the uk prime minister's top adviser, dominic cummings, denies doing anything wrong when he drove hundreds of miles to his parents‘ home during the lockdown. the uk prime minister announces all nonessential retailers can reopen in england from the 15th ofjune. outdoor markets and car showrooms will reopen next week. spain says it's going reopen its borders, lifting the two—week coronavirus quarantine requirement for foreign travellers from july the 1st. and greece has also begun easing restrictions to help boost its flagging tourism industry. greeks are once again able to travel freely to the country's islands. stay with us here on bbc world news for all the latest of elements in the uk and around the world. let's remind ourselves of some of the key points from that press conference given a little earlier by

the prime minister, borisjohnson. he began by confirming that there have been a further 121 coronavirus—related deaths in the last 2a hours, bringing the total number of deaths in all settings to 36,914. the prime minister praised the country's collective effort, the "key indicators are heading in the right direction". with this in mind, he signposted towards the next set of restictions that will be eased. he confirmed that the government intends for outdoor markets and car show rooms to open from the 1st ofjune, and that from the 15th ofjune, the government intends to allow all other nonessential retail to reopen, but only in premises that are "covid—secure". responding to questions about his chief adviser dominic cummings, borisjohnson said he regretted the "confusion and anger" caused by the the row. mrjohnson said that people must make up "their own minds" about mrcummings trip to county durham during lockdown. let's have a listen now

to what mrjohnson had to say. 3,532,634 tests for coronavirus have now been carried out in the uk, including 73,726 tests carried out yesterday. 261,184 people have tested positive, and that's an increase of 1625 cases since yesterday. 8834 people are in hospital with covid—19 in the uk, and that's down 12% from 10,092 this time last week. and sadly, of those who tested positive for coronavirus across all settings, 36,914 have now died. that's an increase of 121 fatalities since yesterday. and this new figure includes deaths in all settings,

notjust in hospitals. and once again, my deepest condolences go out to all those who have lost their loved ones before their time. we must, and we will not forget them. two weeks ago, i set out our roadmap for the next phase in our fight against covid—19, and it's a cautious plan, informed by the evidence about what is safe, and it's conditional upon our continual progress against the virus, and we are making progress, thanks to this country's collective efforts, the key indicators are heading in the right direction. the daily number of deaths is down, the number of new cases is down, our survey evidence suggests the infection rate is falling and the r has not risen above one. so, just over two weeks ago, we moved to step one of our plan,

encouraging those who are unable to work from home to go back to work, with new guidelines setting out how workplaces can be made covid—secure. at the same time, we allowed people to spend more time outdoors and to meet one member of another household outside, provided they remain two metres apart. i also said we would be able to move to step two of our plan no earlier than monday the 1st ofjune, a week today. we will set out our formal assessment of the five tests that we set for adjusting the lockdown later this week, as part of the three—weekly review we are legally required to undertake by thursday. but because of the progress we are making, i can, with confidence, put the british people on notice of the changes we intend to introduce as we move into step two.

and i think it's important to give that notice, so that people have sufficient time to adjust and get ready before those changes come into effect. yesterday, i set out our intention to begin reopening nurseries and particular years in primary schools, reception, year one, year six, from the 1st ofjune, followed by some contact for those secondary school pupils with exams next year, from the 15th ofjune. some contact for years ten and 12 from the 15th ofjune with their teachers. this announcement has given schools, teachers and parents, clarity about our intentions, enabling them to prepare in earnest. the department for education is now engaging with teaching unions, councils and school leaders to help schools get ready. today, i want to give

the retail sector notice of our intentions to reopen shops, so they, too, can get ready. so, i can announce that it is our intention to allow outdoor markets to reopen from the 1st ofjune, subject to all premises being made covid—secu re, as well as car showrooms, which often have significant outdoor space and where it is generally easier to apply social distancing. we know that the transmission of the virus is lower outdoors and that it is easier to follow covid—secure guidelines in open spaces. that means we can also allow outdoor markets to reopen in a safe way that does not risk causing a second wave of the virus. then, from the 15th ofjune, we intend to allow all other nonessential retail, ranging from department stores

to small independent shops, to reopen. again, this change will be contingent upon progress against the five tests and will only be permitted for those retail premises which are covid—secure. today, we are publishing new guidance for the retail sector detailing the measures they should take to meet the necessary social distancing and hygiene standards. shops now have the time to implement this guidance before they reopen. this will ensure there can be no doubt about what steps they should take. while the vast majority of businesses will want to do everything possible to protect their staff and customers, i should add that we will of course have the powers we need to enforce compliance where that is required. i want people to be confident that they can shop safely provided they follow the social distancing rules for all premises. the food retail sector has already

