05/12/2011 Daily Politics

Afternoon folks, welcome to The Daily Politics. As Gary McKinnon

fights attempts to send him to the United States to face computer

hacking charges, MPs debate a change in the law - is it too easy

Another week, another crunch meeting for the eurozone. President

Sarkozy and Angela Merkel are meeting in Paris - but what's the

The kids are hooked to their games consoles - the grown-ups to their

smart phones. But could our obsession with these digital toys

be messing with our brains? We have now been in government for 500 days.

Although, to be fair, it did take 499 of those for Gordon Brown to

accept that he was no longer Prime Minister. The art of political

speechwriting, and making sure they deliver them right. I'll be talking

to one of David Cameron's former wordsmiths. And with us for the

duration, the Prime Minister's former speechwriter Danny Kruger,

who now runs a charity that works with prisoners, ex-offenders and

young people at risk of crime. First this morning, MPs will debate

a motion this afternoon which attempts to make it more difficult

to extradite British citizens who are wanted for crimes committed

abroad. The debate is inspired by the case of Gary McKinnon, who is

alleged to have hacked Pentagon and NASA computer systems, and could

face a prison sentence of up to 60 years if convicted. MPs claim this

case highlights an intrinsic unfairness in the extradition

treaty that's led to 25 British citizens being sent to the US but

only five American citizens extradited to Britain. So, is it

unfair? The figures suggest that there seems to be something unfair

about the flowers of suspects. But this debate today, I understand, is

also about a European aspect, which is parallel but unrelated. There is

an assumption that simply because the European countries have their

own rules, that they have a justice system which is as fair as ours.

While I do not think the American system is corrupt or wrong, there

seems to be something about the principle of any country being able

to decide who was extradited and when. What we have is caught some

ministers here being powerless to decide who should go abroad, and I

think there's something wrong about that. There's justification for

debating it. The Gary McKinnon case has been very emotive, it has been

picked up by Fleet Street, he has his champions on this but it could

be dangerous to change the law on the basis of one case. There's

always human beings involved in these cases, and there's no reason

why they should not talk about it. I think there is something wrong

about this case. It is really an Now, Italy's new Welfare Minister

showed governments all over Europe how to use empathy to sell

difficult austerity policies. She burst in to tears yesterday when

announcing an increase in the retirement age to 66 - part of a 30

billion euro package aimed at shoring up Italy's finances.

Meanwhile the quest to resolve the wider eurozone crisis rolls on.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel

are meeting in Paris now to thrash out an agreement ahead of a crunch

European Council meeting later on this week. We hope to speak to our

Paris correspondent shortly, but let me try and explain what's going

on first. Just before we came on air, I spoke to our Europe

correspondent, Christian Fraser. It's the sheer complexity of

decision-making in the eurozone and the wider EU - with 27 member

countries, some of which even have their own elected government - that

makes this crisis so difficult to resolve. It's not just the French

and the Germans who have one eye on their own domestic political

concerns - here in Britain, the debate is also hotting up over any

potential treaty change.The American Ambassador here, Louis

Susman, has told MPs that the current arrangements are working

well for both countries. So should David Cameron be playing a straight

hand and aiming to help his fellow players fix the euro, while

stopping the new euro union gaining too many powers? Or should he

gamble that this is an opportunity to raise the stakes and demand the

repatriation of powers from Europe that his party promised at the last

election and many of his MPs would like to see? And if there is a new

treaty on the cards, will David Cameron be forced to play his trump

card, and call a referendum, potentially threatening to wreck

the whole rubber? We can go over to Paris now, I spoke earlier to our

Paris correspondent, and I asked him what was separating the French

and German leaders. The German Chancellor obviously wants legally-

binding limits on all eurozone countries, with automatic penalties

for governments which break the budget rules. And she would like to

take the decisions away from member countries, she would like the

institutions of Europe to decide when those penalties are imposed.

So perhaps there would be a move to get the European Court of Justice

involved, there could be a stability commissioner, who would

have an oversight of national spending plans and tax-and-spend

policies in these countries. The French agree that there has to be a

change in the system, because self- regulation obviously has failed.

But they are nervous about transferring more power to Brussels.

They would like to see power resting with the countries, perhaps

in the shape of qualified majority voting. They would also like to see

countries adopt decisions made within the round of the eurozone

within their constitution, the so- called golden rule which President

Sarkozy has talk about. Let's suppose that they do come to some

kind of agreement, some kind of compromise, before the European

Union summit later in the week - is there any evidence to indicate that

the other members of the eurozone will be happy to have what is in

essence their tax-and-spend policy controlled by an external body?

