this is bbc news, i'm shaun ley. the headlines at three. police in england and wales are being given greater stop and search powers to tackle rising knife crime. it is a very important tool. it is a vital tool in fighting serious violence. i want police officers to feel more comfortable, to use it so they can protect all communities. what next to break the brexit deadlock. tomorrow mps vote again on alternative options — and if a plan for a softer brexit gets a majority — one cabinet minister says theresa may must consider it. i don't think it is sustainable to say, well, we will ignore parliament's position and therefore leave without a deal. i don't think that is a sustainable position for the government to take. there's been a sharp rise in the number of adults calling a national helpline for the children of alcoholic parents, according to figures

seen by the bbc. the founder of facebook, mark zuckerberg, calls for governments to play a more active role in regulating the internet. and in victoria derbyshire — the week in review — we'll be looking back at some of the best interviews and reports from the programme — that's at half past three. new stop and search powers are being given to police in england and wales to try and tackle rising knife crime. the home secretary sajid javid is making it easierfor officers to intervene where they think serious violence may occur. but critics say it's intrusive and could increase tensions between the police and local communities. our home affairs correspondent, danny shaw reports.

another knife off the streets. this three—and—a—half inch blade was found when a young man was stopped and searched in north london. now police in the seven areas worst affected by knife crime will be able to carry out more searches because the government is relaxing rules brought in when theresa may was home secretary. the whole government agree that stop and search is a vital power. we still of course want it to be targeted and focused and intelligence—led, which it will be, but with these new powers and increased powers, we all agree, including the prime minister, this is exactly what is needed to help fight the rise in serious violence. under the changes, police will be able to search anyone in areas where they believe serious violence may occur. police inspectors can approve the powers rather than more senior officers. police say stop and search acts as a deterrent, helping to prevent violence and keep weapons off the streets but it is an intrusive tactic

and highly controversial. too many of my experiences and stories i've heard have been very unpleasant, which leads to building a lot of tension between the police and young people to the point where you have young, innocent civilians running away from police just to avoid being stopped and searched. but for the vast bulk of knife searches police conduct, they need reasonable suspicion that someone is carrying a weapon and those powers remain the same. danny shaw, bbc news. earlier i spoke to dr erin sanders—mcdonagh, a senior lecturer and critical criminologist at the university of kent. she is currently writing up findings on gang and serious youth violence in london — and asked whether there was any evidence that stop and search worked. the college of policing carried out a review of met police data from 2004 to 2014, and there is very little evidence that stop and search works. we know it antagonises particular communities and really, it's not going to tackle the knife crime problem. mrjavid said stop and search

is a hugely effective power when it comes to disrupting crime and taking weapons off our streets, and keeping us safe but you would question whether there is statistical evidence. yes, i've not seen any evidence that suggests that would work. what impact does it then have? you say it aggravates communities but presumably, self—evidently if you are taking a knife off someone then you are reducing the number of knives which is why a lot of people would be attracted to it. well, yeah, it makes a great headline but what are you going to do once you take the knife off them? we know that young people are being put into prison more often for carrying knives and knife crime anyway. once they are in prison or in a young offending institution we know they do not have particularly good outcomes. so they tend to reoffend once they have been inside? yes. i mean especially for children and young people. i'm not really sure what the point of it is. i think it makes a fantastic headline and it looks like we are doing something but we know that ultimately it is not going to be particularly effective. to do this the home secretary is lowering the level at which senior officers have to be involved, so inspector level,

which means a lot more police officers potentially have the power to do this. but still it has to be in a designated area. presumably, if you take a city like london, that's quite difficult because the stabbings we have seen, and the other knife attacks, have been scattered all over the 32 boroughs. i do not think there is any evidence that even at a borough level this is going to work. i'm not sure what the point of doing it is. if we really want to tackle knife crime we have to look at the root causes. poverty is a huge issue here, we know that, and i do not understand why it is not top of the agenda. what about the response you will get from people saying a lot of poor people do not carry knives. that is absolutely true, but we do know that the people carrying knives often come from deprived areas, we know the communities most affected by austerity are the communities where we have the highest rise in knife crime. it seems important we look at this issue rather than just stop and search. i think policing is important. i have no problem with increasing policing but it has to be community orientated policing. stop and search is not going to help there.

