this is bbc news with the latest headlines: pressure grows to shut more schools. unions are demanding an immediate two—week closure of all primaries and secondaries in england. we don't want to have to say the schools will close, but our fear is if we don't do something now they are going to have to be closed for much longer, for a much longer period, later on this month. a india begins a nationwide mock drill to test its preparedness for mass immunisation against covid—19. french police shut down an illegal rave that had been underway since new year's eve — with more than 2,500 partygoers.

hello, and welcome if you're watching in the uk or around the world — and stay with us for the latest news and analysis from here and across the globe. there's mounting pressure on the government to close all schools in england for face—to—face teaching for two weeks after the christmas holidays. teaching unions say a move to home learning for most children is necessary to curb the spread of coronavirus. one union has described it as, "the only sensible and credible option". it comes after the education secretary said all london primaries would remain shut on monday, rather than only those in some boroughs. here's our education correspondent, dan johnson. in liverpool, teachers are already at the head of the queue for tests, but there are more and more voices saying schools should not reopen on monday. it seems to me just to be inexplicable that the government is getting it so badly wrong.

we said all schools should be closed for the first two weeks, and we regret to have to say that. we don't want to have to say that schools will close. but ourfear is, if we do not do something now, they will have to be closed for a much longer period later this month. secondary schools will phase the return from the 11th of january, with year groups facing exams this summer in first. the government announced that the majority of england's primary schools would take children back on monday, except in some virus hotspots in the southeast. last night, it had to reverse the patchwork approach in london, so now all the capital's primaries will stay closed. it is good they are safeguarding teachers now, but i think school is the best place for them to be. as soon as they can get back, i think they need to be back. i think the government should have done this a long time ago. done a harder lockdown, done it sooner. and i think we should have been stricter a bit sooner, really. my wife is a key worker, so it means we have no choice

but to send our son in to school. whether it is the right thing or not, or how safe that will be for him, i think is where our concern is now. that we do not have another option for childcare, and we have to put him in, but at what risk? there is a lot for the government to consider here. the new strain, the rise in transmission rates, pressure on the nhs, and the demographics in different communities. it has always said keeping children off school would be a last resort. but there is growing pressure to extend closures beyond london and parts of the southeast, and teachers are calling for decisions to be made quickly, but clearly. we appreciate it is a fast—moving situation. the government must be getting different health advice all of the time. but schools do need to plan. we will be opening for quite a few pupils next week, and we will need two rotas of staff — one to deliver to vulnerable pupils, pupils without decent internet access, pupils with sen needs, and another to deliver

high—quality online learning. all of that takes time, and this decision could have been made two weeks ago. teaching unions are discussing the situation this afternoon, and at least one said it isn't safe for staff to be back in the classroom next week. everyone recognises the practical difficulties of learning from home, but that's already a reality for many children in the next fortnight, and possibly longer. dan johnson, bbc news, in south—east london. india has begun testing its plans for a huge coronavirus vaccination programme. the aim is to vaccinate as many as 300 million people by the middle of this year — that's just under a quarter of the india's population. of india's population. a full—scale rehearsal is now under way, involving tens of thousands of health workers and volunteers across the country. it's intended to plug any gaps in logistics, facilities and training before the vaccination programme begins.

0ur south asia editor, anbarasan ethirajan, has more from delhi. it is going to be a major challenge for the indian health care system because they have never done anything like this before. at the same time, you have to inoculate within a few months about 300 million people. india has a lot of experience in terms of mass vaccination programmes, for example, they had this polio vaccinations some time ago and the country is now polio free, so they have the experience and expertise, but they want to make sure the system will cope with such a huge number. this comes the day after the expert panel committee appointed by the government recommended the use of astrazeneca oxford university vaccine and it is being produced in india itself by one of the world's largest vaccine makers, the serum institute of india, and this is the south asian version of that, equal to this oxford university vaccine. and the government hopes that this will be the main answer to this pandemic because this vaccine

is cost—effective and it can be transported easily. it doesn't require a deep freeze kind of conditions. now, tens of thousands of workers were trained and they are being monitored on how the whole process will go off. and they also want to monitor the patients after the vaccination is given, whether there are any side effects, so the logistics, transportation and also the computer system, the software system to manage the whole thing, needs to be calibrated and that is what happened today. india held one of its biggest rehearsals for this vaccination ride. more than 2,500 people have attended an illegal rave in brittany, in defiance of french coronavirus restrictions. it started on new year's eve and went on for more than 30 hours. at least three police officers were injured in clashes with some party—goers. the prefect of brittany said officers were faced with a difficult choice between breaking up the gathering and keeping everyone safe.

