two people have been arrested. police say they are looking for futher suspects. israel says negotiations in paris over the release of hostages in gaza — and a possible new ceasefire — were "constructive", but "gaps remain". a deal could see fighting suspended for two months. the islamic state says it was behind a shooting on an istanbul church that left one person dead. turkish police are on the hunt for two gun men, captured on cctv entering the church, on sunday. now on bbc news, it's newscast, with laura kuenssberg, paddy o'connell and henry zeffman. newscast. newscast from the bbc. hello, it's laura in the studio. paddy in the studio. and henry at home.

and if you're watching, this is the sunday edition of newscast, which is new on the tv. and i think, chaps, the main thing we're going to talk about today is trust in politics, which is something that people talk about a lot very earnestly and occasionally pompously. but the reason to talk about it today is that the big focus group project that we did, britain in a room, which we talked about yesterday, it was on the telly today, did raise a really central theme — does the public think that politicians can actually get anything done? does changing them bring change? yes. the system is broken. yeah. and i think as i said yesterday and we discussed a lot on bbc one this morning is there is a mood in the country at the moment that whichever politician it is, they're not really offering anything that can actually get stuff done. henry, do you think this is something to do with changing prime ministers more times than socks? that's surely part of it. i mean, it certainly feels like public trust in politics generally has got worse over

the last few years. but i don't think that began, was it 2022 when the conservatives had so many prime ministers? i can't even remember now. you know, it certainly was accelerated by brexit because roughly half of the country was upset with the outcome. but then among those who were happy with the outcome, they were frustrated by the way in which the outcome was delivered and all that parliamentary wrangling and all of that. but then you could go back even further and say that the fact that the uk voted to leave the european union, even though the vast majority of the political establishment, for want of a better phrase, wanted the uk to stay was itself a symptom of declining trust in politics and politicians. so i don't really know if there is one easy single cause or point at which this problem began, and i think it is uncontroversially a problem, but certainly it's in a bad state, and that's something i know lots of politicians i talked to are very aware of and worried about. they are worried about it.

i mean, they really, really are worried about it. and if you look at the polling where the drops came, particularly in the tories were partygate — drop, liz truss blows up the financial markets — drop, and those are the sort of two key polling moments. but what we've been doing this weekend is really trying to get into people's minds in terms of the focus group. we had nadine dorries, a former cabinet conservative minister, on the programme this morning and she told us actually that she's very worried about the state of the nation and actually her belief that it's worse than our focus groups were suggesting. i think it's worse even than probably your focus group demonstrated. people are just. . .the apathy, they've had enough and they�* re dealing with real life problems. and sadly, we have failed them as a government due to our own internal warfare, which has taken place over the last five years. they're really seriously worried about cost of living. now, it's interesting, isn't it? nadine dorries is no fan of rishi sunak right.

let's be upfront about that. she's very cross that her party removed borisjohnson. she thinks it was all a terrible disaster. however, it is quite something for somebody who was a conservative minister for a long time to sit and openly say, "we have failed the country, we have been talking amongst ourselves, we haven't got things done and it's on us," because that's basically what she was saying. she wasn't saying, "oh, it's all terribly difficult because ukraine and energy prices" and things that are real factors, she was basically saying the conservatives, of which she is a member, have failed the nation. what do you think this is going to mean for the conservative party? because one of the things that nadine did do is write a book called the plot. she did. is it really credible, henry, that there is another plot of the kind nadine�*s writing a book about and wants us all to mention? well, i think plenty of people would say that nadine dorries' initial plot that she describes in her book is not itself credible, let alone this continuation of it. clearly, she's right that a lot of conservative mps wanted

borisjohnson to be removed as prime minister and then removed him as prime minister, and the question that's occupied westminster this week is how many conservative mps want rishi sunak to be removed as prime minister? obviously we saw sir simon clarke go over the top and call for rishi sunak's resignation at the start of the week. publicly, he was not joined by anyone. privately, there's probably a few more, but not loads more conservative mps who. 20? well, i don't know. i mean, certainly those who say they do want a change think that's about the ballpark. obviously, that's way short of what would be needed to remove rishi sunak. but the biggest concern, i think, for rishi sunak in terms of staying in his position is that simon clarke was making two arguments. one was that the conservative party