you are talking about a regular day to day or weekly contact between officers on the beat and the community? absolutely, and officers interested and trying to understand what is happening in local areas rather than just using stop and search. i have heard academics saying this, you have said this, but actually other academics saying, we got into a lot of this in the early days of austerity, saying, well look, numbers of boots on the ground does not necessarily equate to a reduction in crime. it is a mixed picture, isn't it? it is difficult. it is a complicated issue. if you're going to put more police on the streets, and i do think having police interested in working with communities and community engagement are more likely to have an impact on stopping young people carrying knives, but stop and search in itself is not going to work and we know that. a manhunt is under way after four people were stabbed in a spate of apparently "random" attacks in north london. a woman and three men were all approached from behind and knifed in the back as they walked alone

in edmonton over the weekend. police said each victim appeared to "selected at random" for being "alone and vulnerable" in the potentially linked attacks. two are in a critical condition. a senior government minister says theresa may has to look closely at pursuing a customs union with the eu if parliament votes for it this week. thejustice secretary, david gauke, said that it wouldn't be sustainable for ministers to ignore the house of commons' views. tomorrow mps will once again discuss the options other than accepting mrs may's deal — which has now been rejected three times — and vote to see if they can find a consensus on the way forward. here's our political correspondent, jonathan blake. shame on you! a week of protest at parliament when people came to westminster demanding decisions. give us all a final say!

the government suffered another defeat and now waits to make its next move. tomorrow mps will try again to agree on an alternative to the prime minister's deal. and one cabinet minister has made clear the government must listen. if parliament is voting overwhelmingly against leaving the european union without a deal but is voting in favour of a softer brexit then i don't think it is sustainable to say, well, we will ignore parliament's position and therefore, leave without a deal. i don't think that is a sustainable position. time for reflection at church this morning. the prime minister knows a customs union with the eu would be a huge shift and a promise broken. it is still her ambition, we are told, to get her deal through. this weekend she will be weighing up when, if, to put it to a fourth and final vote. too late, say labour who want to break the deadlock with a general election. but what would be their promise on another public vote? obviously i don't write labour's manifesto. i am one vote around the table but it seems to me, inconceivable that if there was a general election tomorrow and we hope there will be, we have been calling for one for months that a people's vote

will be in that manifesto. he knows what it is like to fight and lose an election, and today warned that's the last thing his party or the country needs. but as another senior conservative said the tories were planning sensibly and pragmatically, this former prime minister said the parties coming together to govern may be the only way out. in the interests of the nation, in the interest of decisions being taken, and the interest of ending the chaos we have now, and that could continue, we must have a government that has a working majority and that is the only reason for a time limited unity government. parliament and the government have long been divided about the best way to deliver brexit and now with a new deadline looming, pressure is building on the prime minister and time and her options are running out. jonathan blake, bbc news, westminster. welljonathanjoined me in the studio earlier and assessed the challenges facing the prime minister in the week ahead.

there is a divide in cabinet as we know and have reported for some time about the best way forward for brexit and what it should mean. the conservatives in their manifesto at the last election promised to deliver brexit by taking the uk out of the single market and out of the customs union and the prime minister has repeatedly said to do anything different would be a betrayal of that promise. but there are those in government who believe that sort of brexit where you keep a relatively close economic relationship and you apply the same import and export tariffs to goods coming in and out of the eu, which is what being in a customs union would mean, is the best course of action. it is also what labour advocate as part of their vision for brexit. as we have seen, it is something which could perhaps has almost commanded a majority in the house of commons, it might this time at the second time of asking in this indicative of votes. this is in tomorrow's

session of parliament? yes. but it is controversial and there are those that will not like it because it would restrict for the uk doing independent trade deals with other countries around the world even though it is outside of the european union. there is a definition about what we meant in the referendum about being out of the european union. are we out of every aspect of our engagement with europe in terms of formal mechanisms? it would and that is the problem politicians have faced, it was a binary choice, it was in or out. people did not vote for a certain type of brexit and did not vote necessarily to leave the customs union and single market, and it is down to government and parliament to decide what leaving the european union means and that is why we have face difficult decisions. the government has felt it has been