I understand it, the smaller eurozone countries prefer the idea

of Europe controlling that element of their budget, or having

oversight, rather than Germany and France. Over the course of the last

few months, they have been dictated to by Paris and Berlin. Politically,

it looks better if it comes from Brussels. But obviously all

governments have concerns about transferring powers to the centre,

away from nationally elected governments. The problem I think

also for the Germans is that unilaterally, they cannot be seen

to be imposing austerity rules on the rest, so they do need the

French alongside, although it is the Germans which are dictating the

terms. Nonetheless, politically, it suits them to have the French

alongside them, urging the others on. In that sense, President

Sarkozy does have bargaining power. We're hearing that there will be I

think an agreement between the two, probably to add something to the

treaty, in the shape of a protocol, rather than root-and-branch reform

of the Lisbon Treaty. With me now are the Conservative MPs Nadhim

Zahawi and Bernard Jenkin. Let's assume, Bernard Jenkin, that the

French and the Germans agree to some kind of fiscal union in order

to attempt to keep the union together - what should the British

response be to that? This represents a very fundamental

change in our relationship with our European partners. It started at

Maastricht, this is the conclusion. The Prime Minister says we should

have had a referendum at Maastricht. Well, this is Maastricht plus. If

we did not have a referendum then, we need one now. The question on

the ballot paper is, do we support these terms of membership? Because

we need to renegotiate our terms of membership. We have been asked to

believe two completely incomprehensible things, firstly,

that this does not represent any change in our terms of membership,

and secondly, that when all of this is done and dusted, in two or three

years' time, that's the time when we will go and renegotiate, when

they have settled everything already. Those two propositions are

ludicrous. But if the fiscal union applies only to members of the

eurozone, of which we are not a part, why does it change our

relationship with the wider European Union? We would not be

bound by these fiscal laws. This is the the credit crunch point. This

is about real power. At the moment, the institutions of the European

Union are meant to serve all 27 member states. If, effectively,

there is an economic state at the heart of the European Union, of 17

members or maybe fewer, that is going to be their main

preoccupation. They're already attacking the City of London, they

already want a financial transactions tax, they already

burdening our competitiveness with more and more regulation, they do

not care about our interests. Are we seriously being asked to believe

that we're going to have more influence in this new arrangement?

Of course we are not, we're going to have far less influence, which

is why ministers are talking about the threat to the single market. If

now is not the time to renegotiate our membership, when will be a

better time Question Time so, the theory is that come the time when

it turns into a fiscal union, rather than just a monetary union,

that is the time for Britain to reassess fundamentally its

relationship with Europe? Bernard Jenkin is right to be passionate

about this, but timing is everything. The point teammates,

that there is going to be a paradigm shift in structures within

Europe, everybody agrees about that. That will happen. But we need to

see the detail of it. I think the timing, push and the crux of it, we

are uniquely positioned, in Britain, I believe, more so than France, to

put our arm around Germany and help them make the decisions they need

to make to allow them to save the eurozone. Because their demons are

the Weimar Republic of 1920, we are uniquely placed to help them.

we are not close enough, our arm cannot reach that far. We are an

economic powerhouse. Remember, we buy more from Europe... Did you

hear the Autumn Statement last week?! We're having tough times,

but we are still economically powerful. My point is that timing

is everything. It is not the right time... You have just heard it,

we're going to put our arms around Germany, and in a couple of years'

time, Germany is going to agree to all of the things they have never

agreed to for the last 20 years. This is ludicrous. This is the end

game in Europe. This is the final act of desperation in the European

integration project. One assumes that they are going to save the

euro, but I very much doubt that myself. Unless we're going to

negotiate and put our demands on the table now, when will we do it?

If David Cameron was simply to say, look, this is so fundamental, this

change in our relationship with the European Union, even though there

is nothing which directly legally applies to us, this is so obviously

the European Union changing the nature of itself, that we're going

to have a referendum on this, and unless we can get the renegotiated

terms which suit our national interests, we will be saying no.

is unlikely, if the eurozone becomes a fiscal union, which means

increasingly it will have a common tax policies, common budget deficit

policies, Konnie regulations, all of which will be quite centralised,

perhaps even quite onerous, it is unlikely they are going to agree to

a kind of Hong Kong type Britain, deregulated, lower budget deficit,

less government spending, floating off into the North Sea - they're

not going to let that happen. not just Britain, you have got nine

other countries, with Britain. some of them want to join the euro.

