28/11/2017 London News

wintry by the end of the week. Thank

you.

That's all from the BBC News at Six,

so it's goodbye from me

Tonight on BBC London:

so it's goodbye from me

A

so it's goodbye from me

A special

so it's goodbye from me

A special report

so it's goodbye from me

A special report reveals

so it's goodbye from me

A special report reveals au

so it's goodbye from me

A special report reveals au pairs

so it's goodbye from me

A special report reveals au pairs

are being treated like slaves behind

closed doors.

The family was really

violent with each other. I felt

uncomfortable and unsafe. I did 14

hours a day, seven days a week. It

was too much.

Now there are calls

for a change in the law to offer

more protection.

Also tonight:

Tube bosses look at new ways to stop

panic on the underground

after the false terror alert

at Oxford Circus.

Plus, cheaper bills for Thames Water

customers after the company admits

it's "let people down".

After showing off his moves

on the dance floor, we hear

from sprinter Jonnie Peacock

about how he wants people

with disabilities to get inspired.

And they're the new craze popping

up across the capital.

Why are igloos so hot

this Christmas?

Good evening and welcome to the

programme with me Louisa Preston.

Tonight the vulnerable young women

who are being treated like slaves

behind closed doors.

That's the view of one au pair

agency in the capital.

A BBC London investigation has

found that some au pairs

are being exploited and even bullied

by the host families

who are supposed to be

looking after them.

There are now calls

for the Government to introduce

tighter regulations to protect them.

Alpa Patel has this special report.

Some on this march are strangers.

Almost all are foreign au pairs.

They have come to support each

other and make a stand

against exploitation and abuse.

We meet Ellie, not her real name.

We have disguised her face and

changed her voice for legal reasons.

She tells us about her

previous host family.

The family were very violent,

they were not violent with me,

but violent with the children.

I felt really

uncomfortable and unsafe.

I also did 14 hours a day,

seven days a week.

It was too much and I left.

We also spoke to Isabella,

again we have disguised her

identity for legal reasons.

She says she worked up to 70 hours

a week for just £100.

I started at seven o'clock,

I tidied, I did three

washing machines, I cried

after the first day.

My house mum told me to go

to my room, she said you work for me

and you need to do what I want.

After a few weeks I escaped.

She was scaring me.

Isabella was homeless

in a foreign country,

but luckily she was put

in touch with Maggie.

She runs an au pair agency

in Hampstead and found

Isabella another host family.

But only after she provided a clean

criminal record and two references,

something not required

by the current system.

Some of them are working all hours.

She said she was working weekends

sometimes frequently,

seven days a week.

Au pairs are entitled to two

completely free days a week.

But they get really bullied

by family some of them.

It is unbelievable.

They told me all about it.

Slavery is getting so much

publicity at the moment,

but some of it is going on with some

of these families and the way

they are treating their au pairs.

The government says if an au pair

is a victim of modern slavery,

it should be reported to the place.

it should be reported to the police.

According to government guidelines,

au pairs are not workers

and so are not eligible

for a minimum wage or paid holiday.

They are meant to be treated

as a member of the family

and given a room and meals.

In exchange they do around 30

hours of light housework

and baby-sitting a week.

In return for what is called pocket

money of £70 or more a week.

But we found online adverts that

went beyond the recommended hours,

adverts asking for excessive

household tasks, and

even proxy parenting.

The title of the advert up

here is au pair-carer.

Rosie Cox has carried

out extensive research.

She has been trying to raise

awareness about Bopara

She has been trying to raise

awareness about au pair

exploitation for over a decade.

The government needs to be quite

frank about what an au pair is said

is so that somebody can say actually

70 hours a week is not au

they ought to be being paid

the minimum wage.

At the moment nobody

knows where au pairs are.

They are not registered in any way,

the agencies who pays them do not

have to be registered,

so there is this unknown population.

We need to think about how

vulnerable they are,

it is almost always young women

inside people's homes.

Not every single au pair we met

had a negative story.

Anna is Spanish and looks

after Isabel and Rufus in Nunhead.