trying to stop the process from grinding toa trying to stop the process from grinding to a halt. parliament has felt paralysed because everyone wants to do in in a different way. david gauke acknowledged in the interview earlier on, you heard a clip in the report, we cannot get our first choice in parliament so we have to look at another way which may look at doing things we promised we wouldn't. whether theresa may is willing to do that herself is a different matter. is it still your impression that the government wants to try once more for prime minister's deal or at least the prime minister wants to try once more? i think she would but who could know what theresa may's mind is at or what she is being advised. we know there are different opinions in downing street about the best course of action from here on. it remains, we are told, the ambition of the prime minister to get a deal through parliament still after those three defeats and number ten

were spinning on friday votes were going in the right direction but it is still a huge task and tall order. that is what you have got government ministers and others saying if we tweak things and take the idea of a customs union that parliament can get behind and tack that on to the political declaration of the deal that looks at our future relationship at the eu, maybe that would fly. but there would be a lot of conservatives who were not likely to swallow that. thousands of post offices would become branches of a new publicly owned bank under labour proposals to reform the uk banking system. shadow chancellorjohn mcdonnell says a "post bank" could be run through the post office network in a bid to protect easy access to face—to—face banking. other ideas outlined by mr mcdonnell include keeping rbs in public ownership when it returns to profitability and a national investment bank to support small businesses. let's hear what he had to say about why the focus is on post offices, rather than existing high—street banks. well, because the post offices are there. they are good locations.

they have developed a banking facility already but this would be a real boost rocket to that, and i think in some ways, on the figures we have seen, a lot of towns are being held back in terms of the local economy and it is because of the lack of borrowing and lending out of local small to medium enterprises, but also a lot of high streets are in decline. this would make sure the high streets, first of all, had a banking facility back. many of them have lost that banking facility but i think would include a real contribution to making high streets vibrant again. ukraine goes to the polls today in the first round of a presidential election. the frontrunner to win is a television comedian — who plays a man who becomes president on the tv. he is expected to beat the incumbent president, petro poroshenko. it's ukraine's first presidential election since russia seized part

of its territory in 2014. the main candidates are all largely pro—european. here, the government has pledged another £200 million pounds for councils in england to improve roads. £50 million pounds will be available to fix pot holes the rest being used to fund and reward improvements in road repair techniques such as developing new, more durable road surfaces. the husband of a british—iranian woman who is currently in prison in iran has delivered a mother's day card to her on the steps of the iranian embassy, as part of his campaign for her release. nazanin zaghari ratcliffe was jailed for five years in 2016 on spying charges which she denies. with more here's our correspondent sangita myska. almost three years ago nazanin zaghari—ratcliffe was stopped by iranian police at tehran airport. she was about to fly home with her child but was instead arrested and accused of spying. seen here with her daughter gabriella, just before being jailed for five years,

the british government and herfamily have repeatedly called for nazanin‘s release. today on mother's day her husband who has tirelessly campaigned on behalf of his wife, delivered a card and dozens of flowers to the iranian embassy. this is a message that this is the third mother's day that nazanin is away. this year we are back in front of the iranian embassy saying this iranian government needs to solve this message. it is a message of flowers, it is a soft one. the reason for flowers is because that's what prisoners are given when they are released so it is a mother's day link, it is also linking to the fact that hopefully she will be home soon. the foreign secretary, jeremy hunt, was in iran late last year to push for her release. he recently took the unusual step of granting nazanin diplomatic protection in the hope the iranians would be compelled to release her. yet, 40—year—old nazanin remains injail, separated from her daughter for yet another year.

