Morning briefing Friday 31st 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 Times Radio's morning briefing on Friday the 31st of July. Pressure is continuing to mount on FIFA president Gianni Infantino after a growing number of football associations rejected his controversial plans to sell off the World Cup.

0:50North America's CONCACAF has joined UEFA in opposing the proposal to bring private investors into FIFA's flagship competitions. Amid growing questions over Infantino's future, TalkSport's Ben Jacobs told Times Radio he believes the FIFA president's position has become untenable. It may be that the very suggestion of it alone rather than the reality actually ends up being Infantino's downfall, not just in the context of the future of FIFA, but also in light of the fact that Infantino thought he'd be standing and winning by a landslide and now we might even get a scenario where he's not the next FIFA president.

1:29Donald Trump says an historic agreement has been reached to disarm Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza. The US president says the deal would be implemented in phases leading to the withdrawal of Israeli forces and the creation of a new Palestinian government. Senior Hamas officials have confirmed an agreement's been reached. Israel has yet to comment. The UK is in the midst of one of its driest and hottest summers with wildfires and droughts across Britain. A fire in Suffolk near the nuclear power station Sizewell B has grown to the size of 200 football pitches with over 100 firefighters involved in trying to contain it.

2:06A drought's been declared across Wales, with the country on track for its driest July on record in 190 years. Meteorologist Steph Goulter told Times Radio the UK needs to adapt better to the hot weather. We need cool spaces where people can go and actually cool off. this happens quite a lot in other countries where they're more used to heat there are libraries there are places you can go to cool down if you don't have ac in your own home and of course here in the uk no no one very few people have ac people have been going to work rather than working from home recently a little bit more often because there is ac in some offices andy burnham is promising what he's calling the biggest transfer of power from westminster in a generation with plans to give England's regional mayors a share of local income tax and business rates.

2:55The Prime Minister says it'll give local leaders more control over investment, transport and housing. But critics warn areas without elected mayors could lose out. Paul Pristos, the Conservative Mayor of Cambridgeshire. A lot of the capital investment government will want to spend is inevitably going to be in the north with Labour mayors in the north and the Midlands. We're used to it, we're often ignored in the east of England. What I want is the power to do this ourselves. So I'm going to do two things. I'm going to borrow against extra revenue. But the second, I'm going to reduce tax rates or business tax rates to try and incentivise businesses to relocate.

3:31A nurse in the US has survived after a trekking pole pierced his torso while he was hiking in Montana. David Cefaldi then walked 10 miles and descended 5 ,000 feet to safety rather than wait to be rescued. There's more on these stories throughout the day on Times Radio. 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. 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.

4:19PwC turns innovation into implementation so you can accelerate from experiment to scale. Discover more at pwc.co.uk. Hi, I'm Katie Prescott from the Times Tech Podcast, which is currently sponsored by IBM. IBM has worked with Wimbledon for more than 30 years, helping the championships use data and AI to create more engaging digital experiences for fans. That includes tools like Match Chat, which can answer questions during play, and Likelihood to Win, which uses live match data to offer near real-time predictions. It's a practical example of AI in action, helping fans follow the tournament more closely while showing how organizations can turn data into useful insight.

5:07To learn more about how IBM helps create smarter business, visit ibm.com.