19/01/2012 Newsnight

The market is the best imaginable force for improving human wealth

and happiness, according to our Prime Minister today. It just needs

a little adjustment. And it's not just him, it is all the main party

leaders. They don't buy it at the protest

camp, but how has this mainstream consensus been built, and can it

last? I have been speaking to the Marxist historian, Eric Hobsbawm.

Capitalism developed a sort of pathological degeneration of the

admit Smith's line, in which you believe that responsibility had

absolutely nothing to do with it. The question for our guests: if

capitalism is so broken, why is an alternative so very hard to

imagine? The story of how the British

Government betrayed this man when he tried to warn them that tax-

payers' money was being given to companies accused of money

laundering. I don't know how else to put it, at some point or the

other I will have to pay the price for what I have done.

What do you mean? Retribution. There will be some form of

retribution. The Most Excellent Order of the

British Empire, to receive the honour of Knighthood. Calls mount

for the man who shredded the royal bank of Scotland to be striped of

his Knighthood. Since when has incompetence within an offence, and

since when could jailbirds keep their peerages.

Both the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition spent

today arguing for a socially responsible version of capitalism.

They follow ed the Deputy Prime Minister, who is a fan of what he

calls a John Lewis-style of economy. The days of an ideolgical divide

are gone. The de bait now is just how the market works. The voices

saying that even if you put lipstick on a pig it is still a pig

are muted or ignored. Our economics editor, Paul Mason, reports.

Today, if we're frank, many people are questioning, not just how and

when we will recover, but they are questioning the whole way in which

our economy works. The Occupy protest at St Paul's may be facing

its final days, but its legacy could be this, both Labour and the

Conservatives vying with each other to verbally beat up capitalism.

Yesterday, unemployment rose again, and across Europe...With

speechwriter recruited from the Guardian, and an audience from the

Co-op movement, Mr Cameron weighed in. No true Conservative has a

niave belief that all politics and politicians have to do is just

stand back and let capitalism rip. We know there is every difference

in the world between a market that works and the one that does not.

Markets can fail. Uncontrolled globalisation can slide into

monopolisation, sweeping aside the small, the personal, the local. But

we are the party that understands how to make capitalism work. Across

London, it was the turn of Labour to wave the red flag against

irresponsible capitalism. challenge to David Cameron is to be

judged on his deeds not his words. So, if he's serious about tackling

irresponsible capitalism, he needs to clampdown on the fact that train

companies are ripping people off. If he's serious about tackling

irresponsible capitalism, he needs to take action to break up the

rigged energy market. If he's serious about irresponsible

capitalism, he needs to take action to stop those exorbitant bank

charges. That is the proof that he is really serious about this agenda.

The drivers of discontent are clear, a million young people on the dole,

wages stagnant, growth shuddering to a halt, millions shut out of the

credit market. But what does all the rhetoric about capitalism

really mean. If by capitalism we mean the concentration of wealth,

power and influence, among a few rich people in place like the City

of London, nobody in mainstream politics, in truth, intends to do

much about that. One reason might be, the absence of alternatives

Over the past 18 months, the UK Uncut movement, has pushed issues

like corporate tax avoidance and inequality into the headlines. This

woman, a veteran of those protests, at the age of 26, is notm prised

with the concept of -- impressed with the concept of responsible

capitalism. When politicians like David Cameron and Ed Milliband set

up these strange die cots me of responsible and irresponsible

capitalism I just don't believe it, there are systemic issues with

capitalism. Your movement avoids the systemic issues, because there

is no alternative coming out of your movement? It is not our

responsibility to come up with the alternative. It is the

responsibility of UK Uncut and Occupy, to put pressure on

Governments to deliver fairer and more progressive and more people-

centered society. The reason we elect politicians is so they can

come up with cold, hard alternatives, of which there are

many. But, among the high towers of high

finance, not many people can see an alternative, even if they can see

major flaws in the current system. At the Financial Times, they are

running a debate entitled "Capitalism in crisis". For all the

column pages filled, the solutions are remarkably thin.

Can you see any alternative view, as in the 30s, when there is a big

inflection point in economic thinking, is anything emerging?

the moment the answer is no. There are two sorts of reasons for that.

