this is bbc news, i'm lukwesa burak. the headlines at 8pm... lockdown eases in wales — the first uk nation to lift travel restrictions within its borders. borisjohnson says england's roadmap out of lockdown remains on track — as it's revealed covid boosterjabs may be available as early as september. mp kenny macaskill says he will quit the snp to stand for election within alex salmond's new party. it's a party for those who support the cause of independence, and who want to make sure that we grasp that nettle, which is badly required because of the risks and challenges that we face. the un says its received shocking reports of violence in myanmar — around 90 pro—democracy protestors are reported to have been killed by security forces.

work continues to refloat the giant container ship blocking egypt's suez canal —— 1a tug boats are now involved in the operation. and at 8—30, talking movies looks ahead to this year's oscars — which, due to the pandemic, will be unlike any previous academy awards ceremony you've seen. that evening and welcome to bbc news. —— good evening. wales has become the first nation in the uk to relax the lockdown measures, which have been in place since december. the stay local rule has been scrapped, in favour of unlimited travel within wales, and alowing groups of six people

from two households to meet up outdoors in private gardens. next week, will see some rules change in england and scotland too. our wales correspondent, tomas morgan has this report. things are beginning to look a little brighter in wales today. as beaches across the nation are open once again. travel is allowed, much to the delight of these visitors to barry island. breath of fresh air. the kids love being out here, ice—cream and chips. it feels amazing. really hot. being out with our family. tourism has also partially re—opened. a welcome relief for the mcleer family, who have travelled to saundersfoot after being in lockdown in merthyr tydfil since 19th december. we started off this morning at 8:15, the traffic was very good, weather was very good. we got down here at about quarter to ten. we were saying, you know, "we've escaped, we've escaped." there is that feeling. although travel within wales

is permitted, crossing the border either way is still not allowed, other than for work, childcare or emergencies. some holiday premises rely heavy on the english coming here. however the prospect of any tourists coming back is good news for those in the industry. getting the owners back today will really help bring the park back to life. we only have a handful of local owners, people within the county, but that is a start to the season where we can start looking forward to getting back to some sort of normality. last year when restrictions began to lift, beauty spots across wales were flooded. today people were more cautious, planning their visits carefully. i was here five in the morning and i think there was only two other cars here. but i think it is more of a shock, knowing everyone�*s still in this phase of kind of going, "is it real? "are we allowed out now? "is it ok to go out?" national parks and natural resources wales have asked people to be sensible.

along with travel six people from two households are also able to meet outside from this weekend and organised outdoor activities and sports for under 18s can resume. any travel further afield will be discussed at the welsh government's next three weekly review on thursday. but for now, an ice—cream on the sand will do in this glorious welsh sunshine. tomos morgan, bbc news, south wales. and we'll find out how this story — and many others — are covered in tomorrow's front pages at 10:30 and 11:30 this evening in the papers — our guestsjoining me tonight are the broadcaster, penny smith and the chief sports reporter for the sun — martin lipton. people over 70 could be given what have been called, boosterjabs in september, in order to protect them from new variants of coronavirus.

the government has indicated that nhs workers and care home staff would also be eligible. the vaccines minister said eight different vaccines are expected to be available in the uk by the autumn. here's our health correspondent, katherine da costa. nearly 30 million people in the uk have at least one dose of the covid vaccine. scientists are looking at whether booster shots may be needed. they could be rolled out to the over 70s, health and care workers and people vulnerable from september. the immune system tends to become forgetful as people become older. so immunity wanes over time. so this new plan to give boosters has a lot of merit. viruses continually mutate to survive. some mutations cause concern if they make the virus more harmful. 0ne mutation called e484k has been

found in the south britain and brazilian viruses. it helps the virus escape immunity from past infections. current vaccines do provide some protection, but may not be as effective against these variants. france, germany and poland are seeing in a surge in infections. there is concern lifting travel restrictions with europe could increase the risk of bringing new variants into the uk. and undermining our own roll—out. there is interconnecdness in the worlds we live and people move from one place to another and viruses move and there is connectedness in vaccine production. this is a complicated task enough now and it is not going to get easier as we look towards what to do next. scientists are working

