this is bbc news. the headlines at 2pm: more than three million british gas customers will see their electricity prices increase by 12.5% next month. the white house insists his new chief of staff will bring discipline to the white house, following the sacking of communications director anthony scaramucci. there's a second day of trouble at the mount prison in hertfordshire, with armed prisoners understood to have taken over a wing. the trauma unit at oxford'sjohn radcliffe hospital is to close for up to a year after the building was found to be a fire risk. and in the next hour: the man who drifted miles out to sea in a toy dinghy is rescued by a rnli crew. what are you doing out here? it comes as the charity launches a water safety campaign this month — the busiest for its lifeboat crews. the piece hall in halifax has re—opened today following a £19 million makeover. british gas will increase

electricity prices by 12.5% in september, a move which will affect more than three million customers. its parent company centrica said the price rise is a because of the increasing cost of transmitting energy to people's homes, and government environmental policies. the government has indicated that it may still legislate to impose a cap on energy prices. our business correspondent theo leggett reports. music. british gas likes to say it is putting its customers in control. we are bringing the nation smarter connected homes. but even if they turn the heating down, those on a standard variable tariffs will see their bills going up. after the increases announced today, the cost of an average

dualfuel energy bill, electricity and gas, provided by british gas, will be going up. it will now cost you £1,120 a year, that is an increase of £76 compared to last year. it is not the cheapest among the big players any more, but it is not the most expensive. british gas says it does mean 3 million people will pay more for their energy, but another 5.3 million customers will not be affected. british gas‘s owner centrica says it has little choice but to increase bills because the cost of providing electricity in particular has increased sharply. the reason for this is the transmission and distribution costs have been going up as well as the environmental and social policy costs, and recently, we have been selling electricity at a loss. and recently, we have been selling electricity at a loss. those are the reasons why we have had to put prices up, beginning in the middle of september. over the past six months, centrica has seen profits

from its home energy business falling sharply and it has also lost hundreds of thousands of customers. british gas has had pressure on its profits, on the domestic side, reflected in this announcement which they argue is because the price freeze and they argue most recently they have been making a loss and electricity overall, so there is a on them i guess to make sure they are not loss—making. earlier this year, when other major energy companies raised their prices, the regulator ofgem said the increases were notjustified. but plans for a cap have been watered down. the government needs to urgently look at what they do for the customers paying over the odds. there has been so much discussion about the energy market and it does not work for consumers. the discussion needs to end and we need to see some action. regulators want more people to shop around and switch suppliers to find a cheaper deal. but not everyone is willing to do that. for the sake in my case of maybe £20 saving a year, it is not worth it.

it is not worth my time. it is dear enough as it is, that is why i have both and gas and electric together because you get the 10% discount. if i could get a better deal somewhere else, i will always look for the best deal possible. centrica says it would welcome some changes to the energy market, including the abolition of the expensive standard variable tariffs. let's speak to the shadow minister for energy and climate change. british gas say they were selling electricity at a lost and cannot continue. it would be interesting to see the detailed breakdown of that. what i think the truth of the various house prices is that yes you have a number of levies which come m, have a number of levies which come in, environmental and social levies. a much larger sum of money, 29% of

the bill, goes on transmission charges. the rest of it is really down to what the energy company does in terms of buying and selling its electricity and what the back office costs are. things that were mentioned as being the chief drivers of the price increase, in this instance, or only a minority of the overall costs of your electricity or dualfuel bill. and overall costs of your electricity or dual fuel bill. and what we have now really is not just dual fuel bill. and what we have now really is notjust sent dual fuel bill. and what we have now really is not just sent a dual fuel bill. and what we have now really is notjust sent a putting up its charges by 12.5% in this recent period, but everything back to march all the other big companies put their bills up by double digits as well. —— centrica. that is the sort of thing that reflects a market which i think doesn't really mark and we cannot go on like that. british gas froze gas and electricity prices in february. the last of those companies to boot up their prices. we had a wholesale

costs fell by £36 in typical bill. he says that is not the driver, it is transmission and distribution of electricity to the home and government policy costs that is the main driver. with the exception of wholesale costs, these are more or less constant over our billing period. over a long period of time they have gone up, but there are co nsta nt they have gone up, but there are constant underpinning. on the labour side, we would like to see a tarot structure which reflected different elements of the bill, publicly registered, so everyone could see what goes into their bill and what the other costs of energy companies we re the other costs of energy companies were and how they worked out their trading as far as the wholesale retail costs are concerned. there area number of retail costs are concerned. there are a number of factors that go into these bills, but overall what we know among other things from competition and markets is the customers said they are being

overcharged by something like {1.4 billion more than you would of done if the market was working properly. and that is what i think we have to address. we have to start doing that by making sure that prices are capped over the next period. that doesn't mean they remain static and it doesn't mean every energy companies have to put their energy prices up to the cap, what it would mean is in a capital market customers would now with reasonable certainty over a period what their bills were likely to be in that next period and can plan accordingly. there have been so many probes, competition reviews, threats of caps. so much talk about it and yet any investigation has yet to come up with a clear answer. they say even a cat isn't necessarily the there are lots of different opinions about this, but what we do know is that on the same day british gas, centrica,

