possible to turn >> it's not possible to turn round more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards. in just a few months, the economy shrank in october. >> are we on the way to recession? this could be labour's worst nightmare. >> elsewhere. freedom of movement for the under 30s. is it a good idea? well, the german ambassador has sat down with gb news. chris hope for a grilling will be many things on the agenda. >> the security pact, which is proposed by the british government. so cooperation on a wide area of topics respecting obviously the red lines, but including the idea of under and continuing the brexit relations re set. reset. >> this comes as a poll shows the majority of brexiteer voters would accept free movement in exchange for access to the single market and royal spy links. >> prince andrew's under fire after reports reveal links to an alleged chinese spy who's been banned from the uk.

>> and is this the end of lunch breaks? kemi badenoch claims lunch breaks are for wimps. after boasting, she brings in her own as she's got no time and save the turkeys at christmas. >> gen z are cancelling christmas turkeys because they'd rather have halloumi or fried chicken instead. so all the plans for the economy. labour's plans seem to have been scuppered with these breaking gdp figures. this morning, rachel reeves mentioned the word growth 31 times during that infamous budget in october, and it appears we have nothing of the sort i know, but these tiny figures, o.i% of the sort i know, but these tiny figures, 0.1% each month, are we're monitoring them going up or down. >> i mean, they don't mean anything in terms of ordinary people's take home pay. i mean, we're looking at long term trends here. would you even if it had been a great budget, would you expect to see growth already? >> so how how how long do we give them. how much goodwill do

labour have left before we start having to mark their cards down? >> it's a good question. it's a good question. i just think gdp as a measure overall is not particularly helpful because it doesn't tell you how much money is in your pocket, gdp per capita. that's what we'll be discussing that later i'm sure. >> big show coming up. but first let's get your news headlines with is it sam francis today tatiana sanchez. apologies, tatiana. >> ben, thank you very much. and good morning. the top stories. the uk economy shrank for the second month in a row in october, as concerns about the budget continue to weigh on confidence, the office for national statistics said. output fell 0.1% following the 0.1% decline recorded for the previous month. the figures showed zero growth in the powerhouse services sector, with manufacturing and construction declining at a pace of 0.6% and o.4%, respectively. the ons says activity had stalled or declined, with pubs, restaurants and retail among sectors

reporting weak months. chancellor rachel reeves said she was disappointed by the data, but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. >> but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether thatis we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> in other news, according to reports, an alleged chinese spy suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. the man, known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese

communist party. buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time. royal mail has been fined £10.5 million for missing postal delivery targets. regulator ofcom said 74.7% of first class mail and 92.7% of second class mail was delivered on time in 2023 , and this year, on time in 2023, and this year, while the targets were 93% and 98.5%. it's the second time ofcom has fined royal mail since the pandemic and it needs to do much better, according to the regulator. in a statement, ofcom said the company blamed a challenging financial position for its poor performance. and the government has unveiled a clean power action plan to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030. number 10 claims the move will protect households from any future energy spikes, boost growth and tackle the climate crisis. meanwhile, some

government backed researchers have warned miliband's plans could increase energy bills as people could be forced to pay premium to secure the correct technology. and those are the latest gb news headlines. for now, i'm tatiana sanchez. more from me in half an hour. >> very good morning to you. hope you're well. thank you for your company this morning. this is britain's newsroom with me, ben liu and miriam cates. we're reunited again after i can't remember. when was the last time? was it? good afternoon, britain. all those weeks ago? >> yeah, i think so. it's been a while anyway. >> oh, it's nice to see you again. how's your week been? >> yes. good. i enjoyed doing martin daubney show yesterday. i have to say the studio is a lot warmer, so i'm enjoying that this morning. >> so it's nice and cosy in here, isn't it? it's much nicer. >> yes, exactly. >> yes, exactly. >> for christmas. martin likes that studio. >> very cold in westminster. i've heard that. >> and it's the bane of my life. when i finished covering his show, my hands are freezing the whole time. >> i might have had a sneaky

radiator. >> oh. did you? but don't tell him. don't tell ed miliband that. >> oh, yeah. oh, gosh. yeah. well, exactly. well, i was adding to the nation's productivity by turning the heating on, i think. >> yeah. >> yeah. >> good stuff. someone's got to. >> good stuff. someone's got to. >> someone's got to be 2.5 hours. coming up. the top story this morning, of course, is that the uk economy shrunk by 0.1% in october. that's the second month in a row the economy has contracted. >> well, here's what the chancellor, rachel reeves, had to say. >> but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> well, meanwhile, the shadow chancellor of the exchequer, mel stride, has placed the blame on this government's autumn budget. >> and what this shows is that this government's constant talking down of the uk economy is coming through in these

numbers. >> well, there we go. joining us now is gb news political editor christopher hope. christopher, good morning. thank you for joining us. as i mentioned at the top of the show, rachel reeves mentioned the word growth 31 times during the budget in october. and dare i say, labour inherited the fastest growing economy in the g7. so how do they square off today's figures? >> well, morning both morning. they're worried about it. i mean, rachel reeves says today we're determined to deliver economic growth and higher growth means increased living standards for all of us. of course. that's right. being determined to deliver growth isn't the same as delivering it. and the problem they've got is it has fallen both in september and october by narrowly by 0.1%. and you're right to say, miriam, what does that mean to ordinary people? that's the question. i think not being asked not is being asked, i think within the labour government. and they want to make us all feel better in our pockets and the living standards to rise. they've moved away from that target of being the fastest growing, growing economy band in the g7 to having an aim of doing that. but the tory party, of course, is

rightly saying some would say, well, you've brought in a budget which has meant it's more expensive to hire people. it's 2% more on on national insurance to hire somebody. concerns about, of course, inheritance tax on farmers, the winter fuel allowance. there's a negativity around the economy, the this new government came in and suddenly found this £22 billion black hole. i think some of that, maybe all of that has been substantiated by independent experts, but that has meant they are talking down the economy for six, six months. they waited for a long time for a budget that delayed everything. so i think this government is getting going slowly. and we're we're only six months into a four and a half year government. >> so you mentioned talking down the economy. and i think sometimes people think of the economy as a machine. and if you make certain interventions that you can predict what's going to happen. but actually so much of it is, is vibes, it's confidence sentiment. >> exactly. and it's how you feel about yourself. and they know that. and of course this is very difficult i think. and you know, you've got the mel stride here saying it's no wonder businesses are sounding the alarm. this falling growth shows alarm. this falling growth shows a stark impact, he says of the

chancellor's decisions in october 30th budget and continually talking the economy down, they've got to change that. we're hearing from the labour today on clean power, ed miliband, this clean power 2030 action plan, the idea there is to try and move us towards a carbon free economy, 95% of energy from windmills and solar farms and the rest. but quite interestingly than that, even the retail offer from that isn't being talked about properly. the tories say there's no mention of cutting energy bills by £300. that was a big moment in the election. so yeah, not great news. >> yeah i think just on ed miliband's net zero surge i think was it this morning the grid was made up of nearly 80% gas because the storms stormed. dara scuppered solar farms and wind farms all across the country. i mean you can make it up the. you were quite right in saying that the markets and gdp and so on and so on is all about sentiment and how, you know, the

mood of the nation. the labour have been criticised this morning for a delaying the budget for so long. just just get it out there and be in the run up to the budget. the prime minister and rachel reeves were warning of doom and gloom and telling us to brace ourselves. i mean, they they scored an own goal there. really? do you agree with that? >> they they lost some of the goodwill. i mean, i was there in the rolls—royce factory when rachel reeves said, we're going to do our budget. after the obr looked at it, the obr needed, i think, ten weeks. so that's why they delayed for so long. the obr is the independent forecaster. they were so jumpy about doing something which might spook the markets. they had to get like this. trusted with her budget. that's what delayed it. but i think that delayed it. but i think that delay in not having an immediate budget shortly after the election is where is part of the problem. >> we feel stalled now, especially as it created a kind of freeze in business activity, because there was just the sense and the fear of what was going to come next. chris, thank you so much. you'll be joining us later. but joining us now in the in the studio is former labour adviser and columnist paul richards. and paul, thank you so much for coming in. i mean, this

feels like very bad news for the labour government. the one thing that they promised was to be better at managing the economy than the conservatives. >> well, i think they are better at managing the economy after the liz truss budget. but i would say i thought rachel reeves interview with gb news this morning was actually quite bullish. i think she sounded quite confident. i think she's being realistic about the fact that the immediate improvements aren't going to happen straight away, but i think there is a plan there now and some stability. the markets haven't gone haywire today in the result of this news that the economy is flatlining. and it's interesting that if you look underneath the office of national statistics figures, two things that are of concern. one is services and retail. well, that will pick up over christmas and the other is construction. well, labour has just announced a massive house building programme which will definitely get that moving too. so i think we will see growth in the next quarter. i don't think there'll be a recession. i think actually this quarter will lock in some of that activity that we all want and the economy will improve. >> well, you say we didn't expect improvements straight away on the economy, but it's not just improvements. they've gone backwards. the labour

inherited a flatlining labour inherited a flatlining labour inherited the fastest growing economy in the g7, something like bass, something like 0.6% over the first six months of the yeah over the first six months of the year. the best results in decades. >> people didn't feel that that otherwise they would have voted conservative. >> well, we can only work on the figures that we've got. and the fact is that labour inherited, i mean, aside from a bunch of other economic gifts such as falling interest rates, falling mortgage costs and so on and so on, that they did they and that's why people wanted change back in july. >> but people also know full well it ain't going to change straight away. >> but you agree that labour inherited by the facts the best i think the fastest growing economy in the g7. >> i disagree, i think we've gone backwards. i think we inherited an incredibly weak economy with flatlining productivity, sclerotic wages. those are the facts though, and no investment over ten years. and it was a really weak. >> sorry. so can i can i just be clear with you now? >> absolutely. >> absolutely. >> trying to put that right. can i just clarify with you, those are the facts, the gdp figures for the first six months of the yean for the first six months of the year, some of the facts. >> but my point is that we had sclerotic production was on the floor, wages were flatlining.

people didn't have money in their pockets. >> but it's very difficult, paul >> but it's very difficult, paul, to see how that will change because yes, okay. the construction sector might see a bit of a revival, but at the same time we've got announced enormous new numbers of homes. we've announced plans to do that, but there's no planning. indeed. but it's still far from clear that the government will actually manage to cut through some of that bureaucracy. the opposition, you know, that is a big task that's going to be very, very difficult. so we hope we will see a construction boom. but it's far from guaranteed. but it's far from guaranteed. but the budget itself, of course, put employers off hiring low wage workers, which of course one way to boost the economy. but do you think this measure of gdp is actually relevant anymore? i mean, for gdp per capita to have stayed the same last year, given the levels of immigration, we've had to have growth of 2 or 3%. that's not going to happen. >> i mean, i quite like the idea that david cameron mooted a few years ago, which was having a happiness index. and it's a bit picking up ben's point about how you feel about the economy. you know, it's not just about these numbers, which, you know, 0.1 either way doesn't make any difference to me at all. but do people feel confident? are they going to spend their money, are

they going to invest and so on? is there a different matrix, a different metric? and i think the happiness index could be one way to do that. it's quite interesting idea, but how you feel is absolutely part of the economy isn't it? >> well, i mean, again, i go back to the fact the bank of england started cutting rates in august. mortgage costs were coming down, energy costs were coming down, energy costs were coming down. and by the way, just on energy as well. we were told by ed miliband in the run up to the election that bills were reduced by £300 a year. now were reduced by £300 a year. now we don't have a particular time stamp on that. we don't know when that's going to happen. in fact, energy bills are going up in january. >> so again, i would argue, sure, but he has put a plan in place today which will, over the long term, bring the bills down because we're going to become more energy self—sufficient, not relying on the russians or gas, and get the planet in a better place, too. so, you know, the government has only been in for less than half a year, and it's made a series of big announcements on the wealth fund, on the national minimum wage. we've nationalised the railways. you know, there's the green plans, there's the housebuilding. there's a lot of stuff going on. but it's early,

early days. that's all i would say. just, you know, hold your breath. let's see where we are in a year's time. and i'm sure you'll have me back in here defending it. >> i'm sure we will. >> i'm sure we will. >> i'm sure we will. >> i'm not sure i want to risk holding my breath. paul richards, thank you very much. appreciate >> well, next, prince andrew has been linked to a

