29/11/2017 BBC News at Six

What price Brexit?

The Government offers

to significantly increase

what it's prepared to pay the EU.

The Government had said it

would pay 20 billion euros -

it's now thought that that

could rise up to 50 billion euros.

We've been waiting for this

for a long time, 18 months or so.

Now's the time to get the whole ship

off the rocks and move it forwards.

We'll be looking at whether

the latest figure reflects the final

cost and whether we'll ever know

what that is.

Also tonight...

Lawyers for the man convicted

of the murders of Lin

and Megan Russell in 1996 say

they have new evidence which

implicates a different suspect.

A wartime Bosnian Croat commander

drinks what appears to be poison

at his trial at the Hague and dies.

Donald Trump comes under attack

for sharing inflammatory videos

from a British far-right group.

And the UK's highest paid

university vice chancellor -

who's now stepped down -

insists she's not embarrassed

by controversy about her salary.

Coming up on Sportsday later

in the hour on BBC News,

the investigation into Ben Stokes'

involvement

in a fight outside

a nightclub has concluded

and the CPS will now decide

whether or not he will face charges.

Good evening and welcome

to the BBC News at Six.

The Government has offered

to significantly increase

the so-called Brexit divorce bill,

the amount of money it's willing

to pay the European Union

for our departure from it.

It's understood the Government

is now prepared to pay up

to 50 billion euros -

around £44 billion -

in an attempt to kick-start talks on

a future trade deal.

Back in September,

the prime minister

had said the UK was prepared

to pay 20 billion euros.

But the EU's chief negotiator Michel

Barnier insists "we are not there"

and negotiations are continuing.

Our political editor

Laura Kuenssberg has more.

There is no substitute for personal

diplomacy. The Prime Minister, the

first major leader to visit Iraq

since so-called IS were driven out

of Mosul. Thousands of miles away,

dealings between Westminster and

Brussels made a broad offer to

settle the UK's accounts has been

hypothetically agreed.

We are still

negotiations with the European

Union, and I am clear that I want us

to move together onto the stage. We

are working in the lead up to the

December European Council. I want to

see us able to move on to the trade

talks and the security talks, but it

means us moving together.

Surely a

bill of around 40 to 50 billion

euros is too much for Brexiteers,

who promised we would get money

back? After months of haggling and

handshakes and frankly, changes of

heart, the Cabinet is pretty much on

board.

The Prime Minister is going

to go forward to the December

European Council with a very fair

offer. We want to see progress

towards the second phase of the

negotiation. We have been waiting

for 18 months or so. Now is the

moment to get the whole ship off the

rocks and move it forwards.

They

hope is that with more hypothetical

cash on the table, talks about trade

can start next month.

Do you think

the Brexit divorce bill is too

large?

But nothing is final, so and

no minister will publicly give an

official seal of approval.

Nothing

is agreed until everything is agreed

about this whole package, but we

accept that there are obligations

that we have built up and we will

meet them if the Prime Minister has

said.

When we were told we would

have plenty of money back if we

voted to leave, it seems the EU has

won the argument that the bill to

settle our accounts runs into the

tens of billions. Whether it be for

long temperatures we have already

signed up to all the pensions of

Brussels staff in years to come. In

the bigger picture, around 40

billion spread over many years is

not big bucks for the government. So

the anger you might have expected in

there didn't really explode.

If we

are going to negotiate the

comprehensive new trade agreement

with the European Union which we

need for future jobs and prosperity,

we need to be seen as a country

which can be trusted to comply with

the deals we reach.

So will my right

honourable friend guarantee that

there will be no legally binding

commitment to spend money until our

partners agree to a serious free

trade deal?

With the minister agree

that such a move would be betraying

the trust of the British people?

Sangakkara she should not pay more

than we owe, but she should be

confident that whatever it is, it's

a bargain against the cost of

staying in.

Do you welcome Britain's

decision to pay more, Mr Barnier?

We

are still working.

The EU chief

negotiator was in no mood to declare

that it is done. The final details

of the bill will not be agreed for

some time, and they deal to move

onto the next phase of talks could

still be scuppered by disagreement

over the Irish border or the

European courts. We are still

waiting for more from London, he

said. We are not there yet. After

months of European hard talk and

sticking together, Britain has moved

significantly towards their version

of what we have to pay, the

government finding little success

perhaps in the Brexit talks in

trying to stay out on a limb.

So this 50 billion euros, how likely

is that to be the final tally given

that we are unlikely to know the

final tally?

