in south africa, the ruling anc has lost its majority for the first time since apartheid ended 30 years ago. the party has won around 40% of the vote and will now have to hold coalition talks. the uk election campaign is ramping up — labour launches a 5,000 mile �*battle bus tour�* promising to create wealth across the uk. prime minister rishi sunak visits north east england — pledging millions of pounds in funding for local towns if the conservatives hold on to power. after a week of general election campaigning here in the uk, all parties are once again out and about this weekend, vying for public support. 0ur political correspondent, jessica parker has more from the campaign trail.

i am on the conservative campaign bus which had its launch event today and previously viewers have seen us aboard what we have been calling campaign buses and they may not have actually been the properly branded bus but we are now on that after it was unveiled in redcar earlier today and we are now heading back down south towards the capital and earlier the prime minister, rishi sunak, did get on the bus for it's kind of inauguraljourney as the campaign coach but he is not on it now so it is basically just reporters and journalists who have been tracking the prime minister and the conservative campaign over recent days and we have gone to a variety of places, sort of middle to late in the week, including buckinghamshire, and as i say, we went to redcar and we were in the north—west yesterday as well and there have been a variety of announcements over those days and

the one we had today, as you mentioned a moment ago, was this idea of kind of extending the levelling up fund to give up to £20 million to 30 towns across the united kingdom and it is quite interesting to hear "levelling up" being brought out again as a phrase, as it may be one people more associate with the 2019 general election campaign led to then of course by borisjohnson, a predecessor of rishi sunak, and something boris johnson really tried to use also as part of his campaign to take those red wall seats of labour so rishi sunak overnight announcing more cash as part of this brand but it has come in for some criticism of course, as we were hearing in the package just then, but also parties like labour, the liberal democrats, the snp, as well basically arguing they think communities have been let down by the conservatives, towns, because this is a sort of towns fund,

because of council cuts and they say there has not been enough investment in various communities so it has come in for some criticism but that was the announcement is the conservatives wanted to push today. that was jessica parker. after weeks of voting, polls have now closed in the last phase of india's general election — the biggest the world has ever seen. the final stage of balloting took place in 8 northern and eastern states during a severe heatwave. at least 30 people have died of heat stroke. water and fans to cool voters have been provided at some polling stations. results are expected to be announced on the 4th ofjune. earlier, i spoke to our south asia correspondent samira hussain, to hear what happens next. what happens now is we are slowly starting to see exit polls coming out. these are various analysts and media

organisations that have paid to have these exit polls done. you don't really get an inkling ofjust how things are going throughout the indian election over the six weeks. now that all phases of voting have ended, we are starting to see some of those being trickled out. really, when it comes down to the actual real results, well, that still doesn't happen until fourthjune. that's when all the vote counting will take place. and because voting was done primarily by electronic voting machines, the process should be fairly easy — or fairly quick, rather — and they will start counting early in the morning and by early afternoon we should have an indication of which way, in which direction the country is going. just briefly, samira, the numbers of people who have actually been involved here, eligible to vote, are huge, aren't they? we are talking about almost 970 million people that were eligible to vote in these elections and that's why they went on for so long.

in order to organise and have enough manpower to get all of those people to be able to cast a ballot, that's why you have elections over seven phases. and that was samira hussain there earlier. now on bbc news — newscast. laura kuenssberg as i live and breathe. paddy 0'connell, you are wearing a jacket. yes, i'm told that part of this will be televised. 0k, well i will sit up straight then. still have my sneaks on, is that ok on the telly? could we say week one of the election campaign, the conservatives dropped the ball with the rain drenched fiasco and week two, labour dropped the ball with the diane abbott on again off again? i think we can absolutely say that. i think we will absolutely say that labour lost some days of its very carefully choreographed grid with unavoidable mistake born of not dealing with a long—term issue between the party leadership and diane abbott. icon of the left, prominent friend

and ally ofjeremy corbyn and the on again off again embarrassment around her position in the party has been notjust distracting but also i think quite damaging with some voters. we will get into that. could you reveal from the contact books, did your phone burst into life with a message of interest this week? what was interesting is most people this week in the political firmament were talking about diane abbott, they weren't abbott, they weren't talking about the big shape of the campaign or even the quite a few more policies the conservatives put out. and i think what is interesting about, lots of interesting things about it, but the row over diane abbott doesn't seem, at this stage, to be turning into something that would threaten labour's dominance — thus far, the polls and really budging. however, it exposed those still very kind of raw roots under the surface of the labour's decades—old struggle between the left and the right and just how much keir starmer�*s blue suits as they are sometimes nicknamed, those youngish men who eagerly work for him and mainly,

