11/01/2018 BBC News at Ten

Patients are dying prematurely

in hospital corridors -

the stark warning to

the Prime Minister from

dozens of senior doctors.

They've written to Theresa May

saying safety is being compromised

at some A&E units in England

and Wales, and conditions

are at times intolerable.

There is a clear emergency

and what a number of other observers

have clearly described as a crisis.

The doctors' warning comes with A&E

waiting time levels in England

and Wales amongst the worst

since records began.

Also on tonight's programme.

Dealing with plastic pollution -

the government promises to eliminate

all avoidable plastic waste by 2042.

Still searching for survivors -

rescue dogs are brought

in to look for the missing,

after California's deadly mudslides.

A mixed bag of Christmas results

on the high street -

with some winners and big losers.

I'm 22 years old.

I bought my first house

for $6.5 million...

The famous video blogger

punished by YouTube -

after posting footage of a suicide

victim for his millions

of followers.

The New York Times was barred

from publishing any more classified

And Steven Spielberg's new film

on Nixon and the press,

and why the director sees echoes

of Donald Trump.

Anybody that offends, you know,

there is a label that is immediately

attached to them which is called,

well that can't be true

because they're all fake news.

And coming up on Sportsday on BBC

News, slam dunks and Celtics -

the bright lights of the NBA hits

London again this evening.

Good evening.

Dozens of senior doctors who run

Accident and Emergency departments

in England and Wales have written

a stark letter to the Prime Minister

warning that patients are dying

prematurely in hospital corridors

and conditions are at

times "intolerable".

They say thousands of patients

are left in the back of ambulances

waiting to get into A&E.

And very high rates of flu recently

mean that some hospitals

are running out of beds.

Today, there's fresh evidence

of the pressure A&E units are under.

More than 300,000 patients waited

longer than they should in December.

Staff managed to see 85%

of patients within four hours -

that's well below the 95% target -

and some of the worst figures

since records began.

Our health editor Hugh Pym reports.

A long wait in an overcrowded A&E

unit, that's what 87-year-old

Yvonne had to endure.

It was ten hours before she saw

a doctor, and hours more before

she was admitted to a ward.

Her daughter, Esther, used her scarf

to secure her in a wheelchair,

because for some of the time,

there was no trolley.

It was just heaving with ambulances,

ambulance drivers, patients

on the ambulance trolleys,

and it was literally wall-to-wall,

both sides, corridors

just full of patients.

It was like, "Gosh, how long is it

going to take us to get through?"

And with scenes like this

filmed by a patient,

senior A&E doctors say they're

so concerned they've written

to the Prime Minister setting out

some of their own experiences.

Over 120 patients a day

managed in corridors,

some dying prematurely,

an average of 10-12 hours

for a decision to admit a patient

until they are transferred to a bed

and patients sleeping in clinics

as make-shift wards.

They say NHS winter planning failed

to deliver what was needed.

There is no doubt that our emergency

departments are facing

the biggest crisis that we have had

for over 15 years.

We absolutely must work together

as system leaders at every level

in order to find both short-term

and medium-term solutions.

The Prime Minister insisted again

there had been extensive measures

to prepare for winter.

For the first time ever,

urgent GP appointments

being available throughout

the Christmas period,

that was a decision taken to improve

the service for people but also

to ensure that the NHS had that

better capacity to deal

with these winter pressures.

For the opposition, the problem

is really about funding.

Money's got to go in now,

but it should have gone in earlier.

Even if the Chancellor

announced billions today,

you can't spend it all by tomorrow.

While the debate goes on,

Rosie can only reflect

on a humiliating experience in A&E.

She was in severe pain

because of a gynecological problem

and was bleeding heavily

but she was examined

in a crowded corridor.

I think I was trolley number 12.

And there were trolleys,

then, all the way up.

You can't see to someone's dignity,

you can't ensure that they're having

a private conversation and that

if they break down in tears,

which, I think I did,

I'm pretty sure that I cried as well

but you can't look into

anybody's right to privacy

or anything like that.