Officials are

metaphorically still out there with

their calculator is, haggling over

particular sums under many different

items that make up this proposed

final bill. Nobody is suggesting

that we have reached the end of this

process. We know that a broad range

has been agreed in the region of

between 40 and 50 billion, and 50

billion euros, as far as the UK

Government is concerned, is at the

top end. People have said to me that

they are confident they can get it

under that. But we can't be sure

what the end total will be because

the UK Government is pretty firm

that it will only pay out that kind

of sum over many years were me know

what we will get in return. And lots

of these payments are not

predictable. There are things like

pensions in here, long term loans

that have been paid out to other

European countries. So we cannot at

this point be forensically clear

about the details. We can be clear

that there is a broad understanding

that should in theory make it easier

for the vital summit next month to

move onto the next phase of this

whole saga.

Talking of that, there

are still the thorny issue of the

Ireland border to be resolved.

And

that is still a huge problem,

because the very point of being in

the European Union is that across

country borders, goods, people,

trucks and families can move

wherever they want. What's the UK

and Northern Ireland are out of the

European Union, what happens to

those borders and things on either

side of the Irish border? The Irish

government wants a cast-iron

guarantee from Britain that there is

no way a hard border would be put in

between the two countries. The UK

Government says of course, that is

not what anybody wants. The Foreign

Secretary has even said it is

unthinkable. But while all these

negotiations are up in the ad, the

UK Government will not make that

cast-iron guarantee that Ireland

says it is after. But with a few

days to go until the real crunch

here, there is such a loss of

bravado on all sides in these

negotiations, and there are some

hints that both sides might be

prepared to budge a little bit.

There is no question that this one

issue could still scupper the talks.

Laura, thank you.

President Trump has used his Twitter

account to share inflammatory videos

which were posted online

by the deputy leader of

the far-right group, Britain First.

The footage purports to show Muslims

committing acts of violence.

Downing Street has

condemned the move.

The president has been accused

here and in the States

of spreading hatred.

The tweets have been welcomed,

though, by the former leader

of the Ku Klux Klan.

Our North America Correspondent

Nick Bryant reports.

Britain First is a far right

anti-Muslim group with a small

membership that often engages in

publicity stunts to try to raise its

profile. Early this morning, it

received a huge propaganda gift from

Donald Trump, the America First

president. On his Twitter feed, he

retweeting three inflammatory videos

from the group's deputy leader, the

first claiming to show a Muslim

migrant packing a man on crutches.

This is the depute leader in action.

Earlier this month, she was charged

with using threatening behaviour

during speeches she made above us.

For her, these presidential retreats

are manna from heaven. God bless

you, Trump, she tweeted. God bless

America. There has been a despairing

response from the family of the

murdered MP Jo Cox, who was killed

by a right-wing extremist who

shouted Root. -- shouted Britain

First.

Destroys hate against Muslims

and Donald Trump is the president of

our nearest ally, and the fact that

he didn't check first or didn't even

think about the content of those

tweets before doing it, I think

suggests that his judgment is hugely

lacking.

Downing Street has said it

was wrong for the president to have

done this, but added that his

invitation to make a state visit to

better next year still stands. As

for the White House, it is

unapologetic.

The threat is real.

The threat needs to be addressed.

The threat has to be talked about,

and that is what the president is

doing in bringing that up.

Previous

US administrations have liked to

think of themselves as beacons of

democratic values, but that has not

been a high priority for the Trump

White House. Many people around the

world will be saddened and sickened

to see the president of the United

States appearing to validate tweets

from a far right group. Ten months

into this unorthodox and provocative

presidency, Donald Trump still has

the capacity to shock. Nick Bryant,

BBC News, New York.

A wartime commander of Bosnian Croat

forces has died after drinking

what appeared to be poison

during his hearing

at the International Criminal

Tribunal in the Hague.

Slobodan Praljak had just heard

the appeal against his 20-year

sentence for war crimes

had been rejected.

From the Hague,

Anna Holligan reports.

This was supposed to be a routine

hearing, but as his final

judgment was being read out,

Slobodan Praljak

swallowed something.

Slobodan Praljak

is not a war criminal.

I am rejecting the court ruling.

I have taken poison.

This courtroom is now a crime scene.

Don't take away the glass he used

when he drank something.

Proceedings were immediately halted.

We suspend.

Please, the curtains.

Cameras captured a few

moments of confusion

before the live broadcast was cut.

