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North Korea crisis: Tillerson says diplomacy will continue - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Rex Tillerson insists the US wants to resolve the North Korean crisis through diplomacy.
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Asia
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South Korean forces have been holding exercises along the border with the North
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has insisted President Donald Trump wants to resolve the confrontation with North Korea through diplomacy.
It will continue until "the first bomb drops", he told CNN.
Sanctions and diplomacy, he said, had brought unprecedented international unity against North Korea's nuclear weapons programme.
Last month, Mr Trump told Mr Tillerson not to waste time seeking talks with Kim Jong-un.
Mr Tillerson's remarks come as the US and South Korea begin their latest joint military exercise in waters surrounding the Korean peninsula, involving fighter jets, destroyers and aircraft carriers.
The drills regularly anger the North, and Pyongyang has in the past denounced them as a "rehearsal for war".
In Sunday's interview, Mr Tillerson again refused to comment on whether he had referred to Mr Trump as a moron after a July meeting at the Pentagon.
"I'm not going to deal with that petty stuff," he replied, saying he would not dignify the question with an answer.
The president responded by challenging the secretary of state to an IQ test but a spokeswoman said later it had been a joke.
In recent months, North Korea has defied international opinion by conducting its sixth nuclear test and launching two missiles over Japan.
Analysts say the secretive communist state is clearly set on developing a nuclear-capable missile, able to threaten the continental US, despite UN sanctions.
At the end of last month, Mr Tillerson disclosed that the US was in "direct contact" with the North and looking at the possibility of talks.
After months of heated rhetoric, it came as a surprise to some that the two countries had lines of communication.
However, the next day Mr Trump tweeted Mr Tillerson to say: "Save your energy Rex, we'll do what has to be done!"
This Twitter post cannot be displayed in your browser. Please enable Javascript or try a different browser. View original content on Twitter The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Skip twitter post by Donald J. Trump This article contains content provided by Twitter. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. You may want to read Twitter’s cookie policy, external and privacy policy, external before accepting. To view this content choose ‘accept and continue’. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-41629233
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AirAsia flight returns to Perth after mid-air scare - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Video shows passengers on the flight from Australia to Indonesia being told to "get down".
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Australia
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The plane (not pictured) experienced problems about 25 minutes after take-off
An AirAsia Indonesia flight has been forced to turn back to Australia after pilots were alerted to a possible loss of cabin pressure, airport officials say.
Flight QZ535, bound for the Indonesian island of Bali, changed course about 25 minutes after take-off on Sunday.
AirAsia said the flight experienced a "technical issue". Australian media said it had appeared to lose altitude.
"We were all pretty much saying goodbye to each other. It was really upsetting," one passenger told the local Nine network.
A video taken on the plane, broadcast by local media, shows oxygen masks hanging from the ceiling and one person shouting "passengers get down, passengers get down".
Another passenger, Claire Askew, told the Seven network that "panic was escalated" by airline staff who were screaming and appeared to be in tears.
In a statement, AirAsia said it was "fully committed" to the safety of passengers. It did not elaborate on the problem.
"AirAsia apologises to passengers for any inconvenience caused," the statement said.
In June, an AirAsia X flight on its way to Bali was also forced to turn back to Perth after an engine problem left it "shaking like a washing machine".
In December 2014, an AirAsia plane crashed into the Java Sea, killing all 162 people on board after the aircraft's rudder control system malfunctioned during the flight.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-41631384
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Thomas Sankara - interviewing an African legend aged 11 - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Thirty years after his death, Becky Branford recalls interviewing Burkina Faso's legendary leader just before he was assassinated.
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Africa
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Becky (aged 11) meeting Thomas Sankara in Ouagadougou in 1987, shortly before his assassination
One picture brings it all back home to me again: Me, an 11-year-old London school pupil, gazing up smiling into the eyes of Thomas Sankara, then president of Burkina Faso.
The picture is too dark; it isn't particularly well composed - the sound engineer is in the way, getting my fellow interviewer, 14-year-old Dan Meigh, ready to film our encounter.
But it's the kindly warmth in Capt Sankara's eyes as he looks back at me that takes me back; the sense of calm composure, of someone at ease with himself, and at ease with his young, potentially unpredictable young interlocutors.
It's the simple furniture, the lack of opulence, the lack of Western power-dressing in favour of African fabrics and bare arms.
Little did we realise at the time that we would become the last non-Africans to interview the Burkina Faso leader.
On 15 October 1987, he was assassinated in a coup led by his erstwhile brother-in-arms and best friend Blaise Campaoré - who went on to lead the country for the next 27 years.
We had been in Burkina Faso as winners of a competition run by the BBC news programme for children, Newsround - sent to look at projects run by Sport Aid, a famine-relief fundraising campaign.
The interview took place in the spartan presidential palace
Hearing the news of Capt Sankara's death back home in London, as editing of our programme was still under way, I was saddened and shocked, but the shock was soon superseded by the interview requests that came flooding in from prime-time chat shows, where I was jokily quizzed about bagging a "scoop" at such a young age.
It was only as I grew older that I began to appreciate the legendary status of the man I had interviewed - despite some criticism of his rule, his admirers remain numerous and ardent - and of the symbolism of his murder in the political context of post-colonial Africa.
For Capt Sankara was pursuing a political project described as revolutionary in scope. And unlike many other African icons, such as South Africa's Steve Biko, he did - at least for a time - have the power to begin trying to make his vision a reality.
I witnessed some of it for myself when I was there.
As I have said, he did away with the ornaments enjoyed by many leaders.
We saw few guards at the presidential residence, something Capt Sankara may have come to regret.
Outside there were no luxury cars - we heard he had given them to the national lottery as prizes, replacing the fleet with cheap Renaults.
One of Capt Sankara's priorities was fighting the desertification of his country.
He told us he wanted to make it a commonplace that everyone should plant a tree on their birthday - we planted our own.
He had sent 200,000 people to plant trees and cordon off land, preventing nomadic animals from stripping the land of vegetation.
We saw home-grown solutions being implemented to problems of malnutrition and poverty - for instance, people building "diguettes", stone walls which stop fertile topsoil running off arid agricultural land when it rains, permitting more abundant crops to be grown.
Statistics suggest that the policies Capt Sankara implemented during his short four years in office yielded some startling results.
Many more children went to school under Thomas Sankara's rule
School attendance went from 6% to 22%, millions of children were vaccinated and 10 million trees were planted. The number of women in government soared, female genital mutilation was banned, and contraception was promoted.
Like me, Lamine Konkobo, a Burkinabé journalist with BBC Afrique, was only a child when Capt Sankara was killed - and, like me, he only came to fully understand his political importance as he grew up.
"I was growing up in a village where Sankara was seen as a challenging figure in terms of the ideas he promoted, in terms of women's independence and empowerment, for instance," he told me.
"That did not sit well in the countryside."
Capt Sankara had challenged the old centres of power in Burkina Faso: Traditional leaders and big business.
So among them there was a sense of relief when his rule was over, a relief shared by Lamine's father.
Most young people supported Capt Sankara, but misgivings about his rule even extended to progressive figures, including some intellectuals, who felt his quest to develop the country had an overly paternalistic, authoritarian edge.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A look back at former Burkina Faso President Thomas Sankara's time in power
President Sankara made physical exercise mandatory, for example, so he could harness the powers of the population for his projects and do it without relying on external aid.
Workers accused of not pulling their weight were sometimes tried in "revolutionary tribunals", which were supposed to target corruption.
But the perceptions of Capt Sankara changed after Mr Campaoré came to power.
Under President Campaoré's programme of "rectification", power was restored to traditional leaders and businessmen.
"Justice for Sankara" became a rallying cry decades after his demise
Opponents were assassinated and a market economy was implemented that many blamed for impoverishing the majority and enriching a tiny elite, including Mr Campaoré and his own family.
These changes brought about a reappraisal of Capt Sankara's achievements among many - including Lamine's father.
"After [Sankara] died, we discussed his integrity, his public service, and my dad said everyone had been defending their own interests and had not been not open enough to hear him. 'Now I understand he was much better than what we have now,' my dad said. He died a repentant man."
Although Mr Campaoré, who was overthrown in 2014, erased Capt Sankara's project, ultimately he failed in his aim to erase his vision, Lamine believes.
"This is the real legacy of Thomas Sankara. The ideas he tried to promote remain despite all the efforts of Blaise Campaoré to get people to forget.
"Ultimately those ideas were what spurred people to rise up in 2014 against Blaise Campaoré: They confronted armed police officers and soldiers and they made their point.
"The uprising would not have been possible without young people being driven by this powerful belief within them - the belief that they were pursuing a vindication, that the regime that killed their hopes would go."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-41580874
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Hurricane Ophelia: Latest updates - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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All the latest news as the British Isles prepares for the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia.
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UK
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HSE in Ireland back to normal in 'a few days'
Ireland's health service says to expect delays while its clinics catch up on a backlog of cancelled appointments. HSE cancelled all appointments on Monday due to the storm but hopes to "gradually return to normal services over the next few days". For more details and the latest hospital news, follow its website.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-41633276
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China congress: How authorities censor your thoughts - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The BBC's Stephen McDonell examines China's clampdown on free speech ahead of the party congress.
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China
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. What can and can't you say in China?
If you control public communication you can control the way people think and how they behave. That's what Xi Jinping's government is counting on.
And it is never more true than at the time of major political gatherings.
The Communist Party Congress, held every five years, is set to begin next week: an event which will culminate in the revelation of the new leadership team behind General Secretary Xi.
So the censors here are poised to restrict with one hand and disseminate with the other.
What they're looking out for are key words and expressions popping up in social media. Anything signalling an intention to protest or ridiculing the country's senior political figures will be blocked and potentially see a user reported to the authorities.
For example, a message featuring the name of this country's ever-more powerful leader and his sometimes-used nickname "Winnie the Pooh" (小熊维尼) will simply not go through to group discussions on the messaging app WeChat.
Funny stickers featuring Mr Xi or previous Chinese leaders also can't be sent to chat groups.
This meme comparing Xi Jinping and former US President Barack Obama to Winnie the Pooh and Tigger has been censored in China
China has all the appearances of an increasingly open society: flashy new cities with Hollywood movies advertised on bus stops; digital currency taken up like nowhere else; cool kids getting around on hire bikes zooming through a gleaming modern existence.
And yet, since Mr Xi came to power five years ago, public discourse has been increasingly censored to try and control everything from political thought to sexual activity.
In the lead up to the Olympic Games in 2008, it felt as if freedom of expression was ever on the rise here.
New laws allowed foreign reporters to travel around the country without specific permission from local governments.
It's hard to believe it, but Google searches were not blocked then.
Investigative journalism from local Chinese publications - like the Southern Weekend newspaper and Caijing magazine - was becoming as good as anywhere in the world.
I remember being at a function where a group of journalists were speaking to one of the foreign affairs ministry spokespeople. We had some concern or other, and he was reassuring us that everything would be all right.
"Don't worry," he said, smiling as he pushed an imaginary truck gear into position. "In China we only have one gear, and it's forward."
It sometimes doesn't feel like that now.
Just as China has its Great Wall, so does it also have a powerful internet firewall to block "undesirable" sites
"You can't control the internet," is something people would say in those years - part mantra, part celebration of a new global reality.
But Chinese officials have worked out that actually, you can.
Rather than connecting to the internet, this country has something more like an intranet within the boundaries of the Great Firewall of China.
Sites like Amnesty International, Facebook, and Twitter are unreachable for most Chinese, unless they have use of a virtual private network (VPN), which effectively punts their computer over the Great Firewall.
So, with the congress approaching, there's been an assault on VPN use. The government has ordered Apple to remove all VPNs from its Chinese app store.
The company has decided in favour of not being kicked out of this enormous market and is doing what Beijing wants.
Years ago Google was given a similar ultimatum: allow Chinese officials to censor search results or you're gone. Google didn't cave in, and was blocked.
WeChat is widely used in China
China's most effective censorship tool is also the country's most widespread method of communication.
Pretty much everybody here uses the phone app WeChat. It has text messaging, group chats, photo sharing, location searching and electronic payments.
During periods of political sensitivity - like now - key words will trigger the blocking or monitoring of a post. If sensitive enough, they could even lead to state security knocking on your door.
New regulations also make a person who sets up a group chat responsible for what's said amongst the group.
As you can imagine, the administrators of football team chats might be feeling a little nervous about the content of late night posts from drunken players.
Some will wonder how this is all possible as the app is not owned by the government but run by the hugely-powerful Chinese company Tencent.
Well, under new regulations from the Cyber Administration of China, private entities which run these platforms are required to not only enforce content restrictions but also report those who violate them to the "relevant authorities".
For many Chinese people - even those overseas - WeChat has also become their main news feed. If you restrict this content you can close out certain news coverage.
Potential challengers to WeChat's virtual monopoly are also being reined in. WhatsApp is not 100% within the domain of the Chinese state.
So, at times in recent weeks, its use has been impossible to reach without a VPN.
It is not clear whether the disruption of WhatsApp is a temporary measure to coincide with the congress or yet another restriction that's here to stay.
It is no secret that every Chinese newspaper and television station is under the complete control of the Communist Party.
And yet last year, when Mr Xi visited the People's Daily newspaper, Xinhua wire service and state broadcaster CCTV, he still demanded the absolute loyalty of reporters who should follow the Party's leadership in "politics, thought and action".
But, just in case some journalists didn't get the memo, a set of rules have been sent around governing coverage of this year's congress, requiring all interviews with experts or scholars to be approved by the outlet's "work unit leadership" and the central propaganda department.
However, China's censorship and propaganda model is also going beyond sensitive political matters.
Online bookstores must now work under a rating system from the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television which includes the promotion of "moral values".
Popular blogs focusing on celebrity scandals and the intrigues of the rich and famous have been forced to close.
To talk about such matters has been deemed to be not in keeping with "core socialist values".
For a time, cheap online video dramas were pushing out the boundaries of what could be viewed here. There was a gay sitcom, for example.
But digital platforms have been ordered to stop showing hundreds of foreign shows, and their locally produced material is expected to follow the same restrictions as television.
As it is, on Chinese TV you rarely see anything approaching a passionate kiss.
Two years ago a TV drama was forced to reframe and zoom in on its shots so as to crop out the generous cleavage of its 7th Century maidens, in order to remain on air.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Many in China feel the authorities have gone too far in censoring The Empress of China, as John Sudworth reports
Thus goes the creeping imposition of a state-sanctioned morality under Mr Xi's administration.
Last month, TV dramas were given notice of a new set of rules governing their content. They should "enhance people's cultural taste" and "strengthen spiritual civilisation".
Directors are supposed to come up with engaging characters beyond the realms of lewd behaviour, extra-marital affairs, gambling, drugs, homosexuality and other forms of "immoral" behaviour.
The notice suggested eulogising the Communist Party of China, the country, the people and also national heroes. And one figure is emerging via the propaganda machine to stand head and shoulders above all others.
As the censors shut down dissent, the party is urging a way of thinking about all that's good in China and tracing it back to a single source - Xi Jinping.
An exhibition focusing on the recent achievements of the Chinese government has opened in Beijing.
Vast rooms are dedicated to science, transport, the military, the economy, sport, ethnic minorities, and they are all dominated by massive photos of Xi Jinping. There must be hundreds of them.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Songs have been written celebrating Chinese President Xi Jinping, one even has an accompanying dance routine
The English language newspaper China Daily has been rolling out a series of front page stories - one every day - about the "impact of" a visit from Mr Xi on various villages, towns and cities after the General Secretary passed on his advice.
"He asked people to protect the lake", "President Xi proposed moving people in the villages to the new settlement", "Xi emphasised the importance of afforestation", et cetera.
Some here are joking that this type of reporting is not all that far from what you might expect in the North Korean press describing its own god-like leaders.
When Chinese officials make speeches now, they refer to this or that aspect of what they're up to "with Xi Jinping at the core".
It goes without saying that you cannot question "the core" without this nation's considerable censorship apparatus crashing down upon you.
But, short of such an obvious breach, the rules regarding what can and can't be said, broadcast, forwarded, analysed are thought to be kept deliberately vague.
In this way, everyone is on their toes and the authorities can shut down what they like at any time without having to give a reason.
Editors, cartoonists, reporters, directors, bloggers, comedians, administrators running social media platforms and ordinary Chinese citizens posting to their friends are all staying well clear of certain subjects just in case it lands them in hot water.
In short: Chinese censorship works, and plenty of other governments around the world are looking on with admiration.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-41523073
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Exploring the casting couch culture of LA - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The casting couch may seem like a relic of the golden age of Hollywood - but women say sexual harassment is rife.
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US & Canada
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. On some red carpets, Harvey Weinstein is not a welcome subject
The casting couch may seem like a relic of the golden age of Hollywood - but women here say sexual harassment is rife and that exploitation is a price you pay for being part of the industry.
News that at least 30 women have accused Weinstein of sexually assaulting them - four alleging rape - has been met with sadness and outrage in Tinseltown.
But no one seems that surprised and many expect other powerful men will be exposed.
"I think everyone is shocked - not surprised," says actress Rita Moreno at a Women in TV gala in Beverly Hills. Ms Moreno, now 85, urged women to tell their stories. She says she was aggressively pursued by the head of a studio when she was 19.
"It was frightening and scary."
Mr Weinstein's Oscar for Shakespeare in Love has been tarnished by reports of lewd abuses of his immense power. But women in Hollywood say sexual harassment is common - for actresses and for women behind the scenes on film and TV sets.
We interviewed dozens of people who work in front of and behind Hollywood's cameras.
Almost every person reported experiencing sexism - though no one reported behaviour as severe as the allegations against Weinstein.
But a culture of pervasive sexism emerged. Some are stories of producers soliciting casual sex in exchange for jobs. Most stories involved daily ridicule and disrespect.
"The casting couch is still a major issue in Hollywood many women are being victimised and are being asked for sexual favours in order to get a job, to keep a job or to be promoted," says attorney Gloria Allred who represents women making complaints against Weinstein.
Ms Allred says she has women calling her with stories about other powerful Hollywood players.
The organisation Women in Film has been inundated with calls after they set up a hotline for victims to report abuse this week.
Women in Film's president Cathy Schulman says the revelations this week about Weinstein may be a tipping point - a chance to reform by employing more women in positions of power.
"It's a sad situation but we have to turn that into action. What angers me is women believing that they don't have the power to make change," says Schulman.
"What I get angry about is a system that lets them believe that they deserve to be treated this way."
Many men and women in the industry agree that more women in power would help stop the cliché of powerful Hollywood executives abusing young women.
Weinstein denies raping anyone and has apologised for hurting colleagues in the past. But his company has fired him and his wife has left him. Two weeks ago he was arguably the most powerful producer in Hollywood. Today, he's reportedly seeking therapy in Arizona.
While many of the women who say Weinstein harassed them are A-list actors like Angelina Jolie and Gwyneth Paltrow, others had their lives and Hollywood careers shattered before they began.
It's worrying for the newest recruits in the business.
At the Acting Corps in Los Angeles, Hollywood hopefuls warmed up with word games and improvisational exercises before their big scene.
These aspiring actors have yet to catch their big break, but many of them said they fear propositions from powerful people.
Several male actors have also said they've been groped and hassled by powerful men in Hollywood. The abuses, they say, are about power, not gender.
For years, there have been rumours about A-list actors and producers abusing children and young men in Hollywood.
Stacey Morphis came to LA from England. She left a girl band after being harassed by a colleague.
"I feel like in music or movies it's all about who you know and what you're willing to do," she said before her acting class. "I feel like that's the way it is and there's nothing I can do about it."
Auditions have become a little scarier for Fia Mann since news of Weinstein broke. She said auditions were already scary enough and that it's common for actors to be riddled with self-doubt and insecurities.
"Before you even step into the room - am I the right look? Are they going to like me because of this? I don't have that. But what if they ask me to do that? I can't do that. OK, maybe I shouldn't go.
"It sounds crazy but that's literally the conversation that goes on in your head."
The allegations have brought a darker side to auditions, says Fia Mann
But many people interviewed about sexism in Hollywood and Weinstein still do not want to be identified. There is still a fear about speaking out and upsetting someone who might be the ticket to your next job.
A woman in the costume department said when she was bent down on her knees fixing a male actor's belt, a fellow crew member took her picture and circulated it on set. She demanded he delete it but doesn't know if he did.
Female cinematographers are daily asked how they manage to carry such a heavy camera. "That's a man's job," is a common jibe.
Filmmaker Rachel Elder says a lighthearted Facebook group for mothers that she belongs to has transformed into a support group for sexual assault victims. She wrote about how she was sexually assaulted by her first boss in LA when she was 21.
"I'm very overwhelmed. In the last 72 hours I'm reading about all my friends writing about how they were raped and assaulted," she said.
"So many people are sharing really graphic stories that they've never told anyone before. You have to read it. You want to make people feel heard. It's really hard."
If more women talk about their experiences, will it really bring about change in a male-dominated industry?
A lot of people in Hollywood say they are not surprised
Christy Lamb is a co-founder of Moms in Film. She's worked as a producer for 13 years and also as an actress and in the art department.
"It's such a boys' club," she says, while on her (6pm) lunch break. "We are usually 10% of the people working on projects."
Many say Weinstein's career is over. But Hollywood is a forgiving place and they love a comeback story. The town has forgiven men after rape before.
Ms Lamb is confident that the culture has changed and that Weinstein will not be welcomed back.
"A year ago when Trump offended all women with 'Grab them by the pussy' we weirdly didn't get to execute much power," she says.
Trump was elected, after all, with 46% of women's support.
"But in this situation we can fire him [Weinstein] and we can be sure he doesn't work again."
Ms Moreno - who has won an Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy and a Tony award - says she's confident that this kind of publicity means young hopefuls in Hollywood won't go through what she did nearly seven decades ago.
"Who knows? Predators are predators," she said. "It's certainly going to make them very careful, I think."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41614221
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Newspaper headlines: 'Tax raid' on older workers and Ophelia 'chaos' - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Plans to tax older workers in the upcoming Budget and an impending storm feature on Monday's front pages.
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The Papers
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The man expected to be Austria's new leader, Sebastian Kurz, features heavily this morning.
The website Politico says a win for Mr Kurz and his People's Party heralds a "tectonic shift" in Austrian politics after more than a decade under a centrist coalition.
It believes his win illustrates the "continued potency of the refugee crisis in European politics" and will resonate across the European Union.
The Austrian newspaper, Wiener Zeitung, writes that Mr Kurz may struggle to woo his fellow European leaders, given that he is tipped to form an alliance with the nationalist Freedom Party - which has raised the prospect of leaving the Euro and perhaps the EU altogether.
The Daily Mail reports that inmates in England and Wales are being paid to cold call households from prison.
It says convicts - including a man who ran a telemarketing scam - are receiving £3.40 a day to call potential customers for insurance policies.
In its editorial, the paper asks: "Shouldn't we have the right to know if we are giving intimate details of our home to a convicted burglar?"
The Prison Service says inmates do not have access to personal and financial information.
The Sun leads on a report that the Metropolitan Police will no longer investigate some crimes - unless the victims can identify a possible suspect.
The paper calls the idea "criminal" and says it is a "licence to steal". Scotland Yard is quoted as saying the force has to "prioritise" due to shrinking resources.
Britain is £490bn poorer than thought, according to The Daily Telegraph. The paper reports that the UK no longer has a reserve of foreign assets to help protect against the consequences of Brexit.
The British ship HMS Sheffield was hit by an Argentine missile on 4 May 1982
Quoting the Office for National Statistics, it says Britain's international investment position has collapsed from a surplus of £469bn to a net deficit of £22bn.
The Guardian says the catalogue of errors that ended in the sinking of HMS Sheffield during the Falklands War can now be disclosed, 35 years later.
The paper says a newly-declassified report reveals that the vessel was "not fully prepared" for an attack and a radar which could have sensed the incoming missile was being blocked by another transmission.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-41631277
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Hurricane Ophelia: Three people die as storm hits Ireland - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Thousands are without power as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia reaches the British Isles.
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser.
Two men and a woman have been killed as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia hit the British Isles.
As hurricane-force gusts battered the Republic of Ireland, one woman and a man died in separate incidents when trees fell on their cars.
A second man died in a chainsaw accident while attempting to remove a tree felled by the storm.
Thousands of homes and businesses lost power in Northern Ireland and Wales, along with 360,000 in the Republic.
The power company Northern Ireland Electricity said 15,000 households in the province should prepare to spend Monday night without power.
Police in Scotland say the storm has hit Dumfries and Galloway and it is forecast to continue over the region into the evening.
And in Cumbria, police in Barrow closed roads around Barrow AFC's stadium after wind damaged its roof.
Cumbria Police said it was dealing with "numerous incidents" related to the high winds, which reached up to 70mph in the area.
The force had received reports of roofs and debris on the roads and overhead cables which had come down and it was urging people to only make essential travel.
In Wales, roads and railway lines have been closed and a gust of 90mph was recorded in Aberdaron, Gwynedd.
The Welsh Ambulance service said a woman has been injured after being hit by a falling branch in Wrexham.
In Ireland, the woman, in her 50s, died near Aglish, County Waterford, and a female passenger, in her 70s, was injured.
Her injuries were not believed to be life-threatening, the Gardai, Ireland's police force, said.
One of the men died near Dundalk, Co Louth, after his car was struck by a tree at about 14:45 BST, the Gardai said.
The other man, in his 30s, was killed in Cahir, Co Tipperary.
All road users were urged to stay indoors and not travel unless their journey was absolutely necessary.
Flights were also disrupted as several UK planes were forced to land or divert after reports of a "smoke smell" linked to weather conditions.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A reporter at the scene is caught in Ophelia's wind
BBC Weather said the strongest winds recorded so far were at Roches Point, near Cork in the Republic of Ireland, where they reached 97mph.
Ireland's meteorological service said its highest gust was 109mph at Fastnet Rock.
The Met Office's amber warning for Northern Ireland, western Wales and western parts of Scotland is still in force for wind.
Forecasters are predicting that the far south-west of Scotland will see winds of 80mph on Monday evening, followed by 60mph gusts over Glasgow and the central belt in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
The main danger facing Scottish commuters in the morning would be debris on roads, they said.
Other parts of the UK have seen unseasonably warm temperatures.
And skies have turned red and yellow as Ophelia drags dust from the Sahara through the atmosphere.
An amber warning is in force in Northern Ireland
It could be several days before power is restored to some homes in the Republic of Ireland, ESB Networks has warned.
The roof of Cork's football stadium has also been blown off by the winds.
Ophelia has arrived from the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean and coincides with the 30th anniversary of the UK's Great Storm of 1987.
BBC Ireland correspondent Chris Page said it would be the most severe storm to hit Ireland in half a century.
The Irish Republic's Met Eireann said the storm was forecast to continue travelling north over western parts of Ireland, with "violent and destructive gusts" of 75mph to 93mph expected countrywide.
It also warned of possible flooding due to heavy rain and storm surges.
"There is a danger to life and property," it said.
It has issued a red alert for the country.
In England, three flood warnings - meaning flooding is expected - have been issued in the South West, and there are several flood alerts - meaning flooding is possible - across other parts of the country.
The Scottish Environment Protection Agency has put a series of flood alerts and warnings in place for south-west Scotland.
A trampoline was blown away by strong winds in Cork, Republic of Ireland
The storm hit Land's End leaving these two dogs windswept
And at Trearddur Bay, Wales strong winds whipped up sea foam on to the road
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41627442
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Theresa May to dine with EU chiefs amid Brexit 'deadlock' - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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The PM will be accompanied by the Brexit secretary as she aims to break the stalemate with the EU.
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UK Politics
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Theresa May is in Brussels for a dinner later with EU leaders in a bid to end a stalemate over Brexit.
The meeting, with chief negotiator Michel Barnier and Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker, comes days after the pair said talks were in "deadlock".
Brexit Secretary David Davis is joining Mrs May for the meeting, ahead of this week's summit of EU leaders.
Mr Juncker said details of the dinner would be revealed in an "autopsy" afterwards.
Although Mrs May's trip to Brussels was not made public during last week's negotiations, Downing Street sources insisted it had "been in the diary for weeks".
Over a dinner expected to last 90 minutes, the PM hopes to end a stalemate over the three initial topics for negotiation - the amount the UK owes the EU when it leaves, the future rights of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens living in the EU, and what happens on the Northern Ireland border.
The EU side says that until "sufficient progress" is made on these three items they will not begin discussing the UK's post-Brexit relations - things like trade arrangements and defence.
BBC assistant political editor Norman Smith said the negotiations were entering a "critical phase", with the possibility of the UK leaving without a deal in place becoming the "new front line" in the debate about Brexit.
The UK is doing contingency planning for such an outcome, which both sides say they want to avoid.
Arriving at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said it was time to "get on" with the negotiations.
"It's ready for the great ship to go down the slipway and onto the open sea and for us to start some serious conversations about the future and the deep and special relationship we hope to construct," he added.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Johnson: Time to get on with negotiations
Conservative John Redwood predicted that "at the 11th hour" the EU would want to reach a free trade deal with the UK.
"But if we look as if we are weak, it's going to delay getting any sensible offer out of them," the former minister, who campaigned for Brexit, added.
Mr Redwood said the UK would "do just fine" if no deal was reached and that he was "fairly relaxed" about the prospect of the EU imposing tariffs on UK goods, because the UK could trade "perfectly successfully" on World Trade Organisation terms.
But pro-EU former Tory chancellor Ken Clarke said talks failing to reach an agreement would have a "catastrophic" effect on the UK economy.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Michel Barnier: 'We've reached a state of deadlock which is very disturbing'
Together with Labour's Chris Leslie, Mr Clarke is trying to amend the government's key Brexit bill to put the two-year transition period proposed by Mrs May into law.
He said this could "bind in" the "ultra-right" members of the cabinet and the "ultra left" members of the shadow cabinet and convince Brussels the PM had the UK Parliament's backing.
Mrs May hopes when the 27 EU leaders meet on Thursday and Friday, they will give Mr Barnier a mandate to start talks on future trade.
Ahead of the European Council meeting, the PM has discussed Brexit in phone calls with French President Emmanuel Macron and German chancellor Angela Merkel.
But Mr Barnier has said there is still no agreement on how much the UK should pay the EU when it leaves.
Last week an internal draft document suggested the EU was going to begin preparing for the possibility of trade talks beginning in December - provided the UK does more to bridge the gap on the key negotiating points.
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable said there had been "failures on both sides" of the negotiating table so far, criticising the EU's "rigid" refusal to move the agenda forward.
But he said Mrs May had more to lose than EU leaders who "do not know whether to take her seriously" given Tory divisions over Brexit strategy.
He told BBC News: "Her own authority is very much at stake, and what she's got to do at this dinner is impress on the Europeans A) She's there to stay and B) What she is promising can be delivered - I think she's talking to a sceptical audience."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41631711
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Family dog 'may have killed young boy' in Glengormley - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Police investigate the death of a 10-year-old boy after an incident in County Antrim on Sunday.
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Northern Ireland
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Police investigating the death of a 10-year-old boy in County Antrim believe he may have been attacked by the family's German Shepherd dog.
Paramedics were called to a house on Queen's Avenue in Glengormley at 12:00 BST on Sunday.
The ambulance service said the boy had lacerations and was taken to the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children.
A post-mortem examination was completed on Monday and further forensic tests are to be carried out.
A-38-year-old man who had been helping police with their inquiries was released on Monday night.
A neighbour said she heard loud noises coming from the house minutes before emergency services arrived at the scene.
A boy, bloodied and heavily bandaged, was later taken to an ambulance, she added.
Forensic officers carried out an investigation inside the house through until Sunday night and police cordoned off the area around it.
SDLP councillor Noreen McClelland said people in the area had been left deeply shocked after the "absolute tragedy" in what is a "quiet and tight-knit community".
"There are no words to describe the horror in this community - people are just devastated," she added.
"My thoughts and prayers are with the child's family and friends at this horrendous time.
"I know that people will rally around them to offer their support."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-41629529
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Malta blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia dies in car bomb attack - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Government critic Daphne Caruana Galizia dies in an attack the PM calls "barbaric".
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Europe
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Debris was strewn over the road and a nearby field
A prominent blogger in Malta, who had accused the island's government of corruption, has died in a car bomb attack, according to police.
Daphne Caruana Galizia, 53, was reportedly killed when the car she was driving exploded shortly after she left her home in Bidnija, near Mosta.
Local media say one of her sons heard the blast and rushed outside.
PM Joseph Muscat, whom Caruana Galizia accused of wrongdoing earlier this year, denounced the killing.
"I condemn without reservations this barbaric attack on a person and on the freedom of expression in our country," he said in a televised statement.
"Everyone knows Ms Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and personally, as she was for others too."
Daphne Caruana Galizia was reportedly killed just after leaving her home on Monday afternoon
But he stressed there could be "no justification... in any way" for such action.
"I will not rest before justice is done."
On Monday evening, thousands of people attended a candlelit vigil in the resort town of Sliema.
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Malta Television reported that Caruana Galizia had filed a complaint to the police two weeks ago to say she had received threats but gave no further information.
Newspaper reports said the explosion had left debris from the rental car she was driving strewn across the road and in a nearby field.
Police and forensics experts went to the scene of the blast
Caruana Galizia's death comes four months after Mr Muscat's Labour Party won an election he called early because of the blogger's allegations linking him and his wife to the Panama Papers scandal.
The couple denied claims that they had used secret offshore bank accounts to hide payments from Azerbaijan's ruling family.
Caruana Galizia's popular blog had also targeted opposition politicians, calling the country's political situation "desperate" in her final post.
A spokeswoman for the prime minister's office told the BBC that although there were rumours the attack could be politically motivated, this would be jumping to conclusions. But no lines of inquiry would be ruled out.
Malta has asked for international help - including the FBI in the US - to find the perpetrator, the spokeswoman said.
Meanwhile, Caruana Galizia's family has requested that the magistrate in charge of the investigation be replaced, the Malta Independent reports.
It said the current magistrate had on a number of occasions been the subject of criticism by Caruana Galizia.
Daphne Caruana Galizia was loved and resented in equal measure in politically divided Malta - but she will go down in the Mediterranean island's history as one of the most influential writers.
Her uncompromising blog and scathing pen spared no punches, hitting out mainly at exponents of the ruling Labour Party and their supporters, but also sometimes criticising officials of the centre-right Nationalist Party, including its newly-elected leader.
Starting off as a columnist for The Sunday Times of Malta, her colourful reportage saw her embroiled in several legal battles along the years, including Malta's prime minister.
But beyond all, even her fiercest critics acknowledge she was an impeccable writer and investigative journalist. Her digital cross-investigation into the Panama Papers, which saw the Maltese government's top officials embroiled, effectively triggered off a premature general election last June.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41637730
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US Army sergeant Bowe Bergdahl admits desertion - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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The 31-year-old US Army sergeant tells the court his conduct was "very inexcusable".
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US & Canada
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Bergdahl arrives at the courthouse on Monday
Bowe Bergdahl, the US soldier held as a Taliban captive in Afghanistan for five years, has pleaded guilty to desertion and misbehaviour before the enemy.
The 31-year-old Army sergeant entered his plea on Monday before a military judge at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
The Idaho native's lawyers have argued he cannot get a fair trial following criticism from Donald Trump during last year's presidential campaign.
Mr Trump had called him "a no-good traitor who should have been executed".
When asked during a news conference on Monday whether his comments had any impact on Sgt Bergdahl's case, the president said he could not comment, but "I think people have heard my comments in the past".
"We may as well go back to kangaroo courts and lynch mobs," Sgt Bergdahl said in a 2016 interview that was obtained by the BBC and broadcast on Monday.
In the remarks to British filmmaker Sean Langan, who was himself held captive by the same Taliban group in 2008, Sgt Bergdahl denied he had left his post in order to meet Taliban militants.
An undated, unverified photo of Sgt Bowe Bergdahl with what appears to be Badruddin Haqqani was released by the Taliban after his return to the US
"You know, it's just insulting frankly," he said. "It's very insulting, the idea that they would think I did that."
Sgt Bergdahl, who remains on active duty desk work in San Antonio, Texas, was first charged in 2015, a year after his release.
During Monday's hearing, he told the court: "I was captured by the enemy against my will."
"At the time I had no intention of causing search and recovery operations... It's very inexcusable," he added.
He is scheduled to face a pre-sentencing hearing starting on 23 October.
The maximum penalty for misbehaviour before the enemy is life in prison, and the maximum sentence for desertion is five years.
Army General Kenneth Dahl, who led the investigation into Sgt Bergdahl's disappearance, has testified that a jail sentence would be "inappropriate".
In a podcast interview last year, Sgt Bergdahl said he walked off his combat post to prove to senior officers his commanders were "unfit" for service.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A video shows Sgt Bowe Bergdahl being handed over to US forces
Upon his return to the US, an Army Sanity Board evaluation determined that he had schizotypal personality disorder "at the time of the alleged criminal conduct" and now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.
The decision to exchange five Taliban captives from Guantanamo Bay in order to secure Sgt Bergdahl's release was heavily criticised by Republican lawmakers as contrary to US policy of not negotiating with terrorists.
Several former platoon mates have alleged US soldiers were killed or wounded during the frantic 45-day search for the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment trooper.
The judge has allowed wounded servicemen to testify that they were hurt because of the search for Sgt Bergdahl.
Much of Sgt Bergdahl's captivity was spent in a "cage", he said, and he was extensively tortured by his captors, a military expert has previously testified.
During Mr Trump's presidential campaign, he called Sgt Bergdahl "garbage" and suggested he should be summarily executed.
"You know in the old days - bing, bong," Mr Trump said at a campaign rally as he imitated firing a gun. "When we were strong."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41642168
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Parsons Green Tube station stabbing: One dead, two hurt - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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The incident is not being treated as terror-related, London Ambulance Service said.
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London
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One man died at the scene of the stabbing
A man has died and two others have been injured in a stabbing outside Parsons Green Tube station in London.
The attack happened just after 19:30 BST on Monday at the station where 30 people were injured in a terror attack last month.
A 20-year-old man died in the stabbing, which is not being treated as terror-related.
The two injured people were taken to hospital and one was subsequently arrested.
The dead man's next of kin have been informed although formal identification has yet to take place.
He was pronounced dead at the scene at 20:30.
Two men were taken to hospital, one of whom has been arrested
Cordons are in place at the scene of the incident
One man remains in hospital although his injuries are not thought to be life-threatening. The arrested man was taken to a west London police station for questioning.
Parsons Green Lane and the station were closed by police and cordons put in place. The station has since been re-opened.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-41644039
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How the humble S-bend made modern toilets possible - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Designed in 1775, the S-bend was key to the flushing toilet, and public sanitation as we know it.
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Business
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"Gentility of speech is at an end," thundered an editorial in London's City Press, in 1858. "It stinks!"
The stink in question was partly metaphorical: politicians were failing to tackle an obvious problem.
As its population grew, London's system for disposing of human waste became woefully inadequate. To relieve pressure on cess pits - which were prone to leaking, overflowing, and belching explosive methane - the authorities had instead started encouraging sewage into gullies.
However, this created a different issue: the gullies were originally intended for only rainwater, and emptied directly into the River Thames.
That was the literal stink - the Thames became an open sewer.
Cholera was rife. One outbreak killed 14,000 Londoners - nearly one in every 100.
Civil engineer Joseph Bazalgette drew up plans for new, closed sewers to pump the waste far from the city. It was this project that politicians came under pressure to approve.
The sweltering-hot summer of 1858 had made London's malodorous river impossible to politely ignore, or to discuss obliquely with "gentility of speech". The heatwave became popularly known as the "Great Stink".
If you live in a city with modern sanitation, it's hard to imagine daily life being permeated with the suffocating stench of human excrement.
For that, we have a number of people to thank - but perhaps none more so than the unlikely figure of Alexander Cumming.
50 Things That Made the Modern Economy highlights the inventions, ideas and innovations that helped create the economic world.
A watchmaker in London a century before the Great Stink, Cumming won renown for his mastery of intricate mechanics.
King George III commissioned him to make an elaborate instrument for recording atmospheric pressure, and he pioneered the microtome, a device for cutting ultra-fine slivers of wood for microscopic analysis.
Alexander Cumming's S-bend was crucial in the development of the flushing toilet
But Cumming's world-changing invention owed nothing to precision engineering. It was a bit of pipe with a curve in it.
In 1775, Cumming patented the S-bend. This became the missing ingredient to create the flushing toilet - and, with it, public sanitation as we know it.
Flushing toilets had previously foundered on the problem of smell: the pipe that connects the toilet to the sewer, allowing urine and faeces to be flushed away, will also also let sewer odours waft back up - unless you can create some kind of airtight seal.
