While the duke of edinburgh spent a second night in hospital receiving treatment for a pre exisiting condition. And coming up in half an hour on bbc news, amol rajan takes a look back at a year dominated by the power of social media, in review 2019 the media year. Hello, good afternoon. A six Year Old Girl has opened a pack of Tesco Christmas cards to find a message saying they were packed by prisoners in china being forced to work against their will. Tesco says its stopped production at the factory while it investigates. Greg mackenzie reports. Ready . Uhhuh. It was six year old schoolgirl florence widdecombe whod sat down at home to write out her Christmas Cards to her friends and family when she discovered one of the cards had already been written out. We were writing in them and about on my sixth or eighth card, there was. Somebody had already written in it. There was a message which read, we are foreign prisoners in shanghai, china, forced to work against our will. Please help us and notify Human Rights Organisations. The first thought was that it was some sort of prank. But on reflection, we realised it was actually potentially quite a serious thing and so i felt very shocked, but i also felt a responsibility to pass it on to peter humphrey, as the author asked me to do. The family did just that and contacted the human rights journalist who had spent time at the jail, having been alleged to have taken part in a corruption scandal. Well, i spent two years in captivity in shanghai between 2013 and 2015 and my final nine months of that captivity was in this very prison in this very cell block where this message has come from. So this was written by some of my cell mates from that period who are still there, serving sentences. A tesco spokeswoman says the company was shocked and would never allow prison labour in its supply chain. It has now launched an investigation. Greg mckenzie, bbc news. The family of harry dunn, who was killed outside an raf base in august, have met with the home secretary, priti patel, to discuss the case this morning. Ms patel is considering seeking the extradition of the wife of an american diplomat who has been charged with causing death of the teenager by dangerous driving. Duncan kennedy reports. Hello. Very nice to meet you. The home secretary arrived in harry dunns home village to brief his family in person. Inside, she met harrys dad, tim. This is a good opportunity, and thanks for coming to listen to what we need to say, and then hopefully we can move forward and up and help other people if they ever get into this situation. Priti has come to try and hear from all of you. The fact that priti patel made thisjourney, along with andrea leadsom, the local mp, is a sign ofjust how much impact this case is having at the highest political levels. It is four months since harry dunn died in a Road Accident in northamptonshire. Anne sacoolas, pictured here on her wedding day, is the American Woman who has been charged with causing harrys death by dangerous driving. The home secretary said she was here to explain the extradition process to the family. It was a nice opportunity to hear from them about what they had been experiencing and going through, and to reassure them as well, obviously it has been a very, very difficult and traumatic time for them. Lawyers for Anne Sacoolas say she has been left devastated by this accident, but they say she wont return voluntarily to the united kingdom. Harry dunns family say they are now leaving matters in the hands of british lawyers. It will now be for a judge to decide the merits of extraditing Anne Sacoolas to the united kingdom. That decision will then be passed to the home secretary for a final say on what will happen. Duncan kennedy, bbc news, in northamptonshire. The home secretary was joined by her cabinet colleague and the dunns local mp, andrea leadsom, who spoke to reporters after the meeting alongside the dunn familys spokesman, radd seiger. It has been fantastic to bring the home secretary, priti patel, and see the family of harry. Our hearts go out to them. It is just the deepest, deepest tragedy for the dunn family and nothing will bring harry back, but they seem to be quite reassured that priti patel had set out what the next steps are, and i think we will be able to give them perhaps a little relief, temporarily, while the process continues, but i have assured the family of harry i will do everything i can to ensure we get justice for harry. We know we cannot talk about the illegals of this, what is the next step in terms of extradition . The next step is that the cps sends all of the papers to a judge, and that judge the cps sends all of the papers to a judge, and thatjudge then reviews all of the papers, and all of the different aspects of the case, and then passes papers on to the home office, who assess their mind make their recommendation to the home secretary. Are the family reassured by meeting the home secretary today . Before i answer that, can i thank andrea personally from the bottom of my heart for everything she has done for us over the last few weeks. It has been a tough journey but having heras has been a tough journey but having her as constituency mp, visiting us in talking to us regularly has