announced 800 million plus profits over the last period and put the bills up by 12.5%, and followed suit with other energy companies putting their bills up by similar astronomic levels, when that competition authorities said that was overcharging overall. in the background to that, we have a huge number of customers, so—called sticky customers, on standard variable tariffs, who will not switch in a hurry and who are effectively captive by those energy companies for whatever rises they made it in and often pay the most expensive rises when they have the least available resources. so it's quite a complicated picture. but it's one i think absolutely needs to be tackled. not just it's one i think absolutely needs to be tackled. notjust by an energy cap in the nearfuture, but by

substantial root and branch reform to how the energy market works, which can be undertaken as a result of that cap being put in place. you used the word astronomic. the shadow chancellor said the price hike was extortionate. which suggests something more than just a business needing a bit of reform? is a sense in which energy companies are declaring price rises and knowing they are declaring price rises on they are declaring price rises on the basis of the fact that they have a large number of customers who are effectively captive to the companies. that is a problem that we really have to deal with. and simply telling people to go and switch will not deal with problems in the market. we have to be rather more basic than telling people to switch

and walk away. i thought we had some sort of consensus developing at the time of election would be a cap. we wa nted time of election would be a cap. we wanted to go further than the conservatives in terms of introducing a cap of the number of changes to the market following that cap, but now there isn't even a cap in place. the government has actually done a u—turn on their election manifesto pledge, what smartly off enough said direction and put the ball in the court of ofgem and said it will be no cap from the time being. it is not good enough. if they change their mind and said he would go for a cap, we would support them all the way. thank you. the white house has insisted that president trump's new chief of staff will bring discipline to his administration, following the sacking of anthony scaramucci as director of communications after less than ten days in office. mr scaramucci was dismissed last night, just hours after the appointment

of generaljohn kelly, for what officials described as his "inappropriate" comments in a magazine interview. he's the third trump appointee to leave his role in recent days. richard lister reports. my start state is going to be in a couple of weeks, so it is 100% totally cleansed and clean. anthony scaramucci never made it to the official start state, the white house decided what had to be cleansed was him. why? look at his comments to the new yorker magazine where he said of the then white house chief of staff... but as it turned out, not for much longer, a victim of a vicious political culture he had spoken out to the bbc. one of the things i cannot stand about this town is the backstabbing that goes on here, where right grow up, in my neighbourhood, we are front—stabbers. this is the man who helped to wield the knife, the new chief

of staffjohn kelly, the first retired general in the post since the nixon administration. his task is to bring order to the white house. as i think we have made clear a number of times over the last couple of days to several of you individually, general kelly has the full authority to operate within the white house and all staff will report to him. president trump has nothing but praise for generaljohn kelly but friends say the general was reluctant to become his chief of staff and will want to drive the white house agenda forward. if the president of the united states is disrupted in himself, i think general kelly will have frank discussions about things he could do that would help the situation and improve it. with three high—level departures from the administration in two weeks, general kelly'sjob to maintain discipline will be a challenge. the question is, will we see a more disciplined president trump? and that is the big question going forward.

keep in mind, the departure of scaramucci is perhaps the easiest thing that john kelly will be able to get done in this white house. general kelly will be watching this space, the president's twitter feed, which described yesterday's extraordinary shake—up is simply a great day at the white house. here is the message from donald trump. good news for the 35 million people who follow donald trump at the moment. that message alone has been re—tweeted nearly 9000 times in the last few minutes. the ministry ofjustice has confirmed there is an ‘ongoing

incident‘ at the mount prison in hertfordshire. specialist riot—trained prison staff are being despatched. i was joined a short while ago by our home affairs correspondent danny shaw who started by explaining there was also an earlier incident in erlestoke prison in wiltshire, which now seems to be under control. it appears that the incident has been resolved. i heard earlier that staff had apparently withdrawn from one section of the prison, amp command centre was set up and that tends to suggest it has been a serious disturbance. it looks like it has been resolved. the problems at erlesto ke it has been resolved. the problems at erlestoke prison are over, but still problems at the mount prison in. there was a serious problem. fires were set in two wings. my understanding is at least 50 cells may have been damaged to some extent. the extent of that is being

assessed. they were in lockdown. what has happened this morning is in another wing, a relatively new building is constructed two years ago, it holds over 200 prisoners, there has been trouble. one well—placed source told me weapons we re well—placed source told me weapons were seen. staff have retreated. officers, tornado teams, staff trained to deal with that are being dispatched to the prison. how serious is this? incidents take place in prisons all the time. there are some sort of low—level disturbances, problems with some individuals, the vast majority of those go unreported. but when an incident like this takes place with tornado teams being involved, it

