and here in the uk, the minister responsible for the post office has called forjail time for those responsible for an it scandal — in which hundreds of workers were falsely accused of theft. now on bbc news, newscast. have you seen the traitors? i haven't, no. it's a long—running thing on newscast that when adam is sitting in the seat that you're in, i'm asked about a tv show, and i say no. i've actually heard that a number of times! but you have? i haven't seen tonight's, cos i've promised to wait and watch the next one with my family. but, yeah, it's good, you should give it a go. there's lots of twists, it's quite like politics, chris. but anyway, never mind,

we've got our own show to make, so let's get on with this episode of newscast. newscast. newscast from the bbc. hello, it's james here in the studio in westminster. and it's chris in westminster, too. here we are, and one story that's dominated this week, chris, hasn't it, which has been this post office scandal? but there's one story going to dominate next week, i think, quite likely, in so much as we can forecast. what's that? it is rwanda. so it's the return of the conversation about how you deal with illegal migration. and the government is keen to have this idea of sending folk to rwanda. as newscasters will be aware, it's been getting relatively long in the tooth as an idea, but it hasn't yet happened for a million and one legal reasons. there are also very transparent differences of opinion within the conservative party about how you do it, how you make it work,

can you make it work, and what's the best way of making it work? there was a bit of a to—do before christmas, a lot of noise, and then in the end the government won, and won relatively comfortably. but the argument that was had then amongst those of differing views was, "well, this is the start of this conversation and the time after christmas will come for a more sort of nuanced conversation about how you might, depending on your view on this, improve it." some would say strengthen it, some would say weaken it, whatever it might be, but in the eyes of those who might want to tweak it, improve it as they would see it. and that's where we're getting to, with conservative mps talking about how you do that. and then inevitably a conversation getting to around numbers, in other words, can the government assemble the numbers to pass the plan roughly as it currently stands, or will it need to change it? and if it starts doing that in one direction, what does that mean for people on the other wing of the conservative party? yeah, because more than

30 backbenchers on the right of the party are backing plans to change it in one direction to one extent or another, and one of them's here with us. robertjenrick, conservative mp for newark. hello! hello, good evening. good evening! _ so, robert, give us a sense, first of all, for newscasters, about what it is that you guys are suggesting. well, our only interest is in making this work. if we're going to pursue this policy, and i strongly believe in it, i think it's absolutely critical that we do have a deterrent, and i think that illegal migration is one of the big ills facing not just this country, but all developed countries around the world today and for years to come, as we live in an age of mass migration, with millions of people on the move looking to leave, either fleeing wars and persecution, orjust for better economic prospects. so we have to put in place a deterrent like this, but we've got to be honest with ourselves about whether this actually works or not. and having been one of the authors of this policy for many, many months

as immigration minister, it's my strong view that this bill doesn't work, it doesn't create that deterrent effect, and so we need to improve it. and so we've set out some amendments to the bill. the two principle ones are, firstly, _ to end these so—called pyjama injunctions, which the strasbourg court applies — they did in the summer of 2022, which stopped the flights going off at that time under borisjohnson and priti patel. and as night follows day, that will happen again later this year if the policy proceeds without answering this question. and as a matter of operational success and alsojust as a matter of rule of law, i don't think it's right that a foreign court should be able to do this. so we've put in an amendment which will say that the default position is that ministers decide whether or not to agree to those injunctions or not. and then, secondly, we're also trying to bring an end to this merry—go—round of individual claims,

whereby illegal migrants are able to say that rwanda might be generally safe, which is what the bill sets out to do, "but it's not safe for me and my individual circumstances". and they put in place all sorts of spurious claims, advised by lawyers and legal representatives, and that will thwart the scheme. it will make it impossible operationally to do this, because on a single day, hundreds, sometimes over 1,000 people can arrive in the uk, and if all of those people are putting in claims, it's very quickly going to get undermined. and so i think those two principle amendments, plus some others, turns a bill which simply doesn't work, is guaranteed to fail, into one that has a good prospect of success, and that's why i strongly support them. and you resigned. i mean, we should point out the key thing there, which is you talked about being immigration minister — you resigned over this as a matter of principle because you objected to the direction of travel. do you think what you're trying to do now is going to work, though? do you think you have the numbers?

well, there's certainly a very large number of colleagues in parliament, i think there's over 50 who've now put their name to this amendment, and it's rising every day. and so there's a strong body of opinion within the conservative party, and i hope the government will listen. and, you know, i think the reason why i feel so strongly about it is twofold. 0ne, because i've seen the consequences of illegal migration, the people who are dying in the channel, the trail of human misery that stretches right back across europe into north africa and beyond. the hotels that people hate so much, the billions of pounds of taxpayers' money. and the second reason is that this bill, i believe, is corrosive to public trust in politics and to the legitimacy of westminster, because it purports to create a deterrent, it purports to end this problem once and for all, when almost everyone who's been involved in the drafting of this bill knows full well that it's very unlikely to succeed.

