20/01/2014 BBC News at Six

suspended. A test of Nick Clegg's leadership after Lord Rennard

refuses to apologise to women who alleged sexual harassment. It is

right that people and set for their actions and apologise when they have

done wrong. We will assess the damage to the

party. Mikaeel Kular's mother is charged

with his murder, his body was discovered on Friday.

A report says the organisation representing policemen and women

needs changing. Top to bottom. Nicolas Anelka's

salute costs West Bromwich Albion their sponsor.

A cosmic wake-up call for the Rosetta space probe, scientists wait

to see if it has woken from a deep sleep.

On BBC London News, the chairman of an enquiry into airport expansion

criticises the best for failing to recognise his findings. A coroner

calls for a doctor to be suspended over the treatment of a

four-year-old who died. Good evening, welcome. Lord

Rennard, the man credited with transforming the Liberal Democrats'

electoral chances has been suspended from the party after refusing to

apologise over allegations of sexual harassment.

It follows an independent enquiry which recommended the issue and

apology, though it found insufficient evidence to back up the

accusations. He was suspended while the party investigate if he has

brought them into disrepute. In a personal statement, he said he

regretted any hurt that had been caused, but he said he had been the

victim of a lynch mob then pelleted against some Liberal Democrats.

Nick Clegg wants his party to be seen as competent, fair, but he is

caught in a row that suggests the opposite. It is tearing his party

into, it centres on this man, Lord Rennard, the Liberal Democrats'

former chief executive. To his supporters, and electoral mastermind

who made them a party of government, to his accusers, a man who sexually

harassed staff. Either way, he is no longer a Liberal Democrat, suspended

pending a new investigation, a decision he may challenge in the

courts. It is important we do things properly, there will be due process,

and people who made complaint about him will have their case heard, and

so will he. He has always denied sexually harassing staff. The party

investigation said the claims could not be proven but were credible. His

refusal to apologise has prompted another enquiry, into whether he has

brought the party into disrepute. In a statement, he spoke of how

enormously distressed he was, what he called a smear campaign, and

lynch mob mentality from some party members, which led him to the depths

of depression and consideration of self harm. He said he never intended

to hurt, in Paris or upset anyone, but, I will not offer an apology, he

said, because people should not say what they do not mean. He has been

through a year of hell, people might have been driven close to suicide by

the publicity and humiliation he has suffered and through the

newspapers, day after day after day. This is a good man who has been

punished by the party, and the leadership seems to be showing scant

regard for due process. One of the women who worked alongside him in

the House of Lords and who had complained about his behaviour said

he should not be allowed to return. He should not be readmitted. I am

happy to go through a disciplinary procedure about him being a party

member, but it is untenable for the Liberal Democrats to have a credible

voice on equalities and women's issues in the future if he was

actually allowed to be back on the benches in the House of Lords. A row

about one party member here may seem rather historic and internal, but it

matters because of the potential damage it could do to the party.

Making it less attractive to women voters and giving an impression of

incompetence and weak leadership. It is a close-knit family, there are

45,000 party members, everybody knows Chris Rennard, many people

have met him and lots of people know the women who have made the

allegations. It is a bit like a family at war. It is a board that is

not over yet, the prospect of legal action could mean the scrutiny

continues into the summer, which means into the European elections.

A family at war, how much damage is this doing to the party? One of Nick

Clegg's electoral priorities is to try and persuade people that this is

a sensible, competent party of government, and the risk is this

point people in the other direction, they look at the way this has been

handed -- handled and they ask, is this the way -- is this a party that

is fit for government, operating at its most competent? Many people in

the party say, is this the best way to appeal to younger voters, female

voters, especially ahead of the European elections? What the party

hopes is that by this relatively decisive action today, to suspend

Lord Rennard, not just from his group in the House of Lords but from

the party entirely, that that will draw a line under the crisis in the

short-term, it will mean there is an investigation that will carry on,

that can reach a conclusion at the end, and hopefully reach a

resolution before the European elections. But in the last few

minutes, Lord Rennard has issued a statement in which he says he does

not wish to see legal action between fellow party members, but he says,

in light of the decision taken against him today, he is having to

take legal advice with a view to civil action against the party. Now,

we have the prospect of legal action tracking this process out even

longer. That can only do damage to a party ahead of these elections.

The mother of three-year-old Mikaeel Kular has been charged with his

murder. The body of rusted: 's son was found on Friday night.