ta kes tornado teams being involved, it takes it up to a new level. when you have prisoners in essence barricading themselves in with staff having to withdraw, that is very serious. certainly the problems at the moment have been brewing for some time. there have been reports there is not enough staff. independent inspectors going to prison. they said in february there was something like 2a or 25 staff shot out of a complement of 176. is a serious shortfall. factor in summer a serious shortfall. factor in summer holidays and more static and annual leave, that means there's less time for prisoners to go out of their cells to do activities where they can be safely escorted unsupervised. it means they are stuck in their cells, frustration and anger boils up, and this is what happens. danny shaw speaking to me earlier. the headlines on bbc news:

british gas say they will put up energy prices next month. it will affect more than 3 million customers. the white house insists that president trump's new chief of staff will bring discipline to his administration, following the sacking of anthony skala michie. a second day of trouble at the mount prison in hertfordshire were on prisoners are believed to have taken over a wing. the manchester city goalkeeper was injured in the quarterfinal win over france. siobhan chamberlain who came on for helen bardsley is now likely to take her position in the next game against the netherlands. heart of midlothian have sacked their head coach. it follows their sharp exit from the scottish league cup. pro12 will be expanded to include two south african sides from september. it will be called the pro 1a with

both new site playing their home games in south africa. more and more stories just after 3:30pm. join us then. there has been a shoot—out at a court in moscow. our correspondentjoins us. what do we know? quite an extraordinary incident. three people have been shot dead in the small school courthouse and several people have been injured. a number of official bodies here have been making state m e nts bodies here have been making statements from the police to the investigative committee. they all seem investigative committee. they all seem to agree that what happened is that five suspects on trial in a murder case, are very high profile murder case, are very high profile murder case, are very high profile murder case here, were being transported to the court by bailiffs and were in an elevator the time. one of the five suspects attempted to strangle one of the bailiffs. the others tried to overpower a second

bailiffs and get hold of a weapon. when they tried to escape, there was a shoot out with police officers inside the courtroom in which three of the suspects were killed and two people understand fairly seriously injured. quite extraordinary scenes. it is unclear how these men were able to attack or try to overpower these bailiffs given that in all the trials i have been to involving murder cases are high security cases, these people are normally moved around wearing handcuffs. at this point, it is unclear how this was able to happen at all. looking at pictures, the court building looks big and well secured. what is security like within these buildings? i have been to a lot of these buildings and even at the most low profile of hearings security is very tight. armed bailiffs at all hearings. people are escorted to and from court by armed men. the usually

in handcuffs. it is unusual first of all for them to be using an elevator as far as all for them to be using an elevator as farasi all for them to be using an elevator as far as i understand, and unusual that someone should be able to take weapons of armed guards. obviously the response was quick and the police have been quick to justify the response, saying the robbie investigation but they believe they used the proper methods and all the proper procedures, but as i see three people were killed in a shoot out. just a bit about the gang themselves. they were accused of hijacking cars back in 2013 and 2014 ona main hijacking cars back in 2013 and 2014 on a main road out of moscow. the allegation as they were stopping ca rs allegation as they were stopping cars apparently at random on the main highway and were killing the drivers and passengers inside those cards. it's never been entirely clear what their motive was. nothing appeared to have been stolen from the vehicles at the time, so are rather mysterious case. apparently

nine people were accused in that trial, five of them were supposed to be in court today for the searing. three of them have now been shot dead. thank you. the trauma unit at thejohn radcliffe hospital in oxford will close for up to 12 months due to safety concerns about the cladding on the building following investigations in the wake of the grenfell tower fire. 52 inpatient beds will be moved by august the 4th and the work to remove the cladding could take a year. the oxford hospital trust carried out investigations. thejohn radcliffe hospital filled a out investigations. thejohn radcliffe hospitalfilled a number of safety standards. refound the cladding was flammable. be found that the measures in place to stop fire from spreading from four to four were not as good as these

should be. we have good measures to stop fire from spreading within a single four, but we don't have measures it turns out in that building to stop spread from floor to floor as reliably as we want. the trust decided to evacuate the 52 bed units by friday of this week. fire wardens carry out regular patrols and there is an agreement with oxfordshire fire and rescue that if the fire alarm goes off, the service will deploy a number of cruise. the hospital trust now needs to work out how much it will cost to replace cladding and carry out improvement work. it is expected a trauma unit will remain closed for 12 months. let's speak to sean tipton from the association

of british travel agents — the trade body for the industry. he's in our central london studio. what reports have you been getting of difficulties? you will see longer queues at this time of year asjuly and august are very busy. anyone who doesn't have access to the schengen area within the uk, there are reports of people missing flights. if people are not aware it will take them longer to get through passport control when they are departing somewhere like palmyra in majorca, it could potentially mean that. it has not happened often, but i know package holiday operators are aware it will take people longer to get

