but, more than a year into the negotiations, the eu says the uk still doesn't have a clear negotiating position, and it needs to see one. she headed home, excluded from today's brexit discussion. controversy has of course accompanied every stage of the brexit process, including the way it has been reported on bbc news. for many, the corporation fails to provide balanced coverage, with louise vale putting it like this... but the majority of complaints we received are about a perceived bias in the other direction. here is pat marks. those holding that latter point of view contacted the bbc in large

numbers following saturday's anti—brexit march in central london. that day, there was also a significantly smaller pro—brexit march in london, which received much less airtime. and the disparity annoyed some viewers, such as christine hicks, who e—mailed. .. and brian silvester tweeted. .. apart from the fraught issue of balance, there are other challenges for bbc reporting in this area. one is the danger of boring the audience with excessive coverage of this long—running saga. steve dalligan from derby centres his solution. well, one correspondent who may need

to lie down in a dark room is chris morris, who has the task under the bbc‘s reality check umbrella of explaining the many twists and turns of the process of leaving the european union. here are some recent examples. the government says the uk will pay the eu up to £39 billion to cover things like outstanding bills and pensions. there's also broad agreement on the rights after brexit of eu citizens here in the uk, and uk citizens elsewhere in europe. but it could take years to set such a system up. the eu is sceptical about whether it will work, anyway, and supporters of brexit see this as a trap to keep the uk locked

into the eu system. so the second proposal is for a highly streamlined customs arrangement. it's no secret that the future of the irish border between northern ireland and the republic is proving to be a massive challenge in the brexit negotiations, and that talk of no deal is making a lot of people nervous. but it's notjust in the uk that this really matters, because the republic of ireland is hugely dependent on trade with the united kingdom for its economic well—being. you only need to look at the map to understand why. well, chris morrisjoins me now. welcome to newswatch. there is a lot of talk about deadlines and crunch points, but danny dyer seemed to speak for many on good evening britain when he said brexit is a mad riddle — no—one knows what it is. as the correspondent tasked with explaining it all to us, is it frustrating for you?

it can be, and i thought "mad riddle" was a brilliant phrase and i would like to strenuously object to steve's proposal for a 24—hour brexit channel, because then i would never get to lie down, anywhere. it can be frustrating, but it is incredibly complicated. i mean, people use various different metaphors for trying to get out of the european union. one of them is unmaking an omelette. we've had a0 years of putting it all together, and you can't simply jump away, you have got to unstitch it all. it's very, very difficult and these are issues, frankly, which a lot of people now involved in the negotiations, i think, did not understand. you take issues like the customs union, for example. i've spent a lot of time on air trying to explain what it is, but we still have, from our audience research suggestion, that a lot of people don't quite understand it yet. you know, if you are working for something like the financial times, maybe you know what your audience is. i think one of the big challenges for the bbc is that we have to address and interest those who do know all the technical details, and care about them deeply, and those who don't know all the technical details, but do want to understand how it's going to affect their lives.

can i ask, on that, viewers often say they're baffled by the minutiae of the customs union or agreement, and nothing has been decided. so is there a case to say that the bbc should give less running commentary on all the possibilities, and wait until there is something specific to report? you could do that, but it's quite difficult, i think. look at the last couple of months. obviously a lot of coverage is quite often led by what happens in westminster, and the last few months, really, brexit has been the dominant issue. it is the dominant political issue of our times. you know, and for better or worse, we are, in effect, remaking our country. so i think people actually do deserve to have the ability to have people like us trying to look into all the details. i accept that some of it is baffling, and some of the detail can be very boring, but it is important. you will know the bbc is getting accused of extreme bias by pro—brexit and pro—remain campaigners. everybody. how are you navigating your way through it all, as a reporter? i think one of the things we try

and do is try and look at facts. i mean, people can always quibble about what the facts really are, but for example, we did a piece recently about customs borders elsewhere in europe, because of the customs union debate. and some people were saying it's easy to get across the border, or it's not easy. well, we went to swedish customs and norwegians customs and swiss customs and french customs and turkish customs, and asked them how long does it take for a truck to get across your borders? here are some of the facts, and people can then spin them either way, and i think we are always going to get people on both sides deeply unhappy with us, because this has become probably the most contentious political issue in this country that i can remember, certainly in my lifetime as a reporter. it does not mean that we should not try and say, here are some facts, you go away and interpret them as you choose. but, as you say, part of the frustration is it is sometimes really hard to know what is a proven fact,