translation: clearly the organisers were prepared to resort to violence if confronted by law enforcement. when we saw that, we decided to pull them back and control the area. and from 10pm on new year's eve, no vehicle was able to enter the rave site. you're watching bbc news. let's return now to the news that pressure is growing on the government to keep all schools in england closed for two weeks after the christmas break amid a surge in coronavirus cases. 0ne union has told staff it is unsafe to return to work, while others have called for learning to move online, as our political correspondent, helen catt, explained to me earlier. yes, what we have seen in the last couple of hours is a real ratcheting up of the pressure from teaching unions and several now have come out and called for this short, temporary switch to online learning, remote learning, across england. most of them are going for this idea of a

two—week period in which this would happen, so we have got the nasuwt among those. we also know that two unions, the national association of head teachers and the ascl, they've said this afternoon that earlier this week they started the very early stages of legal action against the government, which covers things like the scientific advice it is basing its reopening recommendations on and its plans for testing, so there is that happening as well. what might prove to be the most decisive intervention actually may come from the national education union, the neu. that is the uk's largest teaching union, 450,000 members and it covers the majority of teachers. it is advising its primary school members that it is not safe for them to return to the classroom next week and will provide them with a model letter they can send to their head teachers, which says it is not safe for them to be in the classroom because, it says, they will be with no social distancing,

no ppe and inadequate ventilation. so if you have lots of teachers who are then saying, "we can't come into work," there are huge questions about what that means for the ability of schools to reopen. questions also there around what happens with the children of key workers because of course when schools are shut, they are not completely shut, they are open for children of key workers, so that is the pressure that is coming from the union side, certainly this afternoon. so that pressure from the ground up might force a political change of direction, which we have already seen, of course, when it comes to education. and a lot of people might be asking the teaching unions, school staff, teachers and other staff, if the government wants to make education the absolute priority that it says it does, why aren't school staff right at the top of the queue for vaccination? so what the government has consistently said on this is it is following a criteria for vaccinating people set out by the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation, which is largely done on an age group basis.

the other thing is of course the department for education says that they are not closing schools because of safety concerns, but they believe there are measures in place which will stop the transmission of the virus or reduce it. the reason for closing primary schools in london, which was the decision that sparked all of this off last night, that u—turn there, was to try to help suppress the spread of the virus in a fast changing situation in the community. so that is their argument, that schools themselves are not inherently unsafe, so it does feel like there is a real collision course coming this weekend and of course for many parents it will leave them in limbo as to whether or not they will be able to drop their child off on monday morning or not. helen catt there. sian elliott is the women's equality policy officer at the tuc, which has 48 member unions. thank you so much forjoining us. and you are here not to talk about the rights and wrongs of school closure, but what employers and the government can do to support parents and carers in the event of schools being closed, indeed beyond the

period for which they are already delaying opening the buildings physically. and ijust wonder, first of all, what lessons have been learned from when schools were closed earlier last year? well, it seems not very many lessons have been learned because yet again we are finding ourselves in a situation where we have last—minute announcements and u—turns on schools, thus wreaking havoc for working parents. anybody with childcare responsibilities knows it ta kes childcare responsibilities knows it takes months of careful preparation and planning to balance annual leave because parents only have a finite amountand because parents only have a finite amount and that is meant to stretch across the course of a school year. those issues have been compounded during the last nine months of the pandemic, with working parents juggfing pandemic, with working parents juggling annual leave and care and this latest announcement coming at the 11th hour after weeks of speculation it has given many working parents an impossible situation, struggling to hold onto theirjobs and cared for their children. with the best will in the

world, i guess it is difficult for employers as well stop if they are in limbo, if it is a last—minute change of plan, to organise their businesses in such a way that they can businesses in such a way that they ca n allow businesses in such a way that they can allow parents, the people who have childcare responsibilities, to be at home? absolutely, but employers do have an option. they have been able to furlough working pa rent have been able to furlough working parent since april, but we know that some have been reluctant to do so and parents have no right to appeal and parents have no right to appeal and their request for white is refused. what we have seen the consequences of that are working pa rents, consequences of that are working parents, particularly mums, losing theirjobs and losing pay, so there isa theirjobs and losing pay, so there is a balance to be struck. employers do have an option and we think all employers should be offering furlough to all parents affected by these last—minute announcements about school closures. social media, as far as about school closures. social media, as farasi about school closures. social media, as far as i can see, is full of pa rents, as far as i can see, is full of parents, especially parents of primary age children, saying, yes, i might be able to work from home, but working from home and trying to

