microsoft says it has detected and thwarted a series of cyberattacks from china, russia and iran, which have targeted november's us presidential election. amongst those responsible are the group accused of hacking the 2016 us presidential election. all three countries have previously denied allegations of cyber—espionage. rio tinto‘s ceo is stepping down over the mining giant's destruction of historically significant aboriginal rockshelters. jean—sebastien jacques, the chief executive of rio tinto, will step down by the end of march after failing to contain the fallout from the destruction of the ancient aboriginal site in western australia. thousands of migrants are spending a third night sleeping out in the open, on the greek island of lesbos after a fire destroyed their makeshift camp. authorities are investigating whether tuesday night's fires were started deliberately after covid—19 tests led to the isolation of 35 refugees. now on bbc news:

the week in parliament. hello again and welcome to the week in parliament. tighter covid rules for england but the health secretary aims for the skies. the so—called operation moonshot to deploy mass testing will allow people to lead more normal lives and reduce the need for social distancing. a startling admission about boris johnson's brexit plan. i would say to my honourable friend that, yes, this does break international law in a very specific and limited way. and a legendary composer warns that the curtain could fall on live theatre for good. there comes a point now where we really can't go on much more. we are bumping up against our

banks and all these things. all that to come and more. but first... the prime minister says it is not another national lockdown but from monday social gatherings of more than six people will be illegal in england. the strengthening of the rules with exemptions for schools and workplaces, weddings and funerals, follows a dramatic rise in the number of cases of coronavirus. borisjohnson used a downing street news conference to confirm the changes. in england, from monday, we are introducing the rule of six. the scottish government has introduced a similar rule. but as the prime minister talked of "operation moonshot" his hope of mass testing within months, mps warned their constituents can't get tested now. the health secretary was forced to make a second commons statement in three days. mr speaker, these are not measures we take lightly. i understand that for many, it will mean changing long awaited plans or missing out on precious moments

with loved ones. but this sacrifice is vital to control the virus for the long term and save lives. and i vow that we will not keep these rules in place for any longer than we have to. new technology offered new hope. we are developing new types of tests which are simple, quick and scalable. they use swabs or saliva, they can be turned around and 90 minutes or even 20 minutes. the so—called operation monshot to deploy mass testing will allow people to lead more normal lives and reduce the need for social distancing. i have long been pushing him for a strategic mass testing regime from the start. the who told us to test, test, test. but we are all fed up of undelivered promises and world beating. mass testing is too important to become another failed project. it is all well and good him talking about moonshot

and the prime minister telling us we will be tested every morning, even better would be simply delivering the extra testing that is needed now, not just headline figures. already, some experts have described this mass testing strategy as being fundamentally flawed. does the secretary of state think the prime minister is gambling on something that experts feel cannot be delivered? both the snp and the labour party opposite are making a huge mistake in opposing mass testing. it is an incredibly important tool in our arsenal. this is a urgent matter and needs a answer before the autumn bites, the bites. will he commit by the end of the month to make sure that anybody that has symptoms of covid—19 can get a test at reasonable place close to their home? that is of course my goal. my goal is for that to happen immediately. strict lockdown restrictions have been tightened further in bolton, said to have the highest rate in england. the lockdown in bolton will devastate the hospitality industry and the physical and emotional health of my constituents. can i ask the secretary

of state to ensure that my constituents can be tested in bolton as soon as require it? and as matt hancock reached for the moon on mass testing, a conservative mp brought him back down to earth. now on tuesday evening, hundreds of cars from across the country, and i mean hundreds from across the country, descended on telford, on the testing sites as directed by the booking system. tests quickly ran out, roads were blocked, people who had travelled from as far as way as cornwall and london were turned away and my constituents were no longer able to access test in the area and they in turn were sent elsewhere. i didn't know about this example in telford although i had heard of people telling me that there's been a lot of people directed to

telford in this instance. the broad problem is something we're absolutely looking at and i will go and take away the particular example and find out exactly what glitch caused it. at prime minister's questions, the labour leader, sir keir starmer, had his own examples of the difficulty of getting a test. yesterday, i spoke to a mum who lives in london. she has a four—year—old daughter who had a very high temperature yesterday morning. she phoned iii and was told to get a test. she tried to book it was told the nearest was romford at nine o'clock in the morning. she was told that there were no tests there. she was then told hayward, halfway to brighton. on exploration, no tests were there either. by lunch time, the mum was told the nearest place was telford, or inverness. the prime minister said the uk had done more tests than any other country in europe, thanks to the efforts of nhs test and trace.

