the pandemic has driven the us economy into its most severe contraction for more than a decade. it shrank nearly 5% in the first quarter, the first three months of 2020, but the lockdown only came in towards the end of that quarter, so the head of the us central bank has warned there'll be much more economic pain in the figures for the following three months. the death toll from coronavirus in the uk has now passed 26,000. for the first time, the official figures count all deaths linked to the virus — including care homes and the wider commnity. the pandemic claimed nearly four thousand more lives than were being recorded previously. the white house health advisor, dr anthony fauci, has expressed optimism about an experimental anti—viral drug. he said trial data shows remdesivir had a clear—cut and positive effect in reducing recovery time.

now on bbc news, wednesday in parliament. hello there, and welcome to wednesday in parliament. coming up, as borisjohnson celebrates the birth of his latest child, dominic raab fields pmqs and faces questions about the coronavirus death rate. far from success, these latest figures are truly dreadful. but the prime minister's stand—in rejects that. it is far too early to make international comparisons. if they are to be done, they should be done on a per capita basis. also in the programme, questions for the home secretary about quarantining travellers coming to the uk. mps give initial approval to a bill to approve fire safety after g re nfell. i never dreamt that we would see double glazing units fully alight

coming down the side of the building, falling out of the building with the cladding itself would be the perpetrator. and children across england breathed a sigh of relief as mps ask how youngsters are to make up for lost schooling. should they open in the summer holidays? we're not planning to run schools through the summer. the day began with some surprising news when it was announced that boris johnson's fiance, carrie symonds, had given birth to a baby boy. the new arrival had not been expected until early summer. it follows a tumultuous few weeks for the couple after borisjohnson was admitted to intensive care and carrie symonds was forced to self—isolate after developing symptoms of coronavirus. the commons speaker was first to send his best wishes. on behalf of everyone in the house of commons, may i say congratulations to the prime minister and carrie symonds on the birth of their son. such happy news amid

such uncertainty. 2020 is certainly a year they will never forget. there were good wishes from all sides as pmqs got under way with the foreign secretary dominic raab once again filling in for the prime minister. the labour leader sir keir starmer questioned him about the rising coronavirus death toll. he said the total number of deaths in hospitals, care homes and in the community was now probably over 27,000. six weeks ago, on the 17th of march, the government's chief scientific adviser indicated that government hoped to keep the overall number of deaths from coronavirus to below 20,000. and we are possibly on track to have one of the worst death rates in europe. on monday, the prime minister said in his short speech that many were looking at our apparent success in the united kingdom, but does the first secretary agree with me that far from success, these latest figures are truly dreadful? the reality is we know a lot more about the virus both domestically

and internationally than we did before and i absolutely share his... i guess, ourjoint horror at the number of deaths. tragedies each and every one, equally i am going to disagree with him that it is far too early to make international comparisons. if they are to be done, they should be done on a per capita basis. we have a heard from the front line of the care sector expressions of real anxiety about the situation they find themselves in. so, can the first secretary explain why he thinks that coronavirus continues to spread so fast in the care sector? dominic raab said to biggest challenge was the ebb and flow of people into care homes. that includes residents. it includes care home workers which sometimes work in different care homes. it also includes nhs workers and of course friends and family. that is the single biggest challenge in terms of reducing transmission. and i will not shy away from saying in front of the right honourable gentleman that this is a challenge

and is a challenge we must grip and we can grip to make sure that those in care can get the numbers down in care homes as we have seen in hospitals and as we have seen in the country at large. sir keir moved on to reported shortages of personal protective equipment for nhs staff. what is going on and how soon can it be fixed? there is no minimising or sugar—coating any of those that he mentioned. i feel animated and inspired to do even better, but he needs to recognise on ppe that there is a global supply shortage and we are doing everything we can to make sure that those in the front line get the equipment they need. finally, on a strategy to end the lockdown, sir keir said other countries had come up with proposals. if you look at those plans, as he has done and i have done, it is clear there are common issues such as school reopening, business sectors reopening. these are the issues that if you want me to put them on the table, i will