Her appearance in court room number four in the building behind me was

brief, it lasted just a couple of minutes. As is normal in

first-quarter appearances here, and as of the public and media were not

allowed in to hear the charges. A lone policeman stood guard outside.

Shortly before midday, a large police presence for a van arriving

at court. It is believed it may have been transporting the woman accused

of murdering her son. She had reported Mikaeel Kular missing on

Thursday morning, hundreds of volunteers had joined police within

hours to search for him. But at midnight on Friday, police announced

they had found his body, near his former home in Kirkcaldy. His mother

was charged under her married name. Her first appearance in this court

was in Private, it was here that she was formally told she would face two

charges on of murder and of attempting to defeat the ends of

justice. She appeared in court on the day children returned to the

nursery for the first time since learning of his death. Just about to

take my son in, I am devastated, even when we found out, looking at

his empty peg, it is horrible. The police continued their search of the

area near where the body was found. His mother made no plea or

declaration during her court appearance. Tonight, she was

remanded in custody and is expected to appear in Private again next

Tuesday. Tonight, police have written to

parents whose children attended his nursery, asking any of them who saw

or spoke to the young boy or her mother -- his mother between Monday

and Wednesday last week to get in touch.

Far reaching changes from top to bottom are needed in the Police

Federation, according to an independent review. It talks of

infighting and a lack of professionalism, the organisation

represents 130,000 officers. It accuses some of being interested in

political gains in light of the so-called Plebgate affair.

Ministers have been heckled at Police Federation conferences.

Today's report says a change of culture is needed to do away with

petty politics and internal squabbling. There is evidence, it

says, bad behaviour by officials and their lack of openness and

transparency. I will not be able to tell you everything you want to

hear. There is no doubt police numbers and resources have been cut

and that the federation is not happy. I believe you are a disgrace.

The report's author says the personal attacks and political

campaigning are damaging. It weakens their influence, but actually, it

does not represent the kind of integrity and impartiality bonbons

from the police service. This organisation represents that

service, it has two have high standards, so it can stand up for

high standards in policing. The current national leadership

commissioned the report after the Plebgate scandal. The campaign

against police cut in West Mersea, and allegations federation officials

tried to discredit Andrew Mitchell, whose friends welcomed the report.

The Police Federation is a very divided organisation, with a fight

with each other, they fight against other people, and it shows they are

not fit for purpose. 18 months after this all started here in Downing

Street, the report calls for new standards of professionalism and

openness. In particular, financial openness. After nine months of

trying, this review failed to get various local Police Federation is

to reveal how much money they have got stashed away in some of their

bank accounts. It could be as much as ?30 million. If that was hard,

how hard would it be for the national leadership to reform the

Police Federation? If we do not bring about the reforms that are

necessary, reform will be done to us, so we can shape our own destiny.

One incentive to the members, the federation has such a large

financial surplus, it is offering to cut subscriptions by a quarter next

year. Kent Police own more than 30

motorists involved in the huge pile of last year will avoid prosecution

if they go on driver alertness courses. 150 vehicles collided in

fog at Sheppey in September. Eight people suffered serious injuries and

200 others were treated at the scene.

The long awaited peace talks over the crisis in Syria, due to start on

Wednesday, have been thrown into disarray before they have begun. It

follows a last-minute invitation from the event, asking Iran to

attend. Severe's main opposition group has threatened to pull out

unless the invitation is withdrawn. Almost three years of increasingly

brutal conflict in Syria has ripped the country to shreds. The Western

powers unable to stop all of this are desperate for peace talks. The

UN blame President Assad for most of the war crimes and say half the

population depend on humanitarian aid. But the president is still in

power, he still labels his opponents as terrorists. TRANSLATION:

Terrorism is rife everywhere, but only in Syria, but in neighbouring

countries as well. -- not only in Syria. It is possible for the Geneva

conference to be a dialogue between Syrians. But now, will the peace

process happen at all? Will they talk? The idea is that the president

will have representatives at the talks, Western governments hope,

with no certainty, his side will sacrifice him in return for a

power-sharing deal with the opposition. But the opposition is

deeply divided. Only the Western backed Syrian National Coalition has

been invited, not those regarded as extremists, the Islamists and

jihadist. These factions are fighting each other, able within a

war. Then, the big international supporters of the opposing sides.