this is an organisation that is working heroically to contain the spread of this disease. and it requires the public to trust this organisation and to participate. yesterday, the right honourable gentleman said it was on the verge of collapse. i think those were ill chosen words. i think he now regrets those words and i think you should reflect and he should take them back. mr speaker, hundreds of families are trying to get a test in the last week and they can't get one. i do acknowledge the number of tests overall but this is basic stuff. people who have covid symptoms are very anxious about themselves, their children and their family and what to do. they cannot go to work, they cannot send their children to school. it matters. if they cannot get a test, the prime minister needs to take responsibility. don't talk about the future, address this problem now. borisjohnson said the government would do more. and the world we want, we want to move to as fast as possible is a world

where everybody can take an enabling test at the beginning of the day, an antigen test to identify whether or not we have the virus or not, like a pregnancy test, so that we know whether we are able to live our lives as normally as possible. that is the vision the health secretary and others have been sketching out over the last few days. that is where we intend to get to. we all want test, trace and isolate to succeed. i've offered my support but the prime minister is ignoring a problem. if people are told to go hundreds of miles away, something is wrong. it has gotten worse. everybody here knows it because they have constituents telling them. there's been a massive increase in the number of people who need or want tests and particularly people who don't have symptoms. and we need to, i hope he agrees, we need to prioritise people such as nhs front line staff, our care workers who urgently need those tests. he accused the labour leader of undermining confidence in the system. what's undermining confidence is families being told go hundreds of miles away and they can't get a test.

that is undermining confidence. ijust want him to fix it. tell us what the solution is. we will all muck in and try to make it make sense to our constituents. but the prime minister said growing demand was a result of the success of test and trace. it is hard work. it's hard work. it's a big job. and they're doing a fantasticjob. i really think what they would like to hear is some praise and encouragement and support from the honourable gentlemen. mr speaker, why can't we just hear from the prime minister an honest answer? if he stood at the despatch box and said "i know something has gone wrong in the last couple of weeks, we've been getting hundreds of examples of people being sent all over the place are being told there are no test. i have looked into it and worked out what the problem is, here's my plan," people might be reassured. but as ever, he pretends the problem isn't there. borisjohnson said his government was working flat out and taking the tough decisions. the covid restrictions are being tightened in scotland too.

as in england, the number of people allowed to meet up has been cut to six. the scottish government has also launched its own contact tracing app for mobile phones. the first minister told msps the pandemic was accelerating. it is worth stressing this position is not totally unexpected. in recent weeks we have reopened significant parts of our economy, though many will be operating below full capacity, approximately 96% of businesses in scotland are now trading again. children have gone back to school. we have eased many social leisure and travel restrictions. people are going out more and travelling more. and all of that is positive. but as we release ourselves from lockdown we also release the virus and we give them more opportunities to spread and so it was always likely we would see a rise in cases. the sobering news here in scotland and across the rest of the uk over the next few days has been a reality check for anyone who thought

the pandemic was on its way out. it is clear that while we can still hope for further progress to be made over the rest of this year, there will be no swift return to normality. when we started to come out of lockdown, we made clear our view that there must be the agility to pause to go back as well as to go forward in this process. and also that there must be transparency in the science to back this up. the science tells us that across much of scotland, the virus is on the rise again and that there is no room for complacency. so we support the first minister's cautionary approach today. some unusually consensual exchanges at holyrood. now we may have left the european union but brexit is very much still with us as the clock ticks towards the end of the transition period on december 31. the resumption of trade talks in london was marked by a ratcheting up of the rhetoric with borisjohnson warning that the uk could walk away without a deal if there isn't an agreement by