home—school a child of that age is no easy task. absolutely, even when schools have moved to online learning, high levels of supervision are required and that is assuming that each child in the household has access to a working computer, a good internet connection. that is not something that all families can afford and what we have found in the survey we did over the summer is that one in six mums, mainly those on the lowest paid, had to reduce their hours at work because of school and childcare difficulties and many of those at the lowest paid because only one in ten jobs on low pay can be done from home. so it is those that can least afford it who are paying the biggest price here. so there are many potential long—term impacts here, is what you are saying, from all of this? although presumably you would be encouraging employers and parents to look at flexible working options, so perhaps they can work later in the day if children are asleep then. you know, some way of working around the

situation? yes, and we saw that in the last drop down, but what we also saw is that it came at huge cost to mums' mental health and their well—being. they were working regularly from 4am late into the night. that is not always manageable, they have got to be some options here and what we are saying is they have got to be a whole system of how parents are supported in balancing work and care. we think, for example, there are no right to paid parental leave. that needs to be fixed. parents should have a day one right to be paid for their work and also a day one right to flexible work, so that they avoid this problem with balancing work and care, they can work with family and be employed as well. yes, flexibility, and i can see more employers being open to that, but paid parental leave perhaps being more difficult for employers to be open to right now but when they are underfinancial strain open to right now but when they are under financial strain because of the pandemic, surely? well, i think

thatis the pandemic, surely? well, i think that is one for the government because the impact of not providing that parental paid leave is that you're going to leave working families in debt, going without income, losing theirjob and that all has a significant cost. actually, if they provided parents with paid parental leave is you could stave off some of the impacts of poverty and debt the extra costs that that has on society. 0k, sian elliott, thank you very much for your time today. won, women's equality officer at the tuc. the headlines on bbc news... pressure grows to shut more schools. unions are demanding an immediate two week closure of all primaries and secondaries in england. india begins a nation—wide mock drill to test its preparedness for mass immunisation against covid—i9. french police shut down an illegal rave that had been underway since new year's eve — with more than two and a half thousand partygoers. sport, and for a full round—up from the bbc sport centre, here's gavin ra mjaun.

i'm good, thank you very much indeed. rangers have won the old firm derby, beating celtic i—0. flowers were laid ahead of the game, to remember the ibrox stadium disaster 50 years ago — in which 66 people lost their lives. 0n the pitch, however, celtic were enjoying nir bitton was sent off, for this foul on alfredo morelos. seven minutes later rangers scored, despite not managing a single shot on target, joe aribo's header going in off the shoulder of callum mcgregor. it's rangers' third derby win in a row, and puts them 19 points clear of celtic, at the top of the scottish premiership. spurs are up to third in the table — after beating leeds 3—0. it's their first premier league win for almost a month. harry kane had already scored from the penalty spot, when he put son heung—min through to make it 2—0. just before half time — that's son's 100th goal for tottenham. toby alderweireld made it three early in the second half.

ilhan meslierfumbled his header, goal—line technology confirming it had crossed the line. spurs are four points behind liverpool and manchester united. to the other games in the premier league this afternoon, crystal palace 1—0 up against struggling sheffield united, wolves travel to brighton later. then it's arsenal against west brom with mikel arteta looking for his third win in a row after a poor run of form. we after a poor run of form. needed those results, the sure, we needed those results, that's for sure, but we need a much longer run than that. there are things that we have done much better to get the result in the last two games, but there are things that still we have to do better and improve. confidence wise, obviously, it is a completely different scenario when you win lots of matches, everybody is playing with more freedom, more belief, the pressure. . . with more freedom, more belief, the pressure... gets released a little bit and then that is always a

positive thing to performances. fulham's premier league match against burnley at turf moor tomorrow has been postponed after further positive coronavirus cases at the west london club. their trip to tottenham hotspur was called off hours before kick—off on wednesday, with the club reporting several positive coronavirus tests. an outbreak at manchester city caused their game at everton on monday to be called off. and one other piece of football news for you... the french champions paris saint germain have confirmed mauricio pochettino will be their new manager. pochettino left tottenham just over a year ago — with plenty of speculation on where the argentinian would move to since leaving spurs. pochettino made 70 appearances for psg as a player, between 2001 and 2003 and has signed a contract with the club untiljune 2022. the former india captain sourav ganguly is in a stable condition after suffering a mild heart attack. he was admitted to hospital in kolkata with chest pains and he's said to be responding well to treatment. ganguly, who's a8, is now the president of the indian cricket board. england's cricketers

