24/09/2014 BBC London News

strikes against Islamic State in Iraq. That is all from us. On BBC

One, we joined the BBC news teams where you are.

I am from Denmark and everything runs 24`hour today. The unions say

they have concerns over safdty. Also tonight. Cleared of a string of

offences. The firearms officer who won a discrimination case against

A pregnant woman who died along with her unborn child ` her family's

anger after one of the midwhves responsible isn't struck off.

And they were very pleased to see us and we were pleased to see them

The contribution female pilots made to the war effort as Bhggin

Hill marks the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain.

Welcome to BBC London News with me Riz Lateef.

It was first promised by thd Mayor last November ` and today wd learnt

From the 12th of September next year a night tube will run at

the weekend ` to coincide whth the start of the 2015 Rugby World Cup.

It'll be the first time in the Underground's historx that

Unions are concerned though that this, combined with separatd

plans to cut the number of station staff could compromise safety.

Let's cross to our transport correspondent Tom Edwards,

This is what is greeting colmuters tonight, on the front page of the

Evening Standard, 24`hour ttbe to start next year. This is big news.

In the main it has been verx well received. After midnight has always

meant a rush for the last ttbe home for Londoners.

From 12th September next ye`r the tube will run through

I'm from Denmark and everything runs 24 hours a day.

I think it is a worthwhile investment.

It will definitely be better than having to get the night bus home

The plan is to run six trains an hour on the Jubilee,

Victoria and most of the Piccadilly and Central lines.

And eight trains an hour on the Northern line.

Tube bosses claim it will boost the night`time economy and

Initially this plan for a 24`hour tube was tied

in with the closing of all ticket offices and the loss of 950 jobs.

The RMT union have today announced an overtime ban for its members

All of the unions, though, say there have been no detahled

Are you being high`handed about this?

I mean, this is great in terms of creating

jobs within London Undergrotnd, jobs for people across London's dconomy.

Of course, there are some ddtails still to iron out but I'm absolutely

convinced we can do this and I know that because we need more drivers

overnight we will need staff on stations because we are absolutely

committed to having visible staff on all of our stations.

This will be welcomed by our employees

The unions say they are behhnd the plans in principle, but do have

They learned of the start date through the ledia.

It's typical of the approach that comes from the Mayor's Office

They are very good at announcing things

There are very detailed discussions that need to happen

about the impact on staff and the impact on passengers.

And the current pay deal runs out in April.

This will certainly affect those negotiations.

But this could be just the beginning for a 24`hour tube in the c`pital.

There is already talk about more 24`hour services such as thd DLR and

Crossrail. This could be just the start. Thank you for joining us

Ed Miliband tells us why he thinks a so`called Mansion Tax is fair for

a city which has more than hts fair share of multi`million pound homes.

A Met firearms officer who won a race and sex discrimination case

against the force has claimdd tonight that she was then

After the employment tribun`l ruled in July ` the Metropolitan Police

then revealed that she was tnder investigation for a string

Yesterday she was told she will not face any criminal charges.

She won her discrimination case against The Met but Carol Howard

still faced a possible crimhnal prosecution. Now no action hs to be

taken against the firearms officer. It's been 13 months of hell. I felt

that my life was put on hold for offences I've always maintahned I

didn't do. In April Carol Howard's tribunal hearing against Thd Met

began and she claimed she h`d been sexually and racially disconnected

against. In July the employlent tribunal ruled in her favour, saying

she had been singled out and targeted by Acting Inspector Dave

Kelly from Sussex. But just days later The Met released detahls

linked to the investigation on suspicion of a string of offences.

She is angry of how The Met gave out information. As a result of that,

that was very malicious. Was it a smear campaign? The tribunal

recognised it was a smear and what they did was malicious. It was

spiteful. One of the allegations was she possessed an indecent ilage of a

child. It was just a picturd of her daughter. To find myself arrested

for a picture, an innocent picture of my own child on my phone, was

deeply upsetting. Especiallx as a result of that being labelldd as a

child predator. It's just absolutely wrong. Carol Howard's legal team has

not ruled out further action against The Met. We are considering for

future actions and options. I suspect there will be more

developments on that in due course. So you haven't ruled out further

legal action? We certainly have not ruled out further legal acthon. As

for releasing details linked to Carol Howard's arrest Scotl`nd Yard

says there was no attempt to deflect attention away from The Met, but the

force says it is deeply regretful of the distress this caused Carol

Howard. Mark Sanders, BBC London News.

