Evening briefing Tuesday 5th 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 the Times News briefing on Tuesday 5th August. An investigation has found the Titan submersible disaster was preventable.

0:40All five occupants of a tourist submarine visiting the wreck of the Titanic died in the incident. Times Radio's Laura Cook has more. The sub was just 90 minutes into a dive to see the wreckage of the Titanic when it imploded in June 2023. The US Coast Guard report says owners Ocean Gate completely ignored vital inspections. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has met with army chiefs to decide on the future of the country's war in Gaza. It's been widely reported he intends to expand military operations to occupy the entirety of the territory. Mia Elran is a former deputy director of military intelligence.

1:19He says there's a deadlock on the ground in Gaza at the moment. Israel has exhausted its last campaign of the last two and a half months with no great accomplishments. Israel is facing a situation in which it has to make some decisions, some very, very serious decisions. President Zelensky says he's had a productive conversation with Donald Trump on ending the war in Ukraine. He's posted online his country and the US have coordinated their positions. He's also revealed they discussed sanctions against Russia. A senior figure at The Office for Budget Responsibility has warned immigration cannot be relied upon to fix Britain's poor economic growth.

2:03Michael Simmons is economics editor at The Spectator. If we're accepting this point now that immigration is not going to really get the economy going, then we need to look at the millions and millions of people who are out of work due to sickness. Businesses have just not been able to find staff to fill roles, to expand their businesses, which is why the Home Office essentially turned the tap on and we went through that Boris wave where we had net migration near a million. The Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner is facing criticism after it's emerged. She's signed off the sale of land at eight allotment sites since the general election.

2:41Allotments are protected from development or sale under the Allotment Act unless there's ministerial sign-off. Aubrey Allegretti is The Times' chief political correspondent and explains that former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been vocal in his opposition of the move. There are 330 ,000 allotments across the UK, so a significant number, but obviously there are lots of people that don't have access to gardens and so these are a sort of vital way for people to engage in nature, to be able to grow food for themselves. So Jeremy Corbyn's been extolling the virtues of digging ground for potatoes.

3:13He's known to particularly love growing marrows and has been very critical of Angela Rayner over her department's decision, which we're told are for new houses to be built. And Ozzy Osbourne's official cause of death has been revealed as an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. The Black Sabbath legend was laid to rest last Thursday at his home in Buckinghamshire. And don't forget you can follow the Times 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.

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