i was seeing there. that's why afghanistan very dangerous for me. i can't go back there. shah spent 18 months waiting for his decision as part of a huge backlog of cases. the home office said earlier this year that the asylum system cost the uk 3 billion a year and was rising. the total asylum backlog has risen sharply over recent years, peaking at nearly 139,000 this summer. ministers have pledged to tackle the backlog and the use of hotels. let me be clear. i want to close all the hotels. i think it's completely unacceptable. it's a waste of taxpayers' money. and as quickly as we can close them, we will do. the number of staff processing applications has increased over the last two years from around 600 to 2,500 now. and the number of decisions made have risen nearly tenfold to almost 16,000 last month.

councils and charities think that new refugees are not being given enough time to adjust before they are told to leave their accommodation. they say some have been given little notice to find somewhere else to stay. 0nce individuals become refugees, the responsibility to look after them falls to the council. need a plan and we need a plan that's resourced. david carter is the chief executive of the whitechapel centre, a leading homeless charity in liverpool. we're in the middle of a housing crisis and a poverty crisis. as a city, we've got 572 households in emergency b&b accommodation, plus over 700 in the commissioned homeless services. this has been exacerbated by the recent home office changes to increase the asylum decision and programme. people are actually fighting for the same resources, so ultimately are going to be going to be competing for the exact same thing because there isn't enough to go round. is it causing tensions? yeah, you can see that that's

going to cause tensions in the future. tensions in terms of who does get that resource, who does get the accommodation. the problem is not confined to liverpool. charities and councils across the country are seeing numbers rise. greater london has the highest number of asylum seekers per capita and the highest rates of homelessness. grace williams is the leader of waltham forest council and speaks for all 32 london boroughs on this issue. london is right at the epicentre of the housing crisis that we're seeing, and that has many different aspects to it. it's about that lack of affordable housing. it's the fact that we're seeing a real rise in demand for temporary accommodation in general. it's really difficult for london councils who all want to help and want to ensure that refugees are safe and they can build their lives to provide that accommodation. the government is doing what people have asked, haven't they? they are clearing the backlog. they are removing people from hotels.

it's completely right that hotels are closed. what we're asking is that it's done in a way that's safe and enables london councils to be able to respond to those challenges. a spokesperson for the home office told this programme, "we are committed to ensuring asylum claims are considered without unnecessary delays. 0nce someone is informed that their asylum claim has been granted, they get at least 28 days' notice to move on from their asylum accommodation". support is offered to newly recognised refugees by migrant help and their partners, which includes advice on how to access universal credit, the labour market and where to get assistance with housing. we are working with local authorities to help communities manage the impact of asylum decisions as the legacy backlog reduces. while we were talking to shah, he had a call from the council. i think they make accommodation for me. so is this good news? i think so. it's good news. i don't know.

but i think. as temperatures drop, councils and charities are concerned with how they will cope with around 90,000 people expected to receive refugee status when many public services are already struggling. not all will need council accommodation and help, but charities say the uk streets could see thousands more rough sleepers if help is not found. that's all from us tonight. mark urban is in the chair tomorrow. goodbye.

airline bosses say this flight shows what can be done. it doesn't mean it's about to become the norm. for alternative fuels like this to be used more widely, much more will have to be produced, and they're expensive. plus, other technologies will be needed to hit emissions reduction targets. we can't produce a majority of our fuel requirements this way because we just don't have the feedstocks. and even if you do, those fuels are not true net—zeroes. we have to treat it as what it must be, which is a stepping stone towards future genuinely net—zero technologies, which might be e—fuels, running conventional engines, it might be hydrogen. environmental campaigners say for now, people need to fly less. we need to reduce the amount we're i flying, and then we can potentiallyl use those so—called sustainable lfuels for the remaining flightsl

that we are going to be taking in the future. i the government disagrees. we want people to be able to continue flying, but we want to do it in a way that's consistent with the environment, which is why sustainable aviation fuel matters, hydrogen matters, electric flight matters. all of those things are part of this journey. airlines and ministers insist fuels like these can play a big part in making the industry greener, but there's still a long journey ahead, and it's likely to mean passengers pay more. katy austin, bbc news. let's take a look at some of the stories in the headlines in the uk. a court has been hearing how a plan to kill transgender teenager brianna jeye who was found in the bedroom of one of the 16—year—olds accused of her murder. a girl and boy — who can't be named because of their age — are alleged to have murdered brianna, stabbing her to death in a park earlier this year. the former boss of wilko has