Cumming's solution was simplicity itself: bend the pipe. Water settles in the dip, stopping smells coming up; flushing the toilet replenishes the water.
While we've moved on alphabetically from the S-bend to the U-bend, flushing toilets still deploy the same insight.
Rollout, however, came slowly: by 1851, flushing toilets remained novel enough in London to cause mass excitement when introduced at the Great Exhibition in Crystal Palace.
Use of the facilities cost one penny, giving the English language one of its enduring euphemisms for emptying one's bladder, "to spend a penny".
Hundreds of thousands of Londoners queued for the opportunity to relieve themselves while marvelling at the miracles of modern plumbing.
If the Great Exhibition gave Londoners a vision of how public sanitation could be - clean, and smell-free - no doubt that added to the weight of popular discontent as politicians dragged their heels over finding the funds for Joseph Bazalgette's planned sewers.
More than 170 years later, about two-thirds of the world's people have access to what's called "improved sanitation", according to the World Health Organization, up from about a quarter in 1980.
But that still means two and a half billion people don't have access to it, and "improved sanitation" itself is a relatively low bar.
It "hygienically separates human excreta from human contact", but it doesn't necessarily treat the sewage itself.
Fewer than half the world's people have access to sanitation systems that do that.
The economic costs of this ongoing failure to roll out proper sanitation are many and varied, from health care for diarrhoeal diseases to foregone revenue from hygiene-conscious tourists.
The World Bank's Economics of Sanitation Initiative has tried to tot up the price tag.
Across various African countries, for example, it reckons inadequate sanitation lops one or two percentage points off gross domestic product (GDP), in India and Bangladesh over 6%, and in Cambodia 7%.
Open sewers are a common sight in Kibera, in Nairobi, Kenya
The challenge is that public sanitation isn't something the market necessarily provides. Toilets cost money, but defecating in the street is free.
If I install a toilet, I bear all the costs, while the benefits of the cleaner street are felt by everyone.
In economic parlance, that's a "positive externality" - and goods that have positive externalities tend to be bought at a slower pace than society, as a whole, would prefer.
The most striking example is the "flying toilet" system of Kibera, in Nairobi, Kenya.
The flying toilet works like this: you defecate into a plastic bag, and then in the middle of the night, whirl the bag around your head and hurl it as far away as possible.
Replacing a flying toilet with a flushing toilet provides benefits to the toilet owner - but you can bet that the neighbours would appreciate it, too.
Contrast, say, the mobile phone. That also costs money, but its benefits accrue largely to me. That's one reason why, although the S-bend has been around for 10 times as long as the mobile phone, many more people already own a mobile phone than a flushing toilet.
If you want to buy a flushing toilet, it also helps if there's a system of sewers to plumb it into, and creating one is a major undertaking - financially and logistically.
Joseph Bazalgette, standing top right, views the Northern Outfall sewer being built below the Abbey Mills pumping station in 1862
When Joseph Bazalgette finally got the cash to build London's sewers, they took 10 years to complete and necessitated digging up 2.5 million cubic metres (88 million cubic ft) of earth.
Because of the externality problem, such a project might not appeal to private investors: it tends to require determined politicians, willing taxpayers and well-functioning municipal governments.
And those, it seems, are in short supply. According to a study published in 2011, just 6% of India's towns and cities have succeeded in building even a partial network of sewers. The capacity for delay seems almost unlimited.
London's lawmakers likewise procrastinated- but when they finally acted, they didn't hang about. As Stephen Halliday recounts in his book The Great Stink of London, it took just 18 days to rush through the necessary legislation for Bazalgette's plans. What explains this sudden, impressive alacrity?
The Houses of Parliament, photographed in 1858, the year of the Great Stink
A quirk of geography: London's Parliament building is located right next to the River Thames.
Officials tried to shield lawmakers from the Great Stink, soaking the curtains in chloride of lime in a bid to mask the stench.
But it was no use. Try as they might, the politicians couldn't ignore it.
The Times described, with a note of grim satisfaction, how MPs had been seen abandoning the building's library, "each gentleman with a handkerchief to his nose".
If only concentrating politicians' minds was always that easy.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41188465
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Harvey Weinstein: Film company in talks over possible sale - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Talks with US investment firm Colony Capital come after sex allegations about Harvey Weinstein.
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Business
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The film production company co-founded by Harvey Weinstein, who is facing a number of sexual assault allegations, is in talks over a possible sale.
The Weinstein Company said it had entered a preliminary deal with US private equity firm Colony Capital.
Mr Weinstein, 65, was fired by the board of his company earlier this month, and was later expelled by the organisation behind the Oscars.
The Hollywood producer insists sexual relations he had were consensual.
Police in London and New York are investigating various allegations against Weinstein.
The Weinstein Company, which was behind Oscar-winning films including The King's Speech and The Artist, has come under intense pressure over the scandal.
The firm said it was in talks with Colony Capital about the sale of some or all of the company. Colony has also agreed to inject funds immediately into embattled firm.
Tarak Ben Ammar, a board member of The Weinstein Company, said the extra funds would "help stabilise the company's current operations".
Colony Capital founder Thomas J Barrack Jr with Harvey Weinstein and Julia Roberts at a film premiere in 2013
Colony Capital, founded by Thomas J Barrack Jr - a friend of President Donald Trump - is already a major player in the film industry.
In 2010, it bought Miramax, another film production company set up by Harvey Weinstein and his brother Bob Weinstein, from Disney.
It also worked with The Weinstein Company in developing the film libraries of the two firms for platforms including Netflix, Amazon and Apple, before selling Miramax last year for an undisclosed price.
Mr Barrack Jr said: "We are pleased to invest in The Weinstein Company and to help it move forward.
"We will help return the company to its rightful iconic position in the independent film and television industry."
The real estate tycoon is a former business partner of President Trump and chaired his inauguration committee. His private equity firm Colony says it has funds of $56bn (£42bn) under management.
The Weinstein brothers set up The Weinstein Company in 2005, twelve years after selling Miramax to Disney.
Last year, Harvey Weinstein said the The Weinstein Company, including its film library, was worth up to $800m and had no debt.
However, a number of the firm's partners have cut ties in recent days amid the allegations against Harvey Weinstein of sexual assault and harassment.
Goldman Sachs said on Friday it was exploring options for the small stake it holds in the company, a day after US publisher Hachette Book Group terminated its tie-up with Weinstein Books.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41641419
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Hospitals in England to ban 'super-size' chocolate bars - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Sweets and chocolate should be under a 250-calorie limit, NHS England says.
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Health
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"Super-sized" chocolate bars are to be banished from hospital shops, canteens and vending machines, NHS England says.
Sweets and chocolate sold in hospitals should be 250 calories or under, the head of the body says.
Under the plans, most "grab bags" will be banned - with hospitals given a cash boost for facilitating the change.
The proposals would also see 75% of pre-packed sandwiches coming in at under 400 calories.
Pre-packed savoury meals and sandwiches must also contain no more than 5g of saturated fat per 100g.
And 80% of the drinks stocked must have less than 5g of added sugar per 100ml.
In April, NHS England said it would ban sugary drinks if hospital outlets did not cut down on the number they sell.
Simon Stevens said the NHS was "stepping up" to combat an issue that was causing "an epidemic of obesity, preventable diabetes, tooth decay, heart disease and cancer".
"In place of calorie-laden, sugary snacks we want to make healthier food an easy option for hospital staff, patients and visitors."
NHS staff are also being targeted as part of the move to tackle unhealthy eating, including those on overnight shifts.
It is estimated that nearly 700,000 of the NHS's 1.3million staff are overweight or obese.
NHS premises have huge footfall from the communities they serve, with one million patients every 24 hours.
The Royal Voluntary Service, the biggest hospital retailer across the UK, said it had already begun introducing healthier choices and had seen fruit sales go up by a quarter.
Public Health England says hospitals have an "important role" in addressing obesity and not just dealing with the consequences.
Campaigners says more action is till needed.
Helen Dickens from Diabetes UK said: "We look forward to seeing more information on how it will work in practice.
"However this is just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to tackling obesity. We need to go much further, which is why we are also calling for the Government to toughen restrictions on junk food marketing to children, end price promotions on unhealthy foods and introduce mandatory front of pack food labelling."
A Welsh Government spokesperson said: "We restricted the sale of chocolate bars and other sugary products from vending machines in Welsh hospitals nine years ago. We're pleased NHS England is now looking to follow our lead."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41630681
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Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner to marry Joe Jonas - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa Stark, and US singer Joe Jonas are engaged.
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Entertainment & Arts
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British actress Sophie Turner and US singer Joe Jonas are to marry.
The pair, who have been together since 2016, both shared the news on Instagram with the same picture of a diamond ring.
Turner, who plays Sansa Stark in fantasy TV drama Game of Thrones, posted the photo with the caption "I said yes".
Jonas's brother Nick, who was also in American pop band The Jonas Brothers, tweeted his congratulations.
He said: "Ahh! Congratulations to my brother... and sister in law to be on your engagement. I love you both so much."
This Twitter post cannot be displayed in your browser. Please enable Javascript or try a different browser. View original content on Twitter The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Skip twitter post by Nick Jonas This article contains content provided by Twitter. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. You may want to read Twitter’s cookie policy, external and privacy policy, external before accepting. To view this content choose ‘accept and continue’. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
The Jonas Brothers was formed in 2005 and gained fame after appearances on the Disney Channel. The band was made up of the three brothers Nick, Joe and Kevin Jonas.
The three-piece broke up in 2013 and Joe Jonas is currently the lead singer for US dance-rock band DNCE.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41630674
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Andrew Lloyd Webber to retire from House of Lords - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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The composer will be stepping down at midnight after 20 years as a Conservative peer.
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UK Politics
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Lord Lloyd Webber was made a Conservative peer by John Major in 1997
Andrew Lloyd Webber is to retire from the Lords as of midnight on Monday, the House has confirmed.
The 69-year-old composer became a life peer in the 1997 New Year's Honours list and sat as a Conservative member.
In a statement from his team, Lord Lloyd Webber said he resigned "with a heavy heart", but added: "What is expected from a member today is very different from what it was."
He also said his work schedule was "the busiest of [his] career to date".
"This means it would be impossible for me to regularly vote or properly consider the vitally important issues that the House of Lords will face as a consequence of Brexit," he said.
"I feel my place should be taken by someone who can devote the time to the House of Lords that the current situation dictates."
Lord Lloyd Webber was a member of the Works of Art Committee for three years and spoke out against government cuts to the arts last year.
However, in the 2,097 votes during his tenure, he voted only 42 times.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41642046
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Hurricane Ophelia: Three killed as storm lashes Ireland - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Irish PM warns people to stay indoors and schools across the island are to remain closed on Tuesday.
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Northern Ireland
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Battling the heavy winds in Donaghadee, County Down
Three people have been killed as Hurricane Ophelia lashes Ireland, with a national emergency declared in the Republic of Ireland.
One man in his 30s died in a chainsaw accident while trying to clear a fallen tree in County Tipperary.
A tree came down on this house in Broughshane, County Antrim
A woman in her 50s in County Waterford and a man in County Louth were killed after trees fell on their cars.
All schools in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic will remain closed on Tuesday.
Taoiseach (Irish PM) Leo Varadkar has warned people to stay indoors, as severe winds cause transport disruption, uproot trees and cut power supplies.
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An amber warning for high winds is in force in Northern Ireland until 23:00 BST.
The worst of the weather is expected to continue into Monday evening, with winds of up to 80mph (130km/h) forecast.
On Monday night, residents were evacuated from flats in Rodgers Quay, Carrickfergus, due to the risk of flooding from tidal surges.
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About 8,000 homes have no electricity in Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland Electricity (NIE) posted this picture of a fallen tree, which brought down an overhead cable and damaged a car in Dunmurry
Some 295,000 customers are without power in the Republic and it could be 10 days before normal service resumes. Emergency crews are coming from Northern Ireland and the UK to help restore the supply, said the Irish PM.
A red weather alert is in place across the Republic of Ireland, meaning there is a danger to life.
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A number of roads in Northern Ireland have been closed or blocked by fallen trees, and public transport came to a virtual standstill from late afternoon on Monday.
Further details are available from Trafficwatch NI.
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The head of the Northern Ireland civil service, David Sterling, chaired a meeting of the civil contingencies group at Stormont to assess how best to deliver public services while Northern Ireland is being hit by the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia.
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Mr Sterling said a lot of work was ongoing to keep people safe.
Responding to criticism from parents about the late warning given regarding Monday's schools closure, Mr Sterling said his officials had to rely on the best evidence available and balance competing judgments.
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The warning about the further closures came earlier at about 16:30 BST on Tuesday,
Originally a hurricane, Ophelia weakened on its path across the Atlantic Ocean
The Irish government has deployed the army and all hospital outpatient appointments in the Republic were cancelled on Monday
The Irish PM said: "I don't want anyone to think that this is anything other than a national emergency and a red alert in all counties, all cities, all areas."
UK Prime Minister Theresa May spoke to her Irish counterpart Mr Varadkar on Monday afternoon to offer support to affected areas.
Are you affected by Hurricane Ophelia? E-mail your stories and pictures to haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk
Please do not put yourself in any danger to take images and please heed all safety warnings.
You can also contact us in the following ways:
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-41632835
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Mesh surgeon investigated by NHS trust in Bristol - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Tony Dixon works at Southmead Hospital and at the Spire private hospital in Bristol.
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Bristol
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The mesh implants are used to ease incontinence and to support organs
A surgeon who carried out mesh surgery that left women in severe pain is being investigated by his NHS trust.
Tony Dixon, who is based in Bristol, uses a technique known as mesh rectopexy to fix bowel problems, often caused by childbirth.
Several women are considering legal action after being treated by him.
Mr Dixon said he was unable to comment because of the investigation, but the BBC understands he denies doing anything wrong.
He works at Southmead Hospital and at the Spire private hospital in Bristol.
One of Mr Dixon's patients, Sam van der Heijden from Hastings in East Sussex, said she was left with major pain and complications after Mr Dixon inserted the mesh in 2011.
She had had previous surgery with someone else and was facing a difficult future.
"I researched on the internet and Mr Dixon came up as the pioneer of mesh rectopexy," she said.
"So I thought, right, if I'm having problems I need to go to the best.
"He said [it] will solve all your problems. Because I believed he was the expert I didn't question it."
Another surgeon told the BBC in their opinion her mesh was not attached where they would expect it to be.
Concerns have also been raised by patients who said they were not fully warned of possible complications.
Sam van der Heijden says surgery left her with major pain and complications
Gynaecologist Dr Sohier Elneil has taken on the care of several patients from all over the UK who were operated on by Mr Dixon in Bristol.
"There might be patients in whom it has been absolutely fine, but we now know there are many patients who are suffering as a consequence of this type of surgery," she said.
"This year alone we've operated on seven such cases.
"It worries me when you start to hear the same name or same technique or the same problem in women from different parts of the country."
Mr Dixon is being investigated by Southmead Hospital, where he currently cannot perform mesh operations.
The General Medical Council (GMC) is also investigating, and has stopped him from performing another form of corrective surgery, known as a Starr procedure (stapled transanal resection of the rectum), for a year from August 2017.
The mesh is made of a polypropylene, a type of plastic
Mesh implants are medical devices used by surgeons to treat pelvic organ prolapse and incontinence in women, conditions that can commonly occur after childbirth.
The mesh, usually made from synthetic polypropylene, is intended to repair damaged or weakened tissue.
Mr Dixon has his supporters, and the BBC has been told he is pioneering, experienced and conscientious.
The Pelvic Floor Society (PFS) says up to 2.5% of women who have mesh surgery will suffer complications, but it can bring life-changing benefits.
The society's Andrew Williams said it was "up to the woman herself" to discuss with her surgeon the "risks and benefits".
One surgeon told the BBC that complications arising from mesh surgery, a procedure which became common in about 2004, could not have been foreseen.
The PFS said it began to recognise complications in 2014, but its chair could not say whether surgeons should have mentioned complications before then.
Two Bristol law firms are considering legal action, after taking on 16 women who were operated on by Mr Dixon.
Madeleine Pinschof from Thompsons Solicitors said the majority had suffered "debilitating complications... far worse than before they had these procedures".
"Certainly we don't believe that all of the possible complications had been explained," she said.
Luke Trevorrow from solicitors Irwin Mitchell said he suspected there may be "more patients out there who have received treatment from Mr Dixon who are equally concerned".
North Bristol NHS Trust, which runs Southmead Hospital, said it was investigating concerns raised over "certain pelvic floor repair procedures" and said Mr Dixon was "not currently providing these procedures" at the trust.
Spire Bristol Hospital's director, Dan Rees Jones, said Mr Dixon was currently not permitted to perform procedures and was "restricted to outpatient follow-up appointments" while the NHS trust completes its investigation.
He added that complications relating to Mr Dixon's practice at the hospital "fall within normal parameters".
Claims by women that the mesh surgery left them with long-term health problems will be investigated on Inside Out West on BBC One at 19:30 BST on Monday 16 October.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-41596436
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Jonny Bairstow on his dad, Cape Town, Geoffrey Boycott and Jonny Wilkinson - BBC Sport
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2017-10-16
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England wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow opens up to Michael Vaughan in a special interview for BBC Radio 5 live.
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Even for an international sportsman, Jonny Bairstow's story is extraordinary.
That the Yorkshireman has had his share of setbacks on the way to becoming one of the leading wicketkeeper-batsmen in the world, or that the young Bairstow was an extremely talented footballer and rugby player are noteworthy, but only a small part of his tale.
Jonny's father David, also a wicketkeeper, had a 20-year career with Yorkshire and played four Tests for England. In 1998, he took his own life.
To mark the release of his autobiography, A Clear Blue Sky, Bairstow spoke to former England captain Michael Vaughan for a BBC Radio 5 live special.
He talks openly about his father, his family, his emotional maiden Test century in Cape Town, thoughts of quitting cricket to play rugby and what it is like to spend Christmas at Geoffrey Boycott's house.
'We went to school the next day'
Suffering from depression, worried about money and facing a drink-driving charge, David Bairstow ended his own life at the age of 46.
He was discovered by eight-year-old Jonny, his younger sister Becky and their mother Janet, who at the time was undergoing treatment for breast cancer.
"Me and my sister were both very young. In some ways, yes, you do remember everything that went on because it is only us who will remember that. At the same time there are bits of it you choose not to remember, that you choose to park.
"We went to school the next day. For me, that was really powerful. It was mum's way of dealing with it, her way of saying 'yes, that's happened now, but we have to deal with it in a certain way'.
"It makes you grow up very quickly. There's a huge sense of realisation around everything. At the same time, when you're eight years old, you don't really know everything that's happened. You understand it a bit, but you don't understand all of it.
"There are questions that are unanswered, but there's no point in revisiting those questions on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis. If you're constantly striving for questions that are never going to be answered, then you're only being detrimental to your own mental health.
"There are so many bits that I didn't know right away, but I've learned, even when I've been doing the book. Having a setback like that can make you mature very quickly."
By taking his own life, David nullified his life insurance policy. In his autobiography, Jonny explains that he knew money was sometimes tight when he was growing up.
"That's why it's been so good to keep pushing forward and represent England, to make Mum proud for the days she took to me to train with Leeds United, three times a week from the age of seven to 15, as well as bringing me to Headingley, looking after my sister, taking us to school and feeding us.
"If you stack everything that Mum did with the help of Grandma and Grandpa and all of our friends, it was ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.
"Mum never made an excuse, even when she had cancer and had a lot on her plate. You have to have huge admiration for the way she brought us up. Hopefully she has brought two role models into the world.
"You think of what might have been different if dad had been around, or how I might have turned out as a person. You just don't know. I might not even be playing cricket.
"There will have been questions along the way, but there's not just one, because there's 20 years of learning off dad that I haven't had.
"If he was here now, I think he'd just tell me to keep going."
Bairstow made his Test debut in 2012 and, despite making 95 in his fourth match against South Africa, needed more than three years to earn a regular spot in the England side.
When Bairstow faced South Africa again, he once more found himself on 95, this time at lunch on the second day of the second Test in Cape Town.
"I was dripping wet. I didn't take my pads off, I didn't eat, I just sat there saying 'it's not happening again'.
"I knew they would start with Morne Morkel after lunch, but when they then used the medium-pace of Stiaan van Zyl, I just wanted him to bowl a short, wide one.
"Getting to that first hundred was just a relief. I was five short four years earlier, so it was four years of questions. Will I get the opportunity again? What could have I achieved if I had made that ton?"
The roar that Bairstow let out when he reached three figures could be heard all around Newlands and was followed with a look to the sky. On Test Match Special, an emotional Jonathan Agnew said: "You won't find a more popular individual. You can't resist the thought of his father looking down and how proud he would be."
"The years of waiting really came through. I don't know how I celebrated, I just ran and shouted. I welled up and got a jittery bottom lip. There was a huge heap of emotion. It's a very, very proud moment.
"There were more tears when I saw my mum and Becky at the end of the day. There's never anything wrong with shedding a tear.
"There's all the time which you spend thinking about it. Are you good enough? Will you get an opportunity? Where and when will it be? I have let myself and my family down by not getting a hundred already and there are people that have spent money coming to watch you.
"That makes you prouder. It reminds you that you're not only representing yourself, but your family and the people who have kept an eye on you throughout your career."
David Bairstow was a close friend of Yorkshire and England batsman Boycott, whose relationship with the Bairstow family continued after David's death and to this day.
Boycott, who scored 8,114 runs in 108 Tests for England, remains a forthright pundit on Test Match Special and in his newspaper column.
"Geoffrey presented me with my cap on the day I made my England Test debut. He'd already presented a special cap to Ian Bell to mark his 75th Test. He said to him 'you're one of the best batsmen in the world, but please stop playing the sweep shot'. That got us all laughing.
"When it came for me to get my cap, I could feel myself going in the back of my throat and in my chest. I had to hold back a little bit. After the hundred in Cape Town, I did an interview with Geoffrey and got emotional then.
"I've perhaps not spoken about cricket enough with him. I've wanted to find it out for myself. Looking back, maybe I should have done it more, but that's my inner stubbornness. I knew that he was there if I needed to speak to him. If I picked up the phone right now, he would be there and would help me if he can.
"The opinions that he has do not cause a massive issue in the dressing room, especially with the group of players we have now. Something could be said that is too close to the bone, but players are close to pundits now - we see them every day and can speak to them for ourselves if we have an issue.
"He once nailed me in front of 400 people at a game at Abbeydale Park in Sheffield. Everyone knows the nature of what pundits do - they are paid to write columns and have opinions. I perhaps didn't realise that at the start and took too much criticism to heart.
"We've had Christmas at his house in South Africa. It's entertaining around the Boycott Christmas table - it's not just him talking about himself."
'I thought about giving up to play rugby'
In the autobiography, Bairstow reveals his admiration for rugby player Jonny Wilkinson.
In the aftermath of England's 5-0 whitewash on the 2013-14 Ashes tour of Australia, Bairstow, a fly-half in his youth, even thought of attempting to start a rugby career of his own.
"Wilkinson changed the game of rugby. He captivated so many kids. I used to watch his DVD when I went to bed on the night before rugby games and I got a real sense of inspiration.
"I looked at the way he trained, the way he prepared and how he never left the training ground until he was content.
"Before he retired, he took a team talk for Toulon in French and English. To be able to be an inspiration to your team-mates in two languages sums the bloke up.
"He got a lot of injuries. The mentality that he had to keep doing the rehab, to answer the questions that people posed of him when he kept coming back resonates with me very firmly.
"He put his body in places that he shouldn't have put his body. He did things that he knew he shouldn't be doing. He wanted to keep pushing.
"When you're going through difficult times, like I was after the 2013-14 Ashes, you start thinking about different bits. Rugby is a huge passion of mine, a lot of my friends play.
"When all the lads are throwing a ball around, you go and play some touch and have an amazing time doing something you stopped when you were 17. You have thoughts of 'shall I, could I, what would happen if?'.
"I don't know who I would have played for. It wasn't a thought that lasted for a long time."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/41523011
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The 'working class boy' who built a £1bn business - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Paresh Davdra developed his successful money exchange firm from the ground up.
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Business
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Mr Davdra's wife recently treated him to a new Harley Davidson
Paresh Davdra is thrilled about the brand new Harley Davidson waiting for him in a friend's garage.
It's not a sign of a mid-life crisis, he insists, but a wedding present from his wife who he married in August.
He just has one more test to pass to get his motorcycle licence, then he can hop on the bike and whizz around London for meetings.
The boss and co-founder of money exchange firm Rational FX, which reported revenues of more than £1bn ($1.3bn) last year, has a life that's worlds apart from his parents and grandparents.
They were forced to flee Uganda in 1972 when dictator Idi Amin gave the Asian population just 90 days to leave the country.
"They came to the UK with just £50 between them," says the softly-spoken Mr Davdra. "My grandfather had his own tailoring shop, but they had to leave everything behind."
His family pulled together and bought a house in Harrow, north London, with his dad securing a job as clerk, and later as a financial controller, at a foreign exchange broker.
Their fighting spirit rubbed off on the younger Davdra. "We were never really given anything - if I wanted something, I had to earn it."
From the age of 16, he spent the school holidays holding jobs in a mobile phone shop and in telesales, while out of term at Middlesex University, he worked at his dad's firm, taking up roles from filing to working in compliance.
He studied marketing and computer science at university, but tells me that technology does not come naturally to him.
"If you told my team I had this degree, they wouldn't believe you. I'm always the one calling IT to connect the laptop to the printer," he laughs.
As soon as Mr Davdra graduated, in 2003, he joined his dad's company as a foreign exchange dealer, helping clients to buy and sell large quantities of foreign currencies.
He was in the role for just over a year, working with Indian-born Rajesh Agrawal, a friend of his father's who had arrived in the UK in 2001. But two factors would spur him to quit.
"I'd tried to buy a property with my dad but the bank rejected the mortgage application," Mr Davdra says. "It deflated me."
At the same time, Mr Agrawal resigned from his IT manager role. "When he decided to quit, I badgered him. I asked him to tell me what he was doing," Mr Davdra says.
The two met for coffee and quickly agreed they wanted to set up a company together. The idea was to support customers buying property abroad with their currency needs.
"Everything we were doing at the old firm was manual, but we thought we could offer the same service online," Mr Davdra says.
However, the duo faced a serious challenge: money. Mr Davdra was only a year out of university and had already taken out a personal loan to buy a BMW.
When Mr Agrawal took their business plan to the bank and asked to borrow £10,000, he was swiftly rejected. But he returned a few days later and asked for £20,000 to buy a car.
"I then sold my BMW and we were set," says 37-year-old Mr Davdra, who also moved into Mr Agrawal's home to save on rent.
Mr Davdra's grandfather had to flee Uganda in 1972
With just £32,000 between them, the pair launched their foreign exchange brokerage, RationalFX, in 2005.
Like many start-ups, the next difficult task was signing up customers.
"We got on the phones and started pitching to estate agents and attended every property industry event there was," recalls Mr Davdra.
"We'd be in the office all day from 8am, then we'd just be at it in the evenings."
Their big breakthrough came when they signed a number of estate agents who were selling properties in Dubai.
However, just two years after launching, the financial crisis hit. Mr Davdra reflects candidly on how it changed his young mindset.
More The Boss features, which every week profile a different business leader from around the world:
"I was 27 at the time and the business was doing great guns, and I was well on my way to being rich. That's all I thought about it.
"It wasn't really about building a business - that comes with time and maturity. But the crash brought that along. It was a good learning curve."
Rational FX also felt the fall-out from the crash, with its growth slowing. But it weathered the storm and went on to diversify.
Today, its clients range from high-net worth individuals, either buying property or making investments, to medium-sized businesses, such as firms exporting cars or importing textiles.
It reported revenues of £1.3bn in 2016, up from £1.1bn the year before, and pre-tax profits of £2.3m - largely because the firm reinvested heavily in its business, Mr Davdra says.
After enjoying success with Rational FX, the founders had an idea for an offshoot company - an online money transfer platform aimed at individuals sending lower sums to family overseas.
"We felt that Rational FX was driving revenues, but Xendpay [the new company] was more of a social initiative, to try and bring the costs of remittance down for people working hard to bring their families out of poverty."
Xendpay has a "pay what you want" model, although it does suggest a minimum commission of 0.3-0.4% of the transaction.
Mr Davdra says that more than 70% of users pay the suggested fee, 10% hand over more, and the rest pay nothing.
The platform isn't profitable yet, although Mr Davdra expects it to break even next year. "It was a bit of gamble but a risk we were willing to take."
Last year Mr Agrawal stepped down from the firm after he was appointed Deputy Mayor of London for Business. He still owns 70% of the business, and is a non-executive director, while Mr Davdra holds the remaining shares.
Mr Davdra says he "misses him".
"Apart from business, over the last 12 years we have developed a good relationship. He's a very very close friend."
For now, there are no plans to sell RationalFX, although private equity firms approach the firm "an average of twice a day".
"Our brands are still growing and are quite young. It's all about the right opportunity," Mr Davdra says.
Headquartered at Canary Wharf, RationalFX and Xendpay together employ 110 members of staff.
Despite his penchant for expensive bikes and cars, Mr Davdra - who still lives in Harrow - has his feet firmly on the ground.
"I think we're pretty humble. We're working class, and we just do normal stuff. It's the way we've been brought up."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41412635
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Can we teach robots ethics? - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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We are not used to the idea of machines making ethical decisions, but the day when they will routinely do this - by themselves - is fast approaching.
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Magazine
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We are not used to the idea of machines making ethical decisions, but the day when they will routinely do this - by themselves - is fast approaching. So how, asks the BBC's David Edmonds, will we teach them to do the right thing?
The car arrives at your home bang on schedule at 8am to take you to work. You climb into the back seat and remove your electronic reading device from your briefcase to scan the news. There has never been trouble on the journey before: there's usually little congestion. But today something unusual and terrible occurs: two children, wrestling playfully on a grassy bank, roll on to the road in front of you. There's no time to brake. But if the car skidded to the left it would hit an oncoming motorbike.
Neither outcome is good, but which is least bad?
The year is 2027, and there's something else you should know. The car has no driver.
Dr Amy Rimmer believes self-driving cars will save lives and cut down on emissions
I'm in the passenger seat and Dr Amy Rimmer is sitting behind the steering wheel.
Amy pushes a button on a screen, and, without her touching any more controls, the car drives us smoothly down a road, stopping at a traffic light, before signalling, turning a sharp left, navigating a roundabout and pulling gently into a lay-by.
The journey's nerve-jangling for about five minutes. After that, it already seems humdrum. Amy, a 29-year-old with a Cambridge University PhD, is the lead engineer on the Jaguar Land Rover autonomous car. She is responsible for what the car sensors see, and how the car then responds.
She says that this car, or something similar, will be on our roads in a decade.
Many technical issues still need to be overcome. But one obstacle for the driverless car - which may delay its appearance - is not merely mechanical, or electronic, but moral.
The dilemma prompted by the children who roll in front of the car is a variation on the famous (or notorious) "trolley problem" in philosophy. A train (or tram, or trolley) is hurtling down a track. It's out of control. The brakes have failed. But disaster lies ahead - five people are tied to the track. If you do nothing, they'll all be killed. But you can flick the points and redirect the train down a side-track - so saving the five. The bad news is that there's one man on that side-track and diverting the train will kill him. What should you do?
This question has been put to millions of people around the world. Most believe you should divert the train.
But now take another variation of the problem. A runaway train is hurtling towards five people. This time you are standing on a footbridge overlooking the track, next to a man with a very bulky rucksack. The only way to save the five is to push Rucksack Man to his death: the rucksack will block the path of the train. Once again it's a choice between one life and five, but most people believe that Rucksack Man should not be killed.
This puzzle has been around for decades, and still divides philosophers. Utilitarians, who believe that we should act so as to maximise happiness, or well-being, think our intuitions are wrong about Rucksack Man. Rucksack Man should be sacrificed: we should save the five lives.
Trolley-type dilemmas are wildly unrealistic. Nonetheless, in the future there may be a few occasions when the driverless car does have to make a choice - which way to swerve, who to harm, or who to risk harming? These questions raise many more. What kind of ethics should we programme into the car? How should we value the life of the driver compared to bystanders or passengers in other cars? Would you buy a car that was prepared to sacrifice its driver to spare the lives of pedestrians? If so, you're unusual.
Then there's the thorny matter of who's going to make these ethical decisions. Will the government decide how cars make choices? Or the manufacturer? Or will it be you, the consumer? Will you be able to walk into a showroom and select the car's ethics as you would its colour? "I'd like to purchase a Porsche utilitarian 'kill-one-to-save-five' convertible in blue please…"
Ron Arkin became interested in such questions when he attended a conference on robot ethics in 2004. He listened as one delegate was discussing the best bullet to kill people - fat and slow, or small and fast? Arkin felt he had to make a choice "whether or not to step up and take responsibility for the technology that we're creating". Since then, he's devoted his career to working on the ethics of autonomous weapons.
There have been calls for a ban on autonomous weapons, but Arkin takes the opposite view: if we can create weapons which make it less likely that civilians will be killed, we must do so. "I don't support war. But if we are foolish enough to continue killing ourselves - over God knows what - I believe the innocent in the battle space need to be better protected," he says.
Like driverless cars, autonomous weapons are not science fiction. There are already weapons that operate without being fully controlled by humans. Missiles exist which can change course if they are confronted by an enemy counter-attack, for example. Arkin's approach is sometimes called "top-down". That is, he thinks we can programme robots with something akin to the Geneva Convention war rules - prohibiting, for example, the deliberate killing of civilians. Even this is a horrendously complex challenge: the robot will have to distinguish between the enemy combatant wielding a knife to kill, and the surgeon holding a knife he's using to save the injured.
An alternative way to approach these problems involves what is known as "machine learning".
Susan Anderson is a philosopher, Michael Anderson a computer scientist. As well as being married, they're professional collaborators. The best way to teach a robot ethics, they believe, is to first programme in certain principles ("avoid suffering", "promote happiness"), and then have the machine learn from particular scenarios how to apply the principles to new situations.
A humanoid robot developed by Aldebaran Robotics interacts with residents at a care home
Take carebots - robots designed to assist the sick and elderly, by bringing food or a book, or by turning on the lights or the TV. The carebot industry is expected to burgeon in the next decade. Like autonomous weapons and driverless cars, carebots will have choices to make. Suppose a carebot is faced with a patient who refuses to take his or her medication. That might be all right for a few hours, and the patient's autonomy is a value we would want to respect. But there will come a time when help needs to be sought, because the patient's life may be in danger.
After processing a series of dilemmas by applying its initial principles, the Andersons believe that the robot would become clearer about how it should act. Humans could even learn from it. "I feel it would make more ethically correct decisions than a typical human," says Susan. Neither Anderson is fazed by the prospect of being cared for by a carebot. "Much rather a robot than the embarrassment of being changed by a human," says Michael.
However machine learning throws up problems of its own. One is that the machine may learn the wrong lessons. To give a related example, machines that learn language from mimicking humans have been shown to import various biases. Male and female names have different associations. The machine may come to believe that a John or Fred is more suitable to be a scientist than a Joanna or Fiona. We would need to be alert to these biases, and to try to combat them.
A yet more fundamental challenge is that if the machine evolves through a learning process we may be unable to predict how it will behave in the future; we may not even understand how it reaches its decisions. This is an unsettling possibility, especially if robots are making crucial choices about our lives. A partial solution might be to insist that if things do go wrong, we have a way to audit the code - a way of scrutinising what's happened. Since it would be both silly and unsatisfactory to hold the robot responsible for an action (what's the point of punishing a robot?), a further judgement would have to be made about who was morally and legally culpable for a robot's bad actions.
One big advantage of robots is that they will behave consistently. They will operate in the same way in similar situations. The autonomous weapon won't make bad choices because it is angry. The autonomous car won't get drunk, or tired, it won't shout at the kids on the back seat. Around the world, more than a million people are killed in car accidents each year - most by human error. Reducing those numbers is a big prize.
Quite how much we should value consistency is an interesting issue, though. If robot judges provide consistent sentences for convicted criminals, this seems to be a powerful reason to delegate the sentencing role. But would nothing be lost in removing the human contact between judge and accused? Prof John Tasioulas at King's College London believes there is value in messy human relations. "Do we really want a system of sentencing that mechanically churns out a uniform answer in response to the agonising conflict of values often involved? Something of real significance is lost when we eliminate the personal integrity and responsibility of a human decision-maker," he argues.
Amy Rimmer is excited about the prospect of the driverless car. It's not just the lives saved. The car will reduce congestion and emissions and will be "one of the few things you will be able to buy that will give you time". What would it do in our trolley conundrum? Crash into two kids, or veer in front of an oncoming motorbike? Jaguar Land Rover hasn't yet considered such questions but Amy is not convinced that matters: "I don't have to answer that question to pass a driving test, and I'm allowed to drive. So why would we dictate that the car has to have an answer to these unlikely scenarios before we're allow to get the benefits from it?"
That's an excellent question. If driverless cars save life overall why not allow them on to the road before we resolve what they should do in very rare circumstances? Ultimately, though, we'd better hope that our machines can be ethically programmed - because, like it or not, in the future more and more decisions that are currently taken by humans will be delegated to robots.
There are certainly reasons to worry. We may not fully understand why a robot has made a particular decision. And we need to ensure that the robot does not absorb and compound our prejudices. But there's also a potential upside. The robot may turn out to be better at some ethical decisions than we are. It may even make us better people.
Illustrations are From Would You Kill The Fat Man? By David Edmonds. Princeton University Press, 2014
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Facebook buys weeks-old app for teens to be nice to each other - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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An app encouraging teens to say nice things to each other has been bought by Facebook.
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Technology
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The tbh app had been downloaded five million times in nine weeks
An app that encourages teens to be nice to each other has been acquired by Facebook for an undisclosed fee.
The app - called tbh, meaning "to be honest" - is just nine weeks old, but had already been downloaded five million times.
The app's creators said it will remain a standalone program but will now have more resources thanks to Facebook.
"We were compelled by the ways they could help us realise tbh’s vision and bring it to more people," tbh said.
According to start-up news site TechCrunch, the deal was for "less than $100m", and tbh's four person team would become Facebook employees.
One expert commented that Facebook keeps a close eye over new companies and is willing to pay a premium to buy them rather than risk them developing into a threat.
"This is the latest example of Facebook snapping up a start-up that could potentially game-change the way people consume social media and erode its own user base," commented Prof Mark Skilton from Warwick Business School.
"Tbh appeals to the teen market - which we know is a very fickle age group - and Facebook knows that it and other apps like it can go viral and explode in popularity very quickly.
"So, this can be seen as a protective measure, and $100m is the equivalent of an account sheet rounding error - it's no money to them."
In a statement, Facebook said: "tbh and Facebook share a common goal of building community and enabling people to share in ways that bring us closer together.
"We’re impressed by the way tbh is doing this by using polling and messaging, and with Facebook’s resources tbh can continue to expand and build positive experiences."
Tbh said the app's success was a sign of teenagers craving more positive interactions online.
"While the last decade of the internet has been focused on open communication, the next milestone will be around meeting people’s emotional needs," it said.
The acquisition has been welcomed by a leading anti-bullying charity - but it added that other efforts were still required.
"We are encouraged to see Facebook taking further steps to create a more positive atmosphere online," said a spokeswoman from the NSPCC.
"However social media companies, including Facebook, need to do more to provide safe environments across all of their platforms - and be more transparent about what they do.
"The NSPCC wants to see a clear set of minimum standards that all social media companies will be held to account to, including clear community guidelines and bespoke accounts for under 18s."
Tbh's achievement has been to create an anonymous app that hasn't descended into a cesspit of trolling and harassment - something many apps before it have dramatically failed to do.
After a user uploads their contacts, the app will ask pre-determined, positive questions such as "best to bring to a party?", and the option of selecting one of four friends.
Users are notified when they are selected, but the details of who chose them is kept anonymous.
Facebook now has over 2 billion users worldwide
Mimicking Facebook's early growth - where it was only available in a handful of colleges for a short time, the makers of tbh only made the app available to users in certain states. Word of mouth would spread at schools as the app was enabled.
"We shipped it to one school in Georgia," explained co-founder Nikita Bier, speaking to TechCrunch.
"Forty percent of the school downloaded it the first day. The next day it was in three more schools, and then the next day it was in 300 schools."
Facebook would not provide any more details about the deal, but the firm is clearly eager to snap up the next big thing in its infancy, save it become another competitor like Snapchat.
An investment bank's recent survey of 6,100 US teens suggested that Snapchat was the preferred social media platform for teenagers - the average age of participants was 16.
