more than 50,000 people have now died in the us from coronavirus. meanwhile, president trump has backtracked on a suggestion that disinfectant could be used to tackle the virus. he said his suggestion that injections of disinfectant could treat patients was sarcastic. the uk government website for key workers to apply for tests has reopened after it was closed due to "significant demand". the tests are being offered to around ten million key workers and their families. the governement aims carry out 100,000 daily tests by the end of april. world leaders and the who have launched a global initiative to accelerate work on drugs to treat coronavirus. the head of the who says the biggest health effort in history is treat covid—19. experts say any vaccine that is developed must be made available and affordable.

now on bbc news: a look back at the week in parliament. hello there, and welcome to the week in parliament. as mps and peers return from their easter break and move into the virtual world. we have a twofold duty of leadership of members of this house. one is to show that we are following the rules that apply to everybody else, and the other is to lead by example in showing that we are getting on with our essential work. sir keir starmer debuts at a very different pmqs and accuses the government of dragging its feet on tackling coronavirus. and there's a pattern emerging here. we were slow into lockdown, slow on testing, slow on protective equipment, and now slow to take up these offers on british firms. i don't accept his premise

that we've been slow. we have been guided by the scientific advice — the chief scientific advice — the chief medical officer at every step along this way. and scotland's first minister says she is not complacent about supplies of protective equipment for health and care staff. if anybody ever hears me standing up here during this pandemic and saying, "we've resolved the issue of ppe," you should have a go at me then. it was time for some pretty extraordinary changes to parliament. with the uk still in lockdown and trying to stop the spread of coronavirus, towns and cities remained empty, roads and railways nearly silent. as the government continued to ask the public to make massive changes to their lives, mps too were facing an upheaval to their working ways. whilst they'd been away for easter, black—and—yellow tape had been stuck to the floor to mark out safe distances. little signs on the seats were put up on seats to tell mps where they could sit.

big screens had been put up in readiness for members to take part via video link from home. but first, the move to a virtual chamber had been that had to be approved by a handful of mps that were physically in the parliament. while the new digital parliament may not be perfect, members may launch forth only to find themselves muted or snatched away altogether by an itinerant internet connection — we must not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. in 1349 when the black death affected this country, parliament couldn't sit — and didn't. the session was cancelled. thanks to modern technology, even i have moved on from 1349, and i'm glad to say — and i'm glad to say that we can sit to carry out these fundamental constitutional functions. it would be rank hypocrisy if we were to expect our constituents to go to work, and we ourselves decided to protect ourselves. we have a duty to be here, we have a responsibility to hold government to account, and we must do that.

the shadow leader wondered about the dress code for mps working from home. clearly the dress code will only apply to the top half, unless it's. .. laughter. unless of course, it's the leader of the house, in which case i know he sometimes likes to be horizontal, so in fact, the dress code will apply to the top half and the bottom half. valerie vaz, referring to the pictures ofjacob rees—mogg in the chamber a few months ago lying almost horizontal on the front bench. so after all that, mps agreed that from wednesday, the commons would become a hybrid chamber with some members attending in person, and others contributing via video link — setting the stage for a very unusual pmqs. the prime minister borisjohnson stayed away, still recovering from his bout of coronavirus. so sir keir starmer, the newly—elected labour leader, made his pmqs debut against dominic raab, who was filling in for the pm. at the start of the day, the speaker, sir lindsay hoyle, welcomed leaders to their brave

new world. yesterday, the house agreed to a motion to allow members to participate virtually in proceedings of the house for the first time in 700 years of history in the house of commons. so i'd like to welcome everyone — both membersjoining us remotely from their constituencies up and down the uk, and members here in the chamber — to the first hybrid sitting of the house of commons. when pmqs got under way a short time later, sir keir starmer said he'd provide constructive opposition, supporting the government when it was right to do so. but he had questions too, beginning with coronavirus testing. the government has an ambition for 100,000 tests a day, and now says it has the capacity to carry out 40,000. but sir keir starmer said only 18,000 were being carried out. it is not now a question

