Evening briefing on Tuesday 29th July

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 29th July. The Prime Minister says the UK will recognise the state of Palestine by September unless Israel takes substantive steps to end suffering in Gaza.

0:49Sir Keir Starmer has held a rare cabinet meeting during the holidays. Among the conditions, he says Israel must allow the United Nations to supply aid and agree to a ceasefire. The Prime Minister added Hamas must immediately release Israeli hostages and play no part in a Gaza. government. An investigation has been opened into the involvement of police officers in the Rotherham grooming scandal. It's being overseen by the Independent Office for Police Conduct, which has directed South Yorkshire Police to investigate on its behalf. Three former police officers have been arrested in connection with child abuse cases.

1:23Assistant Chief Constable Hayley Barnett says one is on police bail pending further inquiries and two have been released from bail while the investigation continues. Conservative leader Kemi Badenrock told Times Radio there are many questions that still need to be answered. An area that hasn't fully been explored is around state bodies. I do think that that's one of the things the National Enquirer on Grooming Gangs should look into. All of the survivors that I have met have talked about being ignored, being turned away, having their own parents arrested by the police, feeling that there was a cover-up.

1:54And I think that this allegation fits in with that trend. I think that is absolutely something that should be looked at. Tommy Robinson is reported to have left the country after video emerged of him walking away from the scene of an alleged assault at St Pancras Station in central London yesterday evening. He was filmed shouting, You saw him, he came at me, as a man laid unresponsive and bleeding on the floor and another man shouts for help. You get some of that, quick. Come on, Tommy. You got my name, Tommy. You got my name, Tommy. You got my name, Tommy. Yeah, yeah. Robinson has now retweeted a post on X saying if you approach someone with hostility, expect to get a clip round the ear hole.

2:34British Transport Police are looking into what happened. The Bank of England's Governor Andrew Bailey has blocked the Chancellor, Rachel Rees, from intervening in the regulation of financial technology giant Revolut. The Chancellor had been trying to organise a meeting to discuss the company's plans to become a fully-fledged UK bank, but Andrew Bailey scrapped it over worries it represented political interference in the bank's independent oversight of the city. Times Radio's business correspondent Dominic O 'Connell explains there's a bit more to this. There's a bit of history here because Reeves has been making all these comments about regulators being rubbish and anti-growth.

3:08In her mansion house speech, the regulators were a boot on the throat of businesses. And she's talked about taking away the retail ring fence, one of the main things that came out of the last banking crisis. And Bailey's indicated that he's not very keen on that either. So there's a bit of history there and this is a pretty sharp edge to that tension, I think. Anglia Water has been told to pay£62.8 million fine for sewage treatment failures. The regulator says the firm didn't upgrade and maintain its plants, leading to excessive sewage spills from storm overflows. Ofwat says the water company has accepted it made mistakes and is taking action to fix the problems.

3:42You can follow The Times News Briefing on Spotify and listen live to Times Radio online. That's your Times Evening Briefing on Tuesday 29th July.

3:58This 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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