Transcripts For BBCNEWS BBC News 20240714

One huge step for mankind. Its 50 years ago today that Neil Armstrong took the giant leap to become the first man to walk on the moon. The crowd in the arena nose. 11 months ago they threw everything out the window. Englands hopes of reaching their first netball World Cup Final have been dashed after they were beaten by four time winners new zealand in liverpool. Full details in sportsday in half an hour. Good evening. The foreign secretary, jeremy hunt, has spoken to his iranian counterpart expressing what he said was extreme disappointment over the seizure of a british flagged oil tanker in the gulf last night. He said the seizure was in clear contravention of International Law and totally unacceptable. The government has advised uk ships to stay out of the area of the strait of hormuz for an interim period after a meeting of the emergency committee, cobra, late last night. State media in teheran say the tanker, the stena impero, had violated International Maritime rules. But the ships owner, the Swedish Company stena bulkt, says the tanker was in full compliance with all navigation and international regulations. Mr hunt said britains response would be considered but robust. Now a news agency close to irans revolutionary guard has published a clip which it claims shows the capture of the stena impero oil tanker. The footage released by Fars News Agency begins with speedboats surrounding the vessel, with a helicopter hovering over the tanker. The video continues with shots from inside the helicopter showing revolutionary guard commandos preparing to land on the tankers deck. At least five men are then seen descending from the helicopter and landing on board. The foreign secretary spoke about his conversation with his counterpart this afternoon. Well, i had a fairly long conversation with the Iranian Foreign minister this afternoon. It is clear from talking to him and also statements made by iran that they see this as a tit for tat situation following grace being detained in gibraltar. Nothing could be further from the truth. It was detained illegally in gibraltar waters because it was carrying oil against eu sanctions to syria. That is why the Gibraltar Authorities acted totally with respect to due process and totally within the law. The stena impero was seized in oman waters in clear contravention of International Law. It was then forced to sail into iran. This is totally a nd forced to sail into iran. This is totally and utterly forced to sail into iran. This is totally a nd utterly u na cce pta ble. Forced to sail into iran. This is totally and utterly unacceptable. It raises very serious questions about the security of british shipping, andindeed the security of british shipping, and indeed international shipping, industries of hormuz. We spent a long time this afternoon at cobra, discussion how we can how we can deal with this. The statement will be made to parliament on monday to update the house of commons and the country about the measures we are going to take. Already this weekend we have raised the threat level to level three, that was the decision made by the transport secretary. But we will take further measures and announce those measures Going Forward on monday. Our priority continues to be to find a way to de escalate the situation. That is why i reached out to the Iranian Foreign minister, that is why due process in gibraltar continues. But we need to see due process happening in iran as well. We need to see the illegal seizing of a british flagged vessel reversed, we need that ship released and we continue to be very concerned about the safety and welfare of the 23 crew members. The us has a new mission in the gulf, is there a case for britain to join them and if so, are you getting involved in the confrontation between the us and iran . This is not about the us strategy, they have a different approach to dealing with iran to us and france and germany. We continue to support the Iran Nuclear Deal. This is about the safety a nd nuclear deal. This is about the safety and security of British International shipping in one of the most important seaways in the world. That is why we are calling on iran to reverse this illegal act. We are looking for ways to de escalate the situation, but we are also clear we will do what it takes to ensure the safety a nd will do what it takes to ensure the safety and security of British International shipping. Jeremy hunt speaking earlier. The labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has called for the tanker and its crew to be released. Writing on twitter, he said escalation risks a deeper conflict, all sides must show restraint. he said that president trumps tearing up of the Iran Nuclear Deal had fuelled confrontation and that its negotiated reinstatement was essential to defusing the threat of war in the gulf. A short while ago, i spoke to our security correspondent Frank Gardner who gave this analysis of recent events. This is by far the most serious incident to have taken place in the gulf coming on the back of a number of incidences, the mining of tankers, the shooting down of a drone and the near capture of another british flagged tanker only another british flagged tanker only a few days ago. The seriousness can bejudged by the a few days ago. The seriousness can be judged by the fact we have just had a ministerial level Cobra Cabinet Office briefing in an emergency session. The British Government is in a bit of a bind because they dont have a great deal of options left to them. What they would like to do is have a Firm International response, preferably done through allies, preferably with the un. But this is a very volatile situation. It is quite clear the iranians are carrying out what they see as a tit for tat, they see this asi see as a tit for tat, they see this as i direct retaliation for the impounding of their vessel in gibraltar. That is not a straightforward case. It was impounded under eu syria sanctions regulation number 36. The Gibraltar Supreme Court has extended its impounding for30 Supreme Court has extended its impounding for 30 days and there will be a legal wrangle amongst maritime lawyers over that. Both lawyers are accusing the other of maritime piracy. I dont know whether you saw that video in full. We clearly see the name of the tanker with those speedboats amongst