A teenage boy accused of killing his 15`year`old

girlfriend on his 15th birthday has recreated in court the loment

Shereka Marsh died after being shot in the neck

Today the boy, who cannot bd named for legal reasons, told a jtry

Alice Bhandhukravi is at thd Old Bailey now, Alice

It's the first time we have heard from the boy, who cannot be named.

He told the court about the events of that Saturday in March, his 5th

birthday. He said he'd agredd to meet his girlfriend, Sherek` Marsh

had been out shopping with friends and had bought him a birthd`y

present. And when he was at how he felt about Shereka Marsh he said

that he couldn't wait to sed her, that they had a very close bond and

that he loved her. He also dxplained that a week earlier he had been

given a gun to hide, and he said he felt under pressure to take this gun

and was not prepared to say who gave him the gun for fear of reprisals.

But suffice to say he had a gun On the day in question he used it, he

says accidentally. Did the court hear how it c`me to be

fired? The 15`year`old defendant, who was

barely 15 at the time, admitted he had been showing off and he said he

had told his girlfriend he had a gun and she asked to see it. He brought

it out of the hiding place hn the bedroom where it was, stored in the

box of an Xbox game. He refdrred to the video game call of duty to

explain how he knew a littld bit about how to handle the gun. He said

he took the trouble to remove the magazine, the storage place for the

bullets, and he said he thotght that had made the gun safe. But ht soon

became clear that the gun w`s not safe. He said he started messing

around with the gun, waving it around as he put it, inadvertently

pulled the trigger and shot Shereka Marsh is sitting barely one foot

away from him and what is shot through the wrist and the ndck and

died later that day. The defendant had already pleaded guilty to

possessing the gun and emission but denies the charges of murder and

manslaughter and the trial continues here at the Old Bailey.

Thank you for joining us. The family of a mother and child who wdre

killed by a train in a suspdcted murder`suicide at Slough st`tion say

they are struggling to come to terms with their deaths. Rubina Khan and

her ten`year`old son were khlled in front of dozens of passengers.

Today, tributes were paid at the mosque attended by the family.

The funeral has taken place of an 82`year`old grandmother who was

found beheaded in her back garden in Edmonton.

concluded that Palmira Silv`'s death was actually due to a stab wound to

25 year`old Nicholas Salvador, from Enfield has been

Ed Miliband has been defendhng his proposals for a tax on homes

It comes after some Labour figures, including potential candidates to

be the next London mayor, raised doubts about his plans

Our political editor Tim Donovan asked the Labour leader why he opted

for a tax which mostly affected the c`pital.

I think that the property t`x on the most expensive homes

I think it is fair that people in the most expensive homes above

We know there isn't much money around.

I could have decided to raise taxes on ordinary families,

on working families who are on much lower incomes and lhve

I don't think that's the right thing to do.

That's why we made the decision we have,

for a specific purpose, to help fund our NHS, which we all benefht from.

But how much of this money, 87% of this tax revenue,

is going to come from London and how much of what it raises is

It will benefit the NHS in London, absolutely.

Well, that depends on exactly how the resources are alloc`ted

But it will benefit London, everybody in London relies

Part of the point here is that we are one United Kingdom and the point

about the NHS is it is funddd by taxation, and that is part of the

redistribution and the fair sharing of resources we have in our country.

But you know that 70,000 properties, it is estimated, are affectdd.

Even Labour figures in London here, mayoral candidates are saying that

People who may be in the property but they by no means

We have said, and it is important, if people have low incomes

but high`value properties wd will look at having a system that allows

them to, for example, pay the tax when they undertake a trans`ction

We understand that particul`r issue that faces people.

The Labour leader speaking to our political editor Tim Donovan who is

now in Westminster. Will those assurances be enough to persuade

people about this tax? We whll probably need to see a bit lore

detail to see how far that count as those individual stories th`t

eventually get the focus of those people in those properties who don't

have that much money. There were other concerns raised by three

mayoral candidates, or potential mayoral candidates, last night on a

fringe in Manchester, Lord @donis, Margaret Hodge and David Lalmy, who

preferred to see a reform of council tax and lots of new bands, luch

lower than 2 million, and they were raising concerns about how luch

money would go back into thd health service. But there are also a lot of

Labour people who say this hs the right thing to do, or the ndcessary

thing to do. Properties over ?2 million are what the experts

describe as prime property, attractive to investors, dolestic

and overseas. And they will say that this is a very important thhng to do

to try and capture some of the value held in these properties by

investors, who see it as a safe haven. Many thanks.

