In central London, on land the size of seven football pitches, sits a mansion called Winfield House - the official residence of the US ambassador to the UK.

It may be a stately home but through the years it's been known to throw one hell of a party, especially on 4 July, America's Independence Day. This year's celebration saw Nile Rodgers & Chic headline the building's lawn for thousands of people.

Fashion's elite, sports stars and wartime leaders have all been entertained here. Even in 1825 when the original site was built, according to Winfield's official website, its primary use was for entertainment.

President Donald Trump is spending the first night of his state visit at the 35-room mansion. The Trumps also stayed there in 2019, as did the Bidens and Obamas previously.

"It's not just the home of the ambassador, but it's also a centre of diplomatic hospitality," says Stephen Crisp, formerly the property's head gardener, who worked there for 37 years until his retirement last year.

One thing Winfield isn't, is a tourist attraction. Located inside Regent's Park, it's exclusive and takes planning to get inside. Friends of Regent's Park previously arranged tours of the grounds - but so far this year the ambassador has not granted permission.

From the road outside, the house cannot be seen. It's shrouded in woodland and is very private for central London.

"It's really, really difficult to get in there. I regard it as a feather in my cap that I actually managed to get in," says Viv Ward, Friends of Regent's Park's event manager. He calls the house "magnificent" and is audibly in awe of the grounds.

Tours of Winfield only allow you to see the ground floor, which is basically a "very posh" area for receptions, and the gardens. The first floor is home to the personal apartments of the ambassador.

As a home and the venue of most American receptions, schedules are tight. "It wasn't a case of we would like to come on this date and this time. It was just, you will be allowed to come here on this day," Mr Ward says.

The property boasts the second-largest private garden in central London, says Mr Crisp. It's home to a lawn, paved walkways, sculptures - and there's also space for helicopters to land.

Socialite and heir to the Woolworths fortune, Barbara Hutton, sold Winfield to the US government for a mere dollar in 1946 in an offer described by the then-president Harry S Truman as "most generous and patriotic".

Hutton had bought the house 10 years earlier after it was partly destroyed in a fire. The Crown Estate Commission gave her permission to tear it down and rebuild in the iconic red brick Georgian style that remains today.

She named it after her grandfather, Frank Winfield Woolworth, the founder of the Woolworth shopping chain.

With World War Two about to erupt and her second marriage not going particularly well, Hutton returned to America with her son in 1939. It would later be revealed this is when she met her next husband - actor Cary Grant - who is said to have stayed at the mansion with her.

During the war, Winfield was commandeered by the Royal Air Force balloon barrage unit with officers reportedly playing football in the gardens.

Hutton returned to London to see what was left of it at the end of the war - and after the Germans' bombs. She called her lawyer and requested it be handed over to the US government for repairs - and it's been used as the official residence of ambassadors ever since.

History is in the walls of Winfield. The original building was called St Dunstan's, and according to Friends of Regent's Park, was used for blind veterans of World War One. A charity of the same name still exists today.

Speaking about US presidents, Mr Crisp says: "At some point they all come, at least once." He explains he met Trump and his wife Melania during their previous state visit in 2019, which was "a little bit surreal". They dined at the property with Queen Camilla and King Charles III before he ascended to the throne.

An iconic image of Mikhail Gorbachev - the last Soviet leader - and US President George W Bush may be one of the most famous moments from the house. The pair held a joint news conference there at the G7 summit in 1991.

Politicians have long used it for key moments, including international summits, grand state dinners and bringing together wartime leaders.

Security detail for presidential visits is secure information - often never released. But Mr Ward shares a glimpse into the daily routine at the house.

"The security is unbelievable, I mean for example I used to have to send the embassy a list of attendees," he adds, saying photo ID had to be shown to the armed presence on the gates of Winfield.

And if you want to leave early? An armed officer has to escort you off the premises.

Winfield House has hosted many varied events, says Mr Crisp.

There have been performances by Take That, Duran Duran, the Foo Fighters, Ed Sheeran and Bastille, he says, sometimes in the garden and sometimes in the house.

It's also been home to sporting events with the Duke of Sussex attending an Invictus Games reception there. Michelle Obama got stuck in with a sports day event, even doing the tug of the war alongside some famous spectators.

Fashion royalty has also hit the corridors of Winfield. Former Vogue boss Alexandra Shulman co-hosted a London Fashion Week opening party with the ambassador at the time. A Spice Girl was spotted too.

Some of the events would involve "thousands" of guests, Mr Crisp says, with the 4 July parties typically gathering 3,000 or 4,000.

It's a bit of an escape.

"You would never know you're in the centre of the London," Mr Ward says.

But what's the most disappointing part of the house? (Disappointing feels like a stretch.) Mr Ward says its driveway is "rather modest" compared to the rest of Winfield.

"It's big enough for big limousines but you couldn't get a brigade of guards walking up and things. It's not like the Mall."

Additional reporting: Grace Dean

Inflation in the year to August remained at 3.8%, according to official figures, after food costs continued to rise.

The pace of price rises matched the inflation rate in July but as some costs such as airfares dropped, food was more expensive with cheese, fish and vegetable prices all rising.

The data emerged as the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee meets to discuss interest rates ahead of an announcement on Thursday.

Inflation remains above the Bank's 2% target but the central bank is not expected to cut borrowing costs.

A former Labour councillor has been charged with blackmail and communications offences, in connection with the Westminster "honeytrap" scandal.

The charge of blackmail relates to alleged unwarranted demands for the phone numbers of up to 12 individuals.

Oliver Steadman, 28, has also been charged with communications offences in relation to the sending of alleged unsolicited indecent images.

Last year a string of men, mostly working in politics, revealed they had received unsolicited, flirtatious WhatsApp messages from people calling themselves "Charlie" or "Abi". In some cases explicit images were exchanged.

Mr Steadman was suspended as a Labour member after the party was notified of his arrest in June 2024.

He resigned as a councillor in Islington, north London the following month.

Malcolm McHaffie, head of the Crown Prosecution Service's Special Crime Division, said: "We have decided to prosecute Oliver Steadman with blackmail and five communications offences in relation to a total of five victims working within politics and Westminster.

"This follows an investigation by the Metropolitan Police Service which looked into messages that included alleged unsolicited indecent images sent to a number of people within parliamentary political circles between October 2023 and April 2024 using Whatsapp.

"Our prosecutors have worked to establish that there is sufficient evidence to bring this case to court and that it is in the public interest to pursue criminal proceedings."

Mr Steadman will appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court on 3 November.

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Thousands of Palestinians are continuing to flee Gaza City, a day after Israel said it had begun a major ground offensive aimed at occupying the city.

Amid large-scale bombing overnight, Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry said al-Ranitisi children's hospital was targeted in three separate attacks, forcing half of its patients and their families to flee.

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports. Earlier, it announced that it had struck more than 150 "terror targets" across Gaza City in two days.

Israel says its aim is to defeat up to 3,000 Hamas fighters in what it describes as the group's "last stronghold" and free its hostages.

But the offensive has drawn widespread international condemnation.

The heads of more than 20 aid agencies have called on world leaders to act, saying "the inhumanity of the situation in Gaza is unconscionable" and calling for "urgent intervention".

For days, huge columns of Palestinians have streamed southwards from Gaza City in donkey carts, rickshaws, vehicles strapped high with belongings, and on foot.

Until now, they have been forced to flee down a single coastal road to an Israel-designated "humanitarian area" in al-Mawasi.

But on Wednesday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced that it would open a second route to leave, down the central Salah al-Din road. It said the route would be open for 48 hours from 12:00 local time (10:00 BST).

Many Palestinians say they are unable to move south due to the rising costs associated with the journey. Some say renting a small truck now costs around 3,000 shekels ($900; £660), while a tent for five people sells for about 4,000 shekels.

Lina al-Maghrebi, 32, a mother of three from the city's Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood, told the BBC: "I was forced to sell my jewellery to cover the cost of displacement and a tent."

"It took us 10 hours to reach Khan Younis, and we paid 3,500 shekels for the ride. The line of cars and trucks seemed endless."

Aid groups, UN agencies and others say the "humanitarian area" they are expected to move to is heavily overcrowded and insufficient to support the roughly 2 million Palestinians who are expected to cram into it.

Some Palestinians who followed the military's orders to evacuate to the zone say they found no space to pitch their tents and so returned north.

The IDF said on Tuesday that around 350,000 people had fled Gaza City, while the UN put the figure at 190,000 since August. Estimates suggest at least 650,000 remain.

As part of its operations, the IDF is reportedly utilising old military vehicles loaded with explosives that have been modified to be controlled remotely.

They are being driven to Hamas positions and detonated, according to Israeli media.

Meanwhile, families of the 48 remaining hostages held by Hamas - 20 of whom are believed to be alive - protested near Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem on Tuesday and Wednesday, arguing that the offensive would endanger their loved ones.

"All day long, you boast about killing and destruction," said Macabit Mayer, aunt of hostages Gali and Ziv Berman. "Bringing down buildings in Gaza - who are you bringing these buildings down on?"

"Could it be that you are bringing these buildings down right now on Gali and Ziv and all the souls left there - the living and the deceased?"

The offensive has drawn widespread international condemnation, with UN human rights chief Volker Türk describing it as "totally and utterly unacceptable" and UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper calling it "utterly reckless and appalling".

But US Secretary of State Marco Rubio appeared to offer tacit support for Israel's operation during a joint press conference with Netanyahu on Monday.

He said the US preferred a negotiated end to the war, but that "sometimes when you're dealing with a group of savages like Hamas, that's not possible".

It came as a United Nations Commission of Inquiry concluded that Israel had committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

Among its findings were that Israeli security forces perpetrated sexual and gender-based violence, directly targeted children with the intention to kill them, and carried out a "systemic and widespread attack" on religious, cultural and education sites in Gaza.

Israel's foreign ministry said it categorically rejected the report, denouncing it as "distorted and false".

Israel launched its war in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

At least 64,964 people have been killed by Israel during its campaign since then, almost half of them women and children, according to Gaza's health ministry.

With famine having already been declared in Gaza City by a UN-backed food security body, the UN has warmed an intensification of the offensive will push civilians into "even deeper catastrophe".

Former Arsenal footballer Thomas Partey has denied raping two women and sexually assaulting a third woman.

The Ghanaian midfielder pleaded not guilty to five counts of rape and one charge of sexual assault when he appeared at Southwark Crown Court.

The alleged offences took place between 2021 and 2022, when the 32-year-old played for Arsenal. He was charged four days after leaving the north London club, following the expiration of his contract at the end of June.

Mr Partey spoke to confirm his name, date of birth and his not guilty pleas during the hearing.

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When Alan gave his Persian tabby cat, Smokey, its regular flea treatment last year, he thought nothing could go wrong.

The 45-year-old from Preston had used the same brand - Frontline Plus - for years without any trouble. But within hours of applying a new dose he'd bought online, his usually lively tabby was violently ill, vomiting and refusing food or water.