Saudi Arabia is nominally a Western ally, but is a source of money and

weapons to militant groups the West finds unacceptable. On the other

side, Iran, supporting the President Assad regime with fighters, guns and

money. But now, arguments over Iran's part in any peace effort have

put the entire process in doubt. The UN invited Iran on the basis it

accepted future power-sharing, something Iran still publicly

reject. Ban Ki-Moon has been warned by the United States to withdraw the

invitation or the opposition will pull out. TRANSLATION: Red meat

appeal for everybody to keep the needs of the Syrian people foremost

in mind. The Foreign Secretary is in the American camp but worries the

peace process could collapse. We have no problem in principle of Iran

attending, but it has to be in the same basis as all of the rest of us.

On Saturday, some of the opposition leaders voted to join the talks. Now

Iran has been invited, they are threatening to pull out. Iran want

to kill Bashar al-Assad, what do we do? The chaos is reflected in

political chaos around possible peace talks. The agony for severe's

people intensifies every day. Our main headline... The Liberal

Democrats in crisis, as their former election mastermind has been

suspended from the party. Still to come, the waiting game - scientists

are watching to see if the Rosetta space probe will wake up. Later on

BBC London, the former Olympic venue which has now got holes in the

floor. A major international net all tournament is abandoned there.

A BBC investigation has found that criminal gangs are helping

householders to steal gas and electricity I tampering with their

supply. British Gas says the gangs are risking causing explosions and

endangering lives. The theft costs the industry up to ?500 million a

year, which is passed on to customers. Emma Simpson reports.

Meet the power theft investigators. They have had a tip-off about this

eight bedroomed mansion in Essex. I think the back of that house and the

garage is coming off an supply which is not metered. There we have it.

All of the power coming through these two meters is not being built,

they are getting it free. The illegal supply is cut off. It will

not be restored until an estimated ?6,000 in stolen energy is paid for.

But there could be an even greater cost for those who tamper with their

meters. It is extremely dangerous just if people start interfering

with their meters, in the case of gas, it can lead to an explosion. In

the case of electricity, it can lead to fires and electrocution. But it

is not only households which are stealing power. We heard from one

convicted crewmen who received a suspended sentence for digging up a

street and illegally connecting electricity to more than 1500 homes.

British Gas says energy theft is now a huge problem, with some ?500

million of it being stolen every year. That is adding around ?30 to

customers' bills. Catching the thieves is costly. When they do, the

lights may go out, but the rest of us will still end up paying.

The property website Zoopla is to end its sponsorship of West Bromwich

Albion at the end of the season, because of a row around a gesture

made by one of the strikers at the club. Nicolas Anelka made the

"quenelle" gesture, which is alleged to have anti-Semitic associations,

hearing a Premier League match. Our correspondent Sian Lloyd is at West

Ridge Albion's ground. How damaging Will this be to the club? This deal

was worth ?3 million over two years. Zoopla is honouring the

contract until the end of the season, when it was due for renewal

anyway. The fans are arriving this evening for their home game against

Everton. It is the first under their new manager Pepe Mel. Nicolas Anelka

may well be playing just controversy continues to surround the French

striker. The FA is investigating him after his celebratory gesture, made

after scoring against West Ham in December. The gesture is known as

the "quenelle", which is hugely controversial and widely condemned

in France as being anti-Semitic. The property website Zoopla has today

said that it will not be renewing its sponsorship deal. It still says

it is the proud sponsor of the club. It is part owned by a Jewish

businessman, and it is understood the company is extremely unhappy

about the decision of the club to continue to play Anelka. The club

has not commented this evening. The FA will be making its findings known

soon. The inquest into the death of a red arrows pilot has been told

that potentially life-threatening problems with his ejector seat had

not been revealed to the RAF. Flight Lieutenant Sean Cunningham died from

multiple injuries when he was ejected 300 feet into the air while

his jet was still on the ground in 2011. Concerns about the assembly of

the parts of the seat, which affected its parachute, were raised

with the manufacturer over 20 years ago. Both the Government and Labour

have been talking tough on welfare benefits today. The work and in

Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, says new migrant workers from Europe will

be unable to claim Housing benefit from April just meanwhile, his

opposite number, Rachel Reeves, has said a Labour government would

introduce Monday to retraining for job-seekers. Those refusing will

lose their job-seekers allowance. Mark Easton reports just -- Mark

Easton reports. The question over welfare looks set to dominate the

next election, with the parties competing to sound tough. You need

that basic maths and English, don't you? In her first major announcement

as Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Rachel Reeves revealed

her plan to stop some unemployed people getting benefit if they will

not study to improve their skills. Under the Labour party proposal,

anyone signing on for job-seekers allowance without basic skills in

maths, English or IT will be required to go back to college for

extra classes. They must pass the exams or be told to do more

training. If they refuse training, they lose the benefit. Is the

message really, we are even tougher than the Tories on welfare? Well,

this policy is tough. People have got to take the training which is

offered to them, and if they are offered a job, they have to take

it, otherwise there will be sanctions. But it is also a

government doing its part in making sure people have the skills they

need to access jobs. The Department for Work and Pensions says Jobcentre

staff can already oblige claimants to get basic skills training. But

the Labour plan would make it standard pack this. That is

diabolical. The lazy should not have the opportunity to claim benefits.

