29/09/2014 BBC News at One

A two-year freeze on working-age benefits.

Chancellor George Osborne outlines his plans to cut the welfare bill.

At the Tory Party conference he also announces plans to cut tax

He says only the Conservatives can be trusted with the economy.

It is the economy that creates jobs. It is the economy that pays for

hospitals, that puts food on the table. We are the only party in

Britain where the plan to fix the economy.

We'll be getting the latest from the Tory Party Conference in Birmingham.

Islamic State militants are reported dangerously close to the Iraqi

capital Baghdad, as allied air strikes continue.

Hundreds gather at a memorial service for the teacher stabbed

Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters shut down the centre

of Hong Kong, as demonstrations spread to other areas.

The party gets into full swing, as Europe's golfers celebrate

Why being sent to a specialist centre rather than A

could double your chances of surviving a cardiac arrest.

The second attempt to extradite a mafia fugitive who lived

Good afternoon and welcome to the BBC News at One.

George Osborne has promised that a future Conservative government would

impose further cuts on the welfare bill in order to reduce the deficit.

Speaking to the Conservative Party Conference in

Birmingham within the last hour, he said that if they won power, a range

of benefits would be frozen for two years saving ?3 billion.

Pensions and disability benefits would not be affected.

Mr Osborne warned that the nation's debt was still "dangerously high",

but insisted the government's long term economic plan was working.

Our political correspondent Carole Walker sent this report.

The Chancellor was in upbeat mood this morning on his visit to the

Jaguar Land Rover factory. A growing workforce. The police to take the

cameras as he ceased to take the focus back to the economy. His

announcement he is abolishing the death tax one more positive

headlines after a weekend dominated by defections to UKIP and a

resignation. Tory supporters have welcomed the move to cut taxes of

those who inherit a pension pot. He has also been stressing the

difficult decisions he will have to take to tackle the nation's debts.