>> hello. welcome back. now, according to reports, an alleged chinese spy who's suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. >> now, the man known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. >> the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese communist party. >> now buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time. >> we're joined now by former chairman of the defence select committee, tobias ellwood. and yeah. good morning. tobias, are you there? yeah, here you are.

this is rather concerning. can you hear me? okay. i can hear you. rather concerning. and it has memories of beijing barry. barry gardiner at the time, who had his own links to the ccp. are you as concerned as some of our viewers are this morning about this? >> i'm hugely concerned. and there's a bigger picture here which we really must not miss. >> this is what china does. grey zone warfare. and it's very, very good at it. seeking opportunities, looking for vulnerabilities to gain privilege and restricted access, not just to promote a softer, more positive image of china, but to seek and exploit opportunities for coercion, espionage, intellectual property theft with a view to causing economic harm and sowing political discord. it's no surprise that prince andrew, given what has happened to him and stripped of the royal household support that might have offered better advice, was targeted this way, and i'm sure

that there will be questions asked about that. but my takeaway from all this is the geopolitical, the absence of clear strategy, given this is what china and russia now do . what china and russia now do. subthreshold warfare. this is the face of the new cold war. we're now subjected to it, and we must wake up to how vulnerable our country has become. >> so we understand that this individual was arrested under counter—terrorism provisions at a uk border in december 2021, and then his phone was interrogated. and these letters and this evidence was found. but are you saying that you believe this is actually quite a common occurrence? now, this has made the news because of, you know, the news because of, you know, the fame of the person involved, but you believe this is quite a common occurrence, then is something that the chinese are tactically doing all the time. >> absolutely. and that's what we need to understand and register. and there isn't a strategy for businesses to be supported. how do you get somebody vetted. where is the guidance to say i can or cannot do business with china because we could be vulnerable. we need

clarity here on how to handle a growing china that is ever dominant in our society. and it is our openness, our. transparency of our society that makes us all the more vulnerable itself. so yes, this has happened to prince andrew. this is your you started off by focusing on it as a royal story. i'm saying it's much bigger than that. it's a national security story, and it's just the start of how china and indeed russia are collecting data and information to use against us in the longer term. >> do you think we take it seriously enough in the west? tobias, the threat from china, because i recall seeing yesterday joe biden had pardoned scores and scores of people, three of them including chinese spies who had been arrested in america. they're now going back to i think that i don't believe we have at all. >> there was a discussion yesterday by nato about whether or not to increase defence spending to 3% at the next wmmw spending to 3% at the next summit. well, look at the world

around. him. is it becoming more dangerous or less? the threats are multiplying, getting tougher and tougher, and we're doing little about it. and this, as i say, this great warfare will be the face of the cold war. that's how. >> okay, unfortunately, we've lost tobias because the line was a bit dodgy, but we've got the we got the gist of it very concerning. i mean, yeah. >> and an interesting suggestion from tobias ellwood there that actually we need some sort of office to that is set up to vet potential chinese contacts for businesses across the country because there's huge amount of trade going on with china. >> i'm surprised there's not. >> i'm surprised there's not. >> yeah, there are i mean, there were certain pieces of legislation passed in the last parliament that were there to put the kibosh on particular business deals when they were seen as in the not in the national interest. and that has indeed happened. but it didn't highlight in vigils of concern. and actually, that's something that that perhaps we ought to be doing. >> oh, apparently this chap known only as what is it, h66. er he was at one point, at one

point so close to the duke of york, he went to his 60th birthday party, and this, this chap h6 even showed the chinese president xi jinping around on a state visit to the uk. he was his number one chaperone when here in the uk. very bizarre. just sticking on the royal stories. there's another one on the front page of the sun, apparently a christmas party of buckingham palace staff went a bit, went a bit wrong, shall we say, after a boozy brawl. it wasn't on the palace grounds and it was an informal party. but yeah, trouble flared up when up to 50 servants arrived for a pre—arranged bash. a woman believed to be a household maid at buckingham palace, aimed a punch at a manager, smashed glasses and there was an arrest as well. so there we go. >> well, there you go. >> well, there you go. >> happens to the best of us all. >> workplaces are the same, not tv news, of course. we don't have a punch up there. >> indeed, lots to come in the next hour, including the under 30s, may be able to get free movement back in a deal with germany. stick with us back in just a tick.

>> despite the morning rain. it'll be a nice, warm, cosy day ahead. boxt heat pumps sponsors of weather on gb news. >> hello there. good morning. welcome to your gb news. weather update from the met office. it's another cloudy and dull day ahead for many of us, with some rain and drizzle at times and on the chilly side too, with temperatures widely just below average for the time of year. so plenty of grey skies to go around today. there will still be lots of dry weather around, but we can't rule out some rain and drizzle at times, particularly around hilly areas, with some longer spells of rain just starting to clip. the northwest of scotland and perhaps western parts of northern ireland later into the day, and some blustery winds following on behind those outbreaks of rain too, and temperatures widely just below average for the time of year, only seeing highs of around 7 to 8 degrees. now, as we head into the evening, those longer spells of rain that are clipping the far north—west of scotland will slowly edge their way further inland. this could be quite

persistent and perhaps heavy at times, mainly across hills. turning clearer behind this though, but plenty of blustery showers behind to these outbreaks of rain just starting to edge into western parts of northern ireland as well, and then elsewhere. once again, that cloud sticking around those outbreaks of rain and drizzle, particularly across western parts of wales and parts of southwest england too, and it pretty much stays that way across england and wales through much of the night. cloudy, with some outbreaks of rain and drizzle. it will start to turn clearer from the far northwest, though we can't rule out some showers at times, these could fall as snow across the hills of scotland, perhaps to higher ground roads as well, which does lead us into an ice risk across scotland during the early hours of saturday. but elsewhere across england and wales, that cloud sticking around. so another grey start still once again with some rain and drizzle at times. so this mainly across western hills with some brighter spells. by the time we get into the afternoon, though, a few showers around coastal areas and then once again, it's the far north—west where we start to see some longer spells of rain and

some longer spells of rain and some blustery winds just start to creep in across western scotland and northwestern parts of northern ireland, and temperatures struggling still around about average for the time of year. >> there will be a light breeze in the morning, leading to a warm boxt heat pumps

>> good morning. it's 10:00 >> good morning. it's10:00 on friday the 13th of december, live across the united kingdom. this is britain's newsroom with ben, leo and miriam cates. >> very good morning to you. hope you're well. britain's economy unexpectedly contracts by 0.1%. so could we be heading towards a reeves recession? well, the chancellor seems to blame the tories. >> it's not possible to turn round more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards. in just a few months, the economy shrinks for

two months in a row, and this is before the impact of the budget is felt by companies. >> are we on our way to a recession and the brexit relations reset? >> a poll shows the majority of brexiteer voters would accept free movement in exchange for access to the single market royal spy links. >> prince andrew's under fire after reports reveal links to an alleged chinese spy who's been banned from the uk. >> and is this the end of lunch breaks? while kemi badenoch claims lunch breaks are for wimps, after boasting, she bnngsin wimps, after boasting, she brings in her own as she's got no time and freedom of movement for the under 30s. >> is it a good idea? well, the german ambassador has sat down with gb news christopher hope for a grilling will be many things on the agenda. >> the security pact, which is proposed by the british government. so cooperation on a wide area of topics respecting obviously the red lines, but including the idea of under 30, it will be included. >> and should we save the

turkeys at christmas? well, gen z are cancelling christmas turkeys and have said they'd rather eat halloumi or fried chicken instead. >> i'm dreaming of a what, 43% of brits say they only dream once a night. but experts claim we can have up to six each night, so why don't we remember them? and what does it all mean? >> i mean, i have heard before that we do all dream a lot. it's just that you don't remember them unless you wake up in the middle of them. and that doesn't happen very often. although i always find that if i've got to get up early in the morning, my ihave get up early in the morning, my i have a recurrent nightmare, which is that i've missed my alarm. >> oh, i dream quite a lot, but i can't quite. i can't unless i write them down in the morning. i can't quite remember. i think it depends on whether what stage of sleep you're at as well, isn't it, rem i'm not an expert, of course, but rem is where you

start dreaming quite vividly, i think. >> i can't remember. that's right. and it's that. but that's the that's the time of sleep where you get your most refreshing and that you really, really need. but yeah, do let us know what dreams you might have had related to christmas. maybe panicking about not taking the turkey out of the oven in time, or the saucy ones too. >> first, let's get your news headunes >> first, let's get your news headlines with tatiana sanchez. >> good morning. the top stories. we start with some breaking news this hour that the actions of armed police, who surrounded and arrested a 13 year old boy after an officer mistook his water pistol for a real gun, were reasonable in the circumstances, according to the independent office for police conduct, the boy had suffered soft tissue injuries after he was rammed off his bike by a police van and handcuffed as he was confronted by marksmen in hackney, east london, in july last year. well, the iopc has said it investigated allegations

of adultification and discrimination by police officers against the child campaign group, the alliance for police accountability, which supported the mother of the child, has criticised the decision. in other news, the uk economy shrank for the second month in a row in october as concerns about the budget continue to weigh on confidence, the office for national statistics said. output fell 0.1% following the 0.1% decline recorded for the previous month. the figures showed zero growth in the powerhouse services sector, with manufacturing and construction declining at a pace of 0.6% and 0.4%, respectively. the ons says activity had stalled or declined, with pubs, restaurants and retail among sectors reporting weak months. chancellor rachel reeves said she's disappointed by the data, but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. >> but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether

thatis we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> shadow chancellor mel stride told gb news. the falling growth shows the stark impact of the chancellor's decisions and continually talking down the economy. >> well, it's not good. these are stark figures. this is the second consecutive month in which the economy has contracted. now bear in mind that the government actually inherited the fastest growing economy in the g7 from the last conservative government. and what this shows is that this government's constant talking down of the uk economy is coming through in these numbers. now, of course, we've had a budget. we're going to be seeing higher taxes, higher inflation, higher interest rates, downward pressure on wages and higher unemployment. and so it's no surprise that businesses right up and down the country are now

sounding the alarm. >> according to reports, an alleged chinese spy suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. the man, known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese communist party. buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time. an investigation will take place after reports a member of buckingham palace staff was arrested after a christmas party, according to a palace spokesperson. the spokesperson said appropriate action would be taken after the palace was made aware of the incident. the metropolitan police told the sun officers had been called to a bar in victoria street after reports a customer had smashed glasses and attempted to assault a member of staff. they said a 24 year old woman was arrested on suspicion of common assault, criminal damage and being drunk and disorderly before being

released after being given a penalty notice. royal mail has been fined £10.5 million for missing postal delivery targets. regulator ofcom said 74.7% of first class mail and 92.7% of second class mail was delivered on time in 2023 and this year, but the targets were 93% and 98.5%. it's the second time ofcom has fined royal mail since the pandemic, and it needs to do much better, according to the regulator. in a statement, ofcom said the company blamed a challenging financial position for its poor performance. elsewhere, the government has unveiled a clean power action plan to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030. number 10 claims the move will protect households from any future energy spikes, boost growth and tackle the climate crisis. meanwhile, some government backed researchers have warned. secretary of state for energy

and climate change ed miliband's plans could actually increase energy bills, as people could be forced to pay premium to secure the correct technology. nato secretary—general mark rutte has issued a stark warning to the west, this time to shift to a wartime mindset and turbocharge our defence, production and defence spending. he warned the military alliance's members were not spending enough to prepare for the threat of a future conflict with russia. mr rudd said moscow was preparing for long term confrontation with ukraine and with us, describing the current security situation as the worst in his lifetime. his comments come weeks before president elect donald trump takes office, having previously suggested the us would not protect nato allies that were failing to spend enough on defence. nato members have pledged to spend at least 2% of the value of their economies, measured by gdp, on defence per yean measured by gdp, on defence per year, by 2024. the chief