responded fantastically well, enabling supermarkets to be kept open in a safe way, and we will learn lessons from that experience as we allow other retail to open. these are careful, but deliberate steps on the road to rebuilding our country. and we can only take these steps thanks to what we have so far achieved together. we will only be successful, we will only be successful, if we all remember the basics. so, wash your hands, keep social distance and isolate if you have symptoms and get a test. i'm now going to hand over to yvonne doyle, medical director of public health england, to take us through today's slides. thank you, prime minister. so, we have several slides here, and the first one is about what's going on in the population. so, you can see here in the yellow circle that 0.25% of the population is the average proportion

of the community that had the infection in a particular week, which was the 4th to the 17th of may. now, this work is produced through estimates, but also through a household sampling survey undertaken by the office for national statistics. and that tells us also that 137,000 people in the community in that week were likely to have the infection. this is some time ago. in any week recently, 61,000 have been infected. there is a range in that, but that is a fairly stable figure. and that leads us to look at the so—called reproduction of the virus between people. and you can see how that works. if the reproduction is three, then for every person, three others and three

more and three more, and that becomes very quick and fast in the community. however, if the reproduction is one, of course, much less so. if it is below one, even less than that. somebody meets several people before any transmission occurs, and this is good news, and at the moment, the estimate is that the reproduction is between 0.7 and one. could i have the next slide, please? so, this shows us the testing, which is always of interest, and the testing at the moment shows, as the prime minister has said, that 3.5 million tests have been done in total, and on a daily basis, recently, the tests have been around 73,000—74,000. and correlating with that, we have the confirmed cases here, and the confirmed cases on the 25th of may were just over 1600. and in total, that leaves us

with 261,000, over 261,000 tests in that period,from the 21st of march to the 25th of may. but you can see the trend here is downwards. this is a seven—day rolling average, because weekends we do have fewer tests confirmed and fewer tests taken. could i have the next slide? so, the hospital data continued to give as good news, because this shows us really how many very ill people there could be in the community who need admission. and the number of admissions estimated with the disease on the 23rd of may was 595. that's daily. and that's down considerably. that's good news. but also, those who are most unwell in icu, on mechanical ventilators, that's a decline of 15% from the 17th of may. so, we now have 12% of people on mechanical ventilation. and you can see here the four countries showing

broadly the same trend, in smaller numbers, that does vary, but you can see with england it's a fairly firm downward trend. so, this is good news for the population. could i have the next slide, please? and then, we're looking at this by region, and there are regional variations, and we can see here where london has a very distinctive curve, epidemic curve, and that is because london was first, really, to experience this epidemic in early to mid—march, and the other regions perhaps followed on, and the devolved administrations. so, that's mainly why you're seeing different patterns in the various regions. but the trend is mainly downwards. the numbers are small in certain regions, such as smaller in the south west, of course, in wales, so there is perhaps more oscillation flatness there, but you can see in the areas where you have had a large number of cases, there

is a definite downward trend. could i have the next slide, please? and sadly, here are the deaths. 121 deaths occurred on the 25th of may. this trend is also downwards, it's very welcome that the trend is downwards. it remains a very tragic event which really touches all of us everyday. however, i do want to point out that it does vary at weekends as well, and bank holidays may show particular downward trends, but we need to be prepared that we're not quite through this yet, but altogether, 36,914 people have died from covid disease who've had a positive test. and i think that is the last slide. thanks very much, yvonne. let's go to our questions from the public and the media. good afternoon. if uk travellers returning from abroad are going to be told

they must self—isolate for 14 days, what actual capacity will exist for health officials to perform spot checks, and will the government be ensuring those people self—isolating received food and medical essentials during this time? well, thank you, i will go to yvonne for the ability of health officials to do spot checks in a minute. but, stuart, what we're trying to do is to make sure that from thejune the 8th, when the measures come into effect, that people... we no longer have people coming into this country who can, as it were, reinfect the uk after we made this huge effort to reduce infections and get the r down. so, that's the reason for the quarantine system. we hope it will be bearable, we hope that people understand why it's necessary and we will take every step to ensure that we make

things as manageable as possible. i cannot tell you what provision we've yet made for people self—isolating, whether they will receive food and provisions, i think possibly, it would be reasonable to assume, as they come into the uk knowing the rules, that they will take steps to self—isolate somewhere where they can make sure that they are provided for, but obviously if they can't, then local authorities are ready to make sure that they are well looked after. yvonne, do you want to say anything about the spot checks? thank you, prime minister. stuart, we've been working hard over the recent months since we set up our contact tracing advisory service in march on a trial basis, and we're now working to connect that, and it will connect with the various places that