said she's devastated to have let down staff, suppliers and customers, when the retailer collapsed earlier this year. lisa wilkinson, who is the granddaughter of wilko's founder, has given evidence to mps about the difficulties faced by the chain. she said the impact of last year's mini budget was partly to blame. an inquiry has found that a maintenance worker who sexually abused dead bodies in nhs mortuaries was able to do so because of "serious failings" at the hospitals where he worked. david fuller abused the bodies of at least 101 women and girls over a period of fifteen years. the abuse was only discovered when fuller was arrested for the murder of two women. australian prime minister anthony albanese will shortly apologise to those people whose lives have been impacted by thalidomide ? the ingredient in a morning sickness drug that caused significant birth defects in babies. the drug was issued

to expectant mothers in the early 1960 s — but was later found to cause deformities in unborn babies ? including damage to internal organs. the australian government says 146 people are officially registered with the thalidomide survivors support program, but its unclear how many more people have been impacted. one of those survivors is trisha jackson ? who will be at parliament house to hear the apology today. ive been speaking to her ahead of the prime ministers speech. i think the apology is is it won't change anything. look at what changed that.

i've got my no arms. it won't change the pain that i live in. but it's recognition that, you know, we have suffered at the hands of the government from protecting us from thalidomide. and i think it's a good chance to remember all those that haven't made it to this far and all the parents that have passed away that will never hear the "i'm sorry," cos no one's ever said sorry to the parents at all. and i think it's it'sjust i hope it finds a little bit of closure to some people and especially to my parents, who are 96. you know, they live with so much guilt and i hope it gives them a bit of peace. you talk about closure. how do you feel about the time that it has taken for this apology to finally come? well, it should have been done years and years and years ago when, you know, people were alive. the mothers were alive. the parents were alive. and and sadly, some of the survivors have died at a very young age. and they never got to hear this apology. and that's sad. and we should remember them. it was the greatest pharmaceutical disaster, and it should never have happened and it should never happen again. what more, in your opinion, should the government be doing to help thalidomide survivors? well, as we said, you know,

the government hasn't acted for 60 years, so they have a lot of catching up to do. and the apology is fantastic. and we're very appreciative of the help that they have started to give us. but the apology means nothing if they don't help the survivors. and what the health fund that they have set up for is it is so physically demanding on us as a disabled person. it's highly inaccessible. and a lot of survivors don't bother claiming what was promised to them because it's just too hard to get anything from it. there has to be an easier way for us. you talked about the guilt that your parents have had to live with, and that's an important aspect to address as well. you are one of the youngest survivors of thalidomide. how has your life been impacted physically and emotionally? it has. it's, watching my mum's guilt for taking that tablet has been very hard to watch for 60 years.

she will have that guilt until her last breath. and it wasn't her fault. and it doesn't matter how many times are you know, isay, mum, it's not your fault. i don't blame you one bit. it doesn't matter. she has that guilt and it will not go away. and it's notjust mum, it's, you know, i say thalidomide has a ripple effect so it affected mum the minute she took the tablet, then it affected me and then it affected my whole family. on that note, trish, i want to ask, thalidomide changed the way pharmaceuticals were approved around the world. approved around the world, really. do you see the revolution in drug testing and approval regimes to be one of the critical achievements in a way that has come out of all the campaigning by people like you? i think it's a good thing and the reason we have such stringent testing in australia now is because of thalidomide. and if we can get one good thing out of thalidomide, well that's probably a good thing to do. trisha jackson on the australian prime minister's upcoming apology over thalidomide.

ukraine's military says its forces continue to repel russian attacks on various fronts near the embattled eastern town of avdiivka. russian troops have been trying to encircle the town, close to donetsk city. the area is witnessing a struggle that some have compared to the battle for bakhmut. a fierce storm that's brought heavy snow to the region and damaged infrastructure has impacted combat on the front lines. nasa managed to land a spacecraft on this asteroid and then brought rock and dust specimens back to earth. now some of those samples from the four and a half billion year old asteroid have arrived in the uk. they could shed light on the origins of our own planet. here's our science editor, rebecca morelle.