"I bought it from a major online site and the price seemed similar so I didn't suspect anything at the time," Alan told the BBC's Morning Live.

Alan's story comes after the government recently issued an urgent warning about fake veterinary products being sold online.

With vet bills up 60% in the last decade, more owners are turning to the internet to hunt for bargains.

• Watch Alan and Smokey's story on Morning Live

The vet that Alan took Smokey to initially found nothing abnormal, but when his condition deteriorated, scans revealed a blockage in his intestines. Emergency surgery saved his life - at a cost of £3,000 - and tests later confirmed he had suffered a toxic reaction.

Alan returned to the vet with the packaging. At first glance, it looked genuine, labelled as "Gatti" - which Alan assumed might be an Italian version of the medication.

But when the manufacturer was contacted, they confirmed it was counterfeit and laboratory testing found it contained a chemical highly toxic to cats.

"We felt really guilty about the fact we had done this to him," Alan said. "But finding out it was fake medication, we were really angry.

"It's horrific and I had absolutely no idea there was such a thing as fake pet medication."

Helen Barnham works at the Intellectual Property Office (IPO), a government team tasked with trying to stop the sale of counterfeit goods.

The team has issued more than 100 seizure notices for the selling of unauthorised animal medicines and supplements, preventing around 18,000 illegal items from reaching consumers.

"Criminals copy these products to make them look like the original and it's all to make money, they don't care about the damage or harm," she explained.

According to the IPO, the online seller who Alan bought the medication from managed to sell 211 batches of suspected counterfeit pet medications and supplements.

"If it's not from a vet or a trusted seller then please be vigilant," Barnham said.

Barnham is urging pet owners to check all pet medicines carefully before using them.

Even if a product looks authentic, there are often subtle clues something is wrong.

Signs that a medicine could be fake

• Poor quality, damaged or flimsy packaging
• Spelling or grammar errors on the label
• Missing instruction leaflets or expiry dates
• Instructions not provided in English
• Suspicious smell, colour or texture
• Tablets or pipettes that look homemade or poorly made
• Unusually low prices or deals that seem too good to be true
• Product names that are slightly misspelled or altered from the original brand

Nina Downing, Vet Nurse from PDSA, a vet charity, says she always recommends only giving your pet medicine which has been prescribed by a vet.

"When fulfilling a prescription online, source them from reputable companies that are on the Register of online retailers, brought to you by the Veterinary Medicines Directorate."

If the medication has any of the above warning signs, you should stop using the product immediately and contact your vet for medical advice.

You should also report it to your local trading standards office and notify the brand manufacturer, who may be able to verify if it's genuine.

When Youngjin looked out of his office window and saw armoured trucks and immigration enforcement officers running around with guns, he was surprised, but not worried.

The young South Korean was certain it had nothing to do with him. He was in the US only for a few weeks on a short-term visa, he thought to himself.

Then the armed agents burst into his room and ordered him outside. They handcuffed him, before attaching chains to his waist and ankles, and loaded him onto a bus bound for a detention centre.

"I panicked and my mind went blank. I felt sick," he told the BBC, now back home in South Korea.

"I couldn't understand why I was being treated like this."

Youngjin is one of more than 300 Korean workers who were detained in the US state of Georgia earlier this month, in one of the largest immigration raids of Donald Trump's presidency to date. He and others interviewed for this article didn't want to reveal their real names in order to protect their identity.

'Helicopters and drones… people with guns'

US officials initially claimed the workers had been in the country illegally on incorrect visas, but eventually the two sides struck a deal allowing them to leave voluntarily without any penalties, so they could return to work there in the future.

Most of the workers were in the US temporarily, helping to build an electric car battery plant run by two South Korean companies, Hyundai and LG – part of a US push to get foreign companies to invest and manufacture more in the states.

LG said that many of its employees who were arrested had various types of visas or were under a visa waiver programme. And so they were especially shocked by the raid.

"We just came out for a brief break and I could see a lot of people, officials with guns. As Koreans, we just thought they were here to arrest criminals, but then, they suddenly started arresting us," said Chul-yong, who was also detained that day.

He said they tried to explain who they were, but they were terrified: "There were helicopters and drones, armoured vehicles… people with guns."

There were some officers pointing guns at workers, he claimed. "You know those red lasers that come out of those guns? It was so shocking that some people were shivering in fear."

Even those who managed to share their visa details said they were arrested. "I thought everything would be cleared up but instead, they suddenly shackled us," said Mr Kim, another worker detained, who only wanted to reveal his last name.

Chul-yong said there was a shackle around his ankles and another around his waist, connected to handcuffs. "It was so tight, I couldn't touch my face with my hands."

They all said they had no idea why this was happening, or where they were being taken. "I later learned that I was detained at the Folkston ICE Processing Center," added Chul-yong, a software engineer. He had been planning to stay for about a month but was arrested on his sixth day there.

'It was freezing... the water smelt like sewage'

Youngjin, an engineer and sub-contractor for LG, was scheduled to be there for five weeks to train staff to operate some of the specialist high-tech equipment.

The 30-year-old was shaking, still visibly upset, as he described to the BBC being taken to the detention centre and locked in a room with 60-70 other people.

"I had a panic attack. I just stood there trembling," he said. The room was freezing, and the new detainees were not given blankets for the first two days, he added.

"I was wearing short sleeves, so I put my arms inside my clothes and wrapped myself in a towel to try to stay warm at night," he said. "The worst part was the water. It smelt like sewage. We drank as little as possible."

The bunk beds were all taken, Chul-yong said, by the time he arrived, leaving him and others to find any empty spot to rest, even an empty desk where they could put their head down.

"We tried to sleep anywhere, really. It was really cold. There were people who found packaged bread, heated it up in the microwave, hugging it throughout the night."

For the first few days, Youngjin had no idea how long he would be held for. He feared it might be months. Only after some of the workers were able to meet lawyers and consular staff, did they realise their government was working with the US authorities to get them released.

"Even the US side feels it may have gone a bit too far," South Korea's chief trade negotiator told reporters after returning from the US. Seoul says it is now investigating potential human rights violations during the raid by US authorities.

Trump acknowledged the need to have specialists from overseas train up US workers, and according to South Korean officials, US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau has expressed his "deep regrets" over the incident.

Still, it has shaken relations between the US and South Korea, usually close allies, especially since it came hard on the heels of a trade deal in which South Korean companies pledged to invest $350bn in the US.

Mr Kim believed his work was permitted by his B-1 visa - and argued it made no sense for the authorities to detain hundreds of people without clarifying their roles in the factory.

Younjin, who was in the US on a 90-day visa waiver programme, is adamant he did nothing illegal. "I only attended meetings and gave training presentations," he said, explaining this was within the scope of the waiver. "My trust in the US has been deeply shaken. I don't think it's a trustworthy partner for South Korea."

Although back with his family, the engineer is still struggling to process what happened to him. When he saw them at the airport after arriving home on Friday night, he said he smiled and hugged them, but felt nothing.

"It was like I was hollow inside. It wasn't until my mum cooked me dinner that night that it really hit me, and I cried for the first time."

And he only leaves the house for short outings. "When I'm outside, if I smell something similar to the prison, I start trembling and get short of breath, so I don't go outside for long now," he said.

Chul-yong says he, too, has been struggling with the experience. "We all came out of the arrival gate smiling, but now that I think of it, I was close to tears," he says, recalling his return home last week. "Saying this makes me tear up."

And seeing himself in news reports on TV has not been easy. "You couldn't see my face, but you could recognise my body. So my family and friends all knew that it was me."

He thinks most of the workers have "had enough" and may not return. But he says he has no choice.

"This is what I do. I've been doing this for 30 years. I've put my life into this work," he adds.

"If I can't do this, what can I do? How will my family live?"

The prime suspect in the high-profile case of Madeleine McCann's disappearance has been released from prison in Germany, where he has been serving a sentence for an unrelated offence.

Christian Brückner was driven out of jail by his lawyer. He wasn't visible in the car but police confirmed he left Sehnde Prison.

He had been convicted of raping an elderly woman in Praia da Luz in Portugal in 2005 and will be fitted with an ankle tag after his release from Sehnde Prison near Hanover.

The German national, 48, has never been charged with any crime in relation to the McCann case. He denies any involvement.

Madeleine vanished in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz in 2007. She and her siblings had been left sleeping in a holiday apartment while her parents, Kate and Gerry, went to a nearby restaurant.

Madeleine's disappearance has become one of the highest-profile unsolved missing person cases in the world.

German prosecutors have pointed to evidence - including mobile phone data - indicating Brückner may have been in the area when she vanished, and have consistently insisted that they think he is responsible.

However, they have not found strong enough evidence to bring charges.

Brückner, who spent many years in the Algarve, was a drifter, a petty criminal and a convicted sex offender. He has several previous convictions, including for sexually abusing children in 1994 and 2016.

Portuguese and German police conducted a fresh search between where the McCanns had been staying and addresses linked to Brückner in June this year, but this yielded no breakthroughs.

In 2023, investigators carried out searches near the Barragem do Arade reservoir, about 30 miles from Praia da Luz.

Brückner spent time in the Praia da Luz area between 2000 and 2017 and had photographs and videos of himself near the reservoir.

In October last year, Brückner was cleared of unrelated sexual offences by a German court, alleged to have taken place in Portugal between 2000 and 2017.

Due to differences in legal systems, German authorities suspect Brückner of murder in relation to Madeleine McCann, while British police continue to treat her disappearance as a missing persons case.

The funding given to the Met's investigation, Operation Grange, has totalled more than £13.2m since 2011. A further £108,000 was secured from the government in April.

Microsoft says its new $30bn (£22bn) investment in the UK's AI sector – its largest outside of the US - should significantly boost Britain's economy in the next few years.

Its package forms a major part of a $31billion agreement made between the UK government and various other US tech giants, including Nvidia and Google, to invest in British-based infrastructure to support AI technology, largely in the form of data centres.

Microsoft will also now be involved in the creation of a powerful new supercomputer in Loughton, Essex.

Speaking exclusively to the BBC Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told the BBC of the tech's potential impact on economic growth."

"It may happen faster, so our hope is not ten years but maybe five".

"Whenever anyone gets excited about AI, I want to see it ultimately in the economic growth and the GDP growth."

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the US-UK deal marked "a generational step change in our relationship with the US".

He added that the agreement was "creating highly skilled jobs, putting more money in people's pockets and ensuring this partnership benefits every corner of the United Kingdom."

The UK economy has remained stubbornly sluggish in recent months.

Nadella compared the economic benefits of the meteoric rise of AI with the impact of the personal computer when it became common in the workplace, about ten years after it first started scaling in the 1990s.

But there are also growing mutterings that AI is a very lucrative bubble that is about to burst. Nadella conceded that "all tech things are about booms and busts and bubbles" and warned that AI should not be over-hyped or under-hyped but also said the newborn tech would still bring about new products, new systems and new infrastructure.