it. But there was a claim earlier there was some sort of British Military escort at the time. Any idea whether this has been confirmed from the british side . idea whether this has been confirmed from the british side . I have not heard that. This particular tanker was inbound, it was coming from the gulf of oman, it had gone round the strait of hormuz, a very narrow strait, and it had just entered the gulf. It was still in oman territorial waters within the 12 mile limitand territorial waters within the 12 mile limit and it was diverted north towards an iranian port. It is a huge big sprawling port, it is irans main gulf port with a big container terminal, and it is home toa container terminal, and it is home to a major revolutionary guard naval base. They have got submarines and other stuff there and they have got naval ports all down that coast. It isa naval ports all down that coast. It is a very congested area. But this tanker was heading towards a saudi port to take on oil, so it was empty en route. This is the first time Something Like that has happened. Frank gardner speaking to me earlier. Some news in the last few minutes regarding British Airways. We understand it has cancelled all its flights to cairo in egypt for seven days. They say it is because of security concerns. Passengers about to board a flight to the egyptian capital at heathrow were reportedly handed a letter saying the decision had been taken as a precaution to allow for further assessment of security arrangements. The statement as we have reads as such. We constantly review our security arrangements in all our airports around the world and have suspended flights to cairo for seven days as a precaution to allow for further assessment. That is the latest statement coming from British Airways regarding the cancellation of flights to cairo. For those of you in the sporting world you will know a large football tournament has very recently ended in cairo. Labour has set out plans to stop private Companies Providing Council Services in england. Shadow chancellorjohn mcdonnell says if the party wins the next election, outsourcing of work such as rubbish collections, would end within five years. Susanna mendonca reports. Who should be responsible for local Services Like bin collections . Your local councils or the private companies they might be paying to do it for them . It is called outsourcing, a practice that was supposed to make it cheaper and more efficient to deliver local services, but labour says its led to councils often paying a high price for a poor job and if it were in government, it would bring an end to most outsourcing in English Councils within five years. To put it simply, the Business Model of outsourcing failed and is broken, and thats why it needs replacing. So after year upon year of failures, the public themselves have lost confidence in the privatisation of our Public Services and the carve up of the public realm for, well, for private profit. Labour points to the collapse of the construction giant carillion last year which saw work on its public contracts, like this super hospital in birmingham, come to a grinding halt when it went out of business. Bringing local Authority Services back in house is just one of the policy ideas labour is rolling out as it prepares for a possible general election, but a government spokesman said it should be for councils to decide which services to let private companies run, notjohn mcdonnell. Susana mendonca, bbc news. We can now talk to ian hudspeth, the conservative leader of oxfordshire county council. Thank you for speaking to us at bbc news. What do you make of those comments . I think there should be a mixed economy. If councils want to have in sourcing, they should be able to. If they want the benefits of outsourcing, they should have that as well. To be prescriptive and say we must do something will create an unfair market under are many benefits from outsourcing. At peak demand you can go and get Additional Services coming in. If it is all in house, you do not have that flexibility. It is about having a mixed bag, outsourcing sometimes does not work and in sourcing does not work sometimes. It is up to individual councils. If they want to outsource, they are able to. Is the system as it is working . The system has flexibility and councils can make that decision whether they want to have in house or outsourcing. It is about giving it flexibility for people locally to determine what services they want so local councillors can decide whether they won in or outsourcing and they can get the benefits and say whichever they prefer for their residents. How and where do you use private outsourcing . Well, for instance most of our social care is outsourced because we are dealing with private social care operators. We also have outsourcing for our highways contracts. That gives us the flexibility. If we have a particular demand in highways, we can call on resources from other areas of the company that would bring those benefits in. If it is all in house, we would have to have all the expenditure and Capital Outlay which could prove very costly. On the subject of social care, you mentioned that you use private outsourcing now. Is there full accountability . Yes, we make sure that all the companies we use are fully accou nta ble to that all the companies we use are fully accountable to us and we make sure that they go through the cpc, the Care Quality Commission procedure and we make sure that we provide the best for our residents. John mcdonnell said this demand for change is coming from councillors themselves, they say they are being ripped off. What do you make of that . If the council is being ripped off, it has to question itself. If they feel they are being ripped off, they feel they are being ripped off, they can in source. We have the ability to do that. The council can do it. I cannot understand why any Council Leader would turn around and say we are being ripped off because it is up to them with their councillors to go through the procedure is to make sure we get the best value for residents. That is not necessarily about course, it is about providing the best service as well and that is the nature that councils operate under. Any council saying they are being ripped off, they are not using their services to they are not using their services to the best ability. You say you