the government's own legal advice, which they haven't denied, says that it has a 50% chance at best of getting a single flight off to rwanda before the general election. so, if that's correct, this is destined to fail, and the public will rightly be furious that we politicians and the government have pretended that it was going to work when we knew it wasn't. newscasters who listen and watch us love understanding what it is that's led people in public life to the views that they have, and we have the space to explore that, which isn't always the case in broadcast interviews. and i wonder, robert, how your mind, if it did, changed on these issues as a result of the time you spent in the job that you're no longer in? or are your instincts broadly where they were, or was it the experience of being in thatjob that made you think, crikey, this is a bigger issue than i realised? well, i've always, or at least for some considerable time, been concerned about migration

as an issue, and in other roles i've had in government, like, as communities secretary, i was concerned about integration and extremism, about people leading parallel lives. i worked with louise casey and sara khan, brilliant experts on that field, who warned that very large numbers of people coming into the country make it difficult for us to build the united country that we all want to see. as housing secretary, i was one, and remain one, of the most passionate supporters of house building, and i think the housing crisis is increasingly an immigration crisis, because you need to build at least half a million homes a year just to keep up with the numbers of people coming into the country. but you're right to say that in this... or in the role i've had for the last year, i did see first—hand the real—world consequences of mass illegal migration. and i think some people, particularly those leading privileged middle—class lives, can be insulated from those consequences,

because they're not necessarily the people living next door to the asylum hotel. they're not the people whose children can't get on the social—housing list because those homes are being taken by new arrivals. they're not the people i visited who lived near the cliffs in dover, who've had migrants who've just come across on boats come to their homes and make their lives difficult. leftie middle—class liberals who sort of don't get it and might be instinctively sort of too soft? well, i think you do have to accept that the only countries that have fixed this problem, and some countries have, have taken very robust action. so if you want to fix this, like australia did, like greece has done more recently, you have to accept that you've got to do some very tough things. and i do think that it's worth doing those things in our own way. we'll make our own choices as a country, but it matters notjust because this is a passing issue, but it's something that's going

to live with us for a long time. are, bluntly, too many people too squeamish? i think they are. i think too many politicians are too squeamish to tackle this issue, and they're worried about being accused of racism or of being uncompassionate, and i think that that's letting the public down, because i don't think that these are right—wing opinions. i think these are mainstream british opinions that are shared by the vast majority of the british public. and we have made promises as a party for many, many years to bring down the levels of net migration, legal migration, and to stop the boats, and i don't want tojust be another politician who makes those promises and doesn't follow through on them. so, it goes without saying, there might be a number of people watching and listening to this who have a different view about immigration and who think it's in fact good for the country and who think perhaps the uk should be more compassionate. we probably don't have time to get into that whole debate, but i just want to ask you, on that subject, you say it's one of the big ills facing this country —

is this the number—one issue at this general election coming up? well, i think the economy and the cost of living is almost certainly the most important issue. well, where does this rank? well, the polling suggests that it's the second or third most important issue. the public care passionately about the nhs and good—quality public services, and they're very concerned about immigration, and to the voters who put us into power in 2019, this is— an extremely important issue, and i think we have to deliver on those promises, or else it does damage public trust in politics. and it's actually not just as short—term as that. for 30 years, the british public have been voting for parties who have been promising to bring down levels of migration. the brexit referendum was clearly the clearest expression of that. and since then, actually, levels of legal migration have risen. and that, you know, ithink, is very concerning, you know,

notjust because i think it's the right thing to do to bring down net migration, but it's also something that the public have been asking us to do, and too many governments have failed to deliver on those promises. you know, one of the reasons i left government, one of the things i'm now committed to doing, is to making that public argument that a different way is possible, that we as a party and as a country can work our way through this age of mass migration in a sensible, intelligent manner, not using incendiary language or, you know, populist policies, but trying to find ways of actually delivering for the public. you very much, robert. right, let's introduce our panel. we have scarlett maguire from the polling companyjl pollsters.

