and these stars are now using their talents to create a christmas concert for every care home across the country. # time forsinging christmas songs. # this is particularly close to my heart, because we lost my nan this year. she was in a care home. obviously towards the end we weren't able to go and see her. # rudolph the red nosed reindeer had a very shiny nose. # i've seen what impact music can have on people living in homes with alzheimer's and dementia. and where better to preview it than at brinsworth house, a nursing home for those who've served in the entertainment industry. she sings rosario and josephine were both performers. and now i sing in my dressing room or my bedroom, along the corridor, and in the loo.

i couldn't sing the carols because i don't sing carols in english. i only sing carols in spain. i do enjoy watching good shows done by great people. it feels like the most christmassy thing i've ever done in my career. we can do something good for somebody else, and how christmassy is that? # we wish you a merry christmas and a happy new year. # fiona lamdin, bbc news. time for a look at the weather, here's darren bett thank you very much. it's another mild day to day. the best of the weather it continues to be across the eastern side of the uk, where we've had lovely blue skies but further west the weather is changing because the cloud is rolling in. we are going to find the wind starting to pick up and we've already got

some showers affecting wales, the cloud increasing in northern ireland, scotland, down the western side of england, with some sunshine further east, but out towards the west that cloud is going to bring some rain into northern ireland by the end of the day. is that rain moves eastwards for a while it will turn heavy. it will push its way across turn heavy. it will push its way a cross m ost turn heavy. it will push its way across most of the country. as it heads towards the south—east of the country and east anglia by the end of the night the rain does tend to peter out and by the end of the night most places will be dry. perhaps a few breaks in the cloud in scotla nd perhaps a few breaks in the cloud in scotland allowing temperature 7—8 but elsewhere a very mild, breezy start on friday but a lot of cloud. we have more rain to come in from the west, heavy rain into the south—west of england and wales, could bring some more flooding. the wetter weather moves into northern ireland, northern england and through the day it will turn wetter in scotland. for east anglia and the south—east missing out on the wet weather for the time being. south—east missing out on the wet weatherfor the time being. it should be largely dry. windy everywhere, gales in south—west wales but because it's a southerly

wind and we have them i'll start it will be a very mild day tomorrow, temperatures could reach 13—14 degrees. but of course there will be some rain around and that wetter weather on that weather front will push its way eastwards overnight, eventually clearing away from eastern areas on saturday morning and then this is the main feature of the weather over the weekend, low— pressure the weather over the weekend, low—pressure to the north—west of the uk. that will push away that very mild airwe the uk. that will push away that very mild air we are seeing on friday. it will turn cool as the weekend goes on and it will also be quite windy this weekend too. we will see a mixture of sunshine but also a scattering of showers and most of the showers, particularly on saturday, will be coming into the western side of the uk. they could be heavy and thundery as well. some showers blown in through the english channel. for many eastern parts of the uk this is where it's going to be dry and there may be more sunshine. the time still in double figures, tempered somewhat by the rather strong and blustery winds. ——

the temperatures in double figures. more showers in southern parts of england across western areas and particularly into western parts of scotla nd particularly into western parts of scotland where they could be heavy for a while. perhaps showers easing down in the afternoon as winds become less strong. temperatures won't be as high, ranging from 8-10 c. that's all from the bbc news at one. on bbc one we nowjoin the bbc‘s news teams where you are. good afternoon. it's 1:30pm and here's your latest sports news. more former rugby union players havejoined legal action against the game's authorities for alleged negligence. it's after nine recently retired international players came forward to say they're suffering permanent brain damage caused by repeated blows to the head. our sports news correspondent, chris mclaughlin, is following the story. the legal action has been made official today? that's right. this is something we we re that's right. this is something we were expecting, these nine former

players and the legal firm representing them have today officially launched a letter of claim with the wru, the rfu and world rug by claim with the wru, the rfu and world rugby for negligence. we already knew that steve thompson, the former england player, alex popham and michael lipman were involved in this potential class action. two other names to bring you this afternoon, the former leicester and gloucester flanker, neil spence. he is currently 1m. and the former trans centre, adam hughes, just 30. retired in 2018 because of fears over a brain injury. also they are suffering from the early signs of dementia, or say that is due to repeated blows to the head, be that in training or in matches. that letter of claim will be lodged with the governing body. they have given them three months to respond to that. there has been a response from