is headed for an electoral iceberg, as he memorably put it, and two, that therefore the conservative party should remove rishi sunak. almost no conservative mp i spoke to this week disagreed with simon clarke's first point. they only disagreed with his prescription — that changing leader would improve the situation. and that means that rishi sunak's position, ithink, is stilla bit more fragile than it appears, even though simon clarke ended up looking very isolated. and there are byelections to come. local elections to come. local elections in may. and the thing is, whether politicians like it or not and kemi badeonich, the business secretary, who was on with us this morning, does not like it at all. but whether they like it or not, they are all themselves, maybe not all, obsessed with the plot—ometer, you know, where is this? who's up? who's down? who's in?

who's out? who's positioning themselves for the leadership? who's actually kind of given up? who is it? which former adviser has gone off and is having secret meetings in an office in the west end near an italian restaurant where they may or may not have had a meeting to plan the plot? and i think the conservatives at the moment, they seem kind of addicted to this stuff. it's running through their veins. so whenever something goes wrong for rishi sunak, where they're going to bounce back into that situation where it all becomes a sort of frenzied situation, even though it seems at the moment this plot on the plot—ometer, such as it is, seems to be about 11 people. right? we're not talking about back in the days of theresa may, for example, when you had the european research group, you know, more than 80 strong with lots of people involved trying to get theresa may out in a very concerted, organised fashion. it seems to me we are not remotely in that place. which steve baker later apologised for. indeed. it had driven him to the wall. i was plotter in chief, he said. kemi badenoch, of course we'll hear from her herself. by the way, a former leadership candidate out on many

programmes saying calm down, dear to her, the conservatives, and here she is. let's have a listen. one person wrote an article saying that he was unhappy. i called him after that and asked him what on earth he was doing because this is exactly the sort of thing that we have to stop doing in public. we can have private discussions about what is going wrong, and i actually think it is healthy for us to have a debate for that to not be a debate is unhealthy. so, i mean, i'lljust bring this together. it seems a bit presumptuous because you interviewed her, but henry, the link is the public doesn't really like plots. yes, so we're told but also, i mean, i guess if simon clarke was here, he'd say the public doesn't really like rishi sunak and that therefore it's his sort of obligation as a conservative to plot. i mean, kemi badenoch, ithink, could not have been firmer today. there was no hint of a suggestion of a flicker of a sort of "come and get me" plea to the rebels at all. she was adamant that she supports rishi sunak. and to be fair, it's never sort of been imputed to her that she is part of these whispers around rishi sunak's leadership. not this time. exactly.

the question is often then to people like simon clarke, "ok, well, who would you replace the prime minister with?" and that's when people say, not that simon clarke has said this publicly, but people then sort of turn to kemi badenoch. i mean, ithink some people who would who i've been speaking to this week, conservative mp who would like her to become leader of the conservative party at some point would prefer her to renew the conservative party in opposition, because i can't stress enough that is the assumption of every conservative mp that they're headed for a opposition rather than become prime minister for a few months before what they assume is a defeat. but why, if people haven't been following every twist and turn of this in westminster, you say she put a real line in the sand down today saying she has nothing to do with this. and that's important because many people in westminster do point a finger at her. she would say that's unfair. she said any real friend of hers would never indulge in that kind of stuff because they care about her. but what was interesting, though, actuallyjust after the programme,

somebody, a senior...a colleague of hers messaged me to say that the key line was when at the beginning she said, "we need more hope and optimism". yeah, well, we've discussed this on this podcast. but that is, although henry says she wasn't having a go at rishi sunak, she was very firmly behind him... she did, though, give that nudge to say we maybe have to do things a little bit different. because as we keep discussing, the message of hope is the one that the voters say they really want. they want to hear a reason to go into the ballot box, because the biggest problem for labour will be if people think there's no point voting. there's no point having a lead in the opinion polls if people then don't go and vote because they think the system is broken. i think in preparation for meeting you two, and just a word, because we're new on on the tv at this time, which is... oh, yes, we better sit up straight! but it's the wash up from the sunday show, so you're both telling us, you're both experts in this field, she's messaging on the strongest possible way on the sunday shows, "don't put my fingerprints on this petty plot".

