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04/03/2016

Morning news and current affairs. Includes Sports Desk, Yesterday in Parliament, Weather and Thought for the Day.

3 hours

Last on

Fri 4 Mar 2016 06:00

Today's running order

0650
For a long time now there have been warnings by some senior figures in the energy world that we are not going to be able to generate enough electricity for our needs in the next few years. So what is the answer? Use the national grid more effectively and store electricity. Dr Jennifer Baxter is head of energy and environment at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.

0655
The monastery at Lindisfarne is going to be excavated for the first time, and that can happen because an archaeologist won a TED prize from the online lecture series. We hear from Dr Sarah Parcak, a pioneering space archaeologist who uses satellite imagery to discover ancient sites and map looting, and Lisa Westcott Wilkins, Co-founder and Managing Director of DigVentures.

0710
The ceasefire in Syria is holding - more or less - but people are still fleeing from the country. And there is plenty happening on the diplomatic front to try to deal with the refugees. The president of the European Council is meeting the president of Turkey today and then in Paris the French president is meeting the German chancellor. We hear from the former Brinish foreign secretary David Miliband who now runs a charity (the International Rescue Committee) that works in Syria.

0715
There is news this morning of another encouraging piece of progress in the fight against cancer; it is a scientific breakthrough that suggests that the all-important clinical work might one day be done.   Writing in the journal Science British researchers at University College London say they have worked out a method to find the features of a cancer tumour that the body’s immune system might attack. Professor Peter Johnson is a Chief Clinician with Cancer Research UK.

0720
The Venice Biennale is arguably the most prestigious arts show in the world and artists kill for the honour (and prestige) of representing their country. It's just been announced who will represent Britain. We hear from our BBC Arts Editor Will Gompertz and the winning artist.

0730
A vaccine against the Zika virus could be ready for human trials by late summer, according to the man in charge of the American government's research programme. Dr Anthony Fauci says he hopes to start testing a DNA vaccine in America in August or September. The BBC's Global Health correspondent Tulip Mazumdar reports from the agency's labs in Maryland, and we speak to Trudi Lang, Professor of Global Health Research, Centre for Tropical Medicine at Oxford University.

0745
For 27 hours the great film director Francois Truffaut talked to another great film director Alfred Hitchcock, possibly the longest film interview on record.  That was back in 1962 and it's acquired a legendary status in the film world. Now another film director, Kent Jones has used it to make a documentary of his own. BBC reporter Nicola Stanbridge spoke to him.

0750
It used to be the case that if you wanted to save electricity you switched the lights off. It's all much more complicated now but we are being told this morning that we can benefit from that complexity. The National Infrastructure Commission that the government set up to advise us on the big stuff that keeps the country running, are telling us we could use electricity differently and by doing that use less of it and save money. We speak to Lord Adonis, Chair of the National Infrastructure Commission.

0810
We bring you a further diary entry written by one activist based in Raqqa – the capital of ‘Islamic State’ – controlled territory, about life there. We hear live from David Kilcullen, a counterinsurgency and military strategist. He was a senior adviser to then General David Petraeus in 2007 and 2008, when he helped to design and monitor the Iraq war troop "surge".

0820
Richard Gere's latest film couldn't be more different than the films in which he made his name - films like Pretty Woman and American Gigolo. In "Time Out of Mind" he plays a homeless man. There's very little plot but instead he tries to recreate what it is really like to sleep rough. He calls the film a "tool for social change", and he has shown it to politicians and policy makers in cities across America. Last week he was doing the same in Glasgow and now is in London, where it opens tonight. Sarah Montague has been speaking to him.

0830
Today, Tory MP Liam Fox will be making a speech in Edinburgh on Friday morning in favour of campaigning for a leave vote in Scotland. The SNP claim that a leave vote in the UK would lead to a second referendum vote in Scotland. We hear from Dr Liam Fox, Former Conservative Defence Minister, he is pro-Brexit.

0840
Overnight, the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un, has ordered his country to be ready to use nuclear weapons at any time. According to the country's state-controlled news agency, he said its military should be ready to stage a "pre-emptive attack. This follows the launch of six short range missiles which were fired by North Korea into the sea yesterday. How seriously should we take these actions? We speak live to John Everard, Former UK ambassador to North Korea 2006 and 2008.

0845
Women in the UK spend more than double the amount of time looking after children than men do according to a global report by the Overseas Development Institute. Ireland was the most unequal of 37 countries with available data studied by researchers – with men doing just seven per cent of childcare. It was followed by Iraq, Albania and South Africa with women doing 92, 91 and 90 per cent respectively. We are joined by Claire Melamed, Overseas Development Institute's Director of Poverty and Inequality, and Lauren Hampshire a Mum of two girls, freelance journalist and vlogger.

Broadcast

  • Fri 4 Mar 2016 06:00