Daily briefing Sunday 23rd August

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 Welcome to the Times Radio Daily Briefing for Sunday 23rd August. Andy Burnham will give regional mayors the power to overrule planning decisions, enabling them to give the go-ahead for new housing developments.

0:49Mayors will be able to direct councils to approve new building or to refuse it. They'll also be able to grant upfront permission so developers can start building without having to apply. The Prime Minister has been speaking to the Sunday Times in his office in Manchester. The whole theme of Number 10 North is quickening the pace of decision-making and delivery. That is what this place exists to do. It's changing the way the country thinks about growth. It's a much more dynamic process and putting as much at the local and regional level as can be done, let places make their own decisions. The Kremlin has withdrawn its ambassador to the UK, Andre Keelan, who was in post for more than seven years, left on July 21st.

1:35Ukraine has used British drones to strike deep into Russian territory. Times Radio's political reporter Ali Raza Manji says there appears to be a diplomatic impasse. There hasn't been any sort of move to replace him in the Foreign Office, no suggestions to the Foreign Office of a new name, and the actual people in the embassy don't know if they're going to get a new ambassador. So is this sort of a lowering of diplomatic relations between the UK and Russia? And this partially comes after a week in which Ukraine used British drones in Russia, and certainly that has left a mark, I suppose, in terms of how diplomatic relations are.

2:07It's understood that a police car hit head-on by a vehicle travelling the wrong way on the A66 in Middlesbrough was not involved in a pursuit before the collision. Seven people, including two officers, were killed in the early hours of yesterday morning. The other car, a Volkswagen Passat, was being chased by another marked police car. That pursuit ended when it drove onto the A66. Policing commentator Graham Whetton says the officers' colleagues will be in mourning. It's a relatively small force, just about 1 ,000 officers. So these two officers have been very, very well known within Cleveland Police, within the senior leadership team.

2:43A huge tragedy for Cleveland Police and the officers' families and friends, etc. They went to work and sadly didn't get home. At least a third of people having their drinks spiked are now male. That's up from less than a quarter in 2021. Women remain the majority of victims, but cases involving men are rising, with motives ranging from pranks and robbery to sexual assault. Colin Mackey is the co-founder of Spike Aware. He's told Times Radio why more men are being recorded as victims. Spiking is always classed. You'll always hear it's always classed under the violence against women and girls banner.

3:18So I think a lot of the time the male ego wouldn't allow people to come forward. We've had victims speaking to us and male victims saying, why was I singled out? It's only girls that get spiked. You can follow the Times Radio News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio online.

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