28/08/2014 BBC News at Six

A blow for the Conservatives as a Tory MP defects to UKIP.

I am leaving the Conservative Party and joining UKIP.

Douglas Carswell's announcement has triggered a by-election

The problem is, some of those at the top of the Conservative Party are

not on our side. It is obviously deeply regrettable when things like

this happen and people behave in this way. It is also good.

We'll be looking at how damaging this to the Conservative party

and to the prime minister. Also tonight:

The Rotherham child abuse scandal - a former social worker there says

the pressure to meet targets meant children were neglected.

NATO accuses Russia of sending 1,000 of its troops over

the border into Ukraine. I will be reporting to find out how

the Scottish independence campaign is playing out in the promote

geographical places of the country. the border into Ukraine.

Postal voting starts in the Scottish referendum as

the prime minister says why business is better off in a Kingdom.

And after his first World Cup goal now Wayne

Rooney becomes England captain. On BBC London:

The killing of a robbery victim with the mental

age of a nine-year-old - a gang of teenagers are found guilty.

And the business secretary on Oxbridge elitism and whether London

state pupils are denied top jobs. Good evening and welcome to the BBC

News at Six. A conservative MP has

unexpectedly defected to UKIP. Douglas Carswell,

the MP for Clacton, has triggered a by-election which he says he will

contest on behalf of his new party. The seat currently has

a 12,000 Conservative majority. Mr Carswell, a Eurosceptic, says he

doesn't believe the prime minister is serious about change in Europe.

Mr Cameron has called the MP's defection deeply regrettable

and counterproductive. More from our political

correspondent, Carole Walker. For once, Westminster news

conference delivered a bombshell. I am today leaving the Conservative

latte and joining UKIP. Douglas Carswell said it had not been an

easy decision. A lifelong conservative, but he said only UKIP

could shake up what he called the cosy little clique he calls

Westminster. They talk the talk before elections and say what they

feel they must say when they want our support. But on the recall of

MPs, closing our borders, bank reform and cutting public debt and

an EU wreck the random, they never actually make it happen. Nigel

Farage predicted others will follow him into the UKIP fold. This is not

my show today. It is Douglas's show. It isn't a great secret there are a

number of members of Parliament sitting on the Conservative benches

and the Labour benches who hold UKIP was Mac reviews very strongly. This

will be the scene of the by-election battle. UKIP had a resounding

victory here. Douglas Carswell has a significant, personal following.

Will they vote for him now he has switched? Yes, it is the best thing

he could do. He will get extra votes. I think it is the wrong move.

I don't think he will be re-elected if he stands for UKIP. I have voted

him before. I like his policies and I like the reasons he has moved to

UKIP. It is good news. If Douglas Carswell does secure a foothold for

UKIP here on the shores of ethics, it will help his new party make

further inroads into both the Tory and Labour votes elsewhere in the

country. David Cameron knows he has a fight on his hands. It is deeply

regrettable when things happen like this and people behave in this way.

But it is also dip. If you want to wreck the random on Britain's future

in the EU, whether we should stay or go, the only way to get that is to

have a conservative government after the next election. That is until

only recently, what Douglas Carswell was saying. In the coming weeks, MPs

will be back at the seaside, here, battling to turn the tide against

UKIP. Our Political Editor Nick Robinson

is in Glasgow where, as we've heard, he's been speaking to the

Prime Minister. Was David Cameron taken by surprise

by this defection as everybody else has been? Yes, he was not warned and

he had not an idea Douglas Carswell was going. It is not because the

Tories cannot live without one fewer MP, all it without losing a

by-election, which they may do, it is more this will revive what David

Cameron told his party was their dangerous obsession with Europe.

Because now a Tory activist and Tory MPs and the Tory press will worry

about who might follow Douglas Carswell. Is Nigel Farage telling

the truth when he says other Tory MPs will follow him into UKIP. They

will worry about whether David Cameron needs to harden up his

European policy. This afternoon, I asked him to spell out would he be

prepared to leave the EU if he did not get his way in every negotiation

and he refused to do it. I asked him what he not met he had not met his

immigration target. Again he refused. This is an issue once

described as a previous Tory leader as an unexploded bomb. Fiona, it

just went off. Prime Minister.

New immigration figures show a big jump in the number

of people from the European Union coming to Britain.

The latest figures show that net migration - that's the difference

between the number of people coming into the UK and those leaving -

is up by nearly 40% in the past year and now stands at 243,000.

The prime minister had pledged to reduce net migration to 150,000

by next year. Matt Prodger reports.

