this is bbc news. the headlines: hundreds of marches are being held across the united states to pressure congress into making changes to gun laws. following a spate of mass shootings, the rallies are being organised by the group march for our lives. president biden says guns should be a key issue in the coming elections. with fighting intensifying in ukraine, officials warn their army is running out of ammunition as it engages in intense artillery battles with russian forces. western countries are being urged to speed up their delivery of long—range weapons and ammunition to help ukraine strike back in the south and east. royal officials in britain have insisted that prince charles "remains politically neutral" following a report that he has strongly criticised government plans to send some asylum seekers to rwanda in central africa.

an unnamed source told the times newspaper that prince charles has described the policy as "appalling". now on bbc news, dateline london. hello, and welcome to the programme which brings together leading uk commentators with the foreign correspondents who write, blog and broadcast from the dateline london. this week — political apologies and their consequences. 40% of borisjohnson�*s mps say it isn't enough to say sorry — he should quit. we'll be discussing why history

may be on the british prime minister's side. and in africa, the king of belgium voices his "deepest "regret" over the "abuse and humiliation" caused in what is now the drc by his family and other belgians. why do those who colonised find it so hard to say sorry? in the studio are stefanie bolzen, uk and ireland correspondent for the german media group die welt, marc roche, who writes for the french news magazine le point, and adam raphael, who began reporting on uk politics in 1976 — the last year to date in which a british prime minister left office by choice. lovely to see you all. thank you for being with us. let me start with you, adam, on the question of boris�*s apparent survival — and, certainly, survival for now. he says he is getting on with thejob. is this just a display of kind of what one might call boris bravura, or is the prime minister kind of right to think

that his enemies perhaps moved a bit too soon? well, they may have moved too soon to kick him out but actually, i think his position is unsustainable. and my own view is that he will be out before the end of the year. the fact is if you look at the simple maths of it, 211 voted for boris but of that 211, 170, no less, are the payroll vote. so he has sort of a0 or 50 independent votes. well, the people who voted against him — they got 148, three times as many. three times as independent tory mps voted against him. that is unsustainable. and if you look at what happened in the past to iain duncan smith, to theresa may, to john major, they all were out very soon after confidence votes. and, of course, mrs thatcher was challenged for the leadership as well and she was out as well. so, once a party is totally divided, as the conservative party is now, it is externally difficult to recover. the other interesting thing —

and this sounds hostile to boris, who i've known for many, many years and find a charming and funny, like many others — he always has lied himself out of trouble. and he continues to lie. but what worries me about him now as it is notjust lying, it is almost fantasy politics. so, he describes this result as "extremely positive, "decisive, conclusive" and as though it was some kind of triumph. well, successful liars, at least you've got to have a plausible story — you mustn't be found out immediately. and i think he is beginning to lose his touch. now, quite apart from any of that, he is faced by how —— by a horrendous political situation. he's got two by—elections which he is capable of losing coming up in tiverton and in wakefield and he has got a cost of living crisis in this country which we have not seen since post—war britain.

so, i would be really very surprised if he was able to sustain his position because the conservative party, one thing it does do very well, it has a link and a range to power. and if they think boris is a loser, as i think they are beginning to realise that will be at the next election — they will get rid of him. what did you make of this result? how do you try to explain it to your audience? i honestly have been a bit more cautious about announcing that this is now the last chapter, because there have been— so many last chapters in the last two years. shaun chuckles. it is like a book of last chapters! yes — i mean, it has felt a bit like groundhog day. you have seen this before. you see the prime minister going to the cabinet and saying, "we will really do what is in the wishes "of the people". i am cautious and would not bet any money — i know the brits love betting. i will lose, so i rather don't it. but there is a lot of