exactly. we want to say that was... nail that has wash up. but in preparation for meeting you two, i was reading tony benn�*s diary on the 1990 plot to oust margaret thatcher, and the way that the momentum gets going surprised him. and one of the iconic figures of politics of the 20th century was watching another party's meltdown. and it surprised him the moment that the candidates changed. because, henry, you've told us this before, quoting borisjohnson, "when the herd moves". that's right. and i do think the two moments that laura identified earlier, the by—elections in february and the local elections in may are big moments for rishi sunak to see whether simon clarke does become part of a herd that is moving or whether he remains isolated in public, at least, particularly because this is something that's increasingly being discussed in westminster,

because they will give a sense of how the reform party is doing, which is the party that nigel farage is sort of a part of, though there's a question of how prominently he wants to be a part of it in this election year. but one of the things that's been new in the last few weeks and months for conservative mps watching the polls closely is that the reform party seems to be inching upwards and upwards. now, that has not been replicated in any local elections by elections, anything like that. but if in those february by elections, especially in wellingborough, peter bone's former seat, the other by—election is in kingswood on the outskirts of bristol, especially in wellingborough, if reform party does well or as one plotter — if that's the right word for it — said to me this week, if the reform party does better than the conservatives and beats the conservatives into third place — now that seems fanciful to many — but that's one thing being discussed then that would throw a lot of the focus back on to rishi sunak. yeah, and one of the worst

moments for theresa may was when the brexit party, as was, beat the tories in the european elections and that was one of the big triggers. now, keir starmer was also something that ourfocus group voters talked about a lot. and if you haven't seen the programme or you haven't heard the clips, which we played some of them yesterday, there was really a distinct lack of enthusiasm. so the polls suggest labour's somehow going to smash it at the next election. that was not the mood of the room at all. and this morning jonathan reynolds, one of keir starmer�*s top team, was out and we made the politicians, you know, they listened to the focus groups, so they had to respond directly to the voters this morning. and one of the things i asked him is what we heard from people again and again — it's not just that they're not excited about him, but also he changes his mind. they're not quite sure what he stands for. so we put that to mr reynolds this morning. no—one is complacent because we know where we are coming from to do that. and you've got to have the self—awareness to acknowledge in opposition. you've got to keep making the case, keep doing that.

people only tune in a little bit to oppositions, i think, when you get closer to an election, but look at the progress that has been made to date. keir starmer was on radio 4 with me a few weeks ago, and to voters who say they don't know what he stands for, actually, i think keir starmer�*s fans and supporters would say, well, actually he stands for this. he had to clear up discipline in the labour party. he had to deal with the problem of antisemitism. he had to get rid of jeremy corbyn, which is... you can tell where he stands on jeremy corbyn now very clearly. then he had to go about his business of calling for a programme for government. and we know that peter mandelson and alastair campbell, two architects of the �*97 victory, said he needed to get to that point quickly this year. he's been boosted by some mahoosive by—election victories, to give it the official psephological term. and actually it's all very well these voters saying they don't know what he stands for, but the election could