people will need follow—up and will need support and contact tracing. now, we've had some experience of this considerably in the contain phase between january and march, where our colleagues were very much connected with the ports and the border force. we were able to ascertain people who were not well when they were coming in and to follow those up. and that system will continue to be the case, where people are unwell 01’ we are concerned, then we would certainly want to follow them up through our contact tracing service. we are working with one of the airports to look at other ways that perhaps checks can be done through the airport. it has to be effective, it isn't always possible to ascertain people who don't have symptoms who may be about to develop them. as far as supporting people when they're actually isolating, we have got form in this in looking after people who are particularly vulnerable, those who are shielding and those who are not able to go out and get what they need, and that system, really,

is one that needs to imbue into the follow—up of people who are very vulnerable. so, this system will be set up to connect maximally, and we will be testing that from june. thanks so much, yvonne. we'll go to clare from harpenden. well, clare, again i'm going to hand over to yvonne to talk about transmission outdoors, but let me just say that it is vital that all of us continue to observe the rules on social distancing, on washing our hands and making sure that if we have symptoms,

that we self—isolate, get a test as we go forward. the only reason we've been able to make as much progress as we have, the only reason i'm able to announce that we are finally able to begin getting schools back, to begin getting retail back from the 1st ofjune, is because this country has observed the social distancing rules. so, clare, what i would say is obviously you should feel free to speak to people yourself if you feel that they are not obeying the rules. but the police will step in if necessary and encourage people to obey the law. prime minister, and clare, thank you for the prompt here to say that what we are doing going forward depends on the partnership between the population and the unlocking process that we're trying to support to happen. this isn't about going back to the way everybody lived before.

it is a responsibility socially to distance, to not go out if unwell, to remember that this virus can reappear. therefore, it is important that people maintain the basic hygiene and distancing rules that are there. and we're dependent on this on a voluntary basis. we want people to understand that this is the way we will be living for some time. thank you very much, yvonne. we go to the media, we go first to laura kuenssberg of the bbc. thank you, prime minister. you promised people maximum transparency. you knew your chief adviser had gone against the spirit of the lockdown rules, whether driving 30 miles to a local beauty spot when he was in county durham, supposedly to test his eyesight, or not self—isolating straightaway when his wife had symptoms. in fact, he returned to work at downing street when she was falling ill. dominic cummings would not express any regret about any of that this afternoon. do you? well, first of all, let me repeat

what you heard earlier today, which is that it's absolutely true that i didn't know about any of the arrangements in advance. what i think did happen was while i was ill and about to get a lot sicker, we had a brief conversation in which i think dominic cummings mentioned where he was, but i have to tell you that at that stage i had a lot on my plate and didn't start to focus on the matter until the story started to emerge in the last few days. my answer to your question is, do i regret what has happened? and, yes, of course i regret the confusion and the anger and pain that people feel. as yvonne has just been saying, this is a country that's been going through the most tremendous difficulties and suffering. and in the course of the last ten weeks, and that's why i wanted

people to understand exactly what had happened. you mentioned openness and transparency, laura. i thought it was important, and i tried yesterday to explain my version of what i heard from dominic cummings, but obviously i couldn't go into it in all the detail that i know you that you all want to hear and i think the public actually needed to hear. so, that was why we had the statement and the extensive questions that we had today. thank you, laura. can we go to robert peston of itv news? good afternoon. you heard yesterday the long account that dominic cummings gave us today of his reasons for driving 260 miles to durham. and inevitably, it leaves some questions unanswered. so, he said his main reason for driving to durham

was because of protests outside his house, but of course, in full lockdown, the risk of those protests is reduced, perhaps to nil. so, it seems a slightly odd reason. i wonder if you'd asked him about that. and secondly, his excursion to barnard castle, 30 miles, again seemingly breaking the rules, was to test his eyesight to see if he could drive back to london. but why didn't his wife, mary wakefield, who was better than he was, drive back to london or why didn't the government just lay on a car, given his importance? robert, you're a formidable journalist and those are very good questions. but i have to tell you that to the best of my knowledge, mr cummings has just subjected himself to your interrogation for quite a long time now about these detailed produced quite a substantial chunk of autobiography about what happened in the period from the 27th of march to the 14th of april.

