this is bbc news, the headlines... alex salmond, the former first minister of scotland and one of the best—known scottish nationalists, has died aged 69. it is understood he collapsed after delivering a speech at an international conference in north macedonia. salmond was the first

pro—independence politician to hold the role of first minister, which he did from 2007 to 2014. he led the yes campaign during the scottish independence campaign and resigned after voters backed remaining in the uk. the un world food programme says no food aid has entered the north of gaza since the 1st of october. the humanitarian group says it's unclear how long the limited food supplies previously delivered can last. the un peacekeeping mission in south lebanon says another of its soldiers has been wounded but says it doesn't yet know the origin of the fire. four un peacekeepers have been killed in previous incidents. let's get more on the death of alex salmond within the past few minutes king charles has released this message — "my wife and i are greatly saddened to hear of the sudden "death of alex salmond. "his devotion to scotland drove

his decades of public service. "we extend our deep condolences to his family and loved ones "at this time." let's show you the latest pictures we have of alex salmond. this is him at the conference he was attending in north macedonia earlier today. you can see him there in a blue shirt and blue tights standing in the middle of the delegates at the global conference. he is also pictured sitting on the stage at the forum. a debate and a speech after which he is believed to have collapsed, and a party representative said it was thought id —— it was thought he suspected and suffered —— a suspected heart attack but a postmortem examination will take place. a very poignant picture of alex salmond. he was also tweeting

many times today, before the news that has shocked so many people, that he has collapsed and died in north macedonia shortly after that conference. lesley riddoch is a broadcaster and journalist. she gave her reaction to the news of alex salmond's death. i'm really upset, um, very upset. i think for, for many people, he's... you didn't... i suppose you don't realise how much a part of the kind of almost scottish political firmament he's been until suddenly he's not there. um, it seems quite extraordinary because there was, if you just put all the negatives that i'm sure will be brought up by lots of people now to one side, he had energy, drive and vision. there would be no wind industry, energy industry in britain, never mind scotland, if he hadn't used the powers that devolution gave the scottish parliament to drive ahead with wind and energy when it was being stopped south of the border. he brought in prescriptions, free prescriptions. he abolished tuition fees. he abolished tolls on bridges.

i mean, when they came in as a minority government in 2007, you fairly knew that there was a new government in town. he even got guys to go out at night a couple of weeks after the unexpected victory in 2007 and change the name on the civil service building from the scottish executive to the scottish government because he wasn'tjust going to be an administrative wing of something from westminster. this was going to be a government, and he was going to drive things in a different direction. and all i think about him is that, and also how incredibly personable he was on a one—to—one basis. i can think of so many examples of people i've met and they would say, do you know, alex came in and my dad wasn't very well and he couldn't get up because he was old and alex got down on one knee and just crouched there and spoke to him for almost half an hour. and the stories like that are legion. the amount of time he took with people.

so it's completely devastating to think that he's died today. i can imagine, lesley, and you talk about... you describe his energy and his optimism. what fuelled that, even through some of the most difficult and dark moments that he's been through in recent years? well, i think because he, he could see ahead. i mean, when other people could only see lots of obstacles, he always seemed to be able to see some kind of path. i mean, after all, he actually retired once early on from being the leader of the snp. i can remember back in 1990 to 2000, he was leader for the first time. then he stood down, and then when it looked like things were not going in the right direction, hejumped back in again in 200a. and of course, as people will say, the rest is history. but that that is only with hindsight. at the time in 2004, independence wasn't on anyone�*s lips outside the snp. and he drove that whole campaign. he did a very strong

deal with david cameron. i mean, he said that in fact he was able to slightly kind of bamboozle him into offering the referendum that alex salmond wanted, which was the one that only had two options on the ballot paper. so all of that would only be possible with somebody who could look at all the statistics, which at the beginning were just so overwhelmingly negative to his cause, to the party of the snp, to the possibility of independence, to the idea of scotland as a separate country, as a distinctive country. he saw all of those difficulties and he powered right through them. the scotsmans�* westminster correspondent alexander brown reflected on his life and influence on scottish politics. it's really shocking. alex seemed like one of those massive figures who would be in and out of scottish politics forever. even when he left the snp had a huge falling out

