Brexit is a big issue because we are both very staunch remainers. brexit is a big issue because we are both very staunch remainers. If we have a good deal with europe, everything is benefits. Health and education is more important to me than brexit in an ordinary election but at the moment, brexit takes priority. So in the early rounds, brexit might have stolen the show but the old favourites never go away. I think theyre doing fa ntastically away. I think theyre doing fantastically considering how bad it is. Ive never had a problem with the nhs around here. I had my baby ten months ago. The doctors surgeries though, to be fair, if you wa nt surgeries though, to be fair, if you want an appointment, you have to ring up and it could be two or three weeks. Knowing that the nhs is going to be there in five or ten years time is really important to us. Obviously if its not, we will become very americanised and it could be a real struggle. This contest has only just could be a real struggle. This contest has onlyjust started. There are four more weeks for the Political Parties to persuade voters to ta ke Political Parties to persuade voters to take their lead. Peter whittlesea, bbc news. The headlines on bbc news the labour leader, jeremy corbyn, says the partys election manifesto includes policies that would transform the lives of many people. President trump describes james comey, the fbi director he sacked, as a showboat and a grandstander. Mr trump saying he would have dismissed him even if officials had not recommended it. An analysis of nhs data suggests waiting times in england are at their worst level in five years. Now on bbc news its time for meet the author. France celebrated novelist to poet. Michel fabers success has come in many genres but after the death of his wife eva, he decided to write a book of poems, undying a love story. , which follows the last stages of her illness and describes the raw day by day process of his own grief afterwards. Welcome. Asa as a novelist, was it difficult to commit yourself, especially under this very painful circumstances, to a poetic form . I didnt feel i was committing myself to anything. In the aftermath of eithers death, these poems came to me. I had no conception that i was going to put them out there. They were just suggesting themselves to be written. It seemed perverse not to write them, given that they were coming to me. I didnt feel that i would put them out there, but when i started reading the mad at literary festivals, i noticed that they were connecting with people and i thought that maybe this was something which wasnt essentially private, maybe they could be shared. Reading this very direct, frank, sometimes brutal poems was, in a strange sort of way, giving people consolation, because i was talking about things which are almost forget forbidden to be talking about. Even though theres a lot of grieving poetry out there, it tends to be quite decorous and, and beautiful. Yes. And you wanted some of this to be raw. I wanted it to be raw and, in fact, i stopped writing. I could have gone on writing the poems until now. But i stopped writing them at the end of 2015, because i felt id the stage in my grieving where there was a risk i would just write a beautiful poem that happen to have grief as its subject, rather than feeling grief and needing to express it some way. They were private expressions of your own feelings, some kind of reassurance, some kind of record, i suppose, of the journey youd been through. With all its pain and difficulties. And joys as well, along the way. But youd always thought of them are something personal to you . Well, i have a long record of writing things and not putting them out there. I wrote for 25 years without submitting anything. So, yes, if i had thought that they were just me talking to myself about what i had gone through, i wouldnt have shared them. There is anger in there, there is unbearable sadness. And there are those moments after your wifes death that everyone will recognise at that sort of time. Things, for example, like the death of a cat. Which takes you back in a weird way to your human loss. And its the kind of thing people think about but dont often say, let alone write down. Yeah. The poem that was particularly significant on that level is. There is a poem called you were ugly. Which talks about what happened to her body as a result of the cancer. And thats a taboo, youre really not allowed in our. To talk about the physical changes. Yes, yes. Towards the end of her life. And when i read that poem out on the radio about a year ago, someone phoned in the Radio Station and said, look, im not ready to read this book yet. I lost my wife to recently. But i am consoled that someone has expressed this thing which ive been thinking and felt that i wasnt allowed to think. Will this take you into poetry as a medium . No. Beyond this volume . No, this will be the only book of poetry that i write. Im under no illusions that im a good enough poet to write poems about anything other than the loss. This one experience. Does that mean that you will return to fiction . Because it has been quite a journey. As you say, you had a long period where you didnt submit anything for publication. You know, youre sort of famously almost reclusive as a writer in that sense, for a long time. Will this have that same effect on you or not . Well, when eva was ill, and she knew she was going to die, she was very, very upset with my decision, which i had already made, that i would write no more novels. Her attitude was never say never. But i would be