the wru, the rfu and world rugby today for the i will bring you an excerpt on the bbc website was that it says, we are deeply saddened to hear of the brave personal accounts from former players. rugby is a contact sport and, while there is an element of risk to playing any sport, player welfare extremely seriously and it continues to be our number one priority. thank you, chris. elsewhere, premier league bosses will discuss the potential use of concussion substitutes at a meeting today. it's after the green light was given to trials to start next month. teams would be allowed to make two extra changes when a player gets a head injury. the plan is for it to be trialled in the third round of the fa cup, which starts in early january. there have been calls for concussion substitutes to be used in football for some time, to give players more protection. daniel parslow is a fomer york city defender, and retired from football last year after being concussed during a match. lots of concussion

injuries are delayed and, in my circumstances, it was exactly that. ifelt fine, i passed all the initial checks and it was not until two, three, four minutes later that the nausea, dizziness, unease on my feet and it was at that stage that we knew it was very serious. staying with football, and edinson cavani could be banned for up to three games, after being charged with misconduct by the fa. it's after the manchester united striker posted a message on social media which contained an offensive spanish phrase. cavani deleted the message and apologised when the potential meaning of the post was pointed out to him. his side take on sheffield united this evening in the premier league. more sports have been deciding their schedules for 2021. the start of the australian open tennis has been delayed because of the pandemic. the first grand slam event of the year was supposed to start in melbourne on the 18th january. it'll now begin three weeks later, on 8th february, and that'll allow the players to complete a two—week quarantine period, which is

currently required in australia. and get ready for the longest formula one season in history. there'll be 23 races next year, starting in australia on 21st march and running right though to abu dhabi on 6th december. all the details are on the bbc sport website and app. that's all the sport for the time being. see you later, gavin. that's all the latest sport. good afternoon. you are watching bbc news with jane hill to ta ke are watching bbc news with jane hill to take you through the next few hours of coronavirus news and more besides. we will start with covid, because we had that announcement from matt hancock talking about tiers in the last hour and a half or so. the leader of the opposition, sir keir starmer, has today called for the government to provide "clearer messaging" over the tiered restrictions and a stronger financial package to support workers who need to isolate. speaking to uk broadcasters

on a visit to bentley, south yorkshire, the labour leader said his concern about the tier system is that it is "just not strong enough to control the virus". i think we need to be led by the science on this. my concern about the tier system is it is just not strong enough to control the virus, and we have been seeing the numbers going in the wrong direction across the country in the last seven days in particular, and there are real gaps in the system, and i think there are many areas that are going to stay in tier 3, and they will be asking themselves, how on earth do we get out of this situation but do you fear that businesses in tier 2 might have to close again in the new year with a new national lockdown? many businesses are worried about the constant chopping and changing, because they adapt their business, sometimes it's ten days, 1h days until it changes again. that costs them and it makes it very hard. the uncertainty is hard. i am not going

to pretend this is easy, because we need restrictions, and no government could do this without some difficulty, but we had a tier system before lockdown that didn't really work for the it seems to me that it isn't really doing the work that the prime minister promised it would do. you say the system isn't working. what is your alternative? we need restrictions, and the bits that need mending most urgently other messaging, because it's been all over the place, work at home, don't work at home, go at it, don't go out to it, enjoy christmas, have a small christmas, so the messaging needs to improve. the support for people who need to self—isolate needs to improve. many people want to do the right thing but they don't feel they can right thing but they don't feel they ca n afford right thing but they don't feel they can afford to take time off work. we have been pushing the button on that. businesses need better support. if you are going to have restrictions, and we need restrictions, and we need restrictions, put the package around it that will make it work, and then the final bit is track, trace and isolate, crucial to the operation of any restrictions, still not working