of driving up demand. demand is there. last week, the health secretary said that every care worker who needed a test would get one. but the reality on the ground is very different, and there were very few tests indeed. we've got mobile labs to go to some of those areas that are hard to reach. we will be using the army who have made, along with the other key workers, incredible contributions to support that effort. but ijust come back to the key point, i think it is important to have a target and to drive towards a target. sir keir said the government had also failed to take up offers from the british firms to help out with the provision of personal protective equipment — known as ppe. something's going wrong, and there's a pattern emerging here. we were slow into lockdown, slow on testing, slow on protective equipment, and now, slow to take up these offers from british firms. i don't accept his premise that we've been slow. we have been guided by the scientific advice — the chief scientific advice — the chief medical officer at every step along this way. if he thinks he knows better than they do with the benefit of hindsight,

then that's his decision. but that is not the way we've proceeded, and it is not the way we will in the future. the snp‘s westminster leader renewed calls for a basic income for all. polling shows that 84% of the public now support this. a universal basic income is a solution that will provide support for anybody — and crucially, it will leave no one behind. we want to make sure we provide support to those who need it most. a universal approach, uniform without reference to need or income, or the most vulnerable in our society is not the way i respectfully suggest to achieve it. will the government commit itself now in for a future independent, judge—led inquiry into how this crisis has been handled? i won't take up his offer of committing to a public inquiry. i think that there are definitely

lessons to be learned when we get through this crisis, and it will be important that we take stock and come together to understand with an unprecedented challenge on an international scale, what can be done to avoid it happening again. we go across to liz saville roberts. liz saville roberts? if the lockdown is lifted in one nation or region because it has passed the peak, we will see confusion and we will start to see people running around, which runs the risk of further infection. will the first secretary of state confirm that if the four nations approach is to be meaningful, the four governments must have an equal say, and that lifting the lockdown can only happen by the unanimous agreements of the four governments together? i think it's fair to say, we've had excellent cooperations between all four nations, and indeed, with the current mayor of london. that is critically important. if she looks at the social—distancing measures, there's been remarkable consistency in all four nations in terms of compliance. so i hope that we can continue to work together on a collaborative basis as we look

towards the second phase. dominic raab, filling in for borisjohnson at pmqs. a few minutes later, mps were able to take up their concerns with the health secretary when he updated the commons on the government's battle plan, starting with testing. the tests are conducted in nhs hospitals, through our drive—through centres, mobile units and home deliveries. these tests are then sent to laboratories. we've completed the construction of three lighthouse labs in milton keynes, glasgow and cheshire. each site tookjust three weeks to complete and begin testing. and as we have reached the peak and as we bring the number of new cases down, so we will introduce contact tracing at large scale. he said a vaccine trial on humans would start on thursday, and social distancing was making a difference. but labour'sjonathan ashworth had serious concerns.

it looks like we are heading to one of the worst death rates in europe. the government have been careful to always say, "we're following scientific advice." could the secretary of state tell us what the explanation is from the government's scientists as to why our death rate seems so poor compared to, for example, germany? he asked the question about the relative international comparisons on the number of deaths. of course, this needs to be done scientifically, taking into account the size of the populations of different countries. and there's an important analysis that we're constantly doing of why the death rates of proportion to the population in germany is lower — it is something i speak to my german counterpart about — in the same way that we look at all the european countries where the death rate is higher, and we try to learn also lessons to make sure that we are doing the best that we possibly can here. now ministers say three million people face being temporarily laid off during the coronavirus outbreak.