He told the conference his long-term economic plan is working but huge

risks remain with the national debt dangerously high. Here are the

facts. The latest Treasury estimate is that to eliminate the deficit

requires a further ?25 billion of permanent public spending is the

rings -- public spending savings. The option of taxing your way out of

the deficit no longer exists if it ever did. He warned this would mean

more cuts after the election, targeting first the ?100 billion

welfare bill. Working age benefits in Britain will have to be frozen

for two years. This is the choice Britain needs to take to protect our

economic stability and to secure a better future. The fairest way to

reduce welfare bills is to make sure benefits are not rising faster than

the wages of the taxpayers paying for them. Pensions and maternity pay

will not be affected but the freeze will affect child benefit,

jobseeker's allowance, income support and working tax credit and

save the billion pounds which will be used to cut the deficit. The

other big announcement was aimed at the other end of the scale, big

business 's and a crackdown on tax avoidance. -- technology companies

go to extraordinary lengths to pay little or no tax. If you abuse our

tax system you abuse the trust of the British people and my message is

clear, we will put a stop to it. Low taxes that are paid. The benefit

cuts have probed -- provoked outcry amongst families struggling to make

ends meet. George Osborne wants to show he is serious about tackling

the debt. Our home editor is with me now. Cutting the welfare bill. Who

is this going to affect? This is for working age benefits. Particularly

jobseeker's allowance, income support, child benefit, tail and

working tax credit. It makes for a good headline. -- child. It is

currently ?168 billion. Less than 1% of the total welfare bill. The other

change was to reduce the welfare cap. These changes coming in should

they be elected in 2016, if the welfare cap is reduced it would go

down to ?23,000 a year. This will not save very much money. The

current caps, cap -- cap, it might add a bit more to that. It might

tell us whether the Conservatives... Where their

priorities lie. Let's speak to our assistant

political editor Norman Smith, This makes for a good headline,

particularly in the Tory press. My view is this was a political

curveball. It is extraordinary in many ways because usually a chance

all at his last conference beach before a general election is making

promises and trying to lift spirits. -- conference speech. ?25 billion

still to be saved. His hope is confidence and candour, that voters

will reward him for the government being successful in bringing down

the deficit so far. Plaudits for levelling with the British people

about the scale of the challenge we face as a country in tackling the

deficit. The Conservative MP Mark Pritchard

is to lodge a formal complaint to the new press regulator about

the actions of a freelance reporter He's one of several Tories

approached by the journalist, who had posed

as a young female Conservative One of his colleagues,

Brooks Newmark, resigned from the government on Saturday,

after allegations that he sent The headlines were embarrassing, but

the MP was the victim of deception. Brooks Newmark thought he was

exchanging explicit photos with a 23-year-old Conservative Party

worker. It was a male freelance reporter. He was not the only MP to

be targeted. Those complaining about press standards are furious. It is

about subterfuge. When do journalists have the right to use

that kind of trickery? I do not think they had any information to go

on, so it was a fishing expedition, and if we allow that and accept that

then we are licensing journalists and anybody else to go fishing in

our private lives for whatever they might fade. The timing, at the start

of the Tory conference, created maximum impact. Other Conservative

MPs were targeted. One has complained to the police and the new

press regulator. The Miller says Brooks Newmark is part of a group

which aims to encourage women into politics. They said the story was in

the public interest. If you have the Minister for Civic Society charged

with getting more women into politics who seems to be interested

in getting them into his bed, that is in the public interest. Brooks

Newmark has said he was a fool and had no one to blame but himself, but

the new press regulator with much to prove his its first high-profile

complaints to deal with. -- has its first.

There are reports of fierce fighting between Iraqi

government forces and Islamist militants to the west of Baghdad.

Islamic State fighters were held off with the help of air strikes

by the US-led coalition, but the militants didn't retreat.

In some places, the jihadists are said to be very

Our correspondent Christian Fraser is here with

We are only a week into the air strikes on Syria, but the bombing of

Islamic State targets in Iraq has been ongoing since 8th August.

Yet no sign their control over these areas in orange is slipping.

They still hold Mosul, Iraq's second largest city, and the

Today they are engaging the Iraqi army here in Amriyat al-Fallujah,

We can speak to our Chief International Correspondent

Yes. Reports are reaching us almost everyday of heavy fighting close to

the capital. Iraqi air strikes were called in as gunmen and soldiers

struggled to push back these so-called Islamic State fighters who

were tackling a strategic town 25 miles west of Baghdad. That

intervention helped to repel the attack, but there is a stand-off

along the main route used for logistics by the Iraqi army. We were

able to visit the protected belt around Baghdad yesterday and we were

with two powerful people tasked with keeping the enemy out of Baghdad and

pointed to how some of the IS fighters are as close as five miles

away. The IS fighters are still able to attack and threaten even the

capital, Baghdad. The CIA thinks Islamic

State has 30,000 fighters. Some estimates put

the figure much higher. Whatever the number, they are

proving themselves highly capable of For far too long they were dismissed

as fanatics without any real plan. The remnants of Al-Qaeda in Iraq

who could be crushed at will. Did they underestimate

Islamic State? It seems

the Americans are reassessing. Over the past couple of years

during the chaos of the civil war where essentially

you had huge swathes of the country that are completely ungoverned, they

were able to reconstitute themselves It is led by this man,

the new figurehead of global jihad. Islamic State is

different to Al-Qaeda. It is run by a council

of former Iraqi generals who can bring conventional

and guerrilla tactics and terrorism. They have already taken Mosul,

Iraq's second biggest city. Today they are fighting

25 miles from Baghdad. Not to take the capital

but to undermine it. They want air strikes to

concentrate around Baghdad in order to relieve the other units

of the Islamic State and also there They want to create

a divide within Baghdad along with Since the air strikes began

Islamic State tactics have changed. They are dispersing

into smaller groups. This weekend the RAF tornadoes

returned to base along with It is proving difficult

to identify the targets. What Islamic State is hoping to do

is render the air campaign useless. Sucking in the ground forces

of the Shia led Iraqi army, It's the kind of resistance that

will win it support in Sunni Arab countries and help it to recruit

even more would-be jihadists. Thousands of people are attending

a memorial service for Ann Maguire, the teacher stabbed to death

at a Leeds school in April. Her family have spoken publicly

for the first time about their loss, describing her as a "dedicated

wife" and "natural mother". Her daughter, Emma, says they've

been comforted by the community. Our correspondent Danny Savage is

in Leeds. This service was due to be taking

place around the corner at the Catholic cathedral but because so

many people were expected it was moved to this bigger venue. It is

packed inside and there are people standing outside. These are friends

and colleagues and people from the city who wanted to pay tribute to

Ann Maguire along with her family. You This lunch time people packed

into remember Ann Maguire. A formal, meticulously planned tribute to a

teacher who taught at the same school over four decades. They

queued for hours to get in and all have their own personal reason for

being here. Within seconds of opening her mouth on the first

lesson of the subject, she got you liking the subject. She was an

amazing, passionate educator of our young people. At the front was Ann

Maguire's family. Five months on, things have not got any easier for

her family, including two nephews she adopted as her own when her

sister died. They spoke to me at the family home about what they hoped

today's events would achieve. I would hope the memorial service

would reflect Ann's life and help people connect to her life because

she was a very special individual. She did the everyday things in a

very special way. We really want mum's legacy to be something that

stands for everything she was. She taught for 40 years and will have

affected thousands of pupils' lives, shaping their career choices and

decisions they made in their life. They have always been aware of the

public support for them, and they say it has been a great comfort. At

this afternoon's service, they saw and heard some of those sentiments

in a specially prepared film. Just perfect, passionate. Fantastic.

