Evening briefing on Tuesday 19th 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 This is your Times Evening Briefing on Tuesday 19th August. I'm Laura Cook. A council has won a temporary high court injunction to block asylum seekers from being housed at a hotel in Essex.

0:45It follows recent widespread protests and counter-demonstrations outside the Bell Hotel in Epping. All migrants must be removed by September 12th. Epping Forest District Council leader Chris Whitbread says he was delighted with the judgement. We always knew the Bell Hotel was the wrong location because of its close proximity to schools and other parts of the community. It was never going to work out and we did repeat that to them on several occasions. Owner Somani Hotel says it plans to appeal. President Trump has said he hopes Vladimir Putin is prepared to move towards peace in Ukraine after talks with Vladimir Zelensky and European leaders in the White House.

1:24President Trump spoke to Fox News earlier today. This one is the one that is the most difficult, and I thought it would be an easy one. So I hope President Putin is going to be good, and if he's not, it's going to be a rough situation. And I hope that Zelensky, President Zelensky, will do what he has to do. He has to show some flexibility also. A NATO meeting is scheduled for tomorrow, with the prospect of a trilateral meeting between Zelensky, Putin and Trump becoming clearer. Vadim Brishdyko, former Ukrainian ambassador to NATO and London, says that's the next step. Surely I would love to have the ceasefire first, which was actually promised by many leaders, including Trump himself.

2:05Now he changed his mind and he's saying that we can do actually negotiating while the canons are still talking louder than us. I have to remind that we actually did it before and Zelensky met with Putin once in Paris. I was there at that meeting. we can actually sit around the table and find some agreement. Whether we will be able to live with this agreement later on, this is something we will see later. People with houses worth more than£500 ,000 could face an annual property tax under reported plans to replace stamp duty. Ministers reportedly asked officials to look at options for the tax which would remove the levy on people when they buy property.

2:43David Smith is the Sunday Times' economics editor says reforming the property tax system could be beneficial in the long term. If you can get around the problem of, as I say, the people who are asset rich but income poor, and there are ways of getting around that, I think fundamentally this is a good thing for the Treasury to be looking at. This is a kite that is worth flying, I think. And whether we see anything solid in the autumn budget or whether we see a consultation on this, which I suspect is more likely, I think this is a good area for the Treasury and for the Chancellor. Senior diplomats say Hamas has agreed to a ceasefire deal that would see half the remaining Israeli hostages in Gaza freed.

3:24It's understood the proposals include another exchange of Palestinian prisoners and more aid deliveries into the territory. Journalist Jonathan Sarcadotti says it's similar to what the US previously suggested before European leaders stepped in. So in a sense, some are saying that that does prove what Israel has been saying all along, that it's only military pressure or even the threat of military pressure increasing, which is going to force Hamas to do anything. And millions of households have been warned to brace themselves for higher winter energy bills. Industry experts Cornwall Insight are predicting a£17 a year increase in Ofgem's price cap from October 1st for a typical dual fuel bill.

4:03That's 1 % more than the current level of the cap. You can follow the Times News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio online. That's your Times Evening Briefing on Tuesday the 19th of August.

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