Facebook reportedly tried to buy Snapchat in 2013 for $3bn. Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, is today worth $19bn.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-41646738
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Ed Sheeran breaks arm in cycling accident - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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The pop star's tour dates could be in jeopardy after he has "a bit of a bicycle accident".
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Entertainment & Arts
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The pop star has the biggest-selling album of the year
Pop star Ed Sheeran has broken his right arm, putting his upcoming tour dates in jeopardy.
"I've had a bit of a bicycle accident," wrote the star on his Instagram page, posting a picture of his arm in a cast.
"I'm currently waiting on some medical advice, which may affect some of my upcoming shows. Please stay tuned for further news."
The 26-year-old was on a break from his world tour, but was due to resume with a gig in Taipei next week.
He has a further 14 dates scheduled this year, including concerts in Japan, South Korea and Thailand, before kicking off the Australian leg of his tour in March 2018.
The tour is in support of his multi million-selling third album Divide, which was released earlier this year.
Sheeran famously plays his concerts solo - using just a guitar and a loop pedal to layer up songs like Thinking Out Loud, Sing and Shape of You.
Losing the use of his right arm would make such a set-up impractical - but, speaking to BBC News earlier this year, Sheeran said he would never consider playing with a backing band.
"I don't feel like there's anything interesting or new about seeing a singer-songwriter with a band behind them," he said.
"I don't feel like if I suddenly got a band, everyone would go, 'Wow!'. I actually feel it'd take away from me."
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41636692
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Sex exploitation 'as bad in music industry as in Hollywood' - BBC News
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2017-10-16
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Music manager Sarah Bowden said she had once been sacked after refusing to sleep with a manager.
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Entertainment & Arts
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Sarah Bowden says one major promoter exposed himself to her
The treatment and sexual exploitation of women in the music industry is "as bad, if not worse" than in Hollywood, an experienced artist manager has said.
Sarah Bowden told the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme she had once been sacked after refusing to sleep with a colleague in return for a promotion.
She said one major promoter exposed himself, expecting a sex act from her.
He was still working in the industry, she added, and believed he was behaving the same way.
It comes after a number of sexual assault allegations against Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein.
Ms Bowden said exploitation happens "all the way down through the industry" and was "as common as being wolf-whistled at in the street".
She said earlier in her career she had been told the job she wanted was not usually open to women but that an exception could be made if she slept with a more senior colleague.
She had refused and had been fired, she added.
Years later, after she had progressed in the industry, she claimed a well-known band promoter exposed himself to her at a music festival.
"He took me back to a caravan and basically exposed himself to me" she said, adding that he expected her to perform a sex act.
"I know that he did the same thing to other women, that same day, and he's still working in the industry."
Ms Bowden has waived her right to anonymity.
Ms Bowden, who has worked in the industry for 20 years, said women did not speak out because they felt nothing would be done.
She said she had witnessed one senior figure in the industry regularly promise young women jobs or roles on high profile band tours in return for sexual favours.
The agent would "parade" the women around, she added, mentioning names of famous artists with whom he had worked.
She said the man, who still works in the industry, was "brazen" about the acts.
Watch the Victoria Derbyshire programme on weekdays between 09:00 and 11:00 on BBC Two and the BBC News Channel.
• None Festival websites to go black over assaults
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41633726
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Newspaper headlines: MI5 boss warns web giants and pension 'timebomb' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The MI5 chief tells internet firms to stop aiding terrorists, and 15m workers not paying into a pension make the front pages.
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The Papers
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MI5 chief Andrew Parker features on several of Tuesday's front pages
The Guardian leads with a warning from the head of MI5 that Britain is facing its most severe terror threat ever.
The paper says that Andrew Parker believes more attacks are inevitable.
The Daily Mail, which also has the story on its front page, says Mr Parker wants internet companies to do more to stop extremists using the "safe spaces" on the web to learn bomb-making techniques.
The BBC's decision to axe the evening edition of Crimewatch after more than three decades has been criticised in the Daily Telegraph as "utter madness" by the family of James Bulger.
James' stepfather Stuart Fergus, who also manages the James Bulger Memorial Trust, describes the programme as an institution and says it helped to bring justice for his stepson.
In the Times, the father of the murdered schoolboy Damilola Taylor has also called for the BBC to reconsider its decision.
The Daily Telegraph says that one of the City's most senior figures is warning that France and Germany risk starting a new global financial crisis - if they try to use Brexit as an excuse to dismantle London as one of the world's main financial centres.
Xavier Rolet, who is chief executive of the London Stock Exchange Group, warns Paris and Berlin against making "a political point".
The paper's business editor, Ben Wright, says that destabilisation of the City would undermine the whole global financial framework.
According to the Daily Mail, sunflower oil is being tested to see if it could be used to fill cracks in the road to prevent potholes.
The paper says Highways England is carrying out the unusual trial after sunflower oil capsules were found to make roads "self heal" when added to asphalt.
The Mail says it costs more than £88 million each year to fill in the potholes in England's roads and - at about £1.15 a litre - the cooking oil is a cheaper alternative.
The Daily Mirror leads with research from the Financial Conduct Authority which suggests that a third of workers - 15 million people - are not paying into a pension.
The paper warns of what it calls a "pension timebomb" and says that many people will have to keep working into their 70s and 80s to make ends meet.
According to the Daily Express, British researchers believe that a new once-a-day tablet could "significantly" improve the health of people with type 2 diabetes.
The paper says that semaglutide has the power to lower blood sugar and promote weight loss in just three months.
One of the lead researchers describes the findings as "hugely promising".
And the Times reports that the Conservative MP, Tim Loughton, recommends an hour in the bath each morning to cleanse the body and clear the mind.
Mr Loughton, who is co-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on mindfulness, was speaking at a conference exploring how meditation and greater self-awareness can improve the conduct of politics.
He admitted that an hour of topping up the hot water was not cheap - but added that "one of the greatest causes of stress in the world was the invention of the shower".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-41660611
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Bombardier to partner Airbus on C-Series jets - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The European aerospace firm is to take a majority stake in Bombardier's C-Series jet project.
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Northern Ireland
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Parts of Bombardier's C-Series planes are made in Belfast
European aerospace firm Airbus is to take a majority stake in Bombardier's C-Series jet project.
Bombardier has faced a series of problems over the plane, most recently a trade dispute in the US that imposed a 300% import tariff.
Bombardier's Northern Ireland's director Michael Ryan said the deal was "great news" for the Belfast operation.
About 1,000 staff work on the C-Series at a purpose-built factory in Belfast, mostly making the plane's wings.
Airbus and Bombardier's chief executives said the deal - which will see Airbus take a 50.01% stake - would help to boost sales.
The deal also gives Airbus the right to buy full control of the C-Series project in 2023.
Experts have hailed the deal as hugely significant and described it as akin to a supervolcano exploding in the aviation world.
BBC Northern Ireland's business and economics editor John Campbell said Airbus had effectively taken control of the C-Series project in a transformational deal.
He said it would use its financial muscle in procurement and sales, while Bombardier's manufacturing operations would continue to build the planes.
It's perhaps symptomatic of the difficulties the C-Series has faced that Airbus will not have to hand over any cash for its 50% stake.
The hope will be that Airbus' financial muscle will finally put an end to those difficulties.
In particular, Airbus thinks it can solve the C-Series tariff problem by assembling the plane for US customers inside the US at its factory in Alabama.
But, as trade expert Simon Lester of the Cato Institute pointed out to me, it may not be that straightforward.
That's because of something known as "trade circumvention" - in crude terms, when a company tries to avoid tariffs by superficially changing the country of origin of its products.
Will the US trade authorities (and Boeing) see an Alabama-assembled C-Series as an attempt at circumvention?
Davy Thompson, from the trade union Unite, said the deal was a "welcome development".
"My understanding of the deal, and what it means for Belfast, is the supply chain still seems to be what it is today, which would mean Belfast is integral to the overall process.
"That should, we believe, increase and assure people's jobs down in the C-Series plan, but there are still further challenges."
He said there were still some "concerns" over non-C-Series related contracts at Bombardier's Belfast plant, but the deal with Airbus should "allow for more orders to be placed" and help with long-term employment across the site.
The union GMB said it was potentially good news but that the "devil was in the detail".
"This deal is liable to further scrutiny from the US administration that may see it as an attempt to dodge their trade tariffs," said Ross Murdoch, GMB national officer.
"GMB hopes both Bombardier and Airbus have taken cast iron legal advice to ensure they don't get rid on one legal challenge only to open themselves up to another."
Bombardier was accused of anti-competitive practices by rival Boeing, which complained to the US authorities.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The history of Bombardier in Northern Ireland
Boeing accused the Canadian firm of selling the jets below cost price after taking state subsidies from Canada and the UK.
The firm said the agreement with Airbus "looks like a questionable deal between two heavily state-subsidized competitors to skirt the recent findings of the US government".
"Our position remains that everyone should play by the same rules for free and fair trade to work," it added.
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Phil Musser, Boeing's senior vice president of communications, tweeted: "If @Airbus and @Bombardier think this deal will get them around the rules...#thinkagain"
UK Business Secretary Greg Clark said the Airbus tie-up was a "positive step forward".
A US import tax on Bombardier jets could threaten jobs at the firm's Belfast factory
Mr Clark said the UK and Canadian governments had been working to "safeguard jobs and manufacturing at Bombardier Shorts in Belfast, and the supply chain across the UK".
The government was still pushing for a "swift resolution" to the Boeing dispute, he added.
Arlene Foster, leader of Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party, said she hoped the deal would "safeguard" the C-Series programme.
"I'm thrilled there is a bright future ahead following what has been a dark time for staff and management," she added.
Sinn Féin's Stormont leader Michelle O'Neill said the deal was a "good news story for Bombardier" that would "come as a relief to the workers and their families and all those local businesses involved in the Bombardier supply chain".
Labour's Owen Smith, the shadow Northern Ireland secretary, said the deal "looked good for both Bombardier and Belfast".
"Boeing's bullying has united its rivals and hopefully secured the jobs," he tweeted.
The French government, which owns an 11% stake in Airbus, also welcomed the deal.
French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said it made Airbus and the European aircraft manufacturing industry "stronger".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-41646795
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Royal baby: William and Catherine's third child due in April - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The pregnancy, which has seen the duchess suffer morning sickness, was announced in September.
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The Duchess of Cambridge and Paddington danced on Monday
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's third child is due in April, Kensington Palace says.
It said the couple were "delighted". They already have two children: Prince George, who is four, and his younger sister Charlotte, who is two.
As with her previous pregnancies, the duchess has suffered from hyperemesis gravidarum, or severe morning sickness.
The new baby will be fifth in line to the throne, after its grandfather, father and older siblings.
The duchess is expected to give birth at the private Lindo wing of St Mary's hospital in Paddington, where her other children were born.
An official visit to Norway and Sweden, planned for November, has been delayed until early 2018 because of Catherine's sickness.
However, Prince William is going ahead with a solo trip to Finland in November.
The duchess joined Paddington Bear for a dance on a station platform during a surprise visit to a charity event on Monday.
The new baby will be fifth in line to the throne
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41655914
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Family 'hit hard' as ex-England captain Terry Butcher's son dies - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Terry Butcher has previously voiced his pride in son Christopher for his military service.
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Suffolk
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It is not yet known how Capt Christopher Butcher (right), who was 35 years old, died
The "hero" son of former England football captain Terry Butcher has died, his family has confirmed.
Ex-Army Capt Christopher Butcher, who had served in Afghanistan, died on Monday morning.
Announcing the death on Facebook, his younger brother Ed described him as a "hero" and said he was the "best brother" he could have had.
"His death has hit the entire family hard," Mr Butcher, who lives in Southampton, added.
Capt Butcher, who was 35, had served with the Royal Artillery.
His father, former Ipswich Town and Rangers defender Terry Butcher, who lives in Suffolk, has previously voiced his pride in his son's military service.
"The family are together and we will release the dates of the funeral in due time," Ed Butcher said.
"We know how greatly he was loved and we're sorry that we can't call every person who knew him to tell them.
"Chris you were my hero, you were my best friend and you were someone I would throw myself in the way of a truck for.
"This is for you and thank you for everything you ever taught me and I will miss you for the rest of my life but you will never be forgotten."
On his Facebook biography, Capt Butcher had written: "Left the Army and now just a moody bitter vet."
Ipswich Town, for whom Terry Butcher made more than 250 appearances in the 1970s and 1980s, tweeted: "The thoughts of everyone at #ITFC are with Terry Butcher and his family following the sad news of the passing of his son, Christopher."
East Anglian rivals Norwich City said: "Everyone at Norwich City would like to pass on our condolences to Terry Butcher and his family at this sad time."
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Councils buying homeless one-way train tickets - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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One rough sleeper said his local council offered him a ticket to a city he had never been to before.
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UK
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Charity Homeless Link said using one-way train tickets could leave rough sleepers "more isolated"
A number of councils in England are regularly buying one-way train tickets for homeless people out of their area, the Victoria Derbyshire show has found.
Some spent more than £1,000 a year on fares and charity Homeless Link called the scale "worrying".
The strategy can be used to reconnect rough sleepers with family, but one man said he was offered a ticket to a city he had never been to before.
The government said it was investing £550 million to tackle homelessness.
There were 4,134 people sleeping on the streets in England in 2016 - a 130% rise in six years, government figures suggest. The charity Crisis says this is a significant underestimate.
Twenty councils with the highest number of rough sleepers in England were asked - some by Freedom of Information request - how many homeless people had been offered the "reconnection" policy of a one-way train ticket between 2012 and 2017.
Of the 11 that responded, 10 said they had bought such tickets.
Manchester City Council - which had 78 rough sleepers in 2016 - said it had spent £9,928 on reconnecting homeless people in six years, but did not keep a record of how many people this involved.
Gareth Glendall-Pickton said being offered a one-way train ticket was "soul-destroying"
In Bournemouth - which had 39 rough sleepers in 2016 - the council said it had arranged 144 reconnections in three-and-a-half years.
One rough sleeper, Gareth Glendall-Pickton - who grew up in the seaside town - claimed he was recently offered a ticket to Manchester, where he did not know anyone and had never been to previously.
"It made me feel sick," he explained. "I've lived here all my life... it's soul-destroying.
"I think what they want to do is to get the homeless people out of Bournemouth, because all the new people coming to the area are seeing all those homeless people sitting there.
"[The council] see it as making Bournemouth a bad place."
Soup kitchen owner Claire Matthews described the buying of one-way tickets as a form of "social cleansing"
Claire Matthews, who runs the local soup kitchen Hope for Food, described the practice as "social cleansing, and an abdication of any responsibility on [the council's] part".
Bournemouth Borough Council said it only offered one-way tickets to homeless people who did not have a local connection to the area and "where it can be proven that the service user can be safely reconnected back to their area of locality".
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Elsewhere, Bristol City Council said it had offered 167 homeless people a one-way bus, train or plane ticket since 2014 - saying the option was only suggested if accommodation had been confirmed in the new area.
It said: "As a minimum a housing options appointment is set up with the local authority in the area".
The charity Homeless Link described the Victoria Derbyshire programme's findings as "worrying".
Its chief executive Rick Henderson said that if "a person has a support network in a different area, then helping them reconnect can help to end their rough sleeping".
But he added: "Simply displacing rough sleepers without offering support is not solving the issue, and at worst can exacerbate their situation, leaving them more isolated and at risk of deteriorating physical and mental health."
Homeless Link argued that while tight resources may impact councils' homeless services, vulnerable people should be able to seek support wherever they were and regardless of whether they had a local connection.
A spokesperson for the Department for Communities and Local Government said: "Even one person without a roof over their head is too many.
"That's why this government is investing £550 million to 2020 to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping, as well as implementing the Homelessness Reduction Act, which will require councils to provide early support to people at risk of becoming homeless."
Watch the Victoria Derbyshire programme on weekdays between 09:00 and 11:00 on BBC Two and the BBC News Channel.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41501554
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Newspaper headlines: 'Rage of Ophelia' and 15-year limit on peerages - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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A storm turns the UK skies orange and a plan to limit new peerages to 15 years feature on Tuesday's front pages.
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The Papers
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Many of the front pages have pictures of the effects of Storm Ophelia. The Guardian and the i show crowds watching as huge waves crash into the harbour wall and lighthouse at Porthcawl in south Wales.
"Rage of Ophelia" is the headline in the i. For the Star, it's "Hell Storm".
The orange skies produced by the dust and debris blown in by Ophelia are widely featured.
It was, the Mail says, the day Britain turned orange. The Times and the Sun describe the phenomenon as "Red October".
According to the lead in the Times, new peerages will have a 15-year time limit under a plan to shrink the House of Lords.
The proposal is being put forward by the Lords committee given the task of cutting membership of the chamber.
Its report - to be published later this month - will also call on political parties and crossbenchers to commit to reducing their numbers in stages, the paper adds.
An apparent plan by the Chancellor, Philip Hammond, to carry out a Budget raid on older voters to pay for tax breaks for younger workers goes down badly.
Ross Clark in the Daily Express describes it as "madness".
He says the idea, which would promote "inter-generational fairness", ignores the plight of pensioners who have lost out on interest on their savings for nearly a decade.
The size of the House of Commons is the focus of the Telegraph's main story.
It concludes that had the latest Boundary Commission review of parliamentary constituencies been implemented in time for the election in June, the Conservatives would have won an overall majority.
The review would also have delivered on a government pledge to cut the number of MPs by 50 - and the paper's leader column says a smaller House would ensure fairness, giving every constituency a roughly equal number of voters.
The Daily Mail's lead says cannabis growers are routinely being let off by police.
Even those cultivating plants potentially worth tens of thousands of pounds are escaping with cautions, it adds.
A spokesman for the Police Federation, which represents rank and file officers in England and Wales, tells the paper that forces have to prioritise crime.
"Looking at drugs, we have to put the most resources into tackling the ones that cause the most harm to society, and they are not cannabis", he says.
The Sun reports that Crimewatch has been axed after 33 years.
It says BBC bosses are thought to have pulled the plug on the show because of falling ratings - and they also want to spend more on dramas instead.
But, the paper adds, the decision is expected to cause anger among police forces.
In response, the BBC says the move will allow it to create room for more innovative programmes in peak time - but Crimewatch Roadshow, which is shown during the daytime, will continue.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-41646271
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Weinstein scandal: Game of Thrones actress 'felt powerless' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Weinstein was "holding tightly to the back of my arm" after she rebuffed him, Lena Headey said.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Game of Thrones actress Lena Headey, who plays Cersei Lannister on the popular HBO show, has accused producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment.
The Hollywood mogul was "furious" after she resisted his sexual advances, she details in a series of Twitter posts.
The British actress joins a list of over 40 women who have accused the producer of misconduct.
Also on Tuesday, Weinstein resigned from the board of directors of his eponymous film production company.
He has been accused of rape, sexual assault and harassment, but has "unequivocally denied" any allegations of non-consensual relationships.
Despite being fired as chairman of The Weinstein Company studio on 8 October he had continued until Tuesday to hold a position on the company's board.
Weinstein, who has been expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences that present the Oscar awards, still owns 22% of his company's stock, according to Variety magazine.
Amid the fallout over the Weinstein accusations, Roy Price, the head of Amazon Studios, also resigned on Tuesday over allegations of sexual harassment, according to US media.
Mr Price took a "leave of absence" last Thursday after Isa Hackett, a producer on the Amazon series The Man in the High Castle, told the Hollywood Reporter he allegedly sexually harassed her in 2015.
Harvey Weinstein was one of the most powerful men in Hollywood
In her Twitter posts, Headey described sharing a lift with Weinstein after he had invited her to his room to show her a script.
"The lift was going up and I said to Harvey, 'I'm not interested in anything other than work, please don't think I got in here with you for any other reason, nothing is going to happen,'" she recalled.
"I don't know what possessed me to speak out at that moment, only that I had such a strong sense of don't come near me.
"He was silent after I spoke, furious.
"He walked me back to the lift by grabbing and holding tightly to the back of my arm," she said, adding that she felt "completely powerless".
After he allegedly "whispered" that she should not tell anyone about the encounter, she writes: "I got into my car and cried."
Headey's story comes as other Hollywood actresses shared their stories of sexual harassment and impropriety in show business.
On Monday, Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon said she had been harassed by an unnamed film director when she was 16 years old, during a speech to the Elle Women in Hollywood event.
Jennifer Lawrence, who has won a Best Actress Oscar, spoke at the same event and described a casting call where she was made to stand nude in front of producers who criticised her weight.
"After that degrading and humiliating line-up, the female producer told me I should use the naked photos of myself as inspiration for my diet," the star of Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle told the Los Angeles audience.
DreamWorks film studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg meanwhile told a Wall Street Journal conference of Weinstein: "Make no mistake about it: he is a monster."
He added Weinstein had been protected by other men around him, who he described as "a pack of wolves".
Jeffrey Katzenberg pictured with Harvey Weinstein at a charity event in 2005
Screenwriter Scott Rosenberg also got involved by writing a Facebook post about his early days at Miramax Films.
He wrote the movies Beautiful Girls and Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead at the time Weinstein's profile was rising in the film industry.
In his post, he said that while he never heard any rape allegations, he was aware of Weinstein's "dreadful" behaviour - and said "everybody" else knew, too.
"I was there. And I saw you. And I talked about it with you," he wrote. "You, the big producers; you, the big directors; you, the big agents; you, the big financiers.
"And you, the big rival studio chiefs; you, the big actors; you, the big actresses; you, the big models.
"You, the big journalists; you, the big screenwriters; you, the big rock stars; you, the big restaurateurs; you, the big politicians."
He said others chose to ignore what was going on because they were enjoying themselves and because women were told it would ruin their careers if they said anything.
At the end of the piece, Rosenberg apologised for not doing anything.
"I reaped the rewards and I kept my mouth shut," he said. "And for that, once again, I am sorry."
Beautiful Girls actress Lauren Holly has also come forward, sharing her story of harassment, describing an encounter she had with Weinstein.
The pair arranged a meeting in a hotel, which she didn't find "abnormal at all" because she had routinely met producers, writers and directors in their suites.
She described the early stages of the meeting as normal, but said things turned sour when Weinstein walked into the hotel suite "wearing a hotel bathrobe".
"He said, 'OK, let's get to it, this is what we've got going on at my company, these are the scripts we have in the pipeline, this is what I think might be right for you,' and he gestured for me to follow him."
Holly recounted that she followed him into the bedroom part of the suite as he continued talking.
Weinstein then showered and, when he emerged, was naked and started to approach her.
Holly said she started to run away, but that Weinstein began to threaten her, saying she needed to "keep him as [her] ally" and that it would be a "bad decision" if she left the room.
At that point, Holly said, she "pushed him and ran".
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
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UK inflation at highest since April 2012 - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Increases in transport and food prices push inflation to the highest rate for more than five years.
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Business
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The UK's key inflation rate hit its highest for more than five years in September, driven up by increases in transport and food prices.
The Consumer Prices Index (CPI) climbed to 3%, a level it last reached in April 2012, and up from 2.9% in August.
The pick-up in inflation raises the likelihood of an increase in interest rates - currently 0.25% - next month.
The figures are significant because state pension payments from April 2018 will rise in line with September's CPI.
Under the "triple lock" guarantee, the basic state pension rises by a rate equal to September's CPI rate, earnings growth or 2.5%, whichever is the greatest.
At the moment, the full new state pension is £159.55 per week, equivalent to £8,296.60 per year.
Business rates will go up by September's Retail Prices Index (RPI) of 3.9%.
The fall in the pound since last year's Brexit vote has been one factor behind the rise in the inflation rate, as the cost of imported goods has risen.
ONS head of inflation Mike Prestwood said: "Food prices and a range of transport costs helped to push up inflation in September. These effects were partly offset by clothing prices that rose less strongly than this time last year."
Inflation has hit a five year high and is now 0.9% above the rate of wage growth - meaning that the incomes squeeze is becoming tighter.
And if you are employed in the public sector - where pay rises are capped at 1% - or rely on benefits - which are frozen - that squeeze is even tighter.
With poor economic growth figures and uncertainty over the Brexit process, the Bank of England's decision on whether to raise interest rates next month is finely balanced.
Yes, "price stability" is the main purpose of the Bank of England's monetary policy committee which makes the decision.
But many believe that inflation may now have peaked as the effects of sterling's depreciation following the referendum dissipate.
An interest rate rise now, which increases prices for millions of mortgage holders and could dampen economic activity, could be just the medicine the economy doesn't need.
The Bank of England is tasked with keeping CPI inflation at 2%, and last month its governor, Mark Carney, indicated interest rates could rise in the "relatively near term" if the economy continued on its current path.
The governor of the Bank of England has to write a letter of explanation to the chancellor if the inflation rate is more than 1% either side of the 2% target.
On Tuesday, Mr Carney told MPs on the Treasury Committee that "inflation rising potentially above the 3% level in the coming months is something we have anticipated", because of the fall in the value of the pound.
He said he expected inflation to peak in October or November, and at that point he thought it would be "more likely than not that I would be writing on behalf of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) a letter to the chancellor."
Laith Khalaf, senior analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "The tick upwards in inflation will increase expectations of a rate rise from the Bank of England later on this year, stoked by a flurry of hawkish rhetoric coming from Threadneedle Street."
However, he added, it is not a foregone conclusion, "so it's probably best not to count those chickens until they're hatched".
Suren Thiru, head of economics at the British Chambers of Commerce, said the Bank of England's policymakers "should resist the temptation to raise interest rates, particularly during this period of heightened political uncertainty".
"Raising rates before the UK economy is ready risks undermining consumer and business confidence, weakening the UK growth prospects further," he said.
Pensioners will be celebrating again. Today's CPI inflation figure means they will get a 3% rise next April, their largest pension increase for six years.
Those on the new state pension will see their weekly income rise to £164.
Compare that to workers, who've seen their earnings rise by 2.1% over the last year.
This is all thanks to the triple lock, which sees the state pension rise by the highest of earnings, prices or 2.5%.
Food for thought for the chancellor, perhaps, who's reported to be considering tax concessions for younger people in his forthcoming budget, to even-up the inter-generational unfairness that the triple lock has contributed to.
The 2.5% element of the triple lock is due to be dropped in 2021.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41649498
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Amber alert as Ophelia storm reaches Scotland - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The warning is extended to south-west Scotland as the tail-end of Hurricane Ophelia hits with gusts of more than 70mph.
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Scotland
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The Scout hut in Castle Douglas lost its roof in the high winds
Winds gusting at more than 70mph and heavy rain have hit parts of Scotland as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia reached the UK and Ireland.
The Met Office has extended an amber "be prepared" warning to cover the south-west of the country. It is valid from 12:00 to 23:00.
A yellow "be aware" warning remains in place across much of southern and central Scotland.
A further alert of strong winds is in place for many areas on Tuesday.
Ophelia reached Ireland early on Monday with gusts of almost 100mph (161km/h) reported on the south coast.
By Monday evening, gusts of 73mph were recorded in south-west Scotland.
Police Scotland said the storm was affecting Dumfries and Galloway with a number of trees being blown down in the region.
In Castle Douglas, high winds blew the roof off a Scout hut. The roof then became stuck on top of a nearby church.
Residents living near the hut in Blackpark Road, Douglas Court Drive and Jubilee Terrace are being asked to remain indoors.
The A74 near to Castle Douglas was earlier closed after a tree came down over the road.
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The Dumfries and Galloway Virtual Operations and Support Team said: "Police Scotland are warning the public that they are currently dealing with a high number of calls from the public in relation to the effects of Storm Ophelia.
"Reports of trees down, roofs blown off buildings and other damage would indicate that the storm is now taking effect. Calls are incoming from Castle Douglas in the east through to Mull of Galloway in the west."
Police Scotland has advised against all but essential travel in the Galloway region.
Images captured by the University of Dundee satellite receiving station show the scale of the storm
Gusts of up to 60mph are expected to hit the Glasgow area in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
Weather experts predict the high winds will then move across eastern parts of the country.
On Sunday, the Met Office issued Northern Ireland with an amber "potential danger to life" warning.
That was subsequently extended to cover Dumfries and Galloway, Lothian and Borders and Strathclyde.
Edinburgh Airport said its flights to Ireland had been cancelled but all others were unaffected.
SP Energy Networks said it had a team of engineers on standby to tackle any power cuts.
The Scottish Environment Protection Agency has issued a series of flood alerts and warnings for the south west of Scotland.
David Faichney, duty flood manager, said: "The storm this evening is expected to cause significant disruption to some coastal communities in the Solway Coast and Firth of Clyde.
"A combination of tidal surge and large waves will cause overtopping along exposed coastal areas, particularly the Mull of Galloway.
"Impacts are expected to coincide with high tide around 10pm this evening until the early hours of Tuesday."
Transport Minister Humza Yousaf said disruption should be expected during rush hour on Monday evening and on Tuesday morning.
"The impacts will be felt at evening peak today across the west and then in central and southern Scotland the morning peak will probably feel some impact as well," he told BBC Scotland.
"The main message to commuters is when that yellow warning kicks in from 12:00 today, right the way through to effectively 15:00 tomorrow in different parts of Scotland, do check the Traffic Scotland website.
"Expect disruption whether you're on the trunk road network, ferries, whether you're taking a flight and even of course on the trains as well. Do expect some level of disruption so check ahead."
The Met Office warned on Sunday that areas covered by the weather warnings could see longer journey times with possible cancellations to rail, air and ferry services.
The forecaster added: "Some damage to buildings, such as tiles blown from roofs could happen, perhaps leading to injuries and danger to life from flying debris.
"Coastal routes, sea fronts and coastal communities may be affected by spray and/or large waves."
The charity RNLI said the weather conditions could make seas around coastal areas "particularly dangerous and unpredictable".
Meanwhile, Scottish airline Loganair has offered free flight changes to customers who face weather disruption on some of its west coast routes.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-41627846
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Hurricane Ophelia: Weather warnings lifted as storm passes - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Power has been restored to most homes in the UK but thousands remain without electricity in Ireland.
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UK
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Weather warnings have been lifted after the storm caused by the remnants of Ophelia moved away from the UK.
Some 50,000 UK homes lost power during the storm - mainly in Northern Ireland - but most have been reconnected.
However, in the Republic of Ireland, where three people died in the storm on Monday, about 170,000 customers are still without power. It could take days for all their supplies to be restored.
Some 69,000 people are also without water in Ireland.
Households in the worst affected areas have been asked to conserve water.
Father-of-two Fintan Goss, 33, was killed near Ravensdale, County Louth, when a car he was in was struck by a tree.
Clare O'Neill, 58, died when a tree fell on her car in strong winds near Aglish Village in County Waterford.
Michael Pyke, 31, died in an incident when he was clearing a fallen tree with a chainsaw in County Tipperary.
Trees felled in the storm have blocked roads and train lines
The front of a block of flats in Glasgow that had been due to be demolished was brought down
Debris and fallen trees will continue to cause problems
In Northern Ireland, flights and ferries were cancelled as a result of the storm, and many roads are still closed due to fallen trees.
More than 400 incidents of weather-related damage in the country have left people without electricity - mainly in Counties Down, Armagh and Antrim. About 1,800 have yet to be reconnected.
Schools in Northern Ireland were closed for two days but are due to reopen on Wednesday.
Three floors of the unoccupied building in Glasgow were damaged in the partial collapse
In Scotland, a clear-up is under way after roofs were torn off and trees brought down overnight, causing disruption to some rail services.
In Glasgow, part of a derelict block of flats already earmarked for partial demolition collapsed overnight, and a Scouts hall roof was blown off in Dumfries and Galloway as the region took the brunt of winds up to 77mph (123km/h).
In south-west Scotland, 600 homes were without power on Tuesday afternoon.
Some train services in northern England have been disrupted as a result of trees falling across railway lines, including on the line between Halifax and Bradford Interchange.
More than 130 trees were cleared from roads on the Isle of Man.
The Irish Republic's Electricity Supply Board said help from Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK was expected to be drafted in on Wednesday to help restore power.
Crews are already working to fix power lines but officials have warned that repairs will take several days, and up to 10 in the worst-hit areas.
The Health Service Executive in the country said there had been a significant impact on health services.
And it warned of disruption in the "coming days", with some cancellations and delays expected to appointments and discharges from hospital.
A stadium roof in Cork was damaged in the storm
Central London was among the places where a reddish could be spotted on Monday
Strong winds of up to 70mph (112km/h) wreaked havoc in Cumbria on Monday night, damaging the roof of Barrow AFC's stadium and forcing police to close roads in the town.
Cumbria Police said they had reports of roofs and debris on the roads and overhead cables coming down - and it urged people to make only essential travel.
Ophelia was not only responsible for stormy weather - it also drew tropical air and dust from the Sahara, causing a reddish sky and red-looking sun throughout parts of the UK on Monday.
The charity Asthma UK warned the phenomenon could trigger "potentially fatal asthma attacks" and advised at the time that severe sufferers should stay indoors.
Are you affected by Hurricane Ophelia? E-mail your stories and pictures to haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk
Please do not put yourself in any danger to take images and please heed all safety warnings.
You can also contact us in the following ways:
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Why I secretly taped my disability assessment - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Some ill and disabled people are so worried about the process, they are using mobile phones to secretly record those interviews, critics say.
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Health
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Nev Cartwright has been left with complications including chronic infections and emphysema.
Every month 60,000 ill and disabled people have their needs assessed for benefits. Some are so worried about the process that they are using mobile phones to secretly record those interviews, critics say. But using that evidence to overturn a decision is not straightforward.
In 2015, Nev Cartwright sat down with his specialist at a hospital in Leeds. He was told his hacking cough and breathing difficulties were caused by a tumour in his left lung. He was 45.
Since then he has had three operations and a lung removed. Nev was awarded the highest rate of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) - a benefit meant to pay for the extra costs of his condition.
But a year later he received a letter saying the DLA was being replaced by a new benefit, the Personal Independence Payment, and his needs would have to be reassessed by a private company.
The night before his assessment he watched a documentary which questioned how they were being conducted.
"I was really nervous about it and made the decision to audio record the interview covertly. It was a safeguard, an accurate record of what had taken place," he says.
The face-to-face assessment is typically an interview with a health professional, such as a nurse or paramedic, lasting between 30 and 90 minutes. It can also include basic medical tests and a physical examination.
The claimant is assessed depending on their ability to complete day-to-day tasks. That report is sent to an official at the DWP who will then decide the final level of disability benefit that person is awarded.
But things did not go as planned. Nev says he had misgivings from the start but it was only later, when he saw the assessor's final report, that he realised something was seriously wrong.
"Some details discussed in the interview were not in the report and others were completely altered," he says.
"She said she'd done a physical examination of my mobility. It was very evident on the audio recording, that she never did that at all."
On his phone recording you can clearly hear the assessor carrying out a peak test to measure his lung function, and reading out the data.
But in the final report, his last reading appears to have doubled from 150 L/min to 300 L/min, making him seem better than he actually was.
"I totally agree that anyone entitled to benefits should have their needs assessed," he says. "But everyone deserves just and fair treatment."
After his interview Nev had his disability payments cut and had to return the car paid for by the mobility element of his benefits.
He wrote to the DWP and told them about his recording, sending them a written transcript put together by an independent firm.
Claimants can record their assessments but only if they provide tamper-proof equipment like this, which can cost £1,500.
Under government rules, secret or covert recording like this is banned. If it is spotted, the claimant is told to stop. If they refuse it is likely that their benefit application will be rejected.
The government tried to get his recording thrown out before his appeal at tribunal.
But exceptionally, in his case the judge agreed a transcript could be entered into evidence. He went on to win his case and his car was eventually returned.
"I've wasted 12 months of my life in an unfair fight with a government department and the people who work for it," he said.
The private company which carried out his assessment says its "high standards were not met on this occasion" and it has now changed the way it gathers evidence in cases like this.
Critics of the assessment process say formal audio recording of all PIP interviews should be mandatory and available to both sides.
"It would remove the distrust and give so much transparency to everyone," said Tony Lea, lead welfare rights officer at Benefit Resolutions, a disability advocacy service which has been campaigning for a rule change.
As things stand the official rules are complex.
A claimant does have the right to ask for a PIP interview to be formally taped and used as evidence, but unlike other disability benefits like ESA, they have to provide their own equipment.
This must be a secure, tamper-proof double recorder which can cost as much as £1,500. A mobile phone, digital recorder or dictaphone does not meet the requirements.
In March, a major independent review of the PIP system commissioned by the government recommended switching to compulsory audio recordings with an opt-out for people who do not want it.
The government says it is "considering the results" of a pilot of recording in the West Midlands.
A spokesman for the DWP said: "Anyone is free to record their face-to-face consultation, but it must be done in a way that best protects both claimants and assessors."
Nev says his experience shows that some vulnerable people need more protection.
"I should probably be more diplomatic but I think the whole system is a mess," he adds.
"The importance for me of getting that audio recording into evidence was the potential to help other people in the future."
Watch the Victoria Derbyshire programme on weekdays between 09:00 and 11:00 on BBC Two and the BBC News channel.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41581060
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Kurz and charisma: What propels young leaders to power? - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Austria's Sebastian Kurz is just 31 - but he is not the first "Wunderkind" in modern politics.
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Europe
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"Black is Cool": Sebastian Kurz (sitting, centre) in a campaign photo in 2011
In Austria they call him "Wunderwuzzi" - meaning "whizzkid" or "hotshot".
At just 31, the conservative Sebastian Kurz is poised to become Europe's youngest leader, after giving the Austrian People's Party a dramatic makeover.
No detail is too small for the ambitious young politician eyeing the summit of political power.
In 2011 Mr Kurz posed on a jeep for a "Black is Cool" party campaign - when black was the party colour. But for this election, in which he emerged the clear winner, he made the party turquoise, in a big rebranding exercise.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The spotlight was on Sebastian Kurz in Austria's general election
The new colour obviously worked. But what else has propelled charismatic young politicians into power in recent years?
Mr Kurz is the latest youngster to take his country's political establishment by storm and shake it up.
France elected President Emmanuel Macron, just 39, who revolutionised politics by launching a new liberal party, La République En Marche! (LREM). Just weeks after his presidential election triumph came LREM's clear victory in parliamentary elections.
He is France's youngest head of state since Napoleon.
In 2014 Italy got its youngest ever prime minister - Matteo Renzi, then aged 39 too. Like Mr Macron, he had never served in parliament, and was a novice in national politics.
But little Estonia upstaged even those "Wunderkind" examples. The vaulting political ambition of Taavi Roivas made him prime minister in 2014-2016, and he is still only 38.
Their success proves that voters are looking for much more than experience when they elect politicians. Youth and charisma clearly count for a lot, along with persuasive campaign rhetoric.
Some fear that in this digital age, dominated by powerful images and social media, style may often triumph over substance in politics.
"They look slick, but do they have the same amount of substance?" asks Kadri Liik, an Estonian political expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations think-tank.
"I sometimes fear what I call a 'davidcameronisation' of Estonian politics: politicians who look good, speak well, mean well, but lack true seriousness," she told the BBC.
She deplored a "tendency to believe that life is all about PR [public relations], performance, speeches and party politics".
David Cameron's defeat in the UK's 2016 Brexit referendum was a PR disaster - for a man who had been a PR professional before rising to the top of British politics.
Wunderwuzzi's smart casual image showed he had a shrewd sense that young Austrians were yearning for political change.
A penchant for open collars and swept-back hair conveyed a boyish image - not like the decades-old stereotype of Austrian coalition wheeling and dealing by men in grey suits.
Smart casual was also the look of Matteo Renzi. His pose in a white T-shirt and leather jacket led The Guardian to ask if Mr Renzi was modelling himself on "The Fonz", star of the US hit sitcom Happy Days.
Sophie Gaston, deputy director of the British think-tank Demos, says this new breed of political leaders "share an understanding of the modern forces at play in campaigning - particularly their grasp of digital and social media - and how to harness these to connect directly with voters".
"This sets them apart from 'traditional' political elites in mainstream parties."
Mr Kurz, Mr Macron and Mr Renzi all rose through established party structures, but managed to convince voters that they were a breath of fresh air, intent on serious reform.
In that respect, Ms Gaston told the BBC, they have connected with many voters' rejection of the political establishment, especially since the 2008 financial crash.
"They are either seen as untainted by affiliation to this political hegemony or, as in the case of Macron, willing to take risks and challenge political orthodoxy."
Barack Obama projected a sporty image early on - even before becoming president
Their communication skills enabled them to outmanoeuvre far-right and far-left populist parties which, Ms Gaston said, were quick to exploit social media.