constable of lincolnshire says he'll need to lose more than 400 officers without extra funding. paul gibson's warning comes days after his counterparts in the metropolitan police and essex said they would also have to cut staff if shortfalls in their budgets are not addressed. mr gibson says funding has not matched population growth and to maintain existing levels of operations, lincolnshire police would require an extra £57 million over the next three and a half years. among the pledges announced by the prime minister last week was a guarantee that every neighbourhood will have a named, contactable police officer responsible for dealing with local issues. and two people have been taken to hospital and several others were also injured after a fairground ride failed and crashed in birmingham. west midlands fire service said. the ride dropped to ground level whilst in operation in an incident around 730 yesterday evening, according to west midlands ambulance

service. paramedics found 13 patients in need of help when they arrived at the scene. two women were treated by ambulance staff for injuries not believed to be serious and taken to hospital. around a dozen others were addressed and discharged at the scene. and those are the latest gb news headlines for now. more news from me in half an hour. >> very good morning to you, ben and miriam with you on britain's newsroom this morning live across the uk. and thank you for your comments as well on gbnews.com/yoursay. some very funny ones. you've been very creative this morning and also some news. have you heard of this mish rahman the reform council win? they want a seat in. >> was it somewhere in the north—west i think. >> let me just tell you exactly where it was. blackbrook vic floyd of reform uk won a seat on saint helens council from labour after the incumbent passed away. a lady called lynda maloney. yeah. so another success for momentum. momentum not corbyn's

wing of the labour party for reform. >> and there was another by—election council seat in barnsley yesterday where the lib dems retained it. but significant increase in vote share for reform and a collapse in vote for both conservative and labour there. >> so. oh dear. >> so. oh dear. >> yeah, there's the reform definitely seems to have all the momentum with them. like you say at the moment. when are the local elections? >> is it may next year? >> is it may next year? >> may next year? i'm not sure what proportion of seats are up for grabs. it's normally a third each year, isn't it? but it will be very interesting. and i think what's so challenging to kind of the traditional way of doing politics is that certainly the conservative party, it's all about how many leaflets can you deren about how many leaflets can you deliver, how many doors can you knock on? and yet reform got 4 million votes in july with delivering hardly any leaflets. it wasn't about local campaigning at all, was it about tiktok views and youtube views. they really have taken a stranglehold, but i think it was much more about a general disappointment, frustration, anger with the conservatives and also labour, the mainstream party, resulting in a surge of

support for reform. so, i mean, i think, you know, labour and the conservatives will be thinking, how can we get this back? we need better candidates, we need better leaflets. but i just don't think that's the answer at all. >> interesting. yeah. may is going to be pivotal to say the least. one quick one from bob. you said we appear to have a bunch of turkeys in government. i think starmer is a fan of brussels, whilst comrade rayner gets roasted in virtually every interview she does. assuming we'll be able to buy produce this christmas, they will be a prime example. is that what it says? yeah. very funny. what? >> we need to make sure we've got a christmas lunch. i think that's the message which i very much agree with. >> make sure you go for lunch. absolutely. >> it's very important. not for wimps. >> not for wimps, not me. the uk will be pressured next year to allow, under 30s from the eu to live and work in the uk, as part of a new deal to reset the uk eu relationship. >> well, the german ambassador to the uk, miguel berger, sat down with gb news own political edhon down with gb news own political editor, christopher hope, to discuss these brexit relations. >> resets government here says no plans for movement under 30s.

but there's been talks already privately with the german government. >> no not yet. and this would be negotiated by the european union. >> you can't do it. >> we would not do it individually. but you have seen that the prime minister is going to meet miss von der leyen, the president of the european commission, somewhere in spring next year. and then we will start talking about the whole reset, because so far it could not be done. why? because the european commission was not up and working. it was just confirmed some days ago. and so in spring we are going to start these talks and will this be on these talks and will this be on the agenda? >> freedom of movement for under 30s. >> there will be many things on the agenda. the security pact, which is proposed by the british government. so cooperation on a wide area of topics respecting obviously the red lines, but including the idea of under 30, it will be included. yes. and also the question of erasmus programme, where the united

kingdom in the last minute opted out of it. so all of these things will be again on the table. >> well, joining us now to discuss this story is gb news political editor. you saw him in the video. he's now here in the studio. and chris the eu are desperate to restore this freedom of movement for under 30s aren't they. >> they are. and great to see you both in the studio. they are. they really want it to happen. will it happen? big question. what they do keep telling is the red lines are keir starmers red lines. no going back into the customs union, union or the single market. but what they want is freedom of movement for their own own young people. they want to come to the uk, learn english, which is a global language, and go home again. and that's why it will be on the agenda of what is a crucial, i think, summit between ursula von der elianne, who's the eu president, and sir keir starmer early in the new year, after a meeting on the 3rd of february between all eu 27 heads of state or leaders with sir keir starmer. so the first six months

of next year, i think are massive in this. in quotes reset of the european union, uk relations. >> christopher does that include, do you know asylum seekers in germany? i mean, would angela merkel's guests be able to then travel to the uk? >> it depends on the status. ben. there, of course, there were 3.5 million immigrants who arrived in the past ten years in in germany, a million or so from syria when angela merkel opened up the border. if they are, if they have full german passports, there's no reason why they couldn't come across if they're under 30 right now, separate to this, there's a poll out that shows that the majority of britons, including brexiteers, would be willing to swap freedom of movement to get back into the single market. >> is this poll all that it seems? it seems very surprising that people are so keen on even more immigration. >> is the poll of 9000 people over six countries over six countries germany, france, italy, spain, poland and the uk. 54% of britons, they said, who

voted to leave, including 59% of those in the so—called red wall seats. labour seats, you might argue it's an exchange for single market access to accept full freedom of movement for the eu and uk. i mean, i think this is so kind of i think we've moved on a bit. i mean, given a million people arrived here, nearly a million people arrived here in the last calendar year, net legally arrived here. the fact that we might go back towards this is, i think, for the birds, but just just tweaking around the edges, the erasmus scheme, of course, for students to go back and forth between universities. that's one idea. but i think the problem with even the under 30s issue is we are told they want to reduce net migration. if you do that, you lose control of numbers. >> you have no idea exactly how many. the figures will look dreadful, even if they are people who only come back in the 2000. >> when i was doing the home affairs job at the telegraph, and we were trying to work out how many people are here, the government had no idea because of the freedom of movement. so we were counting what called nino's national insurance numbers to try and get a handle on it. i mean, it's really hard

to control who conducted the poll. >> was it the guardian or someone? >> it wasn't. no, it was a body. >> it wasn't. no, it was a body. >> i've never heard of a european wide body. i mean, it's only 1500 people per country. but what really surprised me is that the european countries were much less keen on freedom of movement. >> i think they've moved on a bit. i think they have. i think some people here haven't quite moved on from the battle over brexit. it's a bit alarming, i think, for some people to go towards that, that battle and also it just feels like kind of, you know, boil the frog slowly kind of thing. >> it's like, well, let's start with this freedom of movement deal with this freedom of movement deal. you know, a little bit there and then maybe five years down the line, let's do this and then let's do that, and then we become tied to a body we can't make the laws for. >> that's the point. and don't forget we haven't even talked about donald trump. he takes over on january 20th. he wants a trade deal. we think with the uk he wants closer ties with the country his mother is from. don't forget that. what will he think of this kind of thing. this trade and cooperation agreement will be talked about next year. on the following yean next year. on the following year, fishing rights come back to the uk. will they be sold

down the line for access to other areas? >> now of course, there is a link between this story about freedom of movement and the economy, because one of the reasons that it feels that our economy is so sluggish is because we've had this huge increase in population without corresponding economic growth. and i think if we'd just stayed level last year, the economy would have had to grow by 2 or 3% to take account of the number of people that came here, gdp per capita, per head. >> so we all feel poorer. and that's really why labour won the election in july. i think, you know, 14 years of not feeling ficher know, 14 years of not feeling richer for most people gave them gave them that, that, that win i should say. the gdp by the way, increased by 0.1%, not fell in september and then fell in october. it's basically flatlining at the moment and we are teetering going towards and the worry will be a recession. we're nowhere near there yet, and we'll know that after the first quarter of next year. >> okay, chopper, thanks very much. yeah. gdp per capita, of course, is the true measurement of how well off we are feeling. and we were told, weren't we, for year after year after year, that migration is good for gdp. well, gdp per capita has been contracting for decades. and at the same time migration has been

uncontrolled, exploding millions of people in the country. so if you ask me, that's a myth that migration fuels gdp. >> yeah. and i think what is different now to before brexit and lots of eastern europeans came over here to work, earned good money, send it back home. and the gap between our economy, our gdp per capita and eastern european countries like poland is narrowing. i mean, even if we did have freedom of movement now, i very much doubt the same numbers of polish children, poush numbers of polish children, polish young people, for example, would come here because there just isn't that differential anymore. they've grown a lot quicker than we have. >> just very quickly before we move on. liz truss was tweeting this morning. she said higher taxes, more regulation, more spending, more immigration, more net zero leads to lower growth. the economic doom loop continues. has she been vindicated this morning? >> the thing is that everybody forgets about liz truss's mini—budget. people concentrate on the, you know, the tax cut for the wealthy, which was a tiny amount of money. the problem was she also wanted to spend billions on propping up people's energy prices. now, that's not a small state policy at all. it was an emergency debt. well, it may be a popular policy, but it was that debt that spooked the markets, not

the end to the bankers bonus tax. i think it's important to remember that. >> i think particularly for businesses, those at that point when russia had invaded ukraine, businesses were going under the cost per unit was something like £1.50. >> i'm not arguing that we shouldn't be subsidising people's energy prices. i'm saying that the narrative is she crashed the economy because she ended bankers bonus tax. that's not true. she crashed the economy because the amount of money, the debt, the extra debt that we were getting into, which isn't actually a very conservative policy. >> and also, she didn't put your mortgages up. they're going up all around the world. so there we go. anyway, every day we have a poll of the day. and today we've been asking, do you back ed miliband's clean power 2030 action plan? we'll be bringing you the live results throughout the day, so make sure to stay tuned for that. and the final results will be announced later in martin daubney show. >> so for all our latest polls, news and how to vote, just go to gbnews.com/poll. >> up next, jury trials could be axed to ease backlogs. but what does this mean for the safety on our streets? you're with britain's newsroom on gb news back in tick.

>> welcome back. it's 10:23. and this is britain's newsroom with ben, leo and miriam cates. >> morning. we're also joined by broadcasters bruce, bruce devlin and claire muldoon in the studio. i called you something funny in the breakfast, and i told you. was it alex muldoon or something? no. oh, no. was it you or someone else? sorry. >> ignore me. no. you got someone's name wrong. >> yes, that was it. >> yes, that was it. >> it was andy and alex, wasn't it? yes. yeah. anyway, welcome back. >> and gb news studio. >> and gb news studio. >> hello, bruce. >> hello, bruce. >> hi. >> hi. >> what should we start with? what about wes streeting? i'm a i'm a secret fan of wes streeting. i know the viewers will annihilate me for that. sorry. well, yeah, it's not a secret, but he's criticised ed miliband, his colleague, his colleague, labour colleague, over his failure to back military action against bashar al assad in syria in 2013 after that gassing. of course. claire, do you want to kick off with that? >> yeah, let's. i'm a very big fan of wes streeting. i think he

might be the next leader of the labour party. actually, i think he's a man of conviction, and i think he is a strong willed man. and i think this is more to do with the fact that he's stamping his authority on the party. he was the one one of the only mps, like rosie duffield, who voted against the assisted dying bill, and that went against his party. and we know there was no whip involved in that. therefore it was a free vote. he also knows what a woman is. that's absolutely fundamental to my politicians standing, i think. and also he has got the nhs in his palm and he knows exactly what is needed and he does. >> sorry to interject. two days ago he also announced the permanent ban of puberty blockers in the uk. indeed. >> indeed indeed. >> indeed indeed. >> a lot of stick for him. yes, but i mean it is. >> it is part and parcel of keeping safeguarding children and keeping them children until they are of an age, a legal age when they can make these decisions by themselves. anyway, so i've got a lot of time for wes streeting, and i think this