He acknowledged that its energy consumption remains "very high" but argued that its potential benefits, especially in the fields of healthcare, public services, and business productivity, were worthwhile. He added that investing in data centres was "effectively" also investing in modernising the power grid but did not say that money would be shared directly with the UK's power supplier, the National Grid.

The campaign group Foxglove has warned that the UK could end up "footing the bill for the colossal amounts of power the giants need".

The supercomputer, to be built in Loughton, Essex, was already announced by the government in January, but Microsoft has now come on board to the project.

Big tech comes to town

Mr Nadella, revealed the investment as Donald Trump has arrived in the UK on a three-day state visit

The UK and US have signed a "Tech Prosperity Deal" as part of the visit, with an aim of strengthening ties on AI, quantum computing and nuclear power.

Google has promised £5bn for AI research and infrastructure over the next two years.

UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves opened a £735m data centre as part of the investment on Tuesday in Hertfordshire.

There are some concerns that accepting so much money from US investors will mean the UK relies too much on foreign technology.

In July, Trump made clear his intentions were for the US to win global the AI race.

One of the ways it stated it would do this was to "export American AI to allies and partners."

The UK government has signed number of deals with US technology companies, including an agreement to use OpenAI services in the public sector and a £400m contract to use Google Cloud services in the Ministry of Defence.

Satya Nadella said he thought the agreement defined "the next phase of globalisation" and argued that having access to foreign tech services leveraged digital sovereignty rather than threatened it.

On the growing issue of AI taking over jobs, Nadella said Microsoft also had to "change with the changes in technology", having laid off thousands of staff this year despite record sales and profits. He described it as "the hard process of renewal".

AI growth zone in north-east England

The government also said there was "potential for more than 5,000 jobs and billions in private investment" in north-east England, which has been designated as a new "AI growth zone".

Last year, the government announced a £10bn investment into a data centre to be built near Blyth, Northumberland.

It has now announced another data centre project dubbed Stargate UK from OpenAI, chipmaker Nvidia, semiconductor company Arm and AI infrastructure firm Nscale.

That will be based at Cobalt Park in Northumberland.

OpenAI boss Sam Altman said Stargate UK would "help accelerate scientific breakthroughs, improve productivity, and drive economic growth."

However the UK version is a fraction of the firm's US-based Stargate project, which OpenAI launched in January with a commitment to invest $500 billion over the next four years building new AI infrastructure for itself.

So far, reaction to the agreement has been broadly positive, but its clear that there are many challenges ahead for the UK if it is to fulfil its intended potential.

The Tony Blair Institute described the news as a "breakthrough moment" but added that Britain had some work to do: "reforming planning rules, accelerating the delivery of clean energy projects, and building the necessary digital infrastructure for powering the country's tech-enabled growth agenda," said Dr Keegan McBride, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change's emerging tech and geopolitics expert.

Matthew Sinclair, UK director of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, hailed the agreement as "a powerful demonstration of the scale of the AI opportunity for the UK economy."

But the Conservative Party highlighted that other big international companies such as the pharmaceutical giant Merck have recently cancelled or delayed their UK expansion plans.

Satya Nadella spoke to the BBC News in between board meetings, shortly before jumping on a flight to join Donald Trump as he arrives in the UK on a three-day state visit. Nadella will be among other tech leaders, including OpenAI's Sam Altman and Nvidia's Jensen Huang, attending the Royal state banquet on Wednesday.

He said he would use Microsoft's AI tool Copilot to help him decide what to wear.

"I was very surprised that there was a very different dress protocol, which I'm really not sure that I'm ready for," he said.

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Ben & Jerry's co-founder Jerry Greenfield has left the ice cream maker after almost half a century at the firm, deepening a dispute with parent company Unilever.

In a letter shared on social media by fellow co-founder Ben Cohen, Mr Greenfield said the Cherry Garcia maker had lost its independence after Unilever put a halt to its social activism.

His exit marks the latest episode in a row that started in 2021 when Ben & Jerry's said it would stop selling its ice cream in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

A spokesperson for The Magnum Ice Cream Company, which is being spun off from Unilever, said it was grateful to Mr Greenfield but disagreed with his stance.

In his letter Mr Greenfield said leaving the firm was "one of the hardest and most painful decisions" he had ever made but he could no longer "in good conscience" work for a business that had been "silenced" by Unilever.

This was despite an agreement that protected the brand's social mission when it merged with the consumer goods giant 25 years ago, he said.

A spokesperson for The Magnum Ice Cream Company said the firm had been in dialogue with the two founders before Mr Greenfield's decision to leave.

"We disagree with his perspective and have sought to engage both co-founders in a constructive conversation on how to strengthen Ben & Jerry's powerful values-based position in the world," they said.

Ben & Jerry's has long been known for taking a public stance on social issues since it was founded in 1978, often backing campaigns on issues like LGBTQ+ rights and climate change.

In March this year, Ben & Jerry's said its chief executive, David Stever, was being removed by Unilever.

The allegation was part of a legal case filed in a US court by Ben & Jerry's that said Unilever violated a merger agreement by trying to silence its "social mission".

It came a month after Ben & Jerry's accused Unilever of demanding that it stop publicly criticising US President Donald Trump.

A Unilever spokesperson said it was "disappointed that the confidentiality of an employee career conversation has been made public".

In May, Mr Cohen was arrested during a protest in the US Senate over military aid to Israel and humanitarian conditions in Gaza.

Protesters disrupted the hearing while Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr was testifying.

Mr Cohen was charged with a misdemeanour offence, while another six demonstrators were also arrested and face a number of more serious charges, US Capitol Police told BBC News.

Four men have been arrested after images of Donald Trump and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein were projected on to Windsor Castle on Tuesday, as the US president arrived in the UK for a state visit.

They were arrested on suspicion of "malicious communications following a public stunt in Windsor" and remained in custody, Thames Valley Police said.

Those arrested were a 60-year-old from East Sussex, a 36-year-old and a 50-year-old from London, and a 37-year-old from Kent.

The force said officers responded "swiftly" to stop the projection, and an investigation was under way.

Trump is set to meet King Charles in Windsor Castle during the first full day of his state visit on Wednesday.

He arrived in London late on Tuesday and stayed at the US ambassador's residence in the city overnight.

Some protesters gathered in Windsor ahead of the visit and a significant police operation is in place in the town.

Trump was friends with Epstein in the 1990s and early 2000s. The president has never been officially accused of wrongdoing in connection with the deceased paedophile financier.

Trump's visit comes a week after the prime minister sacked the UK's ambassador to the US, Lord Peter Mandelson, over his relationship with Epstein.

After the fortnight the prime minister has had, a spot of rarefied pageantry is just the ticket.

The government weathered a three-hour monsoon of questions in the Commons on Tuesday, which amounted to MP after MP asking why on earth Lord Mandelson was appointed as our man in Washington in the first place, and then why it took so long for Sir Keir Starmer to realise his position was untenable.

Today they can hope, if only briefly, the questions of who knew what and when and the questions about Sir Keir's abilities to do his job can be dislodged from our screens.

After all, President Trump craves the best pictures and pictures are what any state visit are (pretty much) all about.

The next few days amount to the UK offering a vital ally the full works of what he loves: royalty, military bands, a flypast, a banquet and plenty more besides.

It is the latest point in the arc of the unlikely friendship between Sir Keir and the president, almost exactly a year after they first met at Trump Tower in New York, before the American election.

The rhetoric is already flying higher than the planes that will zoom over Windsor Castle later.

The British embassy in Washington may not currently have an ambassador, but it is still in possession of superlatives.

"The UK-US relationship is the strongest in the world, built on 250 years of history," it claims.

The prime minister's official spokesman added that the next 48 hours would see an "unbreakable friendship reach new heights".

Many, including his political opponents, acknowledge that the prime minister can chalk up as a triumph his relationship with President Trump.

But it is also true that the relationship remains a rollercoaster and will always be one.

Sir Keir wants to lean into the economic wins the UK-US relationship can bring.

The latest announcement from Microsoft is a case in point.

But the news about tariffs on UK steel remaining in place is a case in point about that unpredictability.

Officials say the state visit created an impetus for both sides in recent months to chivvy commercial deals along so both sides had wins they could announce to their domestic audiences during the visit.

Thursday will be the more explicitly political day.

The news conference will be another wild ride of uncertainty for the prime minister, because as senior government figures frequently acknowledge, it is impossible to be certain what the president might end up saying.

And beyond the likely warm words, there are disagreements or at least different emphases on a wide range of issues: the UK's imminent recognition of a Palestinian state, the war in Ukraine and, yes, Jeffrey Epstein.

Questions about the convicted paedophile, who died six years ago, look likely to follow the president over the Atlantic, courtesy of the made-in-Britain-row about Epstein and Lord Mandelson.

As the president enjoys 48 hours in the land of his mother and is the guest of royalty, the noise of controversy from back home may yet greet him – all thanks to the row that has been happening here.

Microsoft says its new $30bn (£22bn) investment in the UK's AI sector – its largest outside of the US - should significantly boost Britain's economy in the next few years.

Its package forms a major part of a $31billion agreement made between the UK government and various other US tech giants, including Nvidia and Google, to invest in British-based infrastructure to support AI technology, largely in the form of data centres.

Microsoft will also now be involved in the creation of a powerful new supercomputer in Loughton, Essex.

Speaking exclusively to the BBC Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told the BBC of the tech's potential impact on economic growth."

"It may happen faster, so our hope is not ten years but maybe five".

"Whenever anyone gets excited about AI, I want to see it ultimately in the economic growth and the GDP growth."

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the US-UK deal marked "a generational step change in our relationship with the US".

He added that the agreement was "creating highly skilled jobs, putting more money in people's pockets and ensuring this partnership benefits every corner of the United Kingdom."

The UK economy has remained stubbornly sluggish in recent months.

Nadella compared the economic benefits of the meteoric rise of AI with the impact of the personal computer when it became common in the workplace, about ten years after it first started scaling in the 1990s.

But there are also growing mutterings that AI is a very lucrative bubble that is about to burst. Nadella conceded that "all tech things are about booms and busts and bubbles" and warned that AI should not be over-hyped or under-hyped but also said the newborn tech would still bring about new products, new systems and new infrastructure.

He acknowledged that its energy consumption remains "very high" but argued that its potential benefits, especially in the fields of healthcare, public services, and business productivity, were worthwhile. He added that investing in data centres was "effectively" also investing in modernising the power grid but did not say that money would be shared directly with the UK's power supplier, the National Grid.

The campaign group Foxglove has warned that the UK could end up "footing the bill for the colossal amounts of power the giants need".

The supercomputer, to be built in Loughton, Essex, was already announced by the government in January, but Microsoft has now come on board to the project.

Big tech comes to town

Mr Nadella, revealed the investment as Donald Trump has arrived in the UK on a three-day state visit

The UK and US have signed a "Tech Prosperity Deal" as part of the visit, with an aim of strengthening ties on AI, quantum computing and nuclear power.

Google has promised £5bn for AI research and infrastructure over the next two years.

UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves opened a £735m data centre as part of the investment on Tuesday in Hertfordshire.

