welcome to bbc news. i'm mike embley. our top stories: to try to break months of deadlock over brexit, the british parliament finally votes, overwhelmingly, for a snap general election in december. to recover the respect in which parliament should be held by the people of this country and that is finally to offer ourselves to the judgement of the people of this country. we are ready for an election. we are going to go out there with a very strong message of how we transform our society. a senior white house official tells the impeachment inquiry into donald trump, he witnessed, first—hand, the president pressuring ukraine's government to investigate joe biden. politicians accuse the plane—maker boeing of putting profit before safety, as the company boss testifies over the 737 max crashes.

anti—government protesters in lebanon celebrate after the prime minister resigns. the us secretary of state urges politicians to form a new government without delay. hello to you. here in the uk, a general election has finally been called for december 12th to try to end the deadlock over brexit. it may also have serious implications for the unity of the country. it'll be the first december election in the uk in nearly 100 years. the prime minister has said the public must be "given a choice" over the future. the leader of the labour opposition described the election "as a once—in—a—generation chance to transform our country". this from our political editor laura kuenssberg. these will soon be portraits from the past. speaker: order!

order! the howls and the rage of a house divided. they'll be replaced with some new voices. some here will disappear. i call the prime minister. mrspeaker, thank you... it's never been that straightforward with this group of mps, as this still new prime minister knows to his cost. there is only one way to restore the esteem in which our democracy is held, and to recover the respect in which parliament should be held by the people of this country, and that is finally to offer ourselves to the judgement of the people of this country, and i commend this bill to the house. labour had said no three times already, but this morning they were up for the rallies and the photo—ops of a campaign, ready after weeks of refusing for the first december election in nearly 100 years.

we're going out there to fight an election campaign, and i can't wait to get out there on the streets. in every town and village in this country, labour will be there, giving a message of real hope, where this government offers nothing. labour only in line because the smaller parties changed tack. the snp and the lib dems reckon now the eu has backed a delay to brexit, their best chance of stopping our departure is that election. if you'd heard them earlier, you might have imagined it was underway already. as a united kingdom family of nations, strong together, working within the eu, we can reshape our economy and harness the technological revolution, and build a brighter future, and that's the message the liberal democrats will be taking to the country in this general election. speaker: order. those backing a trip to the ballot box won the day.

the ayes to the right, 438. the noes to the left, 20. barring something strange happening in the house of lords tomorrow, the election will be on the 12th of december — giving the prime minister his way, giving all of us the chance to say who will come here, which mps, which parties will have the job on unfurling the tangle of the last few years, who will be the prime minister who defines what happens next. laura kuenssberg with that report. donald trump's attempts to fight off moves to impeach him have suffered a serious setback — first—hand evidence from a senior white house official that he was so troubled by the president's phone call with the ukrainian leader that he reported his concerns to a superior. lieutenant colonel alexander vindman is the first serving white house official to speak to the congressional inquiry. 0ur north america editorjon sopel is at the white house. donald trump sought to characterise them as do—nothing democrats trying to tear him down over what

was a perfect call. he's called it a lynching and says it is people giving evidence are never trumpers and that is what he accused lieutenant colonel vindman of being, except that lieutenant colonel vindman is a decorated war hero, injured in iraq and it's hard to characterise him as some kind of party hack who wants to destroy the president. he served both republican and democratic party administrations so that makes it more difficult and what he said in his testimony was devastating. he said, "i did not think it was proper to demand that a foreign government investigate a us citizen." the us citizen he is referring to is donald trump's democratic rivaljoe biden and his son hunter over his business dealings and he said there was no national security justification for turning ukraine into a partisan issue, which it shouldn't be, and he said the president's interest in ukraine and joe biden predated this particular phone call.