At some hospitals like Ipswich

they say careful planning paid off

and though staff were stretched,

they coped with the pressures.

At times over the really busy

New Year period there were trolleys

down the corridor here but at this

A&E unit things do seem to have

calmed a little this week,

with fewer patients coming

through the front door

of the hospital, though no-one's

complacent about what the weeks

ahead may bring.

The medical director told me that

flu was a significant concern.

We've worked very well

to get our staff vaccinated

but we're not at all complacent.

I think the next two months

are going to be a challenging time.

We are looking still to get flu

vaccinations for vulnerable

patients and staff members

and the battle isn't over.

And with the latest figures showing

the highest numbers of flu

figures in seven years,

health leaders call for vaccinations

for NHS staff to be compulsory.

Some hospitals have greater

than 90% vaccinations

for their health workers,

others less than 20%.

This has to be an issue

of leadership but we need people

in the health care sector

to protect their patients.

We have a duty of care

to our patients.

Flu's been an even bigger problem

for Scotland's hospitals,

a teenager died after catching

the virus which developed

into pneumonia.

Scotland and Wales as well as

England have missed A&E

waiting time targets.

One answer, say the consultants

in their letter, is a big increase

in social care funding to allow more

patients to leave hospitals to be

cared for in the community.

It's a debate gaining momentum

as the NHS's bleak winter continues.

Hugh Pym, BBC News.

Our Political Editor Laura

Kuenssberg is in Westminster.

Certainly a very stark letter to the

Prime Minister from these very

senior doctors. Politically, how

awkward is this for the government?

This isn't the first government

that's had to grapple with these

agonising pressures on the health

service in the winter and they are

not the first government to have

been around and in charge when a

conversation about the longer term

needs and sustainability of the NHS

has done the rounds at this time of

year. However, there does seem to be

something a bit different this year,

not just because of how stark

warnings are, how awful the

experiences of some patients that

are emerging have been, but because

there is a mood in the Tory party,

the governing party, there are more

and more voices speaking out,

raising the question of whether or

not the current model can last

without some significant change.

Either in how we pay for it, or in a

significant extra amount of cash

going in. Now Number Ten and number

11 of course who are in charge of

the money, are not yet in a place

either publicly or behind closed

doors where they would acknowledge

that something does have to budge,

but it's well worth noting that the

Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, who

remember Fort and won the battle to

stay in his job this week, said MPs

in the House of Commons, not just

that he would quite like to have a

10-year funding deal for the health

service, but that in the coming

years significantly cash,

significantly more money would have

to go into the health service. Now,

plenty of debates and conversations

about the long-term model, should

there be radical change, have

frankly hit the buffers, but there

is a sense round here right now that

perhaps in the coming months the

political pressure on the

government's position in the NHS is

going to build and build and

something might have to give.

What

the Prime Minister did want to talk

about today was in fact the

environment?

yes, very telling.

Theresa May's first big speech of

this first New Year was basically

her message to say, if you will want

to go green, you have to vote blue.

She launched the government's big

environmental plan to cover the next

25 years today. Top of her hit list,

a crackdown on plastics, with the

environment now seeming to be one of

her top political priorities.

What do you think I should look for?

A grand vision, we were promised,

a plan to look after the spaces

around us for years to come,

and the Prime Minister trying

to spot political opportunity, too.

The environment is something

personal to each of us but is also

something which collectively we hold

in trust for the next generation,

and we have a responsibility

to protect and enhance it.

Top of the list, cleaning

up plastics that harm

wildlife on land and sea,

more charges for plastic bags,

possible taxes on containers,

encouraging shops to use less.

But over time, a long time, with no

new law to underline the change.

In years to come, I think people

will be shocked at how today

we allow so much plastic

to be produced needlessly.

This truly is one of the great

environmental scourges of our time.

So we will take action at every

stage of the production

and consumption of plastic.

You're talking about ideas that

will take place over 25 years

with no legal guarantees.

If actions speak louder than words,

do you really believe this problem

is acute and urgent?