on adapting vaccines, scientists are alreadu working on adapting vaccines to combat new versions of the virus, but keeping cases low while ramping up vaccinations the best way to give us faith we will see an end to this pandemic. the latest government figures show there were 11,715 new coronavirus infections recorded in the latest 24—hour period. 58 deaths were reported in the latest 2a hour period, that's of people who died within 28 days of a positive covid—19 test, taking the total number to 126,573. more than 400,000 people have had theirfirst dose of a covid vaccine, in the latest 24—hour period, bringing the total to more than 29.7 million. almost 3.3 million people, have now had both doses of the vaccine.

coronavirus restrictions are being stepped up in parts of europe, as a third wave of infections continues to sweep the continent. eu states have seen some of the deadliest outbreaks of the pandemic, and are racing to vaccinate people. the prime minister of poland, has warned that the country's hospitals may not be able to cope with soaring covid cases. the uk kent variant of the virus is now responsible for 80% of all infections there. its government has brought in tighter restrictions affecting shops, supermarkets and churches. tougher measures have also been brought in paris and several other parts of france. residents face more stringent police checks, with people in high—risk areas not allowed to travel more than ten kilometres — or six miles — from home, except in emergencies. well, in germany cases are predicted to rise as high as a 100,000 a day, as our berlin correspondent,

damian mcguinness explain. at the moment, cases are around 20,000 a day, but that is a steep rise from what they were even a month or two ago, the beginning of this year, after the christmas lockdown. there had been hopes that by easter germany would start opening up, a plan had been set up in order to get the economy going. those hopes have now been dashed and that is because of the new variants. so what we see when you look at the sorts of infections that are happening, the majority of those are the uk kent variant, and angela merkel herself has said this variant is more infectious, potentially more deadly, and it is also causing this high rise in cases. that is what has got officials worried, and that is why the german health minister this afternoon has expanded now on his thoughts, and he said he believes that a complete lockdown immediately is what he wants, should be implemented for the next up to two

weeks really, now this now this being germany, it being a federal complicated system, you can'tjust, the health minister can'tjust decide to impose that, so he will presumably want to start talking to other political actors, from regional leaders to other government members, and will probably try to start pushing for a more severe lockdown , really, than the one we have already. that is what we are seeing in society as a whole, society is really divided. 0n the one hand you have had people who have had enough of restrictions, but you have a lot people, a good third or 40% of the population, demanding tougher restrictions because everyone is seeing these cases go up, and at the moment, the restrictions are not holding that back, and the vaccination programme is still slow, big numbers of vaccines are due in april. they are not here yet. until then, it seems to be the case that more severe lockdown might just be necessary.

that is certainly what many government ministers are calling for. the first minister of scotland, nicola sturgeon, has said there are "significant questions" over the appropriateness of her predecessor, alex salmond's plans, to return to public office. mr salmond launched a new party yesterday called alba, which will contest the scottish parliamentary elections in may. it's emerged that mp kenny macaskill has left the snp to join the alba party. 0ur scotland correspondent, jamie mciver has the details. nicola sturgeon wanted to focus on the snp's own election campaign today, but instead she's been facing questions about another party's campaign. the new party led by her former friend and mentor, alex salmond. ms sturgeon questions both his motivation and suitability to return to public life. it's not an opportunity to gamble with the future of the country. i know from knowing him well in years gone by, alex salmond is a gambler, it is what he enjoys doing,

but this is not the time to gamble with the future of the country. this is the time the make a serious choice. strong experienced leadership, a policy programme for recovery and a chance to choose independence. the alba party. mr salmond unveiled the new party yesterday. he says he wants to create a so—called super majority at holyrood for independence. he got a boost today when a prominent member of the snp defected. kenny macaskill was the scottishjustice secretary and is now a westminster mp. this isn'tjust the alex salmond party or even the alex salmond and kenny macaskill party, it's a party for those who support the cause of independence and who want to make sure that we grasp that nettle, which is badly required, because of the risks and challenges that we face. the scottish election is still six weeks away and it's hard to predict how much support mr salmond's new party may attract, but the battle between the snp and his party may well become the defining theme of this campaign.

