Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

We're now hearing from Isaac Herzog, president of Israel.

Hamas freed three Israeli hostages in Gaza yesterday, while Israel released 183 Palestinian prisoners in the latest exchange as part of an internationally brokered ceasefire deal which came into force last month.

The three hostages - Eli Sharabi, Ohad Ben Ami and Or Levy - were handed over to the Red Cross on Saturday morning before reuniting with their families in Israel.

Concerns have been raised about their wellbeing, with Sharabi's family - who live in the UK - describing their shock at his "gaunt" appearance.

Returning Palestinian prisoners were greeted with scenes of celebration at Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. Representatives claimed they all needed "medical care".

So far, 21 hostages and 566 prisoners have been freed since the ceasefire began on 19 January.

By the end of the first stage of the ceasefire in three weeks time, 33 hostages and 1,900 prisoners are expected to have been freed.

Read the full story

Image source, Reuters

More reaction from the panel.

Greg Jackson, chief executive of the energy firm Octopus, thinks the government has come out of the blocks with a lot of big announcements but says the proof is in the pudding.

Gillian Keegan, former Tory MP and education secretary, says this all sounds familiar. She adds that when her party was in government, they made progress, but the challenge is huge.

Here's what the panel make of Rayner's comments:

Vicky Spratt, housing correspondent for the i Paper, thinks the government needs to fix housing to grow the economy.

Labour are credible, she says, but Rayner didn't mention reforming compulsory purchase orders – which would make it easier to build on land – or protecting private renters.

They can build the houses, she says, but people need to be able to afford them.

Kuenssberg moves now to the lawsuit filed in a US court by UK parents against TikTok. She asks Rayner if she thinks it is safe for children to use the app.

Rayner says that children need protecting from online harms, pointing to the Online Safety Act, which will come into force in March.

"If you are in a car and you are reckless with the car and it injures someone, you're responsible for your actions. If you're online... and you're reckless with your actions, then you should be held responsible for it," she says.

Kuenssberg asks if she thinks tech companies are reckless. The deputy prime minister says it is "hard to defend social media companies" when you see that they're not taking action to keep children safe.

With that, the interview concludes.

Laura moves on to the council elections. Local elections are set for 1 May, but Rayner has announced delays in nine areas of England due to reorganisation plans.

Laura suggests it might seem like both the government and the Conservatives "are both running a bit scared of Reform UK" and that the delay is convenient.

Rayner insists the delay is down to local government reorganisation.

Laura presses her: "Do you completely deny that there's any sense where actually this is a kind of stitch-up?"

"Absolutely not," Rayner says. "Look, it won't be a stitch up."

Read more about the local elections being postponed for some areas.

Kuenssberg turns now to a recently published book about Labour's July election win, called Get In.

She says the book reports that Rayner suggested the prime minister "couldn't run a bath". Did she say that?

The deputy prime minister says there are details in the book she doesn't recognise and calls the book "tittle-tattle".

Kuenssberg adds that the book also claims Rayner made a disparaging comment about Prince Andrew that can't be repeated on television. Again, did she say that?

Rayner replies that she won't comment on "private conversations" that took place during the passage of the royal succession bill – which Kuenssberg points out is not a denial that she made the comment.

After housing, Laura moves on to an opinion poll suggesting Rayner could be among the Labour politicians at risk of losing their seat to Reform if there were an election.

Laura points out it's just one poll but asks why Labour has been failing to impress the public.

Rayner replies, "I think there's been frustrations, and I can completely understand people's frustrations... people want to see change."

But, she adds, "it takes time to turn that around."

Public money is short and the economy is "stuttering", Kuenssberg says. She puts it to the deputy prime minister that builders won't always want to construct homes if there won't be buyers.

"Costs have been going up for builders ... it's like you're putting the brake on and the accelerator on at the same time," Kuenssberg says.

Rayner replies that there are issues with the housing market, particularly around supply. "We're ramping up that supply that will then help in the medium-to-long term," she says, outlining the government's plan for home-buying, including the mortgage guarantee scheme and the 1.5 million homes goal.

"We're the builders. We're not going to be the blockers," Rayner says.

Laura turns to housing, and the government's manifesto pledged to build 1.5 million new homes in England over the next five years.

Laura tells Rayner, "the number of sites and units approved for development has actually fallen, and house prices have hit a record high just this week."

Rayner replies, "I knew it was going to be really difficult."

Laura asks Rayner if she considered ditching the target.

Rayner replies that they saw "the trend was going backwards" but she is not giving up on the target.

She highlights the government's mortgage guarantee scheme for new buyers and adds, "we're determined to make sure we meet that 1.5 million homes."

After discussing Grenfell Tower, Kuenssberg asks Rayner how she plans to speed up the process of buying a house. What's the plan for buyers?

Rayner says the purchasing process "isn't very digital" and is paper-led.

"What we want to try and do is make sure that we can work with the land registry to have more digitised copies, including digital ID and signatories," she explains.

She adds that these processes already exist at banks, so the government hopes to "streamline" and make purchasing faster.

Laura tells Rayner she should be calling for more pressure and more speedy action. "Bang the table and tell them to get on with it."