the middle of october. the prime minister's plan for trade within the uk after brexit involves re—writing parts of the oven—ready divorce deal on northern ireland and state aid — a deal he agreed last year. a minister admitted this internal market bill breaks international law and the government's top lawyer, sirjonathan jones, resigned. borisjohnson‘s predecessor was among the critics. the united kingdom government signed the withdrawal agreement with the northern ireland protocol. this parliament voted that withdrawal agreement into uk legislation. the government is now changing the operation of that agreement. given that, how can the government reassure future international partners that the uk can be trusted to abide by the legal obligations of the agreements it signs? i thank my right honourable friend for the question. we have worked with the eu

in the spirit of good faith and i know we continue to ensure we do implement the arrangements which uphold the fundamental principles behind the protocol, and our focus continues to be to secure the protocal and the joint committee through trade agreements. but the withdrawal agreement pros and cons are not like any of the treaty. it was written on the assumption that subsequently agreements could be reached between us and the eu on the detail. that is the entire purpose of the specialised joint committee. and we continue to believe that it's possible but as a responsible government we cannot allow businesses to not have certainty for january. the secretary of state has said that he is committed to the rule of law. does he recognise that the adherence to the rule of law is not negotiable? against that background, will he assure us that nothing proposed in this legislation does or potentially might breach international legal obligations or international legal arrangements that we have entered into? i would say to my honourable

friend that, yes, this does break international law in a very specific and limited way. we are taking the powers of this through eu supply contact of direct effect required by article four and a certain very tightly defined circumstances and there are clear precedents for the uk in a certain very tightly defined circumstances and there are clear precedents forthe uk and indeed other countries needing to consider their international obligations. and i would say to members here, many of whom who would have been in this house when we passed the finance act in 2013. an argument disputed by george osborne, who was chancellor at the time. labour said boris johnson had agreed the northern ireland element of the divorce deal. the prime minister personally renegotiated it, campaigned on on it, legislative for it, and ratified an international treaty. with these latest moves some fear that the prime minister is once again using northern ireland as a political football to suit his wider political means. northern ireland's mps queued up to add their criticism. meanwhile, the welsh

and scottish governments say the bill is a power grab, allowing the uk government to make decisions that should be theirs to make. at prime minister's questions, the snp leader seized on brandon lewis's comments. this legislation breaks international law but it also breaks domestic law. the prime minister and his friends are parcel of rogues, are creating a rogue state — one with the rule of law does not apply. what is the prime minister think that he and his friends are above the law. on the contrary, this uk internet market bill is about protecting jobs, protecting growth, insuring the fluidity and safety of our uk internal markets and prosperity throughout the united kingdom, and it should be welcomed, i believe, in scotland, in northern ireland,

wales and throughout the whole country. a liberal democrat mp pursued the argument in a different way. the prime minister may be aware that there are some scottish nationalists who want scotland to follow the example of catalonia and to have a wildcard independence referendum. now, i oppose that because i think it is illegal. if the prime minister thinks it is acceptable for his government to ignore international law, on what basis would he oppose it? myjob is to uphold the integrity of the uk, but also to protect the northern irish peace process and the good friday agreement. and to do that, we need a legal safety net to protect our country against extreme or irrational interpretations of the protocol which could lead to a border down the irish sea in a way that i believe — and i think members

around the house believe — would be prejudicial to the interests of the good friday agreement and prejudicial to the interests of peace in our country, and that has to be our priority. but the european commission has threatened the government with legal action. deal or no deal, there will be changes when the transition period ends and the uk no longer has to follow eu trade rules. a customs expert told mps he fears lorries could be turned around at calais and sent back to the uk. witnesses to a commons committee warned many businesses weren't ready and there weren't enough customs agents to process the paperwork. the biggest absolute fear is that a truck is sent to calais and they send it back. i mean, that is a genuine fear. is that if the paperwork is validated whilst the vehicle is crossing the channel and that validation fails because the transit documents are not correctly authenticated or there aren't any documents, or the entry is not lodged in france,