are heading to sri lanka, for their two—test series, which starts on the 14th, and there's been a really impressive performance from one player not involved in the tour. dawid malan, the world's best t20 batsman, steered hobart hurricanes to victory in australia's big bash league. he top—scored with 75, as they set melbourne stars a target of 165 and the visitors fell 21 runs short. britain's olympic gold medallist, luke campbell, takes on ryan garcia, in texas tonight, as he tries to move closer to a lightweight world title shot. garcia has built up his reputation, through his online videos as much as his fights — he's one of boxing's biggest social media stars. as for campbell, it's more than eight years since he walked away from the london olympics as a champion, and he's had his ups and downs as a professional. the winner of tonight's fight is expected to go on to face the wbc title holder devin haney. that's all the sport for now. a bit late on, we will be back with

more. the gavin, thank you very much. a number of hospitals across the uk are now facing a worse situation than at the peak of the first wave of the pandemic last year that's according to the president the pandemic last year. that's according to the president of the royal college of physicians. professor andrew goddard says nhs staff are braced for a difficult few months as a result of the new variant of the virus. 0ur health reporter, jim reed, has more. the pressure on hospitals in parts of the country shows no sign of easing off. staff are tired, some wards are at limit of their capacity. are at the limit of their capacity. all hospitals that haven't had the big pressures that they've had in the south—east and london and south wales should expect that it's going to come their way. this new variant is definitely more infectious, and it's spreading across the whole of the country. it seems very likely that we're going to see more and more cases wherever people work in the uk, and we need to be prepared for that. another 53,285 virus cases were recorded across the uk yesterday. 616 people lost their

lives to the virus. in london, the nightingale hospital is now being readied for action. it's thought it will soon start to take non—covid patients, or those recovering from the disease. vaccinations are seen as the way out of this crisis. 1 million doses of the pfizer—biontech jab have been delivered, but gps are being asked to postpone a second booster shot, giving it after three months rather than three weeks, to roll it out more quickly. senior doctors say one dose is still effective, but for some any delay to that booster is concerning. darren, a pharmacy technician, suffers from a serious breathing condition, and had his first vaccine dose on boxing day. it would be devastating, another three months, when you're so close, and you think, oh! you know, life... and if that's put off another three months, it's a huge impact.

huge. the government says tens of millions of doses of at least two covid vaccines will be available by the spring. getting those to the people who need them the most will be crucial as the nhs fights the winter wave of this pandemic. jim reed, bbc news. the government is to open 10 additional covid testing centres across england for hauliers heading to france, to speed up processing at ports. lorry drivers must show proof of a negative covid test within 72 hours before travel. the rule was put in place last month after the french government closed its border with the uk amid concerns over the spread of the new variant of the virus. the government is being urged to tackle the growing problem of men offering women rent—free accommodation in return for sex. the housing charity shelter says as many as 30,000 women in the uk may have been propositioned by landlords between march and september, after answering adverts offering a place to live.

peter kyle is the labour mp for hove, and shadow ministerfor victims — he's been campaigning for reform around ‘sex for rent‘ offences for several years now. there are people out there who are very good just exploiting people's vulnerabilities. over the last few years housing has become a vulnerability for a lot of people, so they have been exploiting it. then you add in the covid—19 period and of course there is an additional layer there of vulnerability that people are... can readily exploit, so that is what we are seeing at the moment, so people, young people, but also men as well as women, being entrapped, enticed and then exploited by people who are nothing more than sexual predators. is this already an offence? it is an offence, under the 2003 sexual 0ffences act, section 52, but it is a very old—fashioned law and doesn't quite relate very well to this, which is why there hasn't been a single prosecution under this

because the offence itself is an incitement to prostitution, so it means if a victim of sex for rent comes forward and the perpetrator is convicted, then the victim becomes a prostitute in the eyes of the law, so there is a real disincentive in the law as it stands today, so i am all asking for a specific sex for rent clause to be added to the legislation, so that victims are not stigmatised for it and are incentivised to come forward and get the support they need as victims, and to make sure we can start locking up some of the people who are exploiting young people this way. i will come on to what the government has said to you about this, if anything, so far, but first of all i want to talk about the websites on which these adverts are appearing. clearly there is a duty for them to act. how much progress have you had in conversations with various websites? several years ago i contacted all of the websites that had these on them. gumtree is a good example. within one week of receiving my letter, a director of

gumtree came to my office and sat with me and spoke about the problem, and a week after that they had eradicated it and they now police their website. craigslist is the problem. it is a us—based californian company and they have refused to engage with me and have a conversation on it, theyjust ignore, they ignore journalists and the media and governments as well. we have got to be really clear on what is happening here. they are profiting from the sexual exploitation of young people in our country. they are acting almost like pimps do, but if the police see someone in the street who's pimping out young people for sexual exploitation, they lock them up and get them off the streets, but because this is happening virtually via this website, craigslist, ministers and the home office act in a completely different way. i don't know why we are not treating these people according to their behaviour. just because they are an online platform, we should treat them for the sexual exploiters that they are... and we have contacted... they are getting money for every one of these adverts.