Rayner replies that she told the companies responsible that if they don't do what they need to do, the government will take more legal action against them.

"We expect them to make these buildings safe," she says.

More now on Rayner talking about her meeting with bereaved families earlier this week, during which she told them Grenfell Tower was going to be demolished.

“I tried to deliver that message as sensitively as I possibly could, knowing full well that it was going to be really upsetting for people to hear that but I wanted them to hear it from me,” she says.

Laura pushes again on how many affected people had her and her team spoken to during the consultation period on the building’s fate.

The deputy prime minister says she is “not going to go into details” of which family members, next of kin of those killed, or members of the Grenfell community she had spoken to because “that’s even more insensitive to the various different views”.

Rayner adds that some wanted the tower to remain standing and others wanted it to be taken down.“The crucial thing that I think the families wanted to get [across] is that they didn’t want people to forget and they didn’t want justice not to be served,” she tells Laura.

Laura asks Rayner how many people will be sleeping tonight in a building that still has dangerous cladding.

Rayner replies that more than 4,000 buildings have been identified as being over 18 metres with flammable cladding.

More than half of them still haven't had the remediation, she says.

Rayner says she has put in place a remediation action plan, and developers and freeholders have agreed to undertake the work by the end of this Parliament – but it has taken far too long.

"We've had seven years, and we still we haven't even had over half of them even put into the programme early," she says.

Laura now puts to Angela Rayner that some of those affected by the Grenfell fire had told the BBC that the deputy PM’s behaviour in a meeting with them this week was “upsetting” and “aggressive”.

In response, Rayner says that she didn’t feel like she was “aggressive” and adds: “if anyone felt that way, then I would be sincerely upset about that.”

The meeting, she notes, was “difficult”, particularly when she had to explain to the community the decision that the government had reached on the tower’s fate to be demolished.

Laura pushes back, asking how many families she's spoken to about the issue.

Rayner says she spoke to “a number of the bereaved families” but refused to be drawn on an exact figure, explaining that there’s “lots of different complexities” to people who were affected.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner begins her interview with Laura - the government’s first since announcing on Friday it plans to demolish Grenfell Tower, external - by saying she doesn’t believe “you’ll ever find” a general “consensus” on what to do about the building where 72 people lost their lives in a devastating fire.

She tells Laura that she spoke with the people from the Grenfell community, including bereaved families and survivors, about the tower’s future.

“It’s devastating what happened, but what I want to try and do is work with the Grenfell community, the bereaved survivors, to make sure that we do justice to the fact that there is a sacred place,” she says.

She adds that when weighing up the engineering report and the conversations she’d had with those affected by the fire, she felt that the “only way forward” was to “sensitively” start demolishing the tower and have a “lasting memorial on that site”.

With so much that has happened in politics this week, it is time for Laura Kuenssberg to put it all to the politicians for you.

We are moments away from the show starting, so buckle up as we see what is in store for us today.

And do not forget, you can follow our text updates here and also press Watch live at the top of this page to see the show.

Here's who is joining Laura on the panel:

• Greg Jackson, chief executive of the energy firm Octopus
• Gillian Keegan, former Tory MP and education secretary
• Vicky Spratt, journalist specialising in housing issues

We'll bring you their reaction to the stories we're covering.

Image source, Getty Images

Angela Rayner serves as deputy prime minister of the United Kingdom and secretary of state for housing, communities and local government.

On the gov.uk website the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, external is described as “central to the mission-driven government, from fixing the foundations of an affordable home to handing power back to communities and rebuilding local governments”.

In her role as deputy PM, external, Rayner is tasked with another set of responsibilities, deputising for the PM Keir Starmer in the House of Commons and attending domestic and international engagements.

Image source, Getty Images

Usually, local authorities with social care duties can only raise council tax every year by up to 4.99% without a referendum, while others can increase it by up to 2.99%.

But the government has now confirmed that Bradford Council will be allowed an increase of 10%, while Newham and Windsor and Maidenhead will both be allowed a 9% rise.

Birmingham, Somerset and Trafford will be allowed to increase their bills by 7.5%.

The government blocked several councils from raising taxes above 4.99%, including Hampshire, which had asked to be allowed a 15% increase.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said the councils were selected as they had "amongst the lowest levels of council tax" - even with the sharp increases.

Local Government Association chair Louise Gittins said council finances remain "extremely challenging" and the extra money next year "still falls short of what is desperately needed".

• Millions face council tax rise of more than 5%

Image source, Getty Images

Some local elections in England will be delayed for one year to allow major reorganisations to take place.

The government announced last year that smaller district councils in nine areas will merge with local county councils to form single bodies known as unitary authorities.

Angela Rayner told parliament on Wednesday that delaying the elections would help deliver a "generational power shift from Whitehall to the town hall". She said holding elections for councils set to be scrapped would be "an expensive and irresponsible waste of taxpayers' money".

Conservative shadow minister Kevin Hollinrake called the move a "worrying day for democracy".

Reform UK has launched a petition against the delay, while the Liberal Democrats described it as a "disgraceful stitch-up between Labour and the Conservatives".

Both parties had hoped to make gains in these elections.

• Council shake-up sees elections delayed in nine areas