Slobodan Praljak was a commander

of the Bosnian Croat forces,

guilty of destroying Mostar's iconic

Ottoman-era bridge

and persecuting Muslims.

Outside the court,

the ambulances arrived.

Fire crews wearing oxygen tanks

on their backs ran inside.

This was not the ending

the court had envisaged.

This UN tribunal was set up

before the end of the war,

and has surpassed expectations

by dealing with every one

of the 161 suspects.

But the fact that one of them

was able to smuggle in

a deadly poison and take it in front

of the live cameras

will leave an indelible mark

on this court's legacy.

While it has faced allegations

of bias from politicians

on all sides, many of the victims

believe this institution has given

them some form of justice.

Now the question is,

how could an institution with such

tight security and impressive record

allow such a fatal lapse?

Anna Holligan, BBC News, The Hague.

Companies which incorrectly

treat their workers as if they're

self-employed could be facing

unlimited liability for holiday pay,

due to a court ruling.

The European Court of Justice has

ruled that a British window salesman

was entitled to claim 13 years'

backdated paid leave

in a case that could have wider

implications for firms operating

in the so-called gig economy.

It's one of the most

notorious of British murders.

A mother and daughter,

Lin and Megan Russell,

killed as they walked along a quiet

country lane in Kent in 1996.

Now the lawyers for Michael Stone -

the man found guilty

of the crime, but who's always

protested his innocence -

say the alleged confession

of another suspect, serial killer

Levi Bellfield, suggests hecould

have committed the murders.

Wyre Davies has been given exclusive

access to the evidence.

It was an appalling murder,

a brutal unprovoked attack in rural

Kent in July 1996 on a family

walking home from school.

45-year-old Lin Russell

and her six-year-old

daughter Megan were killed

in the frenzied hammer attack.

But nine-year-old Josie survived,

despite suffering terrible injuries.

Michael Stone, a known

criminal and drug addict,

was arrested a year later and found

guilty of the Russell murders.

He's always protested his innocence.

We intend first to

read a statement...

And today, dramatic new evidence

from Stone's lawyers -

what they say is a detailed

confession to the Russell

murders by this man,

Levi Bellfield, already serving two

full life terms for the murders

of schoolgirl Milly Dowler,

Amelie Delagrange

and Marsha McDonnell.

Bellfield has now, allegedly,

told a fellow prisoner

in considerable detail that he also

murdered the Russells.

The prisoner's words

have been re-voiced.

He said, I've never told

anyone this before.

I killed another child

and got away with it.

He said he approached them

with his hammer in hand,

and the mother screamed

and begged him not

to hurt her children.

He struck her first, and then Josie.

The dog was killed,

followed by Megan.

What gives this alleged confession

even more credibility is that,

as far as we can tell,

it contains certain details

that would have been known

to only very few people,

like police investigators

or the killer himself.

None of Michael Stone's DNA was ever

found at the murder scene.

But his legal team today said

there was potentially new forensic

evidence against Bellfield.

They also said a new eyewitness had

come forward, identifying

Levi Bellfield as a man she saw

driving erratically

near the murder scene.

Speaking from prison,

Stone acknowledged his own

violent past but told me

that unlike Bellfield,

he had no history

of attacking women.

You've got a track record

of violence, you hit

a man with a hammer.

They were desperate

to link me to the crime,

but it's not even similar,

because I went to the house

of someone who I found out

was messing about with people,

and I went to his house

to warn him not to do it,

and he grabbed my throat.

It wasn't a hammer, it was a mallet,

I picked it up to strike him with it

to get him off my neck.

It's nothing like attacking a child,

or a mother and a child.

There's no similarity, really.

Levi Bellfield has now denied ever

making a confession,

and Kent Police said they stood

by Stone's conviction.

Mick's been in prison now for 20

years, and that's 20 years too long

for somebody who hasn't

committed a crime.

But Michael Stone's family described

this as a moment of hope,

saying his case must now be sent

to the Court of Appeal.

Wyre Davies, BBC News.

And to see more on this,

BBC Wales Investigates has a special

programme tomorrow night at 8.30pm

on BBC One Wales and on iPlayer.

The time is 6.15.

Our top story this evening:

The Government significantly

increases what it's prepared to pay

the EU in the Brexit divorce bill.

And still to come:

150 years of the Shipping Forecast,

its distinctive tones loved

by sailors and landlubbers alike.

Coming up on Sportsday in the next

15 minutes on BBC News,

Allardyce and Pardew

are back in the game.

Everton and West Brom turn

to familiar faces

to try and save their seasons.