when the business secretary appeared in front of a committee of mps, he gave an update about firms wanting to take part in a government scheme which pays four—fifths of the wages of workers who have been, in the jargon, furloughed. i can tell you that, as of last night at apm, there were 387,000 applications to the scheme, and that is covering 2.8 million employees. in terms of the grants, these are the £10—25,000 grants, which we've given money to local authorities and they are distributing it. as of 19 april, almost half a million businesses had received that money, representing just over £6 billion. and in terms of the civil scheme — i'm sure you will want to discuss that in more detail how that is working — but the latest figures being published today show that so far, there are around 38,000 applications to date, and 16,600 businesses have secured a loan representing a total value of £2.8 billion.

in switzerland, 98,000 firms have received loans — that's about six times the figure you've given us this morning. and the loans are 100% guaranteed by the state. the form is a one—page online form, and the funds are paid the following day. germany's given out about three times the figure that you've said today, and they've moved to 100% loan guarantees for small firms too. same in hong kong — 100% loans. isn't the case that a number of other countries have been able to do much more quickly with much less bureaucracy than we have? yes, i go back to the point i made earlier, which is that i think

you need to look at the totality of what we are offering. i'll be happy to come back to talk about the german scheme, but if you look at what the swiss are offering in terms of fiscal stimulus, and i'm very happy to stand corrected on this, but as i understand it, the majority of that has gone through these loan schemes that you've talked about. we are offering a range of support — as i've said this morning to the chair, so far, 387,000 applications into the furlough scheme, we're helping an million businesses with support for the grants. and i've talked about the other numbers in terms of the loans. so we have to look at the range of this. the minister also announced plans to help the high street. i'm certainly aware that certain landlords are putting undue financial pressure with aggressive debt recovery tactics. so what i'm very happy to say to you is we will — i will look to introduce temporary measures on this particular issue which will ease commercial rent demand and protect the uk high street.

i don't want to set out the details right now here, but that is something that i will be doing very, very shortly. the head of the foreign office, sir simon mcdonald, told mps the government took a "political decision" not to take part in an eu scheme to get medical equipment to fight the coronavirus. previously, ministers have insisted the uk didn't originallyjoin because of a communications mix—up. why oh why oh why were we not involved in the eu procurement? erm, we left the european union on 31 january... no, we had every right to take part, we were invited to take part, and apparently we missed the e—mails or forgot the e—mails, or didn't ask for e—mails. we led five of the meetings we didn't attend, lots of other meetings we did attend. it's not about leaving the european union. erm, all i can say is,

as a matter of fact, we have not taken part. maybe i could ask, sir simon, what was your policy advice on it? or was it a political decision? erm, it was a political decision. brussels briefed ministers about what was available, what was on offer, and the decision is known. i don't think i could ask another question after that. well later, sir simon issued a correction, saying it had not been a political decision. earlier in the week, the equalities minister faced questions over why, so far, only one female cabinet minister has taken part in the government's daily coronavirus news conference. aren't we going to see you make

an appearance at one of the daily press conferences? it's been really noticeable so far that they have been conducted by men. when‘s your turn? i don't like the idea that somebody should just appear at a press conference, or in a media interview, because they're a woman. so they shouldn't be there just because they're a woman. but you have a remit for elderly people, for the disabled, for those from a bame background, for the lgbtq community — a massive group of people who are being impacted by covid—19. and you think it would be tokenism for you to appear at one of these press conferences? i think we should be focusing on the right people to present at the press conference... is that not you? are you not the right person? the major issue at the moment is health. so i think it's right that at the health secretary is doing a lot of the press conferences and explaining the specific health issues. liz truss.