because they are the issues we need to be addressing. dominic raab said that the government was taking advice from its scientific advisory group for emergencies, known as sage. if he is suggesting we can set out concrete proposals now despite clear evidence and advice from sage that we should wait for their review of evidence in the next week or so, i would gently say that that is the wrong thing to do and if he thinks he knows better than sage and the scientists that suggest that, he needs to explain it. 0ther mps asked about life after lockdown. will garden centres and nurseries be allowed to reopen in short order? we'll continue as i've indicated earlier to keep the evidence on each individual measure under very close review. working people are making huge sacrifices to this crisis, state support is available to big businesses that dodge taxes and pay millions to super—rich executives and shareholders. so will the government follow the likes of denmark and stand up to big businesses by saying if you want state support, you have to prohibit dividend

payments and shared buy—backs and you cannot be based in a tax haven? i think we should take frankly some of the partisan baggage out of this, focus on targeting the businesses that will create the growth which will drive us through this crisis and support the workers up and down this country who rely on those crucial businesses. last week at the first ever virtual pmqs, dave had been the only mp unable to get through to take part in the session. but he had more luck this time. i am delighted to be able to connect with you this week. i finally escaped from the zoom waiting room. and he went on to praise the role of lorry drivers transporting goods through the crisis. however many have struggled to access hot food with their cabs, even to access toilet and shower facilities. so, can the first secretary ensure that we are doing all that we can to support lorry drivers

as they carry out their important duties during this crisis? i thank my right honourable friend, and it's good to see him even via zoom, or especially via zoom. laughter. can i thank all of the delivery drivers for all they are doing in the country to keep us going? and i think across the house, we'd probably agree that our view and definition of key workers has changed as we come through this crisis and there is an appreciation of people doing those grittyjobs. as for the lorry drivers‘ plight, he said all motorway service stations remain open across england. now, a committee of mps has been questioning the home secretary on why the uk hasn't been requiring people entering the country to self—isolate. giving evidence via video link, priti patel said the scientific advice was that quarantines would have a negligible effect on the rate at which

coronavirus is transmitted. germany, new zealand, italy, singapore, australia, canada, greece, all these countries are asking people who are arriving back in the country, people travelling home from all over the world, to self—isolate for maybe 14 days and we don't. and you said it is the science, but is our science different to all of theirs? i think these are questions for sage, but i think there are some fundamental points we must all recognise and note here. every other country has been in a different stage in terms of the virus and the peaks in their own country. and sage and our specific advice can only base their recommendations to ministers and government based on the data they have at a particular time. the professor of epidemiology at the royal society of medicine has said the uk is an outlier and it's most peculiar and of course it's not going to do the job on its own but all of these things are additive. it all adds up to beating the virus. the problem is simply saying, "0h, it is all for sage," and then not

publishing the sage evidence. is that in the end, you are the home secretary taking these really important decisions. surely you have a responsibility to put this information into the public domain regardless of what sage says because this is crucial evidence to substantiate the important decisions that you are making as a minister. i think first of all, all decisions are made in a cross government level and that is exactly what we have been doing as ministers across the whole of government. not the effort of one department, but these decisions are made collectively. and let me just remind the committee and be very clear that scientific advice that isolating incoming travellers, the science has been clear, sage have been clear to us and public health england that this would have a negligible effect on the progression of the virus in the uk. and both base that given on the significantly reduced numbers

of passengers arriving to the country and also levels of the relatively light levels of transmission in the uk. however, i think as ever with any decision and any policy around coronavirus, everything is under review. a conservative committee member said her constituents were very concerned border control. i appreciate that passenger numbers have declined a huge amount, but given that you only need a small handful of people coming into the country with the virus to restart another outbreak, do you think there is a danger that if we don't properly explain to the public why we are keeping the borders open, if we don't bring in or consider more carefully bringing in quarantine measure, that we may lose public concern. people will feel why am i having to stay at home and not being able to see my grandchildren and people i love when we have people arriving in from coronavirus hotspots every day with no quarantine measures placed on them at all.