and that is so different to other stories. so how do you make it comprehensible, as a correspondent, in some of these areas? try to keep the language simple. accept that there are times when you're going to use facts, but after a while, the facts become political. £350 million on the side of a bus is an obvious example. we did a piece saying, look, the chairman of the uk statistics authority has said this is a misuse of official statistics. i think you can make a case that the number wasn't right, and we said that. again, flak from both sides, either we didn't say it strongly enough, or we said it too strongly. but then it kind of goes into the political realm, and i think at that stage you have to let politicians get on with it. some viewers certainly complain about brexit fatigue. how are you holding up? it is tiring, and it is all—consuming, because you have to be across all the kind of bizarre technical details of the negotiations and so forth. and i think you do actually —

if you're covering it in the sort of detail i do, and that some of my colleagues do, you do need to know all those technical details to then step back and say, here's where we are in this process. it's not easy, but i try and do other things occasionally. i went to turkey recently for a week and fact—checked the turkish elections. that was lovely. chris morris, thank you very much. such is the ubiquity of brexit as a topic of conversation that it even cropped up on itv2‘s reality show, love island. in a slightly surreal exchange, where one contestant, hayley hughes appeared to ask whether the uk leaving the eu would mean we would no longer have any trees or possibly cheese. well, that same hayley hughes popped up, to the surprise of many viewers, on last friday's daily politics, questioning brexit guru adam fleming,

with noises off from studio guests alistair campbell and nigel farage. how will it affect my life, and everybody else's? badly. stop it, you two! very well. very badly. all right, we've got very badly and very well in the studio. shush! adam? the easy answer is, it depends. i kind of think it's hard for younger people to have kind of more of an understanding about brexit. but since i've got to learn about it, i'm actually finding it really interesting. well, adam can spend hours with you about it. thank you for coming in and to everybody for being on the show — not that binder! opinion was divided on that encounter, with philip copsey tweeting. .. stephan garcia disagreed. and others were just left bemused.

and that's all from us. thank you for all of your comments this week. if you want to share your opinions on bbc news and current affairs, or even appear on the programme, you can call us on 0370 010 6676. or e—mail newswatch@bbc. co. uk. you can find us on twitter @newswatchbbc and do have a look at the website for previous interviews. the address for that is bbc.co.uk/newswatch. that's all from us. we'll be back to hear your thoughts about bbc news coverage again next week. goodbye. hello there. for the fifth consecutive day, temperatures in the uk got above 30 degrees on friday, and there could be more to come over the weekend.

still plenty of heat, plenty of sunshine, butjust the chance for the odd downpour, particularly on sunday. because, if we look back at the recent satellite picture, you can see this area of cloud that's just been swirling around across iberia. this more unsettled weather is going to drift its way northwards, clipping into the south—west as we go into sunday. but for saturday, we're going to be drawing in some very warm air from the near continent, so those temperatures are going to stay very high. we start the day between ii and 15 degrees. notice a bit more in the way of cloud rolling its way in from the north sea. that could take a little while to break up through the morning. so if you're out and about through the first part of the day, could be a bit of cloud around, but the sunshine will get to work, and there will be lots of it as we get into the afternoon. blue skies, strong sunshine with high uv levels, high pollen levels as well. and as far as the temperatures go, well, look at the extent of the orange shades on our temperature chart — widely in the mid—to—high 20s, some spots, perhaps to the west of london, maybe west wales,

again could get up to 30 degrees. a little bit cooler, perhaps, for some of these north sea coastal areas. now, as we through saturday night, notice the way that the orange colours try to hold on down towards the south. whereas the last few nights have been cool and fresh, saturday night into sunday morning will be a little bit more muggy, a little more humid. 16 there in cardiff and in london. not as muggy further north, nine there in newcastle. but we are going to see more in the way of muggy air wafting its way in from the near continent as we go on into sunday, also this area of low pressure that's starting to churn its way towards the south—west of the country. so here we could see some showers across the south—west of england, into wales, maybe the midlands, maybe northern ireland. also a weak frontal system, which could bring rain into north—west scotland. but everywhere else sunny skies again, and remember that warm and humid air — the orange colours getting deeper, really, across the south—eastern areas. temeprature on sunday afternoon in london up to around 31 degrees. some spots in the south—east could get to 32.

likely to hit 30 degrees. and then we get into the new working week. low pressure still churning around to the south. so the odd shower in southern and particularly south—western areas but, broadly speaking, high pressure remains in charge. so there will be lots more dry weather, lots more sunshine, lots more heat. temperatures still close to 30 degrees, butjust the odd shower at times towards the south—west. welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. our top stories: just hours after reaching a deal, european leaders disagree about who should take in and process migrants coming into europe. police in maryland say the gunman who shot dead five people at a newspaper office would have killed even more, if he'd had the chance. canada fights back, announcing tariffs on billions of dollars worth of us goods saying it will not back down in the face of american pressure.

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