through passport control. if you are travelling independently, iwould leave extra time. you might find a long queue. what more are they now doing to slow down the security one of the great things about being in the eu is they would quickly waive you through. but if you are not within the schengen area, which is the case for the uk and republic of ireland, they are being asked put through a lot of information in the database to check with interpol. instead of taking 20 seconds, it ta kes a instead of taking 20 seconds, it takes a couple of minutes. that all adds up. when you spend your £72 on adds up. when you spend your £72 on a new passport and it says it is biometric and up—to—date, that means nothing? not necessarily. when you

arrive in spain, they will check your passport. it is an issue they are. when you come back to the uk, nothing has changed, this is an eu requirement for people in the schengen area. travelling back to the uk, i think borderforce in the uk generally do a good job. if you'll get the average time they set to get through passport control here it is about 25 minutes. and it's often less than that. the problem will always be the height of summer and if your plane turns up at the same time as two or three others, there will be a big gridlock of people and there will inevitably be queues at this time of year. what is important is that airports make sure they have enough staff on hand. and is nothing more frustrating than being ina is nothing more frustrating than being in a big queue and seeing one or two players not manned. it is not acceptable. what happened to the good old days with a holiday started at the airport? are still does to a

certain extent. but we take so many holidays no, it's not such a treat. when i was a kid, my parents took me to gatwick airport to watch the planes take off. i don't think children would be so excited by that now. many things have improved. it's much cheaper to fly no. in the past, you might go abroad once every two yea rs. you might go abroad once every two years. but it is now. —— but it is now cheap. -- but it is now cheap. thank you. the labour mp steve mccabe has been left with facial injuries after being hit with a brick by an attacker on a motorcycle. the memberfor birmingham selly oak tweeted this picture of himself, saying he was suffering from a "very sore and swollen face" following the incident in the yardley wood area last night.

west midlands police said they are investigating and are appealing for witnesses. a man who drifted a mile out to sea in a toy dinghy had to be rescued by a lifeboat crew last night, as he battled against the wind and tide off redcar. what are you doing out here? the alarm was raised at 7:30pm in the evening after he was spotted near a wind farm off the coast. the man was wearing just shorts and a top. it comes as the rnli says the number of near fatal incidents in uk waters is highest in august — and it's launching a campaign, urging people to take proper precautions when heading out on the water. let's talk to dave cox, lifeboats operations manager at the rnli in redcar. were you on the port last night? now, my role is to coordinate rescues from within the station. the crew fortu nately rescues from within the station. the crew fortunately found the gentleman ina crew fortunately found the gentleman in a short period of time. without using language which might not be appropriate, what was the reaction about what they found? sadly this is an incident we see all too often

across the uk and ireland. we were not totally surprised at this. it was an adult male who could barely fit in the dinghy. despite his best endeavours to paddle back to the shore, the wind and tide were taking him further out to see. he was lucky. it was good you could find tim. what was fortunate was the people who were with them raised the alarm by doing the correct thing. dial 999 and ask for the coastguard. that meant the rescue was triggered very quickly. within 15 minutes of the crew being alerted, he was in a lifeboat and being taken back to shore. what about sea temperatures? it is still cold out there? the sea is very deceptive. you can paddle on the shoreline and it might feel warm, butam the shoreline and it might feel warm, but am i allowed we are

talking about 12 degrees. that could trigger some severe changes in the way the human body functions. one of our messages as you need to fight your instincts. if you fall in cold water, don't try to swim but fought on your back and keep your nose and most clear of water, let the initial shock pass, and then your chance for survival is much greater. if there was such a thing as a stupid gauge, where does this rate and what incidents have been higher in your experience? we try not to be that judgmental, to be honest. people really need to learn to respect the water. the incident last night shows some people don't fully appreciate the conditions. the lifeboat crew asked why he was there. honestly, he thought he would be fine. if he had

tried to swim a mile against tide and currents, it could easily have been a fatality. once he was back to shore, was he aware he was putting other people lives are risks? he will have been given some very direct messages about things which are good and not so good to do in the sea. type thingies like this are not the ideal thing to go out in the north sea in. thank you. criminal proceedings against the mp michelle thompson will not go ahead. she was reported to scotland's crown office in 2016. this is following a police investigation into alleged mortgage fraud. the crown office saying that the prosecutor fiscal received that report. after careful

consideration the facts the crown counsel has concluded there was an absence of reliable evidence and there should be no criminal proceedings at this time. the headlines are coming up. let's get a weather update first. here is jay wynne. for the 1st of august it is disappointing. we will look at the satellite and radar sequence combined. lots of showers from early on across the north and the west and the showers moved into east anglia. along the south coast, we are doing well. that's where the best of the sunshine is. further north some rumble of thunder and hail. as we look towards the south—west for the next spell of rain to head its way in with a freshening breeze. in rural parts of northern scotland, we will go into single figures. tomorrow, it's about the rain coming into the south and the west. the rain will be noticeable. wet and

