Daily briefing Saturday 29th 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 Daily Briefing for Saturday 29th November. The Chair of UK Hospitality has told Times Radio as many as 30 ,000 businesses in the sector will be forced to close next year.

0:47It's amid claims that the Chancellor's reform of business rates announced in the budget was effectively a stealth tax on the high street. A separate government agency announced that a revised method of calculating business rates will result in the levy increasing significantly, and an existing 40 % discount on business rates will expire in April. Kate Nicholls, who campaigns for hospitality businesses, said the impact could be devastating. Between 10 ,000 and 30 ,000, and these are just simply unsustainable. I have had 200 to 300 calls from businesses over the last two, three days since the Chancellor sat down saying, this is existential.

1:24I just don't know how I'm going to manage this. So it is a very real risk. This is worse than we saw in Covid. Passengers have been told to expect limited flight disruption this weekend after several UK airlines were required to carry out a software update in some of its Airbus aircraft. Around 6 ,000 A320 jets could be affected by the potential interference from solar radiation with onboard flight computers. Claire Irvin, the head of travel at The Times and Sunday Times, earlier assessed the situation at Heathrow. The disruption hasn't reached the heights that it looked like it might do yesterday.

2:01Heathrow all seems quite quiet. BA only had three planes affected that they say they've updated. EasyJet had warned of cancellations but is again playing that down this morning. Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky is under increasing pressure to overhaul his government in response to a widening corruption scandal. His chief of staff and closest advisor Andrei Yermak is the latest senior official to resign after investigators raided his home in Kyiv. He's facing allegations of embezzlement from Ukraine's state nuclear company. The Times' special correspondent Anthony Lloyd is in Ukraine. I think civil society here is very worried that Zelensky has shown the traits of holding too much power to his immediate circle, someone like Andriyarmak.

2:49So I think there's a hope that there may be a more decentralised form of power ahead. Whoever it's going to be, whether it's one individual or two, they're going to have to be immediately up to speed on peace negotiations and military development. And officials in Kiev say a Russian drone and missile attack overnight killed at least one person and injured seven others, including a 13-year-old girl. A search for survivors has ended after Hong Kong's worst fire in almost 80 years, even though an estimated 200 people are still missing. Hong Kong has started three days of mourning after at least 128 people died in seven residential tower blocks.

3:2711 people have been arrested. And the Home Office has delayed plans to accommodate 300 male asylum seekers at a barracks in the Highlands. The UK government said while it was still continuing to accelerate plans to move asylum seekers to Cameron Barracks near Inverness, it would wait until they were fully operational and safe. You can follow the Times News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio online.

3:53This 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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