the headlines on bbc news... police in england and wales are being given greater stop and search powers to tackle rising knife crime. the justice secretary, david gauke, has suggested the government should support a softer brexit — if mps rally behind it this week. there's been a sharp rise in the number of adults calling a national helpline for the children of alcoholic parents, according to figures seen by the bbc. and in sport... celtic defeat rangers 2—1 in a fiesty old firm derby, to go 13 points clear at the top... james forrest scoring the winner with 4 minutes to go victor camarasa's smartly taken goal gives cardiff a second—half lead in their premier league clash with chelsea. jonny bearstow smashes 114 — a record ipl score by an englishman — for the sunrisers hyderabad, as they inflict a heavy defeat on on the royal challengers bangalore. we'll have more on those

stories in the next hour. there's been a sharp rise in the number of adults calling a national helpline for the children of alcoholic parents, according to figures seen by the bbc. in 2013 the majority of calls to the national association of children of alcoholics were from children but now more than 80% of calls are from people over the age of 18. the department of health said it was investing six million pounds to tackle the issue. adrian goldberg from bbc radio 5live investigates, has more details... these figures come from the national association of children of alcoholics. back in 2013, they tell us that the majority of the calls that they received seeking help and support from their helpline, the majority of those calls were from children. they did at that time have around 6,500 calls a year from adults, anybody over the age of 18. that figure has rocketed between 2013 and 2018 to the point

where last year they had 23,000 calls from people over the age of 18. that now makes up around 81% of their caseload. a really significant increase in the number of adults contacting that helpline for support and assistance. do we know why there has been such a big rise? it's very interesting. around 2015, when you had high—profile figures like labour mp liam byrne talking as an adult about his experiences, having been a child of an alcoholic, and finally overcoming what he perceived to be the shame and stigma, coming forward to talk about that, that has prompted other adults to come forward and say that they too had problems like this as a child with a parent who had turned to drink. adrian goldberg. amelia, who grew up with an alcoholic father, joined us earlier to share her experience — she sought help after his

death two years ago. i am the youngest of four. i had older siblings who were able to help us deal with that. it was a lot of really difficult times, and unfortunately, my dad passed away from alcoholism about three years ago now. when you have an alcoholic parent from a really young age, you are grieving for that person from when they become an alcoholic, you lose your parent anyway. when that person actually dies, you know, ifelt this horrible relief, and then a lot of shame associated with feeling that relief as well. i had a good family, a good support system. we had our mam and my siblings and a big extended family and we used to talk about it a lot within the family but it wasn't something i sought help for externally until i became an adult.

if you, or someone you know has been affected by any of the issues raised you can find details of where you can find support at www. bbc. co. uk/actionline 0r or you 0ryou can or you can call the telephone number. lines are open 24 hours a day with recorded information and calls are free of charge. the founder of facebook mark zuckerberg says he wants governments to play more of a role in policing internet content. writing in the washington post newspaper he said the responsibility is too great for companies like his to tackle alone. earlier i spoke to catherine miller— she's the director of policy at doteveryone — an independent think tank that champions responsible technology , and asked her what she made of mr zuckerberg's remarks. it is not the first time mark zuckerberg has called for regulation, when he faced questioning in congress he said we need regulation but the right regulation, and i suppose this article is an indication of what facebook

thinks the right regulation is. it is focusing on content moderation, on the integrity of elections, on privacy and on data portability. 0n the integrity of elections that has been raised by what happened in the united states, concerns there may have been attempts to try and influence the online coverage and advertisements people received during the election. presumably that is not hugely contentious but there is a bit about moderating content. for a lot of internet users that is contentious and has proved for facebook especially to be highly controversial, not least what happened with the live streaming of the terrible massacre in christchurch. this article deals in response to that moment and the sense of unbelievable outrage you could have someone streaming a mass murderfor over a quarter of an hour without any intervention at all.

the interesting thing with this is that it may seem incredible there is no regulation of this in the first place and that this is news worthy to be asking governments to regulate, but you have to remember that companies like facebook come from the west coast of the united states where freedom of speech is a constitutional right. so nobody even raises concern about it because it is essential to the character of the american system? absolutely, but you see in the united kingdom it is not an absolute right and you see the problems of taking this absolutist approach to freedom of speech. what occurs if you have people streaming a mass murderer? now for some of today's other stories. an anti—stall system has been blamed for the fatal crash of a boeing 737 max aircraft in ethiopia earlier this month. sources involved in the investigation say the black box shows the nose of the plane was pushed down by the system, before it crashed killing