not all, but mainly men, just how much upset there has been on the left fringes of the labour party about how they have behaved, notjust in the last couple of weeks but in the last couple of years. all of this dissected in newscast. newscast from the bbc. diane abbott was both a candidate and not a candidate according to the deputy leader and labour of the labour party. if you haven't been following this story and you are a new newscaster, diane abbott, very prominent, first ever black female mp, more than one year ago wrote a letter to a newspaper that contained what was seen as offensive and anti—semitic remarks. she said sorry at the time but she was then being investigated by the labour party and she was essentially put on the bench. that took months and months and months and months and her status as whether she could come back into the party, let alone run again as a labour mp... bearing in mind natalie elphicke came back into the party

or came into the party. somebody on the right wing of the tory party was welcomed with open arms. so there has been huge sensitivity about all of this and at the beginning of this week, labour were sort of bounced into saying, yes, she can come back into the parliamentary labour party because our colleague victoria derbyshire on newsnight revealed the investigation had actually been completed months ago. but then whether or not she would be allowed to stand as an mp was still in doubt. because one week ago, you and i were right and we admit when we were wrong, to talk about the proposed deal whereby she would get the whip and then stand down herself and we heard that here, i am often wrong, but that was the deal. but then it is said there was briefing that she would not be standing as an mp and the finger of suspicion pointed at keir starmer�*s chief of staff, morgan mcsweeney. do i know he briefed the papers? no. am i saying he briefed the papers? no. am i saying the finger of suspicion points at him?

yes, i am saying that. and that seemed to spark fury in the camp and supporter group of diane abbott. absolutely and just the next day, there we have it, diane abbott with a group of supporters on the steps of hackney town hall loudly and proudly in her constituency saying, "they want to me out but i will not be forced away." and this isn't new, this has been running and running and running for ages and this is why the whole thing has been unavoidable mistake. because it was an unresolved situation and labour always have told us that they are ready for an election, ready to go but this was an unresolved situation that then sort of exploded into this real tension that we saw on the steps of hackney town hall in north london where diane abbott's many supporters turned out in force. keir starmer at this point was trying to hold a line, basically saying, "it is not up to me, it's up to the national executive committee," labour's powerful sort of decision making body of the party. keir starmer was trying to hold it all at arm's length saying

it is nothing to do with me. and his deputy angela rayner popped up and said diane should be allowed to stand. then the leader of scottish labour anas sarwar popped up and said she should be allowed to stand. lo and behold, eventually on friday keir starmer said, ok, i haven't given if you are up to now but of course diane is free to stand. a big change in his position. so keir starmer risks looking like he took on a fight with the left and then wasn't strong enough to win it. he has also handed the tories and attack line saying, "look, he couldn't even stand up to diane abbott." he has resurfaced also the connections between himself and politicians like diane abbott who were closely associated with jeremy corbyn. there is a theory amongst some of his most ardent supporters that essentially any public row we have with the corbynistas is a good because it shows "we have taken them on, shows we have changed." however, most people i've spoken to in the last couple of days think actually in the context of a campaign, this isjust messy and it looks ugly and therefore somebody said to me it is never a master plan, don't see it as a master plan. public messiness is not good and i think we have seen

keir starmer�*s first stumble. so lifelong listener matt puts this in this way. "what on earth is labour doing with diane abbott? absolutely blows my mind. for me, this election is not about what they are promising today as much as who we know them to be." he says he doesn't trust the conservatives but asks, "what are labour trying to say about themselves?" well, we know what the leader of the labour party is saying, matt, he says, "this party has changed forever. i have changed it." that was the word just before the diane abbott story broke but all of our older listeners will remember fights within labour between the left and the right, often played out with members of the national executive committee, the nec, on which sits angela rayner. so you could not bring back from the past a more potent brew forjournalists who instead of writing about labour policy on new energy, "we have changed the party", candidacy for one of the icons