There are some concerns that accepting so much money from US investors will mean the UK relies too much on foreign technology.

In July, Trump made clear his intentions were for the US to win global the AI race.

One of the ways it stated it would do this was to "export American AI to allies and partners."

The UK government has signed number of deals with US technology companies, including an agreement to use OpenAI services in the public sector and a £400m contract to use Google Cloud services in the Ministry of Defence.

Satya Nadella said he thought the agreement defined "the next phase of globalisation" and argued that having access to foreign tech services leveraged digital sovereignty rather than threatened it.

On the growing issue of AI taking over jobs, Nadella said Microsoft also had to "change with the changes in technology", having laid off thousands of staff this year despite record sales and profits. He described it as "the hard process of renewal".

AI growth zone in north-east England

The government also said there was "potential for more than 5,000 jobs and billions in private investment" in north-east England, which has been designated as a new "AI growth zone".

Last year, the government announced a £10bn investment into a data centre to be built near Blyth, Northumberland.

It has now announced another data centre project dubbed Stargate UK from OpenAI, chipmaker Nvidia, semiconductor company Arm and AI infrastructure firm Nscale.

That will be based at Cobalt Park in Northumberland.

OpenAI boss Sam Altman said Stargate UK would "help accelerate scientific breakthroughs, improve productivity, and drive economic growth."

However the UK version is a fraction of the firm's US-based Stargate project, which OpenAI launched in January with a commitment to invest $500 billion over the next four years building new AI infrastructure for itself.

So far, reaction to the agreement has been broadly positive, but its clear that there are many challenges ahead for the UK if it is to fulfil its intended potential.

The Tony Blair Institute described the news as a "breakthrough moment" but added that Britain had some work to do: "reforming planning rules, accelerating the delivery of clean energy projects, and building the necessary digital infrastructure for powering the country's tech-enabled growth agenda," said Dr Keegan McBride, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change's emerging tech and geopolitics expert.

Matthew Sinclair, UK director of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, hailed the agreement as "a powerful demonstration of the scale of the AI opportunity for the UK economy."

But the Conservative Party highlighted that other big international companies such as the pharmaceutical giant Merck have recently cancelled or delayed their UK expansion plans.

Satya Nadella spoke to the BBC News in between board meetings, shortly before jumping on a flight to join Donald Trump as he arrives in the UK on a three-day state visit. Nadella will be among other tech leaders, including OpenAI's Sam Altman and Nvidia's Jensen Huang, attending the Royal state banquet on Wednesday.

He said he would use Microsoft's AI tool Copilot to help him decide what to wear.

"I was very surprised that there was a very different dress protocol, which I'm really not sure that I'm ready for," he said.

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Labour deputy leadership contender Lucy Powell, who was fired by Sir Keir Starmer in his cabinet reshuffle, has criticised "unforced errors" by the government over welfare.

In her first broadcast interview since being sacked, she told the BBC's Nick Robinson attempts to cut disability benefits and winter fuel payments had left voters questioning "whose side we are on".

She urged the party's leaders to be clearer about their desire to scrap the two-child benefit cap, and move out of a "defensive crouch" on the issue.

And she hit back at claims her deputy leadership bid was a "proxy" for a leadership bid by Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham or Energy Secretary Ed Miliband.

Powell is running against former cabinet colleague Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, in the contest to replace Angela Rayner as Labour's deputy leader.

She dismissed speculation that she was seeking to pave the way for a leadership bid by her long-time ally Andy Burnham as a "classic Westminster bubble obsession".

The Manchester Central MP praised Burnham as a "great politician" and communicator but said it was "sexist" and "wrong" to suggest Labour members might voter for her to be deputy leader to signal they wanted him to replace Sir Keir Starmer as prime minister.

"You've got two strong women standing in a in an open and transparent contest," said the Manchester Central MP.

"And instead of talking about the two strong women, everybody's talking about this being a sort of proxy for war between two men, which quite honestly, I find kind of sexist, but it's also completely wrong."

The Manchester Mayor can not stand to be Labour leader because he is not an MP, but there has been speculation he could seek to return to Westminster in a by-election.

Nick Robinson also suggested Powell could be acting as a proxy for Ed Miliband, who led Labour to defeat in the 2015 general election, if he decided to stand for the leadership again.

Powell, who is Miliband's former chief staff, told Robinson: "Anyone who knows me knows I'm not a proxy for anybody. I'm me.

"I'm a very independent, strong-minded, effective politician in my own right."

She said she may have been sacked as Commons leader in Sir Keir's reshuffle for telling the Labour leadership things "they didn't want to hear" such as how deeply MPs opposed welfare cuts.

If she were elected deputy leader she said she would be a "conduit" for the views of members and tell Sir Keir "when we're getting things wrong".

Speaking to the Political Thinking with Nick Robinson podcast, she said she did not want not want a cabinet job if she succeeds, adding that Sir Keir had been "really clear" that David Lammy would be Rayner's replacement as deputy PM.

As a "full-time deputy leader", she said she would aim to bridge the gap between party members and the leadership.

Launching her bid for the deputy leadership, Phillipson has urged Labour to remain united to win a second term in government.

"I won't pretend this government hasn't made mistakes – I've been first to admit it" she told supporters in her Sunderland constituency.

"But we can't afford to look inwards - to go back to bad old days of divided Labour Party and open old wounds.

"If we turn against each other only one person will win – Nigel Farage - but millions more will lose."

You can hear the full interview with Lucy Powell on Political Thinking with Nick Robinson on BBC Sounds. The interview will also be broadcast on BBC2 on Friday at 14:45 and BBC Radio 4 on Saturday at 17:30.

Nepal's Gen Z protesters brought down a government in under 48 hours – but the victory has come at a heavy price.

"We are proud, but there is also a mixed baggage of trauma, regret and anger," says Tanuja Pandey, one of the protest organisers.

With 72 people killed, last week's protests were the deadliest unrest in the Himalayan country in decades. Official buildings, residences of political leaders and luxury hotels such as the Hilton, which opened in July 2024, were torched, vandalised and looted. The wife of a former prime minister is fighting for her life after their home was set ablaze.

The protests represented "a wholesale rejection of Nepal's current political class for decades of poor governance and exploitation of state resources", said Ashish Pradhan, a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group. But the damage to government services, he added, could "parallel the toll of the 2015 earthquake which took almost 9,000 lives".

The destruction is not only confined to the capital Kathmandu - at least 300 local government offices across the nation have been damaged.

The financial losses could amount to 3 trillion Nepalese rupees ($21.3bn; £15.6bn), nearly half of the country's GDP, according to the Kathmandu Post. Its offices were also attacked by crowds and set on fire.

'Nepo babies'

Two days before the deadly demonstration on 8 September, Ms Pandey, a 24-year-old environmental campaigner, uploaded a video showing a mining site in Chure, one of the most fragile mountain ranges in the region. Nepal's resources should belong to the people, not to "politicians' private limited companies", she wrote, calling on her peers to "march against corruption and the misuse of our nation's wealth".

Like many youth movements in Asia, Nepal's Gen Z protests were leaderless. Others had made similar pleas to Ms Pandey's after the Nepali government decided to ban 26 social media platforms, citing their failure to register locally.

For months, fury had been brewing against "nepo babies", the children of powerful politicians of all stripes, who were accused of flaunting their unexplained wealth on social media.

One of the most viral photos showed Saugat Thapa, the son of a provincial minister, standing next to a Christmas tree made of boxes of luxury brands including Louis Vuitton, Gucci and Cartier. In response, he said it was "an unfair misinterpretation" and his father "returned every rupee earned from public service to the community".

Ms Pandey had watched almost all "nepo babies" content, but one video juxtaposing the luxurious life of a political family and an ordinary young Nepali who had to find work in a Gulf country struck her.

"It is painful to watch, especially knowing that even educated youth are forced to leave the country because wages here are far below what one needs to live with dignity," she said.

Nepal is a young democracy. It became a republic in 2008, after a decade-long, Maoist-led civil war that killed more than 17,000 people.

But the promised stability and prosperity have not materialised. In 17 years, Nepal has had 14 governments, and no leader has completed a full five-year term. The country's politics resemble a game of musical chairs, with communist parties and the centrist Nepali Congress taking turns to rule. Three leaders, including KP Sharma Oli who resigned over the Gen Z protests, returned to power multiple times.

Nepal's GDP per capita remained under $1,500, making it the second-poorest country in South Asia, behind only Afghanistan. An estimated 14% of the population work overseas, and one in three households receives remittances.

Ms Pandey comes from a middle-class family in eastern Nepal and her father is a retired government teacher. Three years ago, she was diagnosed with a brain tumour, for which she is still receiving treatment. The medical bills nearly bankrupted her family, so her older sister moved to Australia to support them.

Before the protests, Ms Pandey worked with others to create guidelines stressing non-violence and respect and reminding participants to stay vigilant against "hijackers".

On the morning of 8 September, she arrived at Maitighar Mandala, a huge traffic island in central Kathmandu with several of her friends. She was expecting thousands would turn up at most – but the crowds kept swelling.

Aakriti Ghimire, a 26-year-old protester, said things were initially peaceful and communal. "We were all seated, we were singing old Nepali songs," she said. "The slogans and everything were so funny, we were enjoying it. And after that, we started to march… the police were there to ensure that there were no vehicles disturbing us."

Both Ms Pandey and Ms Ghimire started to sense danger at around midday, when crowds began moving to New Baneshwor, the neighbourhood housing parliament. Both saw people arriving on motorbikes, and Ms Pandey said these people appeared older than average Gen Z protesters.

Ms Ghimire believes they were infiltrators. "It became very tricky for us to distinguish the peaceful protesters – some people who genuinely came for something – versus those who came in with the intention of being violent."

When some protesters tried to breach the security around parliament, police fired tear gas, water cannon and shots in return. There is evidence live rounds were used and they are accused of shooting at schoolchildren as well. An investigation into what happened is under way.

Chaos and violence reigned the next day. Demonstrators retaliated by setting parliament, the prime minister's office and other government buildings ablaze. Both Ms Pandey and Ms Ghimire stayed indoors and watched the developments online.

"A lot of people did share that it felt so good to finally see politicians face the consequences of everything they've done," Ms Ghimire said, referring to the destruction of the leaders' homes. But the mood soon darkened.

"I saw people with bottles filled with petroleum. They got it from the motorbikes. They started attacking the parliament," said Ms Pandey.

The law graduate cried after seeing the Supreme Court on fire, saying that it was like "a temple" for her. Her friends at the scene were pouring water on the flames to try to put them out. They all knew the effort would be futile – they did it only to console themselves.

"People say the arsonists intended to come and burn these things… Who are these people?" asked Ms Ghimire. "The videos show these people are all masked."

Some calm was restored when the army was deployed to take control of the situation - a curfew was in place for days. Later in the week former Supreme Court Chief Justice Sushila Karki was appointed interim prime minister. She had been backed by protesters for the post.