in other words, he is flatly contradicting what the president has said. not only that, the white house has tried to put a ban on officials giving evidence to this impeachment investigation. they have given evidence and it hasn't been favourable to the president. john sobel at the white house for us. rebecca legrand is a defence attorney who focuses specifically on federal government investigations. she's in our washington bureau now. welcome, thank you very much for your time. we have heard other evidence about this phone call. we didn't even hear this, it was behind closed doors. why are we using words like devastating? why is it such a problem for the president? because one after the other three are public servants, or a military veteran has come before committees in the house

saying that they were disturbed in real—time by what donald trump was doing and a parallel foreign policy seems to be running that was focused, instead of on protecting us security or the security of our allies, focused on digging up dirt on his opponents and focused on trying to relitigate the findings of every intelligence agency that has looked at it that russia interfered with the 2016 elections. that has been incredibly disturbing and witness after witness has gone before congress and said that is what they observed. and he is a first—hand witness, of course, it is not something he heard from someone else. i'd got a whole bunch of people on my timeline, some very proto—, some wanting to be there, saying international diplomacy, politics has always been tit—for—tat, there has always been quid pro quo, why is this different and why are we making such a fuss? when tit—for—tat is interfere with my political rivals to improve my

chances of winning an election, historically, this country, that has not been something we do. and that is what is so troubling and i think iitso is what is so troubling and i think i it so important that these proceedings move quickly as i think the house understands and i think the house understands and i think the courts are showing they understand. because what, arguably, and what they think the facts will show, is happening here is an effort to put the present‘s some on the scales of an upcoming election. rather than leaving us to the election, the election may, god willing, work, but if we want to have free and fair elections we need to make sure that someone's not threatening to withhold half $1 billion in military aid unless the president of a foreign nation gets on tv and says negative things about their arrival during an election. that is what appeared to be going on here and the risk to the integrity of our democracy, if that happens, is clear. republicans also point out, of course, the democrats have been loath to hold a vote on this because they don't want to expose

splits in their own ranks. they have 110w splits in their own ranks. they have now voted to go public. it has a lwa ys now voted to go public. it has always been the case that in an impeachment enquiry the house does the enquiry, that can be in private, the enquiry, that can be in private, the senate does the actual public trial. what difference does it make the democrats are going to go with this? i think this isjust proceeding in the fashion that you would expect as the facts come out and it becomes clear that this will proceed further and that eventually a vote will take place in front of the full house to decide whether to impeach the president, which then goes to the senate, the trial. but i think this is the process you would expect. it's starting out with private meetings and interviews and it will become, very soon, it appears, a public proceeding in the house which i think will be of great interest to the american people who will actually get to hear this testimony, or parts of it, at least, ofa testimony, or parts of it, at least, of a stand. i think this is the process you would expect when the early stages joke that there's a lot more that needs to be done. rebecca legrand, thank you very much. —— stages show.

senators in the us have accused boeing of putting profit over safety in its design of the 737 max 8. two of the aircraft crashed within five months, killing 346 people. the head of the company faced a flood of questions and accusations from a senate committee. tom burridge reports. the photos of loved ones killed were for boeing's boss, who senators said to put profit of a safety when designing an aircraft which crashed twice in the space of five months. we do have competitive pressures around the world, but i can also tell you that never takes precedent over safety. 0ur our business model... i could tell you it definitely did in this case, i would walk before i got on a 737 max. the 737 max had a new flight control system, called mcas,

which malfunctioned and pushed the nose of each plane repeatedly down. the senators pointed out today it was not in the pilots manual. those pilots never had a chance, these loved ones never had a chance, they were in flying coffins as a result of boeing deciding that it was going to conceal mcas from the pilots. and on the key question of whether the aircraft should have been grounded after the first crash, this. we have asked that question over and over, and... if we knew everything back then that we know now, we would have made a different decision. sammy was 2a when she boarded the flight from addis ababa in march. her mother nadia wants answers from boeing and its regulator, the faa. the only way to re—establish trust is to share information, and i are still guarding it. to allow scrutiny. and they are still guiding it. still grounded, the 737 max has been modified to make it safer and get it back in the air, but today boeing's reputation took a battering again. tom burridge, bbc news.