windy weather moving northwards and eastwards. northern scotland will be the place to be for good spells of sunshine and northern ireland should dry up into the afternoon. it looks miserable for south wales and southern count chris of england. top temperatures only 19 or 20 celsius. not much better on thursday and we are back to where we are today. blustery day with sunshine, but also some showers. hello. this is bbc news. i'm simon mccoy. there have been renewed calls for a cap on energy prices, after british gas owner, centrica, announced it would charge 12.5 % more for electricity from september. the white house has insisted that president trump's new chief of staff will bring discipline to his administration, following the sacking of anthony scaramucci as director of communications after less than ten days in office. the ministry ofjustice has confirmed there is an "ongoing incident" at the mount prison. specialist riot—trained prison staff are being despatched. three people have been killed

and several injured in a shoot out in a moscow court room. according to russian police, they were shot dead after overpowering their guards and trying to escape the court. the trauma unit of a hospital in oxford has been closed for a year after it failed fire safety tests ordered in the aftermath of the grenfell tower disaster. sport now. england goalkeeper karen bardsley will miss the rest of women's euro 2017 after it's been revealed she broke her leg. the manchester city keeper was injured in the second half of sunday's quarter—final win over france but managed to walk off the pitch. siobhan chamberlain, who came on for bardsley, is now likely to face the netherlands in thursday's semi—final. ba rdsley gifted bardsley gifted the hosts a goal and then went off with an eye injury.

the scans show that barnsley has a broken fibula and chamberlain will be needed against another host nation. mark sampson has confidence in her. the liverpool keeper has kept eight clean sheets for her country. hearts have sacked head coach ian cathro afterjust seven months in charge. the 31—year—old, who was in his first managerial role, a former newcastle assistant, appears to have paid the price for a shock league cup exit against dunfermline. hearts say it was a very difficult decision, calling him an extremely talented young coach with a very bright future. organisers of rugby union's pro12 have confirmed that the tournament will be expanded to include two south african sides and renamed the pro14 from this coming season. the cheetahs, who are based in bloemfontein, and the southern kings from port elizabeth, recently lost their places in the southern hemisphere's super rugby competition. in the new expanded pro14 the teams will be split evenly into two conferences with two teams from ireland and wales in each, and one team

in each from scotland, italy and south africa. we looked at player welfare and the amount of weekends there are in a season and a mix between those two reasons and quite liked the conference set—up with more play—off by conference set—up with more play—off rugby at the end of the season with six teams going through to knock—out stages and with global season in 2020, with the longer tail, post six nations it just felt like 2020, with the longer tail, post six nations itjust felt like the right format for our tournament and allows us format for our tournament and allows us to do what we're doing, expand further at some stage in the future. so it felt like the right thing to do. british gymnast ellie downie will miss october's world championships in canada after ankle surgery the 18—year—old injured her left ankle at the british championships in march but went on to win four medals in april's european championships. downie plans to return for next year's commonwealth games in australia. she's tweeted "a minor setback is a pathway for a major comeback". her older sister becky will also miss the worlds as she continues to recover from an elbow injury. los angeles is set to host the 2028

olympic and paralympic games la's bid team has reached an agreement with the international olympic committee, which is expected to be ratified by the los angeles city council later today. la had originally been bidding for the 2024 games, but that event is now set to take place in paris. we really have an olympics ready city. one thing i will say is, unlike the old model where people try to fit the olympics to the city, this is a model where we are fitting the city to the olympics. we're not building things for the olympics, we are building things for our people who will benefit, and we know the olympics can take advantage of those. it is a different model, not every city will be la, but we can change the model by telling folks, use what you have and use it well. iaaf president lord coe has called usain bolt "a genius" and says his retirement from athletics will leave a huge void after the world championships.

the 11—time world champion defends his 100 metres title and will also compete in the four by 100 metres relay before bidding farewell to the sport. we shouldn't be sit there saying you're suddenly going to find another usain bolt anymore than boxing suddenly found another muhammad ali. when muhammad ali retired, left the sport, the blood line didn't suddenly dry up. where they arguably pound—for—pound in some cases just as good? there are some cases just as good? there are some who would argue that some were better, burd we are not going to replace usain bolt not because you're going to have a trophy cabinet full of three back—to—back olympic, you know, doubles and relays and world championships. you're just not relays and world championships. you'rejust not going relays and world championships. you're just not going replace relays and world championships. you'rejust not going replace him because his personality, dominated not just our because his personality, dominated notjust our sport, it dominated pretty much every sport out there. that's all sport for now. simon i have had enough of you, hugh

ferris will be here later. centrica says its prices will increase by 12.5%. 3.1 million customers will be affected. the company's customers will be affected. the compa ny‘s gas prices customers will be affected. the company's gas prices will be held at their current level. let's talk to kevin pratt a consumer affairs expert with money supermarket. what difference will it make? what difference will it make ?m will make a big difference in september when people see their electricity bills rising just as we approach the dark and cold winter months. so, announcing the rise at the beginning of august, when people don't have energy bills to the front of mind, maybe thinking more about their holidays can be seen as a shrewd tactic because it is almost like the bad news is coming out at the right time, but when it comes to