Ms Pandey hopes she "can lead the country efficiently, do the election in stipulated time and hand the power to the people".

But the anxiety about Nepal's political future persists.

Rumela Sen, a South Asia expert at Columbia University, said it was "worrying" to see "an unprecedented glorification of the army as a voice of sanity and stability".

Many are also uncomfortable with the involvement of Durga Prasai in the initial negotiation at the invitation of the military. Mr Prasai was arrested for his role in violent pro-monarchy protests in March. He fled to India but was returned to Nepal. The Gen Z protesters walked out.

Meanwhile, families of protesters who were killed are reckoning with their deaths.

"We are deeply shocked because we have lost our beloved son," said Yubaraj Neupane, whose 23-year-old son Yogendra died in the protests. "I am yet to find out how he died."

Yogendra was shot in the back of the head near the parliament building, according to the post mortem report.

From south-eastern Nepal, the family's eldest son had pursued his studies in Kathmandu and aspired to be a civil servant. He was always studying, friends and relatives said.

But on 8 September, he joined the protests with his friends, dreaming of bringing change to the country. His family didn't know he was at the scene until he called them after the situation started heating up.

"Our beloved has lost his life calling for change," his great-uncle Saubhagya said. "His blood and sacrifice should be recognised so that other young people won't have to hit the streets again in the future."

Ms Pandey said she was cautiously optimistic about her country's future, but the trauma of the past week would stay with her for the rest of her life.

This is a political awakening for her generation.

"We are no longer willing to stay silent or accept injustice," she says. "This is not just a gentle nudge; it's a bold challenge to a system that has hoarded power for decades."

Additional reporting by Grace Tsoi

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Josh Wintersgill has been running a successful business selling products to help wheelchair users travel for six years, but its future hangs in the balance.

He's been using the government's Access to Work scheme to help with some of the additional costs of running his company and is afraid that he may lose it after his one-on-one support was slashed by 80%.

The Business Disability Forum (BDF) says businesses and their disabled employees are being "set up to fail," despite the government's ambitions to get 80% of disabled people into the workforce.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said it was reviewing all aspects of the scheme.

'Really frustrating'

Josh needs physical support with most things throughout the day because of his disability. This includes travelling, overnight stays and packing and shipping customer orders. Without this support he says he would not be able to run his company.

The Access to Work grant was providing him with a support worker five days a week, but on reassessment, it was reduced to one day.

He said: "They're basically with me all the time. They help me in every facet of helping me do my job and without them, I can't do any of that."

Josh has appealed the decision and has not had any support since the start of July, when his grant ran out, despite no change in his personal circumstances.

Under the Access to Work scheme, companies and employees can apply for grants to help support disabled people in the workplace.

The programme can pay employees and businesses for the extra costs associated with being a disabled worker - things that go beyond what is legally required by employers to provide. It covers a range of things like paying for taxis, assistive technology and British Sign Language interpreters.

Disabled people have told the BBC their awards have been significantly reduced, completely taken away and in some cases left them forced to shut their businesses and turn down job offers.

Josh is currently managing by using his own money to keep the business afloat, but says things are "very tight" and he'll only be able to do this for the next few months.

"I'm not getting everything done that I used to get done," he says. "There's so much to do that it's just so hard to stay on top of it... it's just really frustrating."

Josh says Access to Work helped him get into work and set up his own business, but is fearful of what will happen if that is taken away.

"It's scary to think that I'm a disabled entrepreneur, helping disabled people and potentially being deprived of doing that."

• Jobs fears as disability scheme owes businesses thousands
• 'I don't want to live on benefits, I want to work'
• Plans to help benefits recipients into work 'a mess', say DWP officials

"We have a system that's making it very difficult for you to remain in work," he adds.

Campaign group Access to Work Collective was set up in response to problems people were facing when applying or reapplying for grants. Its founder, Dr Shani Dhanda said since July they've amassed almost 4,000 members.

The group recently sent an open letter to the prime minister asking him to take "urgent" action to fix the "broken" scheme.

'Affecting the quality of our work'

The lunchtime rush at the Sea Change in cafe in Sunderland is under way. The social enterprise employs 25 neurodiverse adults and uses Access to Work to support most of them.

Lexie O'Connor has been at the cafe since it opened in 2019. In between customers she explains how working at the cafe has given her confidence and a sense of pride and now trains others on how to work with neurodiverse and disabled staff.

Lexie's reapplication took 10 months to come through and when it did the hours for her one-to-one support worker had been greatly reduced, leaving the business to make up the shortfall.

"A lot of employers in that time physically would not be able to manage keeping people like myself employed," she said.

Lexie says she sees a lot of her colleagues worry about their job prospects because of the problems with Access to Work. The cafe has said it already had to let two members of staff go because support was cut.

"We're worrying so much about it, it's affecting the quality of work that we worked so hard to get to in the first place.

"I feel like places like Sea Change are trying their best, they are fighting for people like me."

'Set up to fail'

Ministers have widely acknowledged Access to Work as a key driver in getting disabled people in work, but in an interview with the BBC, minister for social security and disability, Sir Stephen Timms, said the problem was the "huge numbers of people wanting it", adding they had been struggling "to keep up with the demand".

Spending on the programme increased by 41% in 2023-24 to £257.8m.

In February 2025 about 62,000 applications were waiting to be processed, with 33,000 people awaiting payment, according to the DWP.

A government consultation on Access to Work closed at the end of June with ministers currently reviewing what a new scheme could look like.

​​Angela Matthews, director of public policy and research at BDF called on the government to make access to work "more efficient and more resourced".

​​She told the BBC: "Disabled people are set up to fail and so are employers, because disabled people won't get what they need to be able to work and employers won't have the means or the support to provide an inclusive workplace for disabled people."

Member of BDF, Allianz UK, said despite the size of the insurance business, it had not been immune to the struggles with Access to Work.

Diana Salmon, head of occupational health and safety at the firm, says the biggest issue has been the long waits for awards to be processed. In some cases people are waiting longer than 10 months to start work.

Diana says: "It [the delays] could put people off applying to us... so we do our best but we can't afford really to pick up the high support costs."

She referenced a recent example of a new recruit who left the company shortly after starting the role because it took nearly a year to get specialist equipment in place so they could fully carry out the job.

"We want to provide an inclusive environment, but without timely Access to Work funding for colleagues with complex disabilities, they are potentially being excluded," Diana said.

Diana has herself used Access to Work in a previous job. The money paid for travel costs to visit her team in different locations, which she otherwise wouldn't have been able to do, but said she sees the value in the programme.

"It would be much more difficult for us to attract, recruit and to retain employees with disabilities [without the scheme]," she said.

In a statement the DWP said: "We inherited an Access to Work scheme that is failing both employees and employers, which is why - as part of our welfare reform - we consulted on how it could be improved.

"We are reviewing all aspects of the scheme and will develop future policy with disabled people and the organisations that represent them."

It added there had been "no change in Access to Work policy".

When Alan gave his Persian tabby cat, Smokey, its regular flea treatment last year, he thought nothing could go wrong.

The 45-year-old from Preston had used the same brand - Frontline Plus - for years without any trouble. But within hours of applying a new dose he'd bought online, his usually lively tabby was violently ill, vomiting and refusing food or water.

"I bought it from a major online site and the price seemed similar so I didn't suspect anything at the time," Alan told the BBC's Morning Live.

Alan's story comes after the government recently issued an urgent warning about fake veterinary products being sold online.

With vet bills up 60% in the last decade, more owners are turning to the internet to hunt for bargains.

• Watch Alan and Smokey's story on Morning Live

The vet that Alan took Smokey to initially found nothing abnormal, but when his condition deteriorated, scans revealed a blockage in his intestines. Emergency surgery saved his life - at a cost of £3,000 - and tests later confirmed he had suffered a toxic reaction.

Alan returned to the vet with the packaging. At first glance, it looked genuine, labelled as "Gatti" - which Alan assumed might be an Italian version of the medication.

But when the manufacturer was contacted, they confirmed it was counterfeit and laboratory testing found it contained a chemical highly toxic to cats.

"We felt really guilty about the fact we had done this to him," Alan said. "But finding out it was fake medication, we were really angry.

"It's horrific and I had absolutely no idea there was such a thing as fake pet medication."

Helen Barnham works at the Intellectual Property Office (IPO), a government team tasked with trying to stop the sale of counterfeit goods.

The team has issued more than 100 seizure notices for the selling of unauthorised animal medicines and supplements, preventing around 18,000 illegal items from reaching consumers.

"Criminals copy these products to make them look like the original and it's all to make money, they don't care about the damage or harm," she explained.

According to the IPO, the online seller who Alan bought the medication from managed to sell 211 batches of suspected counterfeit pet medications and supplements.

"If it's not from a vet or a trusted seller then please be vigilant," Barnham said.

Barnham is urging pet owners to check all pet medicines carefully before using them.

Even if a product looks authentic, there are often subtle clues something is wrong.

Signs that a medicine could be fake

• Poor quality, damaged or flimsy packaging
• Spelling or grammar errors on the label
• Missing instruction leaflets or expiry dates
• Instructions not provided in English
• Suspicious smell, colour or texture
• Tablets or pipettes that look homemade or poorly made
• Unusually low prices or deals that seem too good to be true
• Product names that are slightly misspelled or altered from the original brand

Nina Downing, Vet Nurse from PDSA, a vet charity, says she always recommends only giving your pet medicine which has been prescribed by a vet.

"When fulfilling a prescription online, source them from reputable companies that are on the Register of online retailers, brought to you by the Veterinary Medicines Directorate."

If the medication has any of the above warning signs, you should stop using the product immediately and contact your vet for medical advice.

You should also report it to your local trading standards office and notify the brand manufacturer, who may be able to verify if it's genuine.

One in four driving tests in Great Britain are being taken in automatic cars, according to new data, as drivers opt for more electric vehicles (EVs) and shy away from manual gearboxes.

Figures from the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) show that 470,000 of the 1.8 million driving tests taken in England, Scotland, and Wales last year were done in automatics.

Insurer AA said the trend is being driven by the UK's ban on new the sale of new petrol and diesel cars coming in 2030, as EVs do not need manual gearboxes.

Emma Bush, the managing director of AA's driving school, said the need to know how to drive a manual car is becoming "irrelevant to many".

To obtain a full driving licence for Great Britain a driver must pass their test in a car with manual gears.

If the test is taken in an automatic car, the driver would get a Category B Auto licence, restricting them to driving to vehicles with automatic transmission only.

Northern Ireland issues its own driving licences.

Ms Bush said that drivers and learners are "becoming confident with the idea of their driving future being electric".

"As we head closer to 2030 and the ban on the sale of new combustion cars, more and more learners will want to learn in an electric vehicle as that's all they will plan to drive."

Following the general election last year, the Labour government pledged to restore the petrol and diesel ban to 2030, after previous prime minister Rishi Sunak pushed it back to 2035.

The lower day-to-day running costs of EVs and hybrids is also attractive to many, Ms Bush said.

