james mattis disagrees that donald trump that the press are the enemy. we sometimes disagree with the press, and i don't have any issues with the press. what next for lincoln city as they wait their fate in the fa cup draw tonight? the draw is at 6:30pm tonight on the news channel. it's the first time a non league has made it to this stage for over 100 years. and coming up, talking business — this week looking at how big names brands survive in a technological age. good afternoon and welcome to bbc news. thousands of prison officers atjails in london and south—east england are to get a pay increase of between £3,000 and £5,000. ministers have made the offer

to try to boost recruitment and to retain workers in prisons — which are under pressure from violence and staff shortages. but there'll be no extra pay for senior officers. here's our home affairs correspondent, june kelly. they're the front line in ourjails, but there aren't enough of them. the shortage of staff is seen as one of the key causes of the problems in prisons. in somejails, officers are struggling on a daily basis simply to maintain control. now the government is putting in place a £12 million pay package to try to retain existing staff and recruit new prison officers. this is wandsworth jail, in south london, and staff here will benefit. the offer is limited to prisons in the capital and the south east. ministers say they're under the greatest pressure. but this has been condemned as ‘divisive‘ by the prison 0fficers‘ association.

they maintain the pay package is tantamount to putting a plaster over a gaping wound. we're welcoming the additional money for our members, of course we are. but we don't think this goes far enough to solving the prison crisis. we believe it needs to be a national issue. we weren't properly consulted on this either, so we believe that if the secretary of state wants to make these arbitrary decisions on pay, then she should consult us fully and we can point out the inconsistencies and problems that will arise as a result of this policy. the offer is for standard grade 3 prison officers, not for more senior supervisors or specialists. each will receive a pay hike of at least £3,000. for new recruits, the pay package will be boosted by 5,000. a sweetener to try to get people into thejob. the justice secretary, liz truss, has already announced plans to recruit 2,500 more prison officers, but it will be the end of 2018 before they're all in place.

it's not something you can sort out in weeks or months, it takes time to recruit people, it takes time to bring those people on. but i'm absolutely determined to deal with that. thejustice secretary rejects claims that, as a country, we are locking up too many people. prison reform campaigners believe we are, and this is a fundamental part of the problem. she has to get the numbers down, at the same time as improving staff morale, pay, retention and training. she also has a problem with community sentences, which are also in a mess. the justice system has to work for victims, the taxpayers, the staff and for people in it. and at the moment, it's not working for anybody. while today's pay package announcement is about trying to bring new people in, those in the service say the challenge is not just recruiting staff, it is retaining them. june kelly, bbc news. earlier i spoke to the former mp jonathan aitken. he now campaigns on prison reform,

having spent time in prison himself. he welcomed today's announcement by liz truss. i think it is a good initiative and the prison officers who are getting these pay rises are worth every penny because theirjob is becoming increasingly dangerous and all ties of pressures, which have mounted hugely because of the staff shortages and staff cuts. she is making the right move. is it enough? i rather doubt it. i thinkjust £i2 million is very welcome, but the bbc panorama programme which seems to have escalated some of the arguments was all about a prison in northumberland and this increase is only going to prisons in any southeast and london. i think there will be a demand from other

prisoners —— prisons to see the same generosity by the government. presumably, liz truss, had a choice. she could have given certain prison officers a pay rise, which is what she's doing, or she could recruited more. i think they're trying to do both, but as they have discovered, it is very difficult to recruit and train and install prison officers and above all, i know having been in prison, that there is a strange chemistry of wary respect between prison officers and sensible prisoners, but the prison officers who gain that respect our experienced, so you need to hang on to the people who had been there some considerable time. the problem with recruiting inexperienced prison

officers is that they can't so easily control a wing full of 90 or 100 prisoners without the character and experience and wisdom that goes with that. there is a lot of catching up from this totally avoidable crisis, the success of justice secretary is allowed 7000 prison officers to be made redundant cause of pressure from the treasury andi cause of pressure from the treasury and i think that was a grave mistake and i think that was a grave mistake and we are paying for it. randox has seen that the system is in trouble. yes, she's clearing up the mess. it would be cleared up quickly, and i think the crisis is deepening rather than easing, although the move she is taking is right move and it will perhaps help a couple of years down the line. iraqi security forces have started a major new offensive against the so—called islamic state in mosul. iraq's second—largest city was seized by the extremist group over two years ago as they took control of northern and western iraq.

