♪ ♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... woman: architect. bee keeper. mentor. a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life well planned. george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. it's exciting to be part of a team driving the technology forward. i think that's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo.

rrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. and by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. announcer: and now, "bbc news". >> i'm christian fras the context. >> make sure the irish records stay in place, keep the peace. th's the main thing. >> outstanding issues that the british government and politicians do with them in fairness to the peoe they deserve working institutions.

>> somebody died here. at the hands of british soldiers. >> various contingencies. remain focused. ♪ >> welcome to the program onto to look forward to this evening including joe biden spending arrival in northern ireland rated air force one expected just after 9:00 tonight we will take you live to that when it lands elsewhere we will discuss the latest assessment on the world economy we are locked into a perilous face what does that mean for dsable income and collective spending power and

what about the documents the waington post reporting today that egypt one of the oldest allies isretly planning to supply rockets to russia, all that to come but we start tonight in belfast the main event a speech tomorrow at the new university campus for it is understood the president will talk about peace and prosperity. it is of course problematic at the moment because there is no power-sharing government that is functioning and that is because the biggest union is not happy with the arrangements. let's play you again what joe biden had to say before setting off this afternoon. >> top priority make sure the irish records d the winter agreement stay in place, keep the peace. that's the main thing that looks like were going to keep our

fingers crossed. >> thank you very much for being with us. how will joe biden's visit be viewed this week? >> i think it will be case of what we see he is an irish american. when he was vice president he made the unfortunate joke that orange wasn't welcome in the white house. it was left off as a bit of humor but it was in very poor taste. but see if the post order of the most important decision in the world the president of the united states is going to come hopefully he will be able to set back to help us over the next few months and years many promises of investments. we would like to see more of

that it's mutually beneficial to the american companies as well is to our people. >> you are right, there is no american president that's been so proudly irish and american, he is a regular st. patrick's day fees in washington and makes frequent allusions to his irish background rated do you think he is an impartial voice? >> i'm not sure. i suppose the next 24 hours will tell us more about that. certain his background is very irish american. that's just the way it is. he did infamously say he was irish. he could have been accused of racism if he had said that.

the most powerful person in the free world, he does hold a very high office and it brings advantages. let's see what he has to say i'm not quite sure what he meant as he was about to board air force one about keeping the peace and dealing with the agreements. the cease-fire was declared 30 years ago next year. we have to -- it's not a prejudicial rark the protocol. it's here, it's getting better we need support to make sure we have a better future for everybody in northern ireland. >> he is bringing with him joe kennedy who is the special advisor to northern ireland rated of course, as you suggest they are coming with this promise more investment for the north. does that mean for you do you

spect -- suspect he is going to try to use it as leverage? >> i think it would be a mistake if he did but as i said earlier it's mutually beneficial. if you speak to the chief executive to many american companies they will tell you it was advantageous. it's beneficial, it's productive, it's profitable. it gives reasonably well paid employment to many people who otherwise probably wouldn't have gotten employment. if joe kennedy can help bring more of that, it's a good thing. we've had promises, we had assurances and-overselling. we need to start seeing her delivery on these things. it hasn't been as much delivery there has been promises. >> thank you very much for being

with us this evening. we will be focusing in the on 9:00 hour. >> the team right in front of me operating right behind me and the team in belfast interesting analysis already from our political agent. he sang for the best part of the year the prospect of this presidential visit has been discussed amongst diplomats. washington wanting to be involved in the agreement. in ireland today both in the republican northern ireland the visit has been dominating the news channels, take a look. >>. good afternoon, a huge security operation is in place ahead of the arrival of the u.s. president in just a matter of

hours. >> president biden will be welcomed by the british prime minister. he is expected to leave belfast around 2:00 p.m. tomorrow to travel across the border for three days of engagements. >> that last bit from the republic. a number of news papers have a guide of what president biden is going to be doing when he visits dublin. stars & stripes appearing across the republic as they get ready for his visit. it's also making headlines in america. here is a taste of what the u.s. networks were running earlier today. >> president biden on his way to ireland where he will mark 25 years as the good friday peace accord being signed. >> president biden travels to northern ireland tomorrow the 25th anniversary of the landmark peace deal. new tensions threaten to undermine the settlement. police in one city were attacked