Multicultural Britain is a fact of life. But these figures are bad

news. In fact, they show a significant annual increase. We have

said previously, because of the increases in the level of net EU

migration, it is challenging. These figures make it further challenging

again. It is rightly focus on net migration because of the pressures

on public services, integration and on issues of wage levels as well

will stop annual net migration has risen from 175 thousand people up to

243,000. The recent entrance from Romania and Bulgaria has more than

doubled. David Cameron promised he would meet his next migration target

and these figures show it is in tatters. It is a problem if there is

such a gap between the rhetoric and reality because it undermines public

confidence. Ministers have restricted immigration from outside

EU, but they have little power to stop people from within the EU

arriving here. About 2.5 million people in the UK citizens from other

countries like Poland. For the first time they outnumber nationalities

from countries outside the EU like China. So the complexion as well as

the volume of immigration is changing. What is good news for the

British economy is it is out performing other EU countries so it

attracts more immigrants. It is bad news for those who see immigration

as a detriment. A former social worker at

Rotherham Council has accused her former employers

of allowing children to slip through the net because of pressure to hit

targets for child protection. Speaking anonymously to BBC News,

she said not enough was done to help the victims.

1,400 children were found to have been abused in Rotherham

by a network of men of mainly Pakistani origin.

Ed Thomas has the details. Children were groomed and abused all

over Rotherham, in parks, town Centre alleyways, taken to their

abusers in taxis and the police and the council both knew. Children at

risk we just statistics and targets. Speaking to BBC News, Sarah is a

former Rotherham social worker, because she still works with

vulnerable children, we have protected her identity. It was how

to manipulate the figures. Pressure was not to put people on the books.

Then those people disappeared. All that mattered is that the target had

been hit. The abuse would continue? The abuse would continue. She has

shown as these letters from inside the council. It goes on to thank

staff for low statistics that month. It was a fiddle, I cannot see it any

other way that led to the children not getting the support they needed.

Then he got out of control and that is worth the cover-up came. And

consider South Yorkshire Police, these men represent the only

grooming gang in Rotherham to be prosecuted. After 16 years of abuse,

today report accused the force of earlier. The report was released

this morning. It says, South Yorkshire Police spends too much

time trying to disprove child victims. It says the for us fails to

record some crimes against children properly. And because of this, boys

and girls are still at risk. The police need to stop should --

treating children as prostitutes. Failures, too familiar to

campaigners like this. The way to stop it is to get alongside the

families and the children and listen to them. This is one Rotherham

barber who says he was not taken seriously. We were lied to, treated

terribly. His daughter was repeatedly raped by a Pakistani

grooming gang. Where you ever listen to? No, we went to a strategy

meeting at the police station and officers came and said, sorry we

have only got this room for 30 minutes because it is booked by

somebody else. Treated terribly by the police and social services as if

it was our fault as parents. My daughter was a big Tim. Pressure is

building. The council will be inspected by the government and the

police could be investigated. In this town, the calls for

accountability will not go away. NATO says there are well over 1,000

Russian troops operating inside Ukraine, a claim echoed by Ukraine's

president after pro-Russian separatists opened up a new front

in the south of the country. Russia has long denied that

its forces have crossed Ukraine's border.

The UN Security Council is to hold an emergency meeting

tonight to discuss the crisis. Our diplomatic correspondent

James Robbins reports. A Ukrainian soldier warns his

colleagues a sniper threatens. These government troops were pushing back

against the separatists in eastern Ukraine, but as victory looks

possible, they are being forced out from some areas, amid claims Russia

has sent reinforcements to the rebels. Russia has sent a number of

armoured personal vehicles, tanks and troops. Ukrainian forces are

capable to tackle and to cope with the Russian led gorillas, but this

is quite difficult for us to fight with Russia. Moscow denies its

forces are in Ukraine. But that was undermined by this rebel leader, who

admits Russian soldiers fight alongside his men, but claiming the

Russians were simply on holiday. This week, these Russian

paratroopers were caught about 15 miles inside Ukraine. Moscow says

they crossed the border by mistake, but now their mother -- mothers are

appealing to the Kremlin to get them released. Ukraine's government

forces have been squeezing the rebels hard and shrinking the

Territory Day control. It is almost two months since rebels were forced

to flee from the North towards Donetsk. There are still thought to

be between 3000 and 4000 fighters bolstered by a significant number of

Russian troops, despite Moscow's formal denials. Another front in the

South, open to fighting. Look at this video which the Ukrainians say

is a Russian tank recorded near the town inside Ukraine. It could be

another part of Russian efforts to prevent defeat. Defeat, not just of

the rebels but the Kremlin's prestige.

