Transcripts For BBCNEWS BBC News 20240713 : vimarsana.com

Transcripts For BBCNEWS BBC News 20240713

Of investigative journalist daphne ca ruana galizia. Joe root returns to form in new zealand, hitting an unbeaten century, as england edge themselves back into the second test on day three in hamilton. And our sunday morning edition of the papers is at 9 35am this mornings reviewers are sian griffiths, the education editor at the sunday times, and the journalist and author Shyama Perera. An urgent review of the licence conditions of every convicted terrorist who has been freed from prison has been launched by the government following the attack at London Bridge on friday. Usman khan, who killed two people and injured three others, before he was shot dead by police, had been released halfway through a 16 year sentence he was serving for his role in an alqaeda inspired plot. He was out on licence and wearing an electronic tag when he started attacking people at a conference on prisoner rehabilitation. John mcmanus has this report. Running across London Bridge, members of the public pursuing usman khan, determined to stop his stabbing spree. Moments before, he had attacked people at a rehabilitation conference inside fishmongers hall. As armed police arrived, the realisation that khan is wearing what appears to be an explosives vest. Moments later, he is shot dead. Yesterday, one of his victims was named. 25 year old jack merritt, who had been working at the conference. Paying tribute to his son, David Merritt called him a beautiful spirit who always took the side of the underdog. Jack was originally from cambridge, and on saturday a vigil was held there to remember all those caught up in the incident. As the investigation into fridays attack continues, properties in stoke on trent and stafford have been searched and the government says it has launched an urgent review into the license conditions under which convicted terrorists like khan are freed from jail. There are thought to be around 70 such people but police have indicated that usman khan had obeyed the conditions of his license. Lets cross to London Bridge now, where we can speak to our correspondent greg mckenzie. What is happening there today . The ministry ofjustice has launched an urgent review into the licensing conditions of those released from jail following terrorism offences. 28 year old usman khan, who carried out the attack over my shoulder here, two people killed, three others stabbed, we believe one of thoseis others stabbed, we believe one of those is seriously ill, and this happened on friday afternoon. Usman khan had been sentenced in 2012 in conspiracy to carry out a bomb attack on the london stock is in. He was given 16 years but only served eight years, being released in december 2018. As far as the metropolitan police are concerned he was complying with strict licensing conditions. 0ne was complying with strict licensing conditions. One of those conditions meant he had to regularly attend a Disengagement Programme which was aimed at getting people convicted of terrorism to disengage and we had to go might rehabilitate them following those offences. He was wearing a tag when he carried out this attack. This morning there will be a number of Church Services to remember those who have died, those who are injured recovering in hospital, and the bravery of many people who came to the aid to stop him carrying out his stabbing spree on London Bridge on friday afternoon. Thank you. 0ur Political Correspondent Susana Mendonca is with me now. This has had a short impact on the electioneering ahead of the general election. We sow our paws on friday night and then yesterday we had the focus of the Party Leaders on this issue, refraining from what they had been planning to do in terms of their campaigns. Today we are going to hear from the their campaigns. Today we are going to hearfrom the Prime Minister later. He will be on the andrew marr show. Because of what has happened the focus will be on security and we understand he will be talking about longer sentencing. The conservatives have talked in the past about longer sentencing but a renewed focus on that. One thing we are going to hear is this pledge that people who commit serious terrorist offences would have to serve a minimum of commit serious terrorist offences would have to serve a minimum 01 14 yea rs. Would have to serve a minimum 01 14 years. He is also going to talk about ending the automatic release system where people who commit offences a re system where people who commit offences are automatically released after serving half of their sentence, and some of them a little later than that. In terms of labour they are focusing on this sojeremy corbyn giving a speech later in york focusing on security and he is going to be talking about the funding aspect, saying you cannot expect to keep people safe on the cheap, drawing attention to the past few yea rs of drawing attention to the past few years of austerity under the conservatives where he says cuts to policing and the Probation Service have played a part in all of this. He has been speaking to sky news and he was asked whether he thought that sentences should be extended for people in this situation. It depends on the circumstances, it depends on the sentence, but crucially, depends on what they have done in prison. So, not necessarily then . No, not necessarily. I think there has to be an examination of how our Prison Services work and crucially what happens when someone is released from prison. Because i need to know whether or not the parole board were involved in his release. Apparently, they were not. They make that statement quite quickly after yesterdays terrible incident. Secondly, there was apparently no Probation Service involvement in monitoring this former prisoner who after all had only served half