09/02/2017 Look East (West)

whether that is legal or not. Full coverage for you online and on

In Look East tonight: Care in the community.

Why a solution to bed-blocking is under threat because funding

27,000 new homes for Milton Keynes, as authorities reveal when and where

And, staying cold with the risk of snow showers in the next couple of

days. I'll be here later with all days. I'll be here later with all

the details. As you may have seen

on the national news, bed-blocking is a huge problem

for our health service. And here in the East,

in December alone, patients spent nearly 15,000 days in hospital beds

when they didn't need to. It is usually because the patients

need care outside that isn't there. But a pioneering scheme to tackle

the problem in Hertfordshire is under threat as its funding

is being slashed. Our Political Reporter,

Tom Barton, has the details. Myra Stevenson has been

in St Catherine's Nursing Home in Letchworth Garden City

for three weeks. She came here straight

from hospital. And the nurses are individuals,

and you're an individual. Myra is benefiting from a scheme

which sees the local NHS and Hertfordshire County Council

working together and It's paying for exercise classes

like this, which have led to a massive drop in the number

of falls, stopping unnecessary And it's also helping to get people

out of hospital more quickly. Hertfordshire have just started

using this red bag as a way of making the process of leaving

hospital run as So it's got everything in it that

you need to go home. So it's got a change of clothes,

it's got your medication, The project also has

a trusted assessor, working in the Lister Hospital on behalf

of the Hertfordshire Care Home Association,

helping to get people out of hospital as soon

as they are ready. We've had a 45% reduction

in hospital admittances since we've In terms of the trusted assessor,

she has now saved, I think it's 305 So that means that we have made

a saving of around ?160,000. The Herts Valley Clinical

Commissioning Group has just taken ?8.5 million out of the shared fund

that pays for schemes like this. This is an additional payment,

very few parts of the NHS And yesterday, a Council committee

decided to ask the Health Secretary I strongly believe that

patients will suffer, because while we can absorb some

of the impact of that funding reduction within the service,

and we will be able to preserve some of it, but the magnitude

of ?8.5 million just being taken out, five weeks before

we set our budgets, it makes it For now, though, Myra and others

like her are benefiting from a system which is really

helping to stop unnecessary Tom Barton, BBC Look East,

Letchworth Garden City. Staying with so-called bed-blocking

- Northamptonshire is one of the worst affected areas,

with more than 5,000 bed Part of the reason,

according to the county's Care Home Association,

is that many homes just won't work with the County Council because it

doesn't pay them enough. The Council says it's

planning to invest an extra The impact is that we cannot provide

the service that we need They don't pay a sufficient amount

of money per week per resident. We're reaching, in effect,

a tipping point. We've said to them that they need

to increase their funds, they need to increase them rapidly,

to prevent further homes from shutting and prevent

bed-blocking in the local hospitals. The fiance of Royston children's

author Helen Bailey has claimed he was blackmailed for ?500,000

by a pair of mystery kidnappers Ian Stewart says they were business

associates of her late husband. He also claims he spoke to Helen

after she disappeared. From St Albans Crown Court,

Kate Bradbrook reports. Ian Stewart was on his

feet in the witness box His voice broke several times

as he gave his version of events He told the court that two men

called Nick and Joe abducted Helen on the 11th of April,

the day she went missing. He said on Friday the 15th, Nick

turned up at the house with a phone. Ian spoke to Helen, who said, "Sorry

about everything, I love you." He replied, "It's not your

fault, I love you too." Ian Stewart told the jury

that the following day he met Nick in Kent to hand over Helen's phone,

as they had requested. He said on the 26th of April,

Nick and Joe demanded access They said, "Helen told us

where something was in the garage." Ian Stewart later told

the court they must have Ian Stewart claimed throughout that

Nick and Joe had threatened that he would never see Helen Bailey

again if he told anyone He said they told him if they didn't

get what they needed, Ian Stewart is accused of drugging

Helen Bailey with sleeping pills He told the court Helen had taken

them when she realised he couldn't When asked why this wasn't mentioned

in his defence statement, he replied, "It only came back to me

when I saw the The drug Zopiclone was found

in Helen Bailey's system when her body was found three months

