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    About £450 million has been lost overnight as old pound coins stopped being legal tender. As of midnight on Sunday, hundreds of millions of round coins were replaced with the new 12-sided design launched in March. Some stores, including Tesco, have promised to let people keep spending the old coin for a limited period, while banks and building societies also offered extra time to deposit. It has now been estimated around 400 to 450 million old round coins were still languishing unspent in members of the public's purses, piggy banks, and sofa nooks. People had been offloading their old coins at a rate of about 60 million a week in the lead up to Sunday night's deadline. Some major stores have said they will give shoppers an extra window of opportunity to spend them. Iceland...

    The Duchess of Cambridge has made a surprise appearance at a charity event with the Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry. Kate, who is pregnant with her third child, is suffering from a severe form of morning sickness but has been well enough to visit Paddington station to meet some of the cast – including Hugh Bonneville – and staff from the movie Paddington 2. The Duke and Duchess and Harry were also due to meet a group of children who have been helped by their charities. During the visit, the Duchess looked relaxed and wore an outfit by designer Orla Kiely. Regarding the Duchess’ health, a Kensington Palace spokeswoman said “she’s better, but she’s still suffering”. The youngsters taking part have been selected by members of the Duke, Duchess and Prince’s Charities Forum ...

    Theresa May will travel to Brussels for talks with European Union leaders amid reports that she has personally urged Angela Merkel to end the Brexit stand-off. The meeting on Monday comes days after Jean-Claude Juncker, the President of the EU Commission, and Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator said talks about Britain leaving the EU in March 2019 were deadlocked. Mrs May is taking Oliver Robbins, the civil servant leading the Brexit talks, with her for the dinner the first since a frosty meal in Downing Street in April. Mr Juncker was reported to have launched a scathing attack on Mrs May during the April dinner, saying that Brexit cannot be a success. Downing Street sources insisted Monday's meeting had "been in the diary for weeks" but the announcement caused surp...

    Parts of England have experienced an unusual side effect from Storm Ophelia: a blood red sun. The former hurricane's powerful winds have pulled air and dust up from southern Europe and Africa - with the spectacular sight prompting "lots of calls" to the Met Office. Forecaster Grahame Madge explained: "It's all connected with Ophelia, on the eastern side of the low pressure system air is coming up in the southern direction. It's most likely the appearance of sunset at midday is caused by the particles scattering the light and giving the appearance of a red sun. Sharon Derrick was one of those admiring the dramatic skyline, saying: Bristol looks like the film The Red Planet... the weather is bizarre. The Bristol Nomad - a part-time photographer - also took pictures of the "v...

    The first ever scheduled flight to British overseas territory St Helena has landed but was 45 minutes late. The UK taxpayer-funded development on the remote South Atlantic island welcomed its first 78 commercial airline passengers at just before 2pm on Saturday. The flight from South Africa landed 45 minutes behind schedule. The territories official Twitter account shared images of huge crowds gathered to welcome the flight and described it as “a big moment for all”. St Helena Airport, built with £285 million of funding from the Department for International Development (Dfid), was due to open last year but the launch of commercial flights was delayed because of dangerous wind conditions. Further trials were carried out in August and the airport was given the go-ahead to be...