reports suggest that at least 90 people have been shot dead in myanmar, on its bloodiest day since last month's military coup. the foreign secretary, dominic raab, said the killings marked a "new low". security forces in myanmar have cracked down on new protests, as leaders of the coup marked armed forces day. protesters took to the streets of yangon and other cities. laura bicker reports. defiant, determined and undaunted, even when faced with bullets. they scream in protest, armed with sticks and slingshots. street battles sprung up in over a0 towns and cities across the country. protesters sheltered behind makeshift barriers in their neighbourhoods, but the gunfire at times appeared relentless. one by one, they carried — and counted — their injured and dead.

this is the deadliest day since the military staged its coup on february the 1st. state tv had issued this chilling warning. to the youth who own the future, you should learn from the tragedy of earlier ugly deaths that you can be in danger of getting shot to the head and back. convince and prevent your friends, before doing something wrong. earlier, the generals had gathered in celebration of armed forces day. and in his address, myanmar�*s military leader, general min aung hlaing, promised the country would hold elections. translation: violent acts that affect stability - and security, in order to make demands, are inappropriate. but the people of myanmar want their elected government back, and appear ready to continue their protest, even if it means that their cities have to burn in the process.

laura bicker, bbc news, bangkok. efforts have resumed to refloat the giant container ship blocking egypt's suez canal. the suez canal authority says 1a tug boats are involved in the operation to free the evergiven, which has been stranded since tuesday. more than 300 vessels are currently waiting for passage through one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. 0ur correspondent, sally nabil, sent this update from the scene. up to now, no—one knows when the giant ship can be refloated. there is a state of uncertainty here. the authorities say they cannot give an exact time frame, they also say that the ship ran aground due to a number of factors — not only bad weather, but there might be human and technical errors too, and they are going to look further into that, when they start an investigation. the problem here is the congestion. a large number of ships are waiting

to continue theirjourney and no—one knows when navigation can be resumed in the suez canal. for egyptians, the canal is not only a source of national pride, but it's a source of much—needed foreign currency. it is one of the most important trade routes around the world. the authorities here are trying to send a message of reassurance, saying they are doing the best they can, to bring things back to normal as soon as possible. but the longer the ship is stuck, the more disruption there could be to global trade. the headlines on bbc news... lockdown eases in wales — the first uk nation to lift travel restrictions within its borders. boris johnson says england's roadmap out of lockdown remains on track — as it's revealed covid booster jabs may be available as early as september. mp kenny macaskill says he will quit the snp to stand for election

within alex salmond's new party. the government's programme to help uk householders insulate their homes has been scrapped. the green homes grant reached only 6% of the 600,000 homes the chancellor said would be improved by march 31st. i've been speaking to our environment analyst, roger harrabin, who explained what's gone wrong. it's been a complete mess from the start. the government at first blamed covid that householders were reluctant to have tradespeople into their homes because of fears of catching covid from them. but the truth is rather broader than that, that loads of people, myself included, actually, tried to get a grant to insulate their homes, butjust simply couldn't get through because all of the contractors were so busy, they were just completely swamped with calls. and if they did get through, they had difficulties with the administration. then there was a further problem

that the administration was so complicated and so badly run that often checks didn't get paid, so it was a great scheme to try to get people back to work. in fact, it appears in some cases to have costjobs because firms have gone bankrupt because they didn't get paid enough. and then there was the problem of overcharging where some contractors have clearly gone in, quoted a price, not been properly checked and ripped off the government and you and me in terms of our taxes. so there really is a catalogue of multiple failures. and now the money that was allocated for it for next year is going to be transferred into a separate fund being administered by local authorities, which is running a lot more smoothly. the original one, the main one, has been run by an american contracting firm, consultants, and that is doing really very badly indeed. in context, i mean, how important was this scheme? it was absolutely vital. we had 19 million homes in the uk

