Evening Briefing Thursday 9th 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. Hello, this is your Times Radio Evening Briefing for Thursday 9th July with me, James Kitchen. A former Downing Street chief foreign policy advisor says Andy Burnham could face an international military crisis within weeks of taking power.

0:47John Pugh, who stepped down from the role last year after serving four prime ministers, told The Times the incoming leader should brace himself for a major provocation from Russia's President Putin. He also urged Mr. Burnham not to abandon the world stage after aides said he would do less globetrotting than Sakhir Starmer. Iranian state media says the country's Busha nuclear plant has been hit by a U.S. projectile after a second night of strikes. Tehran's targeting American bases in several Gulf nations during tit-for-tat attacks. Mehran Kamrava is professor of government at Georgetown University in Qatar.

1:23Speaking to Times Radio, he said this war has no winners. The people who are bearing the brunt of this on a daily basis are Iranians who are being bombarded left and right. But here in the Persian Gulf, the countries that have been hit the most, first and foremost, are Bahrain, then Kuwait and the UAE. Mourners have displayed banners vowing to kill Donald Trump at the funeral of Iran's supreme leader. Huge crowds have gathered in Mashhad for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's burial. Pakistan is expected to refuse to take back the Rochdel grooming gang leader despite plans to change the law so he can be deported.

2:06Shabir Ahmed was released from prison last week after serving 14 years of a 22-year sentence for 30 child rape offences. Islamabad is now demanding the extradition of two political dissidents from the UK in exchange for accepting his return. Times Radio's political correspondent Terry Stiasny says specific cases often don't make for good legislation. As we saw with the whole Windrush affair, because the status of Commonwealth citizens from before 1971 and that act was, you know, tried to be regularised. There are lots of people who don't have the right paperwork, you know, who didn't have to have it because, you know, that was the situation before 1971 and before the law.

2:45So, yeah, I would imagine that it takes some pretty careful drafting. The leader of Restore Britain has been urged to apologise after describing the Dunblane school shooting as one murder. Rupert Lowe was criticising the UK's ban on handguns during an appearance on an American podcast. 16 children and their teacher were killed in the 1996 mass shooting in Scotland. Restore Britain says Mr Lowe was clearly referring to one incident. The waiting list for routine hospital treatment in England has increased for the second month in a row. It's estimated more than 6 million patients were waiting for treatment at the end of May.

3:23Meanwhile, an average of 2 ,432 patients received corridor care in emergency departments in England each day last month. The actress Catherine Zeta-Jones and singer Sir Cliff Richard are among those paying tribute to Bonnie Tyler, who's died at the age of 75. The legendary singer known for 80s ballads like Total Eclipse of the Heart died in hospital in Portugal last night. The Chicago star says her heart is broken, while Sir Cliff says he's grieving the loss of his wonderful friend. Remember, you can follow The Times Radio News Briefing on Spotify and you can listen live to Times Radio Online.

4:00This 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.