28/03/2017 East Midlands Today

And now the news for the East Midlands, I'm Geeta Pendse.

First tonight, the police in Nottinghamshire have started

an intensive search for a mother and her two young sons

They say they urgently need to hear from anyone who can help trace them.

Samantha Baldwin was last seen near Nottingham city centre.

Make no mistake, this search is a priority

I'm at Central police station where earlier this evening

briefed us the media on the latest developments.

I can tell you the missing woman is Samantha Baldwin who's

42 and it's believed she is with her two young sons.

Lewis Madge, who's nine, and his six-year-old brother Dylan.

The family are from Newark but have connections to both Lincolnshire

and Manchester and it's possible they may have travelled

How intensive is the police search tonight?

Well, they are taking this very seriously.

They have a dedicated team of three detective sergeants and 11 detective

constables who are working round the clock.

They also have search teams working in a targeted way to find

They've got specialist missing from home teams and neighbourhood

They have conducted searches of properties and talked

We can't underestimate the importance of the information

So, any bit of information, however small somebody might think it is,

if they've seen people that fit the description, if they have any

knowledge or have heard any rumours about where Samantha and the two

boys might be, then please get in touch through

It's really, really important people do so.

A small bit of information might be the little bits of the jigsaw

Although they're from Newark, Samantha was last seen

near Nottingham City Centre yesterday and police have

They're also working with police in Manchester and Lincolnshire.

"We have two little boys and a mother," they told me

"we want to find them safe and well, that's out priority."

And a reminder of those numbers again.

If you have information you can call 101 and quote incident 332 or ring

Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

Next, what does Brexit mean for hundreds of doctors and nurses

from other EU countries working for the NHS in the East Midlands?

As the government prepares to invoke Article 50,

Britain's formal notice to leave the EU, there are still no

guarantees over the right of medical staff from other EU countries

Our health correspondent Rob Sissons reports

I moved to England two years ago and I moved

I do love Nottingham and I would like to stay here.

She's holding off buying a house in Nottingham

because of the uncertainty around Brexit talks.

We are going to wait and see what that is going to bring us,

but obviously, it's a different country now compared

At a time when the NHS is short of thousands of nurses,

most patients seem to appreciate the contribution of foreign nurses.

The nurse I have, Chiara, she can't do enough for you.

But Chiara says a small minority of patients aren't so welcoming.

It's bad to say, but you feel like you're different

Nurses and midwives from other European Union countries number 215

But there are still no guarantees about their right to remain

It's uncertainty, because people just don't know

So, they are quite anxious and we are reassuring them.

We are sending lots of messages out to our nurses that they are valuable

It's important that they don't make a knee jerk reaction

I came over from the Netherlands about 20 years ago.

I trained and qualified as a nurse of their and I've been working

Marijke's settled and married with children in Nottingham.

She has a Dutch passport and doesn't want to have to give that up.

If it gets harder to stay here, or if people are forced

into becoming British citizens when they don't really want to,

I think they might well choose not to stay here.

Well, the Royal College of Nursing is extremely concerned

about the impact of Brexit on the number of universes

With me is the RCN regional director, Dr Sheila Marriot.

First of all, we saw in Rob's film the level of uncertainty,

this fear that nurses will leave the NHS, the EU nurses.

Surely, the government can't let that happen.

Well, the nurses that are here from the EU

We know there are about 24,000 vacancies in the UK and many

of those vacancies could be filled by nurses from the EU.

But if they are leaving because they feel uncertain

about security of their jobs then they are unlikely to stay.

And have you seen much of an impact already in terms of EU nurses

Well, we know that our nurses have to apply to the nursing

and midwifery board to make sure that they reach the standards

And we know that the numbers are very significantly down

We would like Theresa May to acknowledge the importance

And, secondly, give them some sense of security that they will be able

Do you think this will have an impact on patient care?

Well, if there are 24,000 vacancies, then however hard the nurses that

are working in the NHS at the moment work, clearly, they can't do

the jobs of two or three nurses to fill those vacancies.

OK, well, Dr Sheila Marriot, thank you for joining us.

The agency which recruits workers for the Sports Direct warehouse

at Shirebrook in Derbyshire has told Parliament they have

made their contracts easier to understand for workers.

TransLine were called to give evidence to the Business Select

Committee which is investigating concerns about the treatment

From Westminster, here's our political editor Tony Roe.

Trade unions say there are 1.6 million agency workers,

and those in low paid jobs are most likely to be the ones

The committee began investigating after a BBC Inside Out programme

on Sports Direct's warehouse in Shirebrook in Derbyshire.

It showed some workers earning less than the minimum wage

as they were docked pay for the time spent going through security.

They also had a six strike and you're out policy

Since the Business Select Committee began its inquiry into future work

practices, Sports Direct has made changes.

No zero hours contracts anymore for shop staff,

no six strikes policy, and changes to security searches.

Where Sports Direct are directly responsible, where it was directly

in the public glare, they've taken action.

Where it's not in the public glare, and then not responsible,

although we claimed them to be responsible as the client,

Today's committee heard agencies described as either criminal,

dodgy or compliant, as in compliant with the law.

Not surprisingly, TransLine believe they are compliant.

We want to be seen out there as a compliant agency,

we've had a big red flashing light over us, and we've done

A lot of things have been done and we're not

publicising them beforehand, so we've had a big shift

of our thought process, and thinking, right,

actually, we need to be at the forefront of this.

Some companies like to use agency staff to respond in changes

in demand but unions want access to those workers to have the chance

It's been revealed that dozens of drivers across the East Midlands

were stopped for using their mobile phones in the first week

following the introduction of tough new penalties.

Between the first and 7th of March, Leicestershire Police

stopped 16 motorists, while officers in

In Derbyshire, 64 drivers were stopped for both mobile phone

So, it's goodbye from me, here's your weather now.

Thank you and good evening. A fairly changeable day today and as we move

through the next few days, it's also looking quite unsettled.

Low-pressure out in the Atlantic driving our weather and we will see

some weather fronts making their way from east to West. It's hard to

pinpoint where they will sit so stage into the forecast. Tonight,

some rain, won't be too heavy, turning increasingly dry into the

early hours, fairly cloudy with some hill fog with an overnight low of

9-10. A fairly mild start to the day tomorrow. We could see some

outbreaks of light rain or drizzle and something a little bit brighter

particularly in the south-east moving into the afternoon but that

rain isn't too far away in the north-west. Temperatures at a

maximum of 15. It'll be fairly breezy. Thursday, similar story, the

rain sitting out in the north-west, moving down to the south-east with

some uncertainty. It will be the warmest day of the week with

temperatures reaching a high of 17. A cold front introduces some fresh

air and rain so turning cooler into the weekend. Here's your

times, but fairly mild for the time of year. This stay tuned for the

national weather forecasts with John Hammond.

Good evening. Your parents might have told you once that life 's not

fair and they were right. He is the proof. Over the next few days some

of us will enjoy some lovely sunshine, temperatures in the low

20s. It will feel like early summer. For others, quite a lot of rain

around and it will feel like late March. This is showers earlier on

today and dampness this evening in the West Country and Wales. That is

heading north eastwards. A different sort of night. A lot of cloud

around, quite damp and misty in places. Cloud cover will prevent

temperatures falling much at all. A much milder my