sanchia berg, bbc news.ohnson does decide to go for more restrictions, he could face considerable opposition to them from within his own party. his chief brexit negotiator, lord frost, has resigned from the government — and among the reasons given were his opposition to vaccine passports and further restrictions. here's our political correspondent, charlotte rose. the reaction to news of the chief brexit negotiator, lord frost's resignation came quickly, with members in a whatsapp group of 100 tory mps describing it as a very worrying and a disaster. in the images of the messages first broadcast by sky news, the culture secretary, nadine dorries, steps in to defend the prime minister, telling mps to show a bit of loyalty to the person who won an 83—seat majority and delivered brexit. the response — she is removed from the whatsapp group by senior brexiteer steve baker, who says enough is enough. reacting to the news this morning, the health secretary paid tribute to lord frost. i'm sorry to see him go. i thi

sanchia berg, bbc news.d from attending boarding schools. the often outspoken politician said they should be transferred to day schools to prevent them from influencing other boarders. rights groups have said they�*ll challenge any attempt to enforce the prohibition. gay sex in kenya is punishable by up to 14 years in prison. our correspondent emmanuel igunza says the minister�*s comments were unexpected. it came out of the blue. the minister was speaking on the background on issues about indiscipline in secondary schools. there have been several incidences where schools have been burnt down over the last few months, and he was speaking in that context of indiscipline among students, and then he made this bombshell comment that those who are lgbtq should be banned from boarding schools, and he seems to insinuate that there is some sort of gay culture in boarding secondary schools, and he says that the students, once they are removed from school, they will not be able to influence other students. these are qu

sanchia berg, bbc news.rnoon, the uk health security agency has updated us on the latest number of confirmed omicron cases. there were 12,133 new confirmed omicron cases in the uk — though the real number is expected to be far higher because it takes time to confirm cases are omicron and not all positive tests are sampled. there have been a total of 104 hospitalisations with either confirmed or suspected omicron and 12 deaths. we have just heard about the overall number of covid cases for the latest 24—hour period, we know sometimes over the weekend the figure can be lowered because reporting is slower, but the uk is reporting 82 to that among 82,866 covid cases overall of all variants, compared to 94,000 yesterday. joining me now isjohn burn—murdoch, data journalist at the financial times. these statistics are making some of our heads spin. hoping you could help us out with some of them. we are told scientific advisers believe omicron is the dominant variant now in this country and that cases of it are, or

sanchia berg, bbc news.now face delays. the service says it�*s experiencing "unprecedented pressure" because of staff shortages due to covid—i9. let�*s talk to the service�*s medical director, nigel ruddell. when director, nigel ruddell. you say extreme pressure, does when you say extreme pressure, what does that look like? we when you say extreme pressure, what does that look like?— does that look like? we are seeing the same issues _ does that look like? we are seeing the same issues as _ does that look like? we are seeing the same issues as our— does that look like? we are seeing the same issues as our colleagues| does that look like? we are seeing i the same issues as our colleagues in other ambulance services across the uk and ireland, we have a significant number of staff who are unable to work either because they have developed covid or they are having to isolate because of contact with it, on top of the normal sickness levels we have at this time of year, we have between a quarter and a third of our

he sanchia berg, bbc news.eral tomorrow. the anti—apartheid campaigner died on sunday at the age of 90. 0ur south africa correspondent nomsa maseko is in cape town. what is happening today, nomsa? thousands of people have been flocking to the st george's cathedral to file past the body of archbishop desmond tutu. his remains arrived earlier today, this morning, accompanied by two of his daughters. what we know so far is that just over 2000 people have now filed past the archbishop's body to pay their last respects. we know as well that the government and the family are now finalising the programme for the funeral tomorrow. now finalising the programme for the funeraltomorrow. it now finalising the programme for the funeral tomorrow. it is going to be a state funeral, it is expected to start at ten o'clock local time with guests possibly arriving from eight o'clock. people have been speaking fondly about archbishop desmond tutu, even making reference to the fact that the coffin chosen is a very simple pine wood

sanchia berg reports. # driving home for christmas... to the sound of christmas songs, people queued this morning forjabs outside a chilly wembley stadium. omicron accounts for an estimated 80% of cases in london now. people are trying to protect themselves and their family christmas plans. i would prefer to have it done before christmas. i have an elderly grandfather who is 90 years old so i want to be able to see him and get this over and done with. as soon as i heard that they have an event here where they are giving the boosters out, so i decided to book one immediately for myself. it feels really good. but the virus is spreading so rapidly, the health secretary didn't rule out new restrictions even for next week. there are no guarantees in this pandemic. i think at this point we have to keep everything in review. he urged people across the country to be cautious in the days ahead. if i'm going to see my mum for example, who is very elderly, like most older people, she's more vulnerable than younger people, i will take a test and i m

joining me now is our news correspondent sanchia berg who hs reported extenstively on cases of childain, desperately distressing case. and yet we seem to hear at the end of these grim cases that phrase, "lessons will be learned. but that seems to happen every time. what strikes you when you read about what happened here? well, it does strike me how many parallels there are between arthur�*s case and those of victoria. she also was found dead with over 120 injuries on her small body. she was just eight years old. she had been cruelly treated for months, tortured with lit cigarettes, really terrible things that happened to her. she had come to the attention notjust of social workers but also the police and also doctors. she�*d actually been admitted to hospital for a couple of days a few months before her death. what happened in that case was there was a public inquiry following the conviction of our great—aunt and her great aunts boyfriend for her murder. in a public inquiry concluded that what happens is agencies should be able to talk much more effectively to each other. and let it

joining me now is our correspondent sanchia berg who has reported extensively on child abuse cases whichy, also known as baby p, who died in 2007. it seems to say where we are here again. we know these cases are complex, but the price point, when social services and the police are called into a case because family raises concern, what happens at that point, why did this go unchecked? it is really hard to know unless we have the serious case review exactly what went wrong in this case, but if you think about the victoria colombia case which was a long time ago, ifelt that colombia case which was a long time ago, i felt that 20 years ago, what had happened then was that many opportunities had been missed both by the doctors and by the social workers to intervene. there was a very young social worker in charge of victoria's case, she was overloaded with complex child protection cases, he had poor guidance from her managers. she wasn't able to speak to victoria on her own because victoria only spoke french, she was eight, and lisa arthurworrey only spoke english. three important things didn'