with firebombs. which would you about the french president meeting with president xi and the president of brazil think he will be inviting does -- presidentxi to his country. joe biden taking a trip to ireland this week. while he is there, maybe balderston castle also read -- also. he went on to discuss how he can boost national security interesting dynamic there. american relations taking center stage. i also wanted to highlight this, where theecaster -- weather forecaster predicting he is arriving to northern ireland were it is raining, april showers. >> thank you very much for that. we will stay with issues because

the man suspected of being the top agent within the ira has died. he always denied he was the agent known as steak knife. as in his 70's. joining me to discuss, john, good to have you with us. what is the ira's internal security unit what role did he play in it? >> he became head of it, towards the end of his time. his job was, in essence, to protect the security of the ira. it, you know, cite out informers and agents and when it thought it had a case against them they would bring them in for

interrogation. he was one of the key interrogators and his task would be to get a confession out of the suspects and usually a confession having been r from them, they were shot. >> there wasn't an investigation being carried out into the role he played. we still don't have the full details on that, do we? >> no, this investigation has been six or seven years. it's been headed by former head. we don't know precisely what he's going to publish but we do have an idea.

i think it likely he will suggest that the lives of fellow informers/agents would have been saved had the intelligence been acted on. we don't know yet know the details whether a life of a fellow agent could have been saved. it depends on what was said to intelligence handlers when he told them, what he knew, did he tell them everythinhe knew? did ey have enough intelligence to act on it? did they choose not to because they didn't want to compromise his cover? a very valuable agent because he

was the senior member of the nothing squad they would say he was getting a lot of very valuable intelligence. how valuable the intelligence was, will be something that i imagine will be addressed in the report. >> again he was in his 70's. always denied the steak knife we will have to wait for the report to see how influential he was. around the world and across the u.k., this is bbc news. a look at some of the other stories today. doctors across england began a four-day strike for pay and working conditions. as well as the 35% pay increase and demand the government's says it -- government is saying is unreasonable. operations could be canceled during the strike.

four of the u.k. largest business groups have been sapped. he served as the head of the confederation british industry since 20 stepped aside in march to allow the investigation into misconduct. full tree in england will be a lot back outside starting next week following months of indoor lodown to contain t outbreak of avian flu. the government says the risk is now eased and free range eggs will return to supermarket shelves. >> live with bbc news. increasing rise of young people vaping. a new swap to stop steam --

scheme they will be offering pregnant women and young smokers and festive -- incentive of up to 400 pounds. funding for the scheme over the next two years will cost -- 45 megan pounds. it is estimated smoking costs the nhs 2.6 billion pounds per year. i'm joined by nicholas hopkinson . a good to have y with us, professor. is this something you think will work? >> it is certainly a step in the right direction area there is very clear evidence that both vaping in the way that smokers can get the nicotine which is what they are addicted to with that being exposed to the arms from tobacco smoke. and vaping is much safer than smoking so certainly one way in

which we can improve health pretty quickly is if we can encourage people to switch from smoking to vaping. we said we would advise people in the long-term to give up vaping if they can not as excessive as going back to smoking. >> doesn't add up? 45 million pounds between 6.6 million people. how much is a vaping kit? >> there is a bigger question here. the government has set a smoke-free ambition. what they announced today, there are certain steps in the right direction. but the measures announced are completely inadequate to the task. the government needs to really take this seriously,nd firstly funded properly. a profit cap on the tobacco

industry on the u.k. sales, it will bring 700 million pounds. the questn for the government this evening is really why they're choosing to allow tobacco industries to keep this money rather than taking it now and using it to fund the comprehensive smoking cessation strategy including support for all smokers to quit. mass media campaigns, restore the hundred million pounds a year that is missing from trading standards so the laws we already have for bids sales of cigarettes and vapes to children. these are steps in the right direction but it's just not enough. in other policy we needs raising the legal age of sale from 18 t 21 we saw breezy -- freezing it from 1618 was the

next step. >> very quickly one of the imrtant issues is how compatible this message is from the gernment when they are trying to crack down on vaping among under 18. >> we need to look at these as two separate things. for people who smoke, switching to vaping is really strategy to help them reduce the harms to themselves and the cost to society. tobacco taxation brings 11 billion pounds for direct cost to the government. we are losing 10 billion pounds a year from that. the costs to the economy is widely more. it's estimated to be 173 billion pounds over the year. every day, the government doesn't act on this properly is pouring money down the drain. you are right, the number