whole thing about him attacking ed miliband, of course the papers would use that rhetoric. they would say he was attacking just for us to talk about it like we're doing. but i think it's more him stamping his mark on the party. and if we look back in history to 2013 to the strikes, it was more focused. the optic was clearly on obama at that time than it was more so for us. and history has taught us to look back retrospectively and hopefully learn from it. we now know chemical weapons were used on the people of syria. >> but he's right. i mean, at the time, unusually, parliament had a vote about whether to go for these strikes. i think that's probably because cameron was spooked by everything that had happened to blair under blair. but ed miliband absolutely did lead the charge against that. >> but yeah, and also with that, though, that obama did a complete u—turn. and we always follow america. we all i mean look at the iran iraq war with bush and blair. and, you know, it's actually time that we actually stood on our own two

feet collectively as a nation. but, ed miliband, i've got no time for actually either. and his net zero stupid policy. i understand why he's in the bin and can be recycled. miliband, do you think? >> i don't think so. >> i don't think so. >> him down to net zero. >> him down to net zero. >> he's too plastic, but he's really ineffectual. and he's hanging around. he's like some unwanted uncle at a family function. he has a look of a trouser fumbler about him. that's just my opinion. well, we should probably move on swiftly from that to a slightly less serious story about a christmas party punch up at the palace. >> bruce, do you think this is really news? bruce was there. >> it was me. i'm the 24 year old woman that was arrested and flung in the cells. and this is actually very close to where i live, so it's quite exciting for me. so it was basically 50 aides from the palace had gone there. staff night out in all bar one in victoria, and someone went mental, as we would say, up the road. and it began at 4:00 in the afternoon. what do you expect? because i doubt much food was taken. i don't think

was taken. i think there were many canopies, but food was taken. i don't think there were many canopies, but apparently this individual aim apparently this individual aim was smashing glasses, screaming. was smashing glasses, screaming. and the thing is as well, all and the thing is as well, all joking aside, right, okay. is it joking aside, right, okay. is it newsworthy? is it not? i think newsworthy? is it not? i think it just goes to show how it just goes to show how difficult the service industry difficult the service industry is at this time, with people is at this time, with people just being catatonic. >> i think there's another angle just being catatonic. >> i think there's another angle here as well. and that of here as well. and that of christmas parties. i think christmas parties. i think people have got this propensity people have got this propensity just to let off as if they're a just to let off as if they're a christmas cracker themselves. >> i think they're quite christmas cracker themselves. >> i think they're quite dangerous party to go to these dangerous party to go to these daysif dangerous party to go to these daysif dangerous party to go to these days if you're a professional. i days if you're a professional. i mean, what's the risk reward you mean, what's the risk reward you end up? i mean, what's the end up? i mean, what's the reward? you have a nice time reward? you have a nice time with your friends and your with your friends and your colleagues. i had a lovely time colleagues. i had a lovely time on saturday at the gb news. on saturday at the gb news. well, i didn't go. well, i didn't go. >> oh, well, that was you then. >> oh, well, that was you then. but it is. but it is. >> and the focus is all on. you >> and the focus is all on. you know how much you can drink. you know how much you can drink. you know how much you can drink. you know how much you can drink. you know how much you can drink. you know how a lot by the sounds of know how much you can drink. you know how a lot by the sounds of things. and, you know, things. and, you know, unfortunately, if you are in a unfortunately, if you are in a business where the eyes are on business where the eyes are on you and you will do something you and you will do something like this in the public eye, like this in the public eye, then you do risk. then you do risk. >> but that's the thing. you're >> but that's the thing. you're right. i mean, you do have a right. i mean, you do have a kind of although you're behind kind of although you're behind

the scenes, you're associated the scenes, you're associated with something incredibly high profile. and so but the thing is as well, was it a free bar? because i know what i'm like. i don't get invited to free bars anymore because i just take full advantage. >> it just doesn't seem worth it anymore. you could say something after a couple of drinks that somebody takes the wrong way. the next day you've got an hr complaint or you know, who knows. >> that's the other thing. companies now have got so much potential risk factor associated with anything their employee does because they are responsible for them. and the last thing they want is someone taking offence, as someone said. i mean, we do talk about it. banter police. when is that going to start? when will it stop? thought police or you thought that didn't say it, but you thought it and i'm offended. >> well, on the topic of the police, another story we've got today is about the fact that jury today is about the fact that jury trials could be axed in order to ease the court backlog, which we know is making cases taking months and months and months to come to trial. i mean, do you think this is a good idea? no, i don't at all. >> juries don't at all. don't at all. they tried it in scotland. it was mooted and it was brought

back because of the judiciary.

back in the next hour or so. more coming up on britain's newsroom this morning. but first, let's get your news headunes first, let's get your news headlines with tatiana sanchez. >> ben thank you. the top stories. the uk economy shrank for the second month in a row in october, as concerns about the budget continue to weigh on confidence, the office for national statistics said output fell 0.1% following the 0.1% decline recorded for the previous month. the figures showed zero growth in the powerhouse services sector, with manufacturing and construction declining at a pace of 0.6% and o.4%, respectively. the ons says activity had stalled or declined, with pubs, restaurants and retail among sectors reporting weak months. chancellor rachel reeves said she was disappointed by the data. >> but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5

million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> in other news, according to reports, an alleged chinese spy suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. the man, known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese communist party. buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time, and royal mail has been fined £10.5 million for missing postal delivery targets. regulator ofcom said 74.7% of first class mail and 92.7% of second class was delivered on time in 2023, and this year the targets were 93% and 98.5%. it's the second time that ofcom has

fined royal mail since the pandemic, and it needs to do much better, according to the regulator. in a statement, ofcom said the company blamed a challenging financial position for its poor performance. those are the latest gb news headlines for now. i'm tatiana sanchez. more from me in half an hour for the very latest gb news direct to your smartphone, sign up to news alerts by scanning the qr code or go to gbnews.com/alerts. >> cheers! britannia wine club proudly sponsors the gb news financial report. >> here's a quick snapshot of today's markets. the pound will buy you $1.2643 and ,1.2048. the price of gold is £8,322.48 per ounce, and the ftse 100 is at 8322 points. >> cheers britannia wine

sponsoi's

>> welcome back. it's 1036. you're watching britain's newsroom with miriam cates and ben liu, and we're asking, are gen z turning their back on christmas traditions? >> we ask that because over 75%, apparently, of brits aged between 18 and 26, say they would ditch turkey mince pies and brussel sprouts for alternative foods on christmas day. >> so we're asking if it's time to break with tradition. >> we're joined now by celebrity chef theo michaels, who believes turkeys should keep being eaten at christmas, and senior media and communications manager at the animal charity peta, jennifer white, who believes we should stop eating turkeys. jennhen should stop eating turkeys. jennifer, we'll start with you. what's your. i mean, i think i know the answer to this. what's your issue with turkeys? >> good morning. well, of course, you know, we are urging everyone to have a vegan christmas and enjoy the festive

season with delicious and nutritious vegan foods instead. and you really can have it all. if you want that traditional christmas feel. you can have a vegan turkey, but also you can have a bucket of vegan fried chicken too, if that's what you'd rather. but the main thing is that you can enjoy all of that nostalgia of your favourite foods, all of the taste, but just without any of the cruelty. >> jennifer. dare i say that those alternatives are very unhealthy, ultra processed, millions of ingredients? why not just have a fresh bit of lean meat with one ingredient meat, which has all the vitamins and in some cases, the creatine? all the essentials? instead of getting some processed junk served to you in plastic. >> i mean, there's absolutely nothing healthy about eating the rotting corpse of a tortured bird. and we know that, you know, people who have a vegan diet suffer less from certain types of cancer, from high blood pressure, from heart disease and a host of other health conditions. so the best thing that you can do for your own health as well is absolutely eat a diet that is high in vegan

foods, which of course fruits, vegetables, grains. you don't have to have a meat alternative this christmas if you don't want one, but there are certainly opfions one, but there are certainly options available for everyone. >> theo rotting corpse or a lean source of protein? >> wow, the rotting corpse of a turkey. that was brutal. no, i think the i think the reality is i'm not salivating, if i'm honest over the idea of a nut roast for my christmas dinner. there's a there's a tradition of turkey that's been around since henry the eighth and turkey. there's an entire industry around turkey farming. and actually, it's a really healthy meat. it's really lean when it's cooked great and it's rested for a good hour. it's succulent and juicy. and to me, that's part of the absolute tapestry of our christmas dinner. i, i understand if you happen to be vegan, but the notion of trying to convert the masses to a vegan dinner, i'm just having i'm struggling to salivate over the idea of that. if i'm honest,

jennifer and i think i mean, honestly, like, tradition is no excuse for cruelty. >> and we are talking about individuals here. and of course, i'm not here telling people what they can and can't eat. i'm simply encouraging people to make more informed choices. so if you are someone who is thinking of eating turkey or cows or pigs this christmas, go to peta's website and just try and watch some of the investigation footage that we have taken at hundreds of british farms, showing british farm s, showing deplorable british farms, showing deplorable conditions of animal suffering. and honestly, it's so awful that most people can barely watch more than 30s of it. and if you cannot watch it, then surely you should not be buying it. yeah, and you know what? >> there are some unscrupulous. sort of animal welfare issues out there, and i don't think anyone disputes that. but for so many farmers, there's a turkey farm i'm thinking of. they've beenin farm i'm thinking of. they've been in business 25 years. the turkeys are free range. they're having the time of their life. they are well kept birds. and

when it when the time comes, they are manufactured for our kitchen tables in the most humane possible way and the quickest way. but this is like we are meat eaters. we are carnivores. as human beings. it's part of our entire evolution. i don't dispute, i think it's a great thing that there are more vegan options and there are more vegan options and there is more vegan sort of potential, but we're talking about christmas dinner here, and i've got to say, i'd be upset i wouldn't be able to pull my cracker with someone if they were serving me the vegan turkey over christmas. >> jeff, do you think veganism has peaked? i mean, there's certainly an increase for some time, but i think last year's figures showed a decrease in the number of people who say that they are vegans. do you think have you got a much bigger job have you got a much biggerjob to do to persuade more people to come round to your point of view? >> i mean, we are still very much in the middle of a vegan boom at the moment, but i think just going back to what theo said when he used the word

manufactured, that is certainly one way to whitewash and gloss over the fact that turkeys who were killed between 12 weeks and 26 weeks are, you know, they are hung upside down, they are shackled, they are dragged through an electric bath which doesn't even stun them properly. and they are often still alive and conscious while their throats are being slit. and that is not very festive. i think we can all agree. and the best way to show kindness to everyone is by not eating animals. do they not deserve to be part of the season of goodwill as well? >> they must be part. they do deserve to be part of the season of goodwill and they look especially, well, slightly bronzed with an orange on the side. >> oh, theo. jennifer, i believe it or not, i do. i do agree with you. i think mass industrial farming has had a lot of questions to answer for, and i think i agree with you as well. if you can't watch the slaughter videos and the way some of these animals are treated, then i don't think you should be eating meat. likewise, i think you should be able to, or at least

want to be able to slaughter your own animals. if you're going to be a meat eater, i think it's a bit hypocritical if you don't. however, as i said, my issue with veganism at the moment is you get all these plastic produced fake meats. i also understand, jennifer, why you want to mimic meat, the texture of meat, the flavour of meat, you know, the juiciness of meat. if it's so horrible, why do vegans want to mimic it so much? >> well, that's a good question, but it's actually because most people don't go vegan because they don't like the taste or the texture of meat. it's because they don't want someone to have to die for their meal. so that's why these meat alternatives are great for people who still want that nostalgia of their favourite foods. but of course, there is no pressure for anyone to eat that you know, you can have, you know, tofu, seitan, or, you know, just vegetables, pulses, grains, pasta. you know, there are so many foods that you probably already eat that are just accidentally vegan, that are so good for you, filled with protein, filled with iron. you just there's just absolutely no needin just there's just absolutely no need in 2024 for any of us to be

