Evening briefing Monday 1st June

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 Times Radio's evening briefing on Monday 1st June. Lord Mandelson criticised the Prime Minister, saying he lacked verve and panache in one of 1 ,500 documents about his appointment as the UK's ambassador to the United States to have been presented to Parliament.

0:50The file show Mandelson apparently declined to comply with a request to hand over his personal phone and in one exchange he said the government would never regret his posting to Washington. Senior government figures and civil servants lost their jobs over the appointment, which was given security clearance despite concerns raised by vetting officials over his friendship with Geoffrey Epstein. The Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is Alex Burghardt. The case of Peter Mandelson's appointment remains of the utmost national importance simply because it touches on national security and on the Prime Minister's honesty, integrity and competence.

1:29Stephen Swinford, the Times political editor, says it could be a humiliating episode for the Prime Minister. There are some really indiscreet things that cabinet ministers have said about the Prime Minister and the state of the government, but also it will obviously refer back again to Keir Starmer's original sin of appointing Mandelson in the first place despite knowing his links to Epstein. So all in all, a very difficult day for the government. A member of the British Army has died in a training accident in Iraq, addressing the Commons, the Defence Secretary John Healey said the soldier's family had requested a period of grace before further details are released.

2:05The UK will not have to pay Rwanda millions of pounds over a failed migrant deportation deal after winning an international court case. Signed by the previous Conservative government, the agreement initially proposed the UK would pay Rwanda to host asylum seekers who'd arrived illegally in this country. MPs will debate plans for a single patient record for the NHS in England, bringing together GP, hospital and social care data. It's hoped the plans will remove the need for people to keep repeating their story when attending appointments and doctors can quickly access patient information. Speaking to Times Radio, Dr Sarah Jarvis, a GP and the Clinical Director for Patient Access, highlighted the difficulties with the current system.

2:50If you're an A &E, you won't be able to access the GP records, which means you can't check their history, their medication, their allergies, that sort of thing. If they're unconscious, really important to know if they're allergic to any medication, for instance. But also when they come back to see the GP, we often, for instance, will have results, tests which are carried out in hospital, and then the patient will come back to us to talk about them and we won't be able to access them. A man's been jailed for at least 21 years for the murder of a university student with a large combat knife. Vikram Digwar attacked 18-year-old Henry Novak in Southampton.

3:22as he returned home from a night out last December. Hampshire police initially handcuffed the victim after his 23-year-old killer falsely accused him of racial abuse. And the former England football captain and manager, Kevin Keegan, says he has stage 4 cancer. Keegan's family disclosed his initial diagnosis in January after the 75-year-old had further evaluation of ongoing abdominal symptoms. There's more on these stories throughout the day on Times Radio.

3:55This 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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