you're watching the week in parliament with me, alicia mccarthy. scotland's first minister, nicola sturgeon, faced questions about her government's handling of the crisis. the leader of the conservative group in holyrood quoted an intensive care doctor. he said in the largest icu in scotland there were no advisers and staff would be using single issue visors, potentially contaminated with covid. is it working? the main assurance i would ask people to take is this is something that principally, national services scotland is on literally every minute of the day to make sure that we are able to give confidence about the supplies of these items, notjust now but into the future as well. what is the first minister's advice to those care workers who find themselves on shift in scotland's

care home tonight without the ppe that they need? if he ever hears me, if anyone ever hears me standing up in this chamber during this pandemic and saying we've resolved the issue of ppe, you should really have a go at me then because that would demonstrate a level of complacency that i would never want. can the first minister explain why around half of scotland's testing capacity as being unused at the moment, why we're still testing a much lower percentage of our population than most european countries and when she believes a test/trace/isolate strategy will be in place? as we start to lift some of the most stringent restrictions in place right now, and i don't know exactly when that will be, but as we start to do that, we should be under no illusion that we are still facing a period where we would have

to suppress the virus in different ways. continued social distancing will be a part of that, but test/traced/isolate will be a significant part of that as well. since 2010, members of the uk military have been tightened to a daily operation of £29 and they're deployed to specific operations. would the first minister consider to give an extra £29 a day reward to frontline nhs staff for their service during this pandemic? i will certainly consider any suggestions like that. we will absolutely certainly want to make sure that in no doubt a variety of ways we are recognising the contribution that health care staff have made, but recognising and rewarding that. in the welsh assembly, there were questions for the first minister about his government strategy. the opposition leader paul davis wanted to know about levels of testing.

to be blunt, first minister, why are so few tests actually taking place? and why has the welsh government failing to meet its targets? because it's important our key front line workers are tested as quickly as possible in order to keep them safe. over 20,000 tests have been carried out in wales during the coronavirus crisis. 40% of those tests have been made available to frontline health ca re staff. there is more that needs to be done to simplify the process, from which social care staff in particular can be identified and then offered testing at the different centres that we have. it's almost been six weeks since scientists at cardiff university wrote to welsh government offering their expertise in conducting tests in wales. almost six weeks later, those hundreds of scientists, and by the way, i spoke to one of them yesterday morning,

and their laboratories haven't had the go—ahead, haven't had the accreditation to conduct a single test on a key worker here in wales. we will have more tests in wales this week than last, and we are increasing the take—up of them, particularly from social care and other key workers as well. we have police officers and firefighters being tested now in wales. one health board that i'm in good contact with, and it may be a more general issue, at the end of last week, didn't want to give wider testing to partners and other organisations because of concerns they didn't have cover around data protection and gdpr, and they were waiting for public health wales to publish or at least share a protocol on what should be done. mark drakeford said the data commissioner would look sympathetically being shared, but the law on data sharing hadn't changed.

back at westminster, there was a new look to the house of lords and a little less pageantry. ordinarily when a new peer takes his or her seat, there's a business ceremony and dressing up. the new recruits arrived wearing their ceremonial robes and the few of them processed in before the new peer takes the oath. but the introductions on tuesday were dressed down and socially distanced. if you look closely, you will see no robes, no sponsors, and a socially—distanced clerk. white tape marks where peers should sit. like the commons, the lords is also trying out remote working, but using a different technology for mps. the government's lord ashton set out the challenge. my lords, when you think of the problems of connecting about 780 members of varying degrees

of technical ability, who are distributed around the country and can't be visited to be given help, with little time for testing, using off—the—shelf technology, it is not, as you can see, a trivial problem. he said questions and some debates would take place virtually, but debates on legislation would be held in the chamber. most accepted the changeover was a work in prgress and go smoothly, but a labour former cabinet member said some parts of the new arrangement would worry both peers and the public. one of the cause of most concerning is the fact that these proceedings will not be broadcast for at least two weeks' time, it will not be there for the public to observe what's going on, which is a breach of all precedents in terms of parliamentary proceedings. would the chief whip agree with me that for anything other than a very short period of time, while technical difficulties are sorted out, it is absolutely unacceptable that the proceedings

