news, did you know what other news, did you know what islamic state were doing when you left for syria .7 you left for syria? >> because they had beheaded people? they were executions. >> yeah, i knew about those things and i was i was okay with it. >> i was okay with it. just a beheading or two. labour have refused to rule out letting shamima begum back to britain. ridiculous. and it turns out that this was fake news. >> notpla clutches my arm tightly with both hands. >> okay, does anyone have any water? >> water ? that poor victim >> water? that poor victim turned out to reportedly be a torturer for the assad regime. on my panel tonight, it's columnist carol maloney. we've got journalist benjamin butterworth and associate editor at the daily express, sam lister. oh, and what the heck is going on here? get ready,

britain, here we go. are we living under a keir starmer dictatorship? next. >> good evening. i'm sophia wenzler with your headlines. it's just gone 9:00. the alleged chinese spy linked to prince andrew has said he did nothing wrong or unlawful after he was publicly named for the first time. the high court lifted a ban on naming yang tingbao, described as a close contact of the duke, after rejecting his bid for anonymity. the 50 year old, who was banned from britain on national security grounds, ran a lobbying firm with ties to beijing, westminster and royal circles. yang reportedly

attended the duke's birthday party in 2020 and helped organise a uk china business wmmw organise a uk china business summit. pressure to reveal his identity mounted after reform uk's nigel farage vowed to name him in parliament. meanwhile, the duke of york will not join the duke of york will not join the royal family for christmas at sandringham. that's according to sources. it's understood both prince andrew and his ex—wife, the duchess of york, have decided to avoid the annual family gathering amid the ongoing scandal over the duke's close links to the alleged spy. police in the us say at least three people are dead and six are injured after a shooting at are injured after a shooting at a school in wisconsin. the shooting occurred at abundant life christian school in the state capital of madison. authorities say children were among the dead, while police believe the suspected juvenile shooter was a student at the school. residents have been asked to avoid the area and roads are closed near the

school. in other news, killer nurse lucy letby, his legal team, has said they will be asking the court of appeal to immediately review all of her convictions because an expert witness has now changed his mind on the cause of death of three babies. her new lawyer, mark macdonald, said doctor julie macdonald, said doctorjulie evans had told the jury letby had injected air down a nasogastric tube, leading to the death of the three babies. but he said doctor evans has now changed his mind. letby is serving 15 whole life terms in prison for the murder of seven babies and the attempted murder of seven others while working at the countess of chester hospital in 2015 and 2016. and bashar al assad insists he never considered fleeing as rebel stormed damascus, marking his first reported statement since the city fell eight days ago. shared on the syrian presidency's telegram. assad claims he went to a russian base to oversee combat, only to find

syrian troops had deserted and the base under drone attack. he says russian forces airlifted him to moscow but denies any plans to step down, calling his role meaningless if the state falls to terrorism. rebel groups led by tahrir al—sham are forming a transitional government, though their jihadist past raises doubts about promises of tolerance. meanwhile, earlier today, the foreign secretary, david lammy confirmed the uk has sent a team of officials to damascus for talks on the future of syria. those are the latest gb news headlines. now it's back to patrick 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. >> good evening. are we living

in a keir starmer dictatorship? rumours were swirling that labour was going to cancel the local elections in england. >> why aren't they all going ahead? >> and i would say even before the white paper has been published, the number of councils that have come to us with the line for conversations, why aren't they going ahead, minister? well, at the moment the assumption is that elections are going ahead. however, it's usualin are going ahead. however, it's usual in a process of reorganisation that when a council makes a request for reorganisation, that if there are elections taking place to a council that essentially won't exist within the term of those elections, then you hold off the elections, then you hold off the elections and you elect to a shadow body. and the shadow body basically is a form of the new councils that will follow. >> and now we appear to have confirmation on this. some local elections, due to take place in may next year, might now be delayed until 2027. labour says that they want to postpone them because they're restructuring the councils. some might not exist in a couple of years time, but this excuse doesn't really wash. so these local elections were seen as a referendum on

keir starmer's government. he's currently the most unpopular prime minister of modern times, with an approval rating of somewhere in the region of —61. and this graph actually shows just how quickly his popularity has nosedived. he is sinking like the titanic, and labour are fearful of a monumental kicking in may. angela rayner has tried to spin this. she says this is all part of devolution and she's giving power back to the communities. well, reform mp rupert lowe struck back, stating the bleeding obvious. you don't give power back to communities by cancelling elections. angela, this is unbelievably rich coming from labour over the weekend. labour's very own baroness harriet harman was all over the media saying that nigel farage and reform were a threat to democracy. >> well, i think people should be very concerned about reform because they're not just the threat to individual parties, but i actually think they're a threat to democracy because they are offering easy answers, and

now they are set to apparently cancel local elections in essex, hertfordshire, kent, lancashire and sussex. >> the cynic in me would say this labour are tanking. starmer's handling of the summer disorder, his freezing of pensioners, crippling of farmers, relentless desire to give your money, tax payers money away abroad, which included another £50 million to syria yesterday, the lord alli sleaze and donor gate fiasco, ed miliband's big green revolution and frankly, his total lack of personality mean that he's currently in the toilet. meanwhile, reform uk are surging. they're up seven points since the general election. i mean, they actually have done rather well, haven't they? and this will terrify the labour government. now remember when keir starmer said this? >> it's right that parliament has the first say it's right. the parliament has the first say. but if we need to break the impasse, our options must include campaigning for a public

vote and nobody is ruling out remain as an option. >> yep, that's him there talking about a second brexit referendum. the prime minister has a track record of not liking it when the public or the great unwashed, as he may refer to them, vote the wrong way. cancelling the local elections could be his attempt to make sure they don't even get a chance to vote at all. is he behaving like a proper prime minister or a tinpot dictator? let's get the thoughts of my panel this evening. we, of course, have the wonderful journalist and broadcaster carole malone. we've got commentator and writer benjamin butterworth and the associate editor at the daily express, sam lister. carole, is he behaving a bit like a dictator here? >> oh my god, yeah. this is this is what happens in dictatorships. he's acting like, you know, a third world dictator. it's incredible because dictators are very strong people, you know, and he's not at all. and, you know, he's not at all. and, you know, he literally can't reform, as you said, are surging ahead. you know, reform now has 100,000 members in this country. the labour party has 366,000. so

that gives you an idea of how much the support is surging for him. and i just i think, you know, your time at the weekend. i mean, that is pot calling the kettle black here. she said reform was a threat to democracy. what the labour party do now is a huge threat to democracy. and interesting. a couple of days before that, harman had been on another show and she had praised reform and said they were surging ahead and were actually a danger to laboun were actually a danger to labour. and that is absolutely true. and labour have seen this. they know what's happening. they you know, the reform party is what happens in a country where the ruling party is not listening to the needs and the wants of the electorate. and listening to the needs and the want