No NATO has released aerial pictures which show Russian armoury inside

Ukraine. A blatant attempt to change the fighting, which currently

favours the Ukrainian military. As the battle for control

favours the Ukrainian military. As rages on, EU leaders used words like

intolerable and aggression to describe Russian behaviour. David

Cameron is warning of further consequences if President Putin does

not change course. Tory MP Douglas Carswell defects do you get, saying

he cannot support the Conservatives over Europe. Still to come, beyond

his wildest dreams, Wayne Rooney on being appointed the new England

captain. Later on BBC London,

the woman groped and beaten at the Notting Hill Carnival

tells us why she posted pictures of the injuries online.

And the Champions League draw, we will reveal

who our London clubs will face in Europe's biggest prize in football.

With postal voting under way in the Scottish independence referendum,

the debate ahead of the ballot in three weeks' time is intensifying.

Over 200 business leaders in Scotland have signed an open letter

backing independence in response to a similar attack yesterday

supporting staying within the UK. Special correspondent is in Islay in

the Scottish Hebrides. Tonight we are at a whisky distillery here on

Islay, far from the Central Belt, and a part of the country where the

centres of political power in Edinburgh and London can often feel

very distant, quite a moat and out of reach. This is a very different

Scotland, rural, coastal, Ireland. -- island. What are these bestial

needs of this part of the country? In a moment, I will report on the

independence campaign on the geographical margins of the country.

-- what are the special needs? But first to Glasgow.

The message couldn't be simpler and clearer on the streets of Glasgow,

vote yes not just to end London rule but see the back of the

Conservatives for good. Your bike is interesting. Sack the Tories. Vote

yes. Yeah, simple as that. So independence is a way of getting rid

of the Tories? Paving the way to a fairer society. But not everyone in

the same house agrees. For me, it is too much of a risk, right? For me,

as I said to you, you would not jump into a shark pool to see if you

would get bitten. For me, it is too risky, that is the reason I am

voting no. No wonder David Cameron has to tread carefully every time he

comes north of the border. My heart is saying yes, but when I think

about it... Your head is saying no? On a visit to a haulage firm, I

asked him about a letter signed by 200 Scottish businessmen saying they

backed independence and fear that a future Tory government could take

Scotland and the UK out of the EU. My case is a positive case. If you

stay inside the United Kingdom, you know absolutely you keep the pound

is your currency, you have no border controls, you are part of a

brilliant United Kingdom, and part of a European single market as well.

And you have no idea Tuesday in, because if you become Prime Minister

after the election, there is a referendum, Scotland and the UK

could be forced out. The people in Scotland would have a choice about

whether to stay in a reformed European Union or whether to leave

it. But the yes campaign claims another risk will pack the voters in

for them, the risk of more cuts to services, welfare and the NHS. We

want to protect the NHS in Scotland. We should take control of it so that

those decisions are ours in the future. But the no campaign say that

Alex Salmond and Scotland's own health minister are trying to scare

voters. You decide whether it is privatised or cut, so what has it

got to do with independence? The overall budget is decided in London.

You could increase the budget. At the expense of housing or... That is

the real world, make your choices. If you have powers over taxation and

borrowing, you have more choices. I put the point to the Prime Minister,

wasn't a no result a guarantee that cuts would go on? The people who

make the choices about that in Scotland is the Scottish Government,

Alex Salmond, so his scare stories are ineffective because he has

trying to frighten people about what he might do! But you decide the

overall budget for Scotland. In truth, you would deliver more

austerity, more spending cuts, more welfare cuts. Who knows, there could

be a knock-on for the health budget. The whole of the United Kingdom

faces a big budget deficit, the problems of excessive debt, we have

to get on top of that in a very sensible, measured way. These

arguments are determining our country's future bright here and

right now. 1 million voters have the chance to vote early by post. But on

the streets of Govan, voters are still agonising about what to do and

how to -- who to trust. I am being very cagey, I don't know, maybe!

Well, Islay is the mould whisky Island, home to eight mulled whisky

distilleries, each with its own character, each with its own global

reputation and market. -- malt. They depend upon wide-open spaces in

remote locations, so what does the independence campaign mean here? I

have been finding there is appetite for change to narrow the gap between

the citizen and the state on both sides of the independence question.

Just 90,000 people live in Argyll and Bute, but it has a coastline

longer than that of France. There are so few people in Scotland

that it has a population density just one

seventh that of England and Wales. Pro-independence campaigners

say that makes it a different kind of country, with different

political challenges and needs. The Islay hotelier Davy Graham

leaves his guests in no doubt about his allegiance.

For him, independence is about making government more accountable.

We still feel distant from Westminster,

Westminster still controls a lot of the key levers that can make such

a lot of difference to Scotland as an independent country.

And I personally feel that if we had the politicians closer to

home, they could be more answerable to the demands of the people.