of this house are not broadcast and not open to members of the public at the time when those proceedings take place. lord ashton replied that, at the moment, it was right to focus limited resources on the elected house of commons. so, you won't be able to see the virtual proceedings in the lords for a while yet, but on wednesday, the commons took one more step forward in its march online, agreeing mps would be able to vote from home during the coronavirus pandemic. a new digital system has been developed, but there are concerns that it's not yet robust enough, with worries about its stability. the ability to verify who's voting and about the alerts mps note when it's time to vote. the commons leader, jacob rees—mogg, said the arrangement would be temporary. he also agreed not to hold any votes until after the procedure committee has reported on the system. i think it's fair to say that i'm surprised to be introducing a motion to introduce remote voting

in the house of commons. in general, i'm not an advocate of change. to the house's voting system and to be perfectly honest many other things. lord palmerston's words ring in my mind — "change, change." i'm very grateful to the housing authority and staff in the digital service for the work on developing it so quickly. i know they are keen to facilitate further testing next week, including with members, which will be crucial to build confidence in the new systems. we have to make sure any remote voting is secure and that everyone is satisfied that any remote working is secure. the optics of seeing votes going wrong is not where we want to be. if mps needed a reminder of potential perils of going digital, they need look no further than the welsh assembly. the health minister there found

himself in hot water when he was caught swearing about a labour colleague in a virtual session when he left his microphone on by mistake. he made the comment about cardiff central fm jenny rathbone. i think you need to turn your microphone off. he has since apologised. this brings us to the end of the week in parliament but do join me on monday night at 11pm to see how mps get on with their new digital debates. for now, from me, alicia mccarthy, goodbye. hello there. after a another predominantly dry week for most parts of the uk, the weekend promises plenty more dry weather. but slow, subtle changes, the increasing chance of catching a shower and it

will begin to feel cooler particularly across northern areas. nothing much is changing very quickly at the moment because the pressure pattern is very slack. not many white lines at all on this chart. not many isobars. that means the winds are very, very light. there's nothing really to push the weather along. we start off the day with a lot of cloud across eastern scotland and the eastern side of england, misty and murky conditions in place. that should tend to break up, the mist and fog should lift and all of us should get to see some spells of sunshine. perhaps a bit more cloud than we had over the last couple of days. temperature—wise, 17 to 21 degrees. a bit coolerfor some northern and eastern coasts. north coast of northern ireland having a cooler day and as we go into the late afternoon in the evening, wales and the south—west could see

a shower, and the early hours of sunday, generally more cloud rolling in across the north of scotland. those are your overnight temperatures. most places above freezing. it will be a little bit chilly across some eastern parts of england. we go to sunday and this area of low pressure, quite a weak affair, starts to move its way in from the north, that does increase the chance of seeing some showers across northern parts of scotland, a frontal system pushing south and a band of cloud and some showery rain possible with that and ahead of it across the heart of england and wales, we could see the odd hefty shower into the afternoon. there will still be a lot of dry weather and sunshine and another warm day down towards the south, but noticably cooler across the northern half of the country. and as we move out of sunday and into monday, you see the colder air making some inroads southwards, so lower temperatures for most parts on monday. a band of cloud, frontal system sitting around parts of england and wales, maybe the odd splash of rain but we could see slightly more significant wet weather developing down to the south later in the day. 21 degrees in london, but the further north you are, the much cooler feel

to the weather. and for all of us, it is going to turn cooler as we head deeper into next week. and there is the increasing chance of some rain and some fairly brisk winds as well. that's all from me for now.

welcome to bbc news, i'm simon pusey. our top stories: officials confirm 50,000 people have now died in the united states. meanwhile, president trump attacks the media after he suggested using disinfectants in a treatment. i was asking a sarcastic and a very sarcastic question, to the reporters in the room, about disinfectant on the inside. but it does kill it and it would kill it on the hands. the uk government's new website for tests is swamped and shut down for hours as it's inundated by key workers. world leaders throw their weight behind a drive to develop new treatments for covid—19 and ensure that everyone gets access to them. and the rohinga refugees rescued after being stranded at sea for many weeks, virus fears