Morning Briefing Tuesday 9th September

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 Morning Briefing for Tuesday 9th September with me, James Kitch. France has been plunged into a fresh political crisis with Emmanuel Macron facing the task of appointing his fifth prime minister in two years Francois Beirut has lost a vote of confidence, one he called himself following huge opposition to his plans to cut public spending He will formally resign later this morning The Times' David Chazan, who's in Paris, says finding an effective replacement won't be easy Many people will be reluctant to take on this job because of the huge difficulties of dealing with this fragmented parliament, where Marine Le Pen's national rally is the single biggest party, but the biggest political group is a sort of loose alliance of left-wing parties.

1:27Indians, Pakistanis and Nigerians will face visa restrictions if their countries refuse or delay efforts to take back illegal migrants from Britain. The Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, has signalled her willingness to risk diplomatic spats with high-profile nations in her mission to oversee a surge in deportations. But the former Conservative Immigration Minister, Tom Purseglove, told Times Radio it won't be enough to stop small boat crossings. It will be helpful in relation to some nationalities where the returns cooperation isn't very good. And often what you find is ministers come out and say, we've got this fantastic new returns agreement.

2:04But actually the thing to really look out for that really counts is the cooperation that sits beneath that. And in relation to some countries, I think it could help to drive return numbers by being more challenging and more probing when it comes to the issuing of visas. So I welcome the step, but I think in relation to small boats in particular, it isn't actually going to have the impact that they think it might have. Downing Street is struggling to find a loyalist candidate to replace Angela Rayner as deputy Labour leader. It has several left-wing backbenchers prepared to launch campaigns for the role.

2:37Ministers, including Shabana Mahmood and the Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy, have ruled themselves out of the contest, as has the former Transport Secretary Louise Hay. Bel Ribeiro-Addy of the Socialist Campaign Group has become the first MP to formally announce her intention to run. The former advisor to Gordon Brown, Michael Jacobs, is from the organisation Mainstream Labour. I think Lucy Powell, a Manchester MP just been demoted out of the cabinet, would be another person. I think many people have said today that we need a woman, we need somebody who isn't from London, and there are a number of Labour MPs who fulfil those criteria.

3:13So I and everybody else in the party are looking to see who stands. Democrats in Congress have released a note allegedly signed by Donald Trump and sent to Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday. Lawyers for Epstein's estate sent documents to the House Oversight Committee after they were subpoenaed last month. Democratic members of the committee then posted a copy of the alleged letter, which features a drawing of a woman's body on X. The White House has denied the president drew the picture or signed it. And the new surveys found the number of sick days taken by British workers has risen to the highest level in 15 years.

3:50According to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, staff have taken an average of almost two full working weeks off because of illness over the past 12 months, an increase from just over a week before the pandemic. The sharp rise is being put down to an ageing workforce and a rise in long-term health conditions. And remember, you can follow The Times News Briefing on Spotify and you can listen live to The Times Radio Online.

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