historical parallels, for example, with theresa may — that was a completely different circumstance. there was one faction of the parliamentary group that really wanted her out. and they succeeded and were very targeted. while with this revolution, or rebellion, against boris, it was very difficult to describe. lots of wings standing up and are saying, "we are not happy with this any more". but he is an extraordinary politician, different to everybody else, so maybe he still might be around for the next election. marc, do you have an explanation for readers in france and in belgium of the political phenomenon that is boris johnson? well, the problem i face is that the french - divided about him. on the one hand, they like his politics, he is funny sort - of and he is a francophile, he's a francophone — he is ithe opposite of a stuffy frenchl politician like emmanuel macron or hollande or sarkozy. so they like that. on the other hand, -

they perceive him as a lout because of brexit. he is provoking a terrible - crisis with the european union coming by revoking de facto . the northern ireland protocol. yeha, that legislation apparrently will be published on monday — we will find out what is in it. and he is accountable for the worst crisis . in bilateral relationships i between france and the uk since charles de gaulle refused the brits in- the european community. so, it is divided. but more and more people i are telling me, when they ask me about boris, they tell me, "he is dead, isn't he? - "he cannot survive | being a serial liar." because, of course, in french politics, one never lies! - laughter. adam, there is a line, isn't there, precisely because this rebellion was so broad, that it lacked the depth and the focus? and in a sense, the rebels have now played their hand. any other mp who might

oppose him may go, "actually, what is the point of declaring it? "i'll simply be frozen out by number 10, and we will not "get rid of him anyway". is that he is so stubborn and determined and he could even, only because he now has the power again because the fixed—term parliaments act has been revoked, if his party became really difficult, he could just take his appeal directly to the country, go to the queen and ask for parliament to be dissolved, she constitutionally has to accept that. he goes to the country and basically defies his own rebels. he has that kind of risk taken. he is a risk taker, but that will be one risk too many because to stage an election in defiance of his own party, i think we have to start listening to what the tory associations are saying all around the country. one of the reasons why this big vote against him was as large as it was was because they have been back to their constituencies and they have listened to their own loyal, true conservative members.

and they, frankly, are horrified by what has been going on. now, if the situation in this country was better in terms of the economy, in terms of other areas, it is just possible he might be able to, i think, survive it. but the fact is we are in for a really, really rough situation now. i think the really valid point you make, though, shaun, is that this was a very disparate opposition to him. there is not a focus to it and that is why i think the next few months are going to be extremely messy but very interesting journalistically. yeah, plenty for you guys to write about. let's move on to the economy, because that is the one aspect of this he can't control, however he might wish to. we had the oecd report this week, marc roche, saying that the british economy will perform next year the worst of all the g7 countries. except russia. except russia, and you could argue that russia has its rating circumstances. no longer 620. the economy is effectively being frozen out of the world economy by sanctions and so on. that's not the uk's problem but what is the uk's problem?

what do you think? you've been studying the british economy and its strengths and weaknesses for many years. i wrote a piece this week, | saying that britain is again the sick man of europe. this is the ottoman empire before world war i but - was the situation before thatcher took over in the 705. stagflation, inflation - at 10%, growth down 5% in the last - quarter of 2021. anc the oecd is predicting no growth next year. no growth at all, strikes - repetitive, a commercial war with europe looming, if not already there . because of brexit, and the only thing he has to provide is going back. to imperial measure? shaun chuckles. this delusion of grandeur, - of nostalgia, while the economy is going nowhere is quite typical of boris johnson. |

very pessimistic- about the economy — that could - bring him down. i agree with you. i think you've summed it up very well. i think the economy is in a terrible state and the difficulty forjohnson, he is not really — and i think the conservative party is beginning to realise he is not really a conservative, he is a johnsonian. that is one of the reasons for this degree of great distrust of what he is up to. there is no trust for him and he is confronted by some incredibly difficult decisions. the conservatives are traditionally a tax—cutting party. they cannot cut taxes at this moment, unless they started borrowing huge sums of money — which, in itself, would be profoundly unconservative. there is no way out of this cul—de—sac that he finds himself in. that is through no fault of his own, but his character defects, i'm afraid, plus the fact this is probably the weakest cabinet i have seen since post—war britain, it doesn't really help. i have no confidence that they are going to get out of this mess.