This is an inspiring plan,

it is a long-term plan,

it's about the next 25 years.

But it's a plan that speaks

to everybody who has

an interest in our environment.

Everybody who wants to ensure that

future generations are able to enjoy

a beautiful environment

and a beautiful place

in which to live.

Looking on, alongside

the white-faced whistling ducks,

green campaigners pleased

there is a plan.

But not quite convinced that

a government that also believes

in fracking and building high-speed

rail really means it.

The problem about talking

about a 25-year plan right now,

in the absence of hard measures

about what they will do

here and now, is this

is a government where most

commentators question if it

will last 25 months,

or possibly even 25 days.

What we need is to know

what are the actions happening

in 2018 to make a difference.

Theresa May says conservation

and Conservatism have

always gone hand in hand,

but this isn't just

about principles, or policy,

or this new environment plan,

it's also about politics and how

the Tories fell back

at the general election.

Anxious that millions of younger

voters turned to Labour then,

the Tories have tried

to detox their image with those

groups, greening their credentials,

banning microbeads, plans to end

the sale of ivory.

What does Labour make

of the plastics plan?

25 years is far too long.

The plastic culture

has to be challenged.

The throw-away society culture has

to be challenged and the pollution

of our rivers and our seas

by plastic waste is

absolutely dreadful.

The Prime Minister believes her

promise is the right one to make.

Her hope - to create a habitat more

friendly to her political breed.

Laura Kuenssberg, BBC News.

Our environment analyst

Roger Harrabin joins me now.

Plastics and dealing with them is

what has grabbed the headlines, but

what the Prime Minister announced

today was much broader and ambitious

plans to improve our environment.

Its ironic she focused on plastics

because that's one of the weakest

areas of the document she produced

today. If she wants to be a world

leader in plastics, which she says

she does, maybe someone should have

told her that Bangladesh banned

plastic bags back in 2002. We are

lagging in the UK behind many

African countries in that. Having

said that, she has set the tone for

government, one that we haven't seen

before. Ministers have been nervous

about talking about the environment.

The plan itself is in many ways

really quite radical. It talks about

not just holding the environment

study, which governments have tried

to do before, but actually improving

it, improving wild flowers, which

are almost down to 2% now of their

previous range, in improving forests

and rivers, perhaps bringing more

greenery back to people's

playgrounds, children's playgrounds,

bringing the environment into

people's lives. All that looks

radical. Some caveats. Nothing on

how they will reduce CO2 emissions

in line with the Paris agreement and

that crucial caveat, no underpinning

by law, no firm policies, no money,

nice pictures of bunnies but it

could be on the shelf within a year.

Roger Harrabin, thank you.

A brief look at some of the day's

other other news stories.

The former Ukip leader Nigel Farage

says he's on the verge of supporting

a second referendum on Britain's

membership of the European Union.

He said a second vote to leave

could "kill off" the Remain

campaign for a generation.

He said he thought the leave vote

would be even higher

if there were another poll.

The Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson

has joined with other

European foreign ministers to call

on Donald Trump not to reintroduce

sanctions against Iran.

Mr Johnson said the current

arrangement was the best way

of stopping Iran acquiring nuclear

weapons, and no one had yet come up

with a better diplomatic solution.

Dominic Chappell, who was in charge

of BHS when it went bust in 2016,

has been found guilty on three

charges of failing to provide

information demanded

by the Pensions Regulator.

The scheme had 19,000

members and a shortfall

of £571 million when BHS collapsed.

He'll be sentenced at a later date.

Lingerie company Rigby & Peller said

it was "deeply saddened"

at losing its most prestigious

customer - the Queen.

It had held the royal

warrant since 1960.

But the decision to cancel it came

after the retailer's

director wrote a book -

Storm In A D-Cup -

revealing details of life

inside Buckingham Palace.

Shares in Marks and Spencer dropped

sharply today after the retailer

posted disappointing Christmas

results, with falls in both

food and clothing sales.