after she disappeared. Under cross-examination,

prosecutor Stuart Trimmer QC put to Ian Stewart that it was,

"A long-crafted, cynical and cruel plan of yours to do

away with Helen Bailey." "You smothered her while she was

sleeping or unconscious... Now, Ian Stewart also admitted today

that he lied for months about a note that he claimed Helen had left,

saying that she was He said he had to do that

in order to keep her safe. And also because he was told that

if he didn't, his two sons Now, he told the court that months

later he received a phone call saying that one of the men,

Joe, had now been dealt with, Ian Stewart denies all the charges

against him, and the case Kate Bradbrook, BBC Look East,

St Albans Crown Court. This year, we've been looking back

at the history of Milton Keynes, as the town celebrates

its 50th birthday. But later this month,

the Council will discuss how the town could grow over

the next 15 years. Their new plans include thousands

of new homes and offices, as well as a redeveloped shopping

centre. From the very beginning,

Milton Keynes has made it Today, over 250,000

people live here. And in this new plan, MK would

like to build 26,500 new homes. Which would take its population

to well over 300,000. It's gone over and above

the ten-year statutory We've done what Milton Keynes does,

and always gone that step further. And yes, I think we can indeed

deliver those house numbers if the developers and the builders

will get on and do it. We will grant the planning

permissions, we will set the land aside, but they've got to deliver

on the numbers for us, which up 26,500 new homes is a lot

of homes for you to deliver. It is, absolutely,

it is a lot of homes. And what we've got to do

is bring forward the sites, bring forward the sites in the right

places, those that We believe that we are doing that

in the plan that we're putting out. We now need the developers to do

their bit and build the houses, not at the rate they want to,

but at the rate that we want them them to, and at the rate

that the Government are asking But the Plan MK document is about

much more than just new houses. The main shopping area could also

get a huge expansion. The Centre MK for example could get

new shops and leisure facilities. And the regeneration of Bletchley

town centre will also be a priority. New jobs, better education

facilities are also But central to the plan

is transport. That includes support for the

East-West rail link and an expressway

road linking Cambridge and Oxford. It's taken years of consultation

to come up with Plan MK, and it will now be debated

by the Council later this month. Peterborough travel giant

Thomas Cook has cheered a "solid" start to the New Year,

but says it still remains The company says that holiday

bookings for the Greek islands have risen by nearly 40%,

as travellers move away from Turkey and Egypt because of concerns

about security in both countries. Chief Executive Peter Fankhouser

said there was no sign that Britons had been put off by the weak pound,

but there was still plenty of And that's the late

news from Look East. We are back with bulletins during

BBC Breakfast from 6:30pm. -- 6:30am.

The cold air has now properly established itself across

the British Isles, so it's going to stay

bitterly cold, certainly for

For tonight, temperatures dropping away.

And although a lot of dry weather around, there could be the odd snow

You may wake up to a dusting of snow in places.

Temperatures could get down below freezing in one or two

And that could cause an issue with icy patches on untreated

A very cold start of the day tomorrow.

Not a lot changing in our pressure pattern.

We have still got this bitterly cold easterly

This could mean there are a bit more widespread showers as we go

But there will be quite a bit of dry weather, likely to stay quite gloomy

and overcast for much of the day. Showers being pushed in from the

North Sea. As the easterly wind freshens, it could push them further

inland. Temperatures getting up to around three Celsius. But with the

wind chill it is going to feel colder still. The risk of snow

showers increases into the afternoon and evening. There could be more of

a covering of snow by Friday night and into Saturday morning. The

National weather is coming up, and here is the outlook.

will turn a bit less cold again. All the way up seven Celsius.

At this time of year we can often get the weather stories that reflect

the battle between winter and spring, and that's what's been

happening in New York in the USA. Yesterday, 17 Celsius, but today,

it's been bitterly cold, just a daytime maximum of -2, a significant

wind-chill and some significant snow falling as we speak. This was Times

Square earlier today. For others, it's been a pretty cold day. Not

quite as cold, but nevertheless a lot of low cloud lifting in off the

North Sea and two bridges have struggled. That will continue into

the