ok, mark easton, live at buckingham _ public life.ok, mark easton, live| at buckingham palace, thank you. the video message from the princess of wales was made public early this evening, putting an end to weeks of speculation about why catherine hadn't been seen in public. this is what she said. injanuary, i underwent major abdominal surgery in london, and at the time it was thought that my condition was non—cancerous. the surgery was successful. however, tests after the operation found cancer had been present. my medical team therefore advised that i should undergo a course of preventative chemotherapy, and i'm now in the early stages of that treatment. this of course came as a huge shock, and william and i have been doing everything we can to process and manage this privately for the sake of our young family. as you can imagine, this has taken time. it has taken me time to recover from major surgery in order to start my treatment. but most importantly, it has taken us time to explain everything to george, charlotte and louis in a wa

mark easton, home editor, those inside. mark easton, home editor. thank— those inside.ank you. _ our top story this afternoon... the murder of emma caldwell — herfamily are meeting scotland's first minister now to press for a public inquiry. and how monitoring from space could help to curb global greenhouse gas emissions. coming up on sportsday in the next 15 minutes on bbc news, the home nations, including defending champions england, will find out their path to euro 2025. we'll have all the details of the qualifying draw. the widow ofjohn dignam, who was murdered by the ira in 1992 for being an alleged british informer, has revealed that the army tried to recruit her after his death. claire dignam said she was shocked by the approach. later this week an interim report will be published into the killings of suspected ira informers, as peter taylor reports. john dignam was murdered by the ira in 1992 and branded as a special branch informer. i personally can't see him working for the ruc. i couldn't believe it, knowing johnny, and living with him. i interviewed claire d

our home editor mark easton reports.ders institution today houses some of the most vulnerable and dysfunctional children in the country, including a very small number of girls. when prison inspectors turned up last november, they were deeply shocked to learn that one girl had twice been pinned down and stripped by a team of all male prison officers. staff had intervened to stop the girl potentially using her clothing to hang herself. but the inspection team noted the trauma this response would have had on someone with complex mental health needs. it is really shocking. it cannot be right that girls who are this vulnerable, who are this much of a risk to themselves, are being retraumatised by the processes by which they're being subjected to in this kind of establishment. over the last 20 years in england and wales, the average number of children locked up for their crimes has fallen very significantly — down from more than 3,000 in 2002 to 440 in the latest figures. almost all the children in prison are now teenage boys.

mark easton, bbc news. 1992 says she forgives her husband 5 killers. claire dignam was speaking to the bbc in advance of a police report into some of the most classified aspects of the secret war between the british state and the ira. peter taylor reports. get yourselves off! freddie scappaticci was the embodiment of the so—called dirty war in northern ireland. the stories you make up! for almost 20 years the bbc has been prevented from showing these pictures. don't take any more photos! i'm telling you now, because if you do, i'll come out and (bleep) do you. scappaticci, who died last year, went into hiding after being exposed as the army's most important agent, codenamed stakeknife. his cover was as the most feared interrogator in the ira's notorious internal security unit known as the nutting squad. operation kenova has linked him to the murder of 17 alleged informers. astonishingly, some of them were also working for british intelligence. their families have suffered for decades without getting answers

thank you, mark easton, our home editor.utor. the evidence was then used in a case against a subpostmistress, who ended up being wronglyjailed. marc ashdown has more details. the horizon it system was central to the post office scandal. testimony supporting its credibility was used time and again to prosecute sub—postmasters accused of theft or fraud. one was seema misra, wrongly accused of stealing £75,000, tried and sent to prison while she was pregnant. to this day, the memory is painful. it was horrible. because i lost my faith in the system when i was sent to the prison. i said, if i can be sent to prison for a crime i never committed, anything is possible in this world. if i hadn't been pregnant, i would have killed myself because it brought shame to my family. at her trial in 2010, garethjenkins, the architect of horizon, was called as an independent witness. but evidence submitted to the public inquiry raises questions aboutjust how well he carried out that role. garethjenkins sent his draft witness statement to warw

with me is our home editor mark easton. e been raising eyebrows. they have because _ have been raising eyebrows. they have because you _ have been raising eyebrows. they have because you will— have been raising eyebrows. tue: have because you will remember have been raising eyebrows. tta: have because you will remember this is the result of a home office that was overwhelmed by a number of asylum—seekers coming over in small boats. they didn't have enough asylum while they were waiting for the claims to be processed, that processing was taking forever as well. they got in a real mess. they were spending and still are spending millions of pounds a day on hotel bills for asylum—seekers. you can imagine how well that goes down with voters. there was a huge push in the home office to try to get those people out of hotels as quickly as possible and into these large sites. they looked at a whole range of things, holiday camps turning old office blocks into accommodation. as you say, former raf bases and barges, they actually have

our home editor mark easton has been looking into this story and joins me now.eeds i think to understand the background before you draw any conclusions. almost all the children locked up in wetherby young offenders institution in yorkshire exhibit these very high risk behaviours, extremely violent and a huge amount of self—harm, particularly among the very small number of girls who are held there. and managing these vulnerable and dysfunctional teenagers is a huge challenge for the staff. roughly 440 children are locked up in england and wales at the moment, that's down from where it used to be, it used to be over 3000. and currently there are just seven goals in the whole of england and wales in custody and most of them are held at wetherby which is an old borstal built in the 50s, for boys. so that's the background. when inspectors turned up background. when inspectors turned up unannounced in november last year, and they had been before and had concerns about some of the things that were going on there, they discovered that one of the girls had been restraine

earlier, our home editor mark easton was outside buckingham palace and sent us this.and thoughtful way of producing this news which the royal household and royal family have been living it with some time. tributes coming in from all sides. i think the public too will be incredibly impressed with the composure and the courage that she showed to make her statement. to people around the world earlier this evening. i think the royalfamily is focused on two things. one is catherine's cancer diagnosis, but the king also still dealing with his own cancer and the treatment that he's taking. i think both of those are very significant blows to the royal family. are very significant blows to the royalfamily. i think book personally for the palace, for both the royal family and the royal household, and professionally. this is a slimmed—down monarchy and is looking dangerously stretch right now. we know that the king is unable to perform all the duties that he would like to because of his cancer treatment. prince william has said he will return to doing his royal duties in the mid