properly put up all of that needs fixing fast. for christmas, no changing the rules, but there has been a change in tone. the prime minister needs to show leadership here. he has been weak on this, because the numbers are heading in the wrong direction, the medical advice is that this could lead to real problems in january, advice is that this could lead to real problems injanuary, and instead of the prime minister stepping up himself and saying, i will lead from the front, he is effectively saying, it's over to you, families and communities, and trying to shift the blame to other people to take responsibility for christmas, when he should be leading from the front. we have heard today that thousands of coronavirus tests are missing in wales. how concerned are missing in wales. how concerned are you about that? there is a concern around that. there was an upgrade of the system, so there was no there would be a lack of them coming onto the system. obviously we all want to see the most

comprehensive data and up—to—date data in wales and across the uk, because that helps us control the virus. on brexit, are you sitting on the fence? we haven't got a deal yet, so to accuse us of sitting on the fence when we haven't seen a deal... the prime minister said he had enough and ready deal a year ago. he needs to get on and deliver that and then we will look at it. i am very clear that no deal is not in the public interest, and therefore the public interest, and therefore the public interest lies in us getting a deal, but we are not sitting on the fence because the prime minister hasn't even delivered a deal yet. prime minister hasn't even delivered a dealyet. sur prime minister hasn't even delivered a deal yet. sur keir starmer, labour leader, speaking earlier today. let's get more now on the covid situation across the country. but first, scotland's first minister, nicola sturgeon, updating the holyrood parliament, ahead of first minister's questions. the total number of cases reported yesterday was 858,

4.4% of all tests reported, and the total number of positive cases is now 109,296. 1012 people are in hospital, 19 fewer than yesterday, and 50 people are in intensive care, one more thing yesterday. i also regret to report that in the past 2a hours a further 30 deaths were registered of patients who first tested positive over the previous 28 days. and the total number of people who have died under that daily measurement is now 4203. again, my condolences are with everyone who has lost a loved one. we will also shortly publish the latest estimate of the r number. we expect that it will show that the r number has risen slightly this week and is now around one again, as opposed to just below one. this underlines the importance of having taken a cautious approach to this week's levels review and also why we have reinforced our guidance of people ahead of the christmas period. and i want to briefly reemphasize today what guidance is. firstly, the safest way to spend christmas this year is to stay within your own household and in your own home,

and my strong recommendation is that is what people should do if at all possible. any interaction you do have with another household should, if possible, be outdoors. however, if you consider it essential to meet indoors with someone from another household, and i pragmatically recognise that some people might, you should limit both the duration and the numbers as much as possible. the five—day period over christmas is a limited window, not a period of time that we think it is safe to meet for. my recommendation to anyone who considers it essential to form a bubble is to not meet up with people in it on any more than one day over the christmas period and to keep the duration as short as possible. people should also limit numbers as far as possible, three households and eight people is a maximum that tries to account for the fact that families come in all shapes and sizes, but the smaller the better. and please make sure you keep a safe distance from others, wash your hands and services and keep windows open. and lastly, presiding officer, we recommend against travel from high prevalence to low

prevalence parts of the uk, and that includes advising against travel to or from scotland and tier 3 areas of england. the five—day window of opportunity over christmas is a pragmatic recognition that some people may not be willing to leave loved ones alone, and therefore it is an attempt to put some risk reducing boundaries around that. but let me reiterate that our clear advice is that the safest way to spend christmas this year is to stay within our own homes and households and to keep any interaction with other households outdoors. we now have a real prospect of a vaccination within weeks for many and within months for most. all of us, therefore, should do all that we can to keep each other safe until then. and finally, christmas aside, let me just briefly remind everyone how important it is to stick to the general rules and guidance. the postcode checker on the scottish government's website is there, if you don't know what the rules in your area are, but please don't visit each other‘s homes, stick to the rules on travel and follow the facts. face coverings, avoid

crowded places, clean hands and surfaces regularly, keep two metres distance from people in other households and self—isolate and get tested if you have symptoms. as always, doing all of these things is the best way of protecting ourselves, our communities and each other, and protecting the nhs as we go further into the winter. that update was from scotland's first minister, nicola sturgeon. toy shops say delays at british ports and across the international supply chain mean thousands of gifts might not arrive in time for christmas. retailers and food manufacturers want mps to urgently investigate the disruption, which has been blamed on a number of issues, including brexit stockpiling. our business presenter sima kotecha has more. we've heard for several weeks now about congestion and disruption at uk ports, and it is down to several reasons. brexit, stockpiling, workers working during coronavirus are having to work differently,

