House of Commons
Parliament

Conservative MP Sir Gerald Howarth wants to know when flights to the holiday resort of Sharm El-Sheikh will be resumed. He says he has just returned from a visit to Cairo, where the devastating effect of the loss of tourism was impressed on the visitors. 

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin says he can't say when flights will start again. 

"I fully understand the importance to Egypt of the resumption of flights to that country," he says.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour's Graham Jones is the first MP to rise at topical questions. He says Lancashire County Council has downgraded bus routes, due to cuts. 

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin says the MP needs to question "Labour-controlled" Lancashire council.

Labour's shadow transport minister Daniel Zeichner also brings up bus passengers and fares. When are bus operators going to pass on the savings they are making from low oil prices, he asks.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin says he hopes bus fares do come down. He says while fuel is just one of the costs companies face, he agrees that companies should look to see whether they can bring down fares.

House of Lords
Parliament

Business in the Lords begins with questions at 11am. Peers will be asking the government about migration, fuel poverty, railways in the south west and asylum seekers.

The rest of the day is taken up with debates on local democracy, English language classes for women and adult education.

Victoria Derbyshire

The SNP's economy spokesman Stewart Hosie says he wants the European Competition Commissioner to investigate Google's tax arrangements to make sure it has paid what is due.

"The public are left with an impression that certain large companies can effectively negotiate what they may or may not choose to pay, while the average man, woman or business on the street is given the tax demand and heaven help them if they don't pay it on time," he told BBC's Victoria Derbyshire show.

"Let's have the European Competition Commissioner look at this, respecting taxpayer confidentiality and confirm that the tax paid is the tax due or whatever else she may come across."

House of Commons
Parliament

Conservative MP Stephen Phillips asks the rail minister, Claire Perry, to "put a rocket up Network Rail".

He is referring to question 11, asking about the discussions she has had with Network Rail on compensation for residents affected by the upgrade of the Great Northern Great Eastern line.

He says residents have suffered noise and vibrations, but Network Rail is not helping them.

The minister says she's disappointed because there was a huge amount of consultation about the upgrade and asks the MP to write to her setting out the concerns.

Commenting on the Office for National Statistics economic growth figures, Chancellor George Osborne said: “These figures show Britain continues to grow steadily. Despite turbulence in the global economy, Britain is pushing ahead.

"With the risks we see elsewhere in the world, there may be bumpy times ahead – so here in the UK we must stick to the plan that's cutting the deficit, attracting business investment and creating jobs." 

Image source, Getty Images

The UK economy grew by 0.5% in the three months to end of December, official figures show, taking the annual rate of growth for 2015 to 2.2%.

The figures, from the Office for National Statistics, externalshow quarterly growth above the third quarter's 0.4%.

But it leaves annual growth down on 2014's growth rate of 2.9%.

Output in the three months to December was 1.9% higher than a year earlier, down from 2.1% in the third quarter and the smallest increase since early 2013.

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House of Commons
Parliament

Image source, HS2 handout

Labour's shadow transport secretary Lilian Greenwood says the whole of phase 2 of HS2 is crucial for the Midlands and the north - but the route was due to be decided and has slipped by two years.

She wonders whether the Chancellor - who has a Cheshire constituency - was to "terminate the route south of Manchester" it would be a "an abject betrayal of the Northern Powerhouse".

Patrick McLoughlin replies the Chancellor is a supporter of the HS2 project. "To somehow intimate the Chancellor is against this scheme is wholly wrong," he says.

Victoria Derbyshire

Former Labour minister Yvette Cooper urged the government not to turn its back on children already in Europe that "are fleeing persecution".

"I've met 11 or 12 year olds - that are a similar age to my children - who were alone with nobody to look after them in camps in Calais," she told BBC's Victoria Derbyshire show.

Victoria Derbyshire

Former Labour minister Yvette Cooper says the government's position over child refugees from Syria "seems confused".

The UK is to accept more unaccompanied child refugees from Syria and other conflict zones - but the government has not said how many.

Ms Cooper told BBC's Victoria Derbyshire show she welcomed moves towards helping child refugees who are alone in Europe and vulnerable to gangs, prostitution and abuse.

But she said it was not clear if the government will increase the number of child refugees it has already pledged to help.