The highest paid university vice

chancellor in the UK,

who's announced she's stepping down

after her pay was described

as "outrageous," has

defended her salary.

Professor Dame Glynis Breakwell

at Bath University insists

she's not embarrassed

by her £468,000 annual

pay packet and insists

the university hasn't been damaged

by the controversy.

She's been speaking to our education

editor, Branwen Jeffries.

Cold winter sun on the campus.

The University of Bath

hoping to move on.

The vice chancellor,

in her first interview,

told me her pay was justified.

You seem unembarrassed

by the controversy.

I think that the controversy

has been something that

I would have wished

to avoid, but I'm not

embarrassed by the fact

that

those people who actually have

determined my salary did so in the

way that they did.

Professor Dame Glynis

Breakwell will be paid

£468,000 a year

until February, 2019.

She'll stay in the university flat

in Bath until August, 2018.

And a car loan of £31,000

will be written off.

Your pay has been one element

of the controversy, so has

the house, the housekeeper that goes

with it, the car loan that is being

written off, the fact indeed that

you will now be paid until February,

2019.

Do you think that's going to do

further damage to the

university's reputation?

I don't actually think

that the university's

reputation is being damaged by this.

I think that we recognise the value

and the significance of the

University.

The cost of being

a student has risen.

Rents in Bath are high.

Few today regretted her departure.

Students had no trust in her any

more, so I think that it was

probably the right thing to do.

It was a huge thing

in the House of Lords as well.

She needed to go.

It was bad press.

It's good that now we are doing

something to sort it out,

I think.

Isn't there something fundamental,

though, in this, where

students feel and the wider public

that vice chancellor's pay just

looks excessive now.

Yes, I think that has been argued.

But do you accept it?

I think that we have a situation

where we are in a globally

competitive market.

This is no longer just about Bath.

There are far wider

questions about who

decides on senior pay in

universities, with calls for greater

transparency and fairness.

You have over 50 vice

chancellors who are

paid over £300,000.

You have two thirds

of them who are on

remuneration committees that never

actually tell us how the decisions

are made.

So what's happened here may be

a tipping point, with

universities forced

to justify high pay.

Branwen Jeffries, BBC News, Bath.

A man who a judge ruled had probably

sexually assaulted his baby daughter

before she died has been giving

evidence at an inquest

into her death.

13-month-old Poppi Worthington died

after sustaining unexplained

injuries at her home in 2012.

A police investigation

into her death was botched

and the verdict at the first inquest

quashed by the High Court.

Today Poppi's father,

Paul Worthington, who has

always denied wrongdoing,

refused to answer questions 69 times

at today's second inquest.

Our reporter Danny Savage was there.

Poppi Worthington's life

was tragically short.

The saga surrounding her unexplained

death is very long.

13-month-old Poppi died

nearly five years ago.

She'd been rushed to hospital

in Barrow after being found

unconscious at home

early one morning.

Many months later, a family court

judge found that Poppi's father

had probably sexually

assaulted her shortly

before her death.

Today, he was bundled

through the back door

of the coroner's court

under police guard.

Paul Worthington denies any

wrongdoing and has never been

charged, but he's been called

as a witness at the inquest

into his daughter's death.

Screened from the public but not

the press, he agreed that Poppi

was as fit as a fiddle

and would wake up just before 6am.

But when asked about events closer

to the day that Poppi died,

he kept replying, "I refer

to my previous statements.

"I rely on the right not

to answer under Rule 22."

That rule states no witness

at an inquest is obliged

to answer any question

which might incriminate them.

Last year, Cumbria Police was

heavily criticised for its handling

of the investigation

into Poppi's death.

That report detailed a catalogue

of mistakes made by detectives,

saying that crucial evidence

was thrown away, witnesses weren't

interviewed for eight months,

and there was enough evidence

to arrest Poppi's father on day one.

Accused of sexually

assaulting his own daughter,

Paul Worthington has been

in hiding for months.

But he was called to give

evidence here in person,

although he repeatedly

exercised his right not

to answer questions.

He's expected back here tomorrow.

Danny Savage, BBC News, Kendal.

The taxi hailing service Uber has

revealed that details of 2.7 million

British users and drivers

were stolen in a cyber

attack last year.

The Information Commissioner has

told Uber it expects the company

to notify everyone who was affected.

As soon as possible.

A 15-year-old boy has appeared

at Leeds Youth Court,

charged with causing death

by dangerous driving.

