dan bates is the chief executive of sheffield theatres which includes the sheffield crucible and is one of the organisations to have been awarded funding. i spoke to him earlier. so to wake up to knowing that we have got, received, just over £2.2 million from the government's culture recovery fund is absolutely fantastic news. so that will enable us — we have started to reopen very slowly, and this will enable us to, kind of, grow and sustain us now through till march, the end of march. what does it mean in terms of people, when they do get the opportunity to come into your venues, how different that experience has been for those who've been coming back, as you say, to some of the events you've been holding already? yes, we've been working really hard with sheffield city council and public health england and the dcms, actually, and trying to work out about a safe way of opening theatres. we've been doing this now for a few weeks now in sheffield, and, yeah,

dan bates from sheffield theatres, thank you very much for being with us.ronavirus infection rates higher than during the first wave of the pandemic. in france, the government has imposed a six—week overnight curfew on two—thirds of the country. paul hawkins reports. another patient arriving at a hospital in paris. nearly half of france's intensive care beds are now occupied by covid patients, with the number of cases now passing 1 million. the french president says his country will be fighting the virus until at least next summer. in the meantime, new restrictions have come into force, covering two thirds of the country, that is 46 million people. translation: at this stage, we have no other choice but to slow down. meaning reduce social life as much as possible, to limit contacts, to break the spread. if we really want to preserve our health system, and our fellow citizens, we are forced to do this. in athens it is a similar story. greece will impose a night—time curfew in covid hotspots, from saturday, with restrictions on movement in several areas inclu

speak now to dan johnson whojoins us from salford, in greater manchester. 0ne one of the areas considered for the highest level of restrictions and i suppose people will be waiting with bated further restrictions seem to be inevitable and ministers are in discussion. the key questions will be what level of support will be in place for people and businesses affected. in liveable, people are waking up to the toughest tier of restrictions, further disruption to their social life and the other question how long will it last? four—week review for liverpool. the big concern has been there is no easily definable way to figure out when the measures will be reduced and people wondering how long people will be living in local lockdown and what that means for the winter. we will be speaking further on this at 8:30am. the first minister of wales, mark drakeford, has again warned he could close its border with england, unless borisjohnson acts to prevent people visiting from covid hotspots. mr drakeford has written a letter to the prime minister, claiming his decision not to impose a travel ban for english lockdown areas is undermining the ability to control the spread of the virus in