tv BBC News BBC News January 26, 2020 3:00pm-3:31pm GMT
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this is bbc news. the headlines at 3pm: the death toll from the coronavirus in china rises to 56 — officials warn the spread of the virus is accelerating and the country faces a "grave situation". as the united states announces plans to fly some of its citizens home, the foreign office is urging britons to leave the province where the outbreak began, and advising against further travel there. a member of the grenfell tower inquiry panel resigns over links with the firm that supplied the tower block's deadly cladding. 35 people are dead after the powerful earthquake in eastern turkey — more than 1,600 are injured. three million brexit coins go into circulation on friday — to commemorate the day britain leaves the european union. and coming up in half an hour,
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victoria derbyshire takes a look at some of the highlights from her programme this week. the president of china has said his country is facing a "grave situation" after the number of cases of coronavirus rose sharply, to more than 2,000. chinese officials say the virus is infectious in its incubation period, before symptoms show, making it harder to contain. chinese state media say 56 people have now died. chinese president xijinping held a special goverment meeting on the lunar new year public holiday, where he warned that the spread of the virus is accelerating. a nationwide ban on the sale of wildlife has been imposed.
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it's believed the outbreak stemmed from the illegal sale of animals at a wuhan fish market. elsewhere, the us has announced that staff at its wuhan consulate will be evacuated on a special flight on tuesday. and here, the foreign office has warned against travel to hubei province, where the virus began, and urged britons there to leave if they can. angus crawford has this report. warnings echo through wuhan, a city of 11 million almost deserted. 0nly medical staff are free to travel. checkpoints ring the city. leaving the zone is not an option. hospitals stretched to capacity. foreign nationals unable to get home. the us and japanese governments plan to evacuate citizens, but some british travellers say they're getting no clear guidance. the government is saying that people should leave if they can, but then the uk government is aware
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now that all the transport links are closed. so i find it a little bit surprising that we are being told to leave if we can, when there is no possible route. all the transport links have been closed down. the home secretary says all options are being considered. in light of the urgency of the situation, and rightly so, we are working with the chinese authorities, the world health organization, public health england, to look at what is going on and to ensure that we are doing our utmost to stop the virus from coming to the united kingdom. and obviously becoming a widespread problem. chinese health officials revealed more about the virus which has killed over 50 people, spreading to humans from animals. it's contagious during incubation, with no symptoms. that incubation can last up to two weeks. as a result, all wildlife sales are being banned.
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but there is evidence the illness has already spread abroad. in france, three passengers from china are known to have been infected. in hong kong, with five cases, as a precaution the authorities even closed disneyland. every part of daily life affected by the fear of a virus which knows no borders. angus crawford, bbc news. authorities in hong kong have declared an emergency because of the spread of the virus. 0ur correspondent rupert wingfield—hayes is there. the statitics and predictions for the coming days are quite frightening. we should remember that this virus appears to have a fairly low mortality rate of around 3%, so it is not as serious as the sars virus which had a higher mortality rate. but this virus can spread much more quickly. they are saying in china that there
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are 2000 cases so far discovered. a study done by scientists in britain has suggested there may actually be more than that, perhaps up to 9000 cases, many of which have not been detected yet. but those same scientists in the uk at imperial college are predicting that, by the end of next week, by february the 4th, in wuhan alone, there could be 200,000 cases. that shows you how fast this virus is likely to spread. earlier we spoke to professor peter piot who is the director of the london school of hygiene & tropical medicine. he explained more about the virus and how it spreads. there are so many unknowns still about this new virus. it is a completely new virus, and it is remarkable that less than two weeks after the first cases occurred on december 29th, that on the 9th of january already
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the virus was isolated. one of the big questions is, how infectious is it? can you contaminate someone when you are still in the incubation the incubation period? if that is the case, we would go for a major epidemic, if not a pandemic. we are at the early stages, let's not forget that this virus was isolated only a few weeks ago and it is very new, but we can't take any risks. what is clear is that the virus is spreading much faster than we anticipated at the beginning. it is all over china, we have cases in a number of countries, although no secondary cases have been documented in countries like thailand or france or singapore. that is a big unknown as well, but we can't take any risks and we need to make some really serious contingency planning in case there is a major spread of this new coronavirus.
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families of people who died in the grenfell tower fire have welcomed a decision by a member of the inquiry panel to resign. benita mehra stepped down yesterday, after it emerged she had links to a company that supplied the cladding on the tower block. our home affairs correspondent danny shaw reports. every year since the grenfell fire, people come to remember those who lost their lives. they hope the public enquiry that has been set up will provide answers as to how the fire took hold. but now there are fresh concerns about the process from survivors and the bereaved, after an enquiry panel member resigned. engineer benita mehra was going to provide expert advice to the enquiry, but it has emerged she had a past link to arconic, the company which supplied the external cladding for the tower block. the enquiry has found the cladding did not comply with building regulations, and was the principal reason for the rapid spread of the fire.
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ms mehra said herformer role as president of the women's engineering society, which had accepted a donation from arconic‘s charity, had caused serious concern to the families. the genfell united group welcomed ms mehra's resignation, but accused the government of failing to carry out basic checks before appointing her. they said a new panellist with expertise in community relations must be found urgently. we can talk to remy mohamed, who is the grenfell project coordinator and caseworker for the independent charity inquest. good afternoon, thank you for joining us. thank you. i mentioned
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the enquiry being due to resume, and it was mentioned in our report. can it was mentioned in our report. can it still do so as scheduled, in the light of what has happened? the enquiry made an announcement on social media saying that things will go ahead as scheduled, so we are due to begin hearing phase two of the enquiry tomorrow at 10am. and what will happen to that now inevitable empty chair? are you looking to replace benita mehra as quickly as you can? that is what the bereaved and survivors would want. back in 2017, the bereaved and survivors campaigned for a diverse panel to sit alongside for this enquiry, and one was finally allowed by theresa may, the prime minister at the time. it is unfortunate that this has now happened. the bereaved and survivors should not have been put in this situation. we should have started the enquiry for phase two with two panel members, and now we only have
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one. what does this say to you about the process of evaluating the merits, or otherwise, of those who are due to sit on this panel? well, it is highly surprising that this had not been raised sooner, it took a bereaved family member doing a google search to find out about the link to arconic that benita mehra had. it is highly surprising. i hope that when it comes to selecting a new panel member they are more careful in terms of who it selects. you would welcome the sentiment she aired, namely that she respect of the depth of feeling about her appointment. absolutely, and she has done the right thing in terms of resigning. the bereaved and survivors are now relieved about that, that is definitely the sentiment i am getting from those i have spoken to. and when the next person doesjoin, what
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have spoken to. and when the next person does join, what particular expertise do you want that individual to have? expertise do you want that individualto have? i think the enquiry at the moment has all the technical expertise that it has, but as grenfell united has pointed out, there is somebody necessary for housing at this stage. and in terms of the length of time what still needs to be examined that as yet has been overlooked from your point of view? phase one concentrated just on the night of the fire and emergency response. phase two will be wider, and will probably last around 18 months. it will look at the refurbishment, the cladding, the government response to previous fires. there is a lot there will be looked at in the second phase. when it is concluded, are you confident that we now have a process in place that we now have a process in place thatis that we now have a process in place that is properly going to answer some of the questions that people so desperately want to answers to? the families want truth, justice and accountability. the phase one report
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that was produced by the enquiry tea m that was produced by the enquiry team has been received well and made 46 crucial recommendations that now need to be implemented, so of course the government need to work on that. 0ver the government need to work on that. over 2.5 years has passed already, so the government needs to pull their socks up on this. i think the families are quite hopeful, really, that the enquiry will deliver when it comes to the second phase. we will see what tomorrow brings. thank you for coming on. thank you. a senior cabinet minister has said his gut feeling is that hs2 should go ahead. the brexit secretary steve barclay described the rail project as a "key part" of the government's "levelling up" agenda. ministers are mulling over whether or not to go ahead with the high—speed line, with a decision expected soon. estimates of the costs of the project have been spiralling, as our political correspondent, pete saull, explains. in and around parliament, mps are
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mulling over whether they think it should go ahead, including some of the newly elected tory mps in the midlands and the north of england, many of whom are deeply sceptical about it. i dare say this has been discussed at cabinet level at length, and what is interesting is that, up until this point, ministers had been really keen not to go there, really, in terms of which way this is going to go. however, we heard from steve barclay this morning on the andrew marr programme, perhaps giving the strongest hint yet about what the government ‘s thinking now is. strongest hint yet about what the government 's thinking now is. we have a strong commitment to levelling out all parts of the united kingdom. hsz is a key part of that, notjust from speed, but more from a capacity point of view in the line,. gut feeling, yes or no? yes. now, we will find out quite how accurate his gut feeling is in a matter of weeks, the decision is
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expected next month. but steve barclay is not the person who will be making the decision here, it ultimately lies with the prime minister and he will have conversations with his chancellor and the transport secretary about it. steve barclay ‘s influence is limited, and indeed, his seat at the cabinet table might not be there for too much longer because the government is about to disband the department for exiting the european union because remember we will be doing that on friday of this week. you go where i was about to go, namely friday and the consequences of that. yes, so today we have had the publication of the commemorative coin to mark our departure from the eu, a50p coin to mark our departure from the eu, a 50p piece that has on it "peace, prosperity and friendship with all nations". much more important than the coin, of course, is the next phase of our negotiations. we will close the first chapter of the brexit story on friday, and then we will talk about what our future relationship with
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the eu will look like, and steve barclay again was asked about this on andrew marr this morning, and he said the government would be coming forward with a little bit more detail about what exactly they're hoping to achieve from these negotiations. we are going to publish our object is for the negotiation and we will set that out. after the 31st, there will be a speech from the prime minister to set that out. but the key issue is that we will have control of our rules, we will not be a rule taken, we will not diverged for the sake of diverging. we start from a position of alignment. but the key opportunity is that we will be able to set our standards, high standards on workers' rights, the environment, on workers' rights, the environment, on state aid as part of that trade policy. and a word about labour, still for people trying to become the next leader. any developments there? unite, the biggest financial backer of the labour party, their
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general secretary len mccluskey has been doing the rounds this morning and his union has endorsed rebecca lon bailey on friday, with richard burgin as their choice for deputy leader. no surprise there. many people consider rebecca to be the continuityjeremy corbyn people consider rebecca to be the continuity jeremy corbyn candidate, and she disputes that. she is of the opinion that she is her own person and has a new agenda to take the labour party forward. but len mccluskey really staunch in his defence of rebecca lon bailey this morning. rebecca lon bailey is brilliant. she was brilliant on the day, very good. i think she is brave, courageous, her capabilities are beyond doubt. i think she is the one that can actually unite the party and take a message to not only our heartlands, which we need to wind back, but to the rest of our nation. she is somebody who believes in lots of the radical policies that have been developed over the years,
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but she has something else as well. she wants to talk to the aspirational views of ordinary people. and of course that process still has some way to go. an awful long way to go when it comes to the labour leadership contest. we are currently in the phase where the candidates are trying to get the backing of trade unions, like unite, and affiliated groups so they can ultimately make it onto the ballot. this endorsement from unite effectively means that rebecca long bailey is pretty much there. we expect her to get the support she needs in the next few days. keir starmer is also there. so all eyes in the next couple of weeks are on emily thornbury, the fourth candidate in this race, to see whether she can make it onto the ballot that will go out to members. when we eventually get to that ballot needing sending out, still around another six weeks to go in this contest, so we won't learn who the successor to jeremy corbyn this contest, so we won't learn who the successor tojeremy corbyn is until early april. the headlines on bbc news:
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the death toll from the coronavirus in china rises to 56 — officials warn the spread of the virus is accelerating and the country faces a "grave situation". a member of the grenfell tower inquiry panel resigns over links with the firm that supplied the tower block's deadly cladding. 35 people are dead after the powerful earthquake in eastern turkey — more than 1,600 are injured. in sport, in the fa cup, the holders, manchester city, are through to the fifth round after a comprehensive victory over fulham. it was a 4—0 win at the etihad stadium. england have a comfortable lead in their second innings of day three against south africa after bowling south africa out. and roger federer is through to the quarterfinals of the australian open after victory over the hungarian
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player in four sets. that's it, i will be back with more on those stories in the next hour. emergency teams in turkey are continuing to search for survivors of friday's earthquake. at least 35 people are known to have been killed and more than 1,600 injured after the quake in the east of the country. our world affairs correspondent richard galpin has the latest. she is just five years old, and covered in blood, but this girl is now safe. the rescue team pulling her out from under the smashed blocks of concrete and other debris brought down by the earthquake. for the rescue teams, speed is now essential to save lives in freezing temperatures. this emergency worker using a mobile phone to speak to a family trapped underneath the debris, telling them they must keep awake.
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in the light of morning, the extent of damage was revealed, this just one of 30 buildings to have been brought down. and hundreds of aftershocks over the past 2a hours have added to the fear in this earthquake—prone region. some of the homeless have now found shelter, as the temperature at night drops to —10 degrees. 0thers, though, are out on the streets. richard galpin, bbc news. a man has been awarded £100,000 in compensation from police scotland after he was wrongly arrested, handcuffed and spent four nights in custody. gary webb, from dumfries and galloway, said when police arrested him in 2015, they had a warrant for someone else. the police have offered an unreserved apology. a murder investigation has been launched after the death
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of a non—league footballer in nottinghamshire. 25—year—old jordan sinnot, who played for matlock town, was found unconscious in retford after a night out. a 27—year—old man has been arrested and remains in police custody. the baby food manufacturer, cow and gate, is recalling 15 of its products sold in tesco stores because of concerns that some of them could have been tampered with. customers who bought 200g jars of food for babies aged over seven months are being told not to use them as they may pose a safety risk. cow and gate products sold in other supermarkets are unaffected. police in south east london say they are aware of racist and anti—semitic graffiti which has been scrawled across a number of buildings. the graffiti, which has appeared on a bank in blackheath and outside a takeaway in charlton, depicts stars of david, swastikas and white supremacy insignia.
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local mp matthew pennycook says: greenwich council has described the defacements as ‘shocking' . people in two italian regions are voting in elections that are being seen as a showdown between the government and the far—right party of matteo salvini. his anti—immigrant and populist league party is hoping to make big gains in northern emilia romagna, and the southern region, calabria. emilia romagna is considered the spitirual home of italian socialism, and has been governed by the left since the second world war. a victory there could help the league leader to become prime minister. president trump's defence team have opened their case in the senate impeachment trial, accusing the democrats of seeking to overturn the result of the 2016 election. mr trump denies allegations that he abused his power and obstructed a congressional inquiry. from washington, our correspondent chris buckler reports. as the future of his presidency has
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been facing a congressional challenge, donald trump has been to davos to meet world leaders, to florida to speak to supporters, and ignored other events in washington to attend a pro—life rally. perhaps a sign he is looking past this impeachment trial and already thinking about drumming up votes for the november presidential election. inside congress, his legal team have been arguing that, in bringing this case, the democrats were not really concerned about his behaviour in office. instead they claim that they are trying to overturn the vote that put him there in the first place. they are asking you to tear up all of the ballots across this country, on your own initiative, take that decision away from the american people. at the start of proceedings, democrats delivered a more than 28,000—page record of evidence and arguments that donald trump abused his power. the republican majority
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inside the senate makes it inconceivable that president trump be removed from office. what i have learned from all my years in politics and life, if you are right and keep fighting for the truth, you will prevail. a couple of miles away in the white house, a confident mr trump is tweeting and encouraging his supporters to tune into televised proceedings. he also made some comments about the democrats his lawyers would not have got away with inside congress. they will continue making their case tomorrow and you can expect their arguments to become a little more pointed and a little more political and perhaps a little nastier. chris buckler, bbc news, washington. it's pretty tough for any teacher trying to keep a classroom full of primary school children fully engaged, so imagine how hard it must be for one who's profoundly deaf, relying on sign language and lip reading. but that's exactly the challenge for alysha allen at a school in north london, and she'sjust won an award for her achievements.