a sentence and he came out i think a year ago and there has to be an examination of what goes on in the prison because prison ought to be a place where people are put away because of major, serious offences, but also a place where rehabilitation takes place. Labour also talking about the nhs, there are other key election issue, drawing attention to figures that 6 million patients waited more than two weeks for an appointment with a gp in october. The nhs is one of the big Campaign Issues for labour and the conservatives and all of the parties involved in this election, aside from brexit. Well, as we heard there, questions have been raised around how a convicted terrorist was freed from prison halfway through a 16 yearjail sentence. Bbc breakfast has been speaking to jonathan hall, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation about the law on early release. It is important to start by saying the law has now changed. The law that applied to usman khan is now different. What happened was he was originally given a sentence called detention for public protection. He wasjust under 21, so he had a special sentence called detention for public protection, which meant he could only be released if the parole board said he was safe to be released. He then appealed his sentence and he was in fact one of a large number of men involved in terrorist offences, one group of these men had not been given these sorts of sentences and he had and the court of appeal felt there was disparity and they were being treated unequally, if one group was given one sentence and one was given another sentence, so they adjusted the sentence and they imposed what they called a determinant sentence, that is a fixed period of imprisonment, on usman khan. This is the bit that has changed. At that stage, the law was that you had to be released at the halfway stage. And so he was released and he was released on licence. The parole board would have had nothing to do with it at that stage. Now, in 2012, in other words after the offence he was convicted of, the law did change and that said that you then could only be released from these sorts of very serious long sentences if the parole board said so after the two thirds point and that is the law that now applies. The Prime Minister has said this weekend it is a mistake to let violent offenders out halfway through the sentence, especially where terrorism is concerned. Labour meanwhile have raised issues of cuts to probation and parole services. Does the law need to change to deal with the risk of terrorism and do you think tougher sentences are the right course of action . I think it is important to note the sort of individual one is dealing with with usman khan is particularly difficult to stop. He was an old generation jihadi, someone involved in a classic alqaeda plot involving lots and lots of people. Fortunately, that was intercepted by the Security Services and he was prosecuted. What he did at London Bridge a few days ago was a new generation low sophistication attack, not necessarily. It doesnt appear as if anyone else was involved. Those are highly difficult to detect and to prevent. So, even if he was under quite strict conditions, and he was, as we know, under licence conditions, which included a tag, those things are very difficult to stop, so i think one ought to be cautious about saying there are measures that would have definitely prevented this happening. Lets talk to dal babu, a former chief superintendent in the metropolitan police. Talk to us about the role the police have when a prisoner comes out of jail on licence. How involved are you . Isnt jail on licence. How involved are you . Isnt it jail on licence. How involved are you . Isnt it a probation matter . The Police Gather the intelligence. Crimes happen in neighbourhood areas and they get solved, and you rely on the Police Officers in the neighbourhood to gather intelligence, working on probation with the Probation Service, to monitor individuals and look at whether they are adhering to their conditions, and what we have had is a 22,000 reduction in Police Officers, 18,500 reduction in police staff, so the majority of that production has been neighbourhood policing. What is the difference between police staff and Police Officers . It is almost as big a cut. When i was borough commander i think police staff played an equally Important Role as Police Officers so there would be Community Support officers, a significant reduction in those numbers, intelligence officers, once Police Officers have gathered the intelligence you need people to analyse that information, they would also be people liaising directly with probation and social workers and youth workers, so that kind of glue Holding People together has been richest and all that has happened as Police Officers are being taken off the street in order to fulfil those roles. What plans have the various parties to come up with to replace the police staff . The conservatives want to recruit more officers but you cant do that ina more officers but you cant do that in a hurry. No, you cant turn a civilian into a Police Officer. It isa civilian into a Police Officer. It is a different mindset and it will ta ke is a different mindset and it will take time. I had the benefit of a 20 month Residential Training Programme before i became a Police Officer and a lot of it is done online now so it will take time. This is not going to be done overnight. We have lost a lot of the infrastructure. Simple things like lockers, where would you put the Police Officers . Where would they be stationed . I dont know what will be done about replacing the police staff. Usman khan was part of a programme to help rehabilitate him. How effective are these programmes . Clearly we have had a number of difficulties with the prevent programme. 