it really feel that it would be wrong of me to comment further on what he said. i think people will have to make their minds up. i think he spoke at great length. to me, he came across as somebody who cared very much about his family and was doing the best for his family. as he set himself, reasonable people may disagree about some of the decisions he took, but i don't think reasonable people can disagree about what was going through his head at the time and the motivations for those decisions. and as i say, my conclusion is that i think he acted reasonably, legally and, as i said yesterday, with integrity and with care for his family and for others. those other questions you should direct, with respect, to mr cummings. and you had quite a go at that today. can we go to beth rigby from sky news?

yes, thank you, prime minister. many people who also really love their families made huge sacrifices that you asked them to make in this national effort. and for many people, mr cummings' account of why he appeared to break lockdown rules simply won't be good enough. your own scientific advisers have said that by backing him, you're undermining your government's key public health message at a time of crisis. are you comprising the government's response to this pandemic because you can't cope in number ten without mr cummings? well, thank you for that, beth. the most important thing in all this is to repeat our message. and you're absolutely right to dwell on that. the only reason we can make progress as a country, the only reason that we're able to get this disease under control, the only reason we've got the numbers of deaths down, the numbers of infections down

so that we're actually in a position with our track and trace and isolate operation really to deal with it is because people have obeyed the guidelines. you had an extensive opportunity to talk earlier on, to hear earlier on about how a member of my staff tried to obey the guidelines, and i heard your questions there and i thought they were good. i really can't add anything to those. people will have to make up their own minds. what i will say is that it is absolutely vital that continue to observe the government's public health message and continue to observe the guidelines. and i do think one thing that is in danger of getting lost in much of this, and people think it's banal but it so bears repeating that the single best thing you can do to stop transmission of this virus and to prevent yourself being infected by it is to wash your hands and to wash your hands repeatedly.

and that i'm afraid that is one message that we are going to keep repeating throughout this crisis. hello there. we've had warm sunshine today across england and wales, but the highest temperatures were in the south. over the next few days, though, we're going to see some of that warmer air recirculate around our area of high pressure, and increasingly that warmer air wafts its way northward. so, temperatures for many of us will be rising quite a few degrees. now, today's top temperature reached 27 degrees celsius in teddington in greater london. that's just into the 80s in fahrenheit. it felt warm in the sunshine with light winds, and just down the road from teddington, this is how the sunny skies looked in the hampton area about three miles away. now, towards the north west of the uk, it clouded over in both northern ireland and scotland through the afternoon, and this cloud is a cold front. it's been bringing some rain across northern ireland and scotland. as the front moves into our area of high pressure overnight, the front weakens. so, we could see a few patches of rain perhaps getting into northern england and north wales, but it won't amount to much at all. for many of us, it will become dry overnight, and it will be mild night as well, temperatures 10—14 degrees. tomorrow, our weather front

continues to push southwards. remember it's weak, so just areas of cloud working in across england and wales, and for some across central and eastern parts, there might be quite a nice sunrise to start the day. through the afternoon, the cloud thins further, so bright or hazy sunny spells getting through widely across england and wales, and it's going to be warm again, with temperatures in the low to mid—20s. now, for the far north of england, northern ireland and scotland, there'll be more sunshine around through the afternoon. a fresher feel to the weather, but still feeling warm in the sunshine, highs of 17—20 celsius. through wednesday, the warmer air starts to reci rculate and push northwards. now, this weak weather front could bring a few splashes of rain to northern ireland, but again not amounting to too much. the fresher air still with us across parts of central and northern scotland, but the slightly more humid air is in the south. that's where we'll see sunshine and the warmer temperatures, temperatures reaching 20—25 degrees, with some of that warmer air wafting its way into northern ireland through the afternoon. 0n into thursday, the warmer air pushes northwards.

now, in scotland, in glasgow, towards the end of the week, we could see temperatures up to 24 degrees. similar weather, actually, into the weekend ahead as well. as for further south, across england and wales, that's where we'll always likely see the highest temperatures, with temperatures peaking at around roughly 27 degrees celsius later on in the week in central england.

this is 0utside source on bbc news for viewers in the uk and around the world. we're covering all the latest developments and analysis here in britain and globally. the uk prime minister's top aide dominic cummings insists he won't resign and defends driving hundreds of kilometres during the height of the lockdown. no, i have not offered to resign. umm... did you ever consider it? no, i have not considered it. president trump commemorates fallen us veterans on memorial day, but he's been criticised for his behaviour over the weekend. the uk government has announced it will begin to reopen retail venues in june,

as long as progress in containing