Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Wednesday 20 Oct 2010

Our popular news catch-up service is posted Monday to Friday at 8.0 am, and on weekends at 11.0 am. You can rely on it to keep you up to date with the main news talking points... RETIREMENT AGE GOES TO 66 UNDER SPENDING REVIEWThe state pension age for men and women is to rise from 65 to 66 in 2020, four years earlier than planned, under the comprehensive spending review presented in Parliament today by Chancellor George Osborne (above). Other headline changes, designed to cut £81bn from the national deficit over four years, are an average 19 per cent cut in the running costs of government departments, a 7.1 per cent reduction in central funding to local councils, and a further £7bn cuts from the welfare budget. As feared, public sector job losses are expected to total 490,000 as a result. Spending review at a glance The Mole: A game of brinkmanship BARONESS THATCHER IN HOSPITALFormer Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher will watch George Osborne's spending review from a bed in the Cromwell Hospital, west London. Following a bout of flu which prevented her celebrating her 85th birthday last week, she is said to be suffering from a condition affecting her muscles. Baroness Thatcher has previously suffered minor strokes. ARSENAL AND CHELSEA WIN IN EUROPEIt was a good night for English clubs in the Champions League as Arsenal and Chelsea both won. The Gunners put on a bravura performance in front of their home crowd, crushing Ukrainian champions Shakhtar Donetsk 5-1. Earlier Chelsea made short work of Spartak Moscow in Russia, running out 2-0 winners. GAY SAUDI PRINCE GUILTY OF MURDERPrince Saud Abdulaziz bin Nasir al Saud has been found guilty at the Old Bailey of murdering his 32-year-old manservant while they were staying together at the Landmark Hotel in London at the end of a round-the-world holiday. The homosexual prince, grandson of the Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, was said to be drunk on champagne and 'sex on the beach' cocktails when he brutally assaulted Bandar Abdulaziz in February, biting him on both cheeks. Prince 'battered his manservant to death' BBC LICENCE FEE FROZENThe annual cost of a TV licence fee will be frozen at £145.50 for the next six years in a deal reached yesterday by ministers and BBC executives. In return for having the fee secured, the BBC will take over from the Foreign Office the £272m annual cost of funding the World Service and will contribute £150m a year for the rollout of high-speed broadband in rural areas. SOMALI GUNMEN RELEASE AID WORKERA British security consultant working for Save the Children in Somalia has been released by gunmen who kidnapped him six days ago, without any ransom being paid. Save the Children said the release of Zimbabwean-born Frans Barnard came about through negotiations. He was in the town of Adado, near the Ethiopian border, to research whether it was safe enough for the British charity to set up a new base in the region when the gunmen captured him. BUNNY GIRLS 'TO RETURN TO LONDON'Almost 30 years after the London Playboy Club shut down, Hugh Hefner, the 84-year-old founder of the Playboy empire, says he plans to open a new club a short distance from the first one, which was next to the Dorchester Hotel on Park Lane. It is not known whether Sean Connery, Michael Caine and Jack Nicholson, all of whom were photographed with rabbit-eared bunny girls in the Sixties, will be in the mood to return. ferguson confirms rooney wants to leaveManchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson has confirmed that Wayne Rooney wants to leave the club and told a press conference yesterday afternoon that he was "bemused" by the striker's stance. The England player has fallen out with Ferguson and could now quit Old Trafford in January, possibly to join United's local rivals Manchester City. City and Chelsea want Rooney 42,000 JOBS TO GO UNDER DEFENCE REVIEWPrime Minister David Cameron has announced that 42,000 jobs will have to go - 17,000 in the services and 25,000 among civil servants at the Ministry of Defence - as a result of Britain's first strategic defence review since 1998. Robert Fox, analysing the review for The First Post, says Britain still aims to punch its weight in the world - but with far fewer forces. Typhoon MEgi leaves 200,000 homelessThe 'super typhoon' that hit the Philippines on Monday has left 200,000 people homeless and killed at least 19. The Filipino response to Typhoon Megi has been praised for minimising the loss of life. A typhoon of similar magnitude in 2006 killed more than 1,000 people. Typhoon Megi is now moving very slowly over the South China Sea and is expected to make landfall in China's Guangdong province.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up