18 months ago when you had an attack on London Bridge one of the suspects it was pa rt bridge one of the suspects it was part of the team that murdered eight people, his brother was living in the same house and was a recipient ofa the same house and was a recipient of a £10,000 grant from prevent. You had one brother who was a terrorist and the other working on the anti radicalisation programme. We have to have a review of this. Lord carlile is conducting an independent review but clearly there has been some shortcomings and how people have been identified and the fact they are on programmes and still going out to commit offences. Thank you. General election campaigning is expected to resume fully from tomorrow following a more muted tone this weekend in light of fridays terror attack. Later today the labour leader will be setting out the partys plans for simplifying train ticket sales. Theyre proposing a Central Online booking site, to replace what they say is a confusing system of ticket sales by separate privately owned train operators. And the liberal Democrats Foreign Affairs spokesman chuka umunna will be taking your questions on brexit and the upcoming general election at 2 30pm. Send us your questions on twitter using bbcyourquestions or you can email them to yourquestions bbc. Co. Uk rugby star Gareth Thomas says he wants his everlasting legacy to be greater awareness of hiv, after revealing his own positive diagnosis back in september. The former wales rugby captain has been speaking to prince harry in an interview for the Terrence Higgins trust, as part of world aids day. Youve got a new purpose in life and youve turned a negative into a positive. Yeah. And ill tell you what i feel like. And this is the truth, mate. I always felt that my life was to play rugby and to represent wales, which i did with all the passion i have, right . But i actually feel that my rugby gave me the platform to actually do what im doing now. And i believe what i do now, like, what i do now is really what i care about. Because theres not many people from a simple life like ive come from who could have the power to change other peoples lives. Thats, like. Its one of the most fulfilling things. It blows me away. I sit down with my parents sometimes and we look at my trophy cabinet, which im really proud of. Its big. Yeah, its big, its big. But i look and i think, you know what, theyll gather dust and theyll go away and theyll be forgotten about. But id like to think where we go on this journey of education and breaking stigma around hiv is something i will have a legacy everlasting. There is a 2030 goal and youve now just signed up as a commissioner. Yes. Im going to be a commissioner to sit on a panel with a group of people, we have a common goal that in ten years time within england there will be zero new transmissions of hiv. Now, this whole thing might be bizarre anyway, like, were sitting in a rugby ground, me and you having a chat about hiv, talking about zero transmissions of hiv in ten years time. Like, i cant believe that were actually at a point where thats a reality. But it is. It is a reality. And its something that, for me, its my next step. We know theres a hell of a lot to do but what youve managed to do in the space of, you know, six or eight weeks has been transformational. Genuinely transformational. As you said, we should all know our status. And if its treated just the same as any other virus thats exactly what should be happening. Yeah. From my perspective, all i can do is thank you for the difference that youve made and the lives you are saving on a daily basis now. And you will have every single one of us backing you the whole way. Youre not in this alone. Youre not. You now know that. I know. You put the trust in the british public. And quite rightly. You know, they support you all the way. Im joined by dr michael brady, medical director at the Terrence Higgins trust a charity that campaigns on and provides services relating to hiv and sexual health. How important is it to have somebody with a profile of Gareth Thomas, from a very masculine background of the world of rugby, to be part of an Initiative Like this . It is hugely important and you cannot underestimate it and we have seen a massive impact since he disclosed his hiv status and the work he has been doing to talk about the importance of hiv testing and tackling stigma, and also the support of prince harry is powerful, it addresses the stigma, we see massive rises of people ordering hiv tests online are looking for information about hiv so it is really important. We have known about hiv and aids for a very long time. Why is there so much work to do about raising awareness . One, we have come very far, so there are some very good news stories and in many ways the uk is leading the world in its response to the epidemic, there is incredible treatments that can be as simple as taking one tablet twice a day so people with hiv can expect to live a long and normal and healthy life and be confident they will not pass the virus on to others, but the problem has shifted more onto the area of stigma, to misunderstandings about hiv. It effects peoples perception of risk, it stops them from testing, it stops people from accessing care. Why is there still a stigma . Why are there still myths . It is a throwback to the huge amounts of stigma that what they initially. Hiv tended to affect marginalised communities already initially in that stigma has continued and it is driven by misunderstandings, the fact that people perhaps dont really know how it can be transmitted and dont know it can be transmitted and dont know it cant be transmitted by simple things like kissing or sharing cups are it is about fear and that is driven by misunderstandings, the feat of being infected by somebody living with hiv the fear. We w

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