when this first started, and this was not just at the end of march but going back in february, we did ask people to self—isolate, people coming back from italy and february and march if you recall. and we found places for travellers to self—isolate and effectively then quarantine. but when community transmission separated at quite a rate, you know, the need was much bigger, but the point is now as you have highlighted we are heading into a different phase of this virus. and with this different phase, that means different measures will i think inevitably come in. 0ne mp questioned why the government did not take stronger quarantine measures at the start of the outbreak in the uk. i think a lot of members of the public find it baffling that you were allowing individuals

to come in without any testing checks or even imposing formally the quarantine requirements on anywhere other than wuhan. i think will be helpful if you could give us a detailed list of locations which flights from the start of the year were quarantined formally. was itjust wuhan or the other locations? we will provide that, but i will say again that all decisions around borders and ongoing discussions, because this has not been a binary discussion at all but constantly under review, has been based absolutely on the fact that passenger flows have completely fallen through the floor quite literally and we are seeing that from industry airlines... that happened before. but that was a change in pattern as the world was locking down, but based on scientific and medical evidence and advice provided by sage and public health england. priti patel. the education secretary has told mps that there will be a phased

reopening of schools in england once scientific and medical advisers give the go ahead, but he couldn't say when that would be. gavin williamson told a virtual session of the education committee that 200,000 laptops would be distrubuted to pupils from deprived backgrounds. the committee's chair was worried that disadvantaged children were being disproportionately affected by the closure. unless serious action and thinking is taken by the government, there will be that wave of educational poverty that could potentially come crashing down on thousands of children across oui’ country. we have got to be honest with people that actually taking children out of school for a period of time is not what any of us would want to see. and it does mean that they miss out on a lot of schooling. what we need to do is look at different ways that we can actually help and support those children to ensure that we don't see them falling behind further...

do you have a date when the schools will open? we do not have a date when the schools will be opening. do you imagine when they do open, it will be in stages and do you favour primary schools or secondary schools to open first? i expect schools to open in a phased manner and also plan to give schools as much notice as possible in order to be able to ensure... should they open in the summer holidays? we are not planning to run schools through the summer, but as i was talking about earlier, what we are doing is looking at a whole set of interventions to help children both catch up in terms of their work across a whole broad setting of children of all backgrounds, but we are also looking at different interventions that we can make in order to be able to help children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds.

in my area, we're scrambling around getting voluntary contributions of laptops and some charities are helping, but we don't know when the roll—out of the laptop scheme is happening. so, could ijust ask you, then, about what is likely timeframe of the roll—out of the laptops? we expect the first laptops to be arriving at the end of may, with the majority delivered through june. we do not see this roll—out of additional equipment to be something that is just to deal with the challenge that we're facing today. we see this as part of addressing the longer—term problem in terms of actually helping children get what they need in terms of their learning as rapidly as possible over the summer period. have you had any thoughts about working with the bbc or other broadcasting services to provide a long—term national education service on television that would broadcast a few hours a day

and people can access through a red button what year they are? that way those who don't have access to computers would at least be able to get an education at home if they are not attending school? i've had a number of meetings with the director general of the bbc in order to discuss this exact issue. and if i can take the opportunity to thank the bbc for launching the largest ever education programme that they have had in the corporation's history, recognising the point people don't always have a computer or, sort of, some form of tablet in their home and recognising a tv is a great way of doing that. the education secretary, gavin williamson. you're watching wednesday in parliament with me, alicia mccarthy.