boeing bosses were speaking before the senate and on wednesday they'll be grilled by a committee of the house of representatives. congressman anthony brown will be asking some of the questions. he spoke earlier to the bbc‘s laura trevelyan. thanks for being with us. so we had boeing's was today saying sorry for those crashes of the two jets and also say the company is learning and improving. what's your reaction to the testimony? first of all, i think boeing or to be sorry and apologetic, 346 men, women, and children lost their lives on two aircraft accident, year ago today, and many believe were avoidable accidents. there was a member of congress and a member of the transportation and infrastructure committee, i'll be, along with my colleagues, closely scrutinising and asking sharp questions of the ceo to find out what we knew, what they didn't know, what they shared with

regulators, they may have withheld from regulators, and, perhaps most important, what can we do to ensure this type of mishap, these mishaps, these accidents don't happen again. what is the most pressing question that you want to boeing's ceo? certainly some of the questions they wa nt to certainly some of the questions they want to ask is "was the drive to make a profit, did that motivate and perhaps create short cuts in terms of safety? was there sufficient independence among engineers who may have been concerned with the development, the design of the aircraft, but yet afraid to come forward with that information? did the customers, the airlines, did the pilots who wear the operators and the travelling public have enough information about the design, development, and the feeling of this aircraft? what did boeing know, what did they hold onto, was proffered a driving motive that contributed to these accidents?" are you also

concern that may be boeing is a bit too close to the federal aviation authority and that this plane was approved to fly before it was really tested ? approved to fly before it was really tested? so there's a lot of concerns among members of congress that the current certification process that was developed by the faa, perhaps ten yea rs was developed by the faa, perhaps ten years ago, gives too much independence to industry. think it is important that you strike a balance. there's a lot of expertise in industry that perhaps doesn't reside in government. the government regulators are responsible for that oversight, or check—in, for questioning, requiring information to ensure that we are doing a safe and reliable for the public. so i don't know at the end of the day what the result will be, but that is a line of enquiry about the certification process and they would anticipate that we are going to see some changes forthcoming from congress. and what needs to happen before the boeing 737 max can fly again here in the united states?

sure. a few things need to happen. number one, winning the technical experts to say that all of the problems have been identified. how does mcas, which is a system that is responsible for the mess up, how does it interact with other aircraft systems and is it now safe and reliable? number two, two pilots have sufficient training, background, understanding about the m cars, how it operates normally and how it might operate when there is a failure? do they have the training that they need? so we need the technical sort of check and we need training. we need to know that there is training sufficient so the pilots know how to react if mcas were to fail again. congressmen anthony brown, thanks for joining fail again. congressmen anthony brown, thanks forjoining us. thank you. congressmen brown speaking to laura. stay with us on bbc news. still to come: the 4,000—year—old relaxation technique using gongs to cleanse the mind that's suddenly popular with millennials in singapore. indira gandhi, ruler of the world's largest democracy, died today.

0nly yesterday she'd spoken of dying in the service of her country and said, "i would be proud of it. every drop of my blood would contribute to the growth of this nation". after 46 years of unhappiness, these two countries have concluded a chapter of history. no more suspicion, no more fear, no more uncertainty of what each day might bring. booster ignition and lift—off of discovery, with a crew of six astronaut heroes and one american legend. well, enjoying the show is right. this is beautiful. a milestone in human history. born today, this girl in india is the 7 billionth person on the planet.

this is bbc news. our main headline: the british parliament finally votes overwhelmingly for a snap general election in december to try to break months of deadlock over brexit. lebanon's prime minister has said he will resign in the face of huge protests that have rocked the country for almost two weeks. saad hariri said lebanon was deadlocked and needed a shock to break the crisis. gareth barlow reports. applause after weeks of protest, a moment of celebration as the prime minister announced he would step down. saad hariri said a great shock was needed to fix the crisis, which has brought rare unity to a country often plagued by sectarian division. translation: i am going to the palace to present the resignation of the government to the president and

