Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Monday 30 Sep 2019

1. No. 10 denies Johnson touched journalist’s thigh

Downing Street has refuted claims that Prime Minister Boris Johnson groped a female journalist at a private lunch in 1999. The Sunday Times writer Charlotte Edwardes alleges that Johnson touched her thigh “high up” under a table, grabbing “inner flesh beneath his fingers”. She also claims he did the same to another woman at the same event.

Today’s newspapers: ‘Bullish Boris ready to walk away’

2. Javid to outline £25bn road upgrade programme

Chancellor Sajid Javid will today take to the stage at the Conservative Party conference to announce plans to spend £25bn on England’s roads, as well as a further £5bn to bring fast broadband to more rural areas. The roads funding, to be spent over five years from 2020, had already been provisionally set aside by Javid’s predecessor, Philip Hammond, and will come from taxes and borrowing.

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Tory conference: five things you might have missed

3. Saudi leader warns of ‘Iran threat’ to oil price

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has told CBS News that a war between his country and regional rival Iran would gut the world economy by pushing oil prices to “unimaginably high numbers”. The prince also denied that he ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi operatives but said he ultimately bears “full responsibility” as the leader of his country.

Who shot dead the Saudi monarch’s chief bodyguard?

4. Donald Trump ‘put whistle-blower in danger’

Donald Trump has endangered the safety of a whistle-blower who alleged that the US president tried to get help from the leader of Ukraine to find dirt on Democrat rival Joe Biden, the anonymous source’s lawyers say. The attorneys say the whistle-blower could be put “in harm’s way” should their identity be made public, after Trump reportedly made threatening remarks including: “You know what we used to do … with spies and treason, right?”

5. Tube murder victim’s father ‘watched him die’

The father of an athlete and Olympic hopeful who was fatally stabbed on the London Underground last week says he watched his son die after running back to the station where he had just kissed him goodbye. Tashan Daniel, 20, was on his way to his first Arsenal match when he was attacked at Hillingdon station last Tuesday. Chandy Daniel said his son was a “beautiful soul”. No arrests have been made.

6. Cocaine and alcohol is lethal combination, say doctors

Mixing cocaine and alcohol together creates a “deadly combination” that can increase violent and impulsive behaviour, doctors are warning. Coroners have reported a rise in “self-inflicted” deaths among people who took the two substances, according to the BBC. Research suggests that at least 13 such deaths have occurred in England in the past year.

7. Landlords cash in by abolishing sitting rooms

Nine out of ten houses offered for communal living in London have no shared living room, as landlords cash in on the housing crisis, The Times says. The newspaper found that nationwide, less than a third of the properties on renting websites had a separate living room. Some conversions also ignore building regulations and are potentially unsafe.

8. Hurricane Lorenzo bringing more bad weather to UK

The tail end of Atlantic storm Hurricane Lorenzo is expected to bring more rain and high winds to the UK over the next seven days, following a week in which the Environment Agency issued more than 200 flood alerts and warnings. The weather will worsen later in the week, with today very wet in England and Wales but fairly dry in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

9. New tech set to cut leaves-on-line rail delays

Network Rail is to trial new technology designed to improve train running times in winter by tackling the problem of leaves on the line. Small jets will spray sand onto each rail directly in front of the wheels, helping them to maintain grip despite slippery fallen leaves. The new sanding technique, to be tested during October, could halve the usual safe stopping distance.

10. Briefing: what happened to Trump’s campaign promises?

Just over four years ago, Donald Trump came down the golden escalator at Trump Tower to declare his candidacy for president, announcing that the “American dream is dead” before making a series of outlandish promises.

We take a look at some of his most notable campaign pledges and whether they have come to fruition.

What happened to Donald Trump’s campaign promises?