eating the flesh of animals who did not want to die. >> do you know what you know what, jennifer? i do agree with you on so many counts, if i'm honest. but i think, i think part of this is about sustainability and it's about us still, i believe in in being a meat eater, but i believe it's about being true to the welfare of the animals. pardon me? making it a sustainable product and a and a highly sort of conscientious means as well. i mean, you mentioned you pulled mean, you mentioned you pulled me up on using the word manufactured equally, the connotations of your vernacular of dragging the animals through and slitting their throats. we're both sort of overexaggerating, i guess, in that respect. well, you can watch that for yourself, though. >> you can watch those videos. they are all on peta's website. you can see for yourself that i'm not exaggerating. >> we should also, but we should also film really high quality. high standards farms that do treat animals with a lot more respect. and i believe that this is about more about sustainability, keeping meat

within the food chain, but making it sustainable and changing the entire. there's just nothing sustainable there. >> it's i think, sadly, i think we're going to have to leave it there. we're going to have to leave it there. but jennifer, theo, thank you so much. and do let us know if either jennifer or theo have convinced you to change your mind about what you'll be eating for christmas day. i think what's really interesting about that is, is jennifer kept saying, talking about these animals as if they're people. you don't have to eat someone. fundamentally, this comes down to do you think that animals are sentient beings that animals are sentient beings that should have equal rights as human beings or not? >> well, they are sentient beings and they are conscious and they have feelings and emotions. i mean, cows are meant to be very intelligent, likewise pigs. but i'm sorry, they're not humans. we. yeah, we eat meat. the majority of us eat meat. i respect vegans, i just i just think they're slightly misinformed about things being healthier when it's so ultra processed. >> and especially teenagers need protein, especially teenage boys. and this trend for schools and universities to come up with, you know, vegan monday or

we're not going to serve meat anymore. i actually think it's quite a health concern for growing teenagers to not have enough protein. >> there's been so much propaganda over the years about things like eggs saying they cause high levels of bad cholesterol. they're actually full of very good cholesterol, butter, saturated fats, animal fats. it actually turns out, according to lots of studies, those things aren't as bad for you as previously discussed. and also things like almond milk and all these alternative milks. if you go to california where most of these are produced, they're absolutely wiping out bee colonies, bee populations in california, it's a really unspoken about dark side to veganism. >> but when you mess with the natural world, you get all sorts of unexpected consequences, don't you? yeah. anyway, we're going to be staying on the theme of food and asking our lunch breaks for wimps. well, kemi badenoch, leader of the conservative party, seems to think so. you're watching britain's newsroom on gb news.

>> hello. welcome back. it's nearly 10 to 11. ben and miriam with you on britain's newsroom. only on gb news. >> well, sir keir starmer and kemi badenoch butted heads yesterday over a very pressing matter. you'll never guess it. sandwiches. >> in an interview with the spectator, kemi badenoch claims lunch breaks are for wimps and said they weren't real food. >> meanwhile, reform uk leader nigel farage didn't hold back in his response to the leader of his majesty's loyal opposition. >> kemi badenoch says that lunch is for wimps. well, i tell you what i think . that lunch is what i think. that lunch is pretty cool, but on the busy daysi pretty cool, but on the busy days i stay in the office and have a sandwich. she even thinks sandwiches are wrong. now i leave it up to you centre right voters to decide what kind of leadership you want. lunch is for wimps or me. cheers, everybody. >> it makes me giggle. we're joined now by behavioural psychologist jo hemmings. jo. good morning. sandwiches and lunch breaks. are they for? for wimps? >> good morning. look, i can't

work out if kemi badenoch is being deliberately provocative or she thinks she's got some sort of superpower, because 94% are staggering. 94% of us eat sandwiches at lunchtime. it's a national british tradition. and actually, if you don't eat lunch, all the studies, all the research would say we're less productive in the afternoon. we lose our energy, we get fatigue, our decision making is impaired, our decision making is impaired, our cognitive clarity goes. i mean, there is no reason on earth that i can see in any research why you'd want to skip lunch. 25% of people skip breakfast. so if they're the same people who are skipping lunch, they're going to be really non—productive and exhausted. afternoon. so i really can't work out why she's stirring this particular pot, to be fair. >> nevertheless, it has stoked interesting discussion about

lunch and different lunch habits and traditions. and i think what nigel farage is intervention shows is how much things have changed. you know, there was a time maybe back to the 1980s where people in certain professions would stop, have lunch, boozy lunch, drink red wine and then go back to sleep. now, surely you're not suggesting they are going to be particularly productive in the afternoon? >> no. and judging by nigel farage, his lunch that he was just having, i don't think there was a lot of work that was going to be done later that afternoon. no, but even 20 or 30 minutes away from your desk or having something to eat doesn't have to be a lunch hour. it just has to be. and also social connection. if you're eating in a canteen, you know all that stuff is just missing if you don't eat lunch. no, i think nigel's a rather boozy looking lunch. joyous as it looks, it's probably not a very productive way to go about things. >> yeah, it's a very strange comment from kemi badenoch. in my opinion. you need, even if you're not going off to eat a

sandwich or lunch or whatever your choice of food may be, surely you need just 20 or 30 minutes just to reset your brain. i don't think there's anything noble or virtuous in just grafting for ten hours a day, as if you're, you know, some sort of robot. i mean, where's the plaudits in that? >> i don't know, i felt she was just trying to prove that she was, you know, a warrior, omnipotent. she didn't need lunch. but that's not normal. even if you have to have at your desk. and 30% of us sit at our desks and eat lunch, which always. i always think of messy keyboards at this point. but anyway, if you have to, you have to. yeah, that is better than skipping lunch altogether. >> but it's fine. but again, that's an interesting cultural idea because certainly in places like france, having lunch with other people as a social event and away from your desk is, you know, is a big deal. and indeed, the success of french high streets has been credited with the fact that people leave their offices and go out for lunch and eat together. actually, wouldn't it be better for us if we did use that time to be sociable?

never mind what we eat. >> yeah, wholly. firstly, you've got things to do. sometimes at lunchtime, pop out and buy stuff because you're working all day. people who are working from home maybe have less time in the office. so getting to know their colleagues on a social level as well as a professional level, yeah, these things are all really important. so i cannot say i did. i did note she said something about sometimes she has a steak at lunch i think. okay. >> very bizarre joe steak. thank you for your time this morning. appreciate it. i'll leave you to go and get some lunch. >> yeah. thank you so much. bit early, but i will. >> kemi. kemi, really? she's not impressed me at all. i've heard more about lunch and her eating steak than i have tory policy. >> i don't know whether it's one of those throwaway comments that's now been written up into a story, even at the despatch box at pmqs. >> i mean, she's talking about immigration and accusing labour of not handling migration, but she was the one who wanted no caps on migration. >> i don't understand her eating turkey at christmas by a steak every day for lunch is not going

to be good on the vegans wish list, is it? >> i can have that bit of sirloin for lunch. anyway, still to come. are we looking at a recession under rachel reeves? we'll find out in just a tick. >> ooh, a chilly start will give way to a lovely warm afternoon. boxt heat pumps sponsors of weather on gb news. >> time for your latest weather update from the met office here on gb news. it's been a fairly cloudy week and another pretty drab day for most. some rain and drizzle here and there, but many places will stay dry. we are in for a change though. this cold front is swinging its way south and that should clear away a lot of the cloud. so many of us will be brighter tomorrow. now, today, as i said, it is mostly cloudy, but there's some sunshine over parts of northeast scotland where we had a pretty harsh frost last night. elsewhere, a lot of cloud, some rain and drizzle. southern scotland, parts of the southwest and there's that weather front coming in that will bring some wet weather across the highlands come this afternoon and into the

evening. many places just dry and cloudy with temperatures around or a touch below average. the winds though, are pretty light. it's going to feel quite cool. i suspect though, with these outbreaks of rain coming into the southwest. probably nothing too heavy, but certainly a damp afternoon for somerset, devon, cornwall, parts of south wales, a bit of light rain and drizzle further east but a good chunk of england will stay dry. there's that weather front bringing some rain across the highlands of scotland. behind it we'll start to see the clearer skies coming in and that will be quite noticeable as we go through tonight and tomorrow. we'll track this line of rain then, as it sinks its way into southern scotland, across northern ireland this evening, kind of fizzling out as it does so. so just a little bit of light rain and drizzle for a time, and we'll continue with some patchy rain over england and wales. two quite murky over some of the higher routes. but then the clearer air comes in and the clearer skies come into scotland, northern england, parts of northern ireland and temperatures will drop here, certainly in the east of scotland with some shelter could get to down —2 or —3. the cloudy

skies keeping temperatures above freezing for england and wales, so it will still be cloudy first thing tomorrow here. but i'm hopeful that northern england much of wales will brighten up some showers coming into north and west wales. sunny a day for many and even the south—east will eventually cheer up come the afternoon with some sunny spells before more rain then comes back into the north—west later on. bye for now. >> a nice bright morning will generate a lovely warm day right to the evening. boxt solar

>> very good morning to you. it's 11:00 on friday, december it's11:00 on friday, december the 13th. live across the uk. this is britain's newsroom with me, ben, leo and miriam cates. >> now britain's economy unexpectedly contracted by 0.1%. could we be heading towards a reeves recession? well, the chancellor seems to blame the tories. >> it's not possible to turn

round more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards. in just a few months. >> royal spy links prince andrew under fire after reports reveal links to an alleged chinese spy who's been banned from the uk. >> and is this the end of lunch breaks? kemi badenoch claims lunch breaks are for wimps. after boasting she brings in her own as she's got no time. >> freedom of movement for the under 30s. is it a good idea? well, the german ambassador sat down with gb news political editor christopher hope for a grilling will be many things on the agenda. >> the security pact, which is proposed by the british government. so cooperation on a wide area of topics respecting obviously the red lines, but including the idea of under 30, it will be included and sweet dreams are made of this. >> 43% of brits say they only dream once a night. but experts claim we can have up to six dreams each night, so why don't

we remember them? and what does it mean?

thinks i think so. it would be confined to german citizens. >> yeah. >> yeah. >> however, who knows? would angela merkel's arrivals be in your high street next year or the year after? who knows? >> yes. well, we'll see, but i just don't think i think they'll be put off by the figures. i think yvette cooper will win. >> okay. we'll see. big show coming up last hour. get your views in gbnews.com/yoursay. but before we do anything else, here's your news headlines with tatiana sanchez. >> bannau. thank you very much. the top stories. well, the uk economy shrank for the second month in a row in october as concerns about the budget continue to weigh on confidence, the office for national statistics said output fell 0.1% following the 0.1% decline recorded for the previous month. the figures showed zero growth in the powerhouse services sector, with manufacturing and construction declining at a pace of 0.6% and o.4%, respectively. the ons says activity had stalled or declined, with pubs,

restaurants and retail among sectors reporting weak months. chancellor rachel reeves said she was disappointed by the data. >> but it's not possible to turn round more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> the shadow chancellor, mel stride, says the falling growth shows the stark impact of the chancellor's decisions and continually talking down the economy. >> well, it's not good. these are stark figures. this is the second consecutive month in which the economy has contracted. now, bear in mind that the government actually inherited the fastest growing economy in the g7 from the last conservative government. and what this shows is that this government's constant talking

down of the uk economy is coming through in these numbers. now, of course, we've had a budget. we're going to be seeing higher taxes, higher inflation, higher interest rates, downward pressure on wages and higher unemployment. and so it's no surprise that businesses right up and down the country are now sounding the alarm. >> according to reports, an alleged chinese spy suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. the man, known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese communist party. buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time. an investigation will take place after reports a member of buckingham palace staff was arrested after a christmas party, according to a palace spokesperson. the spokesperson said appropriate action would be taken after the palace was made aware of the incident. the sun

reported. a female member of staff was arrested at a bar in victoria on tuesday. buckingham palace says reports of staff members arrest will be investigated in due course. in other news, the actions of armed police who surrounded. who surrounded a 13 year old boy after an officer mistook his water pistol for a real gun, were reasonable in the circumstances, according to the independent office for police conduct, the boy had suffered soft tissue injuries after he was rammed off of his bike by a police van and handcuffed. he was confronted by marksmen in east london. while the iopc has today said that those actions were reasonable. in other news, royal mail has been fined £10.5 million for missing postal delivery targets. regulator ofcom said 74.7% of first class