been very welcome and thank you. It has been amazing having the home secretary over today to meet with the family. We feel incredibly reassured that this whole saga will end up being dealt with under the rule of law, which is critical to all of us, notjust rule of law, which is critical to all of us, not just to the parents of harry. Dialogue is always good and sometimes there is misunderstandings but when you come together, and you look each other in the eye and resolve any issues, but you hear from some of the most senior politicians in the country that this will be dealt with under the rule of law, absolutely they will go to bed tonight feeling reassured. When you saw the statement from the lord of Anne Sacoolas, saying she will not come back to the uk voluntarily, how did the family react . They are angry, they do not understand why this lady is back in america. They feel she should never have been allowed to go and she should jolly welcome back. They are concerned they have one of the finest lawyers in america is seeking to undermine our very fair and well developed legal system which has fairness at its heart. This lady is entitled to a fair trial, she is guilty of nothing at the moment, and ifand when trial, she is guilty of nothing at the moment, and if and when she comes back, she will get a fair hearing, which is what we are all entitled to. That was the family spokesman speaking alongside andrea leadsom, their local mp, after a meeting with home secretary priti patel today. The australian Prime Minister, scott morrison, has defended his governments record on tackling Climate Change as bushfires continue to rage across parts of the country. Under pressure for taking a holiday while the bushfires have been burning mr morrison conceded there was a link between Global Warming and weather events but said its not credible to make a direct connection to any single fire event. Our correspondent Shaimaa Khalil reports. It feels like a deserted war zone, but this is the aftermath of the catastrophic bushfires that have ravaged New South Wales. And in the village of balmoral, the devastation is everywhere. The Prime Minister, scott morrison, appeared for the first time today after fierce criticism of his holiday in hawaii. It is quite humbling as you come and you speak to families and speak to individuals, you speak to the volunteers, and you see the best of australia on every single occasion, and that is what we are seeing here again today. Russell has been a volunteer firefighter for six years. He was out with his team trying to control the blaze in the village when his own house was burned to the ground. It wasnt until this morning when i came back, because we couldnt get back in here because it was too dangerous, so when i came back this morning, to check the chickens, i then had a look at the property, and thats when, you know, its gone. Russells main worry now is what happens in the next few weeks. There are so many of the brigade that are tired, that is the mental side of it. When you are continually battling something you cant beat. The only thing that will beat this is Mother Nature when she opens the heavens up and puts this out. We cant. We are running out of water here. The catastrophic fires have subsided but the situation is still extremely dangerous here. The roads remain closed off. Balmoral was one of the worst hit areas by saturdays fires and the community is still in shock. Many havent returned to see what happened to their homes and what happened to their village. Just opposite the road from russells shattered house is a very different picture. Craig stayed to defend his home during the fires, using up all the water reserves he had. Flames like a five or six storey building just roaring all around you. Just scared as hell. You dont know what to do. You try not to panic, but we got the job done, so we saved most of the stuff. At the heart of all of this is the divisive Climate Change debate, with many australians linking the ferocity of the fires to the Severe Weather conditions here. Australia is bracing itself for a scorching summer, and many are wondering where the next big fire is going to hit. James morris from the New South WalesRural Fire Service spoke about the scale of the challenge they face. These fires are massive, the biggest we have ever seen in New South Wales, burning out sincejuly, more than 3. 1 hectares of bush and grassland. We currently have 100 fires burning across New South Wales, and one of those which has been elevated in the last five minutes or so to emergency warning, threatening homes around the Blue Mountain so even though in sydney at the moment, it isjust after midnight, where we would typically see very to nights, we are seeing fla mes see very to nights, we are seeing flames 20 metres above the tree tops, threatening homes close by so still very challenging and erratic conditions being seen by firefighters doing a wonderfuljob battling to save as many houses as possible. Unfortunately, saturday we saw catastrophic bushfire conditions across parts of New South Wales. We believe we have lost around 100 homesjust in not believe we have lost around 100 homes just in not fire alone. We have seen close to 1000 lost in this fire season