it is coming back. and ijust think that the fear is that the daily mail headline of "we sent our goods to europe and they send them back" is a matter of time, really. the tools are kind of there to get it right. the car park in kent is because we have not got —— got it right. it's of our making, if you'd like. if something arrives in kent it is not prepared, it's because we have not prepared it. it's nothing to do with the eu, it's — this is our problem to solve and it has always been our problem to solve. some of the fundamental things that need to change are simply not happening fast enough. if we go back to the primary which is about customs intermediaries and having that number of customs agents available to deal with the increased number of declarations, some 200 million additional decorations

on top of the 50 million that are done and the rest of the world at the moment. on top of th 590we are a long way off to being able to recruit those customs agents. richard burnett. time now for a brief look at what else has been going in the world of politics. labour has tried to force the government to implement the initial recommendations of the inquiry into the grenfell tower fire three years ago, in which 72 people died. labour's amendment to the fire safety bill failed but a minister repeated the government's pledge to implement the findings of the inquiry. it is the government's intention, and we have already stated the principal intention to follow through on the phase one recommendations, and we are not resigning from that one job. —— onejot. -- one jot. £15 billion could be wrongly paid out in the government's fellow scheme. —— furlough. jim harra told mps on the public accounts committee

that the "error and fraud" rate could be between five and 10% of spending on the scheme. in terms of actual cash numbers, what does 5% to 7% now look at in terms of the money being paid out? i believe that the last figures that we put out said that we had paid £37 billion on the scheme? i think that's correct. so it would be 5% to 10% of that figure would be the assumption we are basing our — sorry 35.4 billion was the last amount we said that we had paid out on this scheme. a bill denying prorogue to killers who refuse to disclose the location of their victims remains has cleared its final parliamentary hurdle. the prisoners disclosure of information about victims bill is known as helen's law after helen mccourt, whose killer ian simms was freed from jail without disclosing where her body was. the bill means prorogue boards will have to take into account —— the bill means parole boards

will have to take into account an offender's non disclosure of information about a victim's remains, or the identity of child victims in indecent images. as the lords passed the bill, there was a tribute to helen mccourt‘s mother marie. she has worked tirelessly and with great dignity, notjust on her own behalf, but on behalf of of the small number of families who find themselves in this most awful, awful position. three quarters of black people don't believe their human rights are protected, as well as those of white people. that's according to a survey commissioned by the human rights committee. the study also suggested that 65% didn't think the nhs treated them equally, and 85% felt the police weren't fair. the report's authors appeared before the committee to expand upon theirfindings. a really interesting interview was a young woman from kent who ended up getting stopped and searched

and after this whole debacle, she actually spoke to a few friends who were not black themselves, and they spoke about the situation, and it seemed as though it was not a normality for any of her friends, to the point where they were quite shocked and in fear of her own safety. and she expressed that, you know, while there's a high number — while there is not a high number of black females they get stopped and searched, she acknowledged a very familiar process with the black community. now there's never any shortage of political theatre at westminster but the curtain has come down everywhere else because of the coronavirus pandemic. the composer and theatre impresario andrew lloyd webber says the performing arts are now at the "point of no return". he wants the government to announce a date when theatres can re—open. injuly, lord lloyd webber organised a concert at the london palladium to see if it would be possible to re—open theatres safely

and at full capacity. but he told mps on the culture committee that theatres couldn't operate with social distancing. it would be impossible. the margins, say, for a big musical are very, very tight. i mean, if you were to take — say you were talking a really big musical, like the disney frozen that is hopefully coming to dury lane next year, say they were operating at £500,000 a week. the biggest slice of that of course goes in vat, and i reckon disney would be very lucky to make their investment back on that show for perhaps two or three years at least. at least. and that's really at full capacity. the margins are incredibly, incredibly tight. just been absolutely devastating and catastrophic for the theatre industry and the live sector. over 300,000 people are employed by theatres alone, and you can more than double that when you look at what's

going on in the live sector, and that doesn't even count the ancillary services that support what we do. that's over a million people employed by the sector, that is huge, and that makes us uniquely vulnerable as a country in dealing with the pandemic, because the arts and live theatre, not only one of our biggest assets in the strongest experts and things that bring in tourism — over 34 million people come to this country every year, largely driven by the opportunity to see theatre — and if we don't actually do something to address that and don't find the means of actually being able to open theatres and venues again, then a million people will still be without work. it's been a very long time and many of them have had no support. it's a really bad, catastrophic time, and we need to find a way out of it. there comes a point now where we really cannot go on much more. we are bumping up against our banks on all of these things. because, as i say, theatre is an incredibly, incredibly labour—intensive business. in many ways, putting on a show