Well, not all of them. A lot of them are legally bound to join the

euro. Yes, but they have opted to be outside the euro. So, at the

moment, there is an argument, essentially, for saving the

eurozone countries first, and at the same time, as I said earlier,

using that opportunity to negotiate a settlement which is advantageous

to you, versus the eurozone countries. It sounds to me, Bernard

Jenkin, from the Department of Honesty, do you not really think

that if the eurozone goes ahead and becomes a fully fledged fiscal

union, you basically think Britain should leave the EU. We do not want

to leave the EU, for one simple reason. We are in something called

customs union, and a lot of business depends upon that free

movement of goods and services. But you do not have to beat in a

federation, or monetary union, to enjoy the benefits of that. We are

looking at a completely different template of membership, but

personally I would not advocate walking out of the customs union.

But interestingly, Turkey is not a member of the European Union, and

they have a customs union agreement with the European Union. That is

the kind of new relationship I am talking about. We would not be a

member of the EU, we would be And what would that do took Nissan

and other companies which invest here? We cannot give up our self

government permanently which this is amounting to. Danny? Understand

the Prime Minister has a responsibility as a Euro leader to

save our biggest trading bloc from implosion and his mission this week

is to try and renegotiate the eurozone and I think we should save

the euro zone. The priority should be to save the eurozone because of

that blows up the recession we are heading for turns into a

depression? I don't think this is incompatible with saving the

eurozone. The more flexibility we can give eurozone countries, the

better for them. We can give them more flexibility if they give us

the flexibility that we need as well. It is called quid pro quo.

But his Latin! Who is closest to the Prime Minister on this issue?

don't think we know the Prime Minister's mind. I don't know

whether the Prime Minister believes we can save the euro. I think the

Prime Minister knows the priority is to make sure that he acts. Is

the closest to you or Bernard Jenkin? I think he is close to both

of us. I would not like to see you fall out.

Unaccustomed as I am, to public speaking, who wrote that? My guest

of the day is not because he used to write the speeches for the Prime

Minister. Now I come to think of it, I could blame the oratorical

failings of this programme on the producers who write the scripts,

rather than the chap who delivers them because obviously the delivery

and timing is pretty close to perfection. Danny, perhaps you

could give our producers a few words of advice on this. Here is

somebody who writes his own scripts, Giles Dilnot on the art of

political speech-writing. Sadly, there are not many who can

do it but they do not do it alone. In the world of the political

speech, the writers are also King's. You need a script editor, you need

somebody who makes editor Errol -- editorial decisions, otherwise you

have a script written by a committee which is not a good idea.

A lot of Gordon Brown's speeches are like that. They are patchworks

of a bit from this person, a bit from that person and even worse, a

bit for this person and that person and you end up with no coherent

argument. You do need one central writer but usually you will take

the ketone from the person themselves. It will be about who

has the strength, the judgment, the weight, the ideas for Britain's

future in an uncertain world and we do. This party does. If you don't

know what a central argument is, you do not have a good speech.

Berate his speech for William Hague. Somehow, we managed to leave the

key bit of his speech. He was congratulated by the Guardian so

Leaving Las -- Even your mistakes can even work. High oratory has its

place. A pastiche of Martin Luther King will not work on housing

benefit so you have to write for the occasion. You have to write for

the setting. You do not get to write I will fight them on the

beaches very often. If the script is too heavy, what about a bit of

at lib? The classic example was Tony Blair at the CBI. It is also

why we cannot afford... That is probably the Chancellor on the

phone there! By then he was so clear on speaking and what he

wanted to say that actually we were no longer worried. And if you have

got it, flaunt it. The image of Gordon Brown greeting his

predecessor as an EU President was a Just William in 2008. The choking

sensation as the words Mr President are forced out and then once in the

Cabinet Room, the melodrama of when will you hand over to me all over

again? When you work for William Hague, I think George Osborne said

it was like taking free-kicks for Beckham and he is so good at him

himself. Trying to be funny and failing is the worst thing you can

do. We have been in government for 500 days although to be fair, it

did take 499 of those for Gordon Brown to accept he was not Prime

Minister. If you are not good at it and not funny, just don't do it.