doesn't add up to deal with the 6 million people who currently smoke in the u.k.. this is a small step in the right direction but we need a lot more. >> we will have to leave it there, think you very much indeed. one important chance of global growth below 2% this year. that is tough to mount to global recession wch has only happened five times. the u.k. and germany are the biggest european economies. it will be the worst in the g7 this year shrinking by .3%. capital expected to rise to 1% next year we can't ignore the higher food and energy pces. but the ins says the decline is proper because of the way the world has de-with many countries

unraveling supply chains and introducing new trade various. stick a lesson. >> synchronize tightening of monetary policy by most central banks is starting to bring inflation back towards the start. at the same te, financial stability related downside risk have merged. in our latest forecast global growth will bottom out at 2.8% this year before rising modestly to 3% next year. almost no change from january projections. global inflation will ease more slowly than initially anticipated from 8.7% last year to 7% this year and 4.9% next her. >> the chief economist at kpmg, u.k. welcome to the program. can you start with this relating to the europeans, to the u.k. the europeans seem struggling to

come out of the post-pandemic world and the rest of the world. >> i mean, you mustn't forget europe has been hit hardest by the invasion of ukraine and in particular by the short phrase in grices. communicationoss ny economies. >> would do you make of what they said today about interest rates having to come down to a pre-pandemic world, the sort of interest-rate we got used to how quickly do you think that can happen? >> while we are expecting inflatio go back to pre-pandemic world and preinvasion if you like to expect inflation to go down quite qckly and reach the central bank's target next year we are not expecting interest

rates to go back to that record low level that we saw over a decade. expecting interest rates to remain high as central banks deemed neutral rate for some time. >> the risk, the systemic risk to the world economy and the collapse of the silicon valley bank in the deal that was denver credit suisse do you think it will be sorted? >> i have seen -- i think a lot of it is don't the confidence and i think the governments and financial authorities across the world have been working very hard to train continuous issues and to make sure the condence remains strong in the financial system. we've also had a big change especially in places to make it

more resilient. hopefully that is behind us but it remains a race that we will see further turmoil. >> think you very much indeed. let's return to our top story at is hour, belfast and speaking to our correspondent who has a very busy evening ahead of her, good to see you. i have been watching your report for hours people not even born when the good friday agreement was signed, some of them throwing petrol bombs at police trucks. it's a reminr how fragile the pieces. >> it is. it was orchestrated violence which does get planned for certain days of the year when there are tensions, but as you see it is in some ways normalized and many people say it shouldn't be 25 years after the good friday agreement which

was supposed to bring peace, but it is also said it is an imperfect. there is still violence in republican and loyalist areas and the instability too. a good part of the agreement was getting a power-sharing government together and that hasn't been functionineither for the past year because of the disagrments over brexit. when president biden arriv he will underline the progress made over a quarter of a century but it is impossible to ignore the implications of northern island today. >> there's always excitement when an american president comes to town. we just had a politician on at the top of the program there seems to be some indifference, is that fair? >> i think it's pretty accurate. don't forget the dup's position was ey didn't support it.

back then they had serious concerns about decommissioning of weapons. actually looking to the board and getting rid of the guns and they didn't want to see an agreement done. they didn't want to feel like they were showing the violence paid. that was their objection to the agreement back then. the objections now are about brexit arrangements. they field for the irela has been cut off it is undermining their place in the u.k. and they feel they are justified in keeping not functioning and staying out of power-sharing. with all of that in mind, of course that's going to ship the response to a presidential visit. also they do feel to some degree that britain, biden, and other advisors didn't understand the problem. they feel that american leaders always sympathize.

>> ok. you very much indeed and have a nice day in the fest. might be a bumpy ride in for the president. we will live at the top of the hour and we will focus on air force one as it also we will talk about concurrent in the unit narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... narrator: financial services firm, raymond james. man: bdo. accountants and advisors. narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. and by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ ♪

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♪♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... woman: architect. bee keeper. mentor. a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life well planned. george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. it's exciting to be part of a team driving the technology forward. i think that's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo.