20/12/2017 BBC News at Six

Tonight at six - the Met Police

is to review dozens of sex offence

cases after the collapse

of two prosecutions.

In the last week the trials of two

men charged with rape were halted -

police failed to hand over evidence

helpful to the defence.

The danger here is that people

will lose years of their lives

locked up in prison for crimes

they haven't committed,

evidence that could have revealed

this being suppressed,

and not disclosed to their lawyers,

and years of their lives wasted.

We'll be asking how many

similar cases there might

be around the country.

Also tonight:

The world's leading financial

organisation says the UK

is in need of a tonic -

it forecasts slower

growth because of Brexit.

A new challenge from the EU's

chief Brexit negotiator -

he says the UK must go it alone

sooner than the government wants.

A special report on why patients

with eating disorders

in Northern Ireland are forced

to travel to England

for hospital care.

You're trying to recover

from an eating disorder,

that in itself is a struggle,

never mind having the added factor

of being away from your family.

The super-agers cheerleading

in their 70s and 80s -

so what's the secret to a long

and healthy life?

And coming up on Sportsday later

in the hour on BBC News: The last

of the League Cup quarterfinals

with Championship Bristol City

getting ready to face

the holders Manchester United.

Good evening and welcome

to the BBC News at Six.

Britain's biggest police force,

the Metropolitan Police,

is reviewing all its current sex

offence investigations

after the collapse of two rape cases

in the space of a week.

Both prosecutions were halted

because the police had failed

to disclose key evidence which might

have helped the defence.

Several legal experts are now

warning that this may reflect

a wider issue across England,

Wales and Northern Ireland.

Here's our legal

correspondent Clive Coleman.

Are the scales of justice being

unfairly kicked against defendants,

because the police are not sharing

evidence that could help their case?

One of the founding principles of

the criminal justice system is beset

by problems. The BBC understands

Isaac Itiary spent months in jail,

awaiting trial on charges of sexual

activity with a child. The case

against him was dropped yesterday,

when text messages from his alleged

teenage victim's phone, showed she

routinely lied about her age. A few

days earlier, the case against Liam

Allan was stopped because text

messages showed her victims enjoyed

having sex with him.

In the last

year I have not concentrated on

anything so it has ripped apart my

normal personal life.

The

Metropolitan Police is now carrying

out a review into what happened to

Liam Allan, and all the evidence in

its current rate and sex abuse

cases.

That is being conducted

jointly with the CPS and our

investigating officers, to make sure

those cases are safe to go to trial.

Our priority are the 30-something

where trials are about to start. I

have no reason to believe there are

problems with any cases, but it is a

pragmatic step to conduct that

checked now.

The police and Crown

Prosecution Service have made huge

efforts in recent years to write the

wrongs of the past and ensure that

alleged victims in rape and sexual

assault cases are treated properly,

but some fear that the process of

disclosing evidence to the defence

has been damaged as a result. The

Attorney General has started a

review into disclosure. He thinks

part of the problem is the sheer

weight of evidence.

We have very

large amounts now of mostly digital

information in a whole range of

trials that is very hard to filter

and sit affectively so you can find

the evidence that ought to be

disclosed. That is a problem we are

encountering in fraud cases,

terrorism cases that others as well.

But there have been many damaging

reviews of the disclosure process in

recent years, and some of those

working in the criminal courts

believe the system's integrity is

now under threat.

The danger here is

people can lose years of their lives

locked up in prison for crimes they

have not committed. Evidence that

could show they are innocent is not

disclosed to them or their lawyers,

and therefore there are great

miscarriages of justice.

The

prosecution's duty to pass evidence

to the defence which assists the

defence underpins our justice

system. That duty is now under

scrutiny as never before.

Our home editor Mark

Easton is here with me.

Is this a problem just for the Met

or are we dealing with something

much wider?

I think it goes much

wider than just rape cases in

London. As Clive was saying, it

might sound counterintuitive, but

the justice system relies on the

people doing the prosecution, the

police and prosecution service, to

give the defence anything that might

undermine their case, their hopes of

getting a conviction. Does it work?