astonished if i wrote another novel for grown ups. I do want to write a novel for children. Its something i havent done before. With each book i wanted to do something that i have not done before. I also think that in the world as it currently is, a little magic doesnt go amiss. A little benign adventure. There are writers, thinking earlier about thomas hardy, who lived to the late 20s, but wrote his last novel in the mid 1890s, and spent the rest of his life Writing Poetry. No, you say youre not going to do another novel, another volume of poetry, but it does seem as if the moment youve reached in yourfiction writing and with this break, because of the circumstances you find yourself in, it is time for something completely new. Yes. And something i also want to do is figure out whether i can have a life beyond being a writer. Because. Do you not know . Im so used to inhabiting that little Sanctum Sanctorum and creating works of art, which is an alternative to hanging out with real human beings and smelling the roses and all those things that ordinary people know how to do. When youre not writing, when youre not sitting in that quiet room, what are you doing . Are you reading fiction at all . I dont read fiction at all. I will occasionally read a book about music. Mainly, i listen to music. Instrumental music mainly. So my space has no language in it. Its an extraordinary thing to hear, in a writer of your celebrity and accomplishment, saying he no longer reads fiction. Do you ever feel guilty about that or is thatjust the way it is . It makes, in some ways it makes things a lot easier because it means when i meet another writer and i havent met their work, havent read their work, its not that im choosing against. You can say i havent read anybody elses either. I havent read anybody elses either. So thats a sort of socially convenient. But maybe in the future i would like to become the sort of person who reads again. So whether youre Writing Poetry in the sadness after your wifes death, or whether you are contemplating a move to fiction for young people, or listening to music, youre always, finally, looking for a new horizon. Somewhere. Yes, but maybe the ultimate new horizon is to become more like other people. Because that has been my mission in a way. All my life. Because i started off very, very alienated, very strange. And i didnt want to become an alienated fringe dweller. Its frightening in a way for me to become more connected, because as you become more connected with other people, youre vulnerable to their lives. Going bad. And if youre a solitary fringe dweller, youre protected from that. Whereas once you welcome these people in, life is harsh. But its a risk you feel you now have to take. I feel its a risk i now have to take. Well, not have to take, but want to take. Michel faber, author of undying a love story, thank you very much. Thank you. Good evening. We have seen some changes start taking place today, with this area of low pressure drifting in from the new continent and that is bringing in some brain, also importing some humid airfor quite a long way south. That will bring humid air through tomorrow, with clouds coming up on that humid air bringing in showers and it will continue to do so over the next few hours. Maybe some of those showers contain a bit of thunder and lightning and it will turn quite wet over Northern Ireland overnight. We will see some low cloud developing from newcastle up towards aberdeen. Eight or 9 degrees here. Quite warm, eight or 9 degrees to 12 to 13 further south. If you showers dotted around at the start of the day tomorrow, so quite grey for many. Northern england, the north east sta rts northern england, the north east starts pretty great, the northwest should be that much brighter, where Northern Ireland is back into cloud and rain. Most of Western Scotland will be quite dry and bright but Eastern Scotland will be quite cloudy and breezy, with the breeze coming in from the sea. More showers and the showers again might contain rumbles of thunder. Quite a warm sort of day across england and wales, 21 degrees across the south east, 16th and 14th across the northwest. Looking ahead to the weekend, sunny spells across much of the country, still some showers around, and by sunday things will be turning a good deal of pressure. Saturday, not too many showers across the midlands and the south east, maybe one or two, but most of the showers will be in the north, fairly warm again and quite humid for much of england and wales. We lose that humidity as we get into sunday, as Fresh Atlantic Airjoins us. Sunday, as Fresh Atlantic Airjoins us. It will be another day of showers, with frequent showers for some, but the sunshine may last quite some time for others. A changeable weather setup for the next few days and if you need more details, there is plenty more on the bbc weather website. Hello, im ros atkins, this is outside source. The fallout from the sacking of the fbi director is gathering pace. Hes showboat, hes a grandstander. The fbi has been in turmoil, you know that, i know that, Everybody Knows that. The man who worked directly under james comey disagrees with the president s assessment. I can tell you that i hold Director Comey in the absolute highest regard. I have the highest respect for his considerable abilities and his integrity. The acting fbi director also says the agency will continue its investigation into claims of russian collusion in the Trump Campaign vigorously and completely. Well be live in washington. The party of the french President Elect has unveiled a list