of the left. that's right. what is it going to be? guilty as charged, i wrote a long and i hope not too pompous piece about how you actually have to see this in the context of what has been a decades—long struggle and it reminded me of a conversation that i had with a very senior labour politician just afterjeremy corbyn became leader for the first time which is nearly ten years ago but i remember it because this person was so angry. they were spitting chips. absolutely furious. and the phrase that is in piece that just has always stuck in my head, he said, "we will have to take them apart piece by piece." and i'm not going to do an impression because it might give away who it was and we would never want that to happen. speaking of speaking of piece, your earpiece, it's taken the moment pop out in support of what you're saying. well, i put my hair over it and nobody to say that it was not pompous. i think we go spool right back to an election campaign is time compressed, it's tardis time. you really can't have three days

talking about diane abbott correct this point in the campaign. now, the second point to make is the polls haven't budged. the polls haven't budged. so you could argue it's a very important issue for some people, but it's not the same as being a very important issue for all the voters. that's absolutely right, except that the distraction point, if you like, the cost benefit, what they've lost by spending days talking about this does matter in the context of a campaign. from a political point of view, though, in terms of the overall context of where this campaign is at and labour's current very significant dominance in the polls, it's not something that they think is going to be a big deal because where you look at the voters who are likely to care about this, which pollsters would call progressive activists, so people who might be on the left of labour or they might be interested in the green party or in scotland, they might be snp facing or in wales

they might be plaid cymru, people often are young, they might be in student towns or big cities. they're likely to live in the kind of area where there are already chunky labour majorities. and because of the way our voting system works, well, if 2,000 people are cross about something in a city where there's already a 20,000 majority for the labour mp, that isn't going to add up to a hill of beans. however, that's not to say there's no impact. there's already unhappiness in those kinds of places over the labour position on gaza, over what some people see also as the watering down on some of its green plans. and there's a different sort of longer term point on this as well. we were talking about this in newcastle on thursday night. in newcast on thursday night. keir starmer doesn'tjust want to win, he wants to win well. and if the polls are even vaguely right, he's going to have an enormous influx of new mps, many more new labour mps than there were existing mps. and to sow any kind of seeds of bad feeling or sort of sourness

of atmosphere about how the leadership behaves, about what they're willing to do, that is something theyjust have to go carefully on. so someone in the shadow cabinet said, "look, i don't think it's not really coming up on doorsteps much. i don't think it'll make that much difference. but we do have to be careful about how this all looks." looks is presentation. what is an election? it's policy, it's politics, it's presentation, it's the public four ps. and the thing is, we should all worship the public. we are the public. we're the voters. this is about us. that's the first thing. policy obviously really matters, to matt's question, "what's your policy, love? " and then we could say about keir starmer and rishi sunak that they are very genuinely wedded to certain policies. we don't have to play a cynical game and say they don't believe in their policies. we can say they believe in their policies, but about the two

of them, presentation and politics, they get a c—minus for going out in the rain to launch the election campaign when ten feet away is a building with a roof on it. that's not presentation perky. and presentation in week two, having what appears to be a very ugly row with a prominent female trailblazing, black women of colour is not a good look as far as many members of the public might... somebody in the labour circles i was having a conversation with yesterday, itjust said to me, itjust looks mean. yeah, it just looks mean. it doesn't look good politics, is it? that's the point. you're the leader of the party. how about you go behind the scenes in advance, get what's possible, and present it to us, the public, as we've done? i'm a leader. anyway, the point is, welcome to the election campaign where there's going to be more of this.

this will crop up with every single—week—slash—day. and there will be and there will be gaffes and there will be problems. and it's interesting that in week two, it's labour that's had a stumble and not the tories having a panic over something or other. just last word on this, though, before we move on is that both parties are having rows about candidates being imposed because the row about diane abbott is also about who stands as labour mps and some of the blue suits are turning into red princes. hang on, i'm advisory person in labour so red and then if you're a red prince i'm a candidate, you're a candidate and you're a candidate who's been sort of anointed by by the leadership, some people might suggest. other people would say and starmer says very much all of this is about trying to get the best possible candidates and the best possible seats. one of them is torsten bell, who sat in that seat, think tank boss, now candidate in swansea for the labour party. there are always grumbles among party activists that people with connections in westminster end up getting access to plum seats as night follows day,

it always happens. there's a similar thing going on in the tory party where rishi sunak�*s, i think deputy chief of staff, somebody who's meant to be involved in running the campaign, is actually now involved in a contest to get a seat in suffolk. in fact, i think we were talking about that last week went way is why some what some of the reason for why the tory campaign seems to not be in great shape is because some of the team meant to be running the campaign are off looking for seats. and i think probably for the next few days, there's going to be a few more of these stories about candidacies. it is nothing new, but it drives local activists absolutely round the twist. and let us drive you to our website for a full list of candidates for swansea and all seats in general, because obviously some are ahead of picking candidates, some haven't been picked them actually as a point of interest, when is the deadline for picking candidates? labour, i think, want to get it all done by tuesday. i think they're nearly there. the tories have still got a lot more to select. there was some reporting this morning still saying

