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Live Reporting

Edited by Nathan Williams

All times stated are UK

  1. Thanks for joining us

    We're going to be finishing our live coverage of Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg shortly. Here's a recap of the main developments of the day:

    • Cabinet minister Oliver Dowden has urged health unions to call off strikes and reiterated that the government is "resolute" on pay. He said the RCN nursing union's demand for a 19% pay rise is "simply unaffordable"
    • Dowden said the government is cracking down on agency spending in response to being asked about the NHS spending £3bn on agency staff to plug the gaps
    • The Liberal Democrats said Dowden is "playing scare tactics" with the public over the upcoming health service strikes and urged him to sit down with nurses and discuss pay
    • On migration, shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, said Labour would cancel the "unworkable and unethical" Rwanda plan and use that money to go after criminal gangs trafficking migrants

    Today's updates were written by Emily McGarvey and Jo Couzens and the page was edited by Nathan Williams. Thanks for following along.

  2. Would pay demands cost an extra £28bn?

    Both Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Health Secretary Steve Barclay - and now Cabinet minister Oliver Dowden - have used the £28bn (£1,000 per household) figure to explain the cost if everyone in the public sector had a pay rise in line with inflation.

    But the BBC's Reality Check team say in terms of the current dispute, these figures look too high.

    So how did the government come up with its figures? Read more here.

  3. Is the NHS pay review body independent?

    Striking nurses on a picket line during industrial action over pay

    Oliver Dowden was quizzed this morning over the government's decision to base its pay offer to nurses in England based on recommendations by an independent pay review body (PRB).

    So how is this body driving the pay decisions and is it really independent from the government? The Reality Check team take a look here.

  4. Strike diary

    Here's a glance at the industrial action expected this week and beyond.

    Graphic showing strike dates
  5. Dowden 'playing scare tactics' over strikes - Lib Dems

    The Liberal Democrats have accused cabinet minister Oliver Dowden of "playing scare tactics" with the public over the upcoming health service strikes.

    Lib Dem Cabinet Office spokesperson, Christine Jardine, said in the week before Christmas, more humanity is needed from Dowden and his government.

    "Sitting down with the nurses and discussing pay is the obvious move right now. Instead he spent this morning playing scare tactics with the public and playing politics with the strikes."

    "This government has spent the past year giving tax breaks to the banks and leaving the NHS and nurses struggling, this has to change to get a fair deal for everyone."

  6. WATCH: Minister tells unions to call off strikes

    Video content

    Video caption: Minister urges unions to call off nurse and ambulance strikes

    In case you missed it, cabinet minister Oliver Dowden has urged unions to be "fair and reasonable" by calling off their strikes and to "give people a break".

    He asked the unions to follow the independent pay review process in order to get a stronger economy, that will allow the government to deliver pay rises.

  7. Key takeaways from Dowden and Cooper

    Cabinet minister Oliver Dowden urged nurses to call off their strikes, insisting the government's door is always open to engagement with the unions.

    Quizzed about the £28bn figure - £1,000 per household - quoted by the government if they were to give the nursing unions the 19% pay rise they're asking for, he said even that number may be an underestimate.

    Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said a Labour government would scrap the controversial Rwanda migrant scheme and focus on cutting the number of dangerous boat crossings from France.

    "Lives are being lost in the icy waters of the Channel," she said, adding that Labour would go after the criminal people trafficking gangs.

  8. Interviews over

    The interviews have finished now on the last Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg show this year.

    Oliver Dowden was put through his paces over the government's numbers on pay demands by public sector workers.

    Yvette Cooper set out Labour's stall on immigration and tackling dangerous small boat crossings from France.

  9. Will Nasa beat the billionaires to get to space?

    On the potential of getting people to Mars, Howard Hu says the moon mission is a "great opportunity to learn, live and operate and then take another really big step to go to Mars".

    "I hope I can see that in my lifetime and I'm excited to be part of that first step going forward," he says.

    Asked about the scarcity of resources on earth and climate change, and devoting those resources to space missions, Hu says he can't answer that in terms of resources but says "we have challenges across a lot of areas".