For me from the first minute

I arrived here I feel

like a member of the family.

I always have the weekends off

so I have a lot of time

to know London and for me

it is amazing living here.

I am lucky.

Anna 's host family work long hours,

they are one of many families

across London who rely on au pairs

to

help with childcare.

But experts warn without tighter

rules on au pairs are left open

to exploitation with few people

to turn to.

Lots more to come including:

After a year of leaks and burst

pipes, Thames Water customer

are to get cheaper bills

after the company admits

it's "let people down".

Tonight City Hall said

they are to review how

stations are evacuated

after a false terror

alert at Oxford Circus

sparked panic on Friday.

A leaked official report

into what happened at the station

says inaccurate information made

the situation worse.

16 people were injured in

the stampede after what was thought

to be gunfire on the platform.

This is a Black Friday these

shoppers will not forget a sphere

swept Oxford Circus, a busy shopping

area. What happened? In a leaked

document we can reveal a timeline of

what happened. At 16:39pm Oxford

Circus station wash-out after

reports received a discharge

firearm. Six minutes later armed

police arrived as the incident was

declared the most category one. By

17:34pm it was over. TfL had been

given permission from the police to

reopen the station. The report does

say the incident was compounded by

various differing reports of what

the incident actually was. The panic

spread from the platforms up here

onto the street level and right down

to Selfridge's and there are the

store says a surge of shoppers not

items onto the marble floor adding

to the pandemonium. Inside

Selfridge's the singer Olly Murs

tweeted there had been gunshots and

on social media many posted about a

possible terror attack. But

commentators say the panic was

understandable.

To go with the herd

is more than just a survival

instinct, it is a smart thing to do.

It is like outsourcing your

cognitive powers to other people,

get them to do the spotting for

danger.

With some injured in the

station evacuation now the

authorities are looking at their

announcements at cheap stations and

whether they can be improved.

Clearly there is an issue about

getting people out of stations very

quickly and that is something that

is worthy of more examination. How

do we evacuate people really quickly

in a situation where there is

probably some panic.?

The Met found

no evidence that any shots were

fired and the authorities are now

looking at what lessons can be

learned, especially

when misinformation and panic spread

so quickly.

Our home affairs correspondent joins

us from Oxford Circus. What is the

advice for Londoners in a situation

like this?

There was a great deal of

confusion here last Friday and

people respond in their own way to a

possible terrorist attack. The

official advice from the

Metropolitan Police in the event of

an attack is to run, height and

tell. That is a message brought in

from the United States and the

message they have been trying to get

out over the last year. There was

evidence people ran on Friday and we

saw a dozen people injured in the

stampede. However, at no point did

the Metropolitan Police issued a

specific run, hide and tell alert in

Twitter in the way they did at

London Bridge were clearly there was

a terrorist attack. On Friday people

were making their own mind up to an

extent about what to do. One

interesting thing we heard from the

organisation that represents

businesses and shops in the West

End, they are talking about whether

there is a need for loudspeakers

like they have in Tokyo to convey

information to the public during an

emergency and that is one thing that

were discussed by police,

politicians and other people here in

the coming weeks.

After being fined record amounts

over sewage leaks and burst pipes

across the capital this year Thames

water has admitted it let its

customers down and now they have

promised to cheaper bills for

everyone next year, but some say

that is not good enough. This was up

a street in Angel after a Thames

water main burst last December. Many

businesses were flooded and around

100 people were evacuated from their

homes.

It was all flooding up to

here.

Trevor Turner was one of them.

He and his wife have not moved

permanently.

Whenever I see anything

about Thames water I go, oak, not

again, because it is a fearful

thought. We watched this giant burst

on the street on upper streak

bubbling away.

It is one of the

incidents Thames water has been

criticised for. The company has

admitted it has let customers down

and is unlikely to meet its targets

for leaks once again this financial

year. It has now announced it will

be paying customers £40 million

worth of penalties for past leaks

earlier than required, having the

expected annual rise in bills by

around £8.

It is not just about

paying back customers early, it is a

lot of incremental investment. This

year we will not be paying dividends

to investors. We will be spending

that money for the benefit of our

customers, improving our service,

and that is the priority for us now.