they still had more than 100 vacancies. that seems pretty stretchy to me, but you know, you never know. and there was a snafu there for fellow broadcaster and podcast prince iain dale. yes. who left lbc on air to stand in tunbridge wells. yes. words that he had spoken to his friend and podcast princess jacqui smith. yes. about tunbridge wells where he wanted to stand, saying "i don't like it very much." part of a sort of joke that they've had between themselves. he's given the context to nick ferrari, but inevitably here's another basic rule — if you're standing in tunbridge wells, don't ever have said about tunbridge wells, you don't like it and you go back to the election campaign and the four ps, the public a re royalty. if they live in tunbridge wells, don't tell them you don't like it. i think that's quite a basic thing for any politician. it's amazing to me to see that here we are in an election repeating errors, blunders, boobs and mistakes that have been the stuff of election campaigns, which is why many people love a general election campaign. yes, we want to talk

policy, but it's so quick. it's like the propeller politics becomes the jet age politics. oh, i like that. you've got to know straightaway. it's like swiping on tinder. what do you think about nuclear energy? yes or no? chicken orfish? fission orfusion. you can't take days working out if you like tunbridge wells. it was 48 hours for him and i'm not rubbing my nose in it or his nose in it. he's done to interview with nick ferrari on a rival station, which you're welcome to watch. very good. i think that's right, gaffes and slips and slips and slops and all sorts of things go wrong. and talking of slips and slops. have you seen how much fun ed davey, the lib dem leader, is having most of all on the slip and slide? not a slip and slop. wow. i mean, i have never seen a politician almost since borisjohnson, who looks as if they're enjoying a photo op quite as much. borisjohnson on the zip line. do you remember that? someone told me it was quite deliberate, actually,

and he fell in. never been able fell in a new pond. about the same time i fell in a new pond, he drove a bulldozer. well, ed davey, ithought last time i had had a good time driving a tractor, having hay bales, having sand tires, all sorts of things. not only has he already been on a paddle board this week, he was also on a giant slip and slide in somerset, appearing talking to the nation in a wet suit, notjust in a wet suit. he'd done the wet suit he had on one of those sort of waterproof t—shirt and shorts situation. now, do they appear — the leaders of the other parties — on tv debate? soon we will get into the territory of the tv debates. yes. tuesday is the first head to head. that's a head to head? correct. so when do we see all the leaders? i think the dates for that are still slightly up in the air. but i think ed davey, i think, look, he is trying to do what the leaders of small parties often do, which is get noticed. so could it be an i agree with ed moment, which remember

i agree with nick. i don't think that the other party leaders are going to appear in that debate. i don't think keir starmer or rishi sunak will appear in the many handers. really? i don't think so. i mean, i'm surprised by that. are you? yeah, i think it's a general election campaign. you would think under the rules. well, there are established rules. well, the rules... well keir starmer and rishi sunak would say to you is that they're the only two people who can be prime minister, so the other parties can fight it out and in previous multi handers or whatever you want to call them, those debates that look like an episode of 15 to i. i love them. do you love them? you know, i mean, they're great. they're all really important. i should get michael mcintyre to do the wheel! it could be like, where do you stand on wind farms? offshore wind farms. not sure you're taking this seriously. it sounds like we're having far too much. i mean, entertainment. but the point is, politics

is not like entertainment. somebody very cruelly once said it was show biz or ugly people. i would not echo that sentiment in any way, shape or form. however, the serious point about those many handed debates, when you have all the parties, i don't think either of the party leaders will do them. and actually remember one debate in times gone by, i think it was the last time round in cardiff, if i remember correctly, and it was the many—hander. actually i think it was rishi sunak who was there on behalf of the tories. he was given a massive starring role as a relatively unknown minister. so we need a bit more information on the debates, which we'll get to in the newscast that follow. borisjohnson might come back or not on the campaign trail. i've seen in my paper. or not. or not, you're not obviously putting credence by that report. no, i just think that people absolutely love speculating about what boris johnson may or may not do. and it quite often ends up being not quite what people either hoped for or originally was planned.