in need of proper installation. uk cannot hit its climate change targets with badly insulated leaky homes like the ones we have. and the government is going to have to come up with another scheme to replace this, but i don't know if you remember, just a couple of years ago, we have the green deal, which was supposed to incentivize people to insulate their homes. at the interest rate was so high that it was actually better for people to just go to the bank and get a loan from the bank. so this is the second failure of the insulation scheme in just a few years. i mean, it really, really is abject. last night — ten people were arested in bristol following a third mass protest in the city, in the past week. around a thousand people had gathered to oppose law changes, that would give police more powers to restrict demonstrations. and today, at least five people have been arrested in manchester city centre, as people gathered to protest against the government's

controversial new policing bill. 0ur correspondent, andy gill, was there and sent this update. the trams in manchester are running again, but for an hour this afternoon, the lines here in the centre of the city were completely blocked, by protestors demonstrating against the new police powers bill. the protest had begun earlier this afternoon — it was peaceful. the protestors then marched through the city for a while, and at one point they blocked a road by sitting down. the police didn't move in. when they came here, to st peter's square, and blocked the metro line, police liaison officers spoke to the protestors and asked them to move. they didn't, and after about an hour police units moved in to disperse them. some wouldn't move and police arrested at least five people. unions are warning that up to 1,000 british gas engineers could lose theirjobs on monday in a deadlocked dispute

over pay and conditions with parent company centrica. the gmb union which represents some 7,000 british gas workers says the company will give formal notice of termination next week for staff who have not accepted the changes to their terms and conditions which they say are unacceptable. centrica says the new terms and conditions are "still very competitive" and that the vast majority of staff have now accepted the new terms. borisjohnson has launched the conservatives' campaign for england's local and mayoral elections in may. in a pre—recorded speech at the party's virtual spring forum, the prime minister said the conservative party continues to fulfil its mandate, despite facing the difficulties of a global pandemic. we're a one—nation conservative government, and we continue — in spite of the pandemic — to deliver on the promises we made in that great election of 2019. we have recruited more than 6,000

of the 20,000 police, we're building the a0 new hospitals, we're recruiting the 50,000 more nurses — 10,600 now in the nhs this year, as opposed to last year. the national crime agency has said phone companies must do more to tackle an "explosion" of impersonation scams since the pandemic started a year ago. it's told the bbc that fraudsters are becoming more sophisticated in how they target victims. dan whitworth is a reporter with bbc radio 4's money box. the technical term is impersonation fraud, but essentially, what it is is that criminals use technology to copy genuine phone numbers. so they might copy genuine phone numbers from hmrc or other government agencies, the police, your bank, and make it look as though they are calling you, calling the victim, from those agencies, when in fact they are not at all, they are criminals and are trying

to steal your money. they do this through either getting information from you or actually tricking people into transferring the money direct to themselves. now, as you said in your introduction, there has been a huge increase in the number and the amount of these spam calls, these spoof calls, that have been happening in the last 12 months. some of our bbc�*s weather watchers have grabbed some great shots of the northern lights recently. and there could be more opportunities in the coming years as activity on the sun increases. simon king spoke to an �*aurora chaser�* from the arctic circle to find out more. as you can see, we're having a really good show tonight in the skies. equinoxes are an amazing time to see northern lights. today, for example, we are not supposed to see any northern lights, but thanks to the effect of the equinox, we are seeing this amazing show behind me. the aurora borealis, or the northern lights, as most of us call them, have been lighting up the skies over