now is almost a labour of love. lord lloyd webber. all elections to public office have been cancelled for the duration of the pandemic in a blow to psephologists and political anora ks alike. the house of lords has been making sure that one controversial election for new hereditary peers doesn't slip through the net. 92 seats in the lords are reserved for hereditaries under changes introduced in 1999. and only hereditary peers can vote for a replacement when one of their number dies or retires. the next vote was due to take place this month, but peers have postponed it until next year. it sparked a wider discussion about how peers can stop the chamber from increasing in size after borisjohnson created 36 new peers injuly. at the moment, no elections to any public office are being held. elections were postponed in may, no by—elections to local councils are being

held, and i think if we — if the only place which was holding elections at this point was a hereditary peers by—election in the house of lords, it would make us look even more foolish — if that's possible — then we look today. live peerages go back to the reign of henry iii, in 12 something or other. and there have been regular live peerages. by chopping off the heads of the lords when they fell from favour. this is no longer recommended procedure. but his one way to address the question of the size of the upper chamber! that was the week in parliament. alicia mccarthy will have the latest from the commons and the lords on monday night at 11 o'clock on bbc parliament. but for me, david corner kick, goodbye for now. —— but from me, david cornock, goodbye for now.

hello. some warmer weather on the way for many of us to end the weekend, but also some heavy rain over the weekend in parts of scotland. and in fact, during thursday, the rain clouds were gathering and for scotland and northern ireland for friday morning, some wet and windy weather on the way as this area of low pressure drives the weather front south across the uk. this is how it looks as we start the day. this is where the rain will be sitting first thing in the morning. for much of the uk, the day starting dry. temperatures at their lowest with the clear spells in the east and south—east of england. some rural spots, around five or six degrees. so through friday morning, the wet weather will push south across scotland and northern ireland. some of the rain quite heavy but by the afternoon, it's brightening up. there'll be a few blustery showers with the sunshine into northern and western scotland. the rain reaching into northern england at this stage, most substantial to the west of the pennines and into north wales. now, it's a blustery day wherever you are, but particularly through northern england, northern ireland and scotland. these are average speeds, some gusts around a0 mph or so. south of our rain band,

it's mainly dry. parts of eastern england seeing a few hazy, sunny spells. this is where we'll see the high temperatures 20, maybe 21 degrees. for friday evening and night, a fairly narrow band of rain makes further slow progress south through wales and england. behind it, some clear spells and further blustery showers into parts of northern ireland, northern and western scotland. a cooler night in eastern scotland, a milder night across much of england as the area of cloud on this weatherfront, not much rain, makes further slow progress southwards. it is still around on saturday morning, still capable of producing a few showers or a few spots of rain, so don't be surprised if you encounter this. still a few showers in northern ireland, towards northern and western scotland, still quite blustery here, but many places having a dry saturday with broken cloud and sunny spells. temperatures for the most part into the mid to high teens. this area of rain will push in towards northern ireland and scotland as we go through saturday night. but particularly in scotland, saturday into sunday and especially in the hills of the west, it is looking very wet. some spots may end up

with over 100mm of rain, bringing a risk of flooding. whereas elsewhere on sunday, a surge of sunshine and warmth coming from the south which will continue into monday. that's your forecast. bye— bye.

welcome to bbc news, i'm rich preston. our top stories: microsoft says it's thwarted a series of cyberattacks from china, russia and iran, targeting the us presidential election in november. the boss of one of the world's biggest mining companies, rio tinto, has resigned over the destruction of a sacred aboriginal site in western australia. thousands of migrants are spending a third night sleeping out in the open on the after their camp burned down. we report from the remains of the camp on the greek island of lesbos homes, livelihoods gone in an instant. it's like a bomb has hit this entire area. at least seven people are dead after a hundred wildfires rip through the us west coast.