last month the eastern half of mosul was recaptured after a major offensive. but around three quarters of a million civilians remain in the west of the city — which is still controlled by is. shortly after dawn, but without any apparent urgency, iraqi government artillery opened fire. in the distance, several kilometres away, smoke rose into the morning sky. the assault won't be a surprise to the population of mosul. after the capture of the eastern half of the city last month, it was only a matter of time before government forces advanced into the west, and the operation was announced by the iraqi prime prime minister. translation: i call on our brave forces to proceed with courage to liberate the other half of mosul and its peoples from the oppression of the islamic state group forever. it is believed there could be as many as 3,000

is fighters in the west, hidden among more than 600,000 civilians. in the densely packed streets the fighting will be intense. the united nations has called on government forces to ensure the safety of those civilians is of paramount importance. the operation to retake the city began four months ago, and military commanders are warning that it could be just as long again, before it's finished. earlier this morning our middle east correspondent quentin sommerville, who's with the iraqi forces, sent this update from the front line. iraqi special forces police are now moving forward. they've breached their own defences and they‘ re heading towards the so—called islamic state, who lie just beyond that hill about two kilometres away. all morning here, coalition aircraft have been overhead, dropping very large bombs on those positions, softening them up so that these troops can then go in.

there's no real element of surprise in modern warfare, and last night, the residents of western mosul, who are just over there, were warned in leaflet drops to stay in their homes. these men, let'sjust spin round and we can show you, they're all lining up and getting ready for the battle. look, there's a tank coming in just up there. these men aren't expecting an easy time of it today because they know from drone footage that the islamic state have dug deep tunnels in the villages just south of western mosul and that they're waiting with car bombs and plenty of fighters, a hard—core of fighters remaining in western mosul, which of course is iraq's last city held by the islamic state. but the assault on that last redoubt of the islamic state is now under way. save the children say hundreds of thousands of children are trapped in western mosul.

aram shakaram is the charity's director in iraq. we believe there are over 800,000 population trapped in western mosul. among them, over 350,000 children who have been suffering since the beginning of the previous operation. also, under the control of isis for the last two years. at the moment there is no escape. we are happy to hear that the government of iraq has prioritised civilian protection in this operation and we hope that will be the case. at the moment, there are no escape routes. since the beginning of the operation this morning, we have not seen anybody that has made it to safety, to nearby places where we are present on the ground for support. what we are hearing from people in western mosul is that they have almost run out of supplies in western mosul. water is the most critical need that they have at the moment

and there is a lot of fear. children, there is not much in terms of medicine and supplies. a two—year—old boy who went missing in perthshire this morning has been found dead in a nearby river. the toddler disappeared close to the bridge of cally — his body was recovered from the river ericht just over an hour later. he was treated at the side scene by paramedics but unfortunately did not survive. the headlines on bbc news: thousands of prison officers in london and the south east of england are to get an instant pay increase of between three and five thousand pounds. ministers hope it'll ease the pressure on the service. save the children say that 350,000 children are trapped in western mosul as iraqi troops, supported by american air strikes, have begun their assault to recapture the city from islamic state militants. the chief executive of sainsbury‘s calls for "fundamental

reforms" of business rates, amid concerns upcoming rises could spark closures on the high street. sport now, and for a full round up, from the bbc sport centre. there are two more fa cup fifth round ties today and tottenham have made it into the quarterfinals thanks to a harry kane hatrick against championship side fulham. mauricio pochettino made five changes to the team that lost in the europa league on thursday night but it was still a strong line—up, kane's first came after 16 minutes he was captaining the side with hugo lloris one of the players rested. his second came soon after the break, spurs dominated possession and could have scored more, kane's second hatrick of the season was completed with just under 20 minutes to play. that takes him up to 19 goals in all competitions. very good. we have had some great

results recently, so one kid to come in today and when, and be done that. we played very well, comfortable. should have had a fume girls, but it was a great game around. —— ghouls. blackburn and manchester united have just kicked off in the day's other tie. and you can watch the draw for the quarterfinals here on the bbc news at 6.30. in the scottish premiership today, aberdeen scored two goals in two minutes to beat kilmarnock and reduce celtics‘ lead to 2a points. aberdeen were 1—0 down going into the last ten minutes before late goals from substitutes jayden stockley and peter pawlett sealed the points that will keep them in second. rangers, who are in third place, play dundee. 2-0. a