the last few months. this winter has definitely been an amazing for the aurora, as we are re—emerging from the solar minimum into the solar maximum. and now spring is the best season to see them. that was an aurora enthusiast, who spoke to me from a frozen lake in northern finland. the green and purple lights have been dancing in the night sky, bringing one of nature's greatest light shows. the most intense aurora is during the solar maximum, where you have got lots of sun spots on the sun, releasing charged particles towards the earth. but in its 11 year cycle, the sun goes to its quieter minimum period, where there are fewer sun spots. we are just coming out of the minimum period now, so how have we had such good aurora this winter without those sun spots? there is a different process on the sun which can lead to aurora. these are called coronal holes, and essentially what we get from coronal holes is a faster solar wind, and these are the charged

particles which are pushed out from the sun all of time. and we get coronal holes, and faster solar winds, this reacts with the earth's magnetosphere and upper atmosphere. so we can actually see some geomagnetic storming and some aurora from these coronal holes. these are more frequent in solar minimum, theyjust aren't strong as from sun spots. there needs to be a strong geomagnetic storm to get the aurora across the uk, but you're most likely to see it in northern scotland, where lots our bbc weather watchers have been sharing pictures with us. in the arctic circle, however, weather permitting, it can be seen at most nights. the aurora belt is the region north from here and the northern scandinavia, norway, sweden, finland, where auroras can be seen more often than anywhere else the world. this is where auroras are born, and even if activity is very low, you can still see some action. we are now into a new solar cycle, so with the sun waking up, there will be more sun spot activity as we arrive to the solar maximum

in 2025, and therefore a greater chance of seeing a more intense aurora, weather permitting, of course. three new arrivals at a wiltshire farm have struck up an unlikely friendship after being hand—reared together. taz the emu, alfred the goat and wriggle the gosling have formed an inseperable bond. they're from caenhill countryside centre in wiltshire. all three of them needed special care after they were born earlier this month, and the trio have become the best of friends since. so lovely. now it's time for a look at the weather with matt taylor. good evening. the clocks spring forward an hour tonight and the temperatures? well, they are set to spring upwards over the next few days. warm weather on the way for many, but across the north—west of scotland particularly, there is a lot of rain on the way. that could even cause

some localised flooding. now, on the earlier satellite picture, you can see a lot of cloud extending out into the atlantic. that is heading in our direction. heavy rain through tonight across northern ireland and scotland, some of that into north—west england and wales as well. very strong and gusty winds across north—western parts of the uk. milder than it was last night. six to 9 degrees. but many spots will start tomorrow cloudy. certainly across central and southern parts of the uk. some sunshine initially across scotland, albeit with some showers. through the day, our band of rain will push northwards again. that rain really setting in across western scotland, eastern scotland should see some brightness. and some southern parts of england and south wales should brighten up just a little. it is windy for all. gusts of a0 to 50 mph, maybe stronger in places, but a little warmer than it was today. temperatures perhaps up to 16 degrees across parts of eastern england. as we head into the evening, we keep cloud and rain, particularly up towards the north—west. it stays quite windy, but don't forget, you get an extra hour of light. the sun setting at 7:36pm

there in manchester. now, as we head through sunday night and into monday, this wriggling frontal system will bring further rain across northern areas, particularly in north—west scotland. to the south of that weather front, though, we'll start to import some really quite warm air for the time of year. so you can see, where we have the cloud and rain on monday, especially for higher ground in western scotland. further south and east, the best of the sunshine lifting temperatures to 21 degrees in hull and in norwich. and tuesday could be warmer still. england, wales seeing plenty of sunshine. some of that into northern ireland, southern and eastern scotland. still that rain for north—west scotland, but look at the top temperatures on tuesday, 22, maybe 23 degrees. but don't get too used to it. another big change on the way from mid week onwards towards the easter weekend. this frontal system sinks southwards, cold air plunges back in from the north, so quite a range of temperatures this week.

london, for an example, 23 on tuesday down to 9 degrees by good friday.

hello, this is bbc news. the headlines... lockdown eases in wales — the first uk nation to lift travel restrictions within its borders. borisjohnson says england's road map out of lockdown remains on track, as it's revealed covid booster jabs may be available as early as september. mp kenny macaskill says he will quit the snp to stand for election within alex salmond's new party.

the un says it's received �*shocking' reports of violence in myanmar —