alone. Devastating times for New South Wales. We have seen eight lives lost, two of those being your own firefighters in recent days, so hard and challenging times for the fire crews but they are doing what they do to protect communities across the state. Given the scale of what you are facing, how do you prioritise what you must tackle first . It can be challenging at times, at one point about six weeks ago, we saw 17 fires burning at the emergency warning alert level. That alert level for us means homes and lives are under threat. Typically in previous years we have seen a typically in previous years we have seen a maximum of four fires at the emergency warning, so to have 17 at that level is massive and it takes a lot of logistical and operational management, from right across New South Wales in the number of Emergency Services but we prioritise as much as possible the areas that those fires are burning in, how many lives and properties. We have thousands of firefighters on the ground each and every day and support from other Emergency Services, from firefighting departments across australia and even assistance at the moment from america and canada. What is the Weather Forecast for the next few days . We are very lucky, we saw our bad weather day on saturday, we have about five days worth of favourable conditions before we start to see conditions before we start to see conditions elevate once again with hot, dry temperatures, and reports of some wind coming through. Christmas day, hopefully, will allow some of our firefighters to be able to spend some time at home with theirfamily but to spend some time at home with their family but considering how dry it is at the moment, we are going to see more than 2000 firefighters out on the field are not at home with theirfamilies trying on the field are not at home with their families trying to protect communities in New South Wales. The queen has attended church at sandringham for a carol concert. She was joined by edward, sophie and their son, but without the duke of edinburgh who has spent a second night in a Central London hospital. Prince philip, whos 98, is being treated for a pre existing condition, on the advice of his doctors. Our correspondent simon jones sent this update from the king edward vii hospital. Alison freeman is in sandringham. What news if any is emerging from london . Iam afraid london . I am afraid we have not had anything new from the palace since friday when he was admitted to king edward vii hospital in london for that pre existing condition, as they called it in their statement. He has been recommended to go there on the advice of his doctors. We do not know what that condition is or what treatment there is but there has not been all week and any sense of alarm from the palace or the family. They seem from the palace or the family. They seem to be carrying on as normal. While Prince Philip was travelling to london to go to hospital, the queen was carrying out her plan journey by train to come to sandringham. This is where the prince normally lives and spends his time. His absence will be being felt by the royals. What of those other family activities and the queen and her movements today and the coming days . We had a first glimpse of the queen on the estate this morning. She arrived by car with prince edward, sophie and their two children. They went down the road which will be familiar to many as the road they walk around on on Christmas Day, having been to the service. It is an annual engagement in their calendar, if you like, that it is much more low key if you like, that it is much more low key than the Christmas Day service today. It is a Carol Service and the queen arrived in her car with a family at about 11 oclock and they were inside for about 45 minutes and we caught a glimpse of her on her way in and out. A small crowd of people stood here to wave at them but are much more sedate affair than we would see on Christmas Day, which are the usual pictures we are used to seeing. The question they will be asking themselves today is whether it is likely that Prince Philip will be back for Christmas Day. We know on Christmas Day last year he didnt join the family at the Christmas Day ceremony but he was said to be in good health. Whether he will be back at sandringham by Christmas Day itself is still unknown and something we might not know for the next few days. Alison freeman, thank you very much. Alison freeman in sandringham. Theres been dramatic scenes off the coast of sardinia, where a merchant ship became stranded on a rocky stretch of coast. The ship had unloaded a cargo of coffee and was heading for spain when bad weather forced the captain to try to return to port. Rescue crews manage to reach all 12 crew members, but not before theyd endured some very large waves crashing onto the deck. Nobody was injured. The latest headlines on bbc news tesco suspends Christmas Card production at a chinese factory after a six Year Old Girl in london finds a message claiming prisoners are being forced to pack them. The home secretary meets the family of harry dunn, the teenager killed in a Road Accident in northamptonshire in august australias Prime Minister returns to the country after facing criticism for holidaying in hawaii