Still to come tonight: Bringing parts of central London to `

standstill. Taxi drivers cl`im they are defending their livelihoods

And I'll be at Biggin Hill, celebrated the role of the Hurricane

Marie in World War II and speaking to one of the female pilots who flew

them. The family of a pregnant wolan who

died along with her unborn child during a botched delivery at Queen's

Hospital in Romford is callhng for dramatic changes to the way the

nursing and midwifery Counchl is run. It's after one of the lidwives

involved wasn't struck off, but suspended for three months. Alex

Bushell reports. Three years ago BBC London News

revealed how Sareena Ali and her She was 27 years old

and expecting her first child with This photo was taken a few hours

before she was to lose her daughter. Both victims of a succession of

failures here at Queen's Hospital. Staff here at the maternity unit

at Queen's tell me they are still haunted by the death of Sardena Ali

and her unborn child. We now know

the senior midwife involved ignored When Sareena Ali slipped

into unconsciousness and went into cardiac arrest that midwife

and he walked out of the door. That midwife has now been stspended

for three months but for thd family For

the judgement to be three months, I honestly haven't got the words to

describe the feeling I have. How can three months justifx

two lives being taken? How can three months prevent other

staff who are meant to be in the care profession, not get aw`y with

being lazy, having an attittde? The family's lawyer is also now

calling for fundamental change in the way that the nursing

and midwifery Council adjudhcates The family who suffered the loss

of a mother and a baby who have not been involved at all in the process,

they didn't know the midwifd was still working, they didn't know

the date of the hearing and they certainly weren't contacted

in a way that I think would have been appropriate by giving ` victim

statement of the impact on them of The NMC will not comment

specifically on this case but the chief executive did tell me

that while they are considering taking victim impact statemdnts

in the future their prioritx has to be to rule objectively on

whether someone is fit to practice. And any suspension is just the

beginning of the process. If a panel decides that somdone

should be suspended from our register for a period of tile then

after that period has elapsdd that individual will need to comd back

and the panel will need to decide whether the suspension should

continue and remain in placd, or whether they are in fact suitable

to go back on the register with As for Queens and its maternity unit

the hospital is adamant lessons have been learned. It's a telling

indictment that it took two people to die for this to be turned around.

One of the things that has really changed in this department hs the

culture. So people have a rdal sense of focus on safety and a re`l sense

of focus on putting the pathent at the centre of everything thdy do.

Standards here have improved, but the fact that one of the senior

midwives involved in the de`th of Serena Ali and her baby has escaped

being struck off has added to the family's anger and grief.

Hundreds of taxi drivers have brought parts

They were staging a protest against regulation, rickshaws,

the cycling super highway and smartphone apps, all of which they

Transport for London described today's protest as regrettable.

Anthony has been a black cab driver for 15 years. And says he owns

?35,000 a year. But he is not happy. It's the rickshaws. Those and

illegal touting of minicabs. You know. And the cycle highway coming

up at the moment. So this afternoon at 2pm, he joined other cabbies to

bring part of London to a h`lt. We are turning right into Powell now

East and it is not moving anywhere. They are blocking the mall,

Shaftesbury Avenue, Charing Cross road. We are not moving at `ll. And

this was Whitehall. The cabbies unhappiness stems from the

rickshaws, looking cabs frol a mobile device and app and a planned

new cycle highway which thex fear will cause more jams. `` looking

cabs. They do nothing about the touting. In the evenings it is

terrible. We will come back until eventually TfL sort themselves out.

At Transport for London HQ, they were monitoring the disrupthon. I

don't really know what todax's protest is about so I am confused.

We are in continuous discussion but there is no need to bring London to

a halt because these discussions are ongoing now. Back on the streets,

some motorists were getting frustrated. I have a job to be at in

ten minutes and I am going to be stuck for another hour. Thex have

jammed it all up. I apologise for the inconvenience but is only for an

hour or two. But it is not `chieving anything, is it? It will evdntually.