be ten months away. well, it could. and there is a huge amount of labour policy out there. actually, there are documents upon documents, apparent documents upon documents about his various missions. the point, though, is that voters haven't really cottoned on to it yet. no, a great number and it's not doorstep—able. some of the stuff can't be put in a sentence. but he did come out and make it plain he wants conservative voters. he praised the status of margaret thatcher a month ago, henry, and he's making it plain if he's going to win, he's got to eat conservative majorities. can i give you both one of my favourite political trivia questions? i promise i have a point, which is the question of which prime minister won the most votes in any general election ever? which prime minister won the most raw votes? isn't itjohn major? it'sjohn major in 1992. more people voted for john major in 1992 than voted for tony blair in 1997. in fact, turnout fell quite a lot between 1992 and 1997. now, look, clearly, tony blair, if you look at the polls, tony blair was more popular than keir starmer is now, so there clearly was more enthusiasm for tony blair as an opposition

leader in the run up to the 1997 general election than there appears to be for keir starmer now. but i do sometimes wonder whether the sort of famous photos of people waving union flags as tony blair arrived in downing street and, by the way, they were labour activists, slightly gives a false sense of what a landslide victory for the labour party or, indeed, for any party looks like. and certainly that's what keir starmer's team are hoping, because they're very aware of the problem or of the reality that he's not being carried into downing street on a sedan chair, even if the polls do suggest that, as it stands, he could be on course for a pretty thumping victory. talking of being carried into downing street on a sedan chair. i once saw the diagram that new labour, very much new labour, had prepared for tony blair's walk into downing street that morning. and you can see that they had sketched out where they would have the line of activists or waving flags and looking happy and smiling.

and then where tony blair and cherie blair would walk along and what the camera shots would all look like. and it was unbelievably carefully choreographed. and some of the shots make it look like there were these enormous crowds, and actually the line was sort of two or three deep. but good politicians — and i've seen this myself a million times, good politicians, whenever there are cameras there, they get out of the car and they do the cheery wave, and i've seen them do it a million times when there's no one there, but there's a camera there. who says we should be cynical? and turn it the other way around. no, i mean, it's very much like my social life actually waving at people who aren't there. but in advance, you have a little diagram. "i will arrive, but i can't be a martini and i will greet my fans." this moment i remember well, partly because of the don't stop of the "things can only get better..." yes. anthem which dream played several times and i was there when bill clinton was nominated. what a name—dropper! it wasn't like i was on the stage

with him, but i was watching it happen in madison square garden and i counted the number of times they played don't stop thinking about tomorrow, because that was the song, and new labour was very influenced by the clintonian win and that whole moment, now that you're evoking it for me, i also remember it with music and it's strange because i know that sounds a bit trivial, but it was about trying to make us all feel we're part of a change moment. we're part of a theatrical spectacle, moment of change. ifeel the hand of history on my shoulder, do i not? and the finger of fudge have i told you that story? no. that really is a great story. i'll tell you that another time. no, you've got to tell us now. 0k. so apparently i was told at that press conference where tony blair was talking about the good friday agreement and said this is not a time for sound bites, but i hear the hat, "feel the hand of history on my shoulder". allegedly a wizened journalist of many years experience in northern ireland muttered under his breath at the back of

the room and "the finger of fudge". anyway, talking of sort of politicians who become celebrities, which tony blair and bill clinton certainly did. what about celebrities who could become politicians? so we had a bit of fun with our photos at the end of our long and fascinating discussion... jurgen klopp. well, i was just about to ask you if you had to... we asked them if they had to pick a prime minister who's not currently in politics, who would it be? now, nadine dorries picked jurgen klopp in the studio this morning, but this is who some of our voters suggested. if you could pick anybody, politician or not, to run i the country, who would do the best job at running the country. - who would that be? carol vorderman. she would be brilliant. absolutely! i don't know. alex ferguson. alan sugar. because he wouldn't take any nonsense from the boardroom. martin lewis. oh, yes. i would like martin lewis. yeah, i like martin lewis. martin lewis. absolutely. he's got a grip of everything. yeah. he's very good, isn't he?