hello, scarlett. hello. we have mary creagh, former labour mp, and standing again in this election in coventry east. standing for selection at the moment. - so it's in the hands— of the labour party members. 0k. and alsojoining us, the former conservative culture minister, lord ed vaizey. hello. let's pick up where robertjenrick left off. robertjenrick contends, scarlett, that immigration is number two or three in terms of voter concerns as we approach the general election. from a pollster�*s point of view, is he right? if you take voters as a whole, it's in the top three issues behind the economy and health. so nhs. crucially, for conservative 2019 voters, it is the most important issue. and we've seen that sort of tick up since last summer, so it overtook the economy then. but even with voters as a whole, it's slowly creeping up. i don't want to interrupt, but conservative 2019 i means red wall voters? no, conservative 2019 voters are anyone who cast their vote for the conservative party in 2019. so it sort of encompasses all of them. is there a difference in the red wall? not especially. the conservative 2019 voters are especially concerned. so that obviously encompasses a lot of people who did vote conservative in the red wall for the first time,

but it's not exclusive to voters in the red wall. conservative voters all over the country care quite strongly about it. i suppose, in that context, because we were talking to robert about the rwanda plan, it's whether the government, in pursuing the rwanda plan and then the conversation that's going on within the conservative party about how you make it work and what kind of flavour of the rwanda plan you should have, is whether kind of pursuing it and trying to make it work addresses the concerns of those 2019 conservative voters, or rather highlights the kind of failure to deal with the problem as they would see it around the whole question of illegal migration. yeah, i mean, ithought_ robert jenrick actually made some pretty compelling arguments. if you take this issue kind of almost in the abstract i and just say, you know, - some of the lines he came out with were challenging, you know, you can't be squeamish _ about this issue. it matters to people. countries that take a tough line make an impact. - the trouble is dealing. with the here and now,

the chance of his amendments getting through are minimal. _ but even if they did, _ the chance of the policy working appear to me to be minimal. the chance of the policy working in time to move the dial- for the next electionl appear very minimal. and the fact that the tory party is now going to go to war- about it next week is simply. going to increase the salience of the issue as an issue that| divides the tory party rather than the salience of the issue i with scarlett's voters all saying, "ah, thank goodness our party is now tackling this issue." _ one more sort of thought experiment from this to both of you, mary and ed, which is, if we accept the kind of contention that a big challenge for richer countries over the next generation is going to be the question of irregular illegal migration and the existing ways of dealing with it aren't working, and therefore countries like the uk are going to have to think radically and do stuff that they might not have entertained in the past, is it not reasonable to jump from those set of assumptions to a point where you say countries

like the uk are going to try and make policies like the rwanda scheme work in the coming years, decades, generation, and therefore the government should be trying to get this over the line even if it doesn't work in the short term? and that maybe future governments of whatever political stripe are going to have to think radically and do things at the moment that might not be palatable to a lot of people. mary? well, i'm not sure i agree with your thought experiment. i mean, i think this is a policy that is entirely self—constructed by the conservatives. it's unworkable, it's wildly expensive. it's already cost the taxpayer £400 million. and not a single person has gone on a plane to rwanda. and it's been chucked out by our supreme court. so ijust don't see where this goes. i think this was seen as a sort of clever dividing line with the labour party. and, you know, we've now discovered that rishi sunak raised concerns about the costs of the policy when he was chancellor.

and i think the fact that we're still here discussing it, you know, whilst there's a record asylum backlog, while there's £8 million a day still being spent on hotels, why is the government not fixing the administrative processes? and why is it pursuing this policy, which at the end of the day is basically meaning that people who may have been trafficked here, who may be the victims of modern slavery, are going to lose the very, very slender rights that they have under the british legal system, and rights that were brought in by a previous conservative prime minister? let's use the e word for the first time — election, or by—elections, actually, given that we now know that there are two coming up — wellingborough in northamptonshire, kingswood in gloucestershire — likely to happen in the middle of next month. curiously, when i speak to folk in both the labour party and the conservative party around by—elections in a general election year, there's a sense of, "oh, well, they've got to happen". they've obviously got to happen,

but the parties have actually got kind of bigger fish to fry. scarlett, talk to us about these by—elections and what we may or may not be able to read into them, given where the national opinion polls are. yes, i think we learnt a huge amount from the by—elections last year actually, and i think they were, taking alongside the sort of very commanding labour lead in the intention polls, they did show that keir starmer is on course for majority in lots of different types of constituencies and i think particularly interested, you know, chris skidmore is actually not even going to exist in the next... in kingswood. exactly, but i think the wellingborough by—election is going to be very interesting. you know, it's one of those sort of 100—odd constituencies where ukip came second in 2015. and actually, i think the difference now is we had a sort of tamworth by—election where reform underperformed their national voting intention polls at the time but still managed to deprive the conservatives of holding the seat because they got more votes than labour won by in the end. and the difference is with wellingborough, i think, which i think is a good opportunity

