Evening briefing Monday 16th 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. Welcome to the Times Radio evening briefing on Monday the 16th of February. Nigel Farrell says the latest government U-turn is a victory for democracy.

0:43Ministers have abandoned their attempt to delay the local elections of 30 councils in England. The ballots will now go ahead in May following new legal advice. Reform UK took the government to court. I thought we'd get a partial victory. I thought ones that were delayed for a second year in a row, we'd probably win that. But this is now a complete victory and there'll be a lot of people up and down the country very grateful to us. The Lib Dems were delaying in Cheltenham. The Conservatives delaying in Harlow and the other counties where they postponed last year as well. The rest of them were Labour, mostly in the north of England.

1:16It's a big win. Farage also says the Community Secretary Steve Reid should consider resigning. The government has now made 15 U-turns. Sikir Osama says he's looking to meet NATO's target of spending 3 % of GDP on defence by the end of this decade. He's previously pledged to spend 2.5 % on defence by April 2027. but speaking this morning he said the UK needs to go faster on this. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister says the Cabinet Office is investigating a Labour think tank that paid for a dossier which smeared journalists from the Sunday Times. Labour Together commissioned a company called Apco to investigate Gabriel Pogrens and Harry York.

1:54Apco's report included false claims that their journalism may have been based on a Russian hack. Neil Lawson, director of the Labour-affiliated pressure group Compass, has given his reaction to Times Radio. Labour Together is very, very close to this government. You know, it was instrumental in getting Keir Starmer elected as leader, or some of its people were. It was the think tank that was in orbit of Keir Starmer and, you know, many of his ministers received huge amounts of funding, grew very quickly around the election. But why on earth was it doing this stuff and what does that tell us about the heart of this political project?

2:29Parents are being urged to make sure their children are vaccinated against measles. A number of kids have been treated in hospital for measles following an outbreak in North London. There have been more than 60 suspected cases in Enfield. Helen Bedford, Professor of Children's Health at University College London, says 60 cases is something to be alarmed about. Yes, it is very worrying because there probably are more cases, but it takes a while for them to be confirmed. And the thing about measles is it spreads incredibly quickly, and that's because it's very, very infectious. It's considered to be the most infectious disease there is.

3:04So to keep it away, we need really high levels, 95 % uptake of two doses of MMR vaccine. The Department of Health is launching a new campaign to increase childhood immunisations. And you can follow the Times Radio News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio online. This 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.

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