But there was good news for Tesco

and for some more recent arrivals

on the retail scene,

as our Business Correspondent

Emma Simpson reports.

The show's over, we've moved

on, but the Christmas

story for retailers is only

now becoming clear.

So who are some of

the winners and losers?

Tesco's done well with sales

up today, so have many

of the other grocers.

But food sales, usually a bright

spot for Marks & Spencer,

went into reverse, and there have

been profit warnings at Debenhams,

Mothercare and Moss Bros.

Things are certainly

more challenging here on

the High Street.

Take House of Fraser,

a business under pressure,

it saw another fall in sales today.

And you don't have to go far to see

how the gap between the weaker and

the stronger players is widening.

Here at John Lewis,

it had no problems.

Pulling customers in.

It's one of the winners today.

There's a sort of slight air

of caution about people's attitudes.

They're not coming in for all sorts.

For perfectly

understandable reasons.

But there is demand there, you just

have to go and find it and you have

to create the conditions where

people want things and of course

that comes to down to

having fabulous products.

And it actually means

you have to be outstanding

at online and shops.

Boohoo is a small but

fast-growing online retailer,

which is doing very

nicely without shops.

...And is expecting to grow

sales by 90% this year.

But some are predicting

problems for the High

Street ahead.

This is going to be the year

of retail distress.

We've already seen bits

of distress percolating through

even before Christmas and I think

that the weaker players are going to

find it too tough to really survive.

It's been a season of mixed

fortunes for retailers.

The New Year heralds

the clearance sales and some

uncertainty about

what 2018 will bring.

Emma Simpson, BBC News.

Hundreds of rescuers

are using helicopters,

search dogs and thermal imaging

equipment to try to find 8 people

who are still missing in California

after the devastating

mudslides on Tuesday.

17 people are known to have died

after a torrent of mud carrying

boulders the size of small cars

smashed through the

town of Montecito.

More than 500 homes have been

damaged or destroyed.

James Cook is there for us.

James? Yes, Sophie, we have details,

in the past few seconds, the police

released the name of all 17 of those

who confirmeded to have died.

Including four children, aged,

three, six, attendant twelve and the

oldest person to have been killed so

far, an 89-year-old man. There seems

little hope of finding more

survivors from the terrible tragedy.

We've been getting details about the

harrowing moment when the mud

landslide roared down this mountain

in the dead of night.

Turn around!

The flash flood is right there!

Get out of here, go!

This was the moment it began.

Oh, my God, Mom!

And then panic.

Close the door!

It was a million miles

an hour in slow motion,

if that makes sense.

I clicked into survival

gear, survival mode.

Wake Dad up!

Every second, it is just roaring

and banging against the house

and the most vicious and violent

sounds you have ever heard.

Montecito is only just beginning

to grasp the scale of the disaster

which will bear its name.

For this idyllic little town

of just 9000 people,

recovery will be long and hard.

People walked their dogs

through here, there are trails,

my kids have grown

up riding their bikes.

Noelle Strogoff fled with her three

children just before the storm.

But many of her neighbours did not.

Two young boys were swept

out of their home,

along with their mother

in the middle of the night.

And the dog is gone.

And they're lucky to be fine.

It is like a war zone here.

There are homes that

are just missing.

And I walk down the street

and I see balls, and toys,

and bicycles and shoes and socks.

And knives and hammers.

It's like people's lives are just

washed to the ocean.

Much of that debris ended up

clogging the main coastal motorway.

We were told the people

in this car escaped.

Above the town, the scorched hills

are scarred by rivers of mud.

Well, the mudslide came

roaring down here,

sweeping everything before it

and if you want to know how houses

can be swept from their foundations

so easily, well, this is the answer.

Just look at the size

of the boulders that were pushed

down from the mountains.

To drive through this little town

is to be stunned by the

power of this mudslide.

Southern California

was once famed for its

agreeable climate.

These days, it reels

from drought, fire and flood.

James Cook, BBC News, Montecito.

Personality disorder -

it affects more than three million

people in the UK and costs the NHS

around £10 billion a year.