It has been a bad year for Thames

Water. It was fined £20 million in

March for allowing 21 point 1

billion litres of sewage into the

Thames and has paid the penalty for

Mr leaked targets. The consumer

Council for water says it must do

better.

If one looks at the track

record for the last few years, there

have been significant bursts and the

leakage problems have not been met

and they have been fined as a result

of that. There has also been sewer

flooding in the Thames Valley area.

This is not acceptable to customers

and they are starting to get

impatient about the need for Thames

Water to put this right.

60% of the

top team has changed at Thames water

since last September. It is a

company that looks to want to turn a

corner and hopes to get back into

target by 2020. As we have been

hearing, children in London are more

likely to do better at school

whatever their start in life than

anywhere else in the country, but

ten years ago it was another story.

Many schools were failing and pupils

were bottom of the league tables.

How have they turned things around?

London has some of the tourist and

some of the most affluent areas in

the country, but no matter where you

live, there is more chance of your

children doing well here than

anywhere else. Look at this social

mobility hotspot and cold spot map

of England. It ranks all 320 local

authorities and London dominates it

with 29 out of 32 boroughs

considered hotspots. There were no

cold spots. Even before reaching

school-age children in London are

getting better opportunities

regardless of their background. This

nursery and School in Hackney has a

special mention in the report for

using the extra pupil premium

funding to give children and parents

more support.

We have been going to

places like Tate modern, the

aquarium and also we are on the edge

of Shoreditch so we can look at

street art and that has been

beneficial for our children because

we know they want to develop their

speed, language and communication

and vocabulary.

They get to go out,

they go on trips, they take part in

gardening and those sort of things

give you life skills.

At school

disadvantaged pupils with free

school meals do well as well. Across

London 51% get good GCSE grades in

English and maths, the average

across England is just 36%. In

Kensington and Chelsea 50% of

disadvantaged youngsters make it to

university. In rural and coastal

areas that is as low as 10%. After

the London riots Pembury estate in

London set up a project to help

community cohesion. There are

literacy sessions for toddlers,

support for secondary school pupils,

and a range of services for young

parents. It has had a positive

impact.

It helps parents like myself

and others to come and kids can play

together.

It brings the community

together and parents together and

allows everyone to integrate

together. There is a good network.

Dads' support network has sprung up

as well.

It is great there are a

number of programmes for mothers in

different estates in different

areas, that is well known, but there

is a lack of help for Dads and we

are trying to readdress the balance.

A ten year plan shows we are

investing in them and their future

and the longevity of people, feeling

they are part of Hackney and it is

that longevity of building a

sustainable community.

London still

has its challenges. There are

entrenched pockets of deprivation,

high housing costs and low paid

employment, all significant barriers

to many for good jobs and even

higher levels of social mobility.

Why are things still difficult for

some children, especially when they

get older?

It is interesting what

the council was saying about the

project being a 10-year plan. We do

not hear that offer from

politicians. Normally it is about

quick fixes, silver bullets,

reinventing the wheel. This is a

joined up thinking in the community

and the passion in that place was

really impressive. London could

become a victim of its own success.

Alan Milburn, a former cabinet

minister, touched on it.

It cannot

be the case that one part of the

country is steaming ahead with

consequences that are not always

possible. High housing costs,

endemic rates of low pay, a lot of

deprivation. London needs its fair

share of resources, but it not is

unfair resources. Resources must go

to where they are needed most.

Ten

years ago Blunden had some of the

worst schools and the worst results

for students. Now it has all turned

around. They have done that with

great teachers, great leaders and

lots of investment. If it is

diverted away and politicians think

the London problem is fixed, they

could be storing up trouble. The

real trick is to learn the success

of London and implement that and

improve things elsewhere but not

take the eye of the ball in London.

Still to come this evening...

Footballers, film stars and a giant

duck. I'm at the Serpentine's New

exhibition were the final paintings

are about to be hung. Hung.

Jonnie Peacock has had amazing

success as a Paralmpic sprinter,

but many will recognise him

for his latest achievements

on the dance floor.

