Afternoon briefing Thursday 17th September

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 your Times Radio news briefing for the afternoon of Thursday 17th September. Interest rates have been kept the same by the Bank of England at 3.75%.

0:44The US brought theirs up to 3.75 % yesterday. The intention was to control inflation by encouraging saving overspending. Buckingham Palace has issued a rare response to a royal memoir suggesting that Princess Diana's brother's recollections are wrong. Earl Spencer's claimed that in the days after Diana's death, King Charles said she would soon be forgotten. The palace has responded, saying the king is mindful that grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory. Jenny Bond, the BBC royal correspondent at the time, told Times Radio how it might affect the monarchy. All the royal family are out and about today, so they are going to feel physically the repercussions of Earl Spencer's words here, because cameras are going to be on them even more.

1:31There may be shouted questions from reporters. Once again, the work that they're doing will be overshadowed by another domestic, I was going to call it squabble, but it's much more, much nastier than a squabble, than a full-blown row. The Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney, has told the European Parliament that they are not fair-weather allies. Seeking closer ties with Europe, he's said they're not limited by geography, but bound by affinity. Russia is probing Britain for weakness, according to the head of the Navy. General Sir Gwyn Jenkins has warned in a private speech that the UK faces threats it's not seen since the Cold War, such as Moscow testing and mapping the seabed.

2:08He said critical undersea infrastructure, such as cables, pipelines and energy networks, were difficult to monitor, hard to repair at speed and increasingly integral to national resilience. The term net zero should be scrapped, according to a group of MPs, because it's become toxic and too politicised. It refers to making sure the amount of greenhouse gases released are balanced by their removal from the atmosphere. But the Energy Security and Net Zero Committee says it's been weaponised by opponents and is deeply unpopular with the public. The Energy and Net Zero Minister, Martin McCluskey, told Times Radio this morning he disagrees with the committee and says Net Zero just needs to be communicated better.

2:47We are not going to start changing government departments' names. I've got a lot of respect for the Energy Security Net Zero Committee and actually there's a lot in this report that I do agree with I think one of the main thrusts of it is that we need to be much clearer with people about the direct benefits to communities around the transition and around the investment in clean power For more stories like this listen throughout the day to Times Radio

3:13This episode of the Times Radio News Briefing is sponsored by PwC AI is everywhere. In the news, in our hands, but return on investment, not so much. So how do you get beyond the hype and deliver AI that powers reinvention and growth across your business? Strong foundations unlock AI's potential. That's why PwC takes you further with tech, strengthening the data quality, processes and workflows that shape how well AI performs. PwC turns innovation into implementation so you can accelerate from experiment to scale. Discover more at pwc.co.uk.

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