Two adults and three children

died on Saturday night,

when a stolen car crashed

in the Meanwood area

of the city on Saturday night.

The teenager was

remanded in custody.

Now, its melodic and rhythmic

charm is unmistakable.

Listen to this.

South, moderate, visibility good.

Shetlands, Orkneys and Faroes,

wind southeast...

Tomorrow marks 150 uninterrupted

years of the Shipping Forecast.

It's believed to be

the longest-running

continuous weather

forecast in the world.

Today it's issued by the Met Office

on behalf of the Maritime

and Coastguard Agency

and is appreciated by sailors

and landlubbers alike.

Weather presenter Sarah Keith-Lucas

looks back at the history

of the Shipping News.

There's a chance that leaving

those seasickness pills

at home was a mistake.

The weather impacts

the power of the ocean.

The shipping forecast

for the next 12 hours.

A disturbance near the Hebrides.

And after a major storm back

in the mid 19th century that led

to hundreds of deaths and the loss

of dozens of ships, the Shipping

Forecast was introduced.

Like then, today the forecast

is a vital tool that saves lives

at sea, and the RNLI says that

forward planning is the key

to safety on the water.

We want people to respect the water

as much as possible.

It's particularly important

for small boats and for

vessels who may not have

computerised apps available.

The traditional use

of the Shipping Forecast

through the radio is what they have

as their forecasting model.

That crucial forecast

data is produced daily,

here at the Met Office.

There was just a feeling

that there was too much

risk of loss of life.

Catherine Ross, the chief archivist,

showed me the very first weather

charts from 150 years ago.

What they did, rather cleverly,

was basically put pins

through the paper, and so you can

kind of see just about these

little pinpricks here,

and that meant they were always

plotting the same information

in the same place.

And you can see how they changed

from having no maps to very detailed

maps, and it was known as the storm

warning service to start with,

but it became known

as the iconic Shipping Forecast.

Before radio broadcasts,

storm warnings were communicated

by using drums and cones

hoisted up masts.

It's a complex job to forecast

accurately what the weather will do.

And, of course, technology has

dramatically changed over the years.

They've even got computers to do

some of the figuring out.

Computers were first used in weather

forecasting in the 50s,

had have become much more

sophisticated ever since.

The duty marine meteorologists will

first and foremost look at the winds

generated by the computer models.

They will then add their

interpretation, their expertise,

to those forecasts, then they look

at the sea state.

They'll also look at the fog

and what the visibility is like,

and the precipitation.

West or south west, five or six,

occasionally four later.

The Shipping Forecast

is not just for mariners,

but it also listened to by hundreds

of thousands of us

every day on Radio 4.

South west, five to seven.

Occasional rain, good,

occasionally moderate.

And that's a flavour of the bulletin

which is broadcast four times a day,

and at 5:20am it needs to be exactly

nine minutes long.

So on a calm day, I can take my time

in describing the weather conditions

for the 31 different sea areas.

Whereas on a stormy day,

I'll have to speak much quicker

in order to fit all that information

into the same nine minute window.

However you get your Shipping

Forecast, it is still essential,

and its melodic and rhythmic

qualities mean it remains an iconic

sound of British radio.

Moderate or fresh, extensive fog.

Weather outlook similar.

There is nothing like it.

Time for a look at the weather.

On the land as well as the sea.

Here's Tomasz Schafernaker.

Here's Tomasz Schafernaker.

Here we have a storm in view of an

area that often gets blasted with

gale force winds, but not today. It

is windy around the North Sea coast

and it has been a cold day. Look at

this from London a little bit

earlier on. Here is the wind, coming

from the north. There has been some

snow across the hills, and over the

next few days and over the course on

Friday into Saturday there could be

some more falling closer to the

North Sea coast, particularly around

the upland areas. The North York

Moors, for example. Rural areas

could be as cold as minus seven

Celsius, but that is the absolute

lowest it will get and we have

already had that this season so far.

Tomorrow, a lot of crisp sunshine,

stronger winds. Mostly rain here but

some of us will get some snow, and

maybe some showers in the South West

two. It will be around 2-3dC, but it

will feel like it is -2 or minus

three Celsius. We are ending the

working week again zero. 5-6

obvious. There is a chance that we

could see some sleep, maybe in the

South East for a time early on

Friday morning. A change on the way

for a Saturday. Slightly less cold

air. Not particularly mild. An area

of high pressure with wind blowing

like so, and what it will do is

bring a little bit of Atlantic wharf

DiNardo