EVs can be significantly more expensive than a petrol or diesel car or a hybrid upfront, but the gap is narrowing.

Additionally, EV owners can expect to save money on fuel and maintenance costs.

Sue Howe, the owner of Sue's Driving School in Swindon, told the BBC that automatics are "the way forward" as the car industry moves towards EVs.

For learner drivers, Ms Howe said, automatics can make the test easier, as "there's just a lot less to do".

Inexperienced drivers can "wreck a gearbox and a clutch", Ms Howe said, adding that nerves may cause them to stall or cut out the engine.

She also said the trend was good for road safety as "people are less tired" driving an automatic.

"It just makes life so much easier - it's less work for the driver to do so they can concentrate more time on the road."

Drivers attitudes to EVs have rapidly changed in just over a decade.

The number of driving tests taken in automatics was 87,844 in 2012/13, or 6.12% of all tests, according to the DVSA figures.

That figure jumped to 479,556 in 2024/25, the last period with complete data, or 26%.

The AA is predicting that 29% of all tests will be taken in automatics in 2025/26.

The figures from the DVSA also showed that more men are opting to take their tests in automatics.

In 2012/13, 23.2% of learners taking tests in automatics were men. Last year, that figure was 39.1%.

The pass rate for automatics last year was slightly lower than for manuals. However, the gap has narrowed since 2012.

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President Donald Trump has arrived in the UK for his historic second state visit, which will see a crowded mix of royal pageantry, trade talks and international politics.

Before making the trip from the US on Air Force One, Trump sent positive signals, describing the visit as an honour and saying: "My relationship is very good with the UK."

"They want to see if they can refine the trade deal a little bit… I'm into helping them," said Trump, with a multi-billion US technology investment deal being announced as the president's visit got underway.

But Trump said the main purpose of the visit was to see "my friend" King Charles: "He represents the country so well, such an elegant gentleman."

Landing at Stansted airport, President Trump received an official welcome from a line-up on the runway including Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper.

The president is spending the night in the US ambassador's residence, Winfield House, before a day of royal ceremony and lavish spectacle in Windsor Castle on Wednesday - with the president describing Windsor as "the ultimate" in settings.

Hosting him will be King Charles and a full line-up of senior royals, currently including Queen Camilla, who had to miss the Duchess of Kent's funeral on Tuesday because she was suffering from acute sinusitis.

Prince William and Catherine will be part of a ceremonial welcome, there will be a gun salute, military inspection and President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump will have a carriage procession within the Windsor estate.

Such spectacles will be aimed at pleasing a president who on Tuesday evening at Winfield House once again revealed his enthusiasm for royalty, saying about the King: "He's been a friend of mine for a long time, and everybody respects him, and they love him."

On his feelings about the UK, President Trump said: "I have a lot of things here that warm my heart. I want to tell you. It's a very special place."

A key message from the UK government will be to encourage the United States to maintain its commitment to Nato and to support Ukraine and there will be a much bigger than usual military line-up for the state visit.

There will be 1,300 service men and women, from the Army, Royal Navy and RAF taking part in the welcome, creating the largest ever guard of honour for a state visit to the UK.

A joint US and UK flypast by F-35 jets and the Red Arrows will fly over Windsor, watched by Sir Keir Starmer alongside the president, in a display showing the closeness of the military relationship.

The centrepiece of the state visit will be the spectacular banquet in St George's Hall, where King Charles and President Trump will make speeches, with guests enjoying a menu that's likely to be a culinary representation of the special relationship, with UK and US food.

Along with the royal pageantry and photo-opportunities, there will be efforts to influence the US president over trade and international co-operation.

State visits are a form of soft power diplomacy, using the royal charm offensive to build relations with important international partners - with none more important than the US.

As the visit got underway, a major technology deal was announced with US tech firms investing £31bn in the UK, including £22bn from Microsoft.

This will see co-operation in artificial intelligence, quantum computing and nuclear power, in a tech deal which Sir Keir Starmer hopes will begin "creating highly skilled jobs, putting more money in people's pockets".

Ahead of the visit, the owner of Google, Alphabet, announced a £5bn ($6.8bn) investment in the UK's artificial intelligence research.

And an agreement is to be signed between the US and UK on accelerating the development of nuclear power.

But ambitions to remove the current 25% tariff on UK steel exports to the US seem to have been put on hold - although this remains lower than the 50% tariff facing many other countries.

Anti-Trump protestors have begun to gather in Windsor - and giant images of Donald Trump and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have been projected on to the walls of Windsor Castle.

Thames Valley Police later said four people had been arrested following an "unauthorised projection at Windsor Castle", with a statement saying they "take any unauthorised activity around Windsor Castle extremely seriously".

A heavy security operation will be in place during the presidential visit, which ends on Thursday afternoon.

But unlike other recent state visits, there will not be any moments visible to the public, with all the events taking place behind the walls of the Windsor estate or at the PM's country estate, Chequers.

The high street in Windsor has US flags flying, but they won't be seen by the visiting president.

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The man accused of fatally shooting Charlie Kirk confessed to killing the right-wing activist in a message to his roommate, prosecutors have alleged, as they announced seven charges against him.

Tyler Robinson, 22, left a note under a keyboard for his roommate to discover, said Utah County Attorney Jeffrey Gray. He added that the roommate was Mr Robinson's romantic partner.

According to Mr Gray, the note said: "I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I'm going to take it."

The prosecutor also shared text messages between the roommates, including one in which the defendant allegedly said he shot Kirk because he had "had enough of his hatred".

The suspect is being held without bail in a special housing unit at the Utah County Jail. He made his first court appearance on Tuesday, appearing remotely as prosecutors read the seven charges against him.

The charges are aggravated murder, felony discharge of a firearm, two counts of obstruction of justice, two counts of witness tampering, and committing a violent crime when children are present.

They also said they would seek the death penalty over the shooting of Kirk, who was killed by a single gunshot fired from a rooftop as he was speaking at Utah Valley University on Wednesday.

Arrested last week after a 33-hour manhunt, Mr Robinson has not entered a plea or confessed to police. Mr Gray also stressed that the suspect is innocent until proven guilty and will face trial by jury.

He unveiled a trove of evidence at a news conference on Tuesday, including the defendant's alleged confession and DNA found on the trigger of the rifle suspected to have been used in the crime.

An alleged hidden confession

Describing the alleged hidden note at a news conference earlier on Tuesday, Mr Gray said Mr Robinson had sent a text message to his roommate reading: "Drop what you're doing, look under my keyboard."

After reading the apparent confession, the roommate, who has not been named and is co-operating with investigators, replied: "What?????????????? You're joking, right????"

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• Who is Tyler Robinson?
• Kirk shooting suspect appeared to confess on Discord
• 'We knew the family': Utah town in disbelief

Mr Gray cited further lengthy text message exchanges between Mr Robinson and his roommate, whom he described as his romantic partner. Authorities have said the roommate is transgender and transitioning from male to female.

In one exchange, the roommate asked Mr Robinson why he had killed Kirk.

"'I had enough of his hatred,'" Mr Gray cited the messages as saying. "'Some hate can't be negotiated out.'"

Mr Robinson also allegedly wrote: "To be honest I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve you."

The roommate replied: "you weren't the one who did it right????"

Mr Robinson replied: "I am, I'm sorry."

Suspect's parents confronted him

Mr Gray also gave more detail about how Mr Robinson's parents became suspicious that their son may have been involved in Charlie Kirk's killing.

He said Mr Robinson's mother had seen a video of the suspect released a day after the shooting and told her husband it looked like their son. She confronted Mr Robinson over the phone about the resemblance, Mr Gray said, but he told her he had been home sick on the day of the shooting.

The father later confronted Mr Robinson, who responded by implying he might take his own life, the prosecutor said.

Mr Robinson was eventually persuaded to come to his parents' house and while there, allegedly hinted he was the attacker. He then said he wanted to "end it" rather than go to jail, Mr Gray said.

With the help of a family friend, who is a retired deputy sheriff, his parents convinced him to surrender to police and he was arrested late on Thursday - 33 hours after the shooting.

The suspect also allegedly told his parents that "there is too much evil and the guy spreads too much hate", in a reference to Kirk, according to the indictment.

Mr Robinson's mother told investigators her son had become more political in recent years, Mr Gray said, becoming more supportive of gay and transgender rights and entering a relationship with a transgender person.

But the prosecutor declined to answer when asked if Kirk had been targeted for his transgender views. "That is for a jury to decide," he said.

Mr Gray said Kirk was answering a question about mass shootings carried out by transgender individuals when the gunshot rang out. The bullet struck Kirk in the neck and he immediately slumped to the ground.

The bullet passed closely by other people, including nearby children and the person who asked Kirk the question, he said.

DNA on the rifle trigger

Mr Gray said the suspect's DNA had been found on the trigger of the rifle used in the shooting.

He also said Mr Robinson's father had suspected the weapon matched a bolt-action rifle that had once belonged to the suspect's grandfather. He contacted Mr Robinson after the shooting and asked him to send a photo of the rifle but he did not reply, Mr Gray said.

The suspect also detailed his movements after the shooting in messages sent to his roommate.

"I had planned to grab my rifle from my drop point shortly after, but most of that side of town got locked down," he wrote, according to prosecutors.

"Going to attempt to retrieve it again, hopefully they have moved on. I haven't seen anything about them finding it," another message allegedly read.

"I can get close to it but there is a squad car parked right by it."

Mr Robinson is also charged with witness tampering, prosecutors said, because he directed his partner to delete their messages and stay silent if questioned.

Two Labour MPs who were travelling to the occupied West Bank say they have been denied entry into Israel.

Simon Opher and Peter Prinsley were travelling in a parliamentary delegation to see medical and humanitarian work being carried out by organisations including Medical Aid for Palestinians.

In a joint statement the two MPs said it was "deeply regrettable" that Israeli authorities had "prevented them from seeing first-hand the grave challenges facing medical facilities in the region".

The Foreign Office and the Israeli Embassy in London have been approached for comment.

The two MPs were crossing into Israel from Jordan on Monday on a three-day visit organised by the Council for Arab-British Understanding (CAABU) when they were stopped by Israeli authorities.

Opher told the BBC they were held in a passport office before being handed a "legal form insisting that we leave the country" and then "escorted to a bus" back to Jordan.

The Stroud MP said he was told they were not being admitted on "public order" grounds and that representations from the Foreign Office to Israeli authorities had been rejected.

He said: "It's very disappointing. We are both doctors and we were really just going to look at healthcare facilities in the West Bank to see if there was anything we could do to support them."

"We weren't in any way trying to undermine the Israelis, just trying to see what we could do in the West Bank" where, he said, they had been told healthcare was getting increasingly difficult.

They had also been due to meet the British Consul General in Jerusalem as part of the visit, as well as meeting Palestinian and Israeli human rights organisations.

Both Prinsley, who represents Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, and Opher were first elected to Parliament in 2024.

Chris Doyle, the Director of CAABU, told the BBC that it had been organising trips for parliamentarians for many years and that recent denials of entry were "regrettable".