There you go, how to do it and how not to do it. Isn't it frustrating

writing speeches, didn't -- don't you think you could do it better

yourself? There is a bit of that. I left that job because ultimately,

it is a terribly literary form unless you are writing the

Gettysburg Address. The have three minutes to deliver, one simple

point and it was an opportunity for hire oratory. Mostly you are

talking about pretty mundane everyday things. The opportunities

for literature are not great. going to say, Mr Blair, when we

covered his party speeches, he in the end got rid of the verb. His

speeches became almost a series of one-word sentences. I think it is

actually OK if you are speaking, if you are delivering a speech.

Because it comes better -- comes across better? Good communicators

are good communicators. Blair could do it and Cameron can do it. One

difficulty are always had was in the British political tradition, we

do not do great oratory and except perhaps in times of the Second

World War. You're writing boring stuff most of the time and you

write great long speeches which are 20 minutes long, they bore

everybody in the hall and they are ultimately only read by 20 or 30

political journalists who are looking for the one or two lines

which can be used in the headline. The main lines in the headline have

been written by the press office and pre-release so what is the

point of the 30 minutes? So you are glad you're not doing it any more!

I can understand that. OK, where was I? Sorry, am I

presenting a TV programme. I was reading some tweets. Is our

constant exposure to computers having an impact on the human

brain? I wouldn't have thought so. It is not expecting my brain. I

think it might have. This evening, neuroscientist Susan Greenfield

will use a debate in the House of Lords to ask the government to look

into whether our brains are being changed by using things like this

and playing games like this. think I am mad, but soon, you shall

see that every move, every strike, was meant to bring us to this.

If he is back on the grid, then so are we.

Attacks were triggered across Europe. Reports of the death toll

are at 100. That was a clip from Modern Warfare

3. It is the latest in a series called Call of Duty. I don't think

anybody will mistake it for Andy Pandy. It sold 55 million copies

around the world. I don't know if that should cheer you up or make

you very, very depressed. It is the kind of video game which is often

blamed for violent behaviour. It is one of the concerns that Susan

Greenfield who joins me now has along with Tom Chivers. He writes

about science for the Daily Telegraph. What impact do videos

and games like that have on children's brains? That is a very

big question. There is a lot of work going on about it. Let's look

at a so called Metro analysis. This was 130 papers which encompasses

130 subjects using 100 or so tests and the broad conclusion was there

is an increase in aggression, an increase in recklessness, high

levels of arousal and a decrease in social behaviour. However, this

paper has been critique as biased. That is the nature of scientific

evidence. Do you think it is right? As a neuroscientist, it is a given,

the brain adapts to the environment. The human brain is exquisitely

involved, more than any other species to adapt where it is placed.

It follows that if the environment chefs with only hearing and vision

being accessed, the brain will be changed. -- if the environment

shifts. Let's unpack the different issues that comes from that. What

do you say about that? I think you are right, no one disputes the

brain changes to its environment. But that has always been the case

and just because our environments involve lots of screens and

computer games, that is accepted it will change our brains but there is

a lot of evidence and studies into these things and as far as I am

aware, there is no solid evidence either way. They have been some

pieces which suggest. I would suspect that most parents would

think instinctively, if my child has got a constant diet of this

sort of thing, it must affect them in some way. Let's just think of

two separate things. One is the anecdotal evidence and I am yet to

make -- meet apparent he says it is great that they Kidd spent so much

time on the computer. Secondly there are the statistics. In a

recent study in the United States, between a child's 13th and 17th

birthday, over half were spending 30 plus hours a week not giving

someone a hug or looking summoning the ire or walking along the beach,

not feeling the sun on your face -- not looking someone in the eye.

That is not true. It is not true that 30 hours in front of a screen

does not mean you are talking to a friend. You are not talking to a

person, you're talking to a screen. You do not look them in the eye of.

You do not do that when you talk on a phone. Their art some -- there is

some evidence that people who have active lives on social media have

active real lives as well. That would surprise me. Also, you look

at other papers like a report from the United -- the University of

Michigan. We can look at different papers. A whole point being that it

is never the case in science way you have the conclusive paper. What

you have to do is rate and evaluate and think and discuss and be

specific in what you are asking. What I want to do this evening is

ask the government for a co- ordinated initiative. Ordinary

human beings who are not scientists, who are parents, teachers,

employers, there is aiming for them to understand what is happening so

they can question and challenge what is happening and we can go

forwards. Our work with ex offenders and youths at risk and

they spend a lot of time playing Call of Duty. They accept it is not

good for their brains like they accept that smoking and cannabis is

not good but they still do it. will come back to this. Thank you

for joining us. That is it for today. Special