Amazing. Extraordinary. Exceptional. An angel. This has underlined what

the special person Ann Maguire was to so many people but the pledge

that her legacy will continue. Ann Maguire's funeral was a very

private occasion but her memorial service is more public. We are

expecting to hear from the family on the steps outside the town hall

shortly when the service finishes, and a 16-year-old is due to go on

trial for her murder in a few weeks' time.

Rescue teams in Japan have resumed their search

for survivors after a dramatic volcano eruption on Saturday.

At least 30 people are thought to have been killed when Mount Ontake

unexpectedly shot plumes of rock and ash into the air, covering victims

Rescue efforts were suspended because of high levels of toxic,

Rupert Wingfield-Hayes sent this report.

Day three since this mountain suddenly exploded into life, it

continues to spew smoke and ash into the sky. On Sunday soldiers had

climbed up here to rescue survivors. Today they began the task of

recovering the dead. We watched as this helicopter repeatedly headed

back into the ash cloud to collect the bodies. In the end of the day,

at least 12 have been brought down, but many more remain stuck close to

the crater, unable to be recovered. Even down here, four miles away from

the summit, there is a strong smell of sulphur and you can feel this

fine, acrid dust falling all the time. The fact that this eruption is

still going on is making the recovery operation much more

difficult. In Tokyo, Japan's prime minister was still calling it a

rescue operation. TRANSLATION: We will keep doing our best to rescue

people and we will be cautious and on alert for further eruptions. Why

there was no warning of Saturday 's eruption is still not clear.

Hundreds of hikers were caught on the volcano. This video shot by one

hiker shows the horrifying moment the massive ash cloud rolls down and

envelops him. Another describes what it was like. TRANSLATION: It was

terrifying. The rock was falling like hail stones. We covered our

faces with anything we could find. We couldn't breathe or even open our

eyes. Despite the Prime Minister 's commitment to keep searching, it now

seems all but impossible that anybody else could have survived out

here for three days. Our top story: A two-year freeze on working age

benefits, George Osborne outlines his plans to cut the welfare bill,

saying it will save ?3 billion. Still to come: This entire area of

the Somerset Levels nine months ago was submerged by flood water. Today

work starts to try to prevent that from happening ever again. On BBC

London: The technology companies helping to train the next generation

of computer coders. The British youth Olympian hoping these skiing

stunts will boost traditional winter sports.

Thousands of pro-democracy protestors in Hong

Kong are continuing to demonstrate, occupying a main road in

They've defied police firing tear gas and ignored appeals to go home.

Hong Kong's chief executive has urged people to keep calm,

and has ordered the police to maintain social order.

The protestors are angry at China's refusal to allow people

The authorities say the protest is illegal.

The Foreign Office says it's watching developments with concern.

From Hong Kong, our correspondent Martin Patience sent this report.

It is one of the world's mightiest financial centres, but again today

pro-democracy protesters brought Hong Kong's business district to a

standstill. Companies were closed and the stock market slumped. This

is the largest campaign of civil disobedience in Hong Kong since

Britain returned the territory to China in 1997. What the protesters

want is a free and fair vote to elect Hong Kong's leader, but

Beijing says all the candidates must be preapproved in order to ensure

loyalty to China. You have two competing visions that cannot be

easily reconciled and the danger is that as these protests continue, the

situation could spiral out of control. We are furious over what

the police have done. The tear gas, the guns, it is unnecessary. We are

peaceful, we have no weapons so why have they done this? We want every

person to have voting rights. Last night Hong Kong police used tear gas

to try to end the protest. The move failed and has provoked defiance.

Britain has expressed concern over the situation in Hong Kong, but

China warned other countries not to interfere. TRANSLATION: We are

resolutely opposed to any foreign country using any method to

interfere with China's internal affairs and we are resolutely

opposed to any country attempting in any way to support such illegal

activities like occupy central. Beijing will want the streets

cleared as quickly as possible, fearing that they may inspire

similar demonstrations elsewhere in China.

Large parts of the Somerset Levels were under water last winter.

Villages were left isolated and homes evacuated as a result

40 square miles of the Levels were swamped, with 200

homes affected, and according to the county council, the cost to regional

It was a hard time for many residents, who had only

just started to recover from serious flooding a year earlier.

Since the crisis, measures to improve flood protection schemes

have been stepped up, and today, work will begin to raise parts

Our correspondent John Maguire is in Beer Wall.