all 157 people on board. authorities in mozambique say the number of cases of cholera in the port of beira has doubled over the past 48 hours. 271 people have now been infected with the disease since cyclone idai struck beira two weeks ago. hollywood actor george clooney is calling for a boycott of nine luxury hotels with links to brunei, after the country said gay sex and adultery would soon be punishable by death. from the 3rd of april, homosexuals could face being whipped or stoned in the south east asian state. all across the world — famous landmarks have descended into darkness — albeit only for sixty minutes — as part of a global call for action on climate change. ‘earth hour‘ takes place every year — and nearly two—hundred countries and territories take part. tim allman reports. hong kong is renowned for its iconic skyline. but even here they sometimes have

to turn out the lights. victoria harbour suddenly a lot less illuminated than normal. and the fight against climate change was the inspiration. we need to find a balance with this planet. it has finite resources and we believe that there are things that people can do, that cities can do, to help us achieve a sustainable future. earth hour began over ten years ago in australia. so it was no surprise to see sydney taking part. both the city's famous harbour bridge and the opera house cast into darkness. the big switch off always taking place at 8:30 in the evening, local time. dozens of countries, thousands of cities. this is mumbai's main railway terminus. 0r here in moscow. the kremlin, for an hour at least, becoming a place of shadows. in greece, the acropolis, which long predated electric light,

an island of darkness in the centre of athens. and in paris, the eiffel tower celebrating its 130th birthday was briefly extinguished like a candle. so many places, one special hour. but as the swedish teenage activist greta thunberg tweeted, earth hour is every hour of every day. firefighters have rescued more than 650 people from locked toilets since 2016. london fire brigade urged members of the public to "use common sense" before dialling 999 after receiving calls from people locked in loos. it said firefighters also had to rescue a child with their head wedged in a potty, a woman stuck up a tree and a pigeon trapped inside a chimney. as well as the "unusual" calls, the brigade had more than 30,000 malicious hoax calls

in the last five years. now it's time for a look at the weather with helen willetts. hello. it is felt much chillier across england and wales because we have changed the type of care across us and it has been windy in some parts but we have had lovely days for the most part, plenty of sunshine and light winds in the north but we pay for that sunshine three the night as the sun sets and we see temperatures tumbling away. even some of the towns and cities will have frost. in northern ireland there will be my cloud and showers and that is the change through tomorrow for northern ireland and through the day for scotland, but for most of us it would be a lovely start to the day. yes, it will be cold with some frost but it should be dry and bright. elsewhere, we are picking up showers so even

elsewhere, we are picking up showers so even though temperatures are on par with today it will feel colder. thereafter, it is cold it with plenty of april showers to come. bye bye. this is bbc news. the headlines: new stop and search powers are being given to police in england and wales to try and tackle rising knife crime. the justice secretary, david gauke, has suggested the government should support a softer brexit,

if mps rally behind it this week. there's been a sharp rise in the number of adults calling a national helpline for the children of alcoholic parents, according to figures seen by the bbc. the founder of facebook, mark zuckerberg, calls for governments to play a more active role in regulating the internet. the husband of the jailed british—iranian charity worker nazanin zaghari ratcliffe delivers a giant mother's day card to the iranian embassy in london. hello and welcome to our programme. over the next half an hour, we'll bring you some of the exclusive and original journalism we've broadcast over the last week. we first reported on breast ironing back in 2016. it's where hot objects are used to press and destroy the breasts of

girls as young as nine. it's a practice that originates in west africa but it's happening here in the uk. 0ur reporter met women in middlesbrough, birmingham and london, all speaking for the first time, who shared their experience of this practice. it's a community—sensitive, hidden crime. the numbers are far greater then we anticipate. a secretive practice happening to girls as young as nine here in britain. you are not supposed to have breasts at this age. men will start coming to you to have sex with you. so they are willing to iron them. i said, "iron them?" difficult to detect but devastating to the lives of the young girls affected. it's mothers, grandmothers that are the perpetrators. if she can iron them and i'm flat, i will be ugly and nobody willadmire me. i can no longer sit back and say i'm fearful of being labelled racist.