years’ time because climate change could make traditional growing areas too dry and hot.Familia Torres is already installing irrigation at its vineyards in Spain and California and is planting vines on land at higher altitudes as it tries to adapt to more extreme conditions.“Irrigation is the future. We do not rely on the weather,” said its 83-year-old president, Miguel Torres. “I don’t know how long we can stay here making good wines, maybe 20 or 30 years, I don’t know

Could a ‘digital diet’ help me fix my bad phone habits?

Smartphone Nation by Dr Kaitlyn Regehr vows to help us take control. But can her methods beat the algorithms?Can you count the number of times you’ve looked at your phone today? Or how often you’ve opened it to do one thing to find yourself doing something else entirely?If you’re anything like me, you’ll have little idea – merely an inkling – that it’s more times than you’d hope. Smartphone algorithms are designed to capture our attention and hold it, but a new book written by an academic who studies them promises to help people take back control.I spent a week putting some of her suggestions to the test.A first step towards breaking any addiction is acknowledging you have one and understanding its nature

Scattered Spider hackers in UK are ‘facilitating’ cyber-attacks, says Google

UK-based members of the Scattered Spider hacking community are actively “facilitating” cyber-attacks, according to Google, as disruption to British retailers spreads to the US.A group of hackers labelled “Scattered Spider” have been linked with attacks on UK retailers Marks & Spencer, the Co-op and Harrods, with Google cybersecurity experts warning this week that unnamed retailers across the Atlantic are being targeted as well.Charles Carmakal, the chief technology officer at Google’s Mandiant cybersecurity unit, said that the threat had moved to the US in a pattern typical of Scattered Spider assailants.“They tend to focus on a particular industry sector and geography for a few weeks and then they move on to something else,” he said. “And right now they’re focused on retail organisations

Twenty years later: how 2005 Ashes marked end of cricket as we knew it

England’s titanic tussle with Australia enthralled a nation but then the Test game vanished from UK free-to-air TVHow are you planning to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the 2005 men’s Ashes? Is it finally time to get that Kevin Pietersen skunk cut? Gather your friends for a drunken knees-up around Trafalgar Square?Realistically, a quiet afternoon on YouTube will do, with Simon Jones’s reverse-swinger to Michael Clarke on repeat, off-stump gone like a popped cork. That rabbit hole should end up taking you to Pietersen’s 2014 appearance on the Graham Norton Show in which he discusses his strained relationship with Andrew Strauss while perched next to Taylor Swift. Yes, that actually happened.Or you could dig into the culture, media and sport committee report published in February 2006 titled “Ashes to Ashes – the death knell for live Test match cricket on free-to-air TV?” You know you want to.It’s not a thriller but worth your time if you’re curious to know how a sport has its breakout moment – the series attracted a peak audience on Channel 4 in excess of 8 million – before going into hiding

Skid marks, swear jars and an early night: welcome to sport’s nanny state | Simon Burnton

A 14-year-old has been taking the Indian Premier League by storm. A 17-year-old may win this year’s Ballon d’Or. Last month another 17-year-old became the youngest winner of a Formula Two race. In darts the last world champion was 17, a 14-year-old just became the youngest winner of a World Darts Federation event and this week the promoter Barry Hearn described watching a prodigy who “had a 106 average and checked out 140 and 154”. He was only 10