That work has just started this morning, you can see the diggers

preparing to dig underneath the main road, and in this village a few

miles away, they will raise this road by four feet. It is an

engineering solution to a natural problem. When the waters rose across

the Somerset Levels last winter, vast tracts of farmland were

submerged and communities were cut off. Nine months on, and James

Winslade, a farmer, is just one of the many waiting to move back in. He

welcomes the flood prevention work. It is enough for this year because

we are going to run out of time. We need to keep going year-on-year,

doing maintenance and upgrading. It is a good start. A 20 year action

plan is being put into place, from dredging to drainage to raising main

roads by as much as four feet in places, so will it work? If we have

the same level of rainfall we had last year, the A372 should remain

open. Although this land is designed to flood, it is also designed to

drain, but this year that process took a long time. Too long. Part of

this main road were submerged for weeks and it has been at risk for a

generation. This covert was built in the 1970s,

it can handle around 17 tonnes of flood water per second. So they are

digging a second call vote, it will double the capacity to 35 tonnes of

flood water per second and that should mean the A372 behind me does

not flood again. After decades of underinvestment, the money is now

being spent at a pace. This amount of work in such a short timescale is

unprecedented. Somerset has attracted millions of pounds

historically but never has it been spent in such a short time and on

such a tight timescale. So this road is closed once again and will remain

so for around 11 weeks, a small price to pay though if these scenes

can be avoided in years ahead. No one is quite sure how much the

winter's flooding cost locals, the economy and the county of Somerset.

Estimates of ?40 million and above, so there is determination here that

what has happened for the last two winters cannot be allowed to happen

again. There was no need for a miracle at Gleneagles yesterday

after the Europeans comfortably saw off the Americans in the Ryder Cup.

The American captain, Tom Watson, has come under a lot of criticism

for the heavy defeat but Europe's captain was delighted with his

side's performance. Paul McGinley with his family and a spot of

silverware, the morning after Europe's Ryder Cup supremacy had

been thrillingly confirmed. Jamie Donaldson's pinpoint precision

securing their eighth win from the last ten competitions, a triumph for

the players but dedicated to the fans. The pleasure we have given as

a team to so many people, you just look at the crowd yesterday and you

see people high-fiving each other when they don't know each other and

that makes it special. The site of the victorious European captain has

become an increasingly familiar one recently. It used to be the US that

dominated the Ryder Cup, how things have changed. Last night the

American recriminations had already begun. Star player Phil Mickelson

questioning the tactics of his captain, but as his team headed home

this morning, Watson had no regrets. The issue between Phil and myself,

it is basically a difference of opinion and he has a difference of

opinion about the way he would like to manage the team, and I simply had

my own opinion about how to manage the team. If the United States seem

disunited, Europe's spirits are undeniable. This, it seems, is now

part for the course. Two days after their wedding

in Venice, actor George Clooney and human

rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin, have The couple smiled and waved

as their boat was surrounded by a flotilla carrying photographers

and onlookers. Hollywood stars such as Matt Damon

and Bill Murray were among the guests at the highly

anticipated three day wedding. Time for a look at the weather.

Here's Louise Lear. September has been lovely and it

looks like we will finish the final few days on a similar note. Feeling

warm for the next couple of days, the driest of the weather in the

east but there are indications of things starting to change as we move

towards next weekend. One of the reasons September has been so

settled is due to this jet stream. It has been sitting to the north of

the UK, steering the weather fronts to the north and allowing quiet

weather conditions to continue. It has allowed the high pressure across

Europe to be a dominant feature, but today we are drugging up some warm,

moist air from the near continent, sparking a change across England and

Wales after the glorious weekend. Some showers dotted around. If you

catch them, they could be heavy, possibly thundery, but pretty hit

and miss. For Northern Ireland, England and Scotland, it will be

feeling reasonably pleasant, but I suspect as we go through to the

early part of the evening some of the showers will linger across

northern England, slowly drifting away into the North Sea. More of a

breeze developing across England and Wales so hopefully not as much as a

threat with some fog forming through the night. We start off tomorrow

with some rain pushing into the west, some of it for a time will be

quite heavy, slowly easing by the afternoon, brushing the fringes of

Wales on the south-west. To the ease of that -- east of that, high

temperatures to close out September. During Wednesday, a band of cloud

and a spot of rain, but behind it fresher and cleaner conditions with

more sunshine coming into Scotland. I suspect Wednesday into Thursday

will be quite a chilly start. Here is the change from Friday onwards,

some wet and windy weather starting to arrive. Gales coming in, and that

will start to drive cooler air from the north. It never really gets all

the way down to the south but a noticeable difference as we approach

the end of the week. Turning unsettled, windy

the end of the week. Turning unsettled, windy conditions, and

potentially some significant rain. A reminder of our top story: A

two-year freeze on working age benefits, George Osborne outlines

his plans to cut the welfare bill, saying it will save ?3 billion.