He said it was "important that British politicians get to see the situation on the ground at a very serious time to determine what's going on. It allows them to assess that situation and British policy towards it".

Earlier this year, two other Labour MPs, Abtisam Mohamed and Yuan Yang, were denied entry to Israel in April on another visit organised by the same organisation.

At the time Israeli authorities said the two MPs had "accused Israel of false claims" and were "actively involved in promoting sanctions against Israeli ministers".

Mohamed and Yang said: "Parliamentarians should feel free to speak truthful in the House of Commons, without fear of being targeted."

The then-Foreign Secretary David Lammy described the move by Israel as "unacceptable, counterproductive and deeply concerning".

In April, Liberal Democrat MP Wera Hobhouse was barred from entering Hong Kong to visit her newborn grandson.

Microsoft says its new $30bn (£22bn) investment in the UK's AI sector – its largest outside of the US - should significantly boost Britain's economy in the next few years.

Its package forms a major part of a $31billion agreement made between the UK government and various other US tech giants, including Nvidia and Google, to invest in British-based infrastructure to support AI technology, largely in the form of data centres.

Microsoft will also now be involved in the creation of a powerful new supercomputer in Loughton, Essex.

Speaking exclusively to the BBC Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told the BBC of the tech's potential impact on economic growth."

"It may happen faster, so our hope is not ten years but maybe five".

"Whenever anyone gets excited about AI, I want to see it ultimately in the economic growth and the GDP growth."

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the US-UK deal marked "a generational step change in our relationship with the US".

He added that the agreement was "creating highly skilled jobs, putting more money in people's pockets and ensuring this partnership benefits every corner of the United Kingdom."

The UK economy has remained stubbornly sluggish in recent months.

Nadella compared the economic benefits of the meteoric rise of AI with the impact of the personal computer when it became common in the workplace, about ten years after it first started scaling in the 1990s.

But there are also growing mutterings that AI is a very lucrative bubble that is about to burst. Nadella conceded that "all tech things are about booms and busts and bubbles" and warned that AI should not be over-hyped or under-hyped but also said the newborn tech would still bring about new products, new systems and new infrastructure.

He acknowledged that its energy consumption remains "very high" but argued that its potential benefits, especially in the fields of healthcare, public services, and business productivity, were worthwhile. He added that investing in data centres was "effectively" also investing in modernising the power grid but did not say that money would be shared directly with the UK's power supplier, the National Grid.

The campaign group Foxglove has warned that the UK could end up "footing the bill for the colossal amounts of power the giants need".

The supercomputer, to be built in Loughton, Essex, was already announced by the government in January, but Microsoft has now come on board to the project.

Big tech comes to town

Mr Nadella, revealed the investment as Donald Trump has arrived in the UK on a three-day state visit

The UK and US have signed a "Tech Prosperity Deal" as part of the visit, with an aim of strengthening ties on AI, quantum computing and nuclear power.

Google has promised £5bn for AI research and infrastructure over the next two years.

UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves opened a £735m data centre as part of the investment on Tuesday in Hertfordshire.

There are some concerns that accepting so much money from US investors will mean the UK relies too much on foreign technology.

In July, Trump made clear his intentions were for the US to win global the AI race.

One of the ways it stated it would do this was to "export American AI to allies and partners."

The UK government has signed number of deals with US technology companies, including an agreement to use OpenAI services in the public sector and a £400m contract to use Google Cloud services in the Ministry of Defence.

Satya Nadella said he thought the agreement defined "the next phase of globalisation" and argued that having access to foreign tech services leveraged digital sovereignty rather than threatened it.

On the growing issue of AI taking over jobs, Nadella said Microsoft also had to "change with the changes in technology", having laid off thousands of staff this year despite record sales and profits. He described it as "the hard process of renewal".

AI growth zone in north-east England

The government also said there was "potential for more than 5,000 jobs and billions in private investment" in north-east England, which has been designated as a new "AI growth zone".

Last year, the government announced a £10bn investment into a data centre to be built near Blyth, Northumberland.

It has now announced another data centre project dubbed Stargate UK from OpenAI, chipmaker Nvidia, semiconductor company Arm and AI infrastructure firm Nscale.

That will be based at Cobalt Park in Northumberland.

OpenAI boss Sam Altman said Stargate UK would "help accelerate scientific breakthroughs, improve productivity, and drive economic growth."

However the UK version is a fraction of the firm's US-based Stargate project, which OpenAI launched in January with a commitment to invest $500 billion over the next four years building new AI infrastructure for itself.

So far, reaction to the agreement has been broadly positive, but its clear that there are many challenges ahead for the UK if it is to fulfil its intended potential.

The Tony Blair Institute described the news as a "breakthrough moment" but added that Britain had some work to do: "reforming planning rules, accelerating the delivery of clean energy projects, and building the necessary digital infrastructure for powering the country's tech-enabled growth agenda," said Dr Keegan McBride, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change's emerging tech and geopolitics expert.

Matthew Sinclair, UK director of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, hailed the agreement as "a powerful demonstration of the scale of the AI opportunity for the UK economy."

But the Conservative Party highlighted that other big international companies such as the pharmaceutical giant Merck have recently cancelled or delayed their UK expansion plans.

Satya Nadella spoke to the BBC News in between board meetings, shortly before jumping on a flight to join Donald Trump as he arrives in the UK on a three-day state visit. Nadella will be among other tech leaders, including OpenAI's Sam Altman and Nvidia's Jensen Huang, attending the Royal state banquet on Wednesday.

He said he would use Microsoft's AI tool Copilot to help him decide what to wear.

"I was very surprised that there was a very different dress protocol, which I'm really not sure that I'm ready for," he said.

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The parents of a 15-year-old boy who was stabbed to death have said they will "not allow his name to be known as yet another statistic in the rise of knife crime".

Mohanad Abdullaahi Goobe died of his injuries after he was stabbed on Moston Street, Manchester, on Monday afternoon.

In a tribute his family said: "Mohanad was the baby of the family, he was quick to laugh, easy to love, with a ready smile".

Another 15-year-old has been arrested on suspicion of murder and remains in custody after the stabbing, Greater Manchester Police said.

In a statement, Mohanad's family said: "His life has been cut tragically short, it is difficult to comprehend that seeing your son head off for school in the morning would be the last time that we would see that handsome face."

They said the 15-year-old had "an uncanny ability to make you laugh, making it sometimes difficult to be serious with him".

He also had an older sister and brother, they said.

"Mohanad had many friends, he was loyal and often played the class clown, simply to see them laugh," the family added.

"Mohanad deserves to be remembered for the young man who was loved by his family, and loved big in return, not as the boy whose life was taken with no thought or reason."

Police are continuing to investigate the stabbing and have urged anyone with information about the attack to come forward.

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In central London, on land the size of seven football pitches, sits a mansion called Winfield House - the official residence of the US ambassador to the UK.

It may be a stately home but through the years it's been known to throw one hell of a party, especially on 4 July, America's Independence Day. This year's celebration saw Nile Rodgers & Chic headline the building's lawn for thousands of people.

Fashion's elite, sports stars and wartime leaders have all been entertained here. Even in 1825 when the original site was built, according to Winfield's official website, its primary use was for entertainment.

President Donald Trump is spending the first night of his state visit at the 35-room mansion. The Trumps also stayed there in 2019, as did the Bidens and Obamas previously.

"It's not just the home of the ambassador, but it's also a centre of diplomatic hospitality," says Stephen Crisp, formerly the property's head gardener, who worked there for 37 years until his retirement last year.

One thing Winfield isn't, is a tourist attraction. Located inside Regent's Park, it's exclusive and takes planning to get inside. Friends of Regent's Park previously arranged tours of the grounds - but so far this year the ambassador has not granted permission.

From the road outside, the house cannot be seen. It's shrouded in woodland and is very private for central London.

"It's really, really difficult to get in there. I regard it as a feather in my cap that I actually managed to get in," says Viv Ward, Friends of Regent's Park's event manager. He calls the house "magnificent" and is audibly in awe of the grounds.

Tours of Winfield only allow you to see the ground floor, which is basically a "very posh" area for receptions, and the gardens. The first floor is home to the personal apartments of the ambassador.

As a home and the venue of most American receptions, schedules are tight. "It wasn't a case of we would like to come on this date and this time. It was just, you will be allowed to come here on this day," Mr Ward says.

The property boasts the second-largest private garden in central London, says Mr Crisp. It's home to a lawn, paved walkways, sculptures - and there's also space for helicopters to land.

Socialite and heir to the Woolworths fortune, Barbara Hutton, sold Winfield to the US government for a mere dollar in 1946 in an offer described by the then-president Harry S Truman as "most generous and patriotic".

Hutton had bought the house 10 years earlier after it was partly destroyed in a fire. The Crown Estate Commission gave her permission to tear it down and rebuild in the iconic red brick Georgian style that remains today.

She named it after her grandfather, Frank Winfield Woolworth, the founder of the Woolworth shopping chain.

With World War Two about to erupt and her second marriage not going particularly well, Hutton returned to America with her son in 1939. It would later be revealed this is when she met her next husband - actor Cary Grant - who is said to have stayed at the mansion with her.

During the war, Winfield was commandeered by the Royal Air Force balloon barrage unit with officers reportedly playing football in the gardens.

Hutton returned to London to see what was left of it at the end of the war - and after the Germans' bombs. She called her lawyer and requested it be handed over to the US government for repairs - and it's been used as the official residence of ambassadors ever since.

History is in the walls of Winfield. The original building was called St Dunstan's, and according to Friends of Regent's Park, was used for blind veterans of World War One. A charity of the same name still exists today.

Speaking about US presidents, Mr Crisp says: "At some point they all come, at least once." He explains he met Trump and his wife Melania during their previous state visit in 2019, which was "a little bit surreal". They dined at the property with Queen Camilla and King Charles III before he ascended to the throne.

An iconic image of Mikhail Gorbachev - the last Soviet leader - and US President George W Bush may be one of the most famous moments from the house. The pair held a joint news conference there at the G7 summit in 1991.

Politicians have long used it for key moments, including international summits, grand state dinners and bringing together wartime leaders.

Security detail for presidential visits is secure information - often never released. But Mr Ward shares a glimpse into the daily routine at the house.

"The security is unbelievable, I mean for example I used to have to send the embassy a list of attendees," he adds, saying photo ID had to be shown to the armed presence on the gates of Winfield.

And if you want to leave early? An armed officer has to escort you off the premises.

Winfield House has hosted many varied events, says Mr Crisp.

There have been performances by Take That, Duran Duran, the Foo Fighters, Ed Sheeran and Bastille, he says, sometimes in the garden and sometimes in the house.

It's also been home to sporting events with the Duke of Sussex attending an Invictus Games reception there. Michelle Obama got stuck in with a sports day event, even doing the tug of the war alongside some famous spectators.

Fashion royalty has also hit the corridors of Winfield. Former Vogue boss Alexandra Shulman co-hosted a London Fashion Week opening party with the ambassador at the time. A Spice Girl was spotted too.