mail and 92.7% of second class mail and 92.7% of second class mail was delivered on time in 2023. and this year, while those targets were 93% and 98.5%, it is the second time that ofcom has fined royal mail since the pandemic and it needs to do much better, according to the regulator. in a statement, ofcom said the company blamed a challenging financial position for its poor performance. the government has unveiled a clean power action plan to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030. number 10 claims the move will protect households from any future energy spikes, boost growth and tackle the climate crisis. meanwhile, some government backed researchers have warned miliband's plans could actually increase energy bills as people could be forced to pay premium to secure the correct technology. and two people have been taken to hospital and several others were also injured after a fairground ride failed and crashed in

birmingham. west midlands fire service said the ride dropped to ground level whilst an operation in an incident around 7:00 yesterday evening. according to west midlands ambulance service, paramedics found 13 patients in need of help when they arrived at the scene. two women were treated by ambulance staff for injuries not believed to be serious and taken to hospital. around a dozen others were assessed and discharged at the scene. and those are the latest gb news headlines for now. more from me in half an hour. >> hello. good morning. it's 1107. this is britain's newsroom with me, ben elliott and miriam cates this morning. we've been talking a lot about eating meat, particularly turkey. at christmas. we had somebody from peta, the animal charity, on saying we absolutely shouldn't eat meat this christmas because it's cruel. so on and so on. you can imagine lots of you getting involved. you've said, ian, good morning to you. i'm worried about eating turkeys. if i'm worried about eating turkeys of colour because i might be called

racist. what about the bronze turkeys? >> okay, yeah, that's where the chef said the how well done they should be. yeah, yeah. >> the celebrity chef we had on. and who else? john, you said ben, i don't agree with you that you're only entitled to eat meat . you're only entitled to eat meat. if you are able to view animal slaughter videos. worse, that you should only eat meat if you're able to slaughter it yourself. it's a highly skilled thing. meat consumption should be addressed collectively, not reduced to an individual litmus test. i get that. i think you should be able to watch how they're slaughtered, though. if you can't do that, i think you're slightly hypocritical. >> world's changed so much, hasn't it? because a couple of hundred years ago, everybody lived in relatively rural areas. they'd watch, you know, you'd have chickens in your house, you'd watch them being killed. you would probably do it yourself, or at least see a farmer or a butcher do it. and now i think a lot of children growing up in very urban areas genuinely don't know where meat comes from and what it actually is. >> yeah, i not is.— >> yeah, i not a is. >> yeah, i not a good thing, i think. i think probably some young adults as well probably think meat just comes from the supermarket in a package package, a piece of plastic, and then it arrives on your dinner

plate. but yeah, interesting. kids are coming in very hungry with all this talk, i know. have you had breakfast this morning? >> i have, i haven't, but now i'm looking forward to lunch. yes, indeed. anyway, a top story this morning is that the uk economy has shrunk by 0.1% in october, the second month in a row that the economy has contracted. >> here's what chancellor rachel reeves had to say about the news. >> but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> meanwhile, the shadow chancellor of the exchequer, mel stride, placed blame on the government's autumn budget. >> and what this shows is that this government's constant talking down of the uk economy is coming through in these numbers. >> joining us now is economics

expert justin urquhart stewart. good morning justin. good morning. labour inherited the fastest growing economy in the g7. the chancellor rachel reeves, said the word growth 31 times in her budget in october. we're not seeing it. >> yes, you can say growth as often as you like. it actually has to be some growth in order to achieve it. and also the fastest growing. it's not very fast. everybody was growing slowly. but it's interesting. eu is going nowhere at all about the same as us. we're going flat, but america's not. america's economy is running hot and they're going to be cutting interest rates next week as well. so actually they've picked up what's the difference because the government there has actually made sure there are now greater incentives to be investing to encourage more money going back into the economy, particularly into tech and things like that. and that vital word confidence is there. what's missing from our economy? over the past few months and few weeks since the election was no confidence at all. >> so that's a big difference with the us is energy prices. i mean, if you look at charts of both domestic and industrial energy prices compared to europe

and america, i mean, it's a phenomenal difference. you just can't produce things in europe anymore. it's too expensive. whereas europe, american going great guns. >> well, they've been very unfair on ourselves with, say, the steel industry, even in old fashioned eu. actually the power they had was subsidised and supported so they could produce steel, a far more effective and profitable way in this country. we actually paid more for it. so it was never going to be able to make any money. so talk about being hamstrung with it. but there's no reason where politicians should sit there and say, this is what we've inherited. there's nothing else we can do. there are lots of things they can do which doesn't actually cost the government a lot of money. we've got things like enterprise investment schemes, which could be broadened out to encourage more people to set up businesses. well, we set up businesses anyway. we're very good at that. but to grow the business to the next stage and do it on a regional basis, particularly around all those tech hubs, that's where the business is growing, that's where they're starting. and the people who really benefit from that at the moment are the americans who come over and say, that's a great bit of technology. fancy going to california?

>> justin? labour types this morning have said, come on, it's only been six months. give it time to flourish. give it give it time to get this administration off the ground. can i ask you, please, when is the cut off date? when do we start saying no? you've got this wrong and they can stop using that excuse. >> oh, they'll carry on as long as it's there. no, they they're right to an extent. they have inherited something. it takes a while to turn it round. but that's not the point in my view. the point is actually inspiring people to say, yeah, it's not, it's not very good, but actually look at the points that actually are doing better, are doing well. we are seeing private investment there. we are still seeing lots of businesses being set up around the country, and we are seeing hotspots in terms of technology. and yet you actually look at the news at the moment, you'd think we're absolutely awful and dreadful and we're not talk it up, don't talk it down. >> although we've seen labour government blame the conservatives, the conservatives, the conservatives, in turn, they blame the labour government beforehand. isn't it the case that this isn't just about the last 2 or 3 years, or even the last 2 or 3 years, or even the last 14 years? we've actually had decades of a particular economic model that is not working very well. we don't

produce anything. we're in enormous amounts of debt. we're paying enormous amounts of debt. we're paying people not to work. i mean, the whole consensus is broken. >> but put it this way, remember, we're still the world's world's fifth or sixth largest economy, depending on where you depend, how you don't calculate india's growth. we're still the ninth largest manufacturer in the world. you say we don't make anything. we actually do make quite a lot of stuff. and we're the 14th, 15th largest exporter. but you wouldn't know any of that if you'd actually listened to the politicians. see, most of them have never been involved in business anyway, to actually understand what it's like and how painful it can be. your house is on the line, your family is on the line, and you're trying to be entrepreneurial. and all the governments are saying, oh, by the way, we're going to put up national insurance, and who has to pay for that? the companies do. so you're not they're not helping themselves. >> well, look, gb news is the people's channel. so we got the thoughts of the people. we went out onto the streets of britain earlier today in london to see what they thought. let's take a quick look. >> i feel it's probably a government of recession the way we're going. it's like we're possibly going into sort of a penod possibly going into sort of a period of austerity. >> again, i think they're likely to do a betterjob than under

the tories, who are just making a complete hash of everything. >> yes, they've got good intention, labour. i just don't think they're going to do it. i just think it's all pie in the sky and we'll see. >> i think it was positive to start with, but the way it's going at the moment doesn't look too positive. >> i mean it is a lot about vibes isn't it, like you say, how people feel about the economy. but if labour, if the government start talking up the economy now, people will accuse them of being disingenuous and pulling the wool over people's eyes. yeah, no. >> so what you've got to give is a clear series of messages coming through in different areas. this is what's being done and how it's improving. now. there's actually no shortage of money in this country. we borrowed lots of money, so of course we did. but bear in mind about a third of our government debtis about a third of our government debt is actually owed to the government for quantitative easing. i mean, we're actually in a position where one has to pay in a position where one has to pay interest on it, though. well, who owns the interest? we do because it goes back to the government. so every every six months or every year, the government will earn about £30 billion worth of interest on its own debt. this is why it's rather perverse, all of this of

quantitative easing. so there's awful lot of pension money around that is actually invested very well, a nice broad way around the world. how about investing locally, investing in britain. not in a nice to be areas but actually profitable future businesses. so actually it's the initiative there. >> just before i let you go, justin, can i read you liz truss's tweet from this morning. she said higher taxes, more regulation, more spending, more immigration, more net zero all leads to lower growth. the economic doom loop continues. is she right? has she been vindicated today? >> well, she likes the word more an awful lot. but certainly, yes, she is right in terms of, you know, all those things we would all agree with. it's the way she went about it was not the right way of going about it. bad communication, no credibility. and people turn around, not just domestically but internationally said, i don't believe you, i'm not investing. and the cost of that was painful for a lot of people. interest rates went up and those people on flexible mortgages paid a lot of money. >> indeed. >> indeed. >> okay. justin urquhart stewart, thank you, as ever, for your expertise. >> now every day we run our poll of the day. do you back ed miliband's clean power 2030 action plan? we'll be bringing

you the results throughout the day, so make sure you do. stay tuned. and the final result will be announced later in martin daubney show. >> and for all our latest polls, news and how to vote, just go to gbnews.com/poll. and there were some stats out this morning, as they are every morning breaking down the how much of natural gas we're using, how much wind, solar, nuclear energy the uk is using. this morning we were using. this morning we were using i think it was approaching 70% gas to fund or to fuel, rather the grid in the uk. >> so this is why, however many renewables we have, you'll always need a base of either gas or nuclear or both, for when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine. so it's a false economy, really. anyway, up next, the uk has crowned its ugliest dog. find out what that looks like next. we cover everything. >> ugliest, ugliest dog, apparently. >> yeah. not turkey this time. turkey's a pretty ugly though, aren't they? anyway, you're watching britain's newsroom on gb news.

welcome back. it's 11:20. and this is britain's newsroom with ben leo and miriam cates. and we're now joined by our panel broadcasters bruce devlin and claire muldoon in the studio to discuss today's news. and claire, an interesting story in the daily mail. would you charge guests to come round for christmas lunch? and of course, making the point that it's quite expensive to feed a lot of people. >> i don't care. you've invited people round to your house on the best day of the year, arguably. and what are you going to do? issue a bill at the end of it with service? i don't think so. >> what about families? so you might have many generations of one family, and you pick the family who've got the biggest house, but why should they? i mean, it can cost hundreds of pounds. >> yeah, but do you know what? if you've been brought up rightly, and if you actually like your family, you would say, shall i do the ham? well, that's a good way of you do the, you

know, what do you want me to bnng? know, what do you want me to bring? yeah. that's what you do. >> that's a good way of if you don't like some family members or friends or in—laws, you can say, oh, it's going to be £100 ahead. and they'll say, oh, well, i'll stay away. >> and that's not the spirit of christmas, darling scrooge. >> no, i know, i know, i know of somebody's not going to name them, but they, when a girlfriend or a boyfriend of their son or daughter came to stay, they charged them for shower. >> really? yeah. so i grew up, you know. >> you know. >> you know. >> right. i grew up in dundee, and there was a woman that lived on the same street as us with four children, and she charged them for lunch. her own children, her own children at when they were at school. no, no, no for lunch, like during the week when the kids were at school. so yeah, imagine having to pay your mum to get like a sandwich and a bag of crisps. >> i'd pay my mum off. >> i'd pay my mum off. >> well, absolutely. i think it's ridiculous. but i agree with you that the vast majority of people say, is there anything i can bring and people are going to bring alcohol and all that kind of stuff. >> so yeah, or just don't have those hangers on that you don't

want to see that you never see any other day, go on holiday, go on holiday, get out the country. >> absolutely unbelievably expensive though to go away at christmas, isn't it? i mean, insanely so. >> one woman here is charging their guests, our guests? £200 a p0p- their guests, our guests? £200 a pop. wow. >> well, where's she getting the food from? fortnum's and harrods. well, who knows, because i would be dragging her across the dining table of anything came from iceland going. >> bruce, you wouldn't be going. >> bruce, you wouldn't be going. >> i'll come to you. >> yeah, come to me instead. i've got three balconies. choose one. >> oh thank you. >> oh thank you. >> right. shall we have a look at the uk's ugliest dog? oh, have we got pictures of the pooch? apparently, this is 12 year old chinese crested canine. could become the poster boy for quirky hounds after being crowned the uk's ugliest pooch. hopefully we've got a picture somewhere. some. some animals are particularly ugly, aren't they? there was one in the barbers the other day, a very small rat looking dog. have you got a picture of this? >> some people are incredibly ugly. >> oh, that's true faces that could stop trains. i mean, seriously, absolutely. i feel sorry for that. why would you. >> let's see the dog. can you

hold it up? >> i don't know, i mean, i mean, he's not bad. >> i've seen worse, actually. >> i've seen worse, actually. >> yeah, i've woken up with worse myself, but i just i kind of think, why why would you why would you? you know, it's beautiful in its own way. it's with tongue and all that kind of stuff. but you see that on instagram a lot now, and it's all these dogs that look perfectly fine. oh, scroll past if you think i'm ugly and think it's like, why are you saying that about, you know, enjoy your pet. >> there is a very true saying that owners morph into their dogs. yes. don't they? i wouldn't like to see that owner. >> i don't think that dog's particularly ugly. i think it's quite cute. >> it's not particularly. >> it's not particularly. >> it's not particularly. >> it is part of the social media culture, though, of just comparing what either people or animals look like. >> all the all for likes, and it's really sad. >> and actually, you know, you see the harm that's been done to teenagers, for example, a very vulnerable time of life where what you look like really, really matters. and yet you or your pet or anybody is constantly being judged by other people. >> yeah. no, i completely agree. i just i think that's quite cute. he's quite cute.