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they were looking at my hands and already i had got them... this is a typical maths lesson for year twos in alysha's class. even though she's profoundly deaf, she teaches at a mainstream school using british sign language and lip—reading. she has just received a national award for her outstanding teaching methods. itjust breaks it down for them visually. so today... it's notjust for maths, it helps the skills to grow. we have to say, good morning, look at each other during the register. their friends look at them. they say good morning to each other, eye contact.
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alysha's is not the only class that uses british sign language at this school. every single pupil learns it. we are going to have a little peek at the zebras, a year 5 class, and see what they are up to. it is very rare for all children in a uk school to learn british sign language. the head teacher introduced it 2.5 years ago. initially there were some reservations from some parents when she started. however, i think when they see how amazing she is and the progress of the children, and how quickly they pick up the different signs, and for a lot of the children now, they have learned sign language for a couple of years, so they have already got some of that knowledge as well. and then there are other adults in the classroom, supporting different children and supporting across the whole classroom, and they see that actually, it's a team effort as well, and everybody is supporting
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and working together for the best of the children. it's my favourite thing to do at school! it makes me feel happy. if you learn how to sign, you can communicate with deaf people. alysha started as a teaching assistant at a special needs school before training as a teacher. anybody thinking about becoming a teacher, think about it and do it. because children need more role models. and anybody who's deaf and is thinking they can't do it, you can! the queen has made her weekly visit to church in sandringham this morning, days after pulling out of a public appearance because of a cold. the 93—year—old missed her annual meeting of the women's institute in norfolk last week because "she wasn't feeling up to it". the queen wasjoined by princess anne at the service in st mary magdalene church. now it's time for a
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look at the weather. hello. it has been a day of big changes in our weather. we have had a band of rain sweeping eastwards. you can see the bright white cloud on the satellite picture, that is what brought the cloud and behind it is the speckled cloud, indicative of cloud and colder air. this evening, the rainbow clear from eastern england, but these showers will rush in from the west, some will be heavy, thundery and wintry across the northern half of the uk. not only over the higher ground, still at relatively low levels. certainly the potential for ice during tomorrow morning. showers will continue to pile in from the west during the day, wintry across the north and west of the uk. further south, any showers were largely fall as rain. eastern scotland and england should stay predominantly dry. more sunshine than of late, but windy and chilly. a cold start to the new week with snow and ice for many of us, then a new change
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a "grave situation". as the united states announces plans to fly some of its citizens home, the foreign office is urging britons to leave the province where the outbreak began — and advising against further travel there. a member of the grenfell tower inquiry panel resigns over links with the firm that supplied the tower block's deadly cladding. 35 people are dead after the powerful earthquake in eastern turkey — more than 1,600 are injured. 3 million brexit coins go into circulation on friday — to commemorate the day britain leaves the european union. and now on bbc news, victoria derbyshire takes a look at some of the highlights from her programme this week. hello, and welcome to our programme.
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