i mean, i have not — been here not as long reporting, but if i may say, one of the first things i was reporting was going north and being taken by the british government to see the northern powerhouse — that was the key word of the day. so, every new government — and don't forget the conservatives are now in power for 12 years, and every new prime minister has a new idea for how to do— real structural reform. and there is a lot of nice slogans and with boris johnson it was "let's get brexit done" and "level the country up" especially the north, but they haven't done anything. here in london, we live quite well. but if you go quite north, there is real poverty there. children do not have to eat now with the energy prices. parents have to choose whether to heat their house or give their children food. many children get to school in the morning and are hungry. so, this is the real

avalanche that is coming, and now, we are in summer. boring — it is a very wasted word, but the autumn or winter of discontent. but i am more worried about what is coming. just in terms of the economic options, the oecd effectively have given the british government cover, haven't they? if yhe ou wanted to back away from some of his policy choices already, like increases in taxation that are planned for the next few months, he could do it. but one wonders whether he has — his party would tolerate that, given the divisions that ahve been on display in the last few months. the problem is the governor- of the bank of england said 80% of the factors of this inflation is external, with absolutely no control. so, he has control of 20%. so, he could stop the tax hike. he could do on this 20% something. i the problem is that what sort of conservative is he? -

he promised a tax cut, - which is typically ridiculous, because we know - that he doesn't want. —— because we know that he doesn't want a supply side l economy the only way i think. he could get a bit out is helping the people most affected by it, i by giving money. printing money. but the chancellor... the prime minister not only said this week on his visit to blackpool, "you can't spend your way out of recession, "you can't tax your way to lowering inflation". i mean, he is starting to revert, in terms of his language, at least, to more thatcherite slogans. it is clear that rishi sunak, his chancellor, takes a more traditionally conservative view. i mean, these tensions have the potential to explode damagingly for government, don't they? i think he couldn't take the resignation of his chancellor. because he is now two weeks. —— because he is now too weak..

i think that would be one of the things, so he has to go along. boris is a really opportunistic politician. i did once ask him, "boris, how do you come to your views? because they are sort of a mixture." it is easy, i wonder if it might ask what the wheelers and i do hundred and i do 180 degrees opposite "and i can't go wrong." that is a typical boris joke but he is veryjournalistic. journalists — maybe marc has firm views — most journalists are very floating voters, they go all over the place on policy. so does boris. he is a total opportunist, he doesn't have really clear, deep beliefs. and the conservative party, certainly, they are beginning to understand this. it is perhaps why none of us have gone into politics clicks, because imagine the damage we would have done without inconsistent views. talking about opportunism, he reminds me of david lloyd george, the great liberal prime minister who ended up leaving george, the great liberal prime minister who ended up leading

hence a conservative coalition government until conservative mps threw him out 100 years ago this year. let's talk about belgium, in particular, and this question of the imperial legacy mark. the king of the belgians, the king of belgium as i could possibly style him, was in the drc, the democratic republic of congo this week. why, and what was different about this? it was the first time - you have a king of belgium, belgium was terrible - at colonising, not that there are good ones but they might- have been among the worst ones with the exploitation - of the people of the congo, and the wealth and the minerals | of the congo that built belgium| as a superpower at the end of the 19th century and - beginning of the 20th century. he went there to apologise. but he said exactly, - "we denounce unacceptable "regime based on paternalism. and discrimination and racism." well, he didn't. really apologise. he just condemned it.

