ITV — ITV News

Wildfires in southern Europe have forced over a quarter of a million people to flee, with France's interior minister calling it possibly the biggest peacetime evacuation in the country's history. Military cargo planes and soldiers have been deployed to the south-west, and strong winds are pushing flames towards Bordeaux. In Spain, nearly 90,000 people have been evacuated or are in lockdown, with one death reported. The Scottish government has also requested military air power to fight a wildfire in the Cairngorms that has burned for over a week, leading to hundreds of evacuations from Nethy Bridge. The final stage of the Tour de France is being shortened so that emergency services can be redirected to help with the French wildfires.

Downing Street has revealed that Prime Minister Andy Burnham will begin addressing adult social care next week, with a potential National Care Service costing an estimated £18 billion. The Lib Dem leader Ed Davey called for cross-party consensus, and the Prime Minister responded positively on social media. Meanwhile, twenty firefighters were taken to hospital after a massive explosion at an industrial unit near Chelmsford in Essex, which destroyed three fire engines and two officer cars. A major incident was declared, and residents were evacuated; the cause is under investigation.

In other news, a Canadian woman of Chinese origin has been arrested and accused of spying while working as an intern at NATO's supreme headquarters in Belgium. The disgraced music mogul Sean Diddy Combs has been placed in solitary confinement following a fight in his New Jersey jail. Katy Perry expressed anger over the use of her song Firework on the White House TikTok account in a video of military strikes. At the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, England won golds in para-swimming events, and Sean McCann, the younger brother of Madeleine McCann, finished eighth in the 400-metre freestyle final.