Indeed, the far-right Freedom Party in Austria accuses Mr Kurz of stealing its thunder on immigration controls.
Projecting a fit and healthy image is a feature of these leaders' success.
On the presidential campaign trail in 2008 Barack Obama played basketball in a photo opportunity in Indiana.
And as president he was often seen on the golf course - now something of a cliché for US presidents.
Many leaders today have been photographed jogging, including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a youthful 45.
But Robyn Urback of Canadian national broadcaster CBC complained "we keep falling for Trudeau's PR".
It was no accident, she wrote, that his personal photographer snapped him jogging past "a group of kids taking pictures on the boardwalk". It made for a nice "feel good" picture.
Mr Macron also has a keen eye for image management. Just before his official photo shoot in the Elysee Palace he was filmed obsessively leafing through a book to find just the right page, so that it could be shown open and impressive on his desk.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Behind the scenes: Mr Macron takes care of the little things...
We are living in a time of "general dissatisfaction with the status quo of politics", says Prof Catherine de Vries, a European politics expert at Essex University.
For decades, she told the BBC, ambitious politicians had to work their way up the party ranks - but that is no longer the case.
They do, however, need "extreme drive - it's not a nine-to-five job". Youth is an asset, she said, along with vision and a will to change the system.
Matteo Renzi was known as Il Rottamatore ("The Scrapper") because he fought the centre-left Democratic Party establishment. "I didn't want to submit to their rules," he said.
Mr Macron abandoned the Socialists when he realised he could woo a vast number of discontented voters outside the party.
But his popularity has slumped in recent months.
So the acid test of the new leaders is whether they can walk the walk, as well as talk the talk.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41640326
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Sainsbury's to cut 2,000 jobs in cost-saving drive - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The UK supermarket plans to cut jobs in human resources as part of a £500m cost-saving plan.
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Business
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Sainsbury's has said it will cut up to 2,000 jobs from its human resources staff as part of plans to reduce costs.
The UK's second biggest supermarket chain says the "difficult decision" will affect roles in stores, as well as in the company's central offices.
It plans to make 1,400 payroll and HR clerks redundant and other changes could see another 600 posts removed.
Sainsbury's is looking to save £500m amid fierce competition from discounters and rising food costs.
The majority of the headcount losses will be from within its supermarket stores.
The 600 roles on which the group is consulting are predominantly HR roles across the supermarket chain, its newly acquired Argos chain, as well as Sainsbury's bank.
Sainsbury's also owns Habitat, and employs nearly 200,000 people in total.
It said it would offer affected staff alternative roles wherever possible, or redundancy packages.
Shopworkers union Usdaw said it would support Sainsbury's staff and look at the company's business case for the plans.
Sainsbury's said last November it aimed to reduce its running costs by £500m within three years. Earlier this year, in March, it said it would cut 400 jobs.
Its biggest rival Tesco is also shrinking its headcount. Tesco said in June that it would cut 1,200 jobs from its head office, just days after revealing that more than a thousand jobs were going at its Cardiff call centre.
All the big established grocers are juggling rising costs and increased competition from the discounters.
It's hard to keep pace with the scale of cost cutting and restructuring underway at Britain's biggest grocers.
And with the competition still cut throat from the discounters, they can't afford to recover those costs by putting up prices too much for the consumer.
Sainsbury's and its other main rivals are all trying to reduce operating costs and simplify their businesses to make them more efficient. It's a big, structural, shift and painful for all those affected.
Figures released earlier on Tuesday by Kantar Worldpanel showed Lidl and Aldi adding sales in the double digits, while established giants were growing sales by around 2%.
Even so, Tesco has 28% of the UK's grocery market, while Sainsbury has just short of 16%.
Sainsbury's latest figures, released in July, were its best in four years, with same store sales up by 2.3%.
A Sainsbury's spokesman said the UK grocery market was "changing at a rapid pace" and meant the firm needed to "transform the way we operate".
He said the supermarket was proposing updates to its HR systems and changes to a number of other support roles as part of a consultation.
"This has been a difficult decision and we appreciate that this will be a tough time for those colleagues affected by the changes. We will support them in any way we can," he added.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41652424
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Why is China investing heavily in south-east Europe? - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Beijing's spending spree in Greece and the Balkans raises concerns that the EU will object to its involvement in the region.
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Europe
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China is pouring billions of pounds' worth of investment into Greece and other Balkan countries to create a "New Silk Road" from the Mediterranean into the heart of the European Union.
The initiative, called One Belt One Road (OBOR) involves the transformation and upgrading of harbours, airports, roads and rail across the Balkans. The Chinese have also bought industries, including a steel factory near the Serbian capital, Belgrade.
But there are concerns that the European Union (EU) might eventually object to the level of investment if it poses a significant Chinese threat to European industries.
Last year, the Chinese state-owned company Cosco purchased a controlling stake in the port of Piraeus, near Athens. The company is investing 385 million euros (£343m) in Piraeus to maximise both capacity and trade with the EU.
Nektarios Demenopoulos of the Piraeus Port Authority says Chinese investment has boomed
Piraeus has always been of immense interest to the Chinese. Its geographical position means it is the first major port for shipments emerging from the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean, and its depth allows it to take the biggest container ships.
Nektarios Demenopoulos, a deputy manager of the Port of Piraeus Authority, told the BBC that Chinese investment in Piraeus had expanded significantly since the Chinese took control of the container port in 2009.
"In 2016 we handled 3.7 million twenty-foot (6 metre) containers," he explained. "That's double what we handled back in 2009. And we will be expanding the container pier to create a capacity allowing us to handle 7.2 million containers. So we will double through-put again."
Those Greeks who are working with the Chinese emphasised the important cultural relationship between the two countries.
Fotis Provatas, of the Athens-based Greek Chinese Economic Council, said. "I was surprised to see how many people in China know about ancient Greek culture and they respect it very much. And they respect the Western culture because they think - and this is true - that it is a continuation of the ancient Greek culture."
He added that the Chinese have huge investment plans for Greece, including plans to buy and then vastly expand Athens airport. He also said China would upgrade the rail network in other Balkan countries, particularly the neighbouring Republic of Macedonia, and Serbia.
Mr Provatas welcomed the investment but said there was also a danger of a backlash from the EU. He added: "Europe wants economic cooperation with China but in a different way to us.
"We do not have industries so we do not compete with the Chinese in that way. They are welcome to come here and make cars and other industrial products. This is not the same elsewhere in Europe. They are competitors."
Greece's Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (l) met with China's President Xi Jinping (r) in Beijing in May 2017
The Greek government believes Chinese investment will be an important factor in the country's recovery from deep financial crisis.
But ministers insist China does not get preferential treatment and that Greece takes its obligations seriously as a member of the EU.
Stergios Pitsiarlos, Greece's deputy economics minister, told the BBC, "We think Greece should take advantage of these new opportunities that the Chinese strategy opens up. Our strategy is to take advantage of our geographical position and to attract foreign investment.
"It is very clear that the Chinese would like to have a corridor towards Europe and the European market. At this point, the starting point for Greece is that we are a country that is a member of both the European Union and of the eurozone, and we will always respect European regulations."
Ana Brnabić, Prime Minister of Serbia, denies that China has any political influence in the region
The Chinese are also investing across the eastern Balkans, including in Serbia.
Last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in the city of Smederevo in eastern Serbia to inaugurate the local steel mill, which had been bought by the Chinese steel giant, Hesteel.
In an interview for the BBC, Ana Brnabić, the Prime Minister of Serbia, welcomed the Chinese investment, saying Serbia is already home to very many Chinese investments, including road and rail.
She denied that this investment would give China undue political influence in the Balkans, adding "Without a doubt when you have a huge inflow of investment from one particular country, it always gives a bigger influence to that country. But I did not notice that it had any political influence."
Serbia has applied to join the EU. Ms Brnabić added: "China wants to get closer to the EU and EU markets and Serbia is happy to be one of the central countries in the One Road One Belt Initiative because it's important for our GDP growth and that is our number one priority today. Politically it doesn't interfere in any way with our EU integration."
Andrew Hosken's report on Chinese investment in south-eastern Europe will be on The World Tonight on BBC Radio 4 at 22:00 on Tuesday 17 October and will be available later via BBC iPlayer.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41654346
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Kevin Nunes shooting: The police mistakes that sank a murder case - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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A family's search for the truth over a young footballer's cold-blooded murder.
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Birmingham & Black Country
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The killing of Kevin Nunes in 2002 remains unsolved after a string of police mistakes
A promising young footballer shot dead. Five men jailed for his murder released after a catalogue of police mistakes.
Fifteen years on from his cold-blooded killing, the family of Kevin Nunes have no answers to their questions, no-one has been held responsible for his death and no police officers have been disciplined.
Here, those at the centre of the saga tell their stories to File on 4.
Things could have worked out very differently for Kevin Nunes. Arriving in the UK from Jamaica as a schoolboy, he began to show promise as a talented footballer.
He impressed scouts at Tottenham Hotspur, and was on Leyton Orient's books. When he moved to the West Midlands, he began playing for Stafford Rangers semi-professionally.
At about the same time, 18-year-old Leanne Williams, from Wolverhampton, caught his eye.
"A friend phoned me and said that somebody liked me, so I went to see who - I was quite intrigued," she recalls.
"He was a good person. He liked playing football, going to the gym and just hanging out really. He was very committed in football."
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By 2002, Leanne was pregnant with his son. But any hopes of Kevin realising his dream as a professional footballer had begun to fade.
He had started hanging around with a bad crowd - a gang of drug dealers linked to a notorious criminal gang in Heath Town, Wolverhampton.
He learned there was quite a bit of money to be made buying cheap cocaine in the West Midlands, and selling it on in Aberdeen.
In what was known as the "Aberdeen run", small-time dealers would board a train in Wolverhampton and head up to the Scottish city, making three or four times as much as they could back at home.
Kevin, then 20, began making several trips. But his money-making scheme did not last long after he clashed with gang members back in the Midlands.
Kevin's bullet-ridden body was found on a grass verge near a farm in the Staffordshire village of Pattingham in September 2002.
Leanne, who had been frantically looking for her boyfriend after he failed to return home, was visited by Staffordshire Police and quizzed about his last known movements.
"The last thing they asked me was what was he wearing. I said 'red cardigan, jeans, white trainers', and they said 'sorry to tell you, it is Kevin we found'.
"I broke down and started crying. Up to this day I don't know what happened or why."
Detectives took about 1,000 statements but, as is often the case with gangland killings, no-one was willing to put a name to anyone responsible.
"They said that they were met with reluctance and that wall of silence, which I know amongst the black community - it's a thing there between the police and ethnic minority, really," says Leanne.
"There's not really that trust there, because we don't believe that they're for us in that way, you know."
But in 2005, a man by the name of Simeon Taylor came forward with key information.
He told detectives that he had been there when Kevin was repeatedly shot and beaten by five men, having driven one of them to the scene.
Police said the killing of Kevin Nunes was gang related
He denied being involved in the murder, and said he was willing to give evidence at a trial.
Already in jail for another offence, when released, Taylor was given protective witness status. It was the job of Staffordshire Police's sensitive policing unit (SPU) to keep him safe ahead of the trial.
The force had their star witness. Five men were in custody awaiting trial for murder. But it is at this point that the investigation started to go very wrong indeed.
As the only person placing the five suspects at the murder scene, Taylor was afforded gold-plated police protection, and he knew it.
He continued to commit crime - such as being in possession of an offensive weapon - but was never charged amid fears it would harm his role as key witness.
His handlers had to clear up drugs paraphernalia he left behind in hotel rooms and safe houses - with no consequences for Taylor.
He was even taken on nights out drinking with officers.
But the most startling revelation is that while on the witness protection scheme, he and his relatives were sent on a lavish, taxpayer-funded trip to South Africa, believed to have cost up to £10,000, as part of a potential relocation package.
His behaviour was so bad, he was asked to leave the country.
Nights out and a trip to South Africa: Simeon Taylor was given gold-plated police protection
Joe Anderson, a former detective inspector who had recently taken charge of the SPU, was flabbergasted.
"I found out he was sent to South Africa - his mother and his two brothers were also sent to South Africa, and spent several weeks over there having a holiday.
"Staffordshire Police was held to ransom, and Staffordshire Police gave in to the vast majority of [the] demands."
Despite being informed about Taylor's behaviour - he had breached a behaviour code of conduct 76 times - Staffordshire's then head of crime, Assistant Chief Constable Suzette Davenport recommended he continue to be granted protected witness status.
"The bottom line is that because of the type of lifestyle he was involved in, I feared for his life," she now says, speaking for the first time on the subject.
"And one of the overriding drivers, because I am a public servant, is to protect life and property, and I absolutely feared that if he wasn't within that protection scheme - regardless of if he might have given evidence or not - that he would potentially have come to significant harm. I feared for his life."
But when Taylor cancelled a hotel booking police made for him, keeping the £320 refund, it was enough to make Det Insp Anderson turn whistleblower.
He believed colleagues had deliberately not recorded this, knowing it could jeopardise the investigation.
"Constantly the words that kept being used to me were, we must get him to court at all costs," said the officer.
This time, he went to Supt Jane Sawyers, the then head of Professional Standards for Staffordshire Police.
He told her he believed what was happening in his department amounted to corruption.
Jane Sawyers has now retired from Staffordshire Police, where she rose to be chief constable
But in her first interview about the case, she recalls a different conversation, during which Det Insp Anderson complained about a lack of professionalism and management support.
Ms Sawyers spoke to her line manager, the then Deputy Chief Constable Adrian Lee, who commissioned an internal review into the department's actions.
It was completed in 2007, before the murder trial took place. The report "exposed failings in the structure, procedures, working practices, culture and management of the unit".
Officers were criticised for socialising with Taylor, and concerns were also raised over the amount of money being spent on him.
A defence lawyer could suggest this amounted to a bribe, the review added.
One member of the SPU was given formal advice by a senior officer, another was put in a different unit.
But the contents of the report were only circulated between a handful of senior officers, and were not disclosed to detectives investigating Kevin's murder.
The murder trial went ahead in January 2008, and five men were found guilty and handed life sentences.
These are the five men Simeon Taylor said were involved in Kevin Nunes' murder. Their convictions were later overturned
Adam Joof and Antonio Christie were jailed for a minimum of 28 years; Levi Walker and Michael Osbourne were handed 27-year tariffs, and Owen Crooks was given at least 25 years in prison.
Leanne, who had travelled to court with her mother and brother Benji, was overwhelmed at the verdicts.
"I cried and I was overjoyed, you know, because I didn't think anybody would get convicted of Kevin's murder.
"I just thought it would be another unsolved case, to be honest."
Leanne and her family moved on with their lives. But two years later, rumours emerged the five men were appealing against their convictions.
Simeon Taylor had been secretly recorded telling a friend he lied in court.
Still concerned the case had been mishandled, Joe Anderson, says he approached Marcus Beale, then the assistant chief constable at the Staffordshire force.
When he heard nothing back, he took his complaints to the CCRC.
"I think the word I'd use is 'shell-shocked'," he says.
"They were clearly shocked at what I was telling them. They told me to go back to the force to secure whatever evidence I could, copy everything and retain everything and bring it back to them."
The chief constable of Derbyshire, Mick Creedon, was put in charge of the probe, which concluded the initial report into the handling of Taylor should have been disclosed long before the trial went ahead.
All five men's convictions were overturned at the Appeal Court on 4 July 2012.
Lord Justice Hooper said the case was "seriously flawed".
"It's to be hoped that the appropriate measures will be taken against those responsible for what appears to be a serious perversion of the course of justice," he concluded.
The Independent Police Complaints Commission took up the investigation.
Meanwhile, the four senior officers under investigation had moved up the ranks since 2012.
Adrian Lee was chief constable in Northamptonshire; Suzette Davenport was about to be promoted to be chief in Gloucestershire; Jane Sawyers was poised to become chief constable in Staffordshire, and Marcus Beale was an assistant chief constable in the West Midlands with responsibility for counter-terrorism.
While Mick Creedon's review found the officers did have a case to answer for gross misconduct, the IPCC ultimately concluded no action would be taken following discussions with the officers' own police and crime commissioners.
Agreeing there had been a collective failure, they all said that there was no evidence that could point to an individual being held responsible and so none faced misconduct charges.
Leanne and her brother Benji still want answers over Kevin's death
Three years after the report was completed, its findings were made public this month.
While it found "significant and serious collective failings within Staffordshire Police" and serious problems with the handling of the protected witness, it concluded there was no deliberate conspiracy.
Jane Sawyers, who retired earlier this year, acknowledges "serious mistakes" were made.
"There was a cock-up, without a shadow of a doubt. There wasn't a cover-up and there wasn't a conspiracy," she adds.
She describes the family of Kevin as being "incredibly dignified" throughout the whole process.
"As I said right at the outset, they've lost a member of their family and they've had absolutely no closure on those responsible for the murder of Kevin. It's a regret of mine."
Fourteen officers were investigated by Operation Kalmia. Thirteen have retired including the three of the most senior. Only Mr Beale is still a serving officer.
Two of the five men cleared of Kevin's murder were awarded £200,000 in damages from Staffordshire Police earlier this year, and it is thought the others may lodge their own claims.
Leanne, whose son is nearly 15, still dreams of justice for Kevin.
"Nobody has been punished, nobody is held accountable, so to me, a report is nothing.
"How is it that nobody, not one person, has been disciplined - nobody?
"It's just shocking to me, it's just absolutely shocking and I just think it's really, really, really, bad."
The full report can be heard on File on 4, Tuesday 17 October, at 20:00 and afterwards on iPlayer.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-41608511
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'Go to the dentist and get fined £100' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Dentists warn that thousands of vulnerable people are wrongly being fined over dental treatment.
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Family & Education
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Charlotte Waite says it is distressing when so many wrong fines are being issued
Going to the dentist is something that many would want to avoid - but how about if you also faced a penalty fine?
More than 40,000 people a year in England are getting fines of £100 - from an automated system that dentists say is hitting the most vulnerable.
They warn that people such as dementia sufferers are unfairly getting caught up in a system meant to stop fraudsters from getting free treatment.
The NHS accepts there is a problem with errors and is promising changes.
The fines, about £4m per year, are being applied by a random screening process that checks on whether people going to the dentist are really eligible for free treatment.
But dentists say rising numbers of people with dementia, or those with learning difficulties, are being unfairly fined for something as simple as ticking a wrong box in confusing paperwork.
When these have been challenged, about 90% have been overturned as having been incorrectly applied.
The British Dental Association says the problem seems to be increasing and with an ageing population is only likely to get worse.
Charlotte Waite, a senior dentist working in Loughborough, Leicestershire, says this is a problem appearing on a "daily basis".
"This has become a significant barrier to care. It can cause a lot of distress if people feel they are seen as fraudulent," she says.
Mrs Waite, vice-chair of the British Dental Association's England community dental services committee, is leading a campaign to stop a wave of fines for elderly and frail people, those with dementia or learning difficulties, who have made honest mistakes when filling in forms about free care.
She says even when patients are eligible for free treatment, an incorrect description of specific benefits or failure to renew documents can trigger a penalty fine, which rises to £150 if there is a delay in payment.
And she says because it typically affects vulnerable and often low-income families, there has been a lack of a "powerful advocate" to raise the issue.
Many such patients will be brought to the dentist by a carer, and Mrs Waite says they might not have the detailed information about types of benefit and exemption certificates.
She says this becomes a dilemma for dentists, whether to turn away patients or to treat them and then risk that patients could face a fine.
Patients might turn up for the dentist and go away again without treatment because of confusion over benefits and entitlements and worries about being fined.
"I feel very strongly that clinical time should be spent on clinical work," she says, rather then trying to navigate the benefits system.
"It's an extreme waste of clinical time.
"We really need to sort this out now."
What dentists say they've seen
"They were fined twice over an 18-month period, due to the change in exemption and Mum accidently putting the wrong thing on the form.
"Mum was having a bad year and the patient had suffered a few health problems, and these fines were very upsetting and caused lots of anxiety.
The NHS says it is going to launch an awareness-raising campaign and make information simpler
"We did manage to get the fines turned around, but this took long periods of time and many phone calls and a letter. We were constantly up against a brick wall."
"He contacted me in quite a panic and I had to reassure him and request that he brought in the paperwork to me to see, I completed the appeal form for him as he was entitled to claim free dental care.
"The appeal form that needed sending back was quite a complex letter, and I think our patient would have struggled to respond to it without help.
"I felt it was most unfair for him to have to go through that."
"I phoned on her behalf, but they would not accept my word regarding the patient's special needs and wanted a letter from the patient's doctor.
"It took three weeks for the patient to get in to see the doctor as it wasn't urgent. All I could get was a deferral in increasing the fine [for non-payment] while the patient waited for a letter from her doctor."
What the NHS wants to do in response
The NHS Business Services Authority, which oversees the fining system, accepts there is a problem and is looking for a way to make improvements.
A spokeswoman says no-one wants vulnerable people to be unfairly fined or for dentists to waste valuable clinical time.
Dentists say the fining errors need to be "sorted out" as soon as possible
The checks have an important role in making sure free treatment isn't being unfairly accessed by those who should pay.
The screening system compares what people have put on forms at the dentist against two databases of information about benefits and entitlements - and if these do not match, the fining system generates a penalty notice.
The most recent figures suggest almost 120,000 fines have been issued over the past three years.
But the British Dental Association says when 30,000 of these fines were checked, almost 90% were overturned, suggesting the scale of the error in the system.
"We want to make sure that patients, particularly those who struggle with literacy, understand if they are entitled to receive free dental treatment or if they should pay," says a NHS Business Services Authority spokeswoman.
"We recognise the importance of information and access to it for everyone."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-41639456
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Ghost of boy 'seen at Bolsover Castle in Derbyshire' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The ghost apparently held visitors' hands at the castle, dubbed the "spookiest" by English Heritage.
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Derby
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English Heritage staff said they saw a ghost of a little boy at Bolsover Castle
A castle where the ghost of a boy was apparently seen holding visitors' hands without them noticing has been voted England's spookiest.
English Heritage (EH) staff gave the verdict on Bolsover Castle in Derbyshire, which is built on an ancient burial ground.
The 1,800 EH employees rated the site they work at on a "spooky scale".
Other events at the ex-home of William Cavendish, include strange footsteps and slamming doors, EH reports.
People also said they had felt like they were being pushed, had cold sensations and heard muffled voices.
EH looks after 400 castles, abbeys and historic houses nationwide.
William Cavendish, the first Duke of Newcastle, inherited the Derbyshire castle
Security guards said they have seen unexplained lights at the castle and one woman claims she heard a scream as she was locking up, only to find no-one there.
Kenilworth Castle was rated second in the "spooky poll"
The 900-year-old Kenilworth Castle, in Warwickshire, came a close second in the "spooky poll".
Staff said they have encountered ghostly figures, an antique cot rocking by itself and the smell of pipe smoke.
A young girl drowned in a well at Carisbrooke Castle
Carisbrooke Castle, on the Isle of Wight, whose deep well was the site of a young girl's drowning, is believed to be haunted by several figures.
Employees said they often heard the sound of children laughing in rooms.
Down House was the home of the scientist Charles Darwin
Lucy Hutchings, of EH, said: "Our sites are soaked in history and from bloody battles to dark deeds, not all of their stories are sweetness and light.
"Our castles and palaces... can be eerie places and some of our team have seen and heard things they can't easily explain."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-41651706
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Crimewatch axed by BBC after 33 years - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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But daytime sister programme Crimewatch Roadshow will continue, the corporation says.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Jeremy Vine and Tina Daheley have fronted the show since its relaunch last year
Crimewatch, one of the BBC's longest-running shows, is being axed after 33 years.
The programme, which asks viewers for help to track down criminals, is hosted by Jeremy Vine and Tina Daheley.
The BBC said in a statement: "We are incredibly proud of Crimewatch and the great work it has done over the years.
"This move will also allow us to create room for new innovative programmes in peak time on BBC One." Daytime series Crimewatch Roadshow will continue.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Former Crimewatch presenter recalls his famous 'Don't have nightmares' line
"We believe the successful Crimewatch Roadshow format in daytime is the best fit for the brand going forward and we will increase the number of episodes to make two series a year," the BBC said.
The Sun, which first broke the story, said ratings had suffered as it was scheduled against Cold Feet and Broadchurch.
Three episodes have aired this year - in February and March - watched by an average of almost three million viewers. That is down from 14 million who watched at its peak.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, former Crimewatch presenter Nick Ross said: "I'm amazed that it's gone on for so long. And it's a tribute to the team they've kept it going.
"When it started, it was revolutionary. Up to that point, television and radio basically talked at the audience. There was no internet, very few phone-ins, this was a programme where the audience could talk back and could actually influence the end of the programme.
"This sort of revolutionary thing then had a huge impact on television generally and has kept going for 33 years despite all the changes in technology."
Ross said falling ratings had had an impact on crime-solving.
"If you get 15 million people watching a programme and you have an appeal, the chance of finding somebody, that one witness who saw something they had no idea was connected with the crime... they can ring in.
"Once your audience starts plummeting, you go back to two million, one million, your chances of finding that person are so remote."
Other previous Crimewatch presenters include Jill Dando, who was murdered in 1999 - with her own case being featured on the show.
Dando, one of the BBC's best-known TV personalities at the time, was shot dead on her doorstep in west London.
Barry George was convicted of her murder in 2001 but was acquitted of the killing at a retrial in 2008 after doubt was cast on the reliability of gunshot residue evidence. Her killer has never been found.
Other Crimewatch hosts over the years include Sue Cook, Kirsty Young, Fiona Bruce and Rav Wilding.
Famous cases the show has featured and helped solve include the James Bulger murder, the killings of Lin and Megan Russell and the murder of schoolgirl Sarah Payne.
BBC Today programme presenter Nick Robinson tweeted a tribute to the show, which gave him his first job 30 years ago.
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Jeremy Vine and Tina Daheley - who also reads the news on the Radio 1 breakfast show - took over as hosts of Crimewatch in September 2016.
The head of the Metropolitan Police described the programme as "public service broadcasting at its best".
Cressida Dick said: "Criminals are behind bars right now because witnesses have seen the show and come forward and I would like to thank the Crimewatch team for their professionalism in bringing the appeals to life."
The Police Federation said it was a "shame" that the programme was ending, and that it had shown "the complex side of policing and solve crime".
Simon Kempton, the Police Federation's head of operational policing, said: "For those wider appeals which needed national coverage it was great and there has been nothing else that has been able to give cases such a wide reach, but if there aren't the audience figures and people aren't watching it then you have to move with the times."
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
• None Jeremy Vine to be new Crimewatch host
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41648972
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Photos from 1970s show life in Manchester's Moss Side - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The images paint a very different picture of one of Manchester's most notorious neighbourhoods.
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Manchester
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Children play on the street in Moss Side in 1972
Moss Side has long been associated with drugs, gangs and violence. But a collection of rarely seen images paint a very different picture of one of Manchester's most notorious neighbourhoods.
When Daniel Meadows moved to the city in 1970, he had a less than complimentary view of it.
"It was a big dark city, it was very dirty, it was damp, it rained all the time.
"But it was full of the most wonderful mix of people."
A family poses for a portrait in the street
It was a sharp awakening for the aspiring photographer, who recalls having a "protected, sheltered childhood" in Gloucestershire.
"By the time I was 18, I was exploding with curiosity about the world and I found myself in Manchester - I might as well have landed on the moon really."
He based himself in Moss Side "because it was cheap" and close to his art school at the former Manchester Polytechnic.
"I found myself living in the middle of this place where something epic was happening - they were completely bulldozing the place."
A couple in cowboy hats are captured while watching a local parade
Demolition in Moss Side was part of a nationwide slum clearance of Victorian terraces, where the houses were described by the area's former Conservative MP, James Watts, as "unfit for human habitation".
It made way for new accommodation and while some residents remained, many were relocated to other parts of the city or chose to move.
Prof Gus John joined other local figures in campaigning against the destruction while working at the University of Manchester.
"The houses were very sturdily built and could have been renovated with some help from government… the area could have been spruced up.
"What they were doing was not just demolishing old houses, they were demolishing communities - there never was that sense of integrated community identity [again]."
Two young friends smile shyly for their photograph
The make-up of the neighbourhood included families of Irish, Polish, Asian and African-Caribbean origin - a "good spread" with a "high level of integration", Prof John said.
"The sense of mutual collaboration on all kind of issues... was absolutely fantastic.
"There were, and still are, people of all dispositions living in Moss Side, people who propped up the health service, people who propped up the industries in Trafford Park."
The portraits were taken in a studio in a disused shop
Keen to document life in Moss Side, Mr Meadows rented a disused barber's shop in 1972 and set up a studio where residents could get their picture taken for free.
He also took snaps on the streets, with curious children edging into shot and people, both young and old, neatly turned out despite the deprivation.
Many women were seamstresses and tailored stylish outfits for their daughters.
Children look at the images in the studio's front window
Three girls edge into a shot in the street
Many of the girls had stylish, tailored outfits
"Most of the parents had high aspirations for the young people," said Prof John, adding that there were several youth clubs and active churches.
"They had a thriving community... and a much greater level of economic activity among that population than you would find now."
Mr Meadows' subjects included local characters and a woman with her foster children
Former resident Christine Henry said: "It was more friendly… if you were going out you would ask a neighbour to take a child in, or they would come to your house.
"I've still got friends [from then] - their kids call me auntie, my children call them auntie, we look at each other as family… we look at each other as sisters."
An elderly gentleman joins two girls to peer at the pictures in the studio's window
Local families struggled financially but affordable housing in Moss Side provided a rare opportunity to own a home.
Former resident Freddie Crooks recalled the demolition as a "heartbreaking" experience.
"The thing is [our home] was a beautiful house… with enough space for a couple and six children."
Prof John believes the destruction of the houses and by extension, the communities, contributed to the headline-grabbing crime of the 1980s onwards.
"There was something quite toxic about the way in which people were expected to live on those [new] estates - it was like herding people.
"You had to walk miles to a shop, there were no facilities for integrating people - no community centres, for example.
"The decision-makers thought that by simply renewing the physical infrastructure, they would actually be improving communities, but quite the opposite happened."
Daniel Meadows, pictured at the back, poses with locals outside his studio
Mr Meadow's first exhibition was at the Manchester Caribbean Carnival
Mr Meadows held his first exhibition of photos showing life in Moss Side at the inaugural Manchester Caribbean Festival in 1972, nailing his pictures to a tree at Alexandra Park.
He continued to document everyday life, taking pictures as he toured England in a bus, which were later exhibited at Tate Britain.
Over the summer, he returned to the festival to meet some of the subjects he photographed 45 years ago.
"Sometimes it got too much negative press," he said, reflecting on the escalation of crime in Moss Side after he left.
"Things happen elsewhere as well but they just concentrated too much on this part of it," he said.
"But I'd like to think that's the past."
See the full report on BBC Inside Out North West on BBC One at 19:30 BST 16 October.
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-41361171
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Wi-fi security flaw 'puts devices at risk of hacks' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Researchers have revealed details of a major problem with the way wi-fi data is protected.
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Technology
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The wi-fi connections of businesses and homes around the world are at risk, according to researchers who have revealed a major flaw dubbed Krack.
It concerns an authentication system which is widely used to secure wireless connections.
Experts said it could leave "the majority" of connections at risk until they are patched.
The researchers added the attack method was "exceptionally devastating" for Android 6.0 or above and Linux.
A Google spokesperson said: "We're aware of the issue, and we will be patching any affected devices in the coming weeks."
The US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (Cert) has issued a warning on the flaw.
"US-Cert has become aware of several key management vulnerabilities in the four-way handshake of wi-fi protected access II (WPA2) security protocol," it said.
"Most or all correct implementations of the standard will be affected."
Most wi-fi devices could be at risk
Computer security expert from the University of Surrey Prof Alan Woodward said: "This is a flaw in the standard, so potentially there is a high risk to every single wi-fi connection out there, corporate and domestic.
"The risk will depend on a number of factors including the time it takes to launch an attack and whether you need to be connected to the network to launch one, but the paper suggests that an attack is relatively easy to launch.
"It will leave the majority of wi-fi connections at risk until vendors of routers can issue patches."
Industry body the Wi-Fi Alliance said that it was working with providers to issue software updates to patch the flaw.
"This issue can be resolved through straightforward software updates and the wi-fi industry, including major platform providers, has already started deploying patches to wi-fi users.
"Users can expect all their wi-fi devices, whether patched or unpatched, to continue working well together."
It added that there was "no evidence" that the vulnerability had been exploited maliciously.
Tech giant Microsoft said that it had already released a security update.
The vulnerability was discovered by researchers led by Mathy Vanhoef, from Belgian university, KU Leuven.
According to his paper, the issue centres around a system of random number generation known as nonce (a number that can only be used once), which can in fact be reused to allow an attacker to enter a network and snoop on the data being sent in it.
"All protected wi-fi networks use the four-way handshake to generate a fresh session key and so far this 14-year-old handshake has remained free from attacks, he writes in the paper describing Krack (key reinstallation attacks).
"Every wi-fi device is vulnerable to some variants of our attacks. Our attack is exceptionally devastating against Android 6.0: it forces the client into using a predictable all-zero encryption key."
Dr Steven Murdoch from University College, London said there were two mitigating factors to what he agreed was a "huge vulnerability".
"The attacker has to be physically nearby and if there is encryption on the web browser, it is harder to exploit."
More details can be found at this website.
Prof Alan Woodward explained the issue to the BBC.
When any device uses wi-fi to connect to, say, a router it does what is known as a "handshake": it goes through a four-step dialogue, whereby the two devices agree a key to use to secure the data being passed (a "session key").
This attack begins by tricking a victim into reinstalling the live key by replaying a modified version of the original handshake. In doing this a number of important set-up values can be reset which can, for example, render certain elements of the encryption much weaker.
This attacks appears to work on all wi-fis tested - prior to the patches currently being issued.
In some it is possible to decrypt and inject data, enabling an attacker to hijack a connection. In others it is even worse as it is possible to forge a connection, which, as the researchers note, is "catastrophic".
Not all routers will be affected but the people this could be most problematic for are the internet service providers who have millions of routers in customers' homes. How will they make sure all of them are secure?
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-41635516
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Red sun phenomenon 'caused by Hurricane Ophelia' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Saharan dust and forest fires are to blame for the phenomenon, says a weather expert.
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England
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Central London was one of many parts to witness the phenomenon
An "unusual" reddish sky and red-looking sun have been reported across many parts of England.
The phenomenon was initially seen in the west of England and Wales before spreading to other areas.
BBC weather presenter Simon King said it was due to the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia dragging in tropical air and dust from the Sahara.
He added that debris from forest fires in Portugal and Spain was also playing a part.
The dust has caused shorter wavelength blue light to be scattered, making it appear red.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. BBC Weather presenter Charlie Slater explains why the sun looks red
The red-looking sun was seen in Bristol city centre
He said: "Ophelia originated in the Azores where it was a hurricane and as it tracked its way northwards it dragged in tropical air from the Sahara."
This meant dust from the Sahara was brought with it, he said.
"The dust gets picked up into the air and goes high up into the atmosphere, and that dust has been dragged high up in the atmosphere above the UK," Mr King explained.
The particles in the air cause blue light to scatter, leaving longer-wavelength red light to shine through.
The Met Office said the "vast majority" of the dust was as a result of forest fires in Iberia, which have sent debris into the air and that has been dragged north by Ophelia.
An orange sky was visible in Bransford in Worcestershire
A red sun was spotted in the sky over Bromsgrove in Worcestershire
This was the scene in Ludlow, Shropshire
Meanwhile, hundreds took to Twitter to share their theories and snaps of the unusual red sun and yellow skies.
Using the hashtags #redsun and #ophelia, pictures were posted with earnest tags insisting that: "There is NO colour correction on this image".
As the skies turned beige over London, Hugh Bennett wondered if: "This is what it must have been like living in the olden days when everything was sepia", while James McNicholas blamed "the hipsters" for putting "an Instagram filter" on the city.
But trending alongside #redsun, #yellowsky and #orangesky was the hashtag #apocalypse.
Like many Ben Shephard posted that: "Not messing around this light is really freaking us out!", while Henry Tudor, said: "This weird light is very disturbing. I keep expecting four blokes on horses to home galloping out of the sky."
Elliot Wagland said: "I just looked out of the window and it appears the world is about to end", and Archer Hampson said: "Somebody said we should head outside because the world was ending. We thought we'd take our cameras."
Louise Lucas, meanwhile, wanted to know if she had missed the memo "about going home early due to #apocalypse?!" and Anthony Court posted that: "If the world does end -please could it be before 10pm tonight when I start my nightshift."
This was the view from Gloucester Docks
The "strange-coloured sun" was photographed over Elkesley in Nottinghamshire
But not everyone was spooked, some were inspired to write poetry like @Scott_W88, who wrote: "Ophelia, you're breaking the sun, You're shaking my garden fence daily".
While Helen Glew, said simply: "The most amazing thing is just how much of the UK is actually seeing the sun on a single October morning."
This was the scene at midday in Cliburn near Penrith, Cumbria
• None Why does the sun look red? Video, 00:00:26Why does the sun look red?
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-41635906
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Should children be heard in English family court cases? - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Campaigners say youngsters should be allowed to put their views to judges.
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UK
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Children, campaigners and some judges are calling for a change in the law so that children at the heart of family cases in England and Wales can talk in private to the judge if they so choose.
More than 100,000 children were involved in family court cases over the past year, according to the guardian service Cafcass.
Many are at the centre of bitter fights - either between their parents or between their families and local authorities. The decisions made will have a fundamental impact on their lives.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Judge Sir James Munby says children should be more involved in court proceedings
Yet they do not give evidence directly, nor routinely meet the judge.
Instead, Cafcass asks them about their wishes and feelings and reports to the court.
This is intended to protect the child - but many children are unhappy with this, and feel they don't have a voice. It can mean they distrust the process and won't support the decision made.
At a recent conference the president of the Family Division, Sir James Munby, said it always struck him as curious that children were "invisible" in family cases.
Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child states children are entitled to:
At present, judges do not hear from children in court in family cases in England and Wales
Oscar, now nine, is one of the youngest members of the Family Justice Children and Young People's Board. It is made up of 40 people now aged eight to 25 who were or are children in family cases.
At the age of seven, Oscar was the subject of a court fight between his parents over where he should live. He said he worried terribly about it, couldn't concentrate at school and would watch the clock, wondering what was happening in court.
He asked to meet the judge. After a brief tour of the courtroom, they talked about the case for an hour.
"I told him what I thought of the situation and what I wanted. Because it is actually about the child, in this case, me."
He is convinced the meeting made a difference, that he was listened to. The judge supported the outcome Oscar had asked for.
For years, district judge Nicholas Crichton argued children should be given the right to talk to judges privately if they wanted.
In 2010, he was asked to draw up guidelines for judges to support this.
Since then, a working group of senior judges has been looking at the issue, including considering whether children should give evidence in court.
And in 2014, the then Justice Minister, Liberal Democrat Simon Hughes, promised to change government policy.
Natasha Phillips discovered that a plan to allow children to meet judges if they wanted had been shelved
But earlier this year, in response to a Freedom of Information request, the Ministry of Justice told campaigner Natasha Phillips the plan had been shelved.
Lord Justice Jackson was one of the most high-profile judges in the Family Division and has recently been promoted to the Court of Appeal.
Last year, he heard the case of a young girl dying of cancer who wanted her body cryogenically frozen.
She was too ill to come to court, so he visited her in hospital instead, and decided to allow the freezing to go ahead.
The girl was thrilled with his judgement and called him "my hero".
He also published a separate judgment in simple language so the children in the case could fully understand it, and recently wrote a letter directly to a teenager who had brought a case asking to live with his father.
Lord Justice Jackson believes that meetings between judges and children should not be an automatic right
Lord Justice Jackson told BBC Radio 4's Today programme not every child would want to meet the judge - for some that could be intimidating, even harmful - and such meetings needed to be carefully planned.
"You want to make sure that the child leaves the room feeling better than they went in," he said. "that the child or young person feels better for knowing who is making decisions about their future.
"And so therefore you have to think carefully about what the conversation should touch upon - sometimes what it should not touch upon - and prepare yourself properly for a meeting of that kind."
As for Oscar, he strongly believes all children should be invited to meet the judge.
"It would just give them a sort of feeling that they were wanted, they weren't the problem, because some children may feel they're the problem because the adults are battling it out for them."
The Ministry of Justice told Today "protecting children and the vulnerable" was at the heart of the family justice reforms and it would be discussing proposals with senior judges in coming weeks.
• None New Family Court comes into being
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41603236
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Einstein's waves detected in star smash - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Scientists detect the warping of space generated by the collision of two neutron stars.