can do this in source. What i dont understand is why it is not being done. Is it costing too much or are councils not up to the job in terms of quality . It is a mixed economy. Sometimes you have things you want to have in house, sometimes it is outsourced. It is about having the ability to provide both in house and outsourcing as well. But it is up to individual councils to determine what is the best for their residents. Most people will be listening to this and saying this all comes down to getting value for money. Give us an idea of marchers. If you were to outsource something and do it in house, at what point do you say it is cheaper for us to go outside, to outsource it . That depends on the service being provided. We want to make sure there is capacity in the market, which means we have the flexibility so if we need Additional Services we can procure them as and when rather than having to provide justification for in house. It is about the actual contract rather than specific amounts of money. How do you see the future of Council Services running . Do you see outsourcing having a larger part in it . What would you like to see to make it and provide a Better Service for your residents . The most important thing is to make sure we have the correct funding. One of the things about social care at the moment is the local Government Association by 2025 is suggesting we have a £3. 5 billion shortfall in funding and we need to address that. That is key. The green paperfor address that. That is key. The green paper for social care is due out and once we have that we will be able to understand how funding will be provided for it. If we do not have a sustainable social care system, then the nhs will not be successful as well. It is about providing that across the board and making sure we have the sustainable funding. How much of a crisis is social care in your council . How much of a priority is it . Where do you see the projection of social care . It is very high on the agenda because the ageing population is coming and we need to address that. Thank you very much for your time. The headlines on bbc news. Dramatic footage of armed iranian troops boarding a british flagged oil tanker in the gulf. The foreign secretary expresses extreme disappointment to his iranian counterpart. British airways has suspended all flight to cairo for seven days due to security concerns. Labour sets out plans to stop private Companies Providing Council Services in england. Police in hong kong say theyve seized a large amount of explosives ahead of a weekend of marches by both pro and anti china demonstrators. Officers found two kilogrammes of a powerful explosive as well as petrol bombs, acidic substances and knives. Theyve arrested a 27 year old man whos understood to be a member of the Hong Kong National front, which advocates independence from china. Police say theyre trying to determine whether the hoard is related to this weekends protests. We are dealing with a home made laboratory for the manufacture of high explosives, specifically t atp. It is well known, it is unstable and it is dangerous. I think without doubt this is the largest seizure that we have come across in hong kong. This is an extremely sensitive and extremely powerful high explosive. It will cause exceptional amounts of damage when used. It is also very unstable and it will react to heat friction and impact. It puts at risk everybody within this building, it puts at risk bystanders outside. Building, it puts at risk bystanders outside. Police are hunting two men after gas was released on a London Underground train earlier this morning. Theyve released cctv images of two young, white men they want to trace. A number of people were treated at Oxford Circus by paramedics. Officers say their symptoms suggest that cs gas was used. The metropolitan police say they are still trying to work out what happened to their twitter account after it appeared to be hacked. A series of messages appeared on the forces official account last night. It has more than a million followers. Officers said they were assessing to establish what criminal offences have been committed over the security breach. Ministers have promised to put an end to the use of so called poor doors in newly built blocks of flats in england. Planning permission can be conditional on developers building some social Housing Units in private developments. The communities secretary, james brokenshire, says separate doors stigmatise social housing tenants, and divide them from private residents. The chairman of the high speed 2 rail project has reportedly warned that its cost could rise by £30 billion. The Financial Times says, allan cook has written to the department for transport, saying the project cannot be completed for the official budget of £56 billion. Heres our transport correspondent, tom burridge. Hs2 a new high speed line linking london, birmingham, manchester and leeds was already set to cost a hefty sum £56 billion. And in recent months, there has been a growing acceptance at the Company Building hs2 that the project is likely to cost more. Now, with work on the line between birmingham and london already under way, and £5 billion spent so far, a report saying hs2 could cost an extra £30 billion. According to the Financial Times, the chairman of hs2, who is carrying out a review of cost and schedule, has written to the government, warning the new rail line cannot be built within budget and could cost between £70 85 billion. The government says the new high speed line is needed because the west coast main line between london, birmingham and manchester is already crowded. Both the department for transport and hs2 said the review into the cost of the project was ongoing. They wouldnt comment on this latest report, but it comes at a sensitive time. Borisjohnson says he will carry out his own review if he becomes Prime Minister next week. He has said the projects costs are spiralling out of control. Some say the high speed line is vital to link the north of england to the midlands and to london. But many question whether its value for money, and if it gets even more expensive, that case will be harder to make. Lets go back to the news that British Airways has cancelled all flights to cairo for the next week, citing security concerns. Matt cole is here. This has come out of the blue, a bit ofa this has