we have contacted craigslist for comment, but haven't heard back. so what in terms of conversations you have been having with the government, any progress there in terms of a concerted cross—party action on this? well, when i first started contacting government, which was several years ago now, it was david liddington, who was the secretary of state forjustice, and he leapt into action and clarified the law. then it became an enforcement issue, and it was amber rudd who was home secretary at the time and she set up a work programme and met with me many times to talk about this on a cross—party basis, but as soon as amber rudd stopped being the home secretary, her successors, sajid javid and then priti patel, they scrapped these work programmes and have not met with me, and engaged with this, and after three years of having this clarified as an offence, there has not been a single arrest or prosecution or conviction for sex for rent, and as you said in the introduction, there are 30,000 people this year alone who have been propositioned by this and the placement of an ad is a criminal offence, so we can actually prevent

people being subjected to the exploitation. and sometimes modern enslavement that this actually entails. so what i'm calling for, really quickly, is for enforcement to start happening now, for a clarification in the law in the destigmatisation for a new clause and then finally for craigslist, the platform which is facilitating the sexual exploitation of young people in our country, to be brought to heel and treated for the criminal activity that they are perpetrating and profiting from. it is absolutely hideous, isn't it, to exploit people in this way. people who, as you pointed out, are under additional pressure this year because of the pandemic, many with a loss of income and financially and in many other ways very vulnerable. is this a problem that you have come across in the area you represent? it is. it is an area which, an area of exploitation that has emerged recent years because areas that have a housing crisis, so short supply, high costs, then you add in university towns because you have a large number of young people

migrating towards it, and then the third element is actually ubiquitous access to online platforms such as craigslist, so you see places like brighton and hove and bristol and canterbury, london, edinburgh, cardiff and bristol, all of these places are really suffering as a result of this. but these are criminal perpetrators, these are people who exploit young people and they are very, very good at being manipulative, so whenever you see a new trend, whether it be the pandemic or a housing crisis, these people will find and exploit all of these opportunities to make people vulnerable. whenever they see a vulnerability in people, they will exploit it, which is why we need to really clarify the law. i am deeply upset that the home office has shrugged this to one side. they have refused to engage with me, they have refused to enforce and they are refusing to do the one thing that could really protect young people. this isn't necessarily the young people, or the kind of young people from a certain background

you would expect to slip into this exploitation. we are talking about young people going to towns, experiencing freedoms for the very first time, geographicalfreedoms, socialfreedom, and yes, sexual freedom as well and at that particular point in their lives people from all sorts of backgrounds are unknowingly vulnerable to the type of predatory behaviour we are seeing at the moment. and it needs government and the home office to really take it seriously. peter kyle, mp, talking to me earlier. an australian pro surfer has been praised for running into rough seas in hawaii to save a woman from drowning. here you can see mikey wright sprinting towards the waves after realising someone was getting swept away in the strong current. he then entered the water, which was full of sharp rocks, to reach the woman. he had to battle to keep hold of her as the waves crashed over them and swept them off their feet, but mikey eventually got her to the safety of the beach. a uk ticket—holder has started the new year by winning

the euromillions jackpot of nearly £40 million. 0ne ticket matched all five regular numbers and two lucky stars in the draw on friday night. the winning numbers were 16, 28, 32, 44 and 48, with the lucky stars 01 and 09. now it's time for a look at the weather with helen willetts. good afternoon. with the cold weather remaining for the rest of the weekend at least, the showers that are coming along are falling as snow over the hills, but even at lower levels, and so ice is a real concern because it is bitter out there. even with the sunshine, temperatures are barely reaching more than 3—4 degrees above freezing, and we have seen quite a number of showers around. so, under the cover of darkness, once again, temperatures will plummet. and it looks as if the showers will continue, as well, so that's obviously going to cause a hazard on the roads with the damp surfaces leading to ice. even in southern and eastern areas, we pick up a few more showers, so the widespread frost

meaning it will be icy.