Afternoon briefing Friday 3rd July

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0:35This is the Times Radio afternoon briefing for Friday the 3rd of July. Andy Burnham has suggested some taxes could rise without breaking Labour's manifesto promises. He said business rates could be increased on out-of-town warehouses to help cut them for pubs and other high street businesses. Michael Jacobs is a former Treasury advisor to Gordon Brown. He told Times Radio Mr Burnham will be looking closely at business rates as well as the rate of capital gains tax. There's probably about£20,£25 billion of tax rises that would not break the manifesto promise. I don't think Andy Burnham thinks that tax rises are a good idea in principle.

1:13We're already pretty highly taxed by historical standards. But if he does want to raise public expenditure to deal with the many problems that we can all identify, he does have some options. Later, Mr Burnham will answer questions from members of the public posted on the social media site Reddit. Police chiefs have criticised the government's last-minute decision to let pubs stay open for England's match in the early hours of Monday. The National Police Chief's Council is urging people to drink responsibly and says forces may have to divert officers from other duties to deal with potential disorder.

1:43Some pub operators say they won't use the blanket licensing exemption that will allow venues to stay open until 5am. Kay Nicholls is head of the industry group UK Hospitality. It's better late than never that the government has amended the legislation to give that automatic right to stay open. But it is only ever going to be a small number of pubs who can afford to open their doors after one o 'clock and take advantage of that. For those that can afford to do that, very welcome news. But unfortunately, it's only going to be a small proportion. The families of three girls murdered in the Southport attack have welcomed a decision to strip taxi driver Gary Poland of his licence.

2:20He dropped killer Axel Ruddokobana at the dance class before driving away after hearing screams. He didn't call emergency services for almost 50 minutes. The families say the decision is a necessary step towards accountability. There's growing pressure on the government to change the law so the ringleader of the Rochdale grooming gang can be deported. The Times has been told talks are underway with Pakistan, but that Islamabad is highly unlikely to agree to take Shabir Ahmed back. Dominic Grieve, the former Conservative attorney general, told Times Radio ministers may have to threaten visa restrictions to put pressure on the country.

2:54And the biggest hurdle of the lot, in my view, is going to be getting cooperation from Pakistan. Now, the Home Secretary has been quite good in recent years in coercing third countries to take back their nationals. That is quite a confrontational approach if you can't reach an agreement. And a major airline is again warning of long delays at holiday airports across Europe. Ryanair says passengers are continuing to miss flights after the introduction of new European exit checks. It says the worst affected airports are Tenerife, Parma, Alicante, Malaga, Krakow and Paris-Bauvet. You can follow the Times Radio News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio Online.

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