As the first person

with a disability to take part

in Strictly Come Dancing,

he's more inspired now than ever

before to get more people

with disabilities moving.

Sara Orchard has been to meet him.

Jonnie Peacock's favourite dance

on Strictly was the Jive,

and it's easy to see why.

Are you missing the sequins?

Missing the sequins?

I'm still finding sequins, yeah.

Yeah.

Still around the house.

You still kind of go around

and there's something

that gets uncovered.

My bum's got its own Twitter account

now - so that's nice!

Jonnie and his bottom became

the eighth celebrity to leave

the hit show and has been

inundated with messages

of thanks, particularly

from the disabled community.

That was one of the biggest reasons

why I wanted to do the show.

You know, I really wanted to kind

of go out there and change people's

perceptions on what they thought

an amputee, a disabled person

could and couldn't do.

You know, I had people doing

the Jive and the Quickstep who had

to have ice baths because their body

was so sore.

Mine was fine, you know!

It could handle that.

As one show finishes,

Jonnie is invited on to another.

Nominated for the BBC's

Sports Personality of the Year Award

after the double Paralympic Champion

took T44 100 meters victory

at the World Parathletics

Championships in London.

2017 really meant a lot to me.

I think it meant

more to me than Rio.

I think going back into that

stadium, were it all started,

in 2012, to manage to do it on that

stage again was probably the second

best memory that I've

ever had after 2012.

So it's really nice to kind of get

recognised for that.

You can do this.

Jonnie is undecided if he'll compete

at next year's European,

but he is championing a walk around

Eton Dorney Lake in

Windsor next month.

There's a lot of disabled people

at the moment who are at home,

perhaps they believe there's not

an event for them.

This is the event for them.

This is the event were they can come

out, they can have fun and just

get out of the house.

Jonnie won't be dancing,

but the Winter Wonderwheels event

takes place next weekend.

Sara Orchard, BBC London News.

Fantastic.

Now you may have seen these

popping up across London,

Plastic Igloos seem to be the latest

craze in the capital.

You might not think

as the temperature drops small ice

domes would be a popular

choice for Londoners.

But as Gareth Furby has been

finding out, they're not

quite what they seem.

On the rooftops in London it gets

very cold at this time

of year as the sunsets,

but some people aren't bothered.

Under a bit of plastic,

the world looks very different.

Angelica Martin, from Epping,

in Essex, works as a host

welcoming people inside.

This is the igloo.

We have snow all over the tables

and all over the floors,

we've got blankets.

It's kind of like an Iceland theme.

So we're kind of supposed

to be like from Iceland.

The snow of course is fake,

but plastic igloos are now

popping up all over London,

on the rooftops and below.

This is in Stratford,

and you may also spot them

by the River Thames.

But they're pretty much

dotted around London now.

It's the exclusivity,

we're on a rooftop.

It gives that element

of overlooking London's skyline.

It's fantastic.

It's apparently all proving very

popular, pretty much

booked up for months,

despite the cost, including drinks

and food, that can add up

to between £80 and £600 to occupy

for just a few hours.

Welcome ladies, can can

I have your name, please?

Martha Bell and her four friends

have made the trip from Windsor

and are paying a minimum of £80

for 90 minutes.

It's their first time in an igloo,

and they say it's worth it.

Maybe everyone does

like to have a bit of private space.

Yeah, something a bit different.

I think everyone likes the kind

of winter, magical, I don't know,

Christmassy feel as well.

Yeah, it's warm, the cider's here.

You can cuddle up with friends.

Ah!

I think when you look out

there and you've had a drink

and you can see all the lights

and everything, I think it reminds

you as to why the reason

why London is amazing.

Of course by this time next year

they may be old hat,

but at the moment it seems an igloo

is a place to be seen this winter -

even without any snow.

Gareth Furby, BBC London News.

It looked good.

She's an award-winning artist

whose works have been

exhibited all over the world.

But until her 70s, no

one was very interested

in Rose Wylie's paintings.

Now in her early 80s,

she's had her first major

exhibition in London.