and did he bring...? that almost makes him seem like a third party, like he was looking from the outside. and it was his family, it was initially... it belongs to leopold ii, . who was his family, saxe— coburg. what did he bringi to the congolese? he didn't bring money- as compensation, he can't afford that at the moment. he brings a few artefacts - from the museum of the congo. the first democratic prime minister. he was killed by the americans, he brings a few artefacts - and the tooth of this i man and says it is done and the tooth of this man

and says it is done. - he hasn't apologised, | he hasn't condemned. i went recently to brussels, the statue of leopold ii - are everywhere and there is not a plaque on this marvellous - building in the centre - of brussels which has been built because of communism. nothing has changed. i think belgium, like most countries, with some - exceptions, cannot cope with its colonial past. i but you think money is quite a big part of this? the fear that it would somehow open the gates to massive compensation? yes, and the compensation will be massive, because . the minerals, gold, diamonds... rubber, everything. everything. - to the compensation. the problem is the congolese are not very well equipped i to get these compensations. they won't go to court

and so at the end of. the belgians will get away with it. - germany faced this dilemma and it took a different route. can you expend the background to this? it was only a couple of years ago. it was not too long ago, i think it was spring 2021 that the merkel government in berlin agreed with the government of namibia for compensation and gave an official apology. they had been negotiating for quite some years about the money that germany was going to pay, and i think it was more thani billion euros, which goes into lots of projects in the country. but i think in a way, germany is a bit of a unique case, if i may say, in europe, and for good reason, because of our history and the nazi history and because of the holocaust. so i really think — i'm one of the germans of the generations who really grew up and was educated with knowing, almost in a too harshly, too much detail, what germans did to the jews,

to the russians, to the ukrainians and to millions of people in europe and beyond. so i don't find it difficult to say sorry, we know there have been atrocities. iam very i am very conscious that we are four white europeans here. adam, this is a live issue for the british, isn't it? we saw the british, isn't it? we saw the visit to the caribbean, which was supposed to be for the queensjubilee, but turned into an argument about the legacy, and their response seemed to be a bit tone deaf, prickly. if some people are saying, they are leaving the commonwealth, ending the links with the queen as the head of state. have the british found a way to address this yet, do you

think? i'm not sure they have. but i suspect i'm tone deaf on this issue too. i am not sure the word �*sorry�* is a very helpful word, the vikings weren't sorry when they plundered this country. countries have their history, and parts of british colonial history are undoubtedly reprehensible, we did some terrible things. part of british colonial history we can be proud of. and i think one has to face up to the facts of what one did and what one didn't do and the feelings, but it is a terrible mistake to judge everything in retrospect from the standards of today. that doesn't mean to say you hide what you have done or it shouldn't be acknowledged what was done at the time, but i am weary of �*sorry�*. i'm not weary of reparations, if they can be shown that you need to make good in terms of relationships what has happened in the past.

but this word �*sorry�* is just too easy a word. i think you just have to face up to your history. just a correction, you choose how strong the link still- is with the commonwealth. the countries who are getting rid of the queen as head - of state are staying. in the commonwealth. that shows how strong link, this colonial link is. - because what is - the commonwealth? it is the remnants of the colonies. . i'm interested in this, because i think when i was growing up in the 1980s, we didn't talk about the other side. we talked about the scrabble for africa is a story, but this is a book called legacy of violence by an american professor. she did some research on actual british government documents, and this is a quote, not a pleasant point but important in the context of this about some of the violence that was used against those who suffered as a result

of this in terms of the violence that was used against them. i willjust try and find, if i can find the right bit of this... i don't think i can, but essentially what she was saying was that there was real violence used and some of the violence was things that would be shameful to many people in this country if they knew the violence, some of those documents were hidden away in a government building and only appeared about ten years ago. the mau mau rebellion. this is an example of the british astonishment burying its legacy. look, all nations do want to hide things at times. but i am just wary of this total sweep of colonial, that all colonialism is bad, which there is a movement on that now. i don't think it is true, i think there were some very good things done. it is easier to sell about the achievements if you acknowledge...