2—0. a window for them would lead them to the top half. the welsh 0pen snooker final is underway in cardiff. the world number two stuart bingham has started very strongly againstjudd trump, who is ranked fourth in the world at the moment. bingham raced into a a—nil lead and though trump clawed a couple back, bingham leads 5—2. -- 5-3. he is looking for hsi first ranking title since winning the world championship two years ago. wigan warriors are facing cronulla sharks in the world club challenge. it's the annual match between the superleague winners and the australian nrl champions. wigan are looking for a record fourth win in this match and it's going well so far at the dw stadium. they lead to 10—0. joe burgess scored both their tries. the first

half tries which makes them top of the table over wasps. a close one between newcastle and the saints. there are by 32 points to... it is straight after half—time. that's all sport for now. you can keep up to date with all those stories on the bbc sport website. and i'll have more in the next hour. greater manchester police has launched a criminal investigation after claims that hundreds of forensic test results issued by a laboratory in manchester were "doctored". two men have been arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice. randox testing services in blackley analyses samples of saliva, blood and hair, looking for traces of drugs and alcohol. let's talk to our reporter philipi norton who's in manchester. randox provide scientific analysis

of samples to be used in criminal cases for police forces across the country, and that is samples such as hair, blood and saliva which i tested for traces of alcohol and drugs. that evidence is then used in court 0cd is. up to 500 drug test results carried out since november 2015 may have been compromised due to what randox says is due to the manipulation of quality control data which supports test results. this might have an impact on criminal cases which have already been concluded. it was brought to light by the companies own internal enquiries, and as a result in the police have launched an investigation into what has taken place. what are randox saying about these arrests? we understand that they have issued a list of potential cases which have been affected to all the police forces who had been

affected by this. randox say there is no evidence that the samples themselves where subject to any interference and in a statement the company said that these actions are in contravention of their well—established and robust practices and procedures. the crew to our working tirelessly to fully assess the impact for each case where possible and when viable, samples will be rerun to provide uncompromised results. two men have been arrested on suspicion of providing course ofjustice but had been released on police bail. the chief executive of sainsbury‘s has intervened in the row about the revaluation of business rates, which takes effect in april. mike coupe says the current system is "archaic" and needs "fundamental reform", because it favours online businesses. it's the latest intervention in the growing row over the changes , which some high street retailers say will see rates rise dramatically. here's our business correspondent joe lynam.

the vast majority of companies on this high—street in oxford street will be paying higher business rates from april, that is because business rates are a tax on the value of commercial property. of course, in london and the south—east, property prices have soared in the last seven years since they were last assessed for rates. if you have a large property footprint, like many supermarkets do, including sainsbury‘s, tesco and waitrose, you will want wholesale reform in how rates are assessed. but the reality is that the vast majority of companies will be paying less or more in england where this applies. half the money will stay in the local community, because it goes to local authorities rather than central government. that won't, though, stop the calls for the chancellor, philip hammond, to look at this issue perhaps in next month's budget. malaysian police say they are seeking four more 15 pm north korean suspects in connection with the death of kimjong—nam, the half brother of the north korean leader.

police identified the four suspects, all men between the ages of 33 and 57, but say they have already left malaysia. police on saturday arrested a north korean man over the killing of mrjong—nam. he died shortly after being sprayed with a chemical at kuala lumpur airport last week. 0ur correspondent kevin kim says this is another twist in the murder investigation. according to police, the four suspects all had north korean passports and boarded flights out of malaysia on monday. that was immediately after the killing took place. authorities say they are still waiting for the toxicology report that will confirm whether mr kim was poisoned. kim jong—nam was waiting at the check—in counter of the main airport in malaysia when two women approached him and sprayed him with the chemical. he sought medical help but fell unconscious and died hours later. the two women who were arrested told authorities that they were paid

to take part in what they believed was a prank for a tv show. a 46—year—old man from north korea is also under custody. lord mandelson, a former labour cabinet minister, has urged peers to not "throw in the towel early" when they debate the process of triggering brexit. the government has warned lords not to block the legislation which will start the uk's withdrawal from the eu. the house of lords will begin debating the article 50 bill tomorrow and earlier, our political correspondent tom bateman, told me the process will be taken very seriously. there will be approaching record numbers in the debate. that gives you a sense of the way in which many of the peers want to influence this process, as this bill passes for the first time to the house of lords. the government's intention is for it to

go through parliament completely unaltered, a clean bill, says the government has the right to begin the brexit process. but many labour and liberal democrat peers are slapping an amendment on to the books as fast as they can and there will be pages of these that potentially will be debated in the laws of the next couple of weeks. ——lords areas where lord mandelson and others are hoping for success are in trying to get the government on the statute book, law to have to come to parliament to give mps and peers a vote on any deal before it aside off by theresa may. the government has already made a verbal agreement to that, they want this in law. the second area is the right of eu citizens in the uk. lord mandelson was pretty confident that they could get somewhere with these issues. i think there is a strong body of opinion across party and most independent peers as well

that both these issues are very serious, but when it comes to eu citizens, the british government is not negotiating with itself, there will be people among the member states who say no, we don't want to take this issue now, we will take it later on during the course of the negotiation, as it is as much negotiating gambit for them as it is for britain. the government doesn't have a majority in house of lords, and it was interesting after the house of commons vote, some of the expressions, and, on a night of that vote, if the laws try to meddle with ——lords this or block it they could face an existential threat, that the public might be calling for the lords to be abolished. downing street road back on that and said it was no such threat. but i think it is interesting that the government knows it still could face some opposition, this could be a time where some peers may try to delay things, so i think they are taking no chances.