he'd be. he'd make a good prime minister. martin lewis himself has tweeted, "apparently i was the choice of voters on bbc to be pm. that's flattering. thank you very kindly, but i'd rather wire my nipples to electrodes. our system is overly adversarial, mandating politicians to lie and sell policies they disagree with in order to hold the party line. oh, this is martin lewis. very disillusioned. i mean, he sort of was expected to go to the lords. this could be something behind that, couldn't there? he thought he might get into the house of lords, martin lewis. is that right? i don't know about that. but i mean, certainly certainly people in law as focus group had a higher station in mind for him. i mean, i think one thing i took from that is if the uk ever abolished the monarchy and had elections for president, i mean, i think one thing that's interesting in that tweet martin lewis has done about this. one of his complaints about politics is that it's structured with an official opposition designed

to oppose for the sake of it, but it does kind of show that politicians can't have it both ways. if you had a much more consensual kind of politics with major parties agreeing much more, you would have a whole other group of critics saying, "this just shows that there's a much "too narrow range of opinions in westminster, cosy "westminster consensus," so on, so on. he also questions the fact that politicians have to toe a party line, but if they didn't have if there wasn't a party whip system, you would have the kind of chaos that all the voters in the focus group, internal divides that the voters in the focus group abhorred. so i do think itjust shows there are no easy solutions here to problems with politics and our political system. yeah, it's also designed, is it not, to have a government in waiting? it's designed to give people time to learn their brief, time to be briefed by the civil service as well when necessary. i said i'd mention this figure down here over your left shoulder, henry. jurgen klopp was picked by nadine dorries,

who's that footballer in the liverpool colours there? who's that? yeah, that's my little shrine to steven gerrard, who will not be succeeding jurgen klopp as liverpool manager, even though a couple of years ago that that looked plausible. or as prime minister by the way. this succession is to many members of the publicjust as big as the prime ministerial. thejurgen klopp shock should have been a political edition of this podcast. we should have done the klopp shock and the rishi plot as one item. can you say that after you've. .. i'm never going to say it again. and actually, funnily enough, neither will anyone else. now i want to tell you that i was chagrined, i read thousands of emails a week from listeners. yes. and one of them wrote, because we interviewed ken clarke and margaret beckett on broadcasting house a few weeks ago. and they said the abuse in politics is too much, it's driving people away. and one of our listeners is a councillor in surrey and she said, "this is happening to me, i'm an independent, i'm quitting". and this is what she said.

how fed up am i? i'm at my wits' end with it. it's for me personally, it's been about three i years of low—level — _ i mean, not death threats, but, you know, pretty nasty emails at first that just left me openl mouthed because they're so nasty. and now it's got worse| in the last three years. and it's notjust me. you know, i was coming in this morning on the train _ and i was looking at somebody writing something on twitter. to our mayor, you know, who's raising money. - and it'sjust extraordinary. i don't get it. and are you going to stay in local politics? no. and we also spoke to the former home secretary, jacqui smith, chair of the jo cox foundation. henry and laura, and this is sort of your territory, does it feel that the tone is ratcheting up, it's going to be an ugly election year, henry? and, you know, there's 28 recommendations from thejo cox foundation wanting change across the board, including parties

should educate candidates what to expect at election time, and social media companies need to do more. what do you hear from mps? it definitely feels like the abuse that mps receive has got worse and worse over the sort of eight or so years that i've been talking to them. it comes up more and more often. often mps, by the way, don't want to go public about the extent of it, partly because they find it difficult to talk about, partly because they fear that would make it worse and partly because for security reasons, they don't want to talk about the mitigations that they have in place. and this is where you both began our episode, which was the cynicism, cynicism allied to being rude to politicians. and we want to keep stressing on newscast that the bulk of politicians go into this for the best possible reason. well, i believe that they do. i think also it is quite easy sometimes to think, "ah, the good old days, everything was genteel "and lovely," you know? i mean, if you go back and you read things that were written in the 18th century, people enjoy being rude