    He says space "inspires us" and being able to advance technologies will "benefit everybody on earth and meeting challenges in the deep space, when reflected back on in history will have benefits for everybody".

    Asked whether Nasa will beat the billionaires in terms of competition to get into space, he says he doesn't see it as a race but a "cooperative effort to advance as people on this planet to get to another planet".

  10. 'Orion mission was first step to sustainable presence in space'

    Nasa's Howard Hu

    Nasa's Howard Hu is talking about Orion, the American space agency’s next generation astronaut ship.

    The ship is still in San Diego but will eventually be taken back to the Kennedy space centre, he says, adding he felt a "tremendous sense of pride for what we've accomplished".

    He says it was surreal to watch as a fan of human space flight, adding he was "awe-inspired by it".

    He describes the mission as the first step to a sustainable presence we're going to have not only on the moon but beyond.

    The craft exceeded Nasa's expectations by how well it performed and said he could not wait to go into work every day to see what was happening: "I wanted to watch our baby take its first step."

    The landing went "exceedingly well" and as planned, he says, explaining the procedure: "It's like skipping a rock across a pond - we're trying to land safely every time."

  11. What legal routes are there for migrants?

    Laura Kuenssberg asks Cooper about the lack of legal routes for migrants to come into the UK.

    People can currently only come to the UK from refugee camps, Afghanistan, Hong Kong or Ukraine, and Kuenssberg asks if a Labour government would add countries to that list such as Iran where there is mass conflict at the moment.

    Cooper says Labour wants a replacement for the old Dublin agreement, which included a family reunion route for refugees who had family in the UK and included safe returns for those who claimed asylum or been through other countries.

    Cooper says the government promised a replacement for the Dublin agreement but they have not done that.

    Kuenssberg asks Cooper again if she would make it possible for people to come from Iran to the UK.

    Cooper says the government in theory has a wider resettlement scheme in place but it isn't working properly and a solution would be to make that work properly.

    She says without tackling criminal gangs, you don't address the problem.

  12. Labour would scrap Rwanda plan - Cooper

    Video content

    Video caption: Labour would end Rwanda plan and prosecute gangs - Cooper

    Yvette Cooper is up next. The shadow home secretary says the net migration figure is unusually high because of Ukraine, support for people from Hong Kong and Afghanistan.

    She says Labour would expect those numbers to come down if in government.

    She says they want a points-based system but based on training.

    "These boats are dangerous," she says, adding: "Lives are being lost in the icy waters of the Channel."

    We have to go after the criminal gangs trafficking migrants, she says and adds Labour would cancel the "unworkable and unethical" Rwanda plan and use that money for a major expansion in the national crime agency to go after those gangs.

    Labour's objective would be to cut the number of dangerous boat crossings and says there needs to be a stronger agreement with France to do that.

  13. Panel discuss Prince Harry and Meghan

    Newton is asked about Prince Harry and Meghan and their claim that the palace briefed papers negative stories about the couple.

    The idea we were always favouring William and Kate over them is simply not true, she says.

    At the heart of it is a terrible rift between brothers and a father, says Reid.

    She says she believes they felt they had too much intrusion and invasion of privacy and that their motivation is that they were hard done by and suffered. "I understand they feel they were intruded upon and their story was never told," she says.

    Welby says he can't comment because he married the couple but says there is always a way forward but it has to be at the right time.

  14. 'Gates of hell were opened' by Ukraine invasion - Welby

    Archbishop of Canterbury

    Welby says when Ukraine was invaded, "the gates of hell were opened and every evil force came out across the world".

    "Everything evil has been unleashed and until there is withdrawal and ceasefire we can't make progress," he says.

  15. Looking back at key moments from the show

    Video content

    Video caption: Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg: Highlights from day one until now

    The panel are giving their views now after watching a short video round-up of the show's pivotal moments.

    Newton says the death of the Queen still being felt and the sense of reassurance she gave everyone has gone.

    She says the King has made some subtle changes already - pictured hugging and dancing this week, being just one example.