social distancing, and also, in some cases, an it failure that has exacerbated that situation. some toy shop owners say they have made orders several weeks ago and they are still stuck at customs. some vessels, we have been told, are being sent to european ports and they are being directed to go to those rather than come to the uk because there's just capacity to taken the produce. —— there's just no capacity to take in the produce. some, as you say, toy shop owners are saying it is costing them tens of thousands of pounds of things like lego and puzzles are really arduous to get at the moment because of this. now, the industry's lobby group, the toys... excuse me, hobby association are calling on the government to do more to ease this congestion. of course, anita, there is real concern about going forward. once the uk has left that you, there could actually be more delays

as additional red tape is added at custom checkpoints, potentially queues of lorries, potentially vessels not being able to drop off their shipment. and all of that could worsen the situation. now, you may have heard of the popular training toy company hornby‘s, they have said that they are stopping all exports from the uk until the 11th of january because of all of this disruption. so just an idea of how all of this disruption to the supply chain, all of this congestion is contributing to decision within companies. —— decision makers within companies. the headlines on bbc news... the health secretary says many parts of east and south—east england are to be moved into tier 3, because of a big rise in the number of cases. thousands of schoolchildren across england will have their return to school staggered

after the christmas break. the level of new coronavirus infections in wales could be twice what was previously thought, after a delay in reporting thousands of positive tests. a team of ten international scientists will travel to the chinese city of wuhan next month to investigate the origins of covid—19, according to the the world health organization. beijing has been reluctant to agree to an independent inquiry and it has taken many months of negotiations for the who to be allowed access to the city. paul hawkins reports. did it come from bats? did it use a host to jump to humans? were the wuhan wet markets where the first outbreak happened? just some of the key questions who scientists will try to answer when they arrive in the city next month. their goal is to find the truth about where the virus came

from and how it started. what we know so far is that on 3rd of january china investigated a virus infecting dozens of people in the city. a week later, chinese media reported the first known death. two months later, the who declared a worldwide pandemic. september saw worldwide deaths pass one million, half of which were in brazil, india, and the us, which in november became the first country to pass 250,000 deaths. finally this month, british woman margaret keenan became the first person in the world to be vaccinated outside trials. but the truth about the virus' origins has, until now, been somewhat elusive. last december, a chinese doctor at wuhan central hospital, li wenliang, warned his colleagues about the spread of a new mysterious disease but was told by police to stop making false comments and was later investigated for spreading rumours. he died a few months later

after contracting the virus. but china's initial attempts to downplay the outbreak, plus its reluctance to open up to the who, have led to accusations like this... china's secrecy, deceptions and cover—up allowed it to spread all over the world. there were also accusations that the virus was accidentally leaked from this laboratory in the city. no—one knows for sure. in the summer, a two—man who team that visited china had difficulty negotiating access to wuhan. i think it will be very important for the chinese government to have transparency so that the scientists can look at everything. so i think it will be important for everybody to have open, transparent communication. scientists say finding out the truth about how the virus started will be key to stopping future outbreaks. just how helpful the secretive chinese authorities will be this time remains to be seen. paul hawkins, bbc news.

hundreds of vehicles have been trapped overnight on a motorway injapan as heavy snow hit a wide area to the north—west of tokyo. some areas of the country have seen record snowfall, with minakami in gunma prefecture having nearly two metres of snow in the two days to thursday morning. the government has set up a special taskforce in response to the extreme weather. a major winter storm is predicted to bring deep snow and power outages on the east coast of the united states. more than 60 million people are expected to be affected, in an area stretching from colorado to maine. the national weather service is warning of "dangerous, if not impossible travel conditions and isolated power surges" in the worst affected areas. how much you should read into facial expressions? a new study suggests there's much