the government to the president and the lebanese people in response to the lebanese people in response to the will of many lebanese who took to the streets to demand change. lebanese is burdened by debt and chronic corruption, and demonstrators are demanding change. they say the resignation of the prime minister and the cabinet is only the beginning. translation: harry reid's resignation is the beginning of what we are working for. this is not enough. we want more of this. we want to continue with the remaining steps. the resignation of saad hariri is the first step in building a patriotic, democratic country. first victory of this uprising has been realised. now we have to start planning for the second victory. earlier on tuesday, protests turned violent when supporters of the sheer muslim groups, has blah, attacked the crowds, forcing the army to intervene to restore calm. meanwhile, both iran and the united states have urged the lebanese

authorities to restore stability. the resignations might bring joy to any but they haven't been welcomed by everyone, and they are no instant fix to lebanese's endemic issues. gareth barlow, bbc news. fewer people would have died in the grenfell tower fire if london's fire brigade had acted differently, that's according to an official report. 72 people died in the tragedy in 2017. the report is due to be published officially on wednesday but sections have been seen by the bbc. it strongly criticises what it calls serious shortcomings and systemic failures in the fire service response. here's our special correspondent, lucy manning. just a warning, you may find parts of her report upsetting. who was to blame? yeah, hello, hi, the fire in grenfell tower. how did 72 people die in their homes, unable to escape the flames? get out, get out! some told by those sent to rescue them to stay put. where is the fire brigade?! jesus!

firefighters were brave that night, risking their lives, but the fire brigade failures were many. the blaze was like one never seen, but institutional failure, wholly inadequate planning and communication problems left people trapped. most damning, the decision to tell residents to stay put in these flames for nearly two hours. the report says if the building had been evacuated sooner, it's likely more lives would have been saved. it's very hard, very hard, very hard, to go on. nabil choucair lost six members of his family in the fire. the families have been told they can't discuss the report before it's formally published tomorrow, but he can talk about what happened to them. do you think your family could have been saved if the building was evacuated earlier? of course, of course. i believe a lot of families could have been rescued, without a doubt. i personally believe they were inadequate

of dealing with the fire. the report also criticises leadership failures. the commissioner of the london fire brigade gave little comfort to families at the inquiry. i wouldn't change anything we did on the night. remarkable insensitivity, said the inquiry. she has already announced her retirement with an estimated £2 million pension pot. i was very disgusted in her comments, and how can you... it shows her incompetence. it's the fact that she has given an escape route for herself. there's some frustration the main criticism centres on firefighters and not those who made the cladding and refurbished the tower. that will be for the next stage of the inquiry. but the report did find there were building failures, that the cladding failed to comply with building regulations — it spread fire rather

than stopping it. we've got planners, designers, architects, builders, subcontractors, building owners, building maintenance. all those things failed before the fire service comes along to put things right. it does feel at times that 20 years of building regulation failure is being laid at the feet of the fire and rescue service. the chairman of the inquiry, sir martin moore—bick, met the grenfell families yesterday and told them he has written to the prime minister, saying he confidently expects the government and those in charge of the emergency services to implement his recommendations without delay. and the bereaved wonder if they will ever get justice. hamid aljafari's family didn't all escape. his father ali died. there's not a day i won't remember him. every second, anywhere, i can smell him, i can feel him, you know? the memories, you know?

to be honest, i don't know, we lost what we are fighting for, i don't know the meaning ofjustice. i don't know, it's now more than two years. we're kind of like leftovers, we don't know what's happening. this tower once dominated the skyline in the most terrible way and the families agonise about how 72 people could have died in what was supposed to be the safety of their homes. lucy manning, bbc news. ona on a lighter note for a moment, a mountaineerfrom nepal on a lighter note for a moment, a mountaineer from nepal has on a lighter note for a moment, a mountaineerfrom nepal has broken records by climbing the world's 14 highest pea ks records by climbing the world's 14 highest peaks in seven months. a former british marine, ml perdue,... it seems he could have been even faster. he climbed everest in five days instead of three because he says he stopped for tonight to have a drink. there are plenty of ways

to relax and zone out — how about lying down while somebody hits a gong? a gong bath, claimed to cleanse the mind and body, is a tradition that goes back 4,000 years, but the 90—minute sessions are popular with millennials in singapore. we went to find out why from one practitioner, suraya sam. it cleanses the mind, the body. why is it called a gong bath? it's because it's a sound bath, right. you are nourished through the frequency. so you're basically showered with 90 minutes of gong. singaporeans or generally this city is always so...