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Science & Environment
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Hear the 'sound' of two dead stars colliding
Scientists have detected the warping of space generated by the collision of two dead stars, or neutron stars.
They have confirmed that such mergers lead to the production of the gold and platinum that exists in the Universe.
The measurement of the gravitational waves given off by this cataclysmic event was made on 17 August by the LIGO-VIRGO Collaboration.
The discovery enabled telescopes all over the world to capture details of the merger as it unfolded.
David Reitze, executive director of the LIGO Laboratory at Caltech in Pasadena, California, said: "This is the one we've all been waiting for."
The outburst took place in a galaxy called NGC 4993, located roughly a thousand billion, billion km away in the Constellation Hydra.
It happened 130 million years ago - when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. It was so far away that the light and gravitational waves have only just reached us.
The stars themselves had masses 10-20% greater than our Sun - but they were no larger than 30km across.
They were the crushed leftover cores of massive stars that long ago exploded as supernovas.
They are called neutron stars because the process of crushing the star makes the charged protons and electrons in the atoms of the star combine - to form an object made entirely of neutrons.
Such remnants are incredibly dense - a teaspoonful would weigh a billion tonnes.
In the landscaped campus of one of the laboratories that made the detection, a fountain sprays jets of water skyward which are then pulled back down by gravity, sending ripples across the crystal clear pond.
The LIGO detector, sitting incongruously in the vast woodland of Livingston in Louisiana, was designed to detect the gravitational ripples across the Universe created by cataclysmic cosmic events.
Since it was upgraded two years ago, it has four times sensed the collisions of black holes.
Gravitational waves caused by violent events send ripples through space-time that stretch and squeeze everything they pass through by a tiny amount - less than the width of an atom.
The LIGO lab at Livingston consists of a small building with two, two-and-a-half-mile pipelines stretching out at right angles. Inside each pipe is a powerful laser accurately measuring any change in its length.
I walk along one of the pipes with Prof Norna Robertson, a Scot who used to work at Glasgow University - and more recently helped to design the instrument's detection system.
Prof Robertson's work has helped the LIGO-VIRGO Scientific Collaboration to make the first ever detection of the gravitational waves given off by the collision of two neutron stars.
"I'm really thrilled about what we have done. I started off as a student in Glasgow 40 years ago working on gravitational waves. It's been a long long road; there have been some ups and downs but now it's all come together," she told BBC News.
"These last couple of years, first of all with the detection of black holes mergers and now a neutron star merger, I really feel we are opening up a new field, and that's what I wanted to do and now we've done it."
The detection enabled 70 telescopes to obtain the first ever detailed pictures of such an event.
These show an explosion 1,000 times more powerful than a nova - a burst called a kilonova.
Gravitational waves - Ripples in the fabric of space-time
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A visualisation shows the coalescence of two orbiting neutron stars
Researchers had suspected that this huge release of energy leads to the creation of rare elements, such as gold and platinum.
Dr Kate Maguire, from Queen's University Belfast, who analysed the collision's burst of light, said that the theory was now proven.
"Using some of the world's best telescopes, we have discovered that this neutron star merger scattered heavy chemical elements, such as gold and platinum, out into space at high speeds.
"These new results have significantly contributed to solving the long-debated mystery of the origin of elements heavier than iron in the periodic table."
Dr Joe Lyman, of the University of Warwick said described the observations as "exquisite".
"They tell us that the heavy elements, like the gold or platinum in jewellery are the cinders, forged in the billion degree remnants of a merging neutron star."
It was also direct confirmation that short bursts of gamma-ray radiation are linked to colliding neutron stars.
By combining information from gravitational waves and the light collected by telescopes, researchers also used a new technique to measure the expansion rate of the Universe. This technique was first proposed in 1986 by the University of Cardiff's Prof Bernard Schutz.
Prof Stephen Hawking of Cambridge University told BBC News that this was "the first rung of a ladder" for a new method of measuring distances in the Universe.
"A new observational window on the Universe typically leads to surprises that cannot yet be foreseen. We are still rubbing our eyes, or rather ears, as we have just woken up to the sound of gravitational waves," he said.
The LIGO Louisiana lab has 4km-long pipes running out from its control centre
Prof Nial Tanvir, from Leicester University, uses the VISTA telescope in Chile.
He and his colleagues started searching for the neutron star collision as soon as they heard of the gravitational wave detection.
"We were really excited when we first got notification that a neutron star merger had been detected by LIGO," he said. "We stayed up all night analysing the images as they came in, and it was remarkable how well the observations matched the theoretical predictions that had been made."
LIGO is now being upgraded. In a year's time it will be twice as sensitive - and so will be able to scan eight times the volume of the space.
The researchers believe that detections of black holes and neutron stars will become common place. And they hope that they will begin to detect objects that they currently cannot even imagine and so usher in a new era of astronomy.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-41640256
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Reversing Brexit would boost economy, says OECD - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The global economic body says staying in the EU would have "significant" positive impact on growth.
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Business
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Reversing the Brexit process would boost the UK economy, the international economic body, the OECD has said.
A new referendum or a change of government leading to the UK staying within the EU would have a "significant" positive impact on growth, the OECD said.
It also warned "no deal" would see investment seize up, the pound hit new lows and the UK's credit rating cut.
It said the outcome of the Brexit negotiations was hard to predict.
The Chancellor, Philip Hammond, said the UK would consider the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)'s report and act where it could.
It's influential. It gets in the news a lot. But what on earth is it? First of all the OECD is an intergovernmental organisation. Its members are mainly the rich countries, though it also includes some of the more developed emerging economies such as Turkey and Mexico - the current Secretary General, Angel Gurria, is Mexican. The OECD does a lot of things that you would expect from a think tank. It publishes research about economic and social issues. It assesses the performance of member countries. But there's more. It's also a forum for its member countries to discuss issues and sometimes to agree on what to do about them, including bribery and tax evasion.
At a press conference following the release of the report, Mr Hammond reiterated that companies in the UK and the European Union would benefit from the certainty of a limited transition period after Brexit.
He said: "[By] delivering a time-limited transition period, avoiding a disruptive cliff-edge exit from the EU, we can provide greater certainty for businesses up and down the UK, and across the European Union."
Angel Gurria, the OECD secretary general, holds a copy of his report
The OECD's secretary general, Angel Gurria, said that any future relationship with the European Union should be close: "It will be crucial the EU and the UK maintain the closest economic relationship possible."
The organisation's report highlights other challenges for the UK, including productivity and the growth of zero-hours contracts.
It says rules should be tightened to restrict self employment to "truly independent entrepreneurs".
But its most forceful language is on the subject of Brexit.
As well as foreseeing a fall in the pound and a freezing of business investment, it says heightened price pressures would "choke off" private consumption.
It also says the current account deficit could be harder to finance, as a fall in the UK's credit rating could lead to higher interest rates to attract lenders from other countries.
The group also commented that UK productivity growth had come to a "standstill", adding that the picture was weakest outside Greater London and the south east of England. It said that pattern "may lead to, or be the result of, important differences among people in terms of income and wealth, jobs and earnings, and education and skills".
It said these "may have been one of the causes of Brexit, as less-educated workers in remote regions might have perceived to benefit less from the European project".
Among its recommendations for boosting productivity are increasing policies that give more power to the regions.
A Treasury spokesperson responded to the OECD's recommendations on productivity.
"Increasing productivity is a key priority for this government, so that we can build on our record employment levels and improve people's quality of life," the spokesperson said.
"Today, the OECD has recognised the importance of our £23bn National Productivity Investment Fund which will improve our country's infrastructure, increase research and development and build more houses."
The OECD suggests the growing use of what it calls "non standard" forms of employment, including self-employment and zero-hours contracts, can be "detrimental" to the acquisition of skills and the job quality of low-skilled workers.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41652416
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'Accelerate' - the word the Tories need - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The government now has one word they can use as evidence that they are getting somewhere.
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UK Politics
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OK, in theory, if I am driving a car at four miles per hour and I speed up to eight miles per hour, technically I am accelerating.
I may still be basically crawling along. I still may be late - very, very late - for my eventual destination. But, by the very action of pressing the pedal and going faster, I am actually speeding up.
If anyone accuses me of going nowhere, or slowing down - well, look at my speedometer. I am going faster and I have evidence that you are wrong!
That is why, in the next few days, don't be surprised if every Tory politician you see, hear, or read about is using that word (at least those loyal to the government) to claim that there is progress in the Brexit talks, just days after the chief negotiator on the EU side declared a deadlock.
As we've talked about before, Michel Barnier's choice of language last week didn't mean that nothing had happened or that there's been no movement at all.
But it made headlines, and all political negotiations of this ilk are in a sense a fight over words, too.
So tonight, the government, beset by its own rows about preparing for a deal, preparing for no deal, preparing to look like they know what they are doing, have a word - one word - that they can use as evidence that they are getting somewhere.
Look, even the arch Eurocrat Jean-Claude Juncker agreed to "accelerate" the talks, you can almost hear them say. Give the news cycle another 12 hours and I'd bet a fiver that will have happened.
But what Number 10 is really hoping for is an agreement on Friday at the summit that points to the way ahead - not just a speeding up, but a commitment to the next junction - to allow the talks to start moving onto the transition.
Despite the promise of acceleration, there is no sign yet tonight that either side is willing to budge far enough to inject some real vigour into the process.
There's no sign the UK is willing to put more cash on the table, yet. There's no sign that a majority of the other side are willing to expand the talks without that promise of more cash, yet.
The talks can accelerate all they like, but without one of the two sides being willing to budge to reach an accommodation, they could be going nowhere fast.
PS: There is precious little detail so far of what actually was discussed at the dinner, and no sign yet of the huge leak of info from the last dinner between this group.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41642052
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Malta journalist Caruana Galizia: Anti-corruption warrior - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The murder of Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia is seen as an attack on democracy.
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Europe
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The killing of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia in a car bomb has left Malta in shock.
On one hand, it caused alarm that organised crime and political vendettas may have spiralled out of control. Caruana Galizia, 53, had relentlessly accused various Maltese politicians and other officials of corruption in her popular Running Commentary blog, and had been sued several times.
But her death near her home in Bidnija, a village in northern Malta, on Monday also represented the loss of "one of Malta's most important, visible, fearless journalists", in the words of former Home Affairs Minister Louis Galea.
In a career spanning more than 30 years Caruana Galizia was a pioneer of investigative journalism in Malta, said the Malta Independent newspaper.
"She was very reserved, almost shy, but had the strongest of standards on personal integrity, and held herself to those standards," a close friend of hers, lawyer Andrew Borg Cardona, told the BBC.
Born in Sliema on the northeast coast of Malta in 1964, Caruana Galizia grew up in "normal, middle-class" family, says Mr Cardona.
Her father had a lift services business and briefly entered politics as a liberal.
She was a voracious reader and got an archaeology degree from the University of Malta.
Before launching her blog Caruana Galizia was a regular columnist for The Sunday Times of Malta, then for The Malta Independent.
She also wrote and edited lifestyle magazine articles, such as "fluffy food and drink features", Mr Cardona said.
"She made a living out of that", he said, adding: "the blog didn't pay the rent".
But she became known as one of Malta's most influential writers, says Herman Grech, Times of Malta online editor. "An impeccable writer and investigative journalist" is how he describes her.
Thousands mourned the journalist in a silent, candle-lit vigil near Valletta
Caruana Galizia's blog mainly attacked ruling Labour Party politicians and their supporters, but sometimes also officials of the centre-right Nationalist Party.
She alleged that the wife of Maltese PM Joseph Muscat was the beneficial owner of a secret Panama company used to channel funds from Azerbaijan's ruling Aliyev family.
Mr Muscat and his wife vehemently denied any wrongdoing. But after the scandal erupted he called a snap election, which he won in June.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Debris was strewn over the road and a nearby field
According to the Panama Papers revelations, two of Mr Muscat's close associates - Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri - were also involved in secret offshore business.
Condemning her death, Mr Muscat said: "Everyone knows Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and personally... but nobody can justify this barbaric act in any way".
"I will not rest until justice is done," he said.
Caruana Galizia also criticised John Dalli, Malta's former European Commissioner, who was embroiled in a scandal over tobacco industry lobbying and lost his job as EU health policy chief.
The influential Politico website called her a crusading, "one-woman Wikileaks" in her role as a whistle-blower.
In December, Politico wrote that "on a good day, Galizia gets 400,000 readers, more than the combined circulation of the country's newspapers (Malta's population is 420,000)".
The controversy did not end with her death.
Investigators will be looking into reports in Maltese media that she told police two weeks ago that she had received threats.
Opposition leader Adrian Delia - whom Caruana Galizia had also criticised - said her murder represented "the collapse of democracy and freedom of expression".
"We shall not be silenced," he added, in a tweet.
Meanwhile one of her three adult sons, Matthew - also an investigative journalist - castigated the police on Facebook, accusing the authorities of negligence for failing to prevent the "assassination".
He called Malta "a mafia state" where "a culture of impunity has been allowed to flourish by the government".
He heard the explosion that killed her and has described running to the scene to find "my mother's body parts all around me".
As well as her sons, Caruana Galizia is survived by her husband, a lawyer.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41650312
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Somali bomb victims: Searching for clues - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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A Facebook page is helping to identify those killed or missing in Somalia's deadliest terror attack in a decade.
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Africa
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A Facebook page has been set up to help identify the victims of Somalia's deadliest terror attack in a decade as well as those still missing.
A lorry full of explosives destroyed hotels, government offices and restaurants at a busy junction in the capital, Mogadishu, killing at least 281 people and injuring another 300.
Somali authorities are struggling to identify the dead - leaving relatives helplessly searching for news.
A group of young people have been raising money for relatives and posting pictures of the missing under the Facebook banner, Gurmad252. Gurmad means "Come and help each other" while 252 refers to Somalia's telephone code,
The Gurmad252 team has set up operation near the scene of the bombing
Photos are accompanied by brief information about where the person was last seen with a number to call should anyone have information.
The team, which has the backing of the government, is also posting the names of those who are being treated in hospital.
It is unlikely we will ever know the identities of everyone who died in the 14 October Mogadishu attack. But this is what we know so far.
A medical student at Benadir University in Mogadishu, Maryam Abduallahi, 25, was preparing to graduate on Sunday.
Her father, who lives in the UK, had travelled especially to Somalia for her graduation, but ended up attending her funeral.
Maryam's sister Anfa'a Abdullahi Mohamed told the BBC Somali Service that she had tried to reach her sister after the explosion.
"I called her number after the explosion, no-one answered.
"I called back and a young man answered and said, 'Your sister is dead and her body is at Safari Hotel. May Allah have mercy on you.'
"Our family is saddened. My parents are most distressed. May God make their hearts strong," she said.
Her older sister had been a role model who liked helping people at the hospital where she worked and at the university, she added.
"She was planning to start training at a mother and baby clinic after her university graduation. She had ambition."
Fa'iso Hassan Ali, 24, had a shop next to Safari Hotel, which was destroyed in the explosion.
Her family have been looking for her since Saturday.
Omar Haji Mohamed has appealed for information about two of his children, a son and daughter, who are thought to have died in the explosion.
Omar Haji Mohamed has been unable to find son and daughter
They were at the family's shop in Soobe, the area where the attack happened, and have not been seen since.
Mr Mohamed has been moving between hospitals and help centres, but has not found them amongst the injured.
A public transport conductor, Suleiman Nuur Ali, 29, had been at work on Saturday in Soobe.
He has not been seen since the attack.
"Please if you get him dead or injured, contact us," a message from his family says.
Bureeqo Abdullahi Adan, 17, was known to be travelling on a bus when the blast happened.
Her relatives are asking for any information.
Abdi Abiid was also last seen in Soobe. The area is near Somalia's CID headquarters and foreign ministry.
His family have not heard from him since Saturday.
According to the director of a Mogadishu ambulance service, 15 primary school children were among those who died.
Abdulkadir Adam told the Associated Press news agency that they had been on a school bus when the lorry exploded.
Freelance cameraman Ali Nur Siad was killed while working for Voice of America, the news agency has said.
"On behalf of the entire agency, my deepest condolences go out to Mr Siad's family," said VOA Director Amanda Bennett.
VOA reporter Abdulkadir Mohamed Abdulle was among those wounded in the attack. He suffered a broken hand, widespread burns and shrapnel wounds to his head and neck. He is receiving medical care in Turkey, the agency said.
Amid all the sorrow and despair, Gurmad252 has found some good news to share. A young woman who had been reported missing has been found alive.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-41652817
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UK TV drama about North Korea hit by cyber-attack - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The TV series Opposite Number was cancelled following a cyber-attack in 2014.
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Technology
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Kim Jong-un's officials described Opposite Number as being "slanderous"
North Korean hackers targeted a British television company making a drama about the country, it has emerged.
The series - due to be written by an Oscar-nominated screenwriter - has been shelved.
In August 2014, Channel 4 announced what it said would be a new "bold and provocative" drama series.
Titled Opposite Number, the programme's plot involved a British nuclear scientist taken prisoner in North Korea.
The production firm involved - Mammoth Screen - subsequently had its computers attacked.
The project has not moved forward because of a failure to secure funding, the company says.
North Korean officials had responded in anger when details of the TV series were first revealed. Pyongyang described the plot as a "slanderous farce" as it called on the British government to pull the series in order to avoid damaging relations.
The North Koreans did more than protest though - they hacked into the computer networks of the company behind the show.
The incident was first reported by the New York Times, which cited Channel 4 as the main target. However, the BBC understands that it was actually Mammoth Screen that was hit by hackers.
Opposite Number's screenwriter Matt Charman was nominated for an Oscar for the 2015 Spielberg movie Bridge of Spies
The attack did not inflict any damage but the presence of North Korean hackers on the system caused widespread alarm over what they might do.
"They were running around with their hair on fire," a TV executive from another company told the BBC, describing the level of concern.
British intelligence was also aware of the attack.
The concern was compounded because Sony Pictures experienced a significant cyber-attack in November 2014. A group called the Guardians of Peace claimed it was behind it but US officials said they believed North Korea was responsible.
That attack was also in retaliation for a drama - in this case the planned release of the film The Interview, a comedy in which the North Korean leader was assassinated.
The studio had its emails stolen and publicly released but also had a significant portion of its computer network destroyed by the attackers. The film was eventually released online amid concerns that cinemas would not show it because of threats.
Sony pulled The Interview from US cinemas after it was hacked
It also led to a strong reaction from the Obama White House, including the imposition of sanctions. There was no commensurate complaint from the British government, despite officials knowing that a UK company had also been targeted - although not affected in the same way as Sony Pictures.
In the UK, Opposite Number has been shelved. The drama was due to be the second commission to come out of Channel 4's newly formed international drama division.
At the time, Mammoth Screen and its distribution partner, ITV Studios Global Entertainment, said they were seeking an international partner. But a spokeswoman for ITV Studios - which purchased Mammoth Screen in 2015 - told the BBC in February that "the co-production hasn't progressed because third-party funding has not been secured".
Those involved will not comment on whether the failure to attract funding and move forward with the production was in any way linked to the cyber-attack.
Mammoth Screen went on to make the ITV/PBS series Victoria
The cyber-threats from North Korea have not stopped. Its hackers have proved increasingly aggressive and adept, targeting banks to steal money and media in South Korea.
British officials also believe North Korea was behind the Wannacry ransomware that struck around the world in May, with significant parts of the NHS affected, although there has been no official response from the UK government to this incident.
But the revelations about an attack on a TV production company may raise further concerns about what North Korea is capable of and how companies in the UK - and the British government - react when it happens.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-41640976
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What Sean Hughes wanted to happen after his death - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The comic, who died on Monday, wrote a poignant poem about his own death back in the 1990s.
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Entertainment & Arts
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A poem about death written by comedian Sean Hughes 23 years ago has resurfaced on social media as a poignant tribute.
The poem, published in Sean's Book in 1994, is titled Death and lays out a list of things he wanted to happen after he passed away.
He said he wanted people at his funeral to "have a laugh, a dance, meet a loved one". He also said he wanted people to say: "I didn't know him but cheers".
The former Never Mind the Buzzcocks captain died on Monday aged 51.
One fan dug out the poem from his book and posted it on Twitter after Hughes's death.
I know how boring funerals can be
I want people to have free drink all night.
I want people to patch together, half truths.
I want people to contradict each other
I want them to say 'I didn't know him but cheers'
adding more pain to their life.
I want the Guardian to mis-sprint three lines about me
or to be mentioned on the news
Just before the 'parrot who loves Brookside' story.
I want to have my ashes scattered in a bar,
on the floor, mingle with sawdust,
Will trample over me… again
Taken from Sean's Book by Sean Hughes, published by Pavilion Books
Sean appeared on Pointless Celebrities last year with Rhona Cameron
The London-born Irish comedian died in hospital in London. He was a team captain on BBC Two's Never Mind The Buzzcocks between 1996 and 2002.
He became the youngest winner of the Edinburgh Festival's Perrier Award (now known as the Edinburgh Comedy Award) in 1990 at the age of 24.
Comedians including Jack Dee, Jim Moir (aka Vic Reeves), Sarah Millican, Katy Brand and Richard Herring were among those to pay tribute to him on Monday.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41651280
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Brexit: Does the UK owe the EU money? - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Brexiters says there is no legal obligation for the UK to pay anything to leave the EU.
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UK Politics
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The Claim: The UK could, in theory, walk away from the EU without paying any money at all.
"We don't as a matter of law owe anything at all" - David Jones MP, 15 October
"We're actually under no legal obligation to pay any money at all after we've left" - Bernard Jenkin MP, 22 September
"We don't owe them any money" - John Redwood MP, 7 August
Reality Check Verdict: Leading Brexiteers are fond of saying that there is no legal obligation on the UK to pay anything at all to the EU as it departs. If there is no deal under the Article 50 process that is almost certainly correct as a strictly legal interpretation, but it is untested. And "no deal" on money would also mean "no deal" on any other issues as well.
Legal and political considerations are obviously intertwined in the debate about a financial settlement as the UK prepares to leave the EU. But it is possible to separate them in some respects.
Article 70 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties states that the termination of a treaty… "does not affect the right, obligation or legal situation of the parties created through the execution of the treaty prior to its termination".
In other words, as the EU would argue, your obligations only come to an end on the day of the termination of an international treaty - the "get-out clause" doesn't apply to obligations made before you leave.
But - and it is a big but - there is a crucial caveat. Those terms apply under the Vienna Convention "unless the treaty otherwise provides or the parties otherwise agree".
And the treaty in question - the Treaty on European Union (TEU) - does provide otherwise, in the form of the famous Article 50. So many (but not all) lawyers argue that Article 50 of the TEU trumps Article 70 of the Vienna Convention.
Now, Article 50 doesn't say anything about money or rights or obligations. So, in this interpretation, the UK would not be required to pay anything if there were to be no withdrawal agreement, because the treaty itself says nothing about any such payments.
Article 50 says "the treaties shall cease to apply to the state in question" either when a withdrawal agreement takes effect, or two years after the Article 50 process has been triggered by the member state that intends to leave. This is the ticking clock.
An in-depth report on this debate, issued by the House of Lords, acknowledges that there are "competing interpretations" on what the UK should pay, but it reaches the conclusion that, because the European treaties do not say anything on the matter, there would be no enforceable obligation to make the UK pay any financial contribution at all.
The Lords has taken the view that Article 50 is in effect a "guillotine" and the UK would be free to walk away without any responsibilities should agreement not be reached. But, and we'll come back to this, it warns that there would be a price to pay.
Would refusing to pay cause more problems than it would solve?
It is also important to emphasise that these are largely uncharted legal waters and some kind of legal challenge at an international level would probably be made. The EU itself could not bring a case against the UK at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, because it is not a sovereign state.
But the remaining 27 member states - acting either individually or collectively - could in theory appeal to the ICJ, or to another relevant international tribunal. They would want their money back.
And this is where we have to get back to politics. No deal on money would mean "no deal" on any of the other issues being negotiated under Article 50, such as the rights of citizens and the future of the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic.
Walking away with no agreement would also do significant reputational damage to the UK - if we can't trust you on past obligations, EU officials would argue, why should we trust you on future ones?
That is why the British government says it wants a deal and it accepts that it does have financial obligations to meet. The trouble is there's no agreement so far on precisely what those obligations are.
In conclusion, it is easy to say - in isolation - that the UK has no legal obligation to pay anything at all. But the reality is that such a provocative move would cause far more problems than it would solve.
Most leading Brexiteers acknowledge that, and accept (with varying degrees of reluctance) that the UK should pay something as a gesture of goodwill. On the EU side it is seen as rather more than that - it is a prerequisite for any deal to succeed.
Update 31 October 2017: This article has been amended to make it clear that many (but not all) lawyers believe that Article 50 of the TEU trumps Article 70 of the Vienna Convention.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41635217
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Domino's pizza shop sex couple spared jail - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Daniella Hirst and Craig Smith were captured on CCTV having sex in a Domino's takeaway in Scarborough.
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York & North Yorkshire
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Craig Smith and Daniella Hirst were sentenced at Scarborough Magistrates' Court
A couple who had sex against the counter of a pizza delivery shop have been given community orders.
Daniella Hirst, 29, and Craig Smith, 31, were captured on CCTV in a Domino's shop in Scarborough in February.
Hirst, of Bridlington, pleaded guilty to outraging public decency and Smith, also of Bridlington, was found guilty in his absence in September.
Magistrates in Scarborough said the couple were "very close to going to prison".
The couple were caught on CCTV at Domino's on Castle Road in Scarborough
An 18-minute CCTV recording of the couple, which the court was shown in September, showed Hirst performing oral sex on Smith before the couple had sex leaning against the counter.
Chairman of the bench, Charles Davis told Hirst, of Gypsey Road, and Smith, of Field Road: "You were both very close to going to prison.
"It was a brazen offence, committed in a public place over a prolonged period and in the presence of staff."
The couple were both handed a 12-month community order and made the subject of a curfew between 19:00 and 07:00 until 27 March.
Smith was also ordered to complete 200 hours of unpaid work.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-41649812
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Jeffrey Barry guilty of 'savage' stab murder in Bristol - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Jeffrey Barry, 56, stabbed and dismembered Kurdish refugee Kamil Ahmad during a 40-minute attack.
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Bristol
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A man has been found guilty of murdering his neighbour in a "savage and sustained" knife attack that lasted more than 40 minutes.
Jeffrey Barry, who has paranoid schizophrenia, falsely claimed victim Kamil Ahmad was a rapist and terrorist.
The brutal attack in Bristol in July 2016 ended with Barry slicing off the Kurdish refugee's penis.
Barry, 56, had denied murder but admitted manslaughter by diminished responsibility at Bristol Crown Court.
During the trial, the jury was told he was racist towards Iraqi-born Mr Ahmad and had previously assaulted him.
A post-mortem examination found injuries to Mr Ahmad included 25 stab wounds to his face and eyes.
Barry, who has a long history of mental health problems, attacked Mr Ahmad hours after being released from hospital against the advice of psychiatrists. A mental health tribunal ruled that he should be discharged.
In the lead-up to the murder, Barry, of Wells Road, had been sectioned, treated at a psychiatric intensive care unit, transferred to an open ward and later released with medication after he promised not to drink or take drugs.
During the trial, the jury was told he had written notes stating his intention to kill people in the shared supported housing unit where the pair lived.
Weeks before the killing at the victim's flat, Barry told police during a phone call he thought Mr Ahmad was a rapist, a paedophile and a terrorist in Iraq.
Kamil Ahmad was killed by Barry in July last year
Speaking outside court, Mr Ahmad's family described the Kurdish refugee as "a deeply loved member of our family".
In a statement, they added: "We have one question: Why was Kamil not protected by the authorities from this violent racist?
"We call on all the authorities to give an honest answer to this question without delay, so that Kamil can rest in peace and so that other vulnerable people are protected."
Lawyer Tony Murphy, who is representing Mr Ahmad's family, said the victim was known to be "very vulnerable and particularly vulnerable and at risk from Barry".
He said there was "documented history" of racist abuse, violence and threats to kill him.
"In those circumstances, the apparent and total absence of a plan to protect Kamil upon Barry's discharge is extremely concerning.
"Had there been a plan, Kamil would be alive today."
Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust described the death as "tragic and brutal".
It said the trust was "committed to close cooperation with all agencies in an effort to prevent such an event happening in the future".
"We have reviewed and strengthened our ways of working with other service providers, including the police, to improve our sharing of clinical and additional relevant information," a spokesman added.
Alex Raikes, from the campaign group Stand Against Racism and Inequality (Sari), said more help should have been available for Mr Ahmad.
"We're seeing cutbacks where we're seeing agencies losing more and more resources, more and more front-line resources, some of our most vulnerable people are even less safe," she said.
"That means that we, as the voluntary and charitable sector, have got to step up and we've got to do more than we ever have done before to be the eyes and ears of people who are so vulnerable, and Kamil was one of those individuals."
Det Ch Insp Richard Ocone of Avon and Somerset Police said Barry "deliberately armed himself" and "purposefully went to Kamil's flat and brutally attacked him".
He said: "Jeffrey Barry may have a history of serious mental illness but at the time he attacked Kamil he knew exactly what he was doing.
"It is clear in the 999 call he subsequently made that he was already thinking of his defence, and the jury rightly recognised he was fully responsible for his actions.
"The public are now much safer with him off the streets for he is an exceptionally dangerous man."
Barry will be sentenced on 10 November.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-41653795
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'Anne Frank' children's costume sparks controversy - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Retailers remove the outfit after a social media backlash over its portrayal of the Holocaust victim.
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US & Canada
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Anne Frank, who became a symbol of courage, died at the age of 15
Online retailers are removing a children's costume from websites after facing a backlash over its portrayal of teenage Holocaust victim Anne Frank.
Several sites have ceased selling the outfit, though others continue to market it as a "World War Two evacuee girl".
The costume - a green beret, blue dress and brown satchel - has been criticised on social media for being insensitive.
Anne Frank's famous diary tells of her life as a German Jew in hiding in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam in World War Two.
Its account of the two years her family spent living in a secret annexe of her father's business premises have made her a household name around the world, and she has come to symbolise courage, optimism and determination.
The Franks were eventually betrayed, arrested and transported to the Auschwitz camp in Nazi-occupied Poland.
Anne and her sister Margot were later taken by train to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in northern Germany in early 1945. They died just months later.
Otto Frank, Anne's father, was the only family member to survive the war.
People have been taking to Twitter to share their outrage at how such a symbolic figure could be used by fancy dress companies and advertised on websites among a catalogue of Halloween costumes.
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Images shared on social media show the costume was initially advertised on sites such as HalloweenCostumes.com - which uses the Twitter handle @funcostumes - as a "WW2 Anne Frank Girls Costume".
"Now your child can play the role of a World War Two hero," the original description reads. "It comes with a blue button-up dress, reminiscent of the kind of clothing that might be worn by a young girl" at the time, it adds.
Carlos Galindo-Elvira, Arizona regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, tweeted that there were better ways to commemorate Anne Frank.
"We should not trivialise her memory as a costume," he wrote.
Another user, Lola, wrote that marketing Anne Frank in such a way was "absurd".
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Halloweencostumes.com later removed the outfit and a spokesman for the retailer, Ross Walker Smith, apologised for "any offence it may have caused".
"We sell costumes... for many uses outside of the Halloween season," Mr Walker Smith wrote, adding that user feedback had been "passed along".
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The product has also disappeared from the Walmart website.
However, other sites such as Amazon have been selling the outfit without any reference to Anne Frank, calling it a World War Two "evacuee girl costume", described as "perfect for carnivals, theme parties and Halloween".
The latest controversy is not the first to involve a Halloween costume.
In 2015, US supermarket Walmart caused outrage for stocking an Israeli army Halloween outfit for children at a time of spiralling violence between Israel and the Palestinians.
In 2014, tens of thousands of people took to social media to debate whether an Ebola-themed Halloween costume was making light of the tragic health epidemic afflicting West African countries.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41651066
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China congress: How authorities censor your thoughts - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The BBC's Stephen McDonell examines China's clampdown on free speech ahead of the party congress.
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China
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. What can and can't you say in China?
If you control public communication you can control the way people think and how they behave. That's what Xi Jinping's government is counting on.
And it is never more true than at the time of major political gatherings.
The Communist Party Congress, held every five years, is set to begin next week: an event which will culminate in the revelation of the new leadership team behind General Secretary Xi.
So the censors here are poised to restrict with one hand and disseminate with the other.
What they're looking out for are key words and expressions popping up in social media. Anything signalling an intention to protest or ridiculing the country's senior political figures will be blocked and potentially see a user reported to the authorities.
For example, a message featuring the name of this country's ever-more powerful leader and his sometimes-used nickname "Winnie the Pooh" (小熊维尼) will simply not go through to group discussions on the messaging app WeChat.
Funny stickers featuring Mr Xi or previous Chinese leaders also can't be sent to chat groups.
This meme comparing Xi Jinping and former US President Barack Obama to Winnie the Pooh and Tigger has been censored in China
China has all the appearances of an increasingly open society: flashy new cities with Hollywood movies advertised on bus stops; digital currency taken up like nowhere else; cool kids getting around on hire bikes zooming through a gleaming modern existence.
And yet, since Mr Xi came to power five years ago, public discourse has been increasingly censored to try and control everything from political thought to sexual activity.
In the lead up to the Olympic Games in 2008, it felt as if freedom of expression was ever on the rise here.
New laws allowed foreign reporters to travel around the country without specific permission from local governments.
It's hard to believe it, but Google searches were not blocked then.
Investigative journalism from local Chinese publications - like the Southern Weekend newspaper and Caijing magazine - was becoming as good as anywhere in the world.
I remember being at a function where a group of journalists were speaking to one of the foreign affairs ministry spokespeople. We had some concern or other, and he was reassuring us that everything would be all right.
"Don't worry," he said, smiling as he pushed an imaginary truck gear into position. "In China we only have one gear, and it's forward."
It sometimes doesn't feel like that now.
Just as China has its Great Wall, so does it also have a powerful internet firewall to block "undesirable" sites
"You can't control the internet," is something people would say in those years - part mantra, part celebration of a new global reality.
But Chinese officials have worked out that actually, you can.
Rather than connecting to the internet, this country has something more like an intranet within the boundaries of the Great Firewall of China.
Sites like Amnesty International, Facebook, and Twitter are unreachable for most Chinese, unless they have use of a virtual private network (VPN), which effectively punts their computer over the Great Firewall.
So, with the congress approaching, there's been an assault on VPN use. The government has ordered Apple to remove all VPNs from its Chinese app store.
The company has decided in favour of not being kicked out of this enormous market and is doing what Beijing wants.
Years ago Google was given a similar ultimatum: allow Chinese officials to censor search results or you're gone. Google didn't cave in, and was blocked.
WeChat is widely used in China
China's most effective censorship tool is also the country's most widespread method of communication.
Pretty much everybody here uses the phone app WeChat. It has text messaging, group chats, photo sharing, location searching and electronic payments.
During periods of political sensitivity - like now - key words will trigger the blocking or monitoring of a post. If sensitive enough, they could even lead to state security knocking on your door.
New regulations also make a person who sets up a group chat responsible for what's said amongst the group.
As you can imagine, the administrators of football team chats might be feeling a little nervous about the content of late night posts from drunken players.
Some will wonder how this is all possible as the app is not owned by the government but run by the hugely-powerful Chinese company Tencent.
Well, under new regulations from the Cyber Administration of China, private entities which run these platforms are required to not only enforce content restrictions but also report those who violate them to the "relevant authorities".
For many Chinese people - even those overseas - WeChat has also become their main news feed. If you restrict this content you can close out certain news coverage.
Potential challengers to WeChat's virtual monopoly are also being reined in. WhatsApp is not 100% within the domain of the Chinese state.
So, at times in recent weeks, its use has been impossible to reach without a VPN.
It is not clear whether the disruption of WhatsApp is a temporary measure to coincide with the congress or yet another restriction that's here to stay.
It is no secret that every Chinese newspaper and television station is under the complete control of the Communist Party.
And yet last year, when Mr Xi visited the People's Daily newspaper, Xinhua wire service and state broadcaster CCTV, he still demanded the absolute loyalty of reporters who should follow the Party's leadership in "politics, thought and action".
But, just in case some journalists didn't get the memo, a set of rules have been sent around governing coverage of this year's congress, requiring all interviews with experts or scholars to be approved by the outlet's "work unit leadership" and the central propaganda department.
However, China's censorship and propaganda model is also going beyond sensitive political matters.
Online bookstores must now work under a rating system from the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television which includes the promotion of "moral values".
Popular blogs focusing on celebrity scandals and the intrigues of the rich and famous have been forced to close.
To talk about such matters has been deemed to be not in keeping with "core socialist values".
For a time, cheap online video dramas were pushing out the boundaries of what could be viewed here. There was a gay sitcom, for example.
But digital platforms have been ordered to stop showing hundreds of foreign shows, and their locally produced material is expected to follow the same restrictions as television.
As it is, on Chinese TV you rarely see anything approaching a passionate kiss.
Two years ago a TV drama was forced to reframe and zoom in on its shots so as to crop out the generous cleavage of its 7th Century maidens, in order to remain on air.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Many in China feel the authorities have gone too far in censoring The Empress of China, as John Sudworth reports
Thus goes the creeping imposition of a state-sanctioned morality under Mr Xi's administration.
Last month, TV dramas were given notice of a new set of rules governing their content. They should "enhance people's cultural taste" and "strengthen spiritual civilisation".
Directors are supposed to come up with engaging characters beyond the realms of lewd behaviour, extra-marital affairs, gambling, drugs, homosexuality and other forms of "immoral" behaviour.
The notice suggested eulogising the Communist Party of China, the country, the people and also national heroes. And one figure is emerging via the propaganda machine to stand head and shoulders above all others.
As the censors shut down dissent, the party is urging a way of thinking about all that's good in China and tracing it back to a single source - Xi Jinping.
An exhibition focusing on the recent achievements of the Chinese government has opened in Beijing.
Vast rooms are dedicated to science, transport, the military, the economy, sport, ethnic minorities, and they are all dominated by massive photos of Xi Jinping. There must be hundreds of them.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Songs have been written celebrating Chinese President Xi Jinping, one even has an accompanying dance routine
The English language newspaper China Daily has been rolling out a series of front page stories - one every day - about the "impact of" a visit from Mr Xi on various villages, towns and cities after the General Secretary passed on his advice.
"He asked people to protect the lake", "President Xi proposed moving people in the villages to the new settlement", "Xi emphasised the importance of afforestation", et cetera.
Some here are joking that this type of reporting is not all that far from what you might expect in the North Korean press describing its own god-like leaders.
When Chinese officials make speeches now, they refer to this or that aspect of what they're up to "with Xi Jinping at the core".
It goes without saying that you cannot question "the core" without this nation's considerable censorship apparatus crashing down upon you.
But, short of such an obvious breach, the rules regarding what can and can't be said, broadcast, forwarded, analysed are thought to be kept deliberately vague.
In this way, everyone is on their toes and the authorities can shut down what they like at any time without having to give a reason.
Editors, cartoonists, reporters, directors, bloggers, comedians, administrators running social media platforms and ordinary Chinese citizens posting to their friends are all staying well clear of certain subjects just in case it lands them in hot water.
In short: Chinese censorship works, and plenty of other governments around the world are looking on with admiration.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-41523073
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Mike Samwell death: Widow 'held dying husband's hand' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Ex-Royal Navy officer Mike Samwell was found by his wife with tyre marks on his chest, a court hears.
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Manchester
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Former submarine officer Mr Samwell died in hospital from his injuries on 23 April
A widow sobbed as she told a court how she held her dying husband's hand and told him she loved him after he was run over by car thieves.
Mike Samwell, 35, had been woken in the early hours by a break-in at his home in Chorlton, Manchester, in April.
The city's crown court was told he ran out of the house and when his wife followed she found him on his back with tyre marks on his chest.
Ryan Gibbons, who denies murder, is accused of running over him twice.
Mrs Samwell, who was allowed to give evidence from behind a screen in the witness box to minimise her distress, broke down in tears.
In a police video interview played to the jury, Mrs Samwell said: "When I got to him, he had tyre marks across his chest.
"There was blood coming out of the back of his head. He was making an awful noise.
"I was ringing the police and trying to talk to the police.
"I was shouting 'Help! Help! Somebody help me!'.
"I was just telling him that I loved him and holding his hand."
Alistair Webster QC, prosecuting, told the court: "One of the rear wheels was actually on Mr Samwell's chest. He was screaming."
Mr Webster said 29-year-old Mr Gibbons, despite his denial and claims he only felt a "bump", must have known he had driven over Mr Samwell.