more than meets the eye and that the way we smile or frown reveals how much humans have in common. tom brada investigates. feeling confused? let me explain. a new study has found that people across the world, no matter where they are from, use the same facial expressions to convey how they are feeling. the human face is amazingly complex. it has more than a0 different muscles, allowing it to pull literally thousands of expressions. add to this, the geographical and cultural differences from country to country, person—to—person, and you might think that we would have little in common when it comes to how we use our faces. yet research carried out by the university of california berkeley, as well as google, found the very opposite to be true. alan cowin helped develop the technology and led the study. we looked at public videos that were posted on youtube,

largely from people's mobile phones. we were interested in capturing everyday situations. we analysed 6 million videos in total, and those came from 144 countries, so to analyse all of those facial expressions we had to build a machine learning algorithm that could take an image and spit out some measurements of facial muscle movements. from smiling at a fireworks display, to furrowing your brow and trying to console a sobbing child, the algorithm found that people use remarkably similar methods to communicate how they feel. and knowing this can produce some real—world benefits. in a hospital context, you might be interested in whether someone is feeling pain and be able to very quickly administer an anaesthetic. you might be interested in whether an infant is likely to develop autism. this study shows us that universal human emotional expressions are more complex than previously thought.

they say that the eyes are the window to the soul, but this study shows that the whole human face is key to understanding how someone really feels. in a world which often seems so divided, it is nice to think that in some ways we are alljust the same. tom brada, bbc news. an engineer investigating mystery power outages in a scottish village has discovered they were caused by a spectacular murmuration of starlings. neil mcdonald, who works at power firm sp energy networks, spotted thousands of birds "dancing" on overhead power cables. the starlings were causing the lines to bounce and the power to trip between them, causing power cuts in about 50 local homes in airth, near falkirk. you learn something everyday.

now it's time for a look at the weather with darren bett. hello there. the best of the weather today has been across more eastern parts of the uk, where it has been drier and sunnier. but we are seeing the weather changing from the west. and we have got this set of weather fronts coming in, the cloud already thickening up, and it is rain that is coming into western areas as well. through this evening, that wetter weather in the west will continue to push its way eastwards to many parts of the country. some heavier bursts of rain over the hills, but the rain does tend to peter out before it arrives across east anglia and the south—east, and we could see a few breaks in the cloud in scotland, with some showers following in from the west. but it is going to be a very mild night, a breezy night, and by the end of the night, most places will be in double figures. but friday looks like it's going to be cloudy for much of the country. we will see more rain developing, heavier rain in the south—west of england and wales, threatening some more flooding. that wetter weather pushes northwards into northern england, northern ireland and up in to scotland. probably still largely dry in the afternoon across east anglia and the south—east, but all areas will have a stronger wind on friday. it is a southerly wind,

gales likely in the south—west of england and south—west wales, but it is going to be very mild. we start off with double figures and temperatures will creep up to around 13, maybe even 1a degrees. as we head into the weekend, we start to push rain eastwards on friday night to clear away on saturday morning. and then this is going to be the dominant feature right the way through the weekend, an area of lower pressure is sitting to the north—west of the uk. that will feed in the showers, pick up the wind, and gradually we will see temperatures dropping a bit as the weekend goes on, as that very mild air on friday gets pushed away. quite a windy weekend, i think, with some sunshine and also some showers, which could be heavy. now, on saturday we are going to find showers pushing through the english channel once that early rain clears away from east anglia and the south—east from overnight. a lot of showers, though, for the western side of the uk, they could be heavy, potentially thundery as well. no doubt some will get pushed inland and further east, but not many. and we've still got the temperatures in much of the country still in double figures, but tempered somewhat by those

strong and blustery winds. still quite blustery on sunday, still some showers, again, mainly across western and more southern parts of the uk. perhaps the showers easing down a bit in the afternoon as the winds start to ease as well, but those temperatures not quite as high. we are looking at around 8 to 10 celsius.

this is bbc news. the headlines: 38 million people will be living under the tightest coronavirus restrictions in england by this weekend. the health secretary says many parts of the east and south of england are to be moved into tier 3, because of a big rise in the number of cases. i regret having to take the action that we have to take. i deem it necessary and there's a strong view right across government that these actions are necessary, but i also plead that personal responsibility is absolutely central to how we as a society should respond to this pandemic. thousands of schoolchildren across england will have their return to school staggered after the christmas break.