28/12/2016 London News

Good evening and welcome to BBC London News.

We start tonight with the plight of London's rough sleepers,

and new figures released by City Hall show that nearly one

in 10 people living on the streets are former servicemen.

The Mayor has pledged to help them, saying he'll spend

an additional ?4 million to reduce homelessness.

It's just a week since this former serviceman walked into this hostel.

After a year of sleeping rough in London. He asked us to hide his

identity to protect his family, he says there are many more like him

without the structure of the military, life too much to bear. I

could take you to Westminster now and show you ten or 12 that I know

of in one tiny area. He thought because he was a former servicemen

he would get more help in London but what he found instead was that he

was sent to the back of the queue. I went into Westminster county council

offices and basically I was told, you can get the form and fill it in

but if you are a single man, you're looking at a 20 year wait on the

waiting list. In the last eight years the number of people sleeping

rough in London has doubled and the proportion of veterans has risen

greatly. This hostel alone has 155 people currently staying here, dirty

one of those ex-service personnel. The mayor has said ?4.2 million is

to be spent directly helping rough sleepers. 2 million will go to help

350 regular rough sleepers, 1.9 million will help recent rough

sleepers, and ?340,000 will go towards the so-called pan London

clearing house. We are bringing together all the different players,

whether that is councils, voluntary sector, homeless charities and

central government and other agencies, to work out how best to

help the different kinds of people who end up rough sleeping. Neil is a

former soldier who has also set grass and now he works bringing

ex-military of the streets. So what does he think of the plan? It is not

going anywhere near far enough, to help eradicate the problem that

there is in London. First give people security of homes and there

needs to be more social housing. Just yesterday a man sleeping rough

behind Trafalgar Square was the start and died. The mayor said in

one of the wealthiest cities on earth homelessness is a source of

shame. Hundreds of nail bars across London

have been visited by immigration officials in an attempt to crack

down on illegal workers. Many of the shops will likely face

fines as more than a dozen vulnerable people were identified

as being at risk of modern slavery. This was part of an operation.

Magnified. It is run by the Home Office. It is trying to target

businesses suspected of employing and exploiting illegal migrant

workers. On this occasion, nail bars targeted as they are seen as a risk

industry because many of the workers, it is manual work and often

workers do not need to speak English. The officers carrying out

these searches have special training to spot those kinds of people being

trafficked into the country. And in one south London nail bar Ilan it is

suspected one third of the workers were forced into work. Looking

across London and the south-east, in total we concede that 161 businesses

were visited. Of those, 52 people were arrested on suspicion of

immigration offences and 40 businesses given warnings that they

could face fines in the future. A little earlier I spoke to Rachel

Harbour from the UK modern slavery helpline and she believes that

London is a hotspot for human trafficking. Through the helpline we

are getting a large number of calls from potential victims or

observations of potential modern slavery occurring in London. I'm not

surprised by the nail bars either, it has been reported as an industry

which uses manual labour and if English is not your first language

then victims can still be profitable to a trafficker and exploited. And

in total across the country it is thought that 14 victims were

suspected of being victims of slavery or human trafficking. The

Home Office told us they are now being taken to a safe place and

offered support. Families left homeless after a fire

ripped through their west London The blaze, in August,

was caused by a faulty It was back in August

when the DeFreitas family's A London Fire Brigade investigation

concluded it was sparked The company behind the tumble dryer,

Whirlpool, say they are still Meanwhile, the family are still

living in temporary accommodation, It's been months and it's been very

frustrating, you know. Your world has been turned

upside down, in a sense, Of the 27 households who had to move

out, 17 are now back in. Chantelle was home in time

for Christmas, but still has some We had to sort of pay

to purchase clothes and stuff. We weren't allowed home for six

weeks to get anything. But nobody wants to take

responsibility for that. It would be nice if we could be

acknowledged as a group, that a lot of us have gone

through unnecessary Whirlpool says its thoughts

are with all those affected. It has identified tumble-dryer

models which need a fire risk, but it has

told its customers they can continue to use them, as long

as they are not left unattended. But the solicitors representing

the tenants affected by The concept that people have to stay

with their tumble dryers in order for them to be safe whilst in use

is pretty ludicrous. I don't think anyone would consider

that that's acceptable. You know, the obligation

is on manufacturers to get Consumers are buying products

and they expect them to be safe. That is an obligation that

manufacturers have in law. This is one of the machines that has

been on the affected list. The London Fire Brigade has also

warned people against using models They said this could have been

much worse than people A look at the weather forecast

now with Chris Fawkes. We are likely going to see some

dense patches of fog forming overnight tonight, the West could be

to the north and the West of London. These areas certainly getting that

fog and visibility down to about 100 metres in the west of that. Also

some frost out of time giving some icy stretches on untreated roads and

services. If the fog forms in the capital, some of the taller

buildings will stick up into the clearer skies above. If you do start

the day with the fog it could remain there all day. But some of us have

sunshine all day with temperatures of about 7 degrees. It gets milder

though in the run-up to the weekend. I'll be back later at 10.40,

but for now from everyone Good evening, the weather is proving

hazardous and the fog now becoming more extensive and causing

disruption overnight tonight. There is a warning from the Met office and

you can stay in touch on the website with all the latest details. For the

most part the Northern Isles of Scotland escaping but not a pretty

picture further south. This is eight o'clock in the morning, not everyone

when he up to that sunshine. The fog will be extensive and freezing with

some slippery surfaces around as well. Further north we have frost

around in the east of Scotland but milder