Only last summer, the people whose

job it was to keep an eye on the

police and prosecutors did an

inspection and came up with some

troubling findings. And in 55% of

Crown Court trials, there were

issues with initial disclosed and

most of those issues were not

resolved. Half of prosecution

lawyers say the same. There have

been recommendations going back

years for better training,

supervision systems. Others argue it

is really about money, more

resources and expertise needed

because complex cases these days

involved in a lot more data. And

some think it may partly be down to

the fact that people want to improve

conviction rates with rape trials.

What should not be forgotten in all

of this is that innocent people have

ended up wrongly convicted of crimes

because evidence has not been handed

over. Getting this right is

fundamental to our system of

justice.

Thank you.

The International Monetary Fund -

the world's leading

financial organisation -

has downgraded its forecast for

the UK's economic growth this year.

The head of the IMF,

Christine Lagarde, said the impact

of the UK's decision to leave the EU

had "weighed heavily"

on the economy, and that rising

inflation and stagnant wages

were squeezing spending power.

Here's our economics

editor Kamal Ahmed.

She came before the referendum with

a warning. If Britain voted Brexit,

then the economic risks were clear.

It is going to be pretty bad to

very, very bad. That is what we see.

Today she was back for the first

time since that Brexit vote, to give

her analysis of where we are now.

Since the start of this year, growth

has slowed notably. The significant

depreciation of sterling that

followed the referendum has pushed

inflation over 3%, squeezing real

incomes.

How do you respond to those

critics who suggest the IMF is

simply too gloomy on the UK economy?

Regrettably, the numbers we are

seeing the economy delivered today

are actually proving the point that

we made a year and a half ago, when

people said you are too gloomy, and

you are one of those experts.

Christine Lagarde came here to the

Treasury to deliver her report, and

let's be clear, she was not all

gloomy. She said that employment

was at record levels, and she

welcomed progress in those Brexit

negotiations. But if I was to

identify one big takeout from the

IMF today, it is this. In a world of

growing global growth, the UK

economy has suffered since the

referendum. The IMF said growth in

the first nine months of the year

was lower than in 2016. It said that

prices had risen because of a fall

in the value of the pound causing a

squeeze on living standards. And

called for a quick agreement on the

transition phase of the Brexit talks

to use uncertainty and avoid

crashing out of the EU. Around the

corner in parliament, it was the

turn of the Governor of the Bank of

England, also pushing for a

free-trade deal, this time in

financial services, despite grumbles

from the EU that such a thing had

never been achieved before.

I don't

accept the argument that just

because it has not been done in the

past it cannot be done in the future

and store we would just walk away

from progress is that was the

approach we took two issues.

The

hunt for an agreement goes on, and

firms like this gin manufacturer in

London are keeping plans on ice

until there is greater clarity.

Clearly helps that the pound is not

strong and becoming more expensive,

but it is not a major factor. Until

it is clear exactly what is going to

happen with Brexit, it is very

difficult to commit to further

investment here, because of the

markets are difficult to access from

the UK, it will be difficult to

justify spending out more money

growing the business.

It is now all

about that clarity, clarity on any

deal with the EU, and clarity with

the future of the UK economy once

Brexit has happened.

Now to the Brexit talks -

and a new challenge

from the EU's chief negotiator.

Michel Barnier says he wants

the transition period after Britain

legally leaves the EU to be shorter.

The Government wants two years for

businesses to adjust to any deal,

but the EU now says the cut-off

point should be the end of December

2020 - that's three months less.

The Prime Minister said

today that the timeline

was a matter for negotiation.

Our political editor

Laura Kuenssberg reports.

She made it this far. The Prime

Minister leaving her house today for

work. Still in Number Ten after EU

when that did not always looks

certain.

Are you looking forward to break,

Prime Minister?

No easy answers on

how government's biggest job, how we

leave the EU. Can the government

have the trade deal ready before we

leave?

That is what we are working

to and that is what I believe we can

do. Everybody wants to know on what

basis they are going to be operating

the future.

There are big doubts in

Brussels about that, and the Tories

expectation that it will take about

two years to make the changes we

need after Brexit, a transition, and

there is nothing surprising about

the European Union getting its

arguments in early. The chief

negotiator saying today we would

have to stick to all of the rules

during transition and that period

would have to be over by the end of

2020, earlier than she believes. It

is not just the government, Labour

thinks two years is about right.