The independence debate reaches into every community.

The level of engagement is unprecedented.

The annual Islay agricultural show brings

the island community together. Minds are being made up

in places like this, in lengthy, passionate conversations

between friends and neighbours. Definitely no. Why?

I can just see chaos. What is the point

in saying we want to be separate? In the meantime all we get is a list

of things we don't want to lose. It would be nice to be one

or the other, so sure of what you want to do, whereas

I am pulled back and forwards. I think it is great,

I think it is a one and only chance in my lifetime that we be able to

take this step and give it a go. It won't be easy,

it will probably be very hard and cost a lot of money,

but I think it's well worth doing. Neither side now is backing

the status quo. For even the most passionate

no campaigners, like the local postmaster,

Alistair Redman, also wants change. Centralisation, a central

technocracy in Edinburgh, has not helped we on the islands.

The best way to achieve devolution is not just increased devolution to

Edinburgh, which I support, but from Edinburgh more local devolution,

and the Nationalists have a terrible track record on this.

In a place like this, you see something very important

about the nature of this whole debate.

It's not just about national identity.

It's also been about power, about where it should properly reside.

Yes, there's been national flag waving, but this has been

an extraordinary and energetic debate that has energised people in

every part of the country, in groups of friends, in families, about the

nature of democracy itself and how to make it better.

The pace of that debate is now accelerating fast.

Both sides say they want change, and the decision - change

in or out of the United Kingdom - is now just three weeks away.

Allan Little, BBC News, Islay. That is the thing that comes up

again and again, it is more than national identity, it is the nature

of power, a great national conversation that has been taking

place at grassroots level in every town, village under city and Street

in the country, and will reach its conclusion to some extent three

weeks from today when those polls open. The owner. Allan Little on

Islay, thank you very much. Wayne Rooney says to be made England

captain is beyond his wildest dreams. Roy Hodgson has appointed as

the new skipper today. Natalie reports.

At times he has been magnificent. At others much maligned. Nice to see

your home fans booing you! But today the tabloid favourite said being

named England captain was beyond his wildest dreams. The England manager

said he is judging Rooney on the mature man he sees now, not his

past. I have had no reason whatsoever, any time, to question

anything about him, but he has that baggage with them, and he will have

to accept that as a further part of the pressure. 16-year-old Wayne

Rooney... Rooney burst onto the scene, becoming the youngest scorer

in Premier League history with this goal against Arsenal. At 18, he lit

up the 2004 euros for England and was named in the team of the

tournament. -- Euros. But it was not until this summer that he finally

scored a World Cup goal. Prior to that, there were calls for him to be

trapped. Nevertheless, on 95 caps, he is now the most experienced

player in the England squad. -- dropped. It is a proud moment, but

the important thing is off the field, so we has to be a man of, and

he has got to represent his country in a bigger way than he has ever

represented his country before. When Rooney leads out England against

Norway next week, it looks set to be the least attended England match at

the new Wembley. Fans just cannot get excited after a dismal World Cup

summer, with Steven Gerrard Anne Frank Lampard now retired, Wayne

Rooney represents the last of the so-called golden generation who

failed to live up to the hype. -- and. This is a team that has hit

rock bottom in terms of performance on the pitch, popularity of the

pitch. They need to start winning, never mind who has the armband. And

therein lies Rooney's biggest problem, to help England achieved

what only one England captain has ever done before him, and that is

actually win something. Let's take a look at the weather

with Peter Gibbs. Signs of summer returning over the

coming days, but quite breezy through tonight, a pretty blustery

old night across many north-western parts of the UK, near gale force

winds through the Irish Sea, lots of rain feeding through, moving into

Scotland and North West England. A few showers further south, but not a

pleasant start to the day across much of Scotland, still breezy,

still some outbreaks of heavy rain at times, perhaps more persistent

rain edging away from Northern Ireland, but parts of northern

England could get off to a wet start as well. Temperatures already up to

the mid or high teens in places. Try and brighter across many eastern

parts, the odd shower beading in. -- dryer. -- feeding in. Further rain

feeding in, not too many showers getting into the Midlands and across

eastern England, largely dry here. Get the sunshine and it will not

feel too bad, 20-21d, but mid-teens, wind and rain will not feel quite so

pleasant. Across the other side of the Atlantic, a hurricane of the

east coasts of the states, and the remnants will be heading into the

Atlantic towards the end of this week. Unlike Hurricane Bertha, which

brought us cold air a week or two back, this one is go to pump up lots

of warm air across the Atlantic, so the signs are that temperatures will

start to rise through the weekend and particularly into the following

week. Great, Peter, thanks very much. It

is good