He said that audio captured by a CCTV camera near the scene recorded "a yelp, a shriek, a large crash, a small crash. Female screams, harsh engine acceleration and shouts for help".
The court heard Mr Samwell, a nuclear engineer, suffered 39 separate external injuries, with "catastrophic" damage to his chest and heart.
Mr Gibbons, of Steven Court, Chorlton, admits burglary and aggravated vehicle taking without consent, but denies murder and manslaughter.
Co-accused Raymond Davies, 21, of Castlefield Walk, Manchester, also admitted a count of burglary but denies manslaughter and aggravated vehicle taking without consent.
He is alleged to have transported Mr Gibbons to the scene of the crime and helped him escape afterwards.
The jury was told police believe two other men were involved in the burglary but have never been traced.
Stacey Hughes, 28, of Steven Court, Chorlton, is also on trial and denies a charge of assisting an offender.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-41650637
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Hurricane Ophelia: Three people die as storm hits Ireland - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Thousands are without power as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia reaches the British Isles.
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UK
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Two men and a woman have been killed as the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia hit the British Isles.
As hurricane-force gusts battered the Republic of Ireland, one woman and a man died in separate incidents when trees fell on their cars.
A second man died in a chainsaw accident while attempting to remove a tree felled by the storm.
Thousands of homes and businesses lost power in Northern Ireland and Wales, along with 360,000 in the Republic.
The power company Northern Ireland Electricity said 15,000 households in the province should prepare to spend Monday night without power.
Police in Scotland say the storm has hit Dumfries and Galloway and it is forecast to continue over the region into the evening.
And in Cumbria, police in Barrow closed roads around Barrow AFC's stadium after wind damaged its roof.
Cumbria Police said it was dealing with "numerous incidents" related to the high winds, which reached up to 70mph in the area.
The force had received reports of roofs and debris on the roads and overhead cables which had come down and it was urging people to only make essential travel.
In Wales, roads and railway lines have been closed and a gust of 90mph was recorded in Aberdaron, Gwynedd.
The Welsh Ambulance service said a woman has been injured after being hit by a falling branch in Wrexham.
In Ireland, the woman, in her 50s, died near Aglish, County Waterford, and a female passenger, in her 70s, was injured.
Her injuries were not believed to be life-threatening, the Gardai, Ireland's police force, said.
One of the men died near Dundalk, Co Louth, after his car was struck by a tree at about 14:45 BST, the Gardai said.
The other man, in his 30s, was killed in Cahir, Co Tipperary.
All road users were urged to stay indoors and not travel unless their journey was absolutely necessary.
Flights were also disrupted as several UK planes were forced to land or divert after reports of a "smoke smell" linked to weather conditions.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A reporter at the scene is caught in Ophelia's wind
BBC Weather said the strongest winds recorded so far were at Roches Point, near Cork in the Republic of Ireland, where they reached 97mph.
Ireland's meteorological service said its highest gust was 109mph at Fastnet Rock.
The Met Office's amber warning for Northern Ireland, western Wales and western parts of Scotland is still in force for wind.
Forecasters are predicting that the far south-west of Scotland will see winds of 80mph on Monday evening, followed by 60mph gusts over Glasgow and the central belt in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
The main danger facing Scottish commuters in the morning would be debris on roads, they said.
Other parts of the UK have seen unseasonably warm temperatures.
And skies have turned red and yellow as Ophelia drags dust from the Sahara through the atmosphere.
An amber warning is in force in Northern Ireland
It could be several days before power is restored to some homes in the Republic of Ireland, ESB Networks has warned.
The roof of Cork's football stadium has also been blown off by the winds.
Ophelia has arrived from the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean and coincides with the 30th anniversary of the UK's Great Storm of 1987.
BBC Ireland correspondent Chris Page said it would be the most severe storm to hit Ireland in half a century.
The Irish Republic's Met Eireann said the storm was forecast to continue travelling north over western parts of Ireland, with "violent and destructive gusts" of 75mph to 93mph expected countrywide.
It also warned of possible flooding due to heavy rain and storm surges.
"There is a danger to life and property," it said.
It has issued a red alert for the country.
In England, three flood warnings - meaning flooding is expected - have been issued in the South West, and there are several flood alerts - meaning flooding is possible - across other parts of the country.
The Scottish Environment Protection Agency has put a series of flood alerts and warnings in place for south-west Scotland.
A trampoline was blown away by strong winds in Cork, Republic of Ireland
The storm hit Land's End leaving these two dogs windswept
And at Trearddur Bay, Wales strong winds whipped up sea foam on to the road
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Reese Witherspoon says she was assaulted by a director at 16 - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The Hollywood star says the incident was at the hands of an unnamed director.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Reese Witherspoon said it had been "a hard week for women in Hollywood"
Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon has said she was assaulted by an unnamed film director when she was 16.
In a speech at an Elle Women in Hollywood event on Monday, the Legally Blonde and Walk the Line star said she felt "true disgust at the director".
And she felt "anger... at the agents and producers who made me feel silence was a condition of my employment".
She said she had suffered multiple other "experiences of harassment and sexual assault" during her career.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Margot Robbie wants "something positive" to come out of the Harvey Weinstein allegations
She didn't go into detail about her experiences as a 16-year-old, but added: "I wish I could tell you that that was an isolated incident in my career, but sadly, it wasn't."
The A-lister, who also stars in TV series Big Little Lies, said she didn't speak about those experiences "very often".
But she went on: "After hearing all the stories these past few days... the things that we're kind of told to sweep under the rug and not talk about, it's made me want to speak up and speak up loudly because I felt less alone this week than I've ever felt in my entire career.
"And I've just spoken to so many actresses and writers, and particularly women who've had similar experiences, and many of them have bravely gone public with their stories.
"And that truth is very encouraging to me and to everyone out there in the world because you can only heal by telling the truth."
The actress said she didn't sleep before giving her speech because of "the feelings I've been having about anxiety, about being honest, the guilt for not speaking up earlier or taking action".
She referred to the fact it had "been a hard week for women in Hollywood" following the Harvey Weinstein allegations.
But she said she believed there was a new attitude towards harassment, which would address "the abuse of power in this business and every business".
She added: "I feel really, really encouraged that there will be a new normal."
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
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Thieves pretend to be police in Llay to target couple - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The two thieves pretended to be searching for damage caused by Storm Ophelia.
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North East Wales
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Thieves stole a "substantial quantity of cash" from an elderly couple's home by pretending to be police officers.
The two thieves said they needed to turn the water stop-cock off because of damage from Storm Ophelia around 19:45 BST on 16 October.
After they left, the couple, who live in Llay, Wrexham, noticed money missing and their closet had been searched.
Det Insp Mark Hughes described it as a "particularly mean crime against an elderly couple in their own home".
North Wales Police is searching for the two men and has warned residents to "be aware of cold callers".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-east-wales-41653072
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Red sun phenomenon 'caused by Saharan dust', analysis shows - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The dust was dragged in from the Sahara by the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia.
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Nottingham
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Dr Beth Steer collected dust samples from her car windscreen and put them under a scanning electron microscope
Analysis of tiny particles has confirmed that dust blown over from the Sahara caused the sun and sky to appear red in many parts of England.
Scientists at the University of Nottingham studied dust particles brought down in rainfall to determine the cause of Monday's phenomenon.
The dust was dragged in from the Sahara by the remnants of Hurricane Ophelia.
Dr Beth Steer collected samples from her car windscreen and put them under a scanning electron microscope.
Anthony Newby captured the skies between Leeds and York
"I was able to collect the dust from my car due to the rain which mingled with the dust to create the muddy rain that has coated everyone's car yesterday," said Dr Steer, from the university's Nanoscale and Microscale Research Centre.
"The particles themselves contain sand grains [quartz], clays and feldspars - all of which are expected in Saharan dust."
Dr Beth Steer said a lot of the rounded grains are quartz, and the more jagged ones are clays
There were also suggestions the red sky was partly caused by debris from forest fires in Portugal and Spain.
However Dr Steer said she would "have to be inconclusive on that one".
"It's possible that some of the carbon rich material I saw was originating from the forest fire, but it is more difficult to diagnose," she said.
"I didn't see any clear pieces of charred wood or similar. Though I did see flakes of carbon, these could also have come from a variety of sources not linked to the fires."
Dr Beth Steer said the particles are all "expected in Saharan dust"
"I thought it would be informative for people to know what was causing the phenomenon and of interest to see it on a micron scale," said Dr Steer.
The scanning electron microscope uses a beam of electrons to create an image of a surface rather than light.
This allows things to be seen at much higher magnifications than they could by light.
Tony Todd snapped this photo in Dalton on Tees, North Yorkshire
Ophelia originated in the Atlantic where it was a hurricane and as it tracked its way northwards it dragged in tropical air from the Sahara.
The dust caused the shorter wavelength light (blue, violet etc) to be scattered away, leaving the longer wavelength light (red/orange) to shine through.
Hundreds took to social media on Monday to share their theories and snaps of the unusual red sun and yellow skies.
Trending alongside #redsun, #yellowsky and #orangesky was the hashtag #apocalypse.
Pete Langford captured the phenomenon over Silkstone Common in Barnsley, South Yorkshire
The dust darkened the sky over Seaham, County Durham, on Monday afternoon
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MI5 boss Andrew Parker warns of 'intense’ terror threat - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Andrew Parker says there is "more terrorist activity coming at us" and it can be "harder to detect".
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. MI5 chief Andrew Parker: 'Over 3,000 extremists in the UK'
The UK's intelligence services are facing an "intense" challenge from terrorism, the head of MI5 has warned.
Andrew Parker said there was currently "more terrorist activity coming at us, more quickly" and that it can also be "harder to detect".
The UK has suffered five terror attacks this year, and he said MI5 staff had been "deeply affected" by them.
He added that more than 130 Britons who travelled to Iraq and Syria to fight with so-called Islamic State had died.
MI5 was running 500 live operations involving 3,000 individuals involved in extremist activity in some way, he said.
Speaking in London, Mr Parker said the tempo of counter-terrorism operations was the highest he had seen in his 34-year career at MI5.
Twenty attacks had been foiled in the last four years, including seven in the last seven months, he said - all related to what he called Islamist extremism.
The five attacks that got through this year included a suicide bomb attack after an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena in May, killing 22.
Five people were also killed in April during an attack near the Houses of Parliament, while eight people were killed when three attackers drove a van into pedestrians on London Bridge and launched a knife attack in Borough Market.
A man then drove a van into a crowd of worshippers near a mosque in north London in June, while a homemade bomb partially exploded in tube train at Parsons Green station last month, injuring 30 people.
In some cases, individuals like Khuram Butt - who was behind the London Bridge attack - were well known to MI5 and had been under investigation by the security services.
People left flowers in Manchester city centre after the Manchester Arena attack
Mr Parker was asked what was the point of MI5 surveillance when someone who had made "no secret of his affiliations with jihadist extremism" had then been allowed to go on to launch a deadly attack.
He said the risk from each individual was assessed on a "daily and weekly basis" and then prioritised "accordingly".
"One of the main challenges we've got is that we only ever have fragments of information, and we have to try to assemble a picture of what might happen, based on those fragments."
He said the likelihood was that when an attacked happened, it would be carried out by someone "that we know or have known" - otherwise it would mean they had been looking "in completely the wrong place".
And he said staff at MI5 were deeply affected on a "personal and professional" level when they did happen.
"They are constantly making tough professional judgements based on fragments of intelligence; pinpricks of light against a dark and shifting canvas."
Mr Parker said they were trying to "squeeze every drop of learning" from recent incidents.
In the wake of attacks in the UK, there had been some, including some in the Home Office, who questioned whether the counter-terrorist machine - featuring all three intelligence agencies and the police, and with MI5 at its heart - was functioning as effectively as previously thought.
However, there was no indication of a fundamental change in direction in his remarks, with a focus on the scale of the threat making stopping all plots impossible.
"We have to be careful that we do not find ourselves held to some kind of perfect standard of 100%, because that is not achievable," he said.
"Attacks can sometimes accelerate from inception through planning to action in just a handful of days.
"This pace, together with the way extremists can exploit safe spaces online, can make threats harder to detect and give us a smaller window to intervene."
Many Britons still fighting in Syria and Iraq may not now return, Andrew Parker said
He renewed the call for more co-operation from technology companies.
Technology was "not the enemy," he added, but said companies had a responsibility to deal with the side effects and "dark edges" created by the products they produced.
In particular, he pointed to online purchasing of goods - such as chemicals - as well as the presence of extremist content on social media and encrypted communications.
He said more than 800 individuals had left the UK for Syria and Iraq.
Some had then returned, often many years ago, and had been subject to risk assessment. Mr Parker revealed at least 130 had been killed in conflict.
Fewer than expected had returned recently, he said, adding that those who were still in Syria and Iraq may not now attempt to come back because they knew they might be arrested.
Mr Parker stressed that international co-operation remained vital and revealed there was a joint operational centre for counter-terrorism based in the Netherlands, where security service officers from a range of countries worked together and shared data.
This had led to 12 arrests in Europe, he added.
In terms of state threats, Mr Parker said the range of clandestine activity conducted by foreign states - including Russia - went from aggressive cyber-attack, through to traditional espionage and the risk of assassination of individuals.
However, he said the UK had strong defences against such activity.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41655488
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Amber Rudd calls Brexit without a deal 'unthinkable' - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The home secretary promises arrangements will be in place with the EU to maintain security.
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UK Politics
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The home secretary said security co-operation must be at the heart of the UK's future relations with the EU
The prospect of Brexit happening without any deal being reached between the UK and the EU is "unthinkable", Home Secretary Amber Rudd has said.
Ms Rudd was responding to a question about the impact on security of nothing being agreed before the UK leaves.
"We will make sure there is something between them and us to maintain our security," she assured MPs.
Earlier Brexit Secretary David Davis defended keeping the "no deal" option open in the on-going negotiations.
After five rounds of Brexit negotiations, the EU has described the talks as in "deadlock" and there has been an increased debate about the possibility of the UK leaving without a deal in place.
One of the UK's aims is for a new security treaty with the EU, and Ms Rudd told the Commons Home Affairs Committee contingency plans were being made in case this was not in place by the UK's departure in March 2019.
Asked whether, if there was "no deal of any form", Britain would be as safe and secure as it currently is, she replied: "I think it is unthinkable there would be no deal.
"It is so much in their interests as well as ours - in their communities', families', tourists' interests to have something in place."
Ms Rudd also said it was "unthinkable" EU citizens would be asked to leave the UK after Brexit, but was unable to offer guarantees while negotiations continue.
Mr Davis was asked about a "no deal" scenario as he updated MPs on Monday's dinner between Theresa May and EU officials.
Reaching agreement with the EU is "by far and away the best option" he said, adding: "The maintenance of the option of no deal is for both negotiating reasons and sensible security - any government doing its job properly will do that."
International Trade Secretary Liam Fox said there was no reason to fear the impact on the economy of no deal being agreed, saying it "would not be the Armageddon that people project".
He told the BBC: "I think that we need to concentrate on the realities, get rid of the hyperbole around the debate and focus on the fact that if we can get a good agreement with the EU, both Britain and the EU would be better off for it."
A UK-EU free trade deal cannot be discussed until the EU deems sufficient progress has been made on other matters and gives the green light.
In his statement to MPs, Mr Davis said the UK was "reaching the limits of what we can achieve" in Brexit talks without moving on to talk about trade.
He urged EU leaders to give counterpart Michel Barnier the green light at this week's EU summit to begin trade talks.
Mr Barnier said he wanted to speed up talks but "it takes two to accelerate".
This was a reference to comments made by Mrs May after her dinner with the EU's chief negotiator, in which she said the two sides had agreed on the need to "accelerate" the process.
Mrs May and Mr Juncker embraced after their working dinner in Brussels
Speaking on Tuesday, Mr Barnier said a "constructive dynamic" was needed over the next two months but "there was a lot of work to do" and issues must be tackled in the "right order".
"At the moment we are still not yet at the first step which is securing citizen rights, guaranteeing the long term success of the good Friday agreement and finalising the accounts," he said.
The talks - which were held as EU member states prepare to assess progress so far on Thursday - were said to be "constructive and friendly" but the UK's financial settlement with the EU continues to be a sticking point and the EU will not discuss trade until this has been settled.
Along with the UK's "divorce bill", the EU is insisting agreement be reached on citizens' rights and what happens on the Northern Ireland border before agreeing to open talks on the free trade deal Mrs May's government wants to strike.
In his Commons statement, Mr Davis urged the EU to give Mr Barnier a mandate to start discussing its future relations with the UK, including trade and defence, telling MPs he was "ready to move the negotiations on".
He suggested the UK was "reaching the limits of what we can achieve without consideration of the future relationship".
"Our aim remains to provide as much certainty to business and citizens on both sides. To fully provide that certainty, we must be able to talk about the future."
On citizens' rights, he said key issues such as the rules on family reunion, the right to return, the onward movement of British expats in Europe and the right of EU residents to export benefits had still to be settled.
Announcing that EU citizens who currently have permanent residence in the UK would not have to go through the full process of re-applying before Brexit, he said the UK had consistently "gone further and provided more certainty" on their status than the EU had done.
While the UK had "some way to secure the new partnership with the EU", he was "confident we are on the right path".
Speaking in the Commons earlier on Tuesday, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he thought a reported bill of £100bn was too high and urged the EU to "get serious" and agree to settle the citizens' rights question.
For Labour, shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer said EU and UK citizens were still no wiser over their future while it "appeared the deadlock over the financial settlement is such that the two sides are barely talking".
"Nobody should underestimate the seriousness of the situation we find ourselves in. At the first hurdle, the government has failed to hit a very important target."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41655195
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No 'magical solutions' for Theresa May's Brexit talks - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The EU wants answers on the money question before discussions can progress, says the BBC's Katya Adler.
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Europe
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Prime Minister Theresa May, seen here travelling to Brussels, wants to speed up the pace of Brexit talks
"Magic solutions" were the words used by one EU diplomat to describe what British Prime Minister Theresa May was looking for during her dinner in Brussels on Monday night.
These elusive solutions are meant to address what the UK sees as EU intransigence in moving to the next stage of Brexit negotiations: trade and transitions agreements.
For now the talks remain at stage one - agreeing the rough outline of a divorce deal, including what happens to Northern Ireland's borders, to EU citizens in the UK and vice versa and how big a divorce bill the UK will pay.
I stood outside the European Commission as the informal dinner between Theresa May and Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker began.
A number of Commission employees walked past me on their way home, eyebrows raised.
It's seen as ironic by many here that the British government came to Mr Juncker seeking help over Brexit.
That same Jean-Claude Juncker is painted almost as the devil incarnate by some British newspapers.
Mrs May and Mr Juncker embraced after their working dinner in Brussels
But the UK has caught glimpses of flexibility from the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, who was also at Monday night's dinner.
He recently raised the possibility of moving to stage two of the talks.
Although Mr Barnier complained last week of deadlock between the UK and EU over the Brexit divorce deal, he has recognised that good progress has been made on other issues.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Michel Barnier: 'We've reached a state of deadlock which is very disturbing'
"Theresa May still doesn't understand how Brussels works," one diplomatic high level source complained to me.
"Even if the Commission thought it were time to move on to transition talks, EU member states are their master in this. And they won't budge on money."
And that's what it comes down to - money.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel told the prime minister in a phone call this weekend that she needs to elaborate on the Brexit speech she gave in Florence last month, when she insisted Britain would honour commitments made while it was an EU member.
But which financial commitments exactly? EU countries want to know.
EU sources emphasise they understand the British argument that it can't commit fully to a divorce bill until it knows what the future relationship with the EU will look like.
No-one expects the UK to agree a final sum until all negotiations are over. They say they don't need the i's dotted and the t's crossed.
But what the EU wants from the UK now is a list of liabilities it accepts - such as pension payments, contributions to multi-annual budgets and loans to countries like Ukraine and Turkey.
Reports in the UK of late have focused on Germany and France being the main blocks in the road to talks of transition and trade. But sources close to Mrs Merkel told me that, while a couple of EU countries are keen to move forward, the majority demand "more progress on the financial settlement first" .
This is EU-speak for wanting Britain to cough up more cash.
Of course German taxpayers are reluctant for the UK to pay a smaller sum than the EU is looking for. As the biggest net contributors to the EU budget, they know they'll be under pressure to make up the shortfall.
But smaller countries also clamour for UK feet to be held over the fire. A big hole in EU finances means they risk losing subsidies, grants and infrastructure budgets.
On Monday night post-dinner, when Mrs May's office jumped on Mr Juncker's joint statement with the prime minister agreeing that Brexit talks should be "accelerated in the coming months", EU eyes rolled again.
"We all want acceleration. That's hardly news," one European diplomat told me. "Time for talks are running out and we all - the UK and EU - want a deal but London has to move over on money or negotiations will move nowhere."
The working dinner on Monday raised eyebrows among some employees at the European Commission
The UK had hoped the EU would vote to start Brexit discussions on trade and transition deals at a summit of EU leaders later this week.
But the EU has no intention of allowing the UK to use the money issue as a bargaining chip when discussing their future relationship.
That's why Brussels insists on separating settling the UK's financial liabilities - which, it says, deal with past commitments - from discussions on trade and transition, which look to the future.
Talking about this to a group of European students last week, Mr Juncker said - imagine going into a bar, inviting your friends to a round of drinks and then telling them they have to pay the tab themselves.
That's how the EU views the divorce settlement with the UK.
The British government has signed up to the sequencing on Brexit talks. Now the EU says it must respect the plan.
Frustrated German MEP Jens Geier told me that blaming Germans or the French for lack of progress was ridiculous. The UK needed to bring concrete proposals to the table, he said.
Theresa May has been told that the EU will approve moving to stage two in December at the earliest - during the next EU summit.
But there is one condition: as the famous song from the film Cabaret goes, "money makes the world go around". The EU insists it is what will make Brexit talks accelerate too.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41650246
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Parsons Green Tube station stabbing: One dead, two hurt - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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The incident is not being treated as terror-related, London Ambulance Service said.
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London
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One man died at the scene of the stabbing
A man has died and two others have been injured in a stabbing outside Parsons Green Tube station in London.
The attack happened just after 19:30 BST on Monday at the station where 30 people were injured in a terror attack last month.
A 20-year-old man died in the stabbing, which is not being treated as terror-related.
The two injured people were taken to hospital and one was subsequently arrested.
The dead man's next of kin have been informed although formal identification has yet to take place.
He was pronounced dead at the scene at 20:30.
Two men were taken to hospital, one of whom has been arrested
Cordons are in place at the scene of the incident
One man remains in hospital although his injuries are not thought to be life-threatening. The arrested man was taken to a west London police station for questioning.
Parsons Green Lane and the station were closed by police and cordons put in place. The station has since been re-opened.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-41644039
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The big cases Crimewatch helped solve - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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After 33 years on our screens, the BBC programme helped solve numerous police investigations.
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UK
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The team on Crimewatch have been working with the public to solve cases for 33 years
After 33 years of appeals and reconstructions, Crimewatch will be hanging up its phone lines for the last time as the BBC axes the ground-breaking programme.
The BBC One institution called on the public to help solve some of the UK's biggest crimes and people would call in their droves with anything they thought could help.
And help they did, with some very high profile cases being solved thanks to the prime time programme.
We take a look at some of the most prominent stories featured on Crimewatch and how its viewers helped secure convictions.
James Bulger was two-years-old when he was murdered by Jon Venables and Robert Thompson in 1993
Two-year-old James Bulger was snatched from a shopping centre in Bootle, Merseyside, on 12 February 1993 whilst out with his mother.
He was taken by Jon Venables and Robert Thompson, who were just 10 years old themselves.
CCTV showed the pair leading James away by his hand. Soon after, they beat him with bricks and iron bars, before leaving his body on a railway line.
It took two days before police discovered the toddler's body.
After the footage was shown on Crimewatch, the two boys were identified by viewers, and convicted of James' murder in November 1993.
Sarah Payne disappeared when walking back from her grandparents' house in 2000
The disappearance of eight-year-old Sarah Payne on 1 July 2000 led to 16 days of frantic searching before her body was discovered.
Sarah had been walking home from her grandparents' house through a field in Kingston Gorse, West Sussex, when she went missing, and was never seen alive again.
Crimewatch carried out two appeals and in both rounds, Roy Whiting was named as a prime suspect.
Fibres from a patterned curtain were found on Sarah's shoe and a viewer recognised the fabric, as she had left it in a van her boyfriend sold to Whiting.
In 2001, Whiting was convicted of the murder and sentenced to life in prison.
The motorway surrounding the capital became the focus of a manhunt in 2001 and 2002 when a number of attacks were carried out on women.
The incidents took place in Kent, Surrey, London and the Thames Valley, and included a victim as young as 10.
An e-fit picture was shown on Crimewatch in October 2002 to try to track down the serial sexual attacker.
A viewer recognised the face and directed police to Antoni Imiela.
He was originally called the Trophy Rapist, as he took items of clothing from the victims as souvenirs.
The 50-year-old was sent to prison for a minimum of 99 years for his crimes, which included seven rapes, kidnap, indecent assault and attempted rape.
Lin Russell (left) and her daughter Megan were killed when Michael Stone attacked them with a hammer in 1996
Lin Russell was on a walk in Nonington, Kent, with her two daughters - nine-year-old Josie and six-year-old Megan - when they were attacked by a man with a hammer on 9 July 1996.
Josie was left for dead, but managed to survive. However, her mother and sister were both killed.
Crimewatch showed a reconstruction of the attack in September and presented the public with an e-fit of the perpetrator.
A year on from the crime, the programme made a further appeal for people who worked in mental health who might have been able to help.
Among 600 calls from the public, one proved to be the key to solving the case and Michael Stone was arrested before being convicted of both murders.
Julie Dart was just 18 when she was murdered in Leeds by Michael Sams
Estate agent Stephanie Slater suffered an horrific ordeal in January 1992 when showing someone around a house.
The 25-year-old was attacked before being blindfolded and hidden in a coffin for eight days in Newark, Nottinghamshire.
A ransom was paid for her release.
After hearing her describe her attacker, the police believed he may have had links to the murder of teenager Julie Dart the year before in Leeds.
Crimewatch broadcast a recording of the kidnapper's voice, which was heard by his ex-wife. She came forward.
As a result, Michael Sams was arrested and convicted for both the kidnapping and murder.
The murder of TV presenter Jill Dando in 1999 remains unsolved
For all of Crimewatch's success stories, there are still cases that remain unsolved, and perhaps none as closely linked to the show as that of Jill Dando.
The TV presenter had been working on the programme since 1995 and gained high praise, including being awarded the BBC Personality of the Year award in 1997.
But in 1999, the 37-year-old was shot in the head on her doorstep in Fulham, west London.
Her case was then featured on the show she had presented for four years.
Local man Barry George was convicted of her murder in 2001 and sentenced to life imprisonment. However, his conviction was quashed after he appealed against it for the third time, and a second trial ended in his acquittal.
The question of who murdered Ms Dando has remained unanswered.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41649334
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From sweets to furniture: The secrets of selling online - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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What's the best way to sell online? And how do you make sure your website really works?
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Business
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Lavinia Davolio says selling her luxury sweets on Amazon Marketplace has been good for business
What are the best ways to sell online? And how do you make sure you have a website that really works? Part one in our eight-part series exploring all things e-commerce.
Lavinia Davolio makes luxury handmade sweets inspired by her Italian heritage. She says her business received a boost when she opened a store on Amazon's Marketplace.
"It's easy for clients to discover something unique and handmade if it's available through such a trusted online platform," she says.
"And it means we can offer convenient next day delivery at a competitive price and give our boutique confectionary an incredible reach and visibility."
Lavinia is one of thousands of small businesses who've decided to set up shop on an e-commerce marketplace - Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Alibaba's Taobao, Rakuten to name some of the largest - rather than go through the hassles of setting up their own websites.
Amazon charges retailers a 15% commission, but in return even the very smallest entrepreneurs can get a slice of the retail titan's global pulling power just by uploading images and descriptions of their products and then setting their pricing.
For an additional fee, Amazon will store and dispatch your goods - the kind of one-stop convenience that is ideal for newbies, suggests Alan Braithwaite, a visiting professor at Cranfield School of Management.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Despite the convenience of online shopping, people still love the physical store
"Something like Amazon Marketplace is a no-brainer," he says. "Entry costs are very low and straightaway you have a very wide marketplace at your fingertips.
"When you're starting out with your own website you're having to attract the traffic, which means a lot of search engine optimisation [SEO]. This can be complicated and mean extra costs if you need outside help."
Some e-tailers want more creative control over their online shops, however - and to keep more of the sales income for themselves.
Going it alone is certainly a lot cheaper than it used to be, but according to payment processor WorldPay, the average small business spends £2,500 on setting up an e-commerce platform.
At its most basic this will cover product display and listing, navigation structure, a shopping cart facility, search features and secure payment gateways - a checklist that swells with business growth.
DIY website providers such as Wix, Weebly and SquareSpace, help the technical novice with design templates and SEO support from as little as $4.50 (£3.40) a month.
And these days, off-the-shelf "software-as-a-service" add-ons can give a basic website selling and fulfilment functionality that "means you can be online and trading for as little as £500," says Prof Braithwaite.
But "cheap isn't always best," he warns. "It's your front window so it can be worth spending a bit extra - around £5,000 on a developer."
And Clare Jackson, founder of e-tailer The Wooden Furniture Store, points out that you have to be prepared to improve and adapt your website constantly or risk losing sales. You can't pay your set-up fee then sit back and relax.
Clare Jackson says she had to adapt her website's content for mobile screens
When they discovered that most customers were coming to their website from mobiles, they had to completely rethink the design.
"With mobile users likely to be on slower connections it's crucial to get more speed into the user experience, so we introduced image optimisation and a content delivery network.
"This adapts content to the sizes of screen and devices being used, meaning that the images load much quicker."
Research by application performance company, Apica, finds that 40% of online shoppers refuse to wait more than 10 seconds for a website to respond.
The website change cost just $200 but has contributed to a 500% hike in sales from mobile and a 230% upturn in mobile visitors, says Ms Jackson.
"As a small business, we combine our agility with the kind of technologies which just a few years ago would have been unaffordable for someone our size," she says.
Wife-and-husband team Claire Kent and Bill Byrne moved their running wear business to Shopify
Claire Kent and Bill Byrne, the husband-and-wife team behind luxury running wear, Iffley Road, found that replacing their bespoke website with the "easy and intuitive" e-commerce platform, Shopify, made a big difference to their online business.
They liked the fact that they were no longer reliant on a third party but could make changes to the site themselves in minutes.
Ms Kent, a former Morgan Stanley equity analyst who had never used Facebook or Twitter before, and who admits to being "completely untechnical", says she has found analysing customer data surprisingly straightforward using Shopify.
A range of tools gives her data on purchase frequency, customer lifetime value, gross margins and net profit - insights she credits with doubling sales.
"It's like I've suddenly got glasses on whereas before I was blind," she says. "I'd say to anyone that you really need to be looking at analytics every day as you learn so much."
She advises retailers to accept that a website will need to evolve with customers' changing expectations.
"Many SMEs prioritise aesthetics over function; you can have a site that looks amazing but if you don't have the right platform then it just isn't going to deliver."
Listening to feedback and acting on it is also crucial, argues Prof Braithwaite.
"Get friends and families to transact on [your website] and listen to feedback, making sure that payment is secure and seamless is an absolute priority; customers won't come back if this isn't right."
"Fail fast, fail often" may be the mantra amongst the technology giants in Silicon Valley, but it is also apt for online retail entrepreneurs. You have to make mistakes, learn from them, and adapt quickly to achieve success in this global online marketplace.
The next feature will look at the best way to take payments and market your online shop.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41636026
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How the humble S-bend made modern toilets possible - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Designed in 1775, the S-bend was key to the flushing toilet, and public sanitation as we know it.
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Business
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"Gentility of speech is at an end," thundered an editorial in London's City Press, in 1858. "It stinks!"
The stink in question was partly metaphorical: politicians were failing to tackle an obvious problem.
As its population grew, London's system for disposing of human waste became woefully inadequate. To relieve pressure on cess pits - which were prone to leaking, overflowing, and belching explosive methane - the authorities had instead started encouraging sewage into gullies.
However, this created a different issue: the gullies were originally intended for only rainwater, and emptied directly into the River Thames.
That was the literal stink - the Thames became an open sewer.
Cholera was rife. One outbreak killed 14,000 Londoners - nearly one in every 100.
Civil engineer Joseph Bazalgette drew up plans for new, closed sewers to pump the waste far from the city. It was this project that politicians came under pressure to approve.
The sweltering-hot summer of 1858 had made London's malodorous river impossible to politely ignore, or to discuss obliquely with "gentility of speech". The heatwave became popularly known as the "Great Stink".
If you live in a city with modern sanitation, it's hard to imagine daily life being permeated with the suffocating stench of human excrement.
For that, we have a number of people to thank - but perhaps none more so than the unlikely figure of Alexander Cumming.
50 Things That Made the Modern Economy highlights the inventions, ideas and innovations that helped create the economic world.
A watchmaker in London a century before the Great Stink, Cumming won renown for his mastery of intricate mechanics.
King George III commissioned him to make an elaborate instrument for recording atmospheric pressure, and he pioneered the microtome, a device for cutting ultra-fine slivers of wood for microscopic analysis.
Alexander Cumming's S-bend was crucial in the development of the flushing toilet
But Cumming's world-changing invention owed nothing to precision engineering. It was a bit of pipe with a curve in it.
In 1775, Cumming patented the S-bend. This became the missing ingredient to create the flushing toilet - and, with it, public sanitation as we know it.
Flushing toilets had previously foundered on the problem of smell: the pipe that connects the toilet to the sewer, allowing urine and faeces to be flushed away, will also also let sewer odours waft back up - unless you can create some kind of airtight seal.
Cumming's solution was simplicity itself: bend the pipe. Water settles in the dip, stopping smells coming up; flushing the toilet replenishes the water.
While we've moved on alphabetically from the S-bend to the U-bend, flushing toilets still deploy the same insight.
Rollout, however, came slowly: by 1851, flushing toilets remained novel enough in London to cause mass excitement when introduced at the Great Exhibition in Crystal Palace.
Use of the facilities cost one penny, giving the English language one of its enduring euphemisms for emptying one's bladder, "to spend a penny".
Hundreds of thousands of Londoners queued for the opportunity to relieve themselves while marvelling at the miracles of modern plumbing.
If the Great Exhibition gave Londoners a vision of how public sanitation could be - clean, and smell-free - no doubt that added to the weight of popular discontent as politicians dragged their heels over finding the funds for Joseph Bazalgette's planned sewers.
More than 170 years later, about two-thirds of the world's people have access to what's called "improved sanitation", according to the World Health Organization, up from about a quarter in 1980.
But that still means two and a half billion people don't have access to it, and "improved sanitation" itself is a relatively low bar.
It "hygienically separates human excreta from human contact", but it doesn't necessarily treat the sewage itself.
Fewer than half the world's people have access to sanitation systems that do that.
The economic costs of this ongoing failure to roll out proper sanitation are many and varied, from health care for diarrhoeal diseases to foregone revenue from hygiene-conscious tourists.
The World Bank's Economics of Sanitation Initiative has tried to tot up the price tag.
Across various African countries, for example, it reckons inadequate sanitation lops one or two percentage points off gross domestic product (GDP), in India and Bangladesh over 6%, and in Cambodia 7%.
Open sewers are a common sight in Kibera, in Nairobi, Kenya
The challenge is that public sanitation isn't something the market necessarily provides. Toilets cost money, but defecating in the street is free.
If I install a toilet, I bear all the costs, while the benefits of the cleaner street are felt by everyone.
In economic parlance, that's a "positive externality" - and goods that have positive externalities tend to be bought at a slower pace than society, as a whole, would prefer.
The most striking example is the "flying toilet" system of Kibera, in Nairobi, Kenya.
The flying toilet works like this: you defecate into a plastic bag, and then in the middle of the night, whirl the bag around your head and hurl it as far away as possible.
Replacing a flying toilet with a flushing toilet provides benefits to the toilet owner - but you can bet that the neighbours would appreciate it, too.
Contrast, say, the mobile phone. That also costs money, but its benefits accrue largely to me. That's one reason why, although the S-bend has been around for 10 times as long as the mobile phone, many more people already own a mobile phone than a flushing toilet.
If you want to buy a flushing toilet, it also helps if there's a system of sewers to plumb it into, and creating one is a major undertaking - financially and logistically.
Joseph Bazalgette, standing top right, views the Northern Outfall sewer being built below the Abbey Mills pumping station in 1862
When Joseph Bazalgette finally got the cash to build London's sewers, they took 10 years to complete and necessitated digging up 2.5 million cubic metres (88 million cubic ft) of earth.
Because of the externality problem, such a project might not appeal to private investors: it tends to require determined politicians, willing taxpayers and well-functioning municipal governments.
And those, it seems, are in short supply. According to a study published in 2011, just 6% of India's towns and cities have succeeded in building even a partial network of sewers. The capacity for delay seems almost unlimited.
London's lawmakers likewise procrastinated- but when they finally acted, they didn't hang about. As Stephen Halliday recounts in his book The Great Stink of London, it took just 18 days to rush through the necessary legislation for Bazalgette's plans. What explains this sudden, impressive alacrity?
The Houses of Parliament, photographed in 1858, the year of the Great Stink
A quirk of geography: London's Parliament building is located right next to the River Thames.
Officials tried to shield lawmakers from the Great Stink, soaking the curtains in chloride of lime in a bid to mask the stench.
But it was no use. Try as they might, the politicians couldn't ignore it.
The Times described, with a note of grim satisfaction, how MPs had been seen abandoning the building's library, "each gentleman with a handkerchief to his nose".
If only concentrating politicians' minds was always that easy.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41188465
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Malta blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia dies in car bomb attack - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Government critic Daphne Caruana Galizia dies in an attack the PM calls "barbaric".
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Europe
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Debris was strewn over the road and a nearby field
A prominent blogger in Malta, who had accused the island's government of corruption, has died in a car bomb attack, according to police.
Daphne Caruana Galizia, 53, was reportedly killed when the car she was driving exploded shortly after she left her home in Bidnija, near Mosta.
Local media say one of her sons heard the blast and rushed outside.
PM Joseph Muscat, whom Caruana Galizia accused of wrongdoing earlier this year, denounced the killing.
"I condemn without reservations this barbaric attack on a person and on the freedom of expression in our country," he said in a televised statement.
"Everyone knows Ms Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and personally, as she was for others too."
Daphne Caruana Galizia was reportedly killed just after leaving her home on Monday afternoon
But he stressed there could be "no justification... in any way" for such action.
"I will not rest before justice is done."
On Monday evening, thousands of people attended a candlelit vigil in the resort town of Sliema.
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Malta Television reported that Caruana Galizia had filed a complaint to the police two weeks ago to say she had received threats but gave no further information.
Newspaper reports said the explosion had left debris from the rental car she was driving strewn across the road and in a nearby field.
Police and forensics experts went to the scene of the blast
Caruana Galizia's death comes four months after Mr Muscat's Labour Party won an election he called early because of the blogger's allegations linking him and his wife to the Panama Papers scandal.
The couple denied claims that they had used secret offshore bank accounts to hide payments from Azerbaijan's ruling family.
Caruana Galizia's popular blog had also targeted opposition politicians, calling the country's political situation "desperate" in her final post.
A spokeswoman for the prime minister's office told the BBC that although there were rumours the attack could be politically motivated, this would be jumping to conclusions. But no lines of inquiry would be ruled out.
Malta has asked for international help - including the FBI in the US - to find the perpetrator, the spokeswoman said.
Meanwhile, Caruana Galizia's family has requested that the magistrate in charge of the investigation be replaced, the Malta Independent reports.
It said the current magistrate had on a number of occasions been the subject of criticism by Caruana Galizia.
Daphne Caruana Galizia was loved and resented in equal measure in politically divided Malta - but she will go down in the Mediterranean island's history as one of the most influential writers.
Her uncompromising blog and scathing pen spared no punches, hitting out mainly at exponents of the ruling Labour Party and their supporters, but also sometimes criticising officials of the centre-right Nationalist Party, including its newly-elected leader.
Starting off as a columnist for The Sunday Times of Malta, her colourful reportage saw her embroiled in several legal battles along the years, including Malta's prime minister.