We

need at least two years. We need

clarity about what that transition

deal means and I think membership of

the customs union and single market

for that period but there needs to

be more flexibility.

But don't be

fooled, there is no real outbreak of

Christmas cheer between the two main

parties.

Last year the Prime

Minister told the radio Times that

on Christmas Day she likes to

prepare and cook her own goose.

LAUGHTER

In the spirit of Christmas, can I

suggest you heard that in an order

to extract the maximum pleasure from

the messy job of stuffing her goose

that she names it either Michael or

Boris.

The applause gave the

Chancellor time to help out the

Prime Minister with her own punch

line.

I think I will have to resist

the temptation to call the goose

Jeremy.

It was Prime Minister's Questions,

not the Christmas panto. But for

Theresa May's party at least, the

end of the year has brought a little

cheer.

Police are continuing

to search two properties,

including a community centre,

following anti-terror raids

in Sheffield and Chesterfield.

Four men have been arrested and held

over an alleged Islamist terror plot

that officers say could have been

carried out this Christmas.

It's being billed as the most

far-reaching overhaul of America's

tax system for decades.

In his first major legislative

achievement, President Trump has

kept his pledge to recast the taxes

individuals and corporations pay.

Critics say the plans

are a give-away to the super-rich,

while his supporters insist

the changes will boost the economy.

Let's speak to our North

America Editor Jon Sopel,

who's outside the White House.

Mr Trump has had quite a rocky time

of it, how significant is this

particular achievement?

I think this

is a significant achievement for the

president. He has been holding a

cabinet meeting in the last few

minutes and was talking about this

being a great gift to the American

people. Although it is fair to say

the very wealthiest American people

will get a much bigger Christmas

present from this tax reduction,

than blue-collar people, the very

people who voted for Donald Trump.

It has global significance as well.

That old phrase that when America

sneezes Britain catches a cold, the

converse is true as well. If there

is bigger economic growth in the US,

if people have more money to spend,

then British exports which are

cheaper at the moment because of a

weak pound, should also benefit the

British economy as well as the

American economy. Britain has an

interest in the American economy

growing. It has been a difficult

year for Donald Trump, but at the

end of it, he can reflect that his

tax reform has got past, the stock

market is at record levels, he has

put his pick into the Supreme Court,

and regulations have been torn up.

It may not have been pretty, but he

sort of got done what he promised to

do.

Thank you.

The time is 6:15pm.

Our top story this evening.

The Met Police will review dozens

of sex offence cases

after the trials of two men charged

with rape were halted.

And still to come:

Why access to high-speed

broadband will soon

become a legal right.

Coming up on Sportsday in the next

15 minutes on BBC News:

Birmingham's bid to host

the Commonwealth's finally

gets the go-ahead.

The Games are coming

to the Midlands in 2022.

Struggling to cope with an acute

eating disorder is tough enough -

but imagine if the hospital

treatment you need is only available

hundreds of miles away.

That's what it's like for many

patients in Northern Ireland -

they have to travel to London,

leaving behind family and friends.

A review of services

in Northern Ireland

is currently under way.

Our health correspondent

Dominic Hughes has this special

report on the challenges facing

patients and those trying

to care for them.

More than a million people in the UK

are living with an eating disorder.

A life-threatening mental illness.

It's a very destructive disease,

like, physically, mentally.

It is just absolute torture.

Student nurse Olivia

realised she had anorexia

while at university.

But when she sought help

from her GP, she was shocked

by a simple lack of understanding.

They should know that it is not

to do with food, it is to do

with maybe some emotional trauma

that you went through,

or the unhappiness in your life.

I cried a lot after that

because no one was taking me

seriously, you know.

There is so much going

on in my head and no one

is dealing with that.

Olivia ended up getting help

through a private clinic.

But in Northern Ireland

where she lives there

is a particular issue around how

and especially where eating

disorders are treated.

Right now thousands of people across

Northern Ireland are struggling

with an eating disorder.

And while there

are services in the community

where they can get help,

those services are under

intense pressure.

And for people who are in a real

crisis, who need hospital treatment,

well, at the moment their only

option is to leave Northern

Ireland altogether.

It was a time in my life where

I just went, how did I come to this?