    Reid says she was at Downing St in May interviewing Boris Johnson and her first question was to ask him if he was honest - within weeks he was an ex-PM, she says.

    She says when you ask people what makes them proud to be British - people say the Queen and the NHS. We spent two years clapping for NHS workers and now we won't give them the pay rise they want.

    The Archbishop of Canterbury speaks of his visit to Ukraine and says the Russian invasion is based on an "ideology of conquest".

    Russia "wants historic Ukraine back", he says and is less worried about the people.

    He says we must continue to support Ukraine because essentially "if Ukraine goes, it's not going to stop".

  16. Which is cheaper - a pay rise or paying agency staff?

    Kuenssberg quizzes Dowden about the NHS spending £3bn on agency staff to plug the gaps.

    She asks and which is cheaper - giving the nurses a pay rise of paying agency staff?

    "We're cracking down on agency spending - we want to move off reliance on agency staff and recruit more nurses, which is what we're doing," Dowden responds.

    He says the 50,000 recruitment target is almost half way there and says the government gave nurses a £5,000 bursary and is increasing training places.

    He says nurses were also given £1,400 across the board in a pay increase.

    "I know things are challenging, we're trying to be reasonable. We will be resolute in response to this. It would be irresponsible to allow public sector pay and inflation to get out of control," he says.

  17. Dowden urges nurses to call off their strikes

    Video content

    Video caption: Minister urges unions to call off nurse and ambulance strikes

    Dowden is asked why the government has been able to ignore advice this year over prison service pay, civil service and judges' pay, but it is not able to ignore the advice on nurses' pay.

    "It's about making sure we have fair straight forward way of doing this," he says, adding that there was acute pressure on public finances at those other times.

    Asked if the decision was a political one, he says by following the independent pay review advice the government is giving some of highest pay settlements for years.

    He says the door is always open to engagement with the unions and urged nurses to call off the strikes.

  18. Dowden pushed on cost of pay rise for nurses

    Kuenssberg quizzes Dowden about £28bn figure quoted by the government if they were to give the nursing unions the 19% pay rise they're asking for.

    Dowden says the government may even be underestimating this number, to which Kuenssberg asks why the Institute for Fiscal Studies have come up with a figure of £14bn as the cost of doing this.

    "Our number is justified on the basis of taking the inflation number, what the unions are asking for, and projecting it forward to next year, that would cost about £28bn and that's £1,000 per household," Dowden says.

  19. Dowden says pay demand from nurses is 'not affordable'

    Cabinet Minister Oliver Dowden

    Laura Kuenssberg starts off by asking cabinet minister Oliver Dowden about the reliability of an ambulance turning up during the strikes this week.

    He urges ambulance union leaders to "call off this strike" to guarantee availability of care to the public.

    He says the government is working with union leaders to ensure availability and says if you have a life threatening injury you can continue to rely on the ambulance service.

    He says the government is working relentlessly to ensure a high level of service for people in the most difficult of circumstances.

    He again urges unions to be reasonable to call off the strikes.

    Asked about nursing strikes, Dowden says he's tried to resolve the issue by "taking politics out of this and putting it to an independent pay review body".

    He says nurses have been offered a minimum of £1,400 or 9% pay rise.

    He says the 19% urged by nursing unions is "simply not affordable", saying this could add to inflation.

  20. What the panel has to say

    The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, Sun Editor Victoria Newton and TV presenter Susanna Reid

    We're hearing now from the panel before the main interviews.

    The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby says it seems there's strife everywhere at the moment - in the UK and around the world. He adds that coming together to celebrate Christmas is a "great moment of togetherness".

    Victoria Newton says PM Rishi Sunak seems determined to hold the line on workers' pay demands. Support for the nurses is very solid from The Sun readers, she says, adding there needs to be more support for them.

    Susanna Reid says her mum has been a nurse for decades, currently working as a volunteer chaplain at children's hospital. Nurses have been underpaid for too long and it's unsafe now, she says, adding that nurses need to feel valued, we need to retain and recruit nurses. Unless the government gives way, a deal won't be reached.