The cabs moved off at about 4pm A controversial art show in London

featuring black performers tied up in chains as part of a human zoo has

been cancelled after protests. Exhibit B was due to open ydsterday

at the Barbican Arts Centre but the venue decided not to go ahead

with the show after demonstrators The protesters barbed the doors to

people trying to enter the venue and at that point it became absolutely

clear that we simply couldn't continue with the performance and

safeguard the safety of our staff, the performers and, above all, the

audience. London's Sir Bradley Wiggins has

just become the first British cyclist for 20 years to be crowned

World Time Trial champion. The 34`year`old,

who grew up in Kilburn, was racing His success in Northern Spahn was

his most significant victorx since 2012 when he won the Tour de

France and an Olympic gold ledal. It was a special day for sole

World War II veterans, who gathered at Biggin Hill to remember

the role of the Hurricane fhghter It was also a chance to celdbrate

the unsung heroism of femald pilots. Our reporter, Sarah Harris was also

there and spoke to one of them, It has been many years sincd Mary

was in the pilot seat of thd Hurricane, but she rememberdd it

with pride and excitement. She now admits to being 95, but in her 0s

with a private pilot licensd, she pledged to do her bit for the war

effort by flying planes between airbases so low. In those d`ys we

were all young and we were called the gamma girls because we had a

grey uniform and it was unusual and we went to the RAF stations, of

course, flying from the thatch is and the RAF were very pleasdd to see

us. And we were pleased to see the RAF! It has long been seen `s one of

the turning points of the w`r but veterans are keen it is the robust

Hurricane, not just the fastest Spitfire, that is recognised as the

power in the Allied Air Force. Young women pilots like Mary had `n

essential role in preparing the aircraft for battle. Absolutely

vital to carry a plane from one field to another with their envelope

and instructions as to wherd they had to go, and they would c`rry out

their duty. Despite being shot at and having to make two emergency

landings, Mary continued to fly for the last two years of World War II.

Not willing to compromise on her hairdo, she did not wear a helmet,

much to the surprise of somd of her colleagues! We just put on ` scarf,

and one day I was flying along and another aeroplane came along and I

tried to waive him away, and I saw it was a man in there! And he must

have been so surprised to sde me with a scarf on! 74 years after the

Battle of Britain, the veterans are eager to sing the praises of the

Hurricane and the gutsy young women like Mary who did their bit in

winning the battle of the skies Such respect for Mary and hdr

colleagues. Let's get a check on the we`ther,

with Chris Fawkes. For many of us, it has been a

glorious afternoon. We lost those showers and in the sunshine it felt

pleasantly warm. This is a couple of degrees warmer than it should be.

In the towns and cities, it won t get particularly cold, with

temperatures at around 9 degrees. But head out into the countryside

and it gets pretty chilly under those clear skies, so we're looking

at Lowes down to two or thrde degrees. A nice start to thd morning

tomorrow and a dry day as wdll but as we head into the afternoon, we

will start to see some highdr cloud moving down from the North West and

initially that makes the sunshine more hazy, but then it clouds over

with limited bright or sunnx spells. The odd shower over the Chilterns

but essentially a dry picture. A similar picture to what we had

today. On Friday, we have a cold front pushing its way south and east

but it is bumping into this area of high pressure sat across sotthern

England. So quite a weak front. Generally on Friday, more cloud

around and that will be thick enough to give a few bits and piecds of

rain come the afternoon. We could see highs of 22 degrees and that is

pretty warm for the time of year. Looking ahead to the weekend, high

pressure will build across the British Isles, and though it starts

pretty cloudy on Saturday, by the time we get to Sunday, we start to

draw up these southerly winds, so the cloud will break up, Sunday will

be largely sunny, and we ard looking at temperatures of 23 on Sunday

afternoon. Not bad at all! The Prime Minister is recalling

Parliament on Friday to discuss the UK's role in air strikes

against Islamic state in Ir`q. The Iraqi government has asked

Britain for help fighting IS. Detectives searching for

the missing teenager Alice Gross are in Latvia to try to learn more about

their main suspect, Arnis Z`lkalns. He was jailed there for sevdn

years for killing his wife. A teenage boy accused of shooting

his 15`year`old girlfriend, Shereka Marsh, in Hackney in March,

has told a jury at the Old Bailey And the Tube is to run

a 24`hour service at weekends The overnight service will coincide

with the start of the Asad Ahmad will be here with

our late news. So, from me and the team here,

thanks for joining us