Aileen's anorexia got so bad

that she required hospitalisation.

But nowhere in Northern

Ireland could deliver

the intensive care she needed.

Her only option, to leave home

and travel to London,

hundreds of miles away.

Trying to recover from

an eating disorder,

that in itself is a struggle.

Never mind having the added factor

of being away from your family.

There's people out there that

are really, really struggling

with life and can't access the help

that they really, really need.

Community-based teams

in Northern Ireland do offer

psychological therapies.

But a population of just 1.8 million

may not be enough people

for a specialist hospital service.

The advice we have sought

is you might need a population

base of say 5 million.

So would we ever justify

an inpatient service, I'm not sure.

For many an eating disorder gives

some control over a part of life

when everything else feels very much

out of control.

Early diagnosis and

treatment are vital.

Every day we worried

if our son was going to be

alive by the night-time.

At the age of just 24,

Lawrence died from a heart attack

after living with bulimia for years.

His mother Pam believes her son

missed out on the best care

and so too, are hundreds of others.

It can be fatal, it has been fatal,

not just for my son

but for a lot of people.

In different age ranges,

not just at 24 years

of age, at 30, 40 and 50.

People need to get

the right support.

They are entitled to it.

The NHS in Northern Ireland is not

alone in struggling to meet demand

for help with eating disorders.

But anorexia and bulimia are taking

lives and tearing families apart.

And there are no easy answers

when it comes to improving

the way they are treated.

Dominic Hughes, BBC News, Belfast.

Uber is officially a transport

company and not a digital service,

that's according to a European Court

of Justice ruling today.

The ride-hailing firm had argued

it was an information service -

helping people to make contact

with each other electronically -

and not a cab firm.

Now, we are doing more

and more things online -

whether it's the shopping

or streaming the latest drama -

but slow broadband speeds can make

the whole process

pretty frustrating.

Now the government says

we will have a legal right to demand

high speed broadband by 2020.

Our Technology Correspondent Rory

Cellan-Jones is here.

I can almost hear millions of people

shouting, "About time too!"

It's

about 4% of the country that is left

in the slow lane but it gets all the

more frustrating for them as it goes

on. Ofcom worked out recently there

is something like 1.1 million homes

and businesses across the UK just

not getting the kind of broadband

they need to do simple tasks. So,

from 2020 they are going to be given

a legal right to a minimum service

of 10 megabits per second, what's

called a universal service

obligation, that still not that

fast. Ofcom reckons superfast

broadband is defined as 30 megabits

per second. Berget into that 10

megabits a second is going to be

quite a challenge, the government

must work out which companies will

do it, what technologies they are

going to use to do it and it will

not even then end up covering

absolutely everyone. Will be a

maximum cost. If you live up the

mountain and they work out it will

cost thousands of pounds you will

still have two whistle for your

broadband, I'm afraid.

Rory, thank

you very much.

A brief look at some

of the day's other news stories.

It's understood Birmingham will be

confirmed as the host city

of the 2022 Commonwealth Games

tomorrow.

It will be Britain's most

expensive sports event

since the 2012 Olympics -

at a cost of £750 million.

Scotland's biggest council landlord

is considering proposals to knock

down all its high-rise flats over

the next 20 years.

North Lanarkshire Council has 48

tower blocks with about 4,000

homes between them.

It will run a consultation on how

to gradually replace them

all with low-rise buildings.

A review has recommended

that the pay of members

of the Northern Ireland Assembly

should be cut by around

£13,000 in two stages.

MLAs have been drawing

their full salaries since

being elected in March -

even though the Assembly

at Stormont hasn't been sitting

because the power-sharing

Executive has collapsed.

Life expectancy across the globe

is continuing to rise prompting

scientists to ask how long we might

live in the future.

Most think we will see gradual gains

in longevity but there have been

predictions that anti-ageing drugs

could allow people

to live for centuries.

In the last of his special

reports on "super-agers",

our medical correspondent

Fergus Walsh has been

to California and Arizona.

I like to do things.

I don't want to sit

in the background.

Enthusiastic, engaged, optimistic.

Lester Dray is 101,

the oldest resident of this

retirement village

in Sun City, Arizona.

You're going to miss something

if you just moan and groan

about how horrible life is.