and rishi sunak did reveal this week that they had been speaking. but it's also been said in the last few weeks that actually borisjohnson is going to be abroad for a lot of the campaign. and interestingly, today in borisjohnson�*s column in the daily mail, he's not written about the uk election. he's been writing in support of donald trump and against the way that he was tried in new york. so i don't know how tory hq will be feeling about that, that borisjohnson chose to use his column not to write about the uk election, which he did last week, and he said all sorts of rude things about keir starmer last week, but this week actually he's chosen to use his platform that he has, a large one actually, to talk about donald trump and not rishi sunak. so just back to ed davey. yes. where you were mentioning he's had a very prominent role in the... he's loving it, yeah. also it seems there's a strategy to get him to talk about his life. yes. i don't think the average voters know could answer many questions on ed davey�*s life. he's been opening up a little bit

and giving ed davey news. so, you're right. ed davey has previously talked about his family quite movingly, but i think it is something that people don't generally know very much about him, as you suggest, paddy. and today he's been tweeting about how he spends time looking after his sonjohn, who has quite significant disabilities. and it's one of the things over time that has, i think, very obviously influenced ed davey�*s policy choices. he's talked a lot about allowances for carers, he's talked a lot about support forfamilies in that kind of situation. it's interesting to see in the white hot context of an election campaign that he is obviously very determined to use his own experience to put forward a powerful message on that. it's interesting. so that is it for this episode of newscast. if you want more, we've recorded more. we're always recording more. and you can hear it on the bbc sounds edition of newscast.

but for now, from laura and me, goodbye. newscast from the bbc. hello there. high pressure has brought most of us a fine and dry day. there's been plenty of sunshine around as well, particularly in scotland, where we've seen temperatures into the low 20s in the warmest spots. i'm sure that would have felt very pleasant indeed. central and eastern england, meanwhile, had a bit more in the way of cloud, but most areas have at least managed some cloud breaks and some sunny spells. now, overnight tonight, clear skies dominate the weather picture with high pressure firmly in charge. these clear skies will allow temperatures to drop away really quickly. and so it's going to be quite a cold night. temperatures even in the towns and cities down to single figures for some, and down as low as five degrees in the coldest parts of rural northern england and scotland. same area of high pressure is with us through sunday.

but this weather front is eventually going to bring thicker cloud in and eventually some rain to the very far north west of scotland. and it may well be quite a nice sunrise for scotland and northern ireland with this cloud getting illuminated by the rising sun. the afternoon, though, sees a bit of rain edging into the highlands and the islands. away from that it's dry and for eastern areas of england, notably, there's going to be much less cloud around, the winds are a lot lighter, it's going to be a lot warmer. temperatures climbing up to about 22 degrees in the warmest spots, whereas temperatures come down a little bit for scotland and northern ireland. that's because we've got this cold front working its way southwards, and that will continue to push south on monday as well, bringing with it cloudier weather, an odd spit of rain — not much. and once the front�*s through, in scotland on monday, the sunshine comes back out. just a few showers across the far north. now, temperatures on monday will be coming down just a little bit. but still, where thejune sunshine comes out through the afternoon, it will feel pleasantly warm with temperatures into the high teens or low 20s. it's through tuesday and wednesday we'll see some much cooler air arriving, particularly across the northern half of the uk. and this heralds the arrival of some pretty unsettled weather conditions, really.

showers become widespread across scotland, northern england and northern ireland — some of them with hail and thunder mixed in. there could be a few showers developing through the day, further southwards as well. and those temperatures continue to ease down a little bit. still 20 in london, but 14 in glasgow. well, the average of this time of year is closer to 18 degrees. and that cool, showery theme to the weather continues then through much of the rest of the week for scotland and northern ireland, temperatures nearer average for england and wales, with some pleasantjune sun.

live from london, this is bbc news. the united states, egypt and qatar urge israel and hamas to finalise a new peace dealfor gaza — as calls grow for an end to the fighting. in south africa, the ruling anc party loses its majority for the first time in 30 years —

as former presidentjacob zuma's newly formed mk party makes surprising gains. live from london, this is bbc news. jacob zuma has created quite a stir here, he's made a rock star entrance. his party came third with an unexpectedly strong showing, taking a lot of votes away from the anc. in the uk election campaign,jobs, skills and funding for local towns takes centre stage — as party leaders tour the country. boeing's first manned space mission is postponed — just minutes before it was due to blast off. hello, i'm lu kwesa hello, i'm lukwesa burak. to the middle east, where hamas has indicated it is willing to discuss