with a party, and set up alba who made no real cut through electorally, had no dent on polling or even winning elections, he remained a force that people continued to listen to. he was always someone who despite his own party would garner coverage and was someone people would listen to and was incredibly influential. so it's a real shock and that's the feeling that i'm getting from people who i've spoken to, whether scots or people involved in politics, there is shock and anguish that some of they thought would be around forever is just gone so quickly. you mentioned alba, the party he formed in 2021, and alex salmond seemed to think that 2026 would be the year that he would take alba to some kind of success. yes, and i'm not necessarily sure whether that was being based on, i don't think alba will ever be particularly a party that will have good polling or a huge backlog

based on, i don't think alba would ever be particularly a party that will have good polling or a huge backlog of support, but i think he perhaps recognised an opportunity. the snp have been struggling in the polls for a long time, the labour party has not had the easiest start so for scottish labour, it maybe it wasn't going to be maybe it wasn't going to be the coronation they expected it would be 100 days ago for anas sarwar and 2026. ever the activist and ever the campaigner, he was always trying and always thought next time will be the one, because he was such a driven, determined lifelong politician. how much of a gap does alex salmond leave notjust in scottish politics but uk politics more widely? even though of course, there have been some serious challenges in recent years. yeah, i mean, he's a massive figure who leaves a huge gap in british politics, as a whole. i think michael portillo said he was the first politician from scotland who was recognisable in england and internationally was known everywhere. so he was obviously a huge force but he was perhaps less of a force in the independence movement and uk politics as a whole. he was an elder statesman who would chip in with his thoughts on his campaigns with without ever

having to cut he was accustomed to and used to. when we talk about his legacy, it was one of scottish nationalism, he had left the snp and the snp had perhaps left him behind them, so maybe there was this idea that for the snp at least, the party has to go forward with new ideas and nationalism needs to go forward with new ideas and new people to take it to that next stage. what will you be filing in the next thing you write for the scotsman about alex salmond? i'm very luckily not the one working today so my thoughts are with my colleagues but i imagine it will bejust the fascinating westminster reaction and the reaction from his colleagues. he was obviously an incredibly divisive figure and he was cleared of all charges after the trial of allegations of sexual harassment, but that left a stain on his legacy, it impacted the way he was received and viewed in the party. it contributed to his falling out with nicola sturgeon, and it also contributed to the

way he was viewed more broadly. the snp falls into two camps — you have people who are die—hard advocates of his who would say about him, his legacy is so important, he's one of the greatest ever, you had joanna cherry saying he was the finest first minister scotland has ever had, and at the same time people will talk about him is a consequential politician who are angry with him for setting up alba, saw him as perhaps a traitor to the cause a traitor to the cause and someone who went off and let the independent movement go on without him. i think it will probably be something along the complicated legacy and the way he's perceived within the independent movement as a whole. that was alexander brown of the scotland clash the scotsman. a month—long strike at the american aircraft maker, boeing, has led the board to cut 17,000 jobs from the payroll, about 10% of its workforce. workers at boeing's main factory in seattle want a 40% pay rise over four years and have overwhelmingly rejected a tentative deal.

boeing lost a record $5 billion during the last quarter, and its chief executive said he expected "substantial new losses" before the end of the year. let's speak to john strickland, air transport consultant. just looking at these figures, slashing 10% of the workforce is quite something, how did it come to this? fix, is quite something, how did it come to this?— come to this? a number of factors led _ come to this? a number of factors led up _ come to this? a number of factors led up to _ come to this? a number of factors led up to this - factors led up to this announcement. the company has losses in the current quarter, it has lost billions in the months and last year or two leading up to this, ever since it had two fatal crashes of its aircraft. the spotlight has been on the company. those crashes happened back in 2019, there was another incident with there was another incident with the door detaching on alaska air aircraft at the beginning of this year. so the regulatory spotlight has been there. part