You need to get those skills in. So, as Labour announces what it

hopes will be seen as a hard but fair policy on welfare, Conservative

ministers are also announcing proposals for tougher rules on the

benefits that immigrants can claim. Welfare Secretary Iain Duncan Smith

says that from April, new EU migrants will no longer be able to

claim Housing benefit if they are receiving job-seekers allowance.

Anybody who wants to come here needs to be coming to look for work and to

take work, and to make contributions, not to come because

the benefits system is more generous. However, the European

Commission says EU states are not obliged to provide housing benefit,

and after three months, jobless migrants can be sent home if they

cannot afford to support themselves. Both parties are terrified about

public opinion, with just months to go before the European elections.

One of the issues they are frightened of is public opposition

to welfare. The proposals trumpeted by Conservative and Labour today are

both criticised as changing very little but with voters enthusiastic

for Welfare Reform Bill we can expect many more tough sounding

ideas in the coming weeks and months.

At ten o'clock this morning, an alarm clock allsorts sounded in

space. It happened on a probe which has had all of its systems shut down

for two years to save energy. In the last few minutes we have heard that

the alarm system worked, and tonight, the Rosetta probe is back

in action. It was launched in 2004 by the European Space Agency. It has

travelled 500 million miles from the Earth. Its mission is to put a

robotic lander onto a comet to discover more about how the solar

system came into existence. David Shukman reports. A vast lump of rock

and ice, blasts of vapour bursting from its surface. This animation of

a comet shows the mysterious and hostile world that a spacecraft will

try to land on. Throughout human history, the glowing tails of comets

have proved both frightening and enchanting. They have remained far

beyond reach, until now. It is an audacious project, it is a huge

mission, doing things we have never done before. We have had previous

missions to comets, just flying by, taking snapshots, from hundreds but

Rosetta is going to get up, close and personal with a comet. It was

nearly ten years ago that the Rosetta spacecraft was launched. You

need patience to be a space scientist, because only now is it

approaching its key phase. Is extraordinary mission will try

something incredibly daring. It is powered by solar panels, 14 metres

long, because being so far away, the rays of the sun are far weaker than

we are used to. Rosetta's journey has seen it go past Mars, using the

gravity of the planet to speed up on a series of orbits, all the time

accelerating so that it can catch up with the comic it is after, its

destination. This has taken Rosetta out towards Jupiter. It is now

circling back in, gaining on the comet, and if all goes well, it will

close in for the first ever attempt to touch down on one of these

bizarre objects. First, Rosetta will orbit the comet, getting pictures

and choosing a landing site. Then, it will release a small craft which

will descend to the surface. Comets are older than the planets, so we

may learn if they brought us water and the building blocks for life.

Comets act as a time travel capsule. From the start of the solar system,

more than 4.6 billion years ago, they contain the earliest water and

organic material which was there before the planets formed. So we

will be able to understand where our water on Earth, and where we, came

from. So, how the solar system evolved, and how, from a swirl of

rocks, we eventually got the planets, and then life, are

questions which this mission may help answer.

That brings us to the weather, with John Hammond. Back down to earth

with some fairly wintry hazards. Fog is already thickening up. There will

be a frost around in the morning as well. Most of the frost and fog

across central and east parts of the UK will be thickening up as the

evening goes on. Further west, it is a different story, with rain heading

into Scotland and Northern Ireland. Not a very nice start to the day

across these western areas. The breeze but at least, with the

clown, the bridges will have risen above freezing. -- with the cloud.

Expect some fog for the morning rush-hour. Ltd brightness. Further

west, the rain will be clearing out of Northern Ireland, moving into

Scotland, Wales and west in England. It will feel chilly in most places.

Tomorrow evening and night, the rain will be staggering eastwards. Moving

into Wednesday, it will probably linger across eastern counties.

Further west, brightening up on Wednesday. Although still, there

will be some sharp showers around. Temperatures reaching respectable

to. Some of us will have to scrape the windscreen first thing in the

morning. That is all from us. Now, on BBC One we