>> lovely hair. >> lovely hair. >> yeah. >> yeah. >> beautiful hair. well it's quite sparse, isn't it. yeah. >> i think the tongue's funny. >> i think the tongue's funny. >> oh >> i think the tongue's funny. >> on right. what about this one breaking. oh, the bbc have broken a story for once online this morning. diary of a ceo host stephen bartlett is amplifying allegedly harmful health misinformation on his number one ranked podcast. he said, clare, that a keto diet which for anyone who's not familiar is a diet on very low carbs, carbohydrates. i think it's less than 40 or 50g per day, he said. people with on a keto diet prevents cancer. >> well, it's recent claims from his guests that that was the case. >> no, from his guest. >> no, from his guest. >> apologies. we all we all know what ofcom are like in terms of their parity or disparity, in terms of what they want pro and against, and that's really difficult, i think, for news organisations to actually have people for and against on a debate, and viewers often don't realise that that is needed and it is a is a control of actual output on tv and in radio. et

cetera, et cetera. just like we've got here @gbnews. so it's really important that people are held to scrutiny, but that scrutiny is somewhat open to interpretation. and that's what but also that there is no requirement for balance or scrutiny on podcasts, youtube, those kinds of channels, that thatis those kinds of channels, that that is a really, really important point that broadcast media has to present a balanced view. >> i mean, you can't have an opinion, but you have to present both sides of the debate, not the case for these kind of podcasts. so if you want to, you can present something that's then surely it is up to the individual listening to do their own research and not just take everything you know as it's been fed to them. >> yeah. >> yeah. >> no, i completely agree. so just to be absolutely clear, it wasn't stephen bartlett who said that. no, he had a guest on the podcast who said a low carb diet would be helpful for preventing cancen would be helpful for preventing cancer. flight studio, which is the podcast production company owned by mr bartlett, said guests were offered freedom of expression and were thoroughly researched, which i get as well, and i think that's a really good response from him. >> however, i think because the

bbc name is attached to the podcast, i think that's why the scrutiny was there at the beginning. >> of course, because he's a dragon. he's a dragon, yeah. >> yes, that's right. >> yes, that's right. >> but i think it is a very, really interesting point. you were saying, you know, it's up to the viewer to do their research. well, yes, you could argue that, but what information do you then trust online? we are in a completely different world to 20 years ago, where all your information was through the broadcast media or newspapers, which, whether you like them or not, do have certain legal standards that they have to uphold. now, you could search for, you know, is it true that keto diets cause cancer? i bet you can find thousands of internet pages that say yes and thousands that don't. so how are you supposed to filter that information as an individual who's not an expert in these things? >> so i suppose you would go for a trusted and regulated regulated body? bbc no, not like the bbc and like an nhs website or something like that. >> can i discuss a story with you that's not on the list. donald trump is the time person of the year. he was up against the likes of kamala harris. who

else was on there? kate middleton, catherine middleton, the princess of wales was on there. donald trump won. clare, i guess whether you are of his politics or not, he has had a pretty decent comeback. >> you know, see, this is a really important point, actually, regardless of whether or not you think he is the messiah, regardless of whether or not you think he is a felon, he was proven to be a felon. i welcome the fact that trump won across the pond. i don't like the man, per se. i wouldn't want to have anything to do with him personally. however, in this day and age, we need a disrupter. we need someone that can do the things that he has already set out to do, and he's doing them and he's doing them. he's shooting from the hip, which i think is so refreshing, and i really do welcome that. so him being time person of the year, i think it cuts through all the diatribe, all the rhetoric. well done time. about time. >> well, it's really like a hollywood film, isn't it, that he, you know, as you say, a convicted felon and all that kind of stuff, and then to have

come back and had this, what are the kids seen on glow up, you know, this political, this huge political victory? again, whether you like him or not is irrelevant. and the story itself is quite spectacular and staggering. >> i think the criteria is the most influential person of the yeanisnt most influential person of the year, isn't it? and i think it's hard to argue that anybody has had more influence over global events than he. >> like it or not, that is the fact. >> i believe. i also, i don't understand when people say, for example, oh, donald trump is thick or stupid, or even meghan markle, they say, or meghan markle's this and that. so, well, clearly donald trump, he started out, he turned something like 1 million or $2 million into multi—billions. he was then a film star, tv star in his own right. again, another lifetime achievement that most people wouldn't be able to achieve. and then he won the presidency the first time against all odds. so whether you like donald trump or not, you have to give him credit for being successful. and likewise, meghan markle. i'm not a massive fan of meghan markle, but i'll never sit here and say she's talentless or she's stupid or thick. clearly she's not. >> but on the other hand, kamala harris, she got what? how did

she get to where she was? because when you you know, lots of politicians are accused of not answering a question. right. and that's true. lots of politicians can talk for hours and hours without answering questions. but she couldn't even articulate her basic viewpoints on things. and that made me think, has she actually got the capacity to be in that position? so just because you get there doesn't mean you necessarily got to carry it through. >> got it. but cameron harris wasn't a multi—billionaire businessman, wasn't a tv star, and didn't win the presidency twice. good point. so who knows. all right. >> just because you didn't win, that's all i'm saying. >> just going back to the steven bartlett story, where one of his guests or a few guests on his podcast were saying, low carb diets are preventative for cancen diets are preventative for cancer. his production firm, flight studio, have said in response to that, the diary of a ceo is an open minded, long form conversation with individuals identified for their distinguished and eminent career and or consequential life experience. there we go. there you go. >> well, lots more to come with

us. but first, it's time for your news headlines with tatiana sanchez. >> miriam. thank you. the top stories. the uk economy shrank for the second month in a row in october, as concerns about the budget continue to weigh on confidence, the office for national statistics said. output fell 0.1% following the 0.1% decline recorded for the previous month. the figures showed zero growth in the powerhouse services sector, with manufacturing and construction declining at a pace of 0.6% and o.4%, respectively. the ons says activity had stalled or declined, with pubs, restaurants and retail among sectors reporting weak months. chancellor rachel reeves said she was disappointed by the data, but it's not possible to turn around more than a decade of poor economic growth and stagnant living standards in just a few months. >> but you'll see from the plans we've been announcing whether thatis we've been announcing whether

that is the energy reforms we've published today, the reforms to build 1.5 million homes that we published yesterday, the pensions reforms, the creation of a national wealth fund. this government are getting on with the job in improving economic growth and driving up living standards. >> according to reports, an alleged chinese spy suspected of having links to prince andrew has been banned from entering the uk on national security grounds. the man, known only as h6, was found to be a close confidant of the prince and was reportedly invited to the duke's birthday celebrations. the home office has accused the individual of covert and deceptive activity, acting on behalf of the chinese communist party. buckingham palace has declined to comment at this time, and planned strikes by workers on avanti west coast have been suspended. members of the rmt union were due to walk out on december the 22nd, 23rd and 29th. the union members, who work as train managers, will now vote on a revised offer aimed at

resolving a row over rest day working, and avanti west coast spokesperson said we are pleased that the rmt have decided to suspend these strikes, which would have caused major disruption to our services dunng disruption to our services during the christmas period. they also add that they remain open to discussion with the rmt and await the outcome of the referendum, where train managers can vote on this offer . and can vote on this offer. and those are the latest gb news headlines. for now, i'm tatiana sanchez. more from me in half an hour for the very latest gb news direct to your smartphone, sign up to news alerts by scanning the qr code or go to gbnews.com/alerts. >> cheers! britannia wine club proudly sponsors the gb news financial report, and here's a quick snapshot of today's markets. >> the pound will buy you $12650 >> the pound will buy you $1.2650 and ,1.2059. the price of gold is £2,107.99 per ounce,

and the ftse 100 is at 8320 points. >> cheers! britannia wine club proudly sponsors the gb news financial report. >> well, welcome back and up at noon. after this show, we've got good afternoon britain with emily and charlie. so we're joined by you both in the studio. what's coming up on your show? >> yes, charlie. peter's in the studio today, which is rather nice. >> yes, monday to friday. nice to end the week a little sandwich. >> yes. let's go with that. yeah. >> been talking a lot about sandwiches. >> we have. we're not going to be talking about sandwiches. i mean, it might come up. it might come up, it might come up. i know ed miliband's been talking about a bacon sarnie now, which is interesting. bring that back up because it is a bad day for ed miliband, i would say. now he wants to push all this green energy. he wants to push the windmills. sorry. the wind turbines. right. but have you seen that these wind turbines are going to be far bigger than

previous wind turbines? now, we're not talking 200ft. we're now talking up to 800ft. and local councils, local people won't be able to object. >> have you seen the amount of steel needed for the foundations and the base of wind turbines? just tons and tons and tons of it. >> they're very impressive pieces of engineering, of course, which is why it's kind of cool to see them when they're being put together and in operation. but will they lower your household energy bills? that's the but this is the problem. >> ed miliband is struggling today, struggling today to say what happens when the wind isn't blowing, when the sun isn't shining? he's also being questioned over this £43,000 that's been spent on his office refurb or something like this, and lots of infighting as well with wes streeting over syria. it's not a great day out. >> it's not. but at the same time, ed miliband is pushing the view that we have to do this because climate change is the biggest threat to britain's security. he said this morning. and a lot of people, of course, will want that shift to renewables to ensure our energy security after the war in ukraine. >> this morning, did you see the percentage of gas versus wind and solar being used to fuel the

grid this morning? it's about 70% gas because the wind's not blowing. also, the storm destroyed some massive solar farms. >> and the point about that is a massive concern. the fact that we had all of this land being used for solar farms, bit of wind from storm darrow, and it's just destroyed. >> well, i assume it's the offshore ones because they're unbelievably exposed, aren't they? but but do you think this could be that the labour party have recognised that ed miliband is not perhaps their strongest weapon because they're actually, you know, they're talking tough on immigration. they're talking tough on the economy. are they realising that actually net zero is increasingly unpopular and ed miliband could drag them down in the polls? >> he's not exactly quiet. i mean, for someone, if they're worried about him being unpopular, he suddenly gets a lot of air time. >> are they targeting him? are they targeting him? >> as in, are they? is it a double bluff to put him out, to make him fall? is that what? well, maybe i'm not going to. >> well, i mean, worked in the wes streeting attack. you've worked in parliament. you know how this works. but yes, the wes streeting attack. very interesting how they're fighting over over syria over over ten

years ago. yeah. whether they should have gone in then we've also got an exclusive, don't we? yes. >> we're going to have an interview with the brother in law of a man called ryan cornelius. he's been held in the uae, he says on trumped up charges, allegations of fraud since 2008. and we've been told and we've seen legal submissions exclusively @gbnews this morning that say that the foreign office is not doing enough to fight for the case of cornelius and other brits banged up abroad. they say that david lammy's first meeting as foreign secretary was with the emiratis. he did not raise the emiratis. he did not raise the case of ryan cornelius. so we'll be speaking to his family today and asking if you trust labour to fight for you if you get in trouble overseas. >> there was also that the other lad, who was accused of having a houday lad, who was accused of having a holiday romance with a 17 year old, he's now doing a year in the slammer in dubai. >> okay, that's harsh, isn't it horrible? >> oh. very harsh. yeah, right. just some breaking news coming in to the newsroom in the past couple of minutes. 609 illegal migrants arrived in the uk in nine small boats yesterday. so that's 609 illegal migrants arrived in the uk in nine small

boats yesterday. that's the first arrivals for over a week. what was the weather like yesterday? it was quite calm and sedate, wasn't it? >> i can't remember, but i'm sure it was. yes. up next, a special christmas message for the 13th of advent. this is britain's newsroom on gb