of the focus has been on the quality production and improve its safety standards lead to restrictions on production so it was not producing as many aircraft as it could, in terms of the demand of its airline customers, it has a big backlog of orders but it couldn't keep up of orders but it couldn't keep up with by production stopping and it lost a lot of skilled workers. then a strike began a month ago and that has added significance out i see this strike is costing over $1 billion a month.- strike is costing over $1 billion a month. what is that doinu billion a month. what is that doing two — billion a month. what is that doing two boeing's - billion a month. what is that doing two boeing's potentialj billion a month. what is that i doing two boeing's potential to actually satisfy and complete the orders that are in? it 'ust siml the orders that are in? it 'ust simply compounds �* the orders that are in? it 'ust simply compounds the h simply compounds the challenge. i think the strike itself, on the face of it, is about pay and conditions but i think it also reflects incredible tension between the shop floor workers, the machinist who are

on strike currently, and the management of the company. there is a new chief executive in place, he has only been there a couple of months so far, he aims to restore trust but there is a long history there of tension between management and the workforce, and as i said, it compounds the challenge of production which was already behind, already below expectation of airline customers, and there is a lot of frustration there. boeing is one of the biggest suppliers to the world's airlines, there is in a choice to get things elsewhere, even though air pass is a big producer, it is not the case of simply swapping from one to another. —— air bus. there is a further delay on the deliveries of this newest models which is not yet even finished its flight certification programme. they were hoping to get it in 2025,

now the company said that won't be before 2026.— be before 2026. john, we have to leave it _ be before 2026. john, we have to leave it there, _ be before 2026. john, we have to leave it there, selling - to leave it there, selling questions for you, i hope we can talk again about this argot which does not end. thank you, john strickland, aviation consultant. let's return to one of our top stories, and the prime minister has been speaking to our colleagues on the bbc newscast podcast, where he reflected on some of the most difficult moments in the first 100 days of the labour govenment. here is he speaking to the hosts of newscast adam fleming and chris mason. prime minister, welcome to the newscast studio. thank you for having me. you're very welcome. we'll talk loads about what you've been up to in some of the ups and downs in the last hundred days. but first, i just wanted to give newscasters an insight into what it is actually like being a prime minister, because not many people get to do thatjob. i mean, how do you sort of convey what it's like? it's a real privilege because you get the chance to take decisions that make a big difference to people's lives, and that is hugely a privilege.

it's what i came into politics to do. for me, it's been much tougher than anything i've done before, but much better. and i came into politics relatively late in life, having spent a lot of time as a lawyer. and that was slightly unusual because a lot of people come in earlier than me. i came in because i decided in my own mind that i wanted to go to politics. i wanted to make a difference. i wanted to improve the country. improve people's lives. and then i got stuck in opposition for nine long years. however you convince yourself in opposition that you're making a material difference... ..ou're not really. ..you're not really. so this, this, this, this, um, coming into power, becoming prime minister, having now what, um, 100 days has been, you know, really, um, why i came into politics.

this is what i wanted to do. and i'm really pleased. at long last, after a long, long wait, to be able to make the decisions that are going to make a big difference to people's lives. it's interesting when you said stuck in opposition, did you think that maybe you would have been in government a bit sooner, or was that the plan? oh, look, i hoped so. i mean, iwent into the 2015 election thinking we might win it. as you do, you know, it's elections are funny old things. you get yourself in a complete mindset of thinking, we're going to win it this time. but, you know, we made the mistake, frankly, that having lost in 2010, we didn't ask ourselves enough searching questions about why we lost, so we went on and lost four more times before we finally asked ourselves the question, could it be us? we changed the party, but still we were stuck in opposition and i found that really frustrating. i'll be totally open with you. really frustrating. you know, the least productive years of my entire career were the nine years in opposition. you've done a good few high

profile publicjobs, director of public prosecutions, leader of the opposition. having become prime minister, how much more of your sort of previous normal life has been squeezed out by the nature of the job you're now doing? 0h, quite a lot. it's because you are necessarily more constrained. the security around me and the family is of a completely different order. is that hard? is that difficult to adjust to? it is, because i'm someone who really likes to sort of maintain strong contact with friends, family, what i'd call the life i was living. that is much harder. and of course, we're living in a flat in downing street above the shop. um, and that's not very normal. you're living in a flat in downing street. everybody who wants to come and see you

