Afternoon briefing Thursday 6th November

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 afternoon briefing on Thursday 6th November. One of the inmates released from Wandsworth Prison in south-west London by mistake has handed himself back in.

0:44Billy Smith was released on Monday. There is still no update on the Algerian national Brahim Khadur Sharif, who was released from the same prison last week. The former head of security at Wandsworth, Ian Hsense, says releases like this are putting the public in danger. People are not safe because the risk is not being properly managed, both inside prisons and outside prisons. And now we have such a dramatic, multi-systemic failure. We do not have a safe system inside prisons for both the people that are sent there by the courts and the men and women who pull on a uniform and do what is now becoming an almost impossible job to protect us.

1:21The government says it's called in prison governors for an urgent meeting. There were a record number of referrals to the anti-extremism scheme Prevent in the year to March. 8 ,778 referrals were made, that's up 27 % on the year before. The largest proportion of referrals were categorised as having no ideology and almost 3 ,200 of them were children aged 11 to 15. The DVSA says it will take action after a Times Radio investigation revealed the money people are losing each month to fake driving test scams has trebled since January. Lerner drivers are facing a huge backlog to book their tests and in total they lost£34 ,000 in August to people offering them fake slots.

2:04One scammer even claimed to our undercover reporter he knew examiners who would guarantee her a pass if she paid him£560. Only we are providing you the service to ignore your files. If you do any kind of mistakes, we will ignore your mistakes. That's it. Lots of contacts. We are doing this every day. The government says it is bringing down the backlog in those waiting to book. Tony Blair's think tank has told the government to drop its plans to introduce workers' rights on day one in order to get businesses back on site. The Tony Blair Institute says the package, which is currently making its way through the House of Lords, could stunt growth.

2:40It's also urging Rachel Reeves to make sure any tax rises in her budget this month are temporary. James Reid, the CEO of Reid Recruitment, told Times Radio what the Chancellor could do to win over businesses. The increase in employers' national insurance in the last budget, I think, came as a big surprise to business. It was a big hit on business. We've seen that, you know, people cutting back on recruitment, people cutting back on investment. It's been bad for business. This budget, I mean, maybe I'm overly optimistic, is an opportunity to actually reverse that mistake. It was absolutely a mistake in my view.

3:09The Treasury says the government will act to safeguard economic security. New figures show construction activity in the UK has fallen at the fastest pace for more than five years. The latest S &P Global data suggests the sector is in its longest downturn since the 2008 financial crisis. The Sainsbury's CEO says there haven't been any more talks with potential buyers for Argos. talks with Chinese company JD.com collapsed in September and the Duchess of Sussex is returning to acting she's playing herself in a Hollywood film called Close Personal Friends which also features the Lessons in Chemistry star Brie Larson and Jack Quaid who's the son of Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid don't forget to subscribe to the Times News Briefing on Spotify or listen live to Times Radio online

3:58This 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.