while bushfires engulf three australian states. More now on one of our main stories. Tesco is investigating allegations that forced labour is used at a chinese factory that produces its charity Christmas Cards. A six Year Old Girl found a message from a prisoner in shanghai asking for help in a box bought from the supermarket. It asked the reader to contact a journalist. Florence widdicombe and her father ben have been speaking to the bbc about what happened. We didnt open them on the day we got them. We opened them about a week ago. We were writing in them and about on my sixth or eighth card, somebody had already written in it. Ok, and so, ben, tell me exactly what had happened. So, about ten days ago, my wife was coming home from work and popped into a tesco to buy some Christmas Cards, because florence and my other children wanted to write Christmas Cards to their friends at school. So on sunday, a week ago, my wife was here cooking and florence was actually at this table here, just going through the cards and writing to her friends and she opened one up and started laughing and said, oh, mum, look, somebody has already written in this card. Isnt that funny . When my wife looked at the card it said what it did, which is that the card had come from somebody imprisoned in shanghai and was raising Human Rights Concerns and asked whoever found the note to pass it on to peter humphreys. What did the card say . The card said that the author was part of a group of foreign prisoners in qing pu prison in shanghai. They were asked or forced to work against their will and please could Human Rights Organisations be made aware and specifically could it be passed on to peter humphreys. When you read the details of what had been written in the card, what did it make you feel . Well, first, incredulity of course its not what you expect. The first thought was that it must be some sort of prank. But on reflection we realised it was actually potentially quite a serious thing and so i felt very shocked, but i also felt a responsibility to pass it on to peter humphreys, as the author asked me to do. Peter humphrey is the journalist who took this story to the sunday times. Here he is on why his name was mentioned in the card and who may have written it. Well, i spent two years in captivity in shanghai between 2013 and 2015. My final nine months of that captivity was in this very prison in this very cell block where this message has come from. This was written by some of my cell mates from that period who are still there serving sentences. Do you think it was written as a collective or one of them wrote it to you . Would it have been decided as a collective thing to do . Im pretty sure this was written as a collective message. Obviously one single hand produced this capital letters handwriting and i think i know who it was. But i will never disclose that name. No. And tell us about life in the prison. What were the conditions like . What were the other inmates like . The foreigners cell block in qing pu prison had about 150 foreign prisoners in it when i was there. Today it has about 250. These prisoners are living a very bleak daily life. There are 12 prisoners per cell. Each cell is painted in grey. Paint is flaking off the ceilings. They sleep in very rusty iron bunk beds with a mattress which is not more than about one centimetre thick underneath them. In the winter its extremely cold. Theres no heating in the building. In the summer its extremely hot because there is no air conditioning in the building. They get up around 5 30am, 6am every day and they have to go to bed again at about 9 30pm in the evening. The day is punctuated by a highly regimented programme of work or study. It now seems that theres more work done than study. When i was there, manufacturing, labour work, was voluntary. Prisoners could do that as a way to earn the pennies that they need to buy daily necessities like soap and toothpaste and biscuits. But what has happened in the last year or so is that work has become compulsory. So, when i was there, it was a relatively easier situation than it is now. And everyone i know in there at the time was in there for very questionable reasons. I met so many people who i considered to be the victims of wrongful imprisonment or at least reckless sentencing for minor offences. That was the journalist peter humphrey. About 1 of the population has some form of epilepsy, which would suggest more than 60 Million People worldwide. Yet for many, drugs don t work very well. Now a team of Cambridge University scientists has built a tiny Electronic Device that could eventually sit on the brain to work out when the patient is about to have a seizure and deliver a drug to stop it. Our science correspondent Richard Westcott reports. In a very, very clean room at Cambridge University, theyre building a device that could one day transform treatment for epilepsy. So, chris, i take it youre not dressing like this forfun, fun as it is yeah, actually, for the electronics were making, its really important to be in an ultra clean environment. No dust, nothing in here . No, no dust, nothing in here. Itll sit on the brain and deliver a drug when it senses a seizure is coming. So, it feels a bit counterintuitive to have