Caroline Davies went behind

the scenes to take a look.

Rose Wylie has many memories of the

Serpentine.

I must have been five

and London was under siege really.

It was the time of the blitz with

German aeroplanes lurking about.

Her

memory is captured in a painting,

centre stage at her retrospective

exhibition at the Serpentine. It's

been an incredible few years for the

artist, who was only recognised by

the art world in her 70s. She

doesn't mind that it took so long.

It's just complete freedom, in a

sense. You do the paintings, get on

with them, nobody saw them. Nobody

wanted them.

You did them anyway. I think that's

probably a good way of working.

Film

adverts, history, football,

inspiration can strike at any time.

It's a scene from a film. Wham I

really liked was the fact that Uma

had sliced up her victims.

Do you go

back to look at the images

afterwards?

No.

It's from memory.

I

never do that. In a sense it would

spoil the immediate effect of

memory. You lose unnecessary detail

and you then try to paint the thing

that caught your eye in the first

place.

Her work is certainly not

realism, but Rose has heard one

criticism many times. Some people

have suggested it's child like. What

do you think about people who said

that about your work?

They say it

until I'm so sick of it, it's not

child. I dislike the criticism

because I know it's a criticism, and

I think that the person saying it

should think a little bit harder.

After decades of painting and a new

audience waiting, this is a new

memory of the Serpentine. The

exhibition opens on the 30th

November. Caroline Davies, BBC

London News.

Right, let's find out

what the weather's up

to with Elizabeth Rizinni.

It looked lovely there. It's getting

colder.

It looked lovely there. It's getting

colder. Yes, Thursday looks special.

More about that later. Questioned

yesterday we got ten degrees, today

was colder, but sunny. We saw seven

degrees. It felt colder than that

because of the strength of the wind.

That will become more northerly as

we head through the week and

eventually north-easterly. A pretty

looking day today, we had sunshine

around. Not looking too bad. It will

get progressively colder as we head

through the week. Temperatures

starting to drop off with that

chilly norly breeze. It will feel

even colder. Mostly dry with a risk

of showers later on through the

working week. Then it will turn

milder. I shouldn't say milder, I

should say less cold as we head into

the weekend. It will be cloudier

too. There will be cloud tonight. A

patchy frost in more sheltered spots

were we keep the clear spells into

tomorrow morning. In the towns we

are likely to hold up at three or

four degrees Celsius in central

London. That is not to say we won't

see some places slip below freezing.

There will be a frost in some places

into tomorrow morning. We will have

clear skies. Tomorrow, a nice sunny

start for many of us. There will be

more cloud around, possibly one or

two light showers, not really

amounting to very much. Mostly out

towards eastern areas as we head

through the afternoon. Here it will

tend to be more cloudy. We will have

winds. The temperatures between five

and seven degrees Celsius. In

reality, it's going to feel colder

than that with the wind-chill, of

course. As we head through to the

end of the working week,

Thursday/Friday, we will start to

see more of a north-easterly wind

develop. That could drive a few

showers our way. Thursday is looking

absolutely freezing. Showers toward

eastern areas. They could be sleety,

particularly as we head into the

evening. A risk of something white

falling out of the sky. It will be

finely balanced. Milder on Friday.

Not looking forward to the cold

weather. Thank you.

Now the main headlines.

Pope Francis has used a speech

in Myanmar to call for justice

and respect for human rights.

But he made no mention

of the country's Rohingya Muslims,

who've been forced to flee

in their hundreds of thousands.

Prince Harry will marry his fiancee

Meghan Markle next May

in St George's Chapel,

Windsor.

Kensington Palace said Ms Markle

will become a British citizen

and will be baptised and confirmed

before the wedding.

A BBC London investigation has found

that some au pairs in the capital

are being exploited by the host

families who are supposed

to be looking after them.

There are now calls for tighter

regulations to protect them.

A review is to take place

into the evacuation

of the Oxford Circus station last

Friday.

That's it.

I'll be back later during

the Ten O'Clock News,

but for now from everyone

on the team have a lovely evening.

Goodbye.