>> hello. welcome back. 1140. ben and mervyn with you on britain's newsroom. only on gb news. let's go back to that breaking news . we broke just breaking news. we broke just before the break. 609 illegal migrants arrived in the uk yesterday in nine small boats across the english channel. we're just trying to look at what the weather was like. i think it was rather sedate because you mentioned that's very unusual for december. >> but yeah, i mean shocking figures. and we're in the tens of thousands this year already, aren't we? and gosh, i mean, even if some of them are genuine asylum seekers, it's still it's an illegal way to come into the uk. and i suppose partly as a

former conservative mp, just so disappointed that the rwanda bill was not enacted before the election because, in theory would have had some sort of defence against this. be able to deport people. >> you wonder why rishi called the election when he did so? the total number of arrivals by small boats in 2024 now stands at a provisional 34,582. 34582. so this is 19% higher than at the same point last year, but 23% lower than the same stage in 2022. so i mean, based on on last year, at least, it is up by 19%. the crossings on thursday, the 609 illegal migrants who arrived. it was the first arrivals for eight days, and they also represent the highest daily total since october the 18th, when 647 migrants arrived. >> so it is just astonishing that there are so many people waiting in calais watching the weather ready to cross, even in december. i mean, it's just absolutely astonishing. it just

shows that you've got to have a deterrent. i mean, there simply isn't another way. i mean, i'm sure the french could do better at stopping people from embarking, but i mean, really, the only way forward is to have a strict deterrent. you get deported as soon as you arrive and then processed in a third country. there isn't another way. >> i guess labour would say, but yeah, but we have deported, sent back around. is it 10,000 people who shouldn't be here since the election? but my argument to that is, well, that's fine, but you've got hundreds coming and it's a tiny fraction. >> and it's people for whom we know their country of origin. and, you know, one of the reasons that people are allowed to stay is they get rid of their documents. and then we don't know which countries and also some countries, we're not allowed under international law to repatriate people because they are genuinely unsafe countries, so very difficult to solve. >> labour is saying the migrant hotels would come to an end, but of course, since they took power, they seem to be popping up all over the country. i went to one in milton keynes the other week. there's one in warwickshire elsewhere. i mean, they're back on the map. migrant hotel is alive and kicking.

>> very difficult to know what to do. anyway, during advent, as we count down to christmas day, we're hearing from church ministers across the country, and each day they've got a special hope filled message for you to celebrate the festive season. >> the gb news advent calendar. day 13. >> hi, i'm tom finnemore. at the heart of the christmas story, there's a moment that's often overlooked. the moment when the angeuc overlooked. the moment when the angelic host appear to the shepherds. the skies light up with the chorus of angels declaring the birth of the saviour. now this might sound like a beautiful, peaceful scene, but there's something radically surprising about it. you see, shepherds in that time were often poor, uneducated, and considered lowly. yet these were the very people the angels chose to first reveal the good news to. this shows us that god's message of hope and joy isn't just for the powerful or the wealthy, but for everyone. the angels didn't announce the birth of jesus to kings or priests,

but to everyday working people. it's a reminder that the love and hope of christ is available to all, no matter our status, our mistakes, or our past. this christmas, let's remember that the story of jesus is not just for the importance or the worthy. it's for all of us right where we are. the radical nature of christmas is that god meets us in our reality, in our struggles, and offers us a message of forgiveness, peace, and joy. i wish you a very merry christmas. >> inspiring stuff. and you can see all of our special advent messages as christmas approaches by visiting gbnews.com/advent. >> up next, dream a little dream of what do you dream? do you dream often? >> i don't normally remember my dreams. >> no. some people keep dream journals where they have a dream and they wake up and they write down. i mean, me, i'll forget

about them within an hour or two. but anyway, experts. they claim we can have up to six dreams a night. so why don't we remember them? we'll be getting stuck into that in just a this is britain's newsroom on gb news.

hello. welcome back. now, have you ever wondered why you don't remember your dreams despite just waking up from one? >> well, experts say that most people dream up to six times a night, as some are even influenced by what they've dreamt about when interacting with others. >> okay, well, we're joined now by dream expert theresa chung. theresa, good morning to you. this comes off the back of a survey which showed that brits, i think 43% of brits said they never dream at all. what's that about? >> yeah, it's a survey conducted by premier inn. i'm collaborating at the moment to find out what guests are dreaming about. and obviously a good night's sleep is one of the first things that you need to

remember your dreams. but yeah, 43% not recalling. and it's such a shame because i'm on a mission to get everybody to fall in love with the problem solving power, the visionary potential, the creative potential of their dreams. and i think just listening to this interview, watching it will potentially trigger dream recall in the morning, because one of the reasons we don't remember our dreams is we don't consider them to be important. but your night vision matters. it can really help and heal you in ways you cannot possibly dream of. >> forgive the pun, theresa, i very rarely remember my dreams, except if i happen to wake up in the middle of one and then obviously, you know it's still present. but it seems to me that mostly it's related to what i've been doing that day, who i've seen, and just kind of a random mix of my, you know, experiences from the previous 24 hours. is that quite normal? >> yes. dreams are supposed to be random and illogical. one of the problems we have with people

new to dream work is they try to impose reason and logic on them. but reason and logic are for the daytime. we've done enough there. you've been there, done that. when you fall asleep, you need to connect to your inner world where intuition and creativity reign supreme. and a lot of us these days squash that. we're so focused on externals, but we need a balance in our lives between external, the outside in approach to life, getting your validation from other people, from things that you do. but for a really fulfilling life. you also need to have the inside out approach which is your own thoughts, your own creativity, your own decisions, your own mindset, your own reactions. and you have more control over that than you realise. people think dreams happen to them, but they don't. what you're getting every night is a beautiful, symbolic re—enactment of your current mindset, and whether it is helping or hindering you, and you are mentioning that you do zone in on certain things. why those things? why did those

particular things show up? because that's where you need to apply because that's where you need to apply some brainstorming insight and decode the meaning. >> theresa, we have about 20 30s left, but do you know much about lucid dreams? because i sometimes have lucid dreams where i'm in control and i can, if i'm flying in the sky, i can control where i'm going. any explanation behind that? yeah. >> that's knowing you're dreaming when you're dreaming. >> a lot of us have that as a child, and that's powerful because it shows you that you are in control of your thoughts and feelings and what you unconsciously believe. and when you are in control of that, the magic begins because you're in control of what's happening inside out. change the world within before you try and change the world outside of you. >> wow. fascinating. thank you so much, theresa, for joining us. theresa. theresa chung there. >> well, everyone, thank you. >> well, everyone, thank you. >> some breaking news at the end of this hour. francois bayrou is the new prime minister of france. the centrist politician met with president emmanuel macron earlier this morning. and of course, this comes after

michel barnier's resignation after he lost a no confidence vote last week, a centrist. >> was that expected? are you clued up on french politics a little bit? >> i am fascinated by french politics. every time we think it's very turbulent here, just look to france. they have it far worse. when is not going to survive this guy? >> no, the pm, the new pm. no, no. >> well yeah. no the new pm because emmanuel macron has got a year and a half left. i think even though he's now deeply unpopular, he's not going to stand down and he's going to keep appointing new prime ministers to try and get some sort of agreement between the far left and the far right, as they're known. it's not going to happen. he's going to end up with if he doesn't choose marine le pen, they're not going to end up with anybody. >> well, that was my next question to you. when is marine le pen going to take centre stage and finally make. >> well, i mean, i don't think she's got any influence. i don't think she's going to be appointed to anything until the next presidential election. and of course, she will stand again and we'll see what happens. but it's so polarised, these two different blocks. so i don't know. yeah. >> interesting. if you thought

we had political turmoil over here. just look at france across the pond. very quick view. mr dodi, you've said, is it just me? ed miliband needed £22 billion for his green vanity project. just the right amount. just the right amount. sorry. in a black hole before the budget. yeah, the carbon capture scheme. >> i've got to read this comment. ben rambow. i think that's you. do guests have to slaughter their own meat for christmas dinner? so instead of charging guests, you make them slaughter the turkeys? >> no. very funny, very funny. no, i just, i just yeah. anyway. very funny. thank you for watching today. i really appreciate your company. that's it from britain's newsroom. we had fun. >> yes. it's been great. yeah. >> yes. it's been great. yeah. >> good. i'm back tomorrow morning from 10 am. and up next, it's good afternoon. britain. what are you on next? >> great question. i think this program back on monday. all right. >> we'll see you there. thank you. at home. we'll catch you next week. have a good weekend. >> yes. how do you feel about having thousands of wind turbines near you? that's ed miliband's big plans. but has he got other things to worry about today? >> lots of political rows brewing. and we're also going to be discussing is china meddling

in britain too much? and has the royal family been an unwitting level of support for them? more to come up in good afternoon britain. >> heavy showers first thing will be followed by a warm, cosy day. boxt boilers sponsors of weather on gb news. >> time for your latest weather update from the met office here on gb news. it's been a fairly cloudy week and another pretty drab day for most. some rain and drizzle here and there, but many places will stay dry. we are in for a change though. this cold front is swinging its way south and that should clear away a lot of the cloud. so many of us will be brighter tomorrow. now, today, as i said, it is mostly cloudy, but there's some sunshine over parts of northeast scotland where we had a pretty harsh frost last night. elsewhere, a lot of cloud, some rain and drizzle. southern scotland, parts of the southwest and there's that weather front coming in that'll bring some wet weather across the highlands come this afternoon and into the evening. many places just dry

and cloudy with temperatures around or a touch below average. the winds, though, are pretty light. it's going to feel quite cool. i suspect, though, with these outbreaks of rain coming in to the southwest. probably nothing too heavy, but certainly a damp afternoon for somerset, devon, cornwall, parts of south wales, a bit of light rain and drizzle further east but a good chunk of england will stay dry. there's that weather front bringing some rain across the highlands of scotland. behind it we'll start to see the clearer skies coming in and that will be quite noticeable as we go through tonight and tomorrow. we'll track this line of rain then, as it sinks its way into southern scotland, across northern ireland this evening, kind of fizzling out as it does so. so just a little bit of light rain and drizzle for a time, and we'll continue with some patchy rain over england and wales. two quite murky over some of the higher routes. but then the clearer air comes in and the clearer skies come into scotland, northern england, parts of northern ireland and temperatures will drop here, certainly in the east of scotland with some shelter could get down to —2 or —3. the cloudy skies keeping temperatures above

freezing for england and wales, so it will still be cloudy first thing tomorrow here. but i'm hopeful that northern england much of wales will brighten up some showers coming into north and west wales. sunny a day for many and even the south—east will eventually cheer up come the afternoon with some sunny spells before more rain then comes back into the northwest later on. bye for now. >> expect a warm front moving from the kitchen right through to the rest of the boxt boilers

>> good afternoon britain. it's 12:00 on friday the 13th of december. >> i'm emily carver and i'm charlie peters. >> britain is on recession. watch that says official figures show the economy shrank for the second month in a row in october. and that was before rachel reeves business bashing budget. how much worse could things get then? >> and could prince andrew's choice of friends get any worse?

he's been accused of having close personal and financial links to an alleged chinese spy who is now banned from britain, reports he even attended the duke of york's birthday party. >> and ed miliband's renewables blitz. the energy secretary will overrule local residents and allow thousands more wind farms to be built across britain. new wind turbines could be up to 800ft high. how do you feel about that? >> and could ed's big day be overshadowed by an ongoing row between himself and the cabinet colleague wes streeting over syria? what about his £43,000 office refurb? >> i mean, so these stats on the economy. okay, so we shrunk in october. now, the budget wasn't until october the 30th, charlie.

so this must be down to