a device in your brain. How do you stop it being rejected . In that it can sense what other nearby cells are doing, and then know exactly when to release chemicals to tell the other cells what to do. Its exactly how the neurones in the brain work. One of the biggest obstacles to treating epilepsy and other Brain Disorders is getting the drug to where it is needed. A thing called the blood brain barrier stops many drugs getting through. This device could bypass that problem. So the benefit of having a small device directly in the brain is that we only deliver drugs where theyre needed, so you mitigate side effects. And because theyre going exactly where theyre needed, theyre highly effective. So we have found a very small amount of a drug can go a very long way, if its delivered in the right location. The only part of the device that actually goes into the brain is this tiny needle here thats the width of two human hairs. If you look at it under the microscope, this red patch here is the drug that is delivered when you need it. And how does it know when you need it . When someones about to have an epileptic seizure, the electrical activity in the brain changes, and sensors on the device pick that up. There are many potential applications for this technology, where we combine the ability to sense with the ability to locally deliver the drug. Other applications we have been looking into, such as treating various cancers, parkinsons disease, chronic pain. Basically, any application where you want to couple the ability to know when to deliver the drugs and then very locally and precisely deliver it where its needed. Its early days, but they hope to be testing in humans within five years. Richard wescott, bbc news, cambridge. As the christmas getaway continues, rail passengers in south wales, the west of england, the london area and the northwest are facing disruption because of widespread train cancellations. Gwr, which runs services in and out of london paddington, has cancelled more than 20 inter city expresses because of staff shortages. Simon calder, travel editor of the independent, is at the station and explains whats causing delays this weekend. Well, lets just put this in context. Paddington station is going to be closed from Christmas Eve onwards until the end of next weekend because of the traditional festive rail engineering works. They are doing an awful lot of work between here and reading. And so gwr, which runs trains from here to the west of england and south wales, told everybody, get your journeys done by monday. Now lots of people have taken that advice. Its extremely busy here. But unfortunately, as you say, more than 20 trains have been cancelled. Thats because of basically a lot of rail employment agreements mean that staff dont have to work on sundays if they dont want to. Its entirely voluntary. And coming up to christmas, evidently, a lot of train crews have decided, no, we are going to spend the time with the family, which is of course fair enough. Weve got mostly trains to and from cardiff and Bristol Temple meads cancelled but also some to and from swansea and also the Early Arrival from exeter didnt run. Anybody whos got a ticket for a cancelled train will be accommodated on other trains and of course you can claim compensation if you are delayed as a result. Just going up to the north west, very similar problems on northern rail. So no trains on the line from manchester piccadilly to crewe via alderley edge, at least the stopping trains. Nothing from liverpool to blackpool north and a reduced service from manchester to as well. From manchester to buxton as well. Actor tony britton has died aged 95. He starred in many british films including the day of the jackal and appeared in the bbc sitcom don t wait up alongside nigel havers. His daughter, presenter fern britton, announced the news on twitter. A nativity scene by banksy has appeared at a hotel in bethlehem in the west bank. Dubbed the scar of bethlehem, the work shows jesuss manger by israels separation barrier, which appears to have been pierced by a blast. The work is a collaboration between the Hotels Owners and the artist, whose described it as a modified nativity. Now the weather with darren. Thank you. We are not expecting a White Christmas this year but then they dont happen very often at all. It has been the rain that has been a problem for the past few days or more. We are ending the day in the east of sunshine. It should be generally dry for Northern Ireland and some showers also for western scotland. Whens macro picking up as we head into the evening especially in western england and the shower is pushing overnight. Not many showers but Eastern England but enough of a breeze to keep temperatures up to around three or four degrees. Where we have clear skies and light winds in the east of scotland, we have frost and a cold day for tomorrow. The main focus for the showers will be central and southern scotland and Northern Ireland and england. Some heavy ones in the morning in particular. There the south of the odd shower around but many places will have a dry day and there will be much needed dry weather and sunshine. Quite mild in the south 00 29 46,409 4294966103 13 29,430 with temperatures ten or 11