to test that reform vote because since then we've seen reform double their vote share in voting intention polls. they've selected a candidate, they're being quite bullish about it and it would be just quite a good test case, i think, to see how much damage they could do. 18,500 majority at the moment for the conservatives in wellingborough. do you think that reform is going to make a difference never mind the by—election, in the general election? well, it hadn't occurred to me until scarlett- explained reform's role _ in the wellingborough by—election. this is another kind of part- of the three dimensional chess that every by—election throws up in terms of throwing a prism on what might i happen in the general election. and i do think reform is a problem. there is an argument . that says it's a problem potentially for both parties, but it's clearly obvious - and common sense that it's a much bigger problem... l i assume scarlett's about to come in and correct me based _ on the polling, but i assume it's a much bigger problem - for the tories. and it is a serious issue that if you're fighting seats - which are nip and tuck and you might

get back in with 300 or 400 votes i and there's a reform candidate who takes your votes away, - that's going to have a real impact. so it's certainly a headache . the conservatives don't want. i don't think there's anything they can do about it. - mary, are these by—elections useful for the labour party as a springboard or an inconvenience and a waste of money when the party would rather be focusing on the general election? well, they are a huge... well, i say as a springboard, assuming labour does well in them, which they might not, but they have in many other by—elections. we had absolutely extraordinary results. i was out in both tamworth and in mid bedfordshire, sort of looking at the streets and the doors and the thatched cottages that we were knocking on in mid bedfordshire. and it's a part of the world i know quite well from my work at cranfield university, but you know, it was literally amazing to see mid bedfordshire coming to us from nadine dorries, from the conservatives. i think in wellingborough the conservatives have made a terrible error choosing peter bone's partner to be their candidate.

the labour candidate, genevieve kitchen. why is that a terrible error? well, ijust think it'sjust... you know, you've got somebody who had to stand down, who forced a recount petition... we're not defined by our partners, though, are we? well, i think the man that was thrown out of parliament for allegedly, you know... i think you've painted yourself into a corner there. _ let's just quickly clear up what we're talking about. there's a sexual misconduct scandal involving peter bone, which he continues to deny, and his partner is subsequently selected as the candidate. so what i think is problematic is that, i mean, it's a bit like the charlie elphicke... except natalie elphicke then won the seat and has proved to be . a very effective mp. so i don't think it is a problem. 0ne assumes that the tories will lose these by—elections, governing parties lose by—elections, and certainly this conservative - party, given the war it's having, i is not in a particular positive way to fight these by—elections.

i think they did it to stop him standing as an independent as well, potentially. so i think it was a political choice. is it a pain for the labour party to- spend money on these by—elections? probably not. it's a free hit in publicity. i mean, the thought i had — - mid bedfordshire was a great result for the labour party. but when you get a big, - big prize seat where people really haven't, you know... there could be something up here. it is a test for the . labour party as well. |so, you know, it is interesting, | the polling and how well labour l is doing, but i think we all know. as kind of laymen on the street that keir starmer hasn't sealed the deal with the british public, _ which is why so much is, - to a certain extent up for grabs, whether it's an outright majority, how big that majority is. - so there is always an element - in some by—elections where labour is as much being put to the test as the tories _ well, that takes us to the prime minister, then. and what is his strategy? because last year, if i recall, he was the continuity.

until he wasn't. and now he's the change candidate. well, he's kind of back to continuity again. i've lost track. it seems like that. is it reasonable... it seems like now — it seems to me, at least, that rishi sunak seems to be pivoting back towards a more traditional argument that those in his position often find themselves in — if your back�*s a bit against the wall but the party's been in powerfor a long time — which is you do a better the devil you know—type routine. do you really want to risk the other lot? that seems to be where he seems to be heading back towards a bit after that conference speech that was doing "status quo of 30 years hasn't been up to much and i'm the change candidate." yeah, i mean there's- a certain sort of brass neck about the conservatives which i'm slightly admiring, which is, - you know, don't vote labour- because they'll put your taxes up, when you've got the biggest tax burden for 70 years! _ i quite admire the chutzpah in that. so more of that, please, rishi. you know, i'm a centrist - and i was very pro—rishi sunak becoming prime minister- because i wanted, particularly after the last few years, _ a prime minister who kind of really