Some of the events would involve "thousands" of guests, Mr Crisp says, with the 4 July parties typically gathering 3,000 or 4,000.

It's a bit of an escape.

"You would never know you're in the centre of the London," Mr Ward says.

But what's the most disappointing part of the house? (Disappointing feels like a stretch.) Mr Ward says its driveway is "rather modest" compared to the rest of Winfield.

"It's big enough for big limousines but you couldn't get a brigade of guards walking up and things. It's not like the Mall."

Additional reporting: Grace Dean

Robert Redford, who has died at the age of 89, appeared in more than 50 Hollywood films, won an Oscar as a director, and became a champion of independent film-makers, founding the annual Sundance Film Festival to showcase their work.

Success meant he could pick and choose his projects, with many chiming with his politically liberal views. And he campaigned on environmental issues and for the rights of Native Americans.

His all-American good looks couldn't be ignored: Redford was once described as "a chunk of Mount Rushmore levered into stonewashed denims".

Another critic said he had "a fluid physical grace and an inner radiance that sometimes makes it seem as if he's lit from within".

But overall, Redford thought his beauty was more of a hindrance than a help to his career - and said karma had brought tragedy in his family life to punish him for his physical good fortune.

• Follow reaction and tributes to Robert Redford
• Hollywood star Robert Redford dies aged 89

Charles Robert Redford Jr was born in Santa Monica, California, on 18 August 1936 - the son of a milkman who later became an accountant with Standard Oil.

At school, he became part of a street gang and was arrested for "borrowing an automobile that had stolen jewellery in its trunk".

He won a scholarship to the University of Colorado thanks to his prowess at baseball, but was thrown out after 18 months for drunkenness. At the same time, his mother died - aged just 40.

Stricken with grief, he drifted for a while, finding work in the Californian oilfields - before travelling to Paris and Florence, where he studied art.

His sojourn in Europe encouraged him to take a fresh approach to the United States: "I began to look at my country from another point of view," he later said.

Returning home, he enrolled at the American Academy of Dramatic Art with ambitions to become a theatrical designer - but quickly switched to acting.

Like many actors in late 1950s New York, he picked up a number of small roles on stage and television, including parts in popular series such as The Untouchables, Perry Mason and Dr Kildare.

His big-screen debut came in 1960 with a minor role in Tall Story, where he found himself working alongside Jane Fonda.

It was not an auspicious start to his film career. The film flopped - with Time magazine opining that "nothing can save this picture".

However, it did mark the beginning of a lifetime's friendship with Fonda, who later admitted to falling in love with him each time they worked together.

"There was always a mystery because he didn't reveal anything. He's got an aura about him," she said.

His first major stage success was as pompous lawyer Paul Bratter in Neil Simon's romantic comedy Barefoot in the Park. It was a role he would reprise in the 1967 film version, opposite Fonda.

In 1965, he picked up a Golden Globe award for most promising newcomer for his role in the film Inside Daisy Clover with Natalie Wood.

But he was turned down for the part of Benjamin Braddock in The Graduate because director Mike Nichols felt he was too good-looking - which made Redford wary of being stereotyped by his appearance.

Global fame came in 1969 with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

The 33-year-old's portrayal of the laidback Kid, in contrast to Paul Newman's fast-talking Butch, proved to be one of Hollywood's great partnerships.

Ironically, Redford nearly missed out on the part after one studio executive said: "He's just another Hollywood blond. Throw a stick out of a window in Malibu, you'll hit six like him."

The studio did everything it could to avoid hiring Redford, until Newman - a huge established star - stepped in and insisted.

The two actors found they shared a love of theatre, and remained firm friends until Newman's death in 2008.

"We'd play tricks on each other," Redford said of his relationship with Newman. "The more sophisticated the joke the better."

In 1973, their natural on-screen chemistry saw them team up again in The Sting.

Redford was Oscar-nominated for his role as Johnny Hooker, a small-time grifter who joins forces with Newman's character to swindle a vicious crime boss.

The film, with its distinctive ragtime soundtrack, eventually won seven Academy Awards including best picture - although Redford was beaten to the best actor award by Jack Lemmon.

It was the only time Redford was ever nominated in the best actor category at the Oscars, although he would later win as a director - and received an honorary Oscar in 2002.

Redford's acting roles were prolific throughout the 70s, although there were mixed reviews for his turn as the enigmatic Gatsby in The Great Gatsby, and he was overshadowed by Barbra Streisand in The Way We Were.

But in 1974, Redford bought the film rights to All the President's Men, an account of the Watergate scandal by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein - the two Washington Post reporters who uncovered it.

"The Washington Post were very nervous about us - that this was Hollywood and it could hurt them," he recalled.

Released in 1976, with Redford playing Woodward alongside Dustin Hoffman as Bernstein, the film was a critical success, winning four Oscars - including best adapted screenplay and best supporting actor for Jason Robards.

Four years on, and Redford made his directorial debut with 1980's Ordinary People, a study of the collapse of a middle-class family after the death of one of their sons. It won him his first and only Oscar.

With recognition came wealth.

Redford used much of his earnings to buy a ski resort in Utah, his wife Lola's home state, which he renamed Sundance after one of his most famous roles.

Around the same time, he founded the Sundance Institute to provide creative and financial support to independent film-makers. He went on to become chairman of the Utah/US Film Festival, later renamed the Sundance Film Festival.

Over time, the festival became a key event in the film calendar, showcasing the work of many directors who went on to become household names, including Quentin Tarantino and Steven Soderbergh.

In acting terms, there were hits and misses over the last two decades of the 20th Century. Prison drama Brubaker was a commercial and critical success, and there was a positive reception for popular dramas The Horse Whisperer and Indecent Proposal.

Out of Africa won a fistful of awards, but Havana was badly received and lost money at the box office.

Simultaneously, Redford continued to direct, including A River Runs Through It - which gave a career boost to a fledgling Brad Pitt - and The Legend of Bagger Vance, the last film to feature Jack Lemmon.

There was a muted reception for Lions for Lambs, which saw him reunited with Out of Africa's Meryl Streep. There was high praise, however, for his role in the groundbreaking All is Lost - about an elderly yachtsman alone on his damaged boat in the Indian Ocean.

"There's no dialogue, none at all. And I'm the only actor on screen in the whole movie," Redford said. Many critics described his performance as the best of his career.

He also starred as S.H.I.E.L.D agent Alexander Pierce in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, a film far removed from his usual fare.

"I like the idea of stepping into new territory," he told the LA Times, in 2013. "This is the kind of film I would love to have seen as a kid."

Away from the studio, Redford became a prominent advocate for the environment. "Ours is a sick planet because of our behaviour on it," he said in a 2014 interview.

Redford married Lola Van Wagenen in 1958, and the couple had four children.

Their youngest, Scott, died of sudden infant death syndrome aged two months.

In interviews, Redford said he believed that karma had punished him for possessing sexual magnetism and leading the hedonistic life of an actor.

"It felt like retribution," he says. "I always had this thing that death was on my shoulder, 24/7. My dogs, as a kid. My mum. My firstborn."

The couple divorced in 1985, and Redford had lengthy romances with Brazilian actress Sonia Braga and costume assistant Kathy O'Rear. He married Sibylle Szaggars - a German-born artist - in 2009.

In 2020, his son, David, died in his fifties from complications of bile duct cancer. He had been ill since birth and had had two liver transplants.

In 2019, Redford announced his retirement from acting soon after his cameo in Avengers: Endgame. But he found it hard to leave the limelight.

Approaching the age of 90, he reversed his decision a few years later - to appear in several episodes of Dark Winds, the story of two Navajo police officers who try to solve a double murder.

Redford often shunned the Hollywood limelight, preferring to plough his own furrow.

Despite never winning an acting Oscar, the Academy paid tribute to his body of work with a lifetime achievement award in 2002.

Ultimately, Redford preferred characters that were a little offbeat - in keeping with his passion for independent cinema.

But he always insisted that his good looks hindered, rather than helped, him as an actor.

"The notion that you're not so much of an actor, you're just somebody that looks well. That was always hard for me," he said.

"I always took pride in whatever role I was playing; I would be that character."

No migrant return flights will take place on Tuesday under the new pilot scheme agreed between the UK and France, the BBC has learned.

The first returns of migrants who reached the UK on small boats via the English Channel from France were expected to begin from as early as Tuesday.

Downing Street has insisted that the removals will begin "imminently" - although initial plans for a flight to Paris today were put back.

On Tuesday, a 25-year-old Eritrean man who arrived on a small boat in August launched a last-minute legal claim at the High Court to stop his removal on a 9am flight to France on Wednesday.

The 'one in, one out' scheme was set up as part of a deal announced by Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron in July this year. Dozens of migrants have been detained since.

On Tuesday, No 10 said the government was "confident in the legal basis for this pilot" and is "prepared to respond to any legal scrutiny that occurs".

Over the last fortnight, some migrants being held in immigration removal centres, having crossed the Channel in dinghies, were told they could be returned to France as early as Tuesday.

Some individuals received letters that said they would be put on a scheduled Air France flight departing from Heathrow Airport for Paris at 9am this morning.

However, a number of sources told the BBC that some of the potential passengers had been told their departure would be deferred as further representations about their cases were made.

It is not unusual for immigration removals to be delayed if officials are warned by lawyers that the individual has not had a full or fair opportunity to present their case.

On Tuesday, the first legal challenge against the 'one in one out' agreement was launched in the High Court in London, where lawyers argued against the removal of their unnamed Eritrean client.

Sonali Naik KC said a decision was pending under the national referral mechanism decision - which identifies and assesses victims of slavery and human trafficking.

Under the new treaty, France agreed to take back adults or accompanied children who make a journey to the UK by small boat, once any asylum claim is withdrawn or declared inadmissible.

For each person sent back to France, the UK will accept someone with a case for protection as a refugee, who has not tried to cross the English Channel and can pass security and eligibility criteria.

The BBC understands that migrants living in the Calais region who have applied to the scheme have been rejected - but asylum seekers in the Paris region have been accepted.

The government has not confirmed how many people a week will be returned or relocated under the scheme, but former home secretary Yvette Cooper stressed that it was operating on a trial basis.

Other factors that may have played a part in the delay include whether France is ready to receive returnees, and on the UK side, the state of security checks of any potential genuine refugees.

The Home Office began detaining some small boat migrants on 6 August on the basis that they were ineligible for asylum because they had spent time in a safe third country.

Under the scheme, officials in London refer each potential return case to French officials. The French authorities then have two weeks to respond - before beginning the process of proposing who should come to the UK in their place.

The scheme is one of a number of measures unveiled by the government which aim to tackle small boat crossings.

However, the Conservatives have argued it will not see enough migrants deported to act as a significant deterrent.

Ministers have not put a figure on how many people will be returned to France under the pilot.

More than 30,000 people have crossed the Channel in small boats so far this year.

It is the earliest point in a calendar year this figure has been passed since data on crossings was first reported in 2018.