has to come through an armed guard. this is, um, odd. might be vladimir zelensky one day. it might be, but... but it also might be, um, one of my old mates that i want to see, um, and and for our kids, it's also quite impactful. my little girl's13. my boy's 16. and so for them to live in that environment is odd for them as well, which is why we've sort of doubled down on protecting them, not using photos, not putting their names out there. but if they want to have a friend over, that friend has got to come through security. it takes a bit of getting used to. so they have to get like, security cleared, like, give us your passport. not as bad as that. but it's not as bad as that. does it impact on your life? yeah, of course it does. but did i know that's what would happen? yes, of course i did. therefore none of that came as a surprise. um, but i can't pretend it doesn't make a difference to the way we're able to just live our lives. um, here's a weird one.

do you still carry a wallet? i have got... i've got my wallet here, as it happens, and written on it. it says, take me home to kentish town. that's an old one. that's an old wallet. i don't use it very often because nobody does anymore. it's all on your phone and all the rest of it. yes, there is that as well. i mean, i know your predecessors have sometimes talked about this, that if there's a big global crisis, there's a knock on your bedroom door at 3:00 in the morning and a civil servant comes in and wakes you up. no, i haven't had that experience yet, although no doubt that will happen, has been a lot of stuff on the international stage where there have been very early morning, very late night sessions because, you know, amongst the things that have happened in the last 100 years, 100 days, that's been very. it felt like 100 years. but the international scene has been very, very tense on a number of fronts, particularly the middle east.

and so that has occupied quite a lot of time. but i haven't had the knock, the coming through the door and the sort of waking me up in the middle of the night experience. i'm sure i will at some stage. let's talk about your first 100 days, not 100 years. are you are you happy with how it's gone? when i look at what it was i wanted to achieve in the first 100 days and ask myself, have we done what i wanted us to do, what i planned for us to do? the answer to that is yes. so i knew we had to hit the ground running with clear sort of series of acts of pieces of legislation that we needed to get on with, and we had planned for that well in advance. and so if i look at the economy and what we've done there and look at the investment that is now coming in, if i look at the nhs, settling the disputes, getting the doctors back into theatre, making sure that we are now pressing on with a ten year plan for the nhs. .. if i look at energy gb

energy we've set up, we've got rid of the onshore ban on wind, we've introduced the biggest shake up of workers rights in a generation. we've set out the national wealth fund. there are lots of the things that i wanted to do. i gave a great long list at conference, i won't run through all that with you, but it is worth reminding ourselves that we have brought about quite a lot of change already in the time that we had, and that is in accordance with the timetable that i set for myself. and therefore, am i happy that we've hit the milestones i wanted to hit? yes _ the other thing that i'm really pleased about is that, um, i was firmly of the view that if we started taking tough decisions on the economy and being clear that we'd take those decisions and stabilise the economy, that would begin to trigger inward investment, which i think is vital to the growing of the economy. and over the last 3 or 4 weeks, you've seen big investment decisions.

amazon putting money in £8 billion. you've had blackstone putting money in £10 billion, carbon capture £22 billion, half a million in northern ireland. just the other day on buses and then another 24 billion today, all of it leading into this investment summit. now that, if you like, is, um, proof to me that the steps we're taking to stabilise the economy are and be clear about our strategy are having an effect. and some of the investors today who put the money in made it clear it was because the government's direction of travel and clarity is what they want to see. so all of that, i mean, look along the way. this was bumps and side winds, which, you know, i prefer, uh, we hadn't bumped into and been pushed by. but such as? such as? well, look, you know, stuff on donation, staffing issues, that sort of thing. why do you think that's happened. i mean, just let me, because i do think it's really important to get the balance right in terms of the things