Image source, Gabrielle Voinot/SPL

Older people in need of urgent help are being failed by the NHS, a group of English and Welsh health leaders say.

Too many over-65s end up in accident and emergency unnecessarily, says the NHS Confederation's Commission on Improving Urgent Care for Older People.

The group said this was because of a lack of help when they fell ill.

It called for radical steps, including providing urgent care at home and getting doctors to carry out "ward rounds" in care homes.

The commission's report said older people were "poorly served" and "all too often forced to go to A&E".

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First up at 10:30 approx, it's shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith on yesterday's Appeal Court ruling about the under-occupancy of spare bedrooms.

Then at 11:15/11:30 approximately, it's shadow foreign secretary Hilary Benn on arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

Image source, Getty Images

People raiding some or all of their pension pot under reforms introduced in April were most likely to spend it on home improvements.

Doing up the house was more popular than big one-off spending on holidays or cars, research has suggested.

Overall, those aged 55 to 70 have taken a safety-first approach to their pension savings, the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association found.

Savers can now cash in their pension pot from the age of 55.

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Supermarkets and other big businesses could face higher business rates under a Welsh Conservative government, with a tax cut for smaller companies.

The Tories propose changing how rates are calculated, as part of a pledge to put the needs of small businesses at the "heart of the Welsh government".

Welsh Tory leader Andrew RT Davies said small firms were vital to Wales and needed help to "develop and grow".

Retailers warned against "creating winners or losers or more complexity".

The Conservatives would also appoint a team of officials in the Welsh government dedicated to small businesses and answerable to the assembly, if they win power in May's assembly election.

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Image source, Thinkstock

NHS patients in Wales wait longer for treatment and diagnosis than patients in England for most of the main categories, BBC Wales can reveal.

Hip operations showed the biggest difference of four months, with an average wait in England of 75 days compared to 197 in Wales in 2014/15.

Diagnosis of heart disease takes on average 10 days longer in Wales.

Deputy Health Minister Vaughan Gething called for a focus on the results of treatment, not just waiting times.

Waiting times for hip surgery have deteriorated significantly in Wales over the past four years. Since 2011/12, the average wait has risen by a fifth for the nearly 6,000 people who had hip operations in 2014/15.

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Norman Smith
Assistant political editor

Image source, AP

The government will today rebuff the mounting calls from charities and others to accept up to 3,000 child refugees who've made it to Europe.

Instead ministers will seek to beef up their existing response to the crisis - by promising to take more vulnerable children from the camps in the countries around Syria.

These will be in addition to the 20,000 places already promised. No number has been put on the additional places - but it is likely to be in the hundreds rather than thousands. 

Ministers have, however, promised to provide more resources to help refugees who've made it to Europe - including unaccompanied children -   to apply to come to Britain if they have a legitimate claim because, for example, they have family in the UK.

And the government will also provide £10 million more to help protect and support child refugees in Europe. Its a move which has been given a guarded welcome by Opposition politicians, but is unlikely to stem the calls for Britain do more, particularly for child refugees in camps like those at Calais and Dunkirk.

Girls at single-sex state schools in England get better GCSE results than those in mixed schools, according to an analysis of the most recent exams.

And the advantage for girls' schools remains even when other factors are taken into account, such as social background or a selective intake.

Girls from poorer families in single-sex schools got better GCSEs than their counterparts in mixed schools.

The study showed much less advantage for boys in single-sex schools.

The high performance of girls in single-sex schools has been identified by education data analysts SchoolDash, external, in a breakdown of GCSE results published last week.

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Today Programme
BBC Radio 4

Margaret Hodge says international agreements are important - after tax expert John Cullen warns they must be respected. 

But she asks why HM Revenue and Customs are not prepared to be tougher with companies like Google when the tax authorities in Italy and France are behaving "much more aggressively".

Today Programme
BBC Radio 4

As the discussion about Google continues, tax expert John Cullen says there a legal reasons tax arrangements are confidential - but there might be a case for greater transparency in the corporate arena.

But he warns against reacting to "irresponsible comment". You would not expect Google or other foreign companies to pay 10% tax in countries where they are not based, he adds.

Margaret Hodge says the rules were created in the 1920s and are out of date.