But beyond all, even her fiercest critics acknowledge she was an impeccable writer and investigative journalist. Her digital cross-investigation into the Panama Papers, which saw the Maltese government's top officials embroiled, effectively triggered off a premature general election last June.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41637730
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Jonny Bairstow on his dad, Cape Town, Geoffrey Boycott and Jonny Wilkinson - BBC Sport
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2017-10-17
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England wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow opens up to Michael Vaughan in a special interview for BBC Radio 5 live.
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Even for an international sportsman, Jonny Bairstow's story is extraordinary.
That the Yorkshireman has had his share of setbacks on the way to becoming one of the leading wicketkeeper-batsmen in the world, or that the young Bairstow was an extremely talented footballer and rugby player are noteworthy, but only a small part of his tale.
Jonny's father David, also a wicketkeeper, had a 20-year career with Yorkshire and played four Tests for England. In 1998, he took his own life.
To mark the release of his autobiography, A Clear Blue Sky, Bairstow spoke to former England captain Michael Vaughan for a BBC Radio 5 live special.
He talks openly about his father, his family, his emotional maiden Test century in Cape Town, thoughts of quitting cricket to play rugby and what it is like to spend Christmas at Geoffrey Boycott's house.
'We went to school the next day'
Suffering from depression, worried about money and facing a drink-driving charge, David Bairstow ended his own life at the age of 46.
He was discovered by eight-year-old Jonny, his younger sister Becky and their mother Janet, who at the time was undergoing treatment for breast cancer.
"Me and my sister were both very young. In some ways, yes, you do remember everything that went on because it is only us who will remember that. At the same time there are bits of it you choose not to remember, that you choose to park.
"We went to school the next day. For me, that was really powerful. It was mum's way of dealing with it, her way of saying 'yes, that's happened now, but we have to deal with it in a certain way'.
"It makes you grow up very quickly. There's a huge sense of realisation around everything. At the same time, when you're eight years old, you don't really know everything that's happened. You understand it a bit, but you don't understand all of it.
"There are questions that are unanswered, but there's no point in revisiting those questions on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis. If you're constantly striving for questions that are never going to be answered, then you're only being detrimental to your own mental health.
"There are so many bits that I didn't know right away, but I've learned, even when I've been doing the book. Having a setback like that can make you mature very quickly."
By taking his own life, David nullified his life insurance policy. In his autobiography, Jonny explains that he knew money was sometimes tight when he was growing up.
"That's why it's been so good to keep pushing forward and represent England, to make Mum proud for the days she took to me to train with Leeds United, three times a week from the age of seven to 15, as well as bringing me to Headingley, looking after my sister, taking us to school and feeding us.
"If you stack everything that Mum did with the help of Grandma and Grandpa and all of our friends, it was ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.
"Mum never made an excuse, even when she had cancer and had a lot on her plate. You have to have huge admiration for the way she brought us up. Hopefully she has brought two role models into the world.
"You think of what might have been different if dad had been around, or how I might have turned out as a person. You just don't know. I might not even be playing cricket.
"There will have been questions along the way, but there's not just one, because there's 20 years of learning off dad that I haven't had.
"If he was here now, I think he'd just tell me to keep going."
Bairstow made his Test debut in 2012 and, despite making 95 in his fourth match against South Africa, needed more than three years to earn a regular spot in the England side.
When Bairstow faced South Africa again, he once more found himself on 95, this time at lunch on the second day of the second Test in Cape Town.
"I was dripping wet. I didn't take my pads off, I didn't eat, I just sat there saying 'it's not happening again'.
"I knew they would start with Morne Morkel after lunch, but when they then used the medium-pace of Stiaan van Zyl, I just wanted him to bowl a short, wide one.
"Getting to that first hundred was just a relief. I was five short four years earlier, so it was four years of questions. Will I get the opportunity again? What could have I achieved if I had made that ton?"
The roar that Bairstow let out when he reached three figures could be heard all around Newlands and was followed with a look to the sky. On Test Match Special, an emotional Jonathan Agnew said: "You won't find a more popular individual. You can't resist the thought of his father looking down and how proud he would be."
"The years of waiting really came through. I don't know how I celebrated, I just ran and shouted. I welled up and got a jittery bottom lip. There was a huge heap of emotion. It's a very, very proud moment.
"There were more tears when I saw my mum and Becky at the end of the day. There's never anything wrong with shedding a tear.
"There's all the time which you spend thinking about it. Are you good enough? Will you get an opportunity? Where and when will it be? I have let myself and my family down by not getting a hundred already and there are people that have spent money coming to watch you.
"That makes you prouder. It reminds you that you're not only representing yourself, but your family and the people who have kept an eye on you throughout your career."
David Bairstow was a close friend of Yorkshire and England batsman Boycott, whose relationship with the Bairstow family continued after David's death and to this day.
Boycott, who scored 8,114 runs in 108 Tests for England, remains a forthright pundit on Test Match Special and in his newspaper column.
"Geoffrey presented me with my cap on the day I made my England Test debut. He'd already presented a special cap to Ian Bell to mark his 75th Test. He said to him 'you're one of the best batsmen in the world, but please stop playing the sweep shot'. That got us all laughing.
"When it came for me to get my cap, I could feel myself going in the back of my throat and in my chest. I had to hold back a little bit. After the hundred in Cape Town, I did an interview with Geoffrey and got emotional then.
"I've perhaps not spoken about cricket enough with him. I've wanted to find it out for myself. Looking back, maybe I should have done it more, but that's my inner stubbornness. I knew that he was there if I needed to speak to him. If I picked up the phone right now, he would be there and would help me if he can.
"The opinions that he has do not cause a massive issue in the dressing room, especially with the group of players we have now. Something could be said that is too close to the bone, but players are close to pundits now - we see them every day and can speak to them for ourselves if we have an issue.
"He once nailed me in front of 400 people at a game at Abbeydale Park in Sheffield. Everyone knows the nature of what pundits do - they are paid to write columns and have opinions. I perhaps didn't realise that at the start and took too much criticism to heart.
"We've had Christmas at his house in South Africa. It's entertaining around the Boycott Christmas table - it's not just him talking about himself."
'I thought about giving up to play rugby'
In the autobiography, Bairstow reveals his admiration for rugby player Jonny Wilkinson.
In the aftermath of England's 5-0 whitewash on the 2013-14 Ashes tour of Australia, Bairstow, a fly-half in his youth, even thought of attempting to start a rugby career of his own.
"Wilkinson changed the game of rugby. He captivated so many kids. I used to watch his DVD when I went to bed on the night before rugby games and I got a real sense of inspiration.
"I looked at the way he trained, the way he prepared and how he never left the training ground until he was content.
"Before he retired, he took a team talk for Toulon in French and English. To be able to be an inspiration to your team-mates in two languages sums the bloke up.
"He got a lot of injuries. The mentality that he had to keep doing the rehab, to answer the questions that people posed of him when he kept coming back resonates with me very firmly.
"He put his body in places that he shouldn't have put his body. He did things that he knew he shouldn't be doing. He wanted to keep pushing.
"When you're going through difficult times, like I was after the 2013-14 Ashes, you start thinking about different bits. Rugby is a huge passion of mine, a lot of my friends play.
"When all the lads are throwing a ball around, you go and play some touch and have an amazing time doing something you stopped when you were 17. You have thoughts of 'shall I, could I, what would happen if?'.
"I don't know who I would have played for. It wasn't a thought that lasted for a long time."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/41523011
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Humberside Police defends social media pictures of officers on dodgems - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Officers were talking to stallholders during a quiet period as "light-hearted public engagement".
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Humberside
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More than 25 officers were on patrol each day during the week-long Hull Fair
Police officers pictured riding the dodgems at Hull Fair were doing so as "light-hearted public engagement", force bosses say.
The Sun newspaper printed the pictures taken from an officer's Twitter page and said residents were "furious".
But, Humberside's deputy chief constable Andy McDyer said he was "really disappointed in the article".
More than 25 officers were on duty during the eight-day event, which attracted more than 500,000 visitors.
More than 110 people have commented on the BBC Look North Facebook page, with most in support of the police.
One post described it "as little light hearted fun that hurts nobody".
Another said : "It shows that they are human too and like to have fun a move which I think will make it easier for children to approach them instead of being frightened."
Comments on a BBC Facebook page expressed support for the police officers
A spokesman for the Sun said the newspaper "stands by its story".
He added: "We are happy with the story we ran and it speaks for itself."
Mr McDyer said the officers were on a break and the photographs showed the "public face of policing".
"Our officers had been out there for eight days," he said.
"They've worked between 10 to 12-hour shifts, invariably not taking the rest periods they're allowed because they want to be out supporting the public.
"This is about an opportunity at 12:30 last Saturday, before the fair was fully opened, before the public was really around to engage with stallholders because they are one of our major partners in this."
Deputy chief constable Andy McDyer said the pictures showed the "public face of policing"
Mr McDyer added officers were praised by the public about the way they had policed the fair, which this year included armed patrols.
The force said it had made four arrests during the week for minor offences.
Earlier this year, it was rated as "requiring improvements" by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary.
The annual fair attracted 500,000 people during with police making four arrests for minor offences
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-41649296
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Rise in hate crime in England and Wales - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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There has been a 29% rise, with the biggest increase in disability and transgender hate crime.
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. A man with his face disguised who claims to have attacked EU immigrants
The number of hate crimes in England and Wales has increased by 29%, according to Home Office statistics.
There were 80,393 offences in 2016-17, compared with 62,518 in 2015-16 - the largest increase since the Home Office began recording figures in 2011-12.
The biggest rise was in disability and transgender hate crimes, but this was due to better crime recording and more people coming forward, the report said.
It also noted a spike in hate crime around the time of the EU referendum.
There were also rises after the Westminster Bridge, Manchester Arena and London Bridge attacks this year.
Home Secretary Amber Rudd said there was "absolutely no place for hate crime in our society" and said the rise after 2017's terror attacks were "undoubtedly concerning".
The Home Office report said: "The increase over the last year is thought to reflect both a genuine rise in hate crime around the time of the EU referendum and following the Westminster Bridge terrorist attack, as well as ongoing improvements in crime reporting by police."
Disability or transgender hate crimes increased by 53% and 45% respectively, but the majority of hate crimes were racially motivated.
Regarding disability, transgender and sexual orientation hate crimes, the report said the rise "suggests that the increases are due to the police improving their identification and recording of hate crime offences and more people coming forward to report these crimes - rather than a genuine increase".
Some crimes were recorded as having more than one motivating factor.
Ms Rudd said she was "heartened" more victims were coming forward and police recording of crime was improving, but "no-one in Britain should have to suffer violent prejudice".
Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott said the rise was "unacceptable".
"The Tories have made great claims about tackling burning injustices," the Labour MP said.
"But they are clearly not tackling the great injustice of being attacked simply because of your religion, your sexuality, the colour of your skin or your disability."
Zainab Talat Mir, a student at Goldsmith's University in London, was verbally harassed on the Tube.
"A lady stood up, she pointed at me and she said "you're the reason our country is terrorised," and she just got off the train.
"She did it when the doors were open, she ran off the train."
Ms Mir said she was so upset she did not go to university, instead returning home to tell her father what had happened.
He "was quite adamant" that she report it, to organisation Tell MAMA.
"They were quite good, they asked me details of what she looked like and what she was wearing. They then reported it to the police.
"But then I got a letter a couple of weeks later, telling me that there was no CCTV."
Ms Mir said the lack of action "put me off a bit on future reports. I was wondering whether I would want to report anything - if it did happen to me - again."
But she said that, as a "quite stubborn" person, she still would.
"I feel that if you report something, even if it's not taken account of, they still see something, they still see the numbers.
"I really think it's important for us to report, no matter what."
Mustafa Field, the director of the Faiths Forum for London group, which organised a vigil after the Westminster attack, said: "We must continue to encourage all those affected by hate crimes to speak out, and in doing so send a clear message that hate and prejudice can have absolutely no place in modern Britain.
"Victims need to know that their voices will be heard and that they will receive both justice and the support they need.
"Perpetrators need to know that such offences will not be tolerated in our communities, and that they will be dealt with under the full force of the law."
The hate crime figures were expected to go up, but the size of the increase is unexpected.
The Home Office is pointing to better police recording as one of the reasons for the rise.
But the EU referendum result and spate of terror attacks show how both politics and the security situation play a role in this most personal of crimes.
While race hate is behind the bulk of the offences, there has been a rise in all types of hate crime - abuse and attacks directed towards those with disabilities have gone up by more than 50%.
Police and prosecutors will be pleased that more complainants are coming forward, but these figures only paint a partial picture.
The Director of Public Prosecutions, Alison Saunders, has acknowledged that hate crime generally is under-reported.
A hate crime is defined as "any criminal offence which is perceived, by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by a hostility or prejudice" based on one of five categories: religion, faith or belief; race, ethnicity or nationality; sexual orientation; disability; or gender identity.
• None The truth about hate crime and Brexit
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41648865
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Facebook buys weeks-old app for teens to be nice to each other - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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An app encouraging teens to say nice things to each other has been bought by Facebook.
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Technology
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The tbh app had been downloaded five million times in nine weeks
An app that encourages teens to be nice to each other has been acquired by Facebook for an undisclosed fee.
The app - called tbh, meaning "to be honest" - is just nine weeks old, but had already been downloaded five million times.
The app's creators said it will remain a standalone program but will now have more resources thanks to Facebook.
"We were compelled by the ways they could help us realise tbh’s vision and bring it to more people," tbh said.
According to start-up news site TechCrunch, the deal was for "less than $100m", and tbh's four person team would become Facebook employees.
One expert commented that Facebook keeps a close eye over new companies and is willing to pay a premium to buy them rather than risk them developing into a threat.
"This is the latest example of Facebook snapping up a start-up that could potentially game-change the way people consume social media and erode its own user base," commented Prof Mark Skilton from Warwick Business School.
"Tbh appeals to the teen market - which we know is a very fickle age group - and Facebook knows that it and other apps like it can go viral and explode in popularity very quickly.
"So, this can be seen as a protective measure, and $100m is the equivalent of an account sheet rounding error - it's no money to them."
In a statement, Facebook said: "tbh and Facebook share a common goal of building community and enabling people to share in ways that bring us closer together.
"We’re impressed by the way tbh is doing this by using polling and messaging, and with Facebook’s resources tbh can continue to expand and build positive experiences."
Tbh said the app's success was a sign of teenagers craving more positive interactions online.
"While the last decade of the internet has been focused on open communication, the next milestone will be around meeting people’s emotional needs," it said.
The acquisition has been welcomed by a leading anti-bullying charity - but it added that other efforts were still required.
"We are encouraged to see Facebook taking further steps to create a more positive atmosphere online," said a spokeswoman from the NSPCC.
"However social media companies, including Facebook, need to do more to provide safe environments across all of their platforms - and be more transparent about what they do.
"The NSPCC wants to see a clear set of minimum standards that all social media companies will be held to account to, including clear community guidelines and bespoke accounts for under 18s."
Tbh's achievement has been to create an anonymous app that hasn't descended into a cesspit of trolling and harassment - something many apps before it have dramatically failed to do.
After a user uploads their contacts, the app will ask pre-determined, positive questions such as "best to bring to a party?", and the option of selecting one of four friends.
Users are notified when they are selected, but the details of who chose them is kept anonymous.
Facebook now has over 2 billion users worldwide
Mimicking Facebook's early growth - where it was only available in a handful of colleges for a short time, the makers of tbh only made the app available to users in certain states. Word of mouth would spread at schools as the app was enabled.
"We shipped it to one school in Georgia," explained co-founder Nikita Bier, speaking to TechCrunch.
"Forty percent of the school downloaded it the first day. The next day it was in three more schools, and then the next day it was in 300 schools."
Facebook would not provide any more details about the deal, but the firm is clearly eager to snap up the next big thing in its infancy, save it become another competitor like Snapchat.
An investment bank's recent survey of 6,100 US teens suggested that Snapchat was the preferred social media platform for teenagers - the average age of participants was 16.
Facebook reportedly tried to buy Snapchat in 2013 for $3bn. Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, is today worth $19bn.
You can reach Dave securely through encrypted messaging app Signal on: +1 (628) 400-7370
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-41646738
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Parsons Green Tube stabbing: Victim named as Omid Saidy - BBC News
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2017-10-17
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Omid Saidy was fatally wounded in the attack outside Parsons Green Tube station.
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London
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Omid Saidy was stabbed to death outside Parsons Green Tube
A man killed outside Parsons Green Tube station was stabbed after confronting a drug dealer, Scotland Yard has said.
Omid Saidy was fatally wounded and two others were injured in the attack on Monday night.
The 20-year-old from Fulham died after confronting a drug dealer and another man who was with him, the Met confirmed.
The injured 16-year-old was discharged from hospital and arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.
A 20-year-old man suffered serious but non life-threatening injuries.
Two men were taken to hospital after the incident, one of whom has been arrested
After confronting the drug dealer, the victim chased the two suspects in the direction of Beaconsfield Walk, police said.
When he caught up with the pair, he was fatally stabbed.
A 20-year-old man who was a friend of the deceased came to his aid and was also stabbed.
One of the suspects, described as a black male dressed in dark clothing, fled down Harbledown Road in the direction of Fulham Court.
The second suspect, a young white male, ran into Beaconsfield Walk.
Police believe he called for an ambulance a short time later for his own injuries.
Det Ch Insp Noel McHugh said: "A young man has tragically lost his life for simply asking a drug dealer to move on.
"I urge anyone who can assist our investigation to come forward without delay."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-41655350
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Newspaper headlines: MI5 boss warns web giants and pension 'timebomb' - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The MI5 chief tells internet firms to stop aiding terrorists, and 15m workers not paying into a pension make the front pages.
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The Papers
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MI5 chief Andrew Parker features on several of Tuesday's front pages
The Guardian leads with a warning from the head of MI5 that Britain is facing its most severe terror threat ever.
The paper says that Andrew Parker believes more attacks are inevitable.
The Daily Mail, which also has the story on its front page, says Mr Parker wants internet companies to do more to stop extremists using the "safe spaces" on the web to learn bomb-making techniques.
The BBC's decision to axe the evening edition of Crimewatch after more than three decades has been criticised in the Daily Telegraph as "utter madness" by the family of James Bulger.
James' stepfather Stuart Fergus, who also manages the James Bulger Memorial Trust, describes the programme as an institution and says it helped to bring justice for his stepson.
In the Times, the father of the murdered schoolboy Damilola Taylor has also called for the BBC to reconsider its decision.
The Daily Telegraph says that one of the City's most senior figures is warning that France and Germany risk starting a new global financial crisis - if they try to use Brexit as an excuse to dismantle London as one of the world's main financial centres.
Xavier Rolet, who is chief executive of the London Stock Exchange Group, warns Paris and Berlin against making "a political point".
The paper's business editor, Ben Wright, says that destabilisation of the City would undermine the whole global financial framework.
According to the Daily Mail, sunflower oil is being tested to see if it could be used to fill cracks in the road to prevent potholes.
The paper says Highways England is carrying out the unusual trial after sunflower oil capsules were found to make roads "self heal" when added to asphalt.
The Mail says it costs more than £88 million each year to fill in the potholes in England's roads and - at about £1.15 a litre - the cooking oil is a cheaper alternative.
The Daily Mirror leads with research from the Financial Conduct Authority which suggests that a third of workers - 15 million people - are not paying into a pension.
The paper warns of what it calls a "pension timebomb" and says that many people will have to keep working into their 70s and 80s to make ends meet.
According to the Daily Express, British researchers believe that a new once-a-day tablet could "significantly" improve the health of people with type 2 diabetes.
The paper says that semaglutide has the power to lower blood sugar and promote weight loss in just three months.
One of the lead researchers describes the findings as "hugely promising".
And the Times reports that the Conservative MP, Tim Loughton, recommends an hour in the bath each morning to cleanse the body and clear the mind.
Mr Loughton, who is co-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on mindfulness, was speaking at a conference exploring how meditation and greater self-awareness can improve the conduct of politics.
He admitted that an hour of topping up the hot water was not cheap - but added that "one of the greatest causes of stress in the world was the invention of the shower".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-41660611
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Traffic jams: UK's worst motorway disruption revealed - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Spilt fuel, emergency repairs and a burning lorry cost millions in wasted time and money.
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England
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. How do you avoid holiday traffic jams?
The worst traffic jams in the UK left drivers facing up to 15 hours of disruption and tailbacks.
A fuel spill, broken down vehicles and an emergency viaduct repair were behind the most severe delays.
Traffic analysts Inrix said drivers and businesses lost millions of pounds in wasted fuel and time.
They looked at disruption on motorways and A roads between September 2016 and August 2017 and found there were about 3,700 jams a day.
The M5 in Somerset saw the longest disruption and biggest tailbacks while three of the top five were on the M6.
On 4 August 2017, drivers faced up to 15 hours of traffic jams after two lorries collided and there was a fuel spill, which resulted in the carriageway of the M5 needing to be resurfaced.
Inrix said it caused problems for drivers up to 36 miles away.
It estimated the cost to the economy of this Somerset disruption as nearly £2.4m based on average fuel consumption, the number of people typically in cars and "assumptions" about the purpose of people's trips.
At the time travel company First Bus said it faced "unprecedented delays" to services in North Somerset.
While the worst traffic jams were caused by accidents and other unexpected problems, some roads often get snarled up.
According to another Inrix study, drivers lost 73 hours in 2016 to delays along the A406 Northbound from Chiswick Roundabout to Hanger Lane in Ealing, London.
The UK's top 10 most congested roads, and the number of hours lost to them, were:
While the M5 saw the worst individual incident, it was the M6 motorway in Cheshire and Lancashire that featured most in the top five.
The second worst traffic jam of the year was on the M6 near Warrington on 7 April 2017.
Emergency work to repair Thelwall Viadict caused disruption and delays from junction 21 back to junction 16 of the M6.
Later in the year, the August bank holiday getaway saw drivers caught in long delays, again on the M6.
However, this time it was between Sandbach in Cheshire and Haydock after a "number of vehicles" including a lorry broke down.
In November 2016, lane closures on the A406W North Circular Road near Wembley in London, led to more than 14 miles of disruption; while a lorry fire near Preston in December that same year closed three lanes of the M6 overnight 12/13 December.
Even when the fire was out there were still delays because the road needed to be re-surfaced.
No-one was injured but there was 10 hours of disruption following a lorry fire on the M6
Graham Cookson, chief economist at Inrix, said: "While queuing is considered a national pastime for many Brits, nothing is more frustrating than sitting in traffic and it's a costly activity.
"Jams can be caused by all kinds of incidents but fuel spillages, emergency repairs and broken down lorries contributed to the biggest pile-ups this year."
Highways England, which is responsible for motorways and major trunk roads, said 85% of incidents were cleared within an hour.
"We will continue to ensure roads are reopened safely, but as quickly as possible," customer service director Mel Clarke said.
The list was compiled by taking the duration of the jam and multiplying it by the length of the queue. Delays caused by scheduled roadworks were excluded.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-41651246
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Blac Chyna sues the Kardashian family - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Reality star claims assault and that Kardashians want to destroy her
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Entertainment & Arts
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Blac Chyna says the Kardashians sabotaged her television series
Blac Chyna is suing the Kardashian family, alleging they are to blame for the axing of her reality TV show.
She claims the "vindictive" family wants to destroy her.
Blac Chyna's attorney confirmed to the BBC that Kris Jenner is named as a defendant in the lawsuit, along with Kourtney, Kim and Khloe Kardashian and Kendall and Kylie Jenner.
A representative acting on behalf of the Kardashians has not yet responded to the BBC's request for comment.
The lawsuit follows the break-up of Blac Chyna's relationship with Rob Kardashian, during which time they had a daughter.
The 29-year-old is alleging she suffered assault, battery, domestic violence and harassment at the hands of her ex-fiance.
The court documents filed against the Kardashians and published in full by Buzzfeed, allege Rob Kardashian is an "abuser intent on destroying Angela White [Blac Chyna's real name]."
The papers also accuse the Kardashians of using their fame, wealth and power to exact revenge on her, "slut-shaming" her and sabotaging the recommissioning of her own reality TV show Rob & Chyna for a second series.
Sisters Kim and Kourtney Kardashian are accused of "slut-shaming" Blac Chyna
The move comes two weeks after Rob Kardashian filed his own lawsuit saying it was she who attacked him - a claim Blac Chyna denies.
Lisa Bloom, who is Blac Chyna's attorney, told the BBC that the idea Rob Kardashian - who is over a foot taller than his former fiancee - "would be in fear of her, is silly".
Rob also accuses Blac Chyna of using him as well as his family for financial gain and said it was a mutual decision by the E! Network and the Kardashian family to cancel the show.
According to TMZ, E! sources say they have emails to prove that the production team were questioning the future of the show due to the fact Blac Chyna and Rob Kardashian could not be in the same room together.
Blac Chyna says they had already started shooting the second series of Rob & Chyna and claims the Kardashians wanted to "kill" the series.
She cites one episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians in which the family discuss whether the show should be axed, saying the series had "bad, unhealthy energy".
Bloom said Blac Chyna would be seeking damages for not only the loss of her reality TV series, but the accompanying endorsements that would have gone with it.
She says her client has lost out on "many many millions" of dollars.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41664188
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Theresa May to scrap universal credit helpline charges - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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But PM rejects Labour's calls to pause the new benefit's roll-out as she loses symbolic Commons vote.
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Speaking in September 2017, claimants told the BBC about the problems they faced
People will be able to call the government's universal credit helpline without being charged, within weeks.
Prime Minister Theresa May said she had listened to criticism of the charges, which can be up to 55p a minute, and decided it was "right" to drop them.
But she again rejected calls by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to "pause" the roll-out of the controversial benefit amid fears it is causing hardship.
In a symbolic vote, MPs backed a pause after Tory MPs were told to abstain.
The opposition won by 299 votes to 0 with one Conservative - Totnes MP Sarah Wollaston - defying her party by siding with Labour.
The outcome is not binding on the government although Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said ministers must "act on the clearly expressed will of Parliament" and halt its roll out.
Commons Speaker John Bercow advised ministers to take account of the vote and "show respect for the institution" by indicating what they intended to do.
Universal credit, which rolls six working-age benefits into a single payment, is designed to make the system simpler and ensure no-one faces a situation where they would be better off claiming benefits than working.
But it has faced a backlash from Tory MPs, who fear payment delays risk pushing families into destitution.
Explaining her decision to rebel, Dr Wollaston said the length of time people were waiting to be paid - in many cases more than six weeks - was a "fundamental flaw" that must be addressed.
She told the BBC she wanted to "see a much stronger commitment" from government "that they'll do that immediately".
At Prime Minister's Questions earlier, Mr Corbyn said he was glad the PM had "bowed to Labour pressure" by scrapping the hotline charges.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser.
But he added: "The fundamental problems of universal credit remain - the six week wait, rising indebtedness, rent arrears and evictions.
"Will the prime minister now pause universal credit and fix the problems before pressing ahead with the roll-out?"
Mrs May prompted cheers from Labour MPs as she began her reply with "yes", before urging them to "listen to the whole sentence I was going to make".
She said universal credit was "a simpler system", that "encourages people to get into the workplace - it is a system that is working because more people are getting into work".
The universal credit hotline will become free to use "over the next month", the government has said, and that would be followed by all DWP helplines by the end of the year.
The government says it makes no money from the 0345 number. It is charged at local rate and is included as a free call in many landline and mobile phone packages but can cost some mobile phone users as much as 55p a minute.
Universal Credit has been introduced in stages to different groups of claimants over the past four years, with about 610,000 people now receiving it.
Almost a quarter of all claimants have had to wait more than six weeks to receive their first payment in full because of errors and problems evidencing claims.
But the government recently approved a major extension of the programme to a further 45 job centres across the country, with another 50 to be added each month.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The PM appears to give a surprising initial answer when asked to pause the national rollout of universal credit.
Labour's Frank Field told MPs a food bank in his Birkenhead constituency needed to order five tonnes of extra food to deal with hardship caused by the roll-out of universal credit over Christmas.
He asked Work and Pensions Secretary David Gauke if his constituents should ignore the food bank's warnings, or give it extra donations as a result of the minister's "inability to deliver a scheme that works".
Mr Gauke had earlier accused Labour of attempting to wreck the new benefit rather than taking a constructive approach to reforming it.
The SNP's Mhairi Black said the offer of advance payments made matters worse for some claimants because they had to be paid back.
She accused the government of acting like a "pious loan shark - except that instead of coming through your front door they are coming after your mental health, your physical well-being, your stability, your sense of security."
The Department for Work and Pensions says its latest data, from last month, indicates 81% of new claimants were paid in full and on time at the end of their first assessment while 89% received some payment.
BBC Newsnight's political editor Nick Watt said he understood ministers were giving "serious thought" to cutting the initial waiting period for payments from six to four weeks around the time of next month's Budget.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41659504
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Weinstein scandal: Game of Thrones actress 'felt powerless' - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Weinstein was "holding tightly to the back of my arm" after she rebuffed him, Lena Headey said.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Game of Thrones actress Lena Headey, who plays Cersei Lannister on the popular HBO show, has accused producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment.
The Hollywood mogul was "furious" after she resisted his sexual advances, she details in a series of Twitter posts.
The British actress joins a list of over 40 women who have accused the producer of misconduct.
Also on Tuesday, Weinstein resigned from the board of directors of his eponymous film production company.
He has been accused of rape, sexual assault and harassment, but has "unequivocally denied" any allegations of non-consensual relationships.
Despite being fired as chairman of The Weinstein Company studio on 8 October he had continued until Tuesday to hold a position on the company's board.
Weinstein, who has been expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences that present the Oscar awards, still owns 22% of his company's stock, according to Variety magazine.
Amid the fallout over the Weinstein accusations, Roy Price, the head of Amazon Studios, also resigned on Tuesday over allegations of sexual harassment, according to US media.
Mr Price took a "leave of absence" last Thursday after Isa Hackett, a producer on the Amazon series The Man in the High Castle, told the Hollywood Reporter he allegedly sexually harassed her in 2015.
Harvey Weinstein was one of the most powerful men in Hollywood
In her Twitter posts, Headey described sharing a lift with Weinstein after he had invited her to his room to show her a script.
"The lift was going up and I said to Harvey, 'I'm not interested in anything other than work, please don't think I got in here with you for any other reason, nothing is going to happen,'" she recalled.
"I don't know what possessed me to speak out at that moment, only that I had such a strong sense of don't come near me.
"He was silent after I spoke, furious.
"He walked me back to the lift by grabbing and holding tightly to the back of my arm," she said, adding that she felt "completely powerless".
After he allegedly "whispered" that she should not tell anyone about the encounter, she writes: "I got into my car and cried."
Headey's story comes as other Hollywood actresses shared their stories of sexual harassment and impropriety in show business.
On Monday, Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon said she had been harassed by an unnamed film director when she was 16 years old, during a speech to the Elle Women in Hollywood event.
Jennifer Lawrence, who has won a Best Actress Oscar, spoke at the same event and described a casting call where she was made to stand nude in front of producers who criticised her weight.
"After that degrading and humiliating line-up, the female producer told me I should use the naked photos of myself as inspiration for my diet," the star of Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle told the Los Angeles audience.
DreamWorks film studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg meanwhile told a Wall Street Journal conference of Weinstein: "Make no mistake about it: he is a monster."
He added Weinstein had been protected by other men around him, who he described as "a pack of wolves".
Jeffrey Katzenberg pictured with Harvey Weinstein at a charity event in 2005
Screenwriter Scott Rosenberg also got involved by writing a Facebook post about his early days at Miramax Films.
He wrote the movies Beautiful Girls and Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead at the time Weinstein's profile was rising in the film industry.
In his post, he said that while he never heard any rape allegations, he was aware of Weinstein's "dreadful" behaviour - and said "everybody" else knew, too.
"I was there. And I saw you. And I talked about it with you," he wrote. "You, the big producers; you, the big directors; you, the big agents; you, the big financiers.
"And you, the big rival studio chiefs; you, the big actors; you, the big actresses; you, the big models.
"You, the big journalists; you, the big screenwriters; you, the big rock stars; you, the big restaurateurs; you, the big politicians."
He said others chose to ignore what was going on because they were enjoying themselves and because women were told it would ruin their careers if they said anything.
At the end of the piece, Rosenberg apologised for not doing anything.
"I reaped the rewards and I kept my mouth shut," he said. "And for that, once again, I am sorry."
Beautiful Girls actress Lauren Holly has also come forward, sharing her story of harassment, describing an encounter she had with Weinstein.
The pair arranged a meeting in a hotel, which she didn't find "abnormal at all" because she had routinely met producers, writers and directors in their suites.
She described the early stages of the meeting as normal, but said things turned sour when Weinstein walked into the hotel suite "wearing a hotel bathrobe".
"He said, 'OK, let's get to it, this is what we've got going on at my company, these are the scripts we have in the pipeline, this is what I think might be right for you,' and he gestured for me to follow him."
Holly recounted that she followed him into the bedroom part of the suite as he continued talking.
Weinstein then showered and, when he emerged, was naked and started to approach her.
Holly said she started to run away, but that Weinstein began to threaten her, saying she needed to "keep him as [her] ally" and that it would be a "bad decision" if she left the room.
At that point, Holly said, she "pushed him and ran".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41650350
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Reality Check: Is it legal to tax old people more? - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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The chancellor is tipped to include measures to help young people in his budget, at the expense of older taxpayers.
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UK
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In November, the man who holds the UK's purse-strings will announce how the nation's money will be spent in the year ahead. And rumours have begun flying about potential cuts and giveaways in the pipeline.
Among these, Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond is rumoured to be planning a reduced rate of National Insurance for young people, while cutting older people's pension relief.
The plans to redistribute wealth across the generations were mooted by Whitehall sources, according to The Telegraph.
Pension relief is a system in which the more you pay into a pension, the more money you can get back as a tax relief from government.
We don't know exactly how this policy - were it to be announced - would work, or which ages would benefit.
But at BBC Reality Check, we wanted to know - can you make someone pay more tax just because they're older?
The short answer is yes - there are lots of instances of people paying more or less tax, based on their age.
It may be discrimination, but it's not illegal.
Until last year, people over the age of 65 were allowed to keep more money tax-free, and it's still the case that UK workers reaching state pension age no longer have to make National Insurance contributions.
You can also be paid a lower minimum wage if you are younger. There are four different minimum wages depending on your age, from £4.05 an hour for under-18s, increasing to £7.50 for over-25s.
These variations don't count as age discrimination in law, and are allowed in the UK system of tax and earnings.
It wouldn't be too difficult to implement either.
But does it make sense to do so?
There is very little economic justification for allowing young people to pay a reduced National Insurance rate according to a spokesman for independent think tank, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).
The IFS says government usually has one of two main aims when reducing taxes for a particular group:
If the aim is to change behaviour - in the case of National Insurance contributions, probably to encourage people to enter or stay in the workplace - certain groups are more "responsive" to tax cuts than others.
Tax cuts for people nearing retirement age, or mothers with school-age children, are more likely to get them to stay in work, according to the IFS.
But young people without dependants are less likely to work more because they are being taxed less.
If changing how the wealth of the country is distributed is the aim, this is a very blunt tool, the IFS says.
It would be better to address the root problems facing young people like the housing market or student debts, according to Julian Jessop at the Institute for Economic Affairs.
He says this system could mean young City workers on six-figure salaries could pay less tax than NHS workers in their 50s.
It could also create an unfair system whereby women who take career breaks when they are younger in order to have children don't benefit from tax breaks in their 20s, but end up paying more tax later in life.
Instead of putting more money in young people's pockets via tax cuts, government could introduce a new form of pension tax relief favouring the young, according to Tom McPhail, head of policy at financial services company Hargreaves Lansdowne.
This could mean the government "tops up" young people's pensions by a larger amount than older people's pensions.
But this may not have the same political capital as a giveaway for young people that they can feel immediately in their pay packets.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41656117
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French magazine accused of glorifying rock-star murderer - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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Les Inrockuptibles defends making Bertrand Cantat - who killed his girlfriend - its cover star.
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Europe
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Actress Marie Trintignant pictured on the set of French TV series Colette, less than a month before she was killed
A leading French music magazine has responded to criticism for making a rock star who killed his girlfriend its cover star.
Les Inrockuptibles placed Bertrand Cantat, who beat actress Marie Trintignant to death in 2003, on its front page last week.
In a statement, it said its choice was "debatable", and expressed "sincere regrets" to "those who felt hurt".
France's Elle magazine responded with an editorial tribute to Ms Trintignant.
Under the headline "In the name of Marie", it said its words were for "all women victims of violence" carried out by men.
Cantat, who was released from prison in 2007, is trying to relaunch his music career with a new solo album.
Les Inrockuptibles said it had been covering Cantat since the 1980s and its history was built on his old band, Noir Desir. It justified its coverage by saying the article tackled controversial issues, such as "Did Cantat have the right to a public life after having killed Marie Trintignant with his fists?"
The magazine said it had received many complaints.
One Twitter user said Les Inrockuptibles "should apologise to the Trintignant family".
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The controversy coincided with the Harvey Weinstein scandal, which has seen the US producer accused of multiple assaults against women and which has also provoked a big reaction in France.
On Monday, Gender Equality Minister Marlène Schiappa set out plans for new laws to crack down on sexual violence.
She said a taskforce of politicians would work with police and magistrates to establish what sort of behaviour constituted sexual harassment.
Cantat, who was convicted of beating Marie Trintignant to death in 2003, returned to music in 2013
"The idea is that society as a whole redefines what it is acceptable or not," she told La Croix newspaper.
French Twitter users have also been using #balancetonporc, meaning "rat on your dirty old man", to encourage women to name and shame their attackers.
First Lady Brigitte Macron has praised women for "breaking the silence".
On Sunday, President Emmanuel Macron said that he would be stripping Harvey Weinstein of the prestigious Legion d'honneur award.
Elle magazine's editorial retort also applauds the "courage" of the Hollywood figures who have spoken out against Harvey Weinstein in light of the recent allegations.
Les Inrockuptibles also noted the Weinstein allegations in its letter to readers, published on Tuesday, adding that it has always strived "to relay feminist ideas".
"It was important for us to tell you that," it said, signing off.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. 100 Women: What exactly do we mean when we talk about street harassment?
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41657066
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Newspaper headlines: PM pledge and FA chiefs 'urged to resign' - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Theresa May's promise to let EU nationals stay and questions over the future of the FA's bosses feature on the front pages.
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The Papers
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A year on from the Brexit referendum, says the Financial Times, the government has still not spelled out what that will mean for the economy.
The paper sees division in the two main parties, the House of Lords, and across the UK.
If things turn nasty, it thinks the government should resist the "petulant and reckless" option of walking out.
But the Sun tells Theresa May "the time for niceties is over."
It says the PM has now assured every EU citizen here that they can stay, come what may - and it's time for other EU leaders to be "equally forthcoming".
And four former Conservative cabinet ministers tell the Daily Telegraph that she should walk away if the EU won't move on to discussions about trade and the future.
The Daily Mail and the Daily Express both see signs that Germany, at least, might want a comprehensive free trade accord.
Several of the papers are struck by - and concerned about - the figures showing how many people are financially exposed.
Millions of people, says the Financial Times, have to borrow from friends and family "to make ends meet."
"More than four million people are living on the brink of financial meltdown," says the Daily Mail, "figures that add up to a crisis."
The i believes half the adult population are at risk, with 15 million of them failing to pay anything into any kind of pension.
A headline in the Times calls that a "retirement timebomb ticking for millions".
The switch to universal credit, says the Guardian, was a sensible idea "on paper".
But in practice, the paper argues, it has been anything but.
The old system, it believes, "was baggier and more accommodating" - for all its flaws - and the new one just doesn't take account of the actual circumstances of many claimants.
The paper fears that pressing on with the change "will leave families to celebrate Christmas on the contents of a food parcel".
The Mirror says Mrs May is "still pig-headedly making life worse for struggling individuals".
The Times is concerned by the limitations which have been imposed on free speech at several universities since the start of the academic year.
And it therefore commends the Universities minister, Jo Johnson, for telling higher education institutions that they will face penalties if they deny a platform to people whose views might upset some.
The paper says free speech is central to what universities do.
The Daily Mail wonders whether Prince Harry's girlfriend, Meghan Markle, has already had a meeting with the Queen.
It says the actress appears to have been whisked into Buckingham Palace a week ago - in a Ford Galaxy with blacked out windows.
The paper says she spent almost an hour with the Queen having tea and cake. The Palace declined to comment.
The Times reports that "the tree that first brought Bramley apples to the world is dying."
The 200-year-old tree, at Southwell in Nottinghamshire, has an incurable honey fungus infection.
Scientists, says the Daily Express, believe they can save it.
The Daily Telegraph hopes they succeed - saying "if Eden's apple gave the world sorrow, Southwell's brought it only wholesome delight".