about politicians. however, certainly in the last eight to 10 years, and you probably think it started getting bad in this country around the time of the scottish independence referendum, 2014, is when i start... followed then by the brexit referendum. and of course the massive tensions inside the labour party in the corbyn era, that had some extraordinary levels of nastiness in between different factions in the party. and then, you know, it happened around brexit. obviously all those divisions that were in there in plain sight, i think it's ghastly, i think it's concerning. it definitely puts people off, who are good people who might otherwise want to come into politics, particularly — not only but particularly women with families. however, my own sense is, and this is not scientific at all, but my sense is actually since we had left the european union and since the labour party isn't at each other�*s throats in the same way that they were, i think the level may have faded somewhat, but it is absolutely still there,

and who knows what it will be like in another election year? and as i stress, that's not scientific. i'm not saying it isn't a problem. it absolutely is a problem. but i do think having two relatively conventional party leaders like rishi sunak and keir starmer, has dialled down the tone a little bit in westminster. it does feel like we've reached the end for many reasons and we're completely out of material. oh, no, you know, we could go on for much, much, much, much longer. but for the people either listening or indeed watching on the bbc news channel, which is happening now — so welcome, if you've been watching us on tv, that is probably enough for now. goodbye. newscast from the bbc. hello there. we did expect it to get a bit warmer today, but it may well turn out to be a record—breaking day with some sunshine and a southerly

wind ahead of a band of rain. in highland scotland, temperatures reached close to 20 degrees earlier on, and that would smash the previous january temperature record in the uk. now, the winds are dropping, actually, and the temperature is going to be dropping too. this band of rain moving through scotland and northern ireland is heading into northern parts of england and wales. and following on from that, in the lighter winds, we're getting into colder air — so much so that in northern parts of scotland there's likely to be a frost overnight tonight, whereas ahead of the rain across england and wales, it's still a mild start to monday. but this rain is going to hang around in northern england and wales, heavy over the hills, particularly in the north west of england. much of scotland and northern ireland likely to be dry with some sunshine, lighter winds but much colder than today. temperatures typically 7—8 degrees, whereas where it's dry across the midlands and southern england, it's still mild, temperatures of 1a, maybe 15 degrees. now, it's notjust rain that we're going to see, though, on monday.

after dark, there could be some snow in the southern uplands leading to icy conditions by tuesday morning, by which point that area of low pressure will have taken the wet weather away and we're left with a cloudy start for england and wales. some sunshine for scotland and northern ireland will push its way southwards through the day. that very mild air is going to get pushed away, but 12 degrees is still possible in the south—east. but for many in the afternoon it's going to be nearer eight degrees or so. so it's turning chillier from the north. but if we look to the north again by the middle part of the week, we've got more isobars, some weather fronts. it's turning wet and windy, particularly in scotland. widespread gales here on wednesday and across northern ireland, northernmost parts of england. the really strong winds are in the far north of scotland, but over the highlands this time we could see a couple of inches of rain. that wet and windy weather in scotland will sink down into northern ireland. england and wales looking dry, the winds much lighter further south and some sunshine, temperatures of 10—11 degrees.

now the weather front bringing that rain is going to move southwards overnight. the rain petering out, chilly weather for a while, but then we change the wind direction by thursday, bringing in a milderair and also more cloud. welcome to newsday, live from singapore, i'm steve lai. the headlines.. three american troops killed in a drone attack near the jordan—syria border. president biden blames iran—backed groups, and promises reprisals. we had a tough day, we lost three brave souls. we shall respond.

north korea says it's tested its new cruise missiles for the second time in a week — with kimjong—un hailing sunday's test a success. and x blocks users from searching for taylor swift, after fake explicit images of the singer spread across social media. presidentjoe biden says the united states will respond after three of its service members were killed in a drone attack on an american base injordan, near the border with syria. us officials say some wounded us forces were evacuated for further treatment and at least 3a personnel are being evaluated for possible traumatic brain injury. president biden said the attack had been carried out by an iran—backed group. jordan — a close ally of the us — has condemned the attack and says it's cooperating with the us to secure the border. our diplomatic correspondent paul adams reports.

the american say the attack happened at abase known as tower 22,