we achieved that we wanted to achieve, the things we started, the legislation we've passed. um, that is all going absolutely according to the schedule that i set out. um, the investment is absolutely crucial, and we're not talking enough about it, in my view, because this is investment that's going to be measured injobs, in places, across the united kingdom, good, secure jobs for the future. so in that sense, i'm pleased we've had headwinds of, say, donation staff. i've had headwinds of the riots and disorder suddenly in the middle of the summer when i thought, right, ijust need to get off for that week's holiday. um, we had terrible riots going on, and the situation internationally has been a sort of constant, um, sort of pressure in terms of the decision making that we've had to do. do you acknowledge there's been sort of self—inflicted political damage around donations, around staffing in number ten, those headwinds that you talk about? i just look at some of the write ups this weekend on your first 100 days, the spectator —

starmer�*s first 100 days couldn't have gone worse. the economist — a very wobbly start at the new statesman, a left leaning sympathetic to labour. 100 days that shook labour. they're not all wrong, are they? well, they are focusing on those issues rather than i don't know how many of them are referencing the stuff on investment. and we'll come on to talk more about the investments. but ijust wonder. i'm not, obviously, i was leader of the opposition before i did thisjob. there was always going to be choppy days, choppy moments. i've been through this before. you get these days and weeks when things are choppy. there's no getting around that. that is in the nature of government. you're under huge scrutiny. i don't think you'd meet any leader that said, you know, could i wish some of that away? and they wouldn't say yes, please. of course. keir starmer on newscast. the prime minister has been reacting over the last couple of hours to the death of the former scottish first minister alex salmond who has died at

the age of 69. that was at an international conference in north macedonia in the lake resort town, according to the party's general secretary. keir starmer called alex salmond a monumentalfigure for starmer called alex salmond a monumental figure for more than 30 years who leaves behind a lasting legacy. these are pictures from that conference which has been taking place at that resort town in north macedonia. mr salmond was believed to have been at a lunch in a crowded room. there is great shock and sadness at the news of his death. it's been a settled start to the weekend. we did manage some spells of sunshine between the successive areas of rain. it

was a mild day, particularly across southern areas of england and wales. in cardiff, drop of four celsius as we head into sunday. low pressure clears off out of the way, a ridge of high pressure follows, bringing a better day for many of us on sunday. however, it is going to be a chilly old start of the underneath these clearing skies, temperatures are dropping like a stone at the moment. a few showers come in and going across the north of wales, coastal cheshire and northern areas of scotland but otherwise it is dry, lowest temperature selling it is dry, lowest temperatures heading into sunday morning about minus three celsius. a cold start to the day but underneath the high ridge of pressure, some fine weather. through the day, there probably will be a few patches of rain getting into northern ireland western scotland but nothing particularly heavy. for the most part, temperatures will probably reach around ten to 13 celsius. that takes us

into sunday night and we are looking at a more substantial pulse of rain is a weak area of low pressure skids eastwards across england and wales. scotland and northern ireland having largely dry weather with a few mist and fog patches and again a few patches of rust. into monday, the rest of the rainbow clear from central and eastern england but it might stay damp into the afternoon for some, the best of the weather on monday the scotland and northern ireland where it should stay dry with spells of sunshine. temperatures come up by an odd degree or so and getting closer or above average for the time of year. tuesday looks like a drier day for all of us, but there is likely to be a lot of cloud cloud bursting, so mist and fog around as well, probably a few bright sunny spells, particularly to the north and high grounds in northern scotland might be one of the sunniest places. turning milder, 40 degrees in glasgow and edinburgh, 17 cardiff and london, even milder into the middle portion of the week, it could hit in london. but the

week will be quite wet and at times really quite windy. the bye for now. —— goodbye for now.

live from london, this is bbc news. scotland's former first minister and current alba party leader alex salmond has died at the aged 69. a giant of scottish politics, he led the country during the independence referendum in 2014. tributes are coming in from across the political spectrum,

the prime minister praises him as caring deeply for scotland's heritage. warnings of growing hunger in gaza, aid workers say food hasn't reached northern areas this month , as an intense israeli offensive continues. and on the front line in southern lebanon — we report from on the ground as israeli troops clash with hezbollah forces. there has been busts of small arms fire, artillery close by, despite israeli control on the ground here this is still very much in active combat zone. still very much an active combat zone. hello, i'm karin giannone. alex salmond, the former first minister of scotland and a dominant figure in scottish politics for decades, has died at the age of 69.

the former mp and msp, who led the country