september people will feel that pinch and that's the time they should be thinking about finding a better deal. when british gas explains why they have done it, people probably glaze over a bit. all they care about is the figure at the end of the year. what will the change to that be? well, if you are ona change to that be? well, if you are on a variable rate standard tariff with british gas and you are a household with typical consumption, you will see your bills go up by £76 a year. to the wrong side of £1100 a year. that's on a standard variable rate tariff. there are fixed—rate ta riffs rate tariff. there are fixed—rate tariffs available from other providers which cost £900 or less so you can see the magnitude of the savings that are available to people who switch away from a standard variable rate tariff. notjust british gas, but all the energy providers, all their variable rate ta riffs providers, all their variable rate tariffs tend to be more expensive than fixed—rate tariffs. so it is worth checking to see if there is a better deal. every time we discuss this subject. it is like banks,

people have a misplaced loyalty to an organisation that they have been to longer than they have been with their wives and husbands, what do you say to people i have been with british gas all my life, it is too daunting? i can understand it is a wrench. som people will have been with british gas since the energy markets were deregulated and privatised in the 80s so moving to another provider will be a wrench for some people. they have the loyalty to the company and the comfort of a big brand, but that's becoming a very expensive luxury. if you're spending 200 headquarters or £300 more every year for your gas and electricity than you need to, then you really need to think, i need to jettison my affection for this brand and move to different one. or do you sit there and say, "look in six months they will be doing the same." the beauty about a fixed—rate tar give, you lock in the tar rough. once you are on a

fixed—rate tariff, the price of the energy won't increase for the duration of the term. so you insulate yourself against price increases that maybe coming down the line. if you don't check websites is there an answer? we strive to make it as simple as possible. so you don't need your energy. if you have got your energy bill to hand, you have got the numbers you need, but we can estimate by using your postcode, the type of house, detached or semidetached and the number of people that live there. that gives us the information to provide you with an estimate. that will allow us to show you how much you will save. when you see that amount, you will be sufficiently interested to give us another five minutes of your time to complete the process and when you have done that, the switch will take 17 to 21 days. there is no need for work at your property, inside or out, it is the

same wires and same pipes and there is no interruption to your supply. kevin, thank you very much. my kevin, thank you very much. my pleasure. britain's only surviving cloth trading hall reopened today, after a £19 million renovation. the piece hall in halifax once operated as a centre for handloom weavers, and was at the heart of the world's wool trade. the refurbishment of the grade i listed building has taken three years. our correspondent fiona lamdin was there earlier and sent this report. for the last two and a half centuries, the piece hall has stood at the heart of halifax. where in 1779, people came to trade pieces of cloth. there were 315 individual rooms built for the sale of cloth, from which clothiers would have sold the wall to merchants. merchants came from quite far afield, including europe. the trade went back to europe and also to the americas. this is the country's only surviving cloth hall. with 315 individual yet

identical trading rooms. it seems such a waste that this beautiful building was only opened back in the 18th century for two hours every week. but after the industrial revolution, the cloth was mainly made and sold from the mills. in its place, the piece hall was filled with fruit and veg sellers. a century on, in the 1970s, this is how it looked. a blot on the landscape, flattened to make way for a car park. one of those who fought to save it back then was mary crossley. she had a shop on the second floor. she's not been inside for decades. we took her back. isn't that lovely! when i first came in, it was all black. there were lean—to sheds.

there were warehouses and vehicles. there were holes on the floor and it smelt of cats. but you still fell in love with it? i still fell in love with it. at 10am today, the people of halifax were welcomed back in. i think it is brilliant. it is a plus for the tone. i am born and bred in halifax. it's fantastic. good to see it how it is back to where it should be. i used to come here and hang out with my mates. it is really nice to see open again. i hope that it takes off and people come and visit it because it is a fantastic place to be. nothing is new for these old stones, who have witnessed itt before. who have witnessed it before.

two robots speaking in their own language sounds like a scene from the film the terminator, well that fantasy has now become a reality. facebook were forced to pull the plug when chatbots alice bob started off by saying, "i can i i everything else". last week facebook boss mark zuckerberg and elon musk the creator of tesla clashed over the future development of artificial intelligence. mr zuckerberg accused mr musk of "trying to drum up doomsday scenarios." let's talk to noel sharkey a computer scientist and the head judge on the bbc programme robot wars. did you understand what the two were