back now to pmqs and to brexit remember that? the uk is due to end its transitional period, where nothing much changes in its relationship with the eu, at the end of december. the government's insisted it won't delay that deadline. but speaking by video link, the snp‘s westminster leader, was alarmed at the rumoured lack of progress in the talks all of it in the middle of a pandemic and economic crisis. refusing to admit the inevitability of an extension is not a taft or clever negotiating tactic, it is a foolish gamble. the secretary of state, will he embrace common sense and recognise the need for a brexit extension, show some leadership and based on the hardliners of the tory party and extend a brexit transition and let us all get on with the job of tackling this health crisis together? dominic raab who was briefly brexit secretary under theresa may gave that short shrift.

if his desire is to avoid uncertainty at the right thing for us to do is double down and get ideal by the end of this year. 0ur desire is to dig ourselves out of the economic challenges that we the european union and the world face. and get a shot in the arm of businesses on both sides of the channel and we are doing it as one united kingdom. the fire at grenfell tower in west london left 72 people dead. the blaze injune 2017 spread quickly up and around the building thanks to dangerous external cladding. in one of the responses to that tragedy, the government has brought forward legislation for england to make it clear who is responsible for the fire safety of external walls in apartment blocks, and of the doors to individual flats. the home office minister, speaking via video link said at the moment, there were inconsistencies and that could put lives at risk.

it demonstrates that we are applying lessons from the grenfell tragedy and we will continue to do everything in our power to ensure the safety of people and their homes. legislation alone cannot provide all the answers. i believe it will make a significant and lasting contribution to the safety of residence. it will provide a catalyst to drive the culture change needed in our building and construction sector to put safety and security at the forefront and provide responsibility and accountability where people fall short. we need to be clear who the responsible persons are and allow nobody, owners or anyone else, to shirk their responsibilities under the act. while these powers are welcome, they are clearly not enough in themselves to meet the government's pledge to prevent another tragedy happening.

a former minister and ex firefighter reflected on the grenfell fire. i was trained on high—rise and i never thought i would see what i saw on the television after i pass on the way to westminster the following morning. i never dreamt what we would see, double glazing units fully a light falling out of the building, that the planning itself would be the perpetrator. the cladding is not the perpetrator of what happened at grenfell. it is unacceptable that residential blocks in my constituency covered and grenfell style cladding has still not had it removed and yet it is not clear today that the fire safety bill will address the fact that the majority of blocks remain covered almost three yea rs after g re nfell. people are being forced to use and live unsafe building. it is apparent what will be done for hundreds of blocks that aren't either nest or set team nests, the deadline cutting removal given

to residents where work has stopped because of covid—i9. as my party's education spokesperson i welcome that this bill will help local authorities enforce the ban on combustible materials cladding on new tall buildings including student accommodation and school dormitories. but we need to make sure our fire and rescue services and councils are financially protected and supported and that any operational changes necessitated by the spell and the secondary legislation do not leave them out of pocket. at a time when many are facing huge shortfalls due to covid—19, the government needs to be careful to make sure that the situation is not made any worse. layla moran. the fire safety bill later passed its first stage in the commons and will now be looked at in more detail. wales‘ first minister mark drakeford says there's no value in testing everybody

in the country's care homes for coronavirus. speaking in a virtual welsh assembly session, mr drakeford said people would have to be re tested because you can go from having no symptoms to having symptoms in 2a hours. his comments came in response to questions from the leader of the opposition. it is absolutely essential we have comprehensive testing taking place across wales so it is disappointing to hear that the welsh government is choosing not to test all care home residents and staff so first minister perhaps you could tell in your response how the welsh government will be stepping up its testing capacity and capability and telling us a bit more on how the welsh government intends to track and trace any future outbreaks and surely by not choosing to test all care home staff and residents, the welsh government is sending the message that community testing is not that important in the first place. the reason why we do not

