Morning briefing Friday 27th February

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 morning briefing on Friday the 27th of February. The Green Party has won the Gorton and Denton by-election in Greater Manchester.

0:43Spencer, Hannah, Catherine, the Green Party, 14 ,980. Hannah Spencer secured a majority of more than 4 ,000 over the Reform UK candidate Matt Goodwin as the Greens claimed their first ever by-election success. Even under pressure, I get things done. I am no different to every single person here in this constituency. I work hard. That is what we do. Except things have changed a lot over the last few decades. Instead of working for a nice life, we're working to line the pockets of billionaires. And I don't think it's extreme or radical to think working hard should get you a nice life. The vote was triggered by the resignation of the former Labour MP Andrew Gwynne on Health Grounds.

1:32Its candidates, Angelique Stoye, was third. Speaking to Times Radio, the Labour MP Carl Turner said the party must get its act together. It's catastrophic as far as I can see it. We've lost a seat that frankly is a Labour seat. There's no getting away from it. We can say it's midterms and all the rest of the stuff, but the reality is the Labour Party have lost a seat that we should never have ever lost, whether it's a by-election or not. Spencer becomes the Greens' fifth MP. Pakistan's defence minister says his country is in an open war with neighbouring Afghanistan. Both nations launched airstrikes overnight, with casualties reported on both sides.

2:11In a post on ex-Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zadari, said that his nation will not compromise on peace and territorial integrity. The former US President Bill Clinton will give testimony before a House Oversight Committee later over his relationship with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Clinton's wife, the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was asked yesterday about her husband's relationship with Epstein and said she would not speculate about things she was not present for. Her testimony was briefly halted after a Republican member of Congress leaked a photograph from the deposition room in violation of House rules.

2:47You know, they had a chance to do it in public and I wish they had done it in public. And I think they're making the wrong decision avoiding doing it in public. I thought it was very repetitive. I thought that they asked literally the same questions over and over again, which didn't seem to me to be very productive. And a painting by Sir Winston Churchill is expected to go on display for the first time in the UK this weekend. Quiet Waters will be the centrepiece of a new exhibition, which also includes the former Prime Minister's steel-framed glasses and painting coat. It opens on Saturday at his former family home at Chartwell in Kent and runs until the 1st of November.

3:34There's more on all of these stories throughout the day on Times Radio.

3:57Power's 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. While every other channel is fighting for your customers' attention, podcasts are where they've already given it. No one accidentally listens to a podcast for 45 minutes. They choose to be here. They trust the voice in their ears. And when that voice talks about your brand, it doesn't sound like advertising.

4:39It sounds like a recommendation from a friend. Acast gives you that trust at scale. Digital precision, host-read authenticity, and performance data that proves it worked. Don't fight for attention. Buy it with ACAST. Learn more by visiting acast.com slash advertise.