Now health professionals

are demanding better access

to treatment for those affected

saying that one in 10 people

diagnosed with it end up

taking their own lives.

Our Home Editor Mark Easton reports.

I'd seen bar codes on the back of my

victim's neck, that were sending

messages to me, telling me to poison

her.

It was only when Kathleen was moved

from a mental clinic, after being

accused of trying to poison a work

colleague, she was finally diagnosed

with a mental disorder.

It is one of the darkest places in

my head, I have ever been. I would

have preferred death to that.

Kathleen tried to control a lifetime

of chronic self-harm and suicidal

thoughts, she is not cured. But part

of her therapy is helping the NHS

getting people with personality

disorder into treatment.

People are waiting months and months

and months for treatment and these

people are dying waiting, Mark.

Because they could kill themselves?

It has happened to a lot of my

friends, I'm afraid.

What is a personality disorder? A

mental diagnosis with two common

types, border line or emotional

unstable personality disorder,

involving disturbed ways of thinking

and problem in solving emotion, Many

kill themselves. Anti-social

personality disorder disorder is

similar. Around 70% of the prison

population are thought to have PD. A

decade ago, mental health

campaigners were trying to convince

that personality disorder existed,

even now some psychiatrists question

if it is a mental illness. But there

is a big change on the estimated

three million people with the

disorder should get.

Sometimes it may be appropriate...

This treatment in group in wind

isson agreed to let us witness the

way that therapy helps them deal

with problematic behaviour, linked

to a past trauma.

Passively suicidal all the time.

You

are self-destructive and push

everyone away.

It's been a lifetime of depression,

trauma, sexual abuse, rape...

You

lose a sense of wanting to survive.

Sometimes doing the simple things

can be the hardest thing in the

world. You can't help it sometimes.

Unfortunately, people with

personality disorder, what hits the

headlines is often violent

behaviour.

They see them as bad people?

Absolutely. That then adds to the

problem of those people are not

offered the treatment that they may

need.

They are, I think, the most

let down group of people within the

NHS.

Today in the Houses of

Parliament, campaigners and health

professionals launched a consensus

statement, demanding help for people

with PD. NHS England says getting

people the help that they need close

to home is at the heart of their

plans.

We need early intervention asking

people when younger, what happened

to you, how can we help? Giving them

tools and skills to help them manage

their live, emotions and

relationships.

Like Katherine and others diagnosed

with it, personality disorder does

not conform to traditional labels.

It causes untold misery and country

beauties to countless tragic early

deaths. It is surely time we helped

to understand it better.

It is surely time we helped

to understand it better.

Details of organisations offering

information and support with mental

health are available at:

bbc.co.uk/actionline,

or you can call for free on:

08000 564 756.

YouTube has cut business ties

with the video blogger Logan Paul -

after he posted video appearing

to show the body

of a suicide victim.

Logan Paul, whose channel has

15 million subscribers,

subsequently apologised

for the video, which was filmed

on a location in Japan.

Here's our Media Editor Amol Rajan.

We're going to take a break

from vlogging and take

a break from each other.

Low budget, confessional and often

astonishingly popular.

This couple announced

they were breaking up on YouTube

in a video seen 15 million times.

If I can do it, you

can do it, for sure.

They're part of a phenomenon called

vlogging, or video blogging,

very often on Google-owned YouTube.

This 21st-century cottage industry

has created a vast new fleet

of online celebrities.

Many vloggers have a committed

following among those

aged between 18 and 34 -

a demographic prized by advertisers.

Vloggers like Logan Paul.

The 22-year-old American

is a YouTube star - or was.

I think this definitely marks

a moment in YouTube history.

This morning, YouTube cut

business ties with him

after he naively posted a video

from Japan's Aokigahara forest,

infamous as a suicide spot.

Paul issued an apology to his 15

million subscribers on YouTube.

I have made a severe and continuous

lapse of my judgment and I don't

expect to be forgiven.

I'm simply here to apologise.

YouTube declined to be interviewed.