come out of the blue, a bit of a surprise, because we are looking desperately for information. What do we know . We picked up chatter on social media that passengers turned away from flights we re passengers turned away from flights were not happy. We contacted British Airways and they confirmed it had suspended all its flights to and from cairo for the next seven days. It is not clear whether they will resume or the suspension will be foreshortened. They have issued a very short statement which says they co nsta ntly very short statement which says they constantly review their Security Operations at all of their airports around the world and have suspended flights to cairo as a precaution to allow for further assessment. They had a second line that said the safety a nd had a second line that said the safety and security of their customers and crew is always there priority. What is clear is there is some concern. Trying to press them on what that is and they will not be drawn. They said they had contacted passengers affected and had invited them to discuss alternative travel arrangements. Like other uk airlines ba did suspend flights to Sharm El Sheikh in 2016 after a Russian Airline was downed after having flown out of the airport. Since then things have been quiet. The Foreign Office says it is aware of the suspension and has advice on its website for travellers that ex presses website for travellers that expresses concerns about aviation in that country, but no reference from the Foreign Office today as to why this latest development had taken place. We are hoping to get more on this, but what about ba customers who are already in cairo . Any more on that . At this stage details are very scant indeed. Several numbers have been put out, one from British Airways. Likewise the Foreign Office has put out another number. Maybe try the numbers to establish what the options are. We are trying to find out if other airlines are making similar measures, but the details at the moment are fairly sketchy. We will let you get back to getting those answers for us. Bbc afriquejournalist, Pierre Antoine denis is in cairo for us. What is going on . It is a bit of a crazy moment especially for me as i was meant to be one of the passengers tomorrow morning on a British Airways flight back to london. I received the news at 5pm local time by message that my flight was cancelled for security reasons and since then it has been a bit chaotic. My colleague was at the airport and she spoke to someone who said that this person had not yet been notified by the decision. At the airport they dont know what is going on. It is a bit of chaos at the moment around British Airways, especially given the other airlines are flying and everything is up and running at the airport except for British Airways. Just to clarify, you hold a ba ticket and you are unable to leave cairo because the statement we have at the moment is ba is not flying into cairo from heathrow. If you are a ba passenger you cannot leave cairo either . Exactly, that is exactly right. I am meant to fly from cairo to london tomorrow morning at 8am and i have received a message saying my flight has been cancelled. However, a few collea g u es has been cancelled. However, a few colleagues of mine have rescheduled their flights colleagues of mine have rescheduled theirflights on colleagues of mine have rescheduled their flights on Different Air companies, for example Royal Jordanian is operating flights and collea g u es jordanian is operating flights and colleagues are on it on monday. But it is true that i will not be able to leave cairo tomorrow morning. Where are you getting your information from . How are ba contacting you and communication with you . There is a phone number we managed to find on the website, but obviously it has been swamped by demand now and it is very complicated to get onto that number. When i first tried to get in touch with them it took me 25 minutes to even speak to someone. So it is very complicated at the moment for us to get in touch with British Airways. Finally, we are hearing sightings of security checks, is there any consular assistance . I cannot really say anything about that. It is true some people at the airport are trying to reach out to the councillors and get assistance in any way. But as my flight and our flights are tomorrow we are still not at the airport. Some of the collea g u es not at the airport. Some of the colleagues left a day before the security decision have been able to fly without any problem. Thank you very much. We understand three egyptian Airport Security sources have been speaking to reuters and they say british staff were checking security at cairo airport on wednesday and thursday this past week. This is a developing story and hundreds of passengers will be affected. More of this in the next hour. In the meantime, it is the weather. It has been a day of sunshine and showers and this was the picture earlier on this evening with blue skies in bexhill in sussex. Clear skies in bexhill in sussex. Clear skies overnight. A bit of a breeze north west, but lighter winds elsewhere and it will feel quite humid overnight temperatures at 1014. On humid overnight temperatures at 10 111. On sunday, long spells of sunshine around. Cloud and rain will push in across Northern Ireland through the latter part of the morning. It will affect the open. It will slowly push eastwards through the day. Eastern scotland and england and wales stay dry during the day. There is temperatures on the day. There is temperatures on the rise through the middle part of the rise through the middle part of the week. Some showers in the north west, bahais the week. Some showers in the north west, ba hais in the week. Some showers in the north west, bahais in london up to possibly 3a degrees. Hello this is bbc news with lu kwesa burak. The headlines. Dramatic footage of armed iranian troops boarding a british flagged oil tanker in the gulf. The foreign secretary expresses extreme disappointment to his iranian counterpart. This is totally and utterly u na cce pta ble. It raises very serious questions about the security of british shipping, and indeed internationally shipping in the strait of hormuz. British airways has suspended all flight to cairo for seven days due to security concerns. Labour sets out plans to stop private Companies Providing council