The Express thinks their mission is a "project with core a-peel."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-41674515
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Why is China investing heavily in south-east Europe? - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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Beijing's spending spree in Greece and the Balkans raises concerns that the EU will object to its involvement in the region.
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Europe
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China is pouring billions of pounds' worth of investment into Greece and other Balkan countries to create a "New Silk Road" from the Mediterranean into the heart of the European Union.
The initiative, called One Belt One Road (OBOR) involves the transformation and upgrading of harbours, airports, roads and rail across the Balkans. The Chinese have also bought industries, including a steel factory near the Serbian capital, Belgrade.
But there are concerns that the European Union (EU) might eventually object to the level of investment if it poses a significant Chinese threat to European industries.
Last year, the Chinese state-owned company Cosco purchased a controlling stake in the port of Piraeus, near Athens. The company is investing 385 million euros (£343m) in Piraeus to maximise both capacity and trade with the EU.
Nektarios Demenopoulos of the Piraeus Port Authority says Chinese investment has boomed
Piraeus has always been of immense interest to the Chinese. Its geographical position means it is the first major port for shipments emerging from the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean, and its depth allows it to take the biggest container ships.
Nektarios Demenopoulos, a deputy manager of the Port of Piraeus Authority, told the BBC that Chinese investment in Piraeus had expanded significantly since the Chinese took control of the container port in 2009.
"In 2016 we handled 3.7 million twenty-foot (6 metre) containers," he explained. "That's double what we handled back in 2009. And we will be expanding the container pier to create a capacity allowing us to handle 7.2 million containers. So we will double through-put again."
Those Greeks who are working with the Chinese emphasised the important cultural relationship between the two countries.
Fotis Provatas, of the Athens-based Greek Chinese Economic Council, said. "I was surprised to see how many people in China know about ancient Greek culture and they respect it very much. And they respect the Western culture because they think - and this is true - that it is a continuation of the ancient Greek culture."
He added that the Chinese have huge investment plans for Greece, including plans to buy and then vastly expand Athens airport. He also said China would upgrade the rail network in other Balkan countries, particularly the neighbouring Republic of Macedonia, and Serbia.
Mr Provatas welcomed the investment but said there was also a danger of a backlash from the EU. He added: "Europe wants economic cooperation with China but in a different way to us.
"We do not have industries so we do not compete with the Chinese in that way. They are welcome to come here and make cars and other industrial products. This is not the same elsewhere in Europe. They are competitors."
Greece's Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (l) met with China's President Xi Jinping (r) in Beijing in May 2017
The Greek government believes Chinese investment will be an important factor in the country's recovery from deep financial crisis.
But ministers insist China does not get preferential treatment and that Greece takes its obligations seriously as a member of the EU.
Stergios Pitsiarlos, Greece's deputy economics minister, told the BBC, "We think Greece should take advantage of these new opportunities that the Chinese strategy opens up. Our strategy is to take advantage of our geographical position and to attract foreign investment.
"It is very clear that the Chinese would like to have a corridor towards Europe and the European market. At this point, the starting point for Greece is that we are a country that is a member of both the European Union and of the eurozone, and we will always respect European regulations."
Ana Brnabić, Prime Minister of Serbia, denies that China has any political influence in the region
The Chinese are also investing across the eastern Balkans, including in Serbia.
Last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in the city of Smederevo in eastern Serbia to inaugurate the local steel mill, which had been bought by the Chinese steel giant, Hesteel.
In an interview for the BBC, Ana Brnabić, the Prime Minister of Serbia, welcomed the Chinese investment, saying Serbia is already home to very many Chinese investments, including road and rail.
She denied that this investment would give China undue political influence in the Balkans, adding "Without a doubt when you have a huge inflow of investment from one particular country, it always gives a bigger influence to that country. But I did not notice that it had any political influence."
Serbia has applied to join the EU. Ms Brnabić added: "China wants to get closer to the EU and EU markets and Serbia is happy to be one of the central countries in the One Road One Belt Initiative because it's important for our GDP growth and that is our number one priority today. Politically it doesn't interfere in any way with our EU integration."
Andrew Hosken's report on Chinese investment in south-eastern Europe will be on The World Tonight on BBC Radio 4 at 22:00 on Tuesday 17 October and will be available later via BBC iPlayer.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41654346
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Carrie Fisher gave a cow tongue to predatory producer - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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The Star Wars actress gave a cow tongue in a Tiffany box to teach the Hollywood producer a lesson.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Carrie Fisher hand delivered the "gift" to the producer
Carrie Fisher once gave a Hollywood producer a cow's tongue after learning he had assaulted her friend.
Heather Ross, who works in the film industry, told Fisher about how the unnamed producer sexually assaulted her in his car.
Fisher reacted by personally delivering the cow tongue in a Tiffany box wrapped in a bow to his office in Los Angeles.
Ross revealed the story on US radio station, 94.9 MixFM in light of the recent Harvey Weinstein allegations.
Ross spoke about how she contacted the producer - who is not Weinstein - to try and be a part of his new project.
After meeting up, she says the producer forced himself on her in his car after making an excuse to pull over, then reached over and climbed on top of her.
Ross told the radio show she managed to push the producer off her, but as she fled, he said: "You'll never make a movie in my town and get the F out of my car."
When she told Fisher about what had happened, the late Star Wars actress took matters into her own hands.
"About two weeks later, she sent me a message online and said, 'I just saw [blank] at Sony Studios. I knew he would probably be there, so I went to his office and personally delivered a Tiffany box wrapped with a white bow.'"
Ross continued: "I asked her what was inside and she said, 'It was a cow tongue from Jerry's Famous Deli in Westwood with a note that said, if you ever touch my darling Heather or any other woman again, the next delivery will be something of yours in a much smaller box!'"
Ross added that knowing the Star Wars actress had her back had left a lasting impression on her.
"It felt validating to know, OK, first of all, this woman who I love as a friend was not just a fake Hollywood friend. That's who Carrie Fisher was. She spoke out and she put things out there in your face," she said.
Fisher, best known for playing Princess Leia in the Star Wars films, died at the age of 60 in December.
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41650345
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'Go to the dentist and get fined £100' - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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Dentists warn that thousands of vulnerable people are wrongly being fined over dental treatment.
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Family & Education
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Charlotte Waite says it is distressing when so many wrong fines are being issued
Going to the dentist is something that many would want to avoid - but how about if you also faced a penalty fine?
More than 40,000 people a year in England are getting fines of £100 - from an automated system that dentists say is hitting the most vulnerable.
They warn that people such as dementia sufferers are unfairly getting caught up in a system meant to stop fraudsters from getting free treatment.
The NHS accepts there is a problem with errors and is promising changes.
The fines, about £4m per year, are being applied by a random screening process that checks on whether people going to the dentist are really eligible for free treatment.
But dentists say rising numbers of people with dementia, or those with learning difficulties, are being unfairly fined for something as simple as ticking a wrong box in confusing paperwork.
When these have been challenged, about 90% have been overturned as having been incorrectly applied.
The British Dental Association says the problem seems to be increasing and with an ageing population is only likely to get worse.
Charlotte Waite, a senior dentist working in Loughborough, Leicestershire, says this is a problem appearing on a "daily basis".
"This has become a significant barrier to care. It can cause a lot of distress if people feel they are seen as fraudulent," she says.
Mrs Waite, vice-chair of the British Dental Association's England community dental services committee, is leading a campaign to stop a wave of fines for elderly and frail people, those with dementia or learning difficulties, who have made honest mistakes when filling in forms about free care.
She says even when patients are eligible for free treatment, an incorrect description of specific benefits or failure to renew documents can trigger a penalty fine, which rises to £150 if there is a delay in payment.
And she says because it typically affects vulnerable and often low-income families, there has been a lack of a "powerful advocate" to raise the issue.
Many such patients will be brought to the dentist by a carer, and Mrs Waite says they might not have the detailed information about types of benefit and exemption certificates.
She says this becomes a dilemma for dentists, whether to turn away patients or to treat them and then risk that patients could face a fine.
Patients might turn up for the dentist and go away again without treatment because of confusion over benefits and entitlements and worries about being fined.
"I feel very strongly that clinical time should be spent on clinical work," she says, rather then trying to navigate the benefits system.
"It's an extreme waste of clinical time.
"We really need to sort this out now."
What dentists say they've seen
"They were fined twice over an 18-month period, due to the change in exemption and Mum accidently putting the wrong thing on the form.
"Mum was having a bad year and the patient had suffered a few health problems, and these fines were very upsetting and caused lots of anxiety.
The NHS says it is going to launch an awareness-raising campaign and make information simpler
"We did manage to get the fines turned around, but this took long periods of time and many phone calls and a letter. We were constantly up against a brick wall."
"He contacted me in quite a panic and I had to reassure him and request that he brought in the paperwork to me to see, I completed the appeal form for him as he was entitled to claim free dental care.
"The appeal form that needed sending back was quite a complex letter, and I think our patient would have struggled to respond to it without help.
"I felt it was most unfair for him to have to go through that."
"I phoned on her behalf, but they would not accept my word regarding the patient's special needs and wanted a letter from the patient's doctor.
"It took three weeks for the patient to get in to see the doctor as it wasn't urgent. All I could get was a deferral in increasing the fine [for non-payment] while the patient waited for a letter from her doctor."
What the NHS wants to do in response
The NHS Business Services Authority, which oversees the fining system, accepts there is a problem and is looking for a way to make improvements.
A spokeswoman says no-one wants vulnerable people to be unfairly fined or for dentists to waste valuable clinical time.
Dentists say the fining errors need to be "sorted out" as soon as possible
The checks have an important role in making sure free treatment isn't being unfairly accessed by those who should pay.
The screening system compares what people have put on forms at the dentist against two databases of information about benefits and entitlements - and if these do not match, the fining system generates a penalty notice.
The most recent figures suggest almost 120,000 fines have been issued over the past three years.
But the British Dental Association says when 30,000 of these fines were checked, almost 90% were overturned, suggesting the scale of the error in the system.
"We want to make sure that patients, particularly those who struggle with literacy, understand if they are entitled to receive free dental treatment or if they should pay," says a NHS Business Services Authority spokeswoman.
"We recognise the importance of information and access to it for everyone."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-41639456
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Ex-England captain Terry Butcher 'devastated' by son's death - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Terry Butcher said his son Christopher's life had been "tragically cut short".
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Suffolk
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Terry Butcher, left, said the life of his son Christopher, right, was "tragically cut short"
Former England football captain Terry Butcher has said he is "devastated" by the death of his son, Christopher.
The ex-army captain, who had served in the Royal Artillery and in Afghanistan, died on Monday morning, aged 35.
Suffolk Police said his death was not being treated as suspicious.
The former Ipswich Town and Rangers defender said his son's life had been "tragically cut short" while a family statement described him as a "formidable leader and soldier".
"Chris was a larger than life character whose personality, laughter and compassion touched the hearts of all who were fortunate to know him," it said.
"He always put others before himself and was a true and trusted brother-in-arms.
"His life has been so tragically cut short, but we will cherish and treasure the memories we all shared, forever."
The family thanked people for the "overwhelming number of messages" which they said were "a testament to how much love and respect surrounded Chris".
Their statement added: "We are all devastated by his loss and thank you now for allowing us some time to ourselves, to grieve and come to terms with his passing."
Butcher, now 58, won 77 caps for England and appeared at three World Cups during his career.
He also played for Ipswich Town where he made more than 250 appearances in the 1970s and 1980s, and has managed several clubs including Sunderland, Motherwell and Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-41673276
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Millions miss bills as finances bite - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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More than four million people face difficulties over domestic or credit bills, says a major study.
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Business
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An estimated 4.1 million people are in financial difficulty owing to missed domestic or credit bills, a major study has found.
These consumers - most likely to be aged between 25 and 34 - have failed to pay bills in three or more of the last six months.
The findings come as part of a survey of 13,000 people by the regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
It suggests 25.6 million consumers could be vulnerable to financial harm.
This means that they display at least one of a series of issues, such as lack of internet access or an overdraft, so their finances would be at an increased risk if something went wrong.
The Financial Lives research, the first of its kind by the regulator, revealed a range of concerns among consumers at a time of weak wage growth, but also low-cost credit.
It concluded that 15 million people had low levels of resilience to a bill shock, that eight million were struggling with debt, and 100,000 had used an illegal money lender in the last 12 months.
One in six (17%) of those with a mortgage or who are paying rent, an estimated five million people, said that they would struggle if monthly payments rose by less than £50.
A rise in interest rates, heavily hinted by policymakers at the Bank of England, could affect many of these people - especially if the Bank rate rose rapidly.
Rent, car loans, mortgages, credit cards, pay day loans, unsecured credit, overdrafts - with real wages falling, the amount of debt we are taking on is rising and the pressure we are under is increasing.
For many, a savings cash buffer to deal with shocks and rising prices is non-existent.
When it comes to the build up of debt, this is a classic story of supply and demand.
The digitisation of financial products - making many loans little more than a mobile phone swipe away - has meant that supply has become broader and easier.
Historically low interest rates have also made products cheaper, meaning that taking on debt appears to be low cost, in the short term at least.
In the same week as the BBC News Money Matters series revealed worrying levels of debt among young adults, the FCA report highlights the issue again for 25 to 34-year-olds.
Its findings show that 23% of consumers of this age were "over-indebted", the highest proportion of any age group.
The report also found that this group were most likely to be in difficulty (13%) or just surviving with their finances.
"This [research] exposes the story around the scale of those who are potentially in difficulty in the younger generation," said Christopher Woolard, executive director of strategy and competition at the FCA.
He added that there were "challenges" faced by every age group and that flexibility was required to ensure that these various issues were tackled.
Gareth Shaw, from consumer group Which?, said: "That such a high number of people in middle-age have not properly considered how they will manage in retirement should be cause for concern.
"The current complex pensions system is leading to disengagement, leaving consumers vulnerable through the real lack of information, support and tools needed to empower consumers to make informed decisions about their financial futures.
"Today's figures should spur on the FCA to take action to deliver a consumer-friendly pensions system that everyone can engage with."
The FCA said that the survey would provide a "wealth of information" that would be used when deciding how to protect vulnerable consumers in the future.
A Treasury spokesman said the government had tightened rules "to ensure that money can only be lent to people who can afford to repay".
"We have also cracked down on pay day loans, saving borrowers over £150m a year, and are introducing an energy cap to help people with household bills," he added.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41655915
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Brexit: EU leaders seek Brexit talks progress - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Leaders gather for a crunch summit as the UK faces EU calls to do more to break the deadlock.
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Theresa May: I want 'urgency' on citizens' deal
EU leaders have urged Theresa May to do more to break the deadlock in the Brexit negotiations as they gather at a crunch Brussels summit.
Dutch PM Mark Rutte said "a lot more clarity" on the UK's financial offer was needed before talks could progress.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said there were "encouraging" signs but that progress so far was "not sufficient" to open trade talks.
However, Mrs Merkel suggested this could happen in December.
Mrs May, who has called for "urgency" in reaching agreement on the issue of citizens' rights, will address EU leaders at the summit later.
At a meeting on Friday, at which the UK will not be present, the 27 leaders are expected to conclude officially that "insufficient progress" has been made on the first topics for discussion to move onto the second phase of trade discussions.
These topics are citizens' rights, the UK's financial obligation and the border in Northern Ireland.
The UK prime minister spoke of her desire for a future partnership with the EU as she arrived in Brussels, but added: "We'll also be looking at the concrete progress that has been made in our exit negotiations and setting out ambitious plans for the weeks ahead.
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"I particularly, for example, want to see an urgency in reaching an agreement on citizens' rights."
Speaking to the BBC, Mr Rutte said he welcomed the PM's recent speech in Florence, where she set out what she has described as a "bold and ambitious agenda".
But he said she needed to make "absolutely clear" what she was offering to do in relationship to the UK's financial obligations towards the EU.
"Maybe it's not possible now to name a number but at least to come up with a methodology, a system, a complete proposal to solve this issue," he said.
"As long as that is not happening I don't see how we can move forward."
Theresa May chatted to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron at the EU summit
The October summit was always the first date in the EU calendar on which a gathering of the 27 heads of government could declare themselves satisfied with the Brexit divorce negotiations and agree to start talking about trade.
It's been clear for weeks that they won't do that - but they will offer the UK some encouragement by starting internal discussions about future trade with the UK - ready for any breakthrough at the next summit in December.
Theresa May isn't expected to make any big new proposal in her after-dinner remarks but to underline the quality of the financial offer made in her speech in Florence - worth around £20bn.
The EU side wants more though - more money as well as further movement on citizens rights and the Irish border.
There are almost as many predictions about what happens next as there are diplomats in Brussels; one has suggested that the prospects of a December breakthrough are no better than fifty-fifty but an official close to the talks said the signal on Brexit from this summit would be fundamentally positive.
Before leaving for Brussels, Mrs May used a Facebook post to offer further assurances to the three million or so nationals of other EU countries living in the UK and uncertain about their future after Brexit.
In the open letter, which was also mailed to 100,000 EU nationals, she said those who already had permanent residence would be able to "swap this" for settled status in as hassle-free a way as possible.
The process of applying for permanent residency, for which EU nationals are eligible after five years, has long been criticised as cumbersome and overly bureaucratic. At one point, it involved filling out an 85-page form.
Theresa May says the future of British and EU nationals has always been her "first priority"
In simplifying it, Mrs May said she was committed to putting "people first" in the negotiations and expected British nationals living on the continent to be treated in the same way.
"I know both sides will consider each other's proposals with an open mind and with flexibility and creativity on both sides, I am confident we can conclude discussions on citizens' rights in the coming weeks," she said.
Nicolas Hatton, of the 3million pressure group formed to fight for the rights of EU nationals in the UK, described the PM's statement as "very positive", but said its timing was "a bit more dubious".
"We should have received that letter maybe 12 months ago so we would not have felt so anxious about our future" he said, adding: "I think the letter was actually addressed to EU leaders."
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Meanwhile a group of pro-Brexit Tory and Labour politicians - including former Chancellor Lord Lawson, former Conservative minister Owen Paterson and Labour MP Kate Hoey - is urging Mrs May to walk away from negotiations this week if the EU does not accommodate the UK's wishes.
In the event of no progress at Thursday's meeting, the letter, organised by the Leave Means Leave campaign, says Mrs May should formally declare the UK is working on the assumption it will be reverting to World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules on 30 March 2019.
Mr Paterson told the Today programme the UK should not be "terrified" of leaving the EU without a deal in place, saying this appeared "inevitable at the moment" due to the EU's "complete obsession with money" - the so-called Brexit divorce bill.
But Labour's Brexit spokesman, Sir Keir Starmer, said it would be "irresponsible" to threaten to walk away with the talks only at "phase one".
He added that Labour was not "duty bound" to support any deal the PM secures with Brussels.
Sir Keir and Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn are also in Brussels for their own talks with EU officials.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41672097
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Charlotte Brown speedboat death: Jack Shepherd in court - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Jack Shepherd faces a manslaughter charge after Charlotte Brown fell into the River Thames.
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London
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Charlotte Brown, known as Charli, was a business development consultant from London
A man whose date died after falling from a speedboat into the River Thames has appeared in court.
Charlotte Brown, 24, died in hospital after both she and Jack Shepherd ended up in the river on 8 December 2015.
Police were called to reports of someone in distress near Wandsworth Bridge, London, at about 23:45 BST.
Mr Shepherd, 30, of Bristol, did not enter a plea when he appeared at Wimbledon Magistrates' Court charged with manslaughter by gross negligence.
He was ordered to appear at the Old Bailey on 15 November.
Ms Brown, a business development consultant from London, was described as "caring and fun-loving" by her family.
A number of her relatives, including her mother, father and sister, sat in the back of the court during the hearing.
Jack Shepherd has been charged with manslaughter by gross negligence
The boat got into difficulty at Plantation Wharf near Wandsworth Bridge
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-41666295
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Fake news: a teenage dilemma - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Smartphones and the internet create such an avalanche of facts, opinions, images and conflicting messages. Is teaching news literacy worthwhile?
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Entertainment & Arts
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The other day I went up to Birmingham to gauge how teenagers are getting their news and, more importantly, whether they can distinguish fact from fiction.
It is always dangerous to extrapolate from the specific experience or anecdote to a general view, and smart policy should be based on solid data. Nevertheless, I was alarmed by what we found out, and persuaded that whatever form it might take, news literacy is an area educators will need to think hard about.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. How hard is it to spot fake news? Amol Rajan meets pupils in Birmingham to find out
Fake news is a deceptive problem. For one thing, it spikes around high-profile news events like the election of Donald Trump, and the evidence of its infiltration into British culture is contested. For another, there is a sense in which inflating the threat of fake news is convenient for those who have a stake in its defeat.
Ambitious politicians can use the issue of fake news to raise their profile, and show themselves attuned to digital technology. Technology firms can point to their (sometimes unimpressive) response to fake news to display a social conscience. And journalists in established and traditional media can make their own trade, which is under tremendous financial pressure, look noble when juxtaposed with the threat from misinformation online.
But there is such a thing as fake news nevertheless, and young people are beginning to wise up to it.
The teenagers at Cardinal Wiseman school in Kingstanding, Birmingham, were hugely bright. It is an impressive school, with inspirational teachers and some wonderful pupils. They knew the phrase fake news well, though they didn't associate it particularly with Donald Trump. And they were profoundly sceptical about the news they get from what they didn't quite refer to as the mainstream media.
Pupils and staff at Cardinal Wiseman School in Birmingham reveal their concerns to Amol Rajan and cameraman Rob Pettit about fake news and the internet
But the most searing takeaway, which all parents of teenagers will relate to, is the sheer volume of information they are deluged with every day. These kids spend hours and hours, and hours and hours, online from morning to night. Leave aside what this does to the wiring of their brains, which is beyond my expertise; it creates such an avalanche of facts, opinions, images and conflicting messages that it is a challenge even for a discerning reporter or a judicious philosopher to know what can and can't be trusted online.
We set them a small test, in which they would look at three stories of varying veracity, say whether they were true, false or in between - and why. Watching their brains whirr was thrilling. And in each case they mostly gave wrong answers, ultimately, but for interesting reasons.
All the questions that an adult might reasonably have on seeing a news article went through these young minds. Does the headline seem plausible? Do I know the publisher? Is there anything about the presentation of this article that looks suspicious? And so on.
The pupils asked all the right questions, but came to all the wrong conclusions, seeing lies where truth resided, and truth where lies ran rampant.
I don't for a minute say that young people today are less bright than in yesteryear. But the amount of news and information they are downloading every day is immeasurably higher than a generation ago; and the fact that the internet does contain lots of fake news and other deceptive information - for instance, mash-ups in which voiceover is laid on top of video footage to give a false impression of what someone has said - makes me wonder if teaching news literacy may be worthwhile.
Of course, pupils who are good at logic and reasoning, perhaps because they have studied philosophy, will naturally be better at deciphering credible information. But it may be that the viral spread of unreliable sources online, combined with the ultra-addictive nature of smartphones and the amount of time young people are spending online, bolsters the case for a more concerted, nationwide effort to tackle fake news in education.
Even if, as I said above, we should be sceptical about fake news itself.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41665814
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Pre-sex HIV drug 'no-brainer' for NHS - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Prep treatment could prevent a quarter of new HIV cases and save the NHS millions, experts calculate.
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Health
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A drug to dramatically cut the risk of HIV infection during sex would save the UK around £1bn over the next 80 years, say scientists.
The team at University College London says Prep, or pre-exposure prophylaxis, is a "no-brainer" for the NHS.
The study predicts that giving Prep to men who have sex with men would prevent one in four HIV cases.
NHS England is currently funding a trial of Prep in 10,000 patients, but does not offer the treatment routinely.
Prep is already available in Scotland. The health service in England fought against paying for Prep in the courts, but agreed to trialling it in selected clinics.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. How taking pre-exposure drugs revolutionised one gay man's relationship with sex
Prep disables HIV before it gets a stranglehold in the body and trials show it can cut the risk of being infected by up to 86%.
The financial analysis, published in the Lancet Infectious Diseases, looked at the cost-effectiveness of a national roll-out of Prep, focusing on the highest risk group - men who have sex with men.
It showed offering Prep would cost the NHS money initially as it paid for both Prep and lifelong care for people already infected with HIV.
It could take up to 40 years to become cost-effective, when savings from the falling number of new HIV cases equal the cost of Prep.
Eventually, after 80 years, the pills would deliver a saving of £1bn, say the researchers.
Dr Alison Rodger, part of the UCL team, told the BBC: "Not only is it a highly effective treatment, it will save money. It's a no-brainer so it's a good thing to do."
It is still cost-effective with a daily Prep pill, but it takes longer to become cost-effective. Both options are being investigated as part of the NHS England trial.
The other major unknown is the long-term cost of the drugs, which may fall as cheaper alternatives become available.
Dr Michael Brady, medical director at the Terrence Higgins Trust, said: "It is important that all who need Prep can access it, and evidence like this reinforces the need for Prep to be fully commissioned and given a long-term, sustainable home on the NHS in England."
Dr Paul Revill, from the centre of health economics at the University of York, said the NHS needed to be "far sighted [and] invest now and reap long-term gains".
He added: "With a combination of frequent HIV testing, immediate treatment, and Prep availability, there is now the prospect of bending the curve of new HIV infections downwards in a way that did not seem feasible just a few years ago."
A spokesperson for NHS England said: "The Lancet study makes an important contribution to the growing evidence for cost effectiveness of Prep, highlighting the factors which will determine this, such as price and duration on Prep."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41637901
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Christian Cole: Oxford University's first black student - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The University of Oxford pays tribute to its first black student Christian Cole.
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Oxford
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Christian Cole was depicted in cartoons during his time at Oxford
In a salute to a "remarkable" man, the University of Oxford has paid tribute to its first black student. But who was Christian Cole and what was life like for him at a time when being black at the university wasn't merely unusual, but remarkable?
Cole was always likely to turn heads when he arrived in Oxford to read classics.
It was 1873 and he was a 21-year-old black man from Waterloo, Sierra Leone, studying alongside young men from the elite families of Victorian England (His arrival pre-dated the institution of the university's first women's college by six years.).
The city must have appeared a daunting place for Cole, said Dr Robin Darwall-Smith, an archivist at University College Oxford.
"For a lot of people he would have been the first black African they had ever encountered," he said.
A new plaque honouring Christian Cole can be seen in Logic Lane at University College
Even understanding his colleagues might have initially been a challenge for a man used to hearing English in a Sierra Leonean dialect, according to cultural historian Pamela Roberts.
The author of Black Oxford: The Untold Stories of Oxford University's Black Scholars, she said he could have expected no special treatment.
"This was not a time of affirmative action or quotas," she said.
Little is known about Cole's early life in Africa, but Ms Roberts suggests a good education and his impressive intellect would have stood him in good stead.
Cole was the grandson of a slave and the adopted son of a Church of England minister in Sierra Leone.
He had studied at Fourah Bay College in the country's capital, Freetown. It was established by Christian missionaries in 1827 and was known as the "Athens of West Africa" because of its academic reputation.
Oxford University is working with Target Oxbridge to increase the number of black students
Cole was a non-collegiate student at Oxford - to help poorer students who might not be able to afford college fees, it was possible to study without being part of a college at the time.
He received an allowance from his uncle to support him, which he supplemented by tutoring and giving music lessons.
These extra commitments did not prevent Cole from making an impression on Oxford life, said Dr Darwall-Smith.
He spoke at the university's debating society, the Oxford Union, and seems to have been a well-known figure.
When he attended Encaenia, Oxford's honorary degree-giving ceremony and a great social occasion, his presence did not go unnoticed. The Oxford Chronicle recorded there were "three cheers for Christian Cole" before the event.
"There would have been these visitors saying, 'gosh, who is that?' 'That is Christian Cole, he's from Sierra Leone.' 'Wow, gosh, how exotic'," Dr Darwall-Smith said.
"Cole would have known this... but he went along. I admire him for that," he added.
His presence in Oxford was also documented in cartoons and he is mentioned in the diary of Anna Florence Ward, who describes spotting him on a visit to her brother, who was at Magdalen College, in June 1876.
She wrote: "Saw Christian Cole (Coal?) also" and then used the N-word in brackets.
After leaving Oxford, Cole wrote a pamphlet on the Zulu War
Although to modern eyes the diary entry is clearly racist, Dr Darwall-Smith said he felt Cole's contemporaries were "looking out for him".
He cites as an example an appeal started by students to help Cole financially after his uncle died.
It was supported by the master of University College George Bradley and fellow student Herbert Gladstone, the son of four-time prime minister William Ewart Gladstone.
Bradley went on to award Cole membership of University College after he left with his Oxford degree in 1876, and paid his college membership fee for two years.
Cole graduated with a fourth-class honours degree in classics, although Dr Darwall-Smith stressed that this was no failure.
Teaching for non-collegiate students was not as comprehensive and very few students who did not belong to a college achieved honours degrees in this period.
The plaque was commissioned after historian Pamela Roberts suggested the idea as part of a project called Black Oxford
Classics was also considered to be the toughest subject at the time.
After leaving Oxford, Cole returned to Sierra Leone before coming back to England to join the Inner Temple in London, prior to becoming the first black African to practise law in an English court, in 1883.
He also published a poem attacking British policy in the Zulu War under the name of a "A Negro, B.A., of University College", in 1879.
The text was addressed to WE Gladstone MP, who he describes as his "Master and Father in politics".
Despite his achievements and his status as the university's first black student, Cole's name is not widely known - although that could be something that will one day change.
The university has said it is a "priority" to broaden the range of people represented by pictures, paintings and plaques around its buildings.
Oxford's African Caribbean Society runs an annual conference to encourage state school pupils considering Oxford, which has been supported by grime artist Stormzy
It is part of a wider recognition the public perception of Oxford University is that it is a place for wealthy, mostly white, students, something that can deter black and ethnic minority candidates from applying.
It is a problem Tobi Thomas recognises. She was the only black undergraduate in her year at Trinity College when she arrived last September.
"There are films like The Riot Club [a depiction of a hedonistic, all-male Oxford University dining society]... I remember talking to friends who said why are you applying?" she said.
Naomi Kellman runs Target Oxbridge, a programme set up to support black students applying to Oxford and Cambridge. She said these narratives can have a "really big impact", which is why they introduce potential applicants to black students at Oxford in order to have those "myths busted".
But how did the story end for the pioneering Christian Cole?
Sadly, it appears he struggled to find enough work after becoming a barrister and he moved on to East Africa.
Information about his life there is "very, very patchy", said Ms Roberts.
Cole died in 1885 in Zanzibar of smallpox aged 33.
At a plaque unveiling held on Saturday, and timed to coincide with Black History Month, the master of University College Sir Ivor Crewe paid tribute to Cole's "remarkable achievements", and said he hoped the plaque would be "a symbol of our continued commitment to recognising and supporting the brightest students whatever their backgrounds".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-40429917
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Children 'embarrassed by tipsy parents' - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Adults do not have to drink a lot for children to notice changes in their behaviour, a study says.
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UK
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Moderate drinking by parents can have a negative impact on children, causing anxiety and disrupting bedtime routines, a study says.
The Institute of Alcohol Studies said parents do not have to regularly drink large amounts around children for them to notice changes in adults' behaviour.
Three in 10 parents said they have been drunk in front of their children and five in 10 "tipsy", its survey found.
The institute said it was hoped the study will help inform parents.
"All parents strive to do what's best for their children, so it's important to share this research about the effects drinking can have on parenting, and what steps parents can take to protect their children," the institute's chief executive Katherine Brown said.
The report, "Like sugar for adults", uses a survey of almost 1,000 parents and their children, focus groups and experts.
In the survey, as a result of their parents drinking, 18% of children said they had felt embarrassed, 11% had felt worried and 15% said their bedtime routine had been disrupted.
Also, 7% said their parents had argued with them more than usual after drinking and 15% had asked their parents to drink less.
The children surveyed who had seen their parent tipsy or drunk were also less likely to consider the way their parent drinks alcohol as providing a positive role model for them.
The report was launched by MP Caroline Flint, who said: "We too quickly dismiss parental drinking as harmless fun and relaxation, but this report shows that parents do not need to be regularly drinking large amounts for their children to see a change in their behaviour and experience problems.
"I'd like to see a more open conversation about this, among parents and professionals."
Viv Evans, of the Alcohol and Families Alliance, said: "We recognise that parenting is difficult and we live in a culture which is remarkably accepting of alcohol.
"We hope that this study goes some way to supporting parents in a difficult job, and alerting us all to the importance of preventing problems with alcohol before they arise."
Alison Douglas, chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland, called for "effective action to protect children and families from alcohol that is too cheap, readily available and constantly promoted."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41665460
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Whiff of foreboding about Brexit talks - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Whatever the spin and expectations management, the process is significantly behind schedule and Thursday's summit is unlikely to change that reality.
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UK Politics
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Let me be the first to make the bad joke, to use the predictable metaphor.
There will be a sour mood over the EU summit in the next couple of days, and that's not just because of the problem with the drains that sent toxic fumes into the atmosphere at the summit building forcing the talks back to the old premises next door. (Sorry)
It will also be the sense of frustration in the air, maybe even of exasperation, and likely too a whiff of foreboding about the whole situation.
On both sides there will be spin. On both sides there is already expectation management.
Here are a few things, however, that are currently true and will probably still be true by Friday lunchtime, with the slim but real chance of course that it could all get turned upside down.
First, the UK-EU talks are significantly behind. The UK hoped that by autumn we'd be able to move onto trade talks properly. That's not going to happen, underlining the change since those heady days when Brexiteers promised it could be straightforward.
Second, there is not likely to be any answer to the main bind on Friday. The UK does not want to put any more cash on the table, beyond the 20bn euros implied by Mrs May's Florence speech.
The strongest voices in the EU, although not every country agrees, think the UK ought to have to wait for the next phase of talks unless it is willing to offer hypothetical extra cash.
Whatever else is said or briefed privately, this is the fundamental issue. And until the PM feels she is in a political situation where it's possible and desirable to budge it's hard to see how they will move on as certainly, there is no appetite on the EU side for a shift.
Third, something will have gone very badly wrong, however, if there is not a nudge towards moving on.
Sources say foreign ministers agreed the draft version of the conclusions of the summit yesterday that are not likely to change much.
They don't exactly give a green light to the next phase, but they do at least give a bit of a push in that direction - although not quite as clearly as the UK had hoped.
Fourth, the EU is still concerned that the UK government is yet to present a clear picture of what it really wants the long-term relationship to be. And it's still the case, sources tell me, that the full cabinet is yet to have a proper discussion that tries to find that answer.
Sounds extraordinary but given how divided the party is, arguably the lack of discussion is what keeps things even vaguely calm. With guns drawn in the Tory party there is no temptation for Theresa May to fire a shot.
And there's nothing in the next couple of days, or even the next couple of months, that's likely to change that or to answer that much more fundamental question.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41674721
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Dragons' Den-backed fake tan misled users, watchdog rules - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Skinny Tan broke advertising rules over claims it tones cellulite, the ASA finds.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Kate Cotton (right) and Louise Ferguson (left) pitching to the Dragons in 2013
A self-tanning product launched with the help of investment from the Dragons' Den panel has been found to mislead customers.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) found claims by Skinny Tan that its product could "tone" or give "less visible cellulite" could not be proven.
Claims that the product was 100% natural were also found to be misleading.
The ASA says the company's adverts must not appear again in their current form.
Skinny Tan launched in the UK in 2013, after company founders Louise Ferguson and Kate Cotton appeared on Dragons' Den, winning £60,000 of financial backing from panellists Piers Linney and Kelly Hoppen.
Dragons Kelly Hoppen (second left) and Piers Linney (second right) invested in the brand
The Essex-born entrepreneurs had all five Dragons vying to invest in their business, which claimed it was the first self-tanner made of natural ingredients and could reduce the appearance of cellulite.
However beauty rivals PZ Cussons complained to the ASA about adverts appearing on Skinny Tan's website and their Facebook page.
The Dragons' Den-backed company had made a number of claims, including that it was the number one self-tanning product in the UK and could "tone" women.
Despite saying the natural guarana in the product would "help make cellulite look visibly smoother and less obvious". the product was not found to have any physiological effects which would achieve this.
Skinny Tan, which was bought by beauty giant InnovaDerma in 2015, defended its cellulite-reduction claims, saying it was "commonly believed that tanning could make you look thinner".
The company said its claims were only in regard to the "cosmetic effect of the tan" and not any physiological effects of the product.
In addition, Skinny Tan was found to give the misleading impression that it did not contain any of the agent DHA - the main colouring agent in tanning lotions which has a distinctive smell.
Skinny Tan claimed without the chemical DHA, their product smelt better than other self-tanning products.
But it was found that Skinny Tan contains the same DHA as other brands and smells no different.
The claims to be all-natural and the UK's number one self-tanning brand were also found to be misleading by the ASA.
InnovaDerma acknowledged the ASA's ruling, adding: "This relates to online advertising in 2016 that was subsequently removed and the company is working with the ASA to ensure all online presence is ASA compliant."
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email entertainment.news@bbc.co.uk.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41664183
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Malta journalist Caruana Galizia: Anti-corruption warrior - BBC News
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2017-10-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The murder of Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia is seen as an attack on democracy.
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Europe
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The killing of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia in a car bomb has left Malta in shock.
On one hand, it caused alarm that organised crime and political vendettas may have spiralled out of control. Caruana Galizia, 53, had relentlessly accused various Maltese politicians and other officials of corruption in her popular Running Commentary blog, and had been sued several times.
But her death near her home in Bidnija, a village in northern Malta, on Monday also represented the loss of "one of Malta's most important, visible, fearless journalists", in the words of former Home Affairs Minister Louis Galea.
In a career spanning more than 30 years Caruana Galizia was a pioneer of investigative journalism in Malta, said the Malta Independent newspaper.
"She was very reserved, almost shy, but had the strongest of standards on personal integrity, and held herself to those standards," a close friend of hers, lawyer Andrew Borg Cardona, told the BBC.
Born in Sliema on the northeast coast of Malta in 1964, Caruana Galizia grew up in "normal, middle-class" family, says Mr Cardona.
Her father had a lift services business and briefly entered politics as a liberal.
She was a voracious reader and got an archaeology degree from the University of Malta.
Before launching her blog Caruana Galizia was a regular columnist for The Sunday Times of Malta, then for The Malta Independent.
She also wrote and edited lifestyle magazine articles, such as "fluffy food and drink features", Mr Cardona said.
"She made a living out of that", he said, adding: "the blog didn't pay the rent".
But she became known as one of Malta's most influential writers, says Herman Grech, Times of Malta online editor. "An impeccable writer and investigative journalist" is how he describes her.
Thousands mourned the journalist in a silent, candle-lit vigil near Valletta
Caruana Galizia's blog mainly attacked ruling Labour Party politicians and their supporters, but sometimes also officials of the centre-right Nationalist Party.
She alleged that the wife of Maltese PM Joseph Muscat was the beneficial owner of a secret Panama company used to channel funds from Azerbaijan's ruling Aliyev family.
Mr Muscat and his wife vehemently denied any wrongdoing. But after the scandal erupted he called a snap election, which he won in June.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Debris was strewn over the road and a nearby field
According to the Panama Papers revelations, two of Mr Muscat's close associates - Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri - were also involved in secret offshore business.
Condemning her death, Mr Muscat said: "Everyone knows Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and personally... but nobody can justify this barbaric act in any way".
"I will not rest until justice is done," he said.
Caruana Galizia also criticised John Dalli, Malta's former European Commissioner, who was embroiled in a scandal over tobacco industry lobbying and lost his job as EU health policy chief.
The influential Politico website called her a crusading, "one-woman Wikileaks" in her role as a whistle-blower.
In December, Politico wrote that "on a good day, Galizia gets 400,000 readers, more than the combined circulation of the country's newspapers (Malta's population is 420,000)".
The controversy did not end with her death.
Investigators will be looking into reports in Maltese media that she told police two weeks ago that she had received threats.
Opposition leader Adrian Delia - whom Caruana Galizia had also criticised - said her murder represented "the collapse of democracy and freedom of expression".
"We shall not be silenced," he added, in a tweet.
Meanwhile one of her three adult sons, Matthew - also an investigative journalist - castigated the police on Facebook, accusing the authorities of negligence for failing to prevent the "assassination".
He called Malta "a mafia state" where "a culture of impunity has been allowed to flourish by the government".
He heard the explosion that killed her and has described running to the scene to find "my mother's body parts all around me".
As well as her sons, Caruana Galizia is survived by her husband, a lawyer.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-41650312
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