talking about? yes, i did. they were trying to negotiate about balls. that was theirjob. so they were looking at this idea of having chat bots swa p looking at this idea of having chat bots swap items with each other. they weren't designed for chat bots to do this together. this was designed for chat bots to negotiate with humans, but theyjust put them together to see how it would go. so what have you worked out about those two? which one was the smarter? neither of them were the smarter. in fact, to me there, is, it isa smarter. in fact, to me there, is, it is a story that's gone everywhere, it is a scaremongering that al is starting to develop its own language. they started malfunctioning and that's why facebook shut them down! well, we have all been there. in bob and assist‘s case, is it because they are having to speak in english because one day they will have their own language? well, computers always had their own language. when you

type into your word processor that gets co nve rt type into your word processor that gets convert nood a machine language. and when robots or machines communicate via the internet they use their own language and there is a lot of experimental work done in the 1980s in belgium where robots would go up to an item and make up a word for it 2 what ‘us 7%§i%’ ¥li§f¢5 and 7.2?7j?17;.3;15;5':f if. f ' ,%§3§51%t i§¥‘f¢: and then ?:'.;,e;zf;f':f if. f ' humans " , humans." i ,humans." i don't "let's kill humans, “ ibein "let's kill humans, “ j be in anybody‘s - who it will be in anybody‘s lifetime who is existing on the planet i would say. at the moment, i could never say. at the moment, i could never say that could never happen, but i'm not worried about that. this is a distraction because there are very

important dangers, things going on, with al programmes and computer programmes, it being used generally. these are tools and it is how we use them that's important. it is not what they do themselves. at this stage, but presumably, at some point, they are going to be able to work out for themselves how to improve themselves? well, that's what people say. there is no evidence for it. as i say, this... you would say that, wouldn't you? it doesn't mean it won't happen. why would i say that? i'm saying that because i have been going at al more about 40 years and one of the things i tried to push strongly is that we stop using metaphor ins our laboratories and develop a scientific language the way biology did it in1910 scientific language the way biology did it in 1910 and that way we can start speaking scientifically and people won't be able to pick up on the metaphors and run with them in crazy kind of ways. and it is a serious point because many people are worried aboutjobs that have been taken over by robots in one

form or another. but how far in your mind, where are we going to be in ten, 50 years with this?|j mind, where are we going to be in ten, 50 years with this? i don't know about 50 years, i couldn't gauge that far in the future, but the worry about jobs gauge that far in the future, but the worry aboutjobs is a real concern to me because what these machines are very good at doing is singular tasks. that's why i'm not worried of them suddenly taking over the world. when the goal player beat the world. when the goal player beat the champion of go, it didn'tjump up the champion of go, it didn'tjump up and give anybody a high five. it isa dumb up and give anybody a high five. it is a dumb machine. it didn't know it had been playing a game, but it plays it very very well, the same way as robots will be taking over people's jobs. it is way as robots will be taking over people'sjobs. it is popping all over the place. there is real concern. driverless cars, look how many truck drivers could lose their jobs. service in the industry, there isa jobs. service in the industry, there is a robot now that can make 400 burgers from scratch cutting up fresh meat in one minute. those are the kinds of jobs fresh meat in one minute. those are the kinds ofjobs that could go. there isjobs going in insurance, there is machines making decision about whether you should have insurance or not. about your

mortgage, about your bank accounts, there is even a court case going on at the moment because the machine made the decision to not grant someone made the decision to not grant someone bail. so these are the really big concerns for me, not a robot take—over. really big concerns for me, not a robot take-over. all right. what about five years' time then? well, i'm talking about five years, ten yea rs' i'm talking about five years, ten years' time. that they will be taking a lot of ourjobs and you know, it's how we use them. so these are tools and if we use them badly we will get bad results. we are not getting a lot of sensible thinking from the government about it, joined up from the government about it, joined up thinking. they are pumping lots of money into it seeing it is a big economic boost, but they are not being cautious. you have elon musk talking about al taking over the world and setting up a company called open ai that's going to make safe ai, isn't that a surprise this is big money. that's why these people are coming out and saying these things. thank you very much for your time. noel sharky.

in a moment a summary of the business news this hour but first the headlines on bbc news: british gas says it will put up electricity prices by 12.5% from next month, affecting more than three million customers. the white house insists that president trump's new chief—of—staff will bring discipline to his administration, following the sacking of anthony scaramucci. armed prisoners are understood to have overtaken a wing at the mount prison in hertfordshire, in a second successive day of trouble. in the business news: the aa has fired its executive chairman, bob mackenzie, for gross misconduct with immediate effect. the company has given no further details and there's been no comment from mr mackenzie. good news, bad news from british gas. it is raising the cost of electricity by