we're rushing for time. they're on their phones, they're always chatting or e—mailing and they forget about their surroundings. so the gong that is right in front of me is the earth gong. the earth gong will ground you and the saturn gong will uplift you. the moon gong is basically for expelling negativity or any stale energy. we do breath work, we do sound bath. i do take people on a sound journey. i definitely feel responsible for bringing an ancient tradition to this era. harry

that's about it for now. thank you very much for watching. hello there. most of us on wednesday are in for fine weather, bright but clear skies, but nippy with the easterly breeze making its presence felt with the temps slightly below—average for the temps slightly below—average for the time of year. the south—west of the time of year. the south—west of the country, different story here. in fact, it's been overcast and damp for the last 24 hours or more and that's how it will remain through the course of wednesday so we have a weather front that's basically stalled across the south—west of the country, so that means slightly milder conditions here but some outbreaks of rain for cornwall and for devon. you can see nine degrees at 6am on wednesday, whereas the clearer skies in england and

scotla nd clearer skies in england and scotland by this stage have led to an airfrost, at scotland by this stage have led to an air frost, at least scotland by this stage have led to an airfrost, at least in scotland by this stage have led to an air frost, at least in the countryside and towns, close to freezing. so the forecast on wednesday morning shows cloudier skies nudging into north wales and maybe the midlands as well, certainly quite cloudy in the south and south—east at times but outbreaks of rain for cornwall and devon. wherever you are, the winds will be blowing out of the east. easterly winds tend to be quite cutting, feeling quite chilly, so temperatures around ten in glasgow, edinburgh and london, feeling on the nippy side, despite the sunshine. that's wednesday. there's a little bit of a change wednesday night into thursday. this weather front will be moving eastwards and northwards, and that's going to introduce one, some slightly cloudy weather and some spots of rain, but also milder conditions coming off the atlantic, so we will see the change from the colder air to the milder air, we

often see misty, murky conditions and it does look as though that's what we're going to have on thursday and thursday, of course, is halloween. so halloween, cloudier weather, especially for some western and south—western areas and is it some spots of rain, nothing too heavy but at times it will be damp. still nippy, single figures in eastern scotland and the north—east of england but in the south—west, where around the mid—teens, 15 expected in plymouth. then a big change on friday and the weekend. big low pressure swings in off the atlantic, in fact multiple low pressures with multiple weather fronts, and that can only mean one thing: very changeable and windy weather at times, we will have to get the wet weather gear out once again. here's a summary, thursday predominantly dry, at times damp weather for halloween, and then friday into the weekend, a big change with a big low and outbreaks of rain and wind. bye—bye.

this is bbc news. the headlines: political parties in britain are braced for a snap general election in december after parliament voted for a snap poll, as a way of breaking the deadlock over brexit. if the conservatives win, the prime minister, borisjohnson is expected to engineer a swift exit from the european union. a senior white house official had told the impeachment inquiry into donald trump, that he witnessed, first—hand, the president pressuring ukraine's government to investigate his political rivaljoe biden. the officer told the hearing that he had been concerned about the request and reported it to government lawyers. us lawmakers have accused boeing of putting profits over safety and engaging in a "pattern of deliberate concealment" after two deadly 737 max 8 crashes killed a total of 346 people.

the accusation came as boeing chief executive dennis muilenburg was quizzed by the senate commerce committee. now it's time for a look back at the day in parliament. hello and welcome to tuesday in parliament. coming up: mps back a december general election. the ayes match the right, 438, the noes to the left 20. the ayes have it, the ayes have it. unlock. also on this programme: labour says newspaper leaks show the government is planning to use brexit to cut workers rights.