About 900,000 Origin Energy customers affected by hack as company admits it was warned weeks before public told

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Chief executive, Frank Calabria, apologises and advises customers to look out for suspicious activity amid heightened scam risk

Origin Energy has admitted it was warned of the hack that accessed 900,000 current and former customers’ personal data three weeks before it first made the data breach public.

Australia’s largest energy retailer said a “significant” proportion of the 900,000 had been former customers, with those affected to be notified in the coming days.

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Ben Carroll announces royal commission into construction sector as first act as new premier of Victoria

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Jacinta Allan steps down from top job before expected spill, saying her deputy has her ‘unqualified support’

Ben Carroll has been sworn in as the premier of Victoria after Jacinta Allan resigned, with his first act as leader to announce a royal commission into alleged corruption in the construction sector.

Carroll’s elevation comes just four months before the state election and follows a tumultuous 48 hours for Labor, during which Allan resigned and a surprise challenger emerged in the leadership contest.

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Blow to NHS as Royal Mail raises prices for bulk users by a third

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Average 25% increase for letters such as marketing, bills and medical appointment notices from 5 October

Royal Mail will increase the price of its wholesale postal service by as much as a third, in a multimillion-pound blow to the NHS and other large organisations.

The postal company has warned customers who use its wholesale postal service for mail including marketing letters, household bills and medical appointment notices that it is raising prices by an average of 25% from 5 October.

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World-class Jodrell Bank is under threat and UK risks a physics brain drain

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Funding crisis could lead to an exodus that would be a blow for British science and national growth

On a chilly day in December 1945, Bernard Lovell, a physicist at the University of Manchester, struck out for the Cheshire countryside to study cosmic rays, the streams of high-energy particles that crisscross the universe. Peering at the signals from his army surplus radar, he made an unexpected discovery: radio reflections from the ionised trails of shooting stars.

The work marked the birth of radio astronomy at Jodrell Bank. A year later, engineers at the site mounted a radar on the base of a searchlight, providing sweeping access to speeding meteors. When Sputnik launched in 1957, they had just completed the Lovell telescope, the largest radio telescope in the world, the only one capable of tracking the Soviet satellite.

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Cottage pie and glass of red, anyone? Britons shun salad despite heat in ‘reverse comfort eating’

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Nostalgic foods like toad-in-the-hole also in demand at Waitrose as people pivot towards familiarity amid climatic and political upheaval

Forget a crisp salad and glass of chilled rosé. Enervated Britons are seemingly more likely to crave a rich cottage pie and a robust red in heatwaves.

In a trend termed “reverse comfort eating”, Waitrose’s cottage pie sales have soared 110% in the last month and South African red wine is up 68% compared with the same period last year. The surprise spike in demand for winter comfort foods also includes retro chicken, bacon and leek pie (up 41%), chicken korma (up 67%) and chicken and ham gratin (68%).

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Train drivers in Great Britain consider strike action over lack of toilets

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Unions say basic needs still not being met a year after regulator told operators to improve facilities

Train drivers are considering strike action over a lack of toilets, with unions saying basic needs are still not addressed a year after the rail regulator told operators to provide more facilities and breaks.

Aslef said it was “putting the industry on notice”. The train drivers’ union added that companies had failed to deliver adequate toilets and reduce maximum driving times without a toilet break.

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Who is Ben Carroll, the man who has become Victoria’s new premier?

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Carroll, who was elected to parliament in 2012 and says he has always been ambitious, has been sworn in as premier after Jacinta Allan resigned

In 2023, when then-public transport minister Ben Carroll failed in his surprising bid to secure the leadership of the Victorian Labor party, he told a press conference: “I was always very keen to rise.”

The premier Daniel Andrews had resigned, believing he had locked in his succession plan: his loyal deputy Jacinta Allan as premier, and treasurer Tim Pallas as deputy.

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