In a statement, they said: It's

taken us a long time to respond,

but we've been listening

to everything you've been saying.

We know that the actions

of one creator can affect

the entire community.

Vlogging is now a hugely profitable

business with the likes

of Logan Paul making vast sums

of money in a variety of ways.

They get paid between £1

and £3 per 1000 clicks

and can top up their income

through merchandising

and deals with brands.

And they do all of that

without the more stringent controls

applied to traditional media.

OK, rolling that.

Licensed broadcasters in Britain

are regulated by Ofcom

and have to vet material

before publishing it.

Vloggers however face

no such constraints.

They are only censored

after the event.

The boss of Britain's

biggest media agency wants

to see smarter regulation.

I would definitely like to see

vloggers with this much reach

and this much influence

to have the sorts of regulation that

traditional broadcasters have

to adhere to, particularly around

content that can be dangerous,

can be glamorising or condoning

anti-social behaviour,

dangerous behaviour,

that can be copied by children.

I'm going to be the biggest

entertainer on the planet.

Logan Paul and his ilk portend

a new kind of celebrity -

one that is intimate,

incessant and ever more devotional.

For all of the glory of the open

web, the danger is that his kind

of immaturity exposes

audiences to material that's

in nobody's interest.

I'm just getting warmed up.

Amol Rajan, BBC News.

The Hollywood film director

Steven Spielberg says he believes

the Trump administration

is using the same tactics

as President Nixon to "try

to silence the press."

Tomorrow sees the release

of his latest film 'The Post',

which tells the story of the leaking

of the classified Pentagon papers -

to American journalists -

during the Vietnam war.

Here's our Arts Editor,

Will Gompertz.

This is a devastating security

breach that was leaked

out of the Pentagon.

Before the Watergate Scandal,

there were the Pentagon Papers.

The first expose of a cover-up

in the Nixon government

by the Washington Post,

led by its legendary editor Ben

Bradlee and publisher Kay Graham.

Do you have the papers?

Set in 1971.

Yes.

But you have described

it as a timely movie.

Well, obviously you just flip the 1

and the 7, or the 7 and the 1,

and you really get to see the great

arc of the pendulum that has brought

us right back to the same tactics

that Richard Nixon used

to try to silence the press.

I'm talking about the current

administration and their absolute

broadsiding of media,

social media, news,

anybody that offends.

You know, there is a label

that is immediately attached

to them, which is called,

well, that can't be true,

because they're all fake news.

I mean, it's a lot more

insidious today, by the way,

than it was in 1971.

If you publish, we'll be

in the Supreme Court next week.

Meaning?

We could all go to prison.

There's been another massive press

expose in the last six months,

which is what looks like the endemic

sexual harassment and exploitation

which is, what looks

like the endemic sexual

harassment and exploitation

of women in Hollywood.

I mean, you're a really senior

figure in Hollywood and you've

been around a long time.

Do you ever think, you know what,

I think I could have done

a bit more to stop this?

Well, you know, I can only basically

react to that question

within my own workplace environment.

Within my organisation,

there weren't incidences,

except for just a couple of years

and years ago, that I would say

gave me the experiences to be

the authority on that

question you ask.

What happened in those incidences?

There were just

a couple of incidences.

I don't go into detail on them,

but they happened years

and years ago, where we had

to let somebody go.

People are concerned about having

a woman in charge of the paper.

That she doesn't have the resolve

to make the tough choices.

Thank you for your frankness.

My prediction is that this

watershed moment for women,

in extolling the courage of women

who, like Katherine Graham,

with the Pentagon Papers,

and with her decision to publish

or not to publish, so many women

have found their voices

and they have been given

so much support.

Not just by other women,

but also by certain men.

I think this is not just

another news cycle.

I think this is not just

another news cycle,

I think this is a permanent

change in the culture.

Maybe.

But as Kay Graham showed

with her courageous leadership

of the Washington Post,

exposing deeply rooted corrupt

behaviour is one thing -

changing it is quite another.

Will Gompertz, BBC News.