Show me your teeth.

Do you hear a sound?

Say, "Aah".

Aah.

He gets regular medical checks as

part of a study into longevity.

It's an issue which is attracting

interest from unusual quarters.

In Silicon Valley, California, some

of the biggest names from Google to

Facebook are investing hundreds of

millions of dollars into defeating

the diseases of ageing.

So, why are tech entrepreneurs

suddenly interested in human health?

I think Silicon Valley

is driven by curiosity.

I think that same curiosity that

drives a 14-year-old to programme

computers in his bedroom drives

someone in their 20s or 30s to

really apply their minds and their

cash to this problem.

The DNA from this special part of

the cell called the mitochondria...

It's why this British scientist set

up in Silicon Valley.

Aubrey de Grey is probably the

world's leading advocate

of life extension.

The idea that humans can and will

live in good health

for hundreds of years.

There will certainly be

no limit on how long

people can live once we bring

ageing under control.

People will still die.

There's still trucks

to be hit by and so on.

But the fact is people will on

average live a lot longer and less

of some bizarre things like we get

hit by an asteroid, or whatever.

That's beautiful...

That's a minority view.

Although extending life

is possible in the lab with

fruit flies, used for worms,

it gets more difficult higher up

the evolutionary ladder.

So in the lab in simple

laboratory animals we can

increase life span by 100%, 200,

500%, really extraordinary

differences in life span.

It turns out ageing is really

plastic

in these simple laboratory animals.

It may be more complex as we go

to mammals, for the mouse, for

example, we've been able to increase

the life span of 20 or 30%.

And we really don't know what's

possible in humans at this point.

We do know exercise

is a magic formula that can

keep us healthy longer and there

are no drugs yet to match it.

There is probably

an upper limit to life

expectancy of around 115 years.

So, the quest for

immortality is still

the stuff of science fiction.

But increasing our health span,

the number of years we spend free of

chronic diseases, well,

that really could be a reality.

Here we go!

# Jingle bell, jingle

bell, jingle bell rock

# Jingle bell, jingle bell jive #

Finding something you enjoy

and staying socially engaged are key

elements of healthy ageing.

Like the Sun City Poms, many of whom

are in their 70s and 80s.

I'm 78, born on the 4th of July, so

I'm still a firecracker

and still going and booming.

It keeps me physically active,

it keeps my brain working

and helps my memory.

We just get out there and do

what we need to do and enjoy.

We can't slow time but we can put

more life in our years,

and hopefully become super-agers.

Fergus Walsh, BBC News,

Sun City, Arizona.

Let's see if the weather is going to

cheer us up.

The picture has been so gloomy, we

had to inject a bit of weather into

the weather forecast, it's not from

today, it is a summary picture. The

picture for the festive period is

the same as today, cloudy, some rain

around, with a bit of brightness. We

had some brightness today, not

cloudy everywhere. Tonight, most of

the UK will be surrounded with

cloud, certainly England and Wales,

quite a bit of cloud of Northern

Ireland, in Scotland clearer skies

so hence a bit colder, maybe a touch

of frost in the Glens. This is the

weather map for tomorrow, the yellow

is the mild air pushing into parts

of Scandinavia, and that means it's

going to be a very similar day

tomorrow to what we've just had. A

lot of cloud around, low grace --

grey skies. The north of Scotland

and the East of England a bit

brighter, Newcastle into Hull with a

bit of brightness and one or two

glimmers of sunshine at some point

in the day across the Midlands and

Wales. Here is a look at Friday

morning. Extensive cloud and drizzle

and maybe some coastal fog, and once

again in the north-east a little bit

of sunshine. Look at those

temperatures, 12 degrees across the

south, above the average for this

time of year, around about nine in

the far north for our friends in

Shetland. This is Saturday, the low

pressure moving to the north of

Scotland, quite a few isobars serve

a subtle change in weather, the

winds will strengthen, gale force

winds in the north for a time, and

the strong wind will help to bring

milder air further north, 12, 11

degrees across the country, Sunday

is looking milder. We are not

getting snow but I thought I would

finish with a festive picture

anyway.

A reminder of our main story. The

Metropolitan Police is to review

dozens of sex offences cases after

the trials of two men charged with

rain were halted because police had

failed to