12.5%. that takes effect in september. but its keeping the price of gas on hold. the aerospace company rolls—royce has had a good six months. it's reported half year profits of £1.9 billion. that compares to a loss of £2 billion the same period last year. it says its seen a big rise in sales. back now to that story about british gas. its parent company, centrica, says profits from its uk energy business that supplies our homes fell by more than a quarter to £381 million. it also announced that three million people will face higher electricity bills from september. the standard tariff is going up by 12.5%. the company boss, ian conn told us why. we have held our electricity prices flat since the beginning of 2014. we have seen reductions in gas prices in the period since the end of 2013 as well as a small electricity fall

at the end of 2013. this is the first time that we've put our electricity prices up therefore in that period and we're leaving gas prices flat. the reason for this is the transmission and distribution costs have been going up as well as the environmental and social policy costs a nd the environmental and social policy costs and recently we've actually been selling electricity at a loss. those are the reasons why we've had to put prices up beginning in the middle of september. the overall impact for the average dual fuel bill is #.3% or # £76 and it will affected 3.1 million out of 8.4. when you put the freeze in at the end of last year. wholesale electricity prices have come down. if you could afford to freeze then, people will say well, nothing has really changed in the landscape, why can't you afford to freeze now? the

reasons that applied then still apply now. in fact, wholesale costs have fallen? we agraofr the last few yea rs have fallen? we agraofr the last few years since we dropped our electricity prices the last time, wholesale costs have indeed fallen by about £36 on the typical bill. but we have seen the other factors of transmission and distribution costs a nd of transmission and distribution costs and energy policy costs go up by nearly £100. that's the main driver. the other thing is, you have to look at where we started from. we've had the cheapest electricity tariff of the large suppliers and even after this increase, we will still be materially below the average for electricity. in other business news, sony has reported its highest ever first quarter profits. the figure came in atjust under $1.5 billion. that means its on track to make its highest yearly

profits for 20 years. but its still facing stiff competition from the likes of lg and samsung. it's been a good year so farfor greggs. it's reported a 7% rise in sales to £453 million. it opened 61 new shops in the first half of the year. another update on house prices this time from nationwide. average prices went up by 2.9% last month. that's a slower rise than the 3.1% rise seen injune. serena williams is calling on black women to step up their demands for equal pay. writing in fortune magazine, the world's highest—earning female athlete urges black women to be "fearless" and to "fight for every penny". her comments were published as part of black women's equal pay day. the markets. so the ftse powering away. building on gains we saw yesterday. the aa has been suffering after news that it's fired its executive chairman. it also issued a profit warning and its shares plunged by more than 16%.

rolls royce shares are doing well after its very strong results british american tobacco has also shown improvement. that's all the business news for now. now the weather. jay wynne has the forecast. very unsettled weather over the next few days. we will take a look out into the atlantic. you can see this swirl of cloud. that's low pressure. its associated weather fronts are heading our way. it will bring wind and rain. ahead of that, lots of showers around today. along the south coast, that's been the place to be for sunshine. clear blue sky for most, however, that's only half the story, because in the midlands and further north, we have seen rain

and further north, we have seen rain and thunderstorms. heavy downpours around, but the trend is for the showers to slowly fade away through this evening and then we look forward the south—west for that area of cloud that i showed you to bring its rain and freshening wind as well. by the end of the night, temperatures around 15 or 16 celsius in the south—western corner, but in northern scotland, single figures, so northern scotland, single figures, so it will be a chilly start. a chilly start but a bright start in northern scotland. further south and west, there will be more cloud in the sky. some parts of eastern england starting on a decent note. towards the south—west, there is that rain into wales. it will be pushing its way into northern ireland as well and it is the south—west of england. the winds picking up and touching gale force around the coasts and over the hills. miserable during the morning here. that bit drier the further east you go and brighter too, but make the most of the morning for the eastern areas because the rain is moving northwards and eastwards. northern scotland seeing the best of the sunshine. northern ireland, wet through the morning, but it

brightens up and one or two showers getting through, but miserable for south wales and southern counties of epg. england. top temperatures 19 or 20 celsius. but that rain is on the move, it is moving northwards and eastwards. it continues to do so through wednesday and into thursday. the centre of that area of low pressure d rifts the centre of that area of low pressure drifts across the uk. lots of isobars for thursday. it is bringing lots of showers. an u nsettled bringing lots of showers. an unsettled and breezy day. a windy day. lots of showers around. most of the showers will be in the north—west. more persistent rain for a time in the northern isles. it is another breezy day on friday. again, it will be sunshine and showers around. most of the showers will be in the north and the west. not too many showers in the south—east, but it will be breezy. if you want to know what the weekend is up, well you can head to the bbc weather website. bye for now. natalia veselnitskaya, natalia

veselnitskaya, this is the bbc news. the headlines at 4: more than three million british gas customers will see their electricity prices increase by 12.5% next month. the white house insists that president trump's new chief of staff will bring discipline to his administration, following the sacking of anthony scaramucci. a second day of trouble at the mount prison in hertfordshire where armed prisoners are believed to have taken over a wing. the trauma unit at thejohn radcliffe hospital in oxford is to close for up to a year because its cladding failed fire safety tests ordered after the grenfell tower blaze. and in the next hour — rescuing a man who drifted out to sea in a toy dinghy. what are you doing out here? the rnli urges people to take care around the water at the busiest time of year for the charity's crews.

and the piece hall in halifax — once at the heart of