got the detail, knew what he was doing. i and i had this terrible kind - of dinner party line that i wanted the health secretary to go into downing street- and the prime minister would know more about health policy _ than the health secretary, which to a certain extent l is true because we keep changing our ministers, | but that's an aside. but i think what has depressed me is the inconsistency. _ and i wish he had kind of led his party. - just said, "this is who i am, i'm going for broke, - this is what i believe in, - and these are the policies — and if you want to squabble with me and fight skirmishes, _ be my guest, but this is what i believe in."| having said that, there - is clearly developing some method in the madness, - which may or may not work, and it may be too late. precisely about what we've been talking about in terms _ of keir starmer, of finding these wedge issues and finding wedgej issues on things like immigration. i i have to say, the line today that| keir starmer was racist was pretty desperate and only lasted - about three hours before people realised that really _ isjust...you're taking the mick. when do you think the election

is going to be, mary? i think it will be october—november. i don't see rishi sunak calling it for may. i mean, he's the prime minister, he can call it when he wishes. i mean, everyone thinks it's - going to be november the 14th. and in terms of public opinion, final thought on the election... we had, of course, the famous brenda from bristol thing, you know, "not not another one" of a few years ago. but is there a sense now in the polling and the focus groups that people want an election sooner rather than later? yeah, i think when you ask people explicitly, would you like an election now? and there's been polling data to back this up, about two thirds of people say not even right now, but yes, we'd like one early. we don't want to wait till sort of winter this year. we don't want to, you know, have another year of this. i don't think it's yet a clamouring, people absolutely desperate to do it. and i think they'd rather just get it done with. well, it's interesting, and it will be along before we know it. scarlett, mary, ed — thank you all very much. thank you. nice to have you, james. it's a pleasure, thank you for having me. i think adam returns soonish. tomorrow, i believe. we'll talk to you again soon. bye—bye.

newscast. newscast from the bbc. hello, there. things are set to turn even colder as we move towards the second part this weekend and into the start of next week as we open the floodgates to arctic northerlies. and that will drive plenty of snow showers into northern scotland, starting on sunday. and the blue colours, the dark blue colours will be reaching pretty much all areas by the time we reach sunday night into the first part of monday. for the rest of today, though, it's not looking too bad across the northern half of the country — bright with some sunshine, some rain showers across northern areas, some snow to the hills. variable cloud, though, for large parts of england and wales. the odd spots of light rain here, too. but there will be a bit of sunshine around. but those temperatures again range from around 5 to 8 degrees. so not quite as cold as what we're expecting by the second half of the weekend. through tonight, under clear skies, it will turn cold and frosty

where we hold on to the cloud. and temperatures holding just above freezing, but it will be turning colder and windier across the far north of scotland. increasing snow showers here and a risk of ice. sunday, then, we see those snow showers become heavy and frequent across northern areas. risk of ice here, the winds picking up elsewhere. plenty of sunshine around, just one or two showers dotted around, particularly wales, south west england, mainly of rain as temperatures here 6 to 8 celsius, but turning colder across the north. then we're all into that very cold arctic air on monday. frequent snow showers affecting coastal areas but in particular across northern scotland into the northern hours with an ice risk. accumulations gathering some snow showers down north sea coast, a few down on the irish sea coast in towards pembrokeshire, perhaps even as far south as south west england, over the higher ground. but for most, it's going to be a sunny day, a very cold day. when you factor in the northerly wind, it's going to feel more like these values suggest, perhaps down to —6 to —8 celsius for northern scotland. so bitterly cold. tuesday, some further snow showers across northern scotland. then we could see this area of cloud and rain which could turn wintry with some snow for northern ireland, the rest of scotland, northern england, perhaps north wales as we move through the day.

that feature runs across the country into the north. further snow showers across the north. i don't think we'll see any problems across southern britain with that low pressure system to bring some snow there. so it looks like it's going to stay dry, but for this upcoming week stays cold with the risk of snow in the north and severe overnight frost.

live from london. this is bbc news. william lai from taiwan's ruling party wins the presidential election and vows to defend the island from china's intimidation and maintain its democratic way of life. translation: thank you to - the taiwanese people for writing a new chapter in our democracy. we have shown the world how much we cherish our democracy. this is our unwavering commitment. but china said "reunification" with taiwan was still "inevitable" after the election on the self—ruled

island that beijing claims as its own. the us military launches a fresh strike on a houthi target in yemen, a day after joint us—uk air strikes across the country. the houthis say the strikes have had no significant impact on their ability to keep attacking vessels in the red sea. hello, i'm rajini vaidyanathan. welcome to the programme. let's start in taiwan, where william lai has won the election and is set to become taiwan's president. he is from the governing dpp, and is set to succeed the the current president, tsai ing—wen. mr lai has been labelled a troublemaker by china, and beijing had warned people against voting for him. in his victory speech, he pledged to use dialogue instead of confrontation in exchanges with china and said he hoped that beijing understood that peace will benefit both sides.