a piece of asteroid from deep space has finally arrived at london's natural history museum. we've separated out these little biggerfragments in our stones of interest. scientists here have been waiting years for the chance of a close—up look, and to get their gloved hands on this precious extraterrestrial material. i think it's beyond our wildest dreams. it's an incredibly beautiful rock. it's very, very black, but with some tiny, little white bits in as well. and we found that each little grain looks a bit different to the other grains. so it's going to keep us busy for years, trying to figure it all out. the sample comes from a 500—metre—wide space rock called bennu. it was collected by a nasa spacecraft in a smash—and—grab manoeuvre, packed into a capsule and brought back to earth, landing in the utah desert. it's incredible to see this material up close, grabbed from an asteroid hundreds of millions of miles away. now, there isn't much in here, just a few milligrams,

but for scientists, this is a treasure trove. every single tiny grain will be analysed, and the hope is they could answer some of the biggest questions we have about our solar system. within this sort of polished section, we have a tiny little particle that, when we look under this microscope, we can start to see all the information. the ultra close—up view provides a map of the minerals and elements within the rock. bennu is a relic from the early solar system and scientists are finding it's rich in carbon and water. we know that we have water here on the earth. how did it get here? and so, we think things like bennu could have potentially brought that water. and so, we're going to study the water in bennu, see if it's similar to the water we have on the earth. and if we find similarities, that gives us a really good idea that asteroids like bennu were helping to deliver at least some of the water to the earth when it was just starting out 11.5 billion years ago.

the uk has a teaspoon of material, but there might be more to come, because some of the space rock is stuck in the sample container at nasa h0. its screws are proving tricky to undo, so new tools are being developed to retrieve every last bit of bennu. the material that's here is being shared with uk universities, so expect a slew of discoveries and some out—of—this—world surprises along the way. rebecca morelle, bbc news. have you ever wished there was something to keep you entertained while you were stuck in your car, waiting for a light to change? well, this traffic enforcerfrom manila might have the right idea. ramiro hinojas has been strutting his stuff, dressed as father christmas, to help ease people's boredom. his aim is to bring cheer to commuters in the notoriously gridlocked city, by showcasing his dance moves as he guides traffic.

that's all for now — stay with bbc news. hello there. temperatures will be plunging even further still as we head through the rest of the week. there's more snowfall always possible, particularly across the north of scotland, such as here in aviemore, but even potentially to some lower levels as well, with wintry showers feeding into north sea facing coast. there'll be some icy stretches here. but for most of us, it is expected to stay dry. but just temperatures really struggling by day to get out of mid single figures, widespread air frost by night. and that's how we're starting off wednesday morning with temperatures widely below freezing, maybe as low as —7 to —9 degrees celsius across parts of scotland, a little milderfor the south and the west underneath some areas of cloud. and with a few rain showers around, there'll also be some patches of freezing fog. and where we see those are be slow to lift and clear. there'll be some more wintry showers just feeding into northern scotland

for these north sea facing coasts as well. possibly a few accumulations a little further inland, though, showers as far south as lincolnshire, but for most, sunny spells, temperatures not getting much past three to five degrees, but of course, milder in the far south and the west underneath all of that cloud. and that's where we look to find this low pressure system that's been really quite troublesome through the week. but now it does look much more likely that this is going to be falling as rain towards the channel coast as we head through thursday, could possibly lap onshore at times given more clouds and outbreaks of rain towards the south coast and maybe a bit of wintry ness over the tops of the moors in the south west. with the elevation further north, though, some sunny spells again, wintry showers for north sea facing coast temperatures once more unlikely to make it much past three to five degrees celsius. let's take a look at friday because not a lot is set to change. we've got more of an easterly wind possibly feeding some showers through parts of the thames estuary, over the downs, perhaps the higher ground here. but for the most part, i think it should stay dry again. there'll be some sunny spells and quite a bit of added wind chill as well. as you can see from the temperature anomaly map, temperatures are well

below the seasonal average marked in the blue here. all of that cold air just sweeping down from scandinavia. and there's no real improvement in the temperatures either as we head through the weekend and into the start of next week. still feeling bitterly cold. here's the temperature outlook for our capital cities, possibly a bit of wintry mix on saturday night, again into sunday further south. bye for now.

this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines for you at the top of the hour, as newsday continues straight after hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. the pause in israel's gaza offensive is still in place, but for how much longer? the netanyahu government, hamas and key third parties like the biden administration seem poised to continue the swap of israelis held hostage in gaza for palestinians imprisoned in israel for a few more days. but then, israel is adamant, the war goes on. my guest is simcha rothman, an mp from the far—right religious zionism party, part of israel's ruling coalition.

does netanyahu have a viable plan for what comes next?