the justice secretary said this this morning. it was voted for conclusively the in the house of commons. the leader of the lords said last week that they wouldn't be holding it up and were looking at scrutinising. it is a simple bill, do we trigger article 50, the british people voted for that, clearly any referendum, and house of lords needs to get on with that. that is what i understand they will do. it is possible there could be some parliamentary ping—pong over this, having the government will try to avoid that, but that is probably a worst—case scenario for them. ministers remain confident they will get this through and it will be ina position to trigger article 50 processed doing the course of march. the us defence secretary james mattis had said he doesn't have any issues with the press. his comments come after

president trump described some parts of the media as ‘enemies of the american people'. ata at a contentious times with the press, but the press as far as i'm concerned i'm a constituency that we deal with, and i don't have any issues with the press. the republican senatorjohn mccain has also been speaking about mr trump's remarks. if you want to preserve democracy, you have to have a free and many times adversarial press, and many times adversarial press, and without it i'm afraid we would lose so much of our individual

liberties over time. that is how dictators get started. that is how dictators get started. that is how dictators get started. that is how dictators get started? no, they get started by suppressing a free press. in other words, a consolidation of power, the first thing that dictators do is shutdown the press. i'm not saying that president trump is trying to be a dictator, and just saying we need to learn the lessons of history. 0ur correspondent david willis is in washington. senior republicans not singing from the same hymn sheet as president trump. allen they are not. those comments by donald trump on friday evening that the media is the enemy of the american people is causing some concern. even amongst senior republicans, you heard from john mccain, they are the strongest comments about the media from donald trump so far, and they have raised questions about press freedom, which

of course is enshrined in the first amendment to the american constitution. donald trump clearly does blame the media for the way his administration has been characterised over the course of this first month. despite the protests a nd this first month. despite the protests and the leaking of classified information, the departure of his national security adviser, michael flynn, and so on, he continues to insist that the administration is operated like a finely oiled machine, and he believes the media has got it in for him. hence the sort of rallies that he held last night in florida, where the get energised by the people, speaks of the calf, he believes he can get his message over the heads of the mainstream media and directly to the people who voted for him. president trump has also been putting sweden in the headlights, by? end that florida rally, donald

trump was talking about the dangers of open borders and that sort of policy that exist in europe, and he mentioned several places where there had been terrorist attacks recently, which he blamed on that policy. he mentioned paris, nice, brussels and sweden. you look at what is happening last night in sweden, he said. who would believe this? reading! well, that took them by surprise in sweden because there hasn't been a terrorist attack on lessons 2010, and that was when an iraqi swede detonated at a device which killed only him. as you can imagine, there has been quite some reaction on social media. the former swedish foreign minister tweeted, terrorist attack, what is he smoking? referring to donald trump. and in actualfact, the big news in

sweden at the moment is about the qualifying process for the eurovision song contest. watts david, many thanks. the president's chief of staff has been defending the president's comments but he told nbc that he believed any free press. the president believes in the first amendment, and in the free press. i believe in those things. we don't believe in those things. we don't believe everyone is lousy in the media or that everything is bad, but there are some things that are bad, and we have tried to... he characterises that is fake news. what we have been doing these last ten days has been unbelievable, leeks, fake stories, accusations. that stuff is bad. a rocket has blasted off from the historic launch pad at the kennedy space centre in florida for the first time since the space shuttle programme ended six years ago.

the private spacex falcon rocket is carrying cargo to replenish supplies on the international space station. launch pad thirty—nine—a first became famous in the 1960s for the giant saturn five rockets nasa used to carry astronauts to the moon. now, the weather. we have a lot of cloud in the uk, not for all, but predominantly. a combination of weather fronts across the uk, most of them fairly weak affairs, as you can see, rolling in the atlantic. that's the important bit of the forecast — they are coming in from the west, relatively mild, and bringing an awful lot of cloud. through the night, that weak band of drizzly rain will sink to the south and then pep up again in the south and then pep up again in the northwest.