offer tests to everyone, is because the clinical evidence tells us that there is no value in doing so. and because of that we do not do that. we offer the testing where the advice to us is that it is clinically right to do that. testing people who have no symptoms today, for that to be a reliable message to them, you have to test them again tomorrow. because you can go from being having no symptoms to having the symptoms and 24 hours. first minister the leader of your party has said we are possibly on track to have one of the worst death rates in europe. he was referring to the uk of course but the same is sadly true for wales. why have we done so badly compared to so many other countries? i do not think i am necessarily the best person to offer a comprehensive answer to that question because the answer will rely on people with expertise

in many different dimensions. ijust want to remind the member that six weeks ago we face opposition here in wales where we had a genuine fear that coronavirus would take off to an extent that our nhs would be overwhelmed and would not have either beds in clinical care or ventilators that were necessary and all the efforts that we have made in the nhs and social care and by welsh citizens means that we are not in that position and have not been in that position. the consequence of the dramatic restrictions on the economic activity in recent weeks are likely to be even greater than those of the great recession in 1929 to 1931 and that means that the tax bases will be reduced and less money to spend on health and social services in the future so it is vitally important

that the restrictions are relaxed as quickly as possible. might we be able to devise a scheme whereby we can relax these restrictions more quickly in sparsely populated rural areas than in heavily and densely populated urban areas? the economy of the head of helpers although these things are in competition with one another. there is nothing worse we could do for the economy than to lift restrictions that lead to another significant peak of coronavirus later in the year in which the current draconian measures might have to be reintroduced. and that's it from me for now but do join us at the same time tomorrow for another round up of the day here at westminster, but for now, from me, alicia mccarthy, goodbye.

hello. it wasn't so much a case of april showers on wednesday, this was the scene for a time across birmingham, but give it a wee bit of time and eventually that rain cleared away and out came the sun. the reason for it all? well, we had not one but two weather fronts to contend with. and thursday again is a real mishmash of weather, low pressure very much the dominant feature, the isobars squeezing together on its southern flank. so, it isn't going to be a particularly cold start to the day given all the breeze and the cloud as well, but for some it may be a wet one. we're just pushing wednesday's rain if you you like, away from the north of england up into central and southern parts of scotland. right from the word go, there are showers to be had across wales and the south—west of england. these will rush their way ever further towards the east as we get on through the afternoon. we may even hear the odd rumble of thunder and those winds too,

quite noticeable through the channel areas, 40—115 miles an hour or so in the highest of the gusts. for northern ireland, the best and the brightest perhaps later in the day, out towards the west. stuck underneath the cloud, the eastern side of scotland, nine only, a high in the day of about 13 or 111. those showers keep going for those eastern areas during the course of the evening, gradually filtering away as the low pressure tries to move its centre of gravity out into the north sea. but it's still the dominant influence across the northern half of the british isles. and come the afternoon again, i think we'll see some pretty heavy downpours towards the eastern side of the pennines. perhaps the driest of the weather further towards the south and west where we could well see a high in the day of 15 or 16. that low pressure is still the dominant feature as i take you out of friday and move you into the first part of the weekend. but you just get the sense that it is drifting a little bit further towards the east and that allows it to start picking up the north and north—westerly wind. so the northern areas fully exposed to that wind, we will probably see the bulk

of the showers there. elsewhere, saturday is shaping up to be a pretty reasonable day. quite a lot of sunshine around and the temperatures responding as a consequence. a high in the day of about 16 or 17. but it doesn't last. now, there is some uncertainty about sunday, it could well be the rain i'm showing you here working its way into the south actually moves a little bit further north. we will keep you posted on that one. take care, bye—bye.

this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. i'm mike embley. the us economy slumps and worse is still to come. spending nose—dived in the last quarter, as the lockdown began. the number of coronavirus deaths in the uk passes 26,000. for the first time, the figure includes deaths in care homes and the wider community. hope for a treatment — one of the most senior health advisers in the us says there's clear—cut evidence an antiviral drug can help people recover. it is a very important proof of concept because what it has proven is that a drug can block this virus. and, the british prime minister and his partner are celebrating the birth of their baby son.