i think marc's point of view is good, that the commonwealth would not exist if britain's record was so poor as is sometimes betrayed. i'm not quite sure, i find it hard to say. "they have been good things done by colonialism," what do you mean for example? in terms of education, commercialisation, in terms of trade, living standards. that is fine... in terms of british law. i don't think one can totally ignore some of the things. it is not about ignoring what has been achieved but it is also about acknowledging what was wrong what you have done. especially here, you don't have to go very far, you only have to go to ireland and understand and have some empathy with the irish. they now again feel they go through a trauma of being let down by the english again, where does this come from? there is something in the collective memory that you have been let down. but the queen apologised to the irish in 2011 - when she went, why can't she -

apologise to the commonwealth? because i disagree with you, | i think now we have in britain a multicultural, multi—ethnic. society, and we cannot continue to have these - statues of slavery. one should get rid of them. it is another good point that britain has changed and perhaps our attitude need to change with it. i think it is a fair point, and i'm not against the discussion or indeed acknowledgement of what is happened, i'm all in favour of that. but the idea of tearing down cecil rhodes�*s statue for my old college in oxford are ridiculous. of course in the end they flunked it. don't symbol matter? symbols do matter, but the idea you tear something down and something is achieved by this. my granddaughter was part it of tearing down the statue in bristol. this divides families. i bet you have some very

lively discussions. in the debate over statues in the southern united states and over the union and the confederacy, it turns out a lot of the statues weren't that old. they were set up at a later stage because people felt they wanted to be reminded of something that for them was a more glorious past. they weren't that contemporary at all. a lot of statues are being captured with plaques. i am all in favour of that, of trying to explain some of the background of what was going on. thank you all are very much. thank you very much, more dateline: london next week. goodbye. hello there.

15 hours of sunshine for some south—eastern areas, where the temperatures got up to nearly 2a degrees celsius on saturday. it was a little different though further north, as you will see. we had a wet and a windy spell. we had nearly two inches of rain in the past 2a hours, across parts of scotland. gusts of wind, 40—50mph quite widely, and even as far south as the llyn peninsula of wales, and that's because of this unusually deep area of low pressure, which is pulling away. so, gradually the winds will ease down but they will still continue to bring in a few showers through the early hours of the morning, particularly in the north and the west. temperatures though under starry skies further south perhaps as low as eight or nine, so a little bit on the cool side, sunday morning, but plenty of sunshine will follow, particularly for england and wales. the cloud bubbles up. the showers are around for northern ireland, particularly north—western parts of england and wales, and particularly across scotland. still some heavy ones here, but generally fewer heavy ones than we had during saturday, and fewer showers. still quite blustery really for the time of year but, again, the winds won't be

quite as strong as we saw on saturday. temperatures will be on par with those on saturday, about 16 to 22 degrees celsius. so some sunshine to be found for most parts and the showers tended to ease later but still some very high levels of pollen, particularly across england and wales. now, as we take the forecast forward then through sunday night and into monday, we start to see those showers fading for a time. weak weather front pushes close by to the north—west of scotland. the winds are easing down a notch as well, so temperatures mightjust be a little bit lower, again, on monday morning, but, again, only 7 and 8 — a fresh start to our monday morning. plenty of sunshine will follow. rather more cloud though, as you can see, across the northern half of scotland. showery outbreaks of rain to come here, but not as windy. still pushing into the low 20s, though, further south, with that strong june sunshine. then, through the week ahead, this high pressure starts to push its influence further north, so still weather fronts around but little appreciable rain away from the far north of scotland,

and actually that high pressure is going to tap into some of that heat that we're seeing further south, so temperatures are likely to rise, particularly for england and wales, but even further north we'll start to see some warmth arriving later in the week. as ever, it's one to watch. we'll keep you posted, there's more online.

welcome to bbc news. i'm lucy grey. our top stories: hundreds of thousands across the usjoin marches to push for reform of gun laws. are you ready, young and old and in between, to be the generations that make ourselves heard from ballots, not bullets? ukraine's army says it urgently needs more ammunition as battles intesfify. so why are western—made arms taking so long to reach the front line? a father and son die in the isle of man's tt motorcycle races, bringing the total number of deaths this year to five. prince charles is politically neutral, say royal officials, following a report he called government plans to send migrants to rwanda "appalling".