Afternoon briefing Monday 9th February

0:00This episode of the Times Radio News Briefing is sponsored by PwCWC. Staying competitive means getting ahead, not just keeping up. So how do business leaders cut through the noise and focus on what really matters? PwC takes you further with tech, from optimising the systems that put your data to work, to scaling AI from proof of concept to competitive edge. PwC helps you meet tomorrow's tech demands, so you can compete at a speed that rewrites the rules. Discover more at pwc.co.uk This is the Times Radio afternoon briefing on Monday 9th February. Sakhir Starmer has lost a second senior advisor in as many days.

0:42His communications director, Tim Allen, who was only appointed in September, has followed Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney in resigning. He says it will allow a new Downing Street team to be built. Minister Jackie Smith has told Times Radio Labour MPs would be making a mistake if they try to get rid of Sakhir Starmer too. In fighting, believing that constant changing of leaders is going to solve some of the very difficult problems that this country and in fact the world faces, that I think would be a mistake and I hope that my colleagues don't pursue that particular route. The Prime Minister will address Labour MPs this evening.

1:18The Times' political editor Stephen Swinford says the release of vetting documents from Lord Mandelson's appointment will be another moment of peril. Last week was really bad. The weekend was terrible. But it's going to get much worse. These Mandelson files that we're going to start seeing probably quite soon, so I think that's going to be really explosive because that will say, black and white, what Keir Starmer knew at the time of that appointment. And it will put his poor judgment, his catastrophic judgment in this case, up in lights. The Prince and Princess of Wales have made their first public statement about the Epstein files, saying they are deeply concerned about revelations.

1:53Kensington Palace has issued it at the start of Prince William's three-day trip to Saudi Arabia. The latest files appear to show emails from Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor when he was trade envoy forwarding on confidential information to Jeffrey Epstein. But the former prince's biographer, Andrew Lowney, thinks the royal family had been protecting him. I mean, they had plenty of information coming in, so they knew about this. They've tried to keep it quiet. They now, because of the public outrage, have had to do something. But I think just saying that I feel sorry for the victims isn't really going to cut it, with the public.

2:24Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has always denied any wrongdoing. The foreign secretary is calling on authorities in Hong Kong to end what she calls the appalling ordeal Jimmy Lai is facing. The media tycoon and democracy campaign has been sentenced to 20 years in prison, having already been held in solitary confinement for almost five years. The Times' Asia editor Richard Lloyd-Parry says it raises questions about how effective Sir Keir Stummer's recent trip to China actually was. You know, perhaps in the view of the Chinese Communist Party, 20 years is leniency but as a man of 78 it's effectively a life sentence and yes plenty of questions for Keir Starmer he when he was in Beijing he said that he had to quote respectfully raised Jim Lai's case with Xi Jinping it obviously hasn't had much effect.

3:08NatWest has agreed to buy wealth management firm Evelyn Partners for 2.7 billion pounds it's the bank's first major acquisition since the government sold its remaining shares and returned it to private ownership last year. A survey for the Times suggests millions would be better off if given a proper financial education. The paper's launching a campaign to give everyone lessons in school to teach them how to save and invest their money. And in American football, the Seattle Seahawks have won the Super Bowl by beating the New England Patriots 29-13. Puerto Rican artist and Trump critic Bad Bunny made history by performing the entire halftime show in Spanish, which the president called an affront to the greatness of America.

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