First Minister, there is no equivalent of communism, nobody

believes in a fundamentally different system. We have to

remember the 30s, many people z most intelligent people believed

that there was that sort of alternative. We are not getting the

sort of Keynsian revolution, even within mainstream politics, we are

going back to Keynsian revolution. The most unconventional thinking is

Keynsianism, that is an 80-year-old system. The answer is, no. We are

seeing demonstrations on the scale of the 30s, and strikes and trouble.

Could the ultimate strength of modern capitalism be, that even

those on the streets can't imagine it ever ending. 20 or 30 years ago,

a young activist on the left, like you, would have just said I'm a

socialist, why is that so hard now? Well, I do consider myself a

socialist, and sometimes I do baulk at saying it, because I think

people of my age have been conditioned, I suppose, by things

like the Cold War, and by Stalin to see socialism as this kind of

monolithic state control over the very tiny minute new shy of your

life. For me, publicly-owned services means everybody puts their

money in the pot, so everybody has stake in the services and ensures

the purpose of the services is to make sure everybody is cared for,

and not to make profits for a few people at the top. Which is what is

happening in a lot of industries at the moment.

Capitalism, irresponsible or not, has become global, complex and

high-tech. The actions of national Governments limited by financial

reality, whatever their rhetoric implies. Even the rhetoric, these

days, ain't what it used to be. At almost any point in the 20th

century you could have found influential figures offering an

alternative analysis to the idea now common place in all three

political parties, that there is nothing intrinsically wrong with

capitalism, it is just a matter of how it operates. According to

Marxist interpretation, selfishness and inequality aren't an abhoration,

but the natural product of capitalism.

Marxists aren't quite on the endangered species yet, the oldman

of Marxism, Eric Hobsbawm, published a book, How To Change The

World, at the age of 94. I went to speak to him earlier.

The Prime Minister was speaking today about responsible capitalism,

do you think such a thing exists? As an economic system, capitalism

has nothing to do with responsibility. It has to do with

growth, with making profit. Over the last 40 years, it seems to me,

capitalism developed a sort of pathological degeneration of the

Adam Smith's line, in which you believe that responsibility had

absolutely nothing to do with it, because all good results, such as

they were, would arise from operations of the free market,

provided the free market were left completely free. What's really

talking about is just capitalism, isn't he. The idea that capitalism

can exist, alongside some sort of social, moral system, in which

there is a degree of equity? It can, if it is made to. By itself, there

is nothing to make it function like that at all. Why is it, do you

think, that when we see capitalism clearly in crisis, in the west now,

why is it that no-one else is reaching for these Marxist utopian

solutions? Marxism isn't a utopian solution. Marxism is a definition

of problems, which we have to deal with, and with which capitalism

cannot, at present deal. The major problem, at the moment, which is

going to be very, very hard for anybody to deal with, is that what

was the transformation of the world through capitalism, and high-

technology, and enormous extraordinary advance, one element

of production has become surplus to requirement. Namely people. If we

go on developing, what happens to the people who previously managed

to get in on the system, largely through getting jobs, getting good

living jobs, bad living jobs, but jobs? We can see some of the

problems right now in detrialised areas. What happens, particularly -

- deindustrialised areas, what happens, in particular to the men,

when there are no jobs. When you look at the riots last summer, do

you think they have a political element to them? I think the riots

were a reaction to a society of demoralised people, that doesn't

know what happens. These particular riots weren't, I think,

particularly political, and it would be a mistake to read that

into it. But, the fact that a large number of people are demoralised

because there is nothing for them to do, is more than the temporary

phenomenon of unemployment. Once upon a time, 80% of the population

in the world were farmers. And that's the only way we could get

the food. Nowadays we can get all the food we want, with maybe 2% or

less of people farming. Now this is happening with the other parts of

production too. That's where the real danger lies. So what do you

make of the Occupy movement? interesting thing is the response.

The response both on the part of ordinary people, to see that this

extraordinary inquay ee quality, social and economic -- inequality,

social and economic inequality, is in some sense seen as a moral

inequality in most cases, is intolerable. The idea that even

among the capitalists, that this isn't what they were supposed to be

producing. To that extent, the lack of self-confidence in capitalism at

the moment is one element that we have to count into the crisis.

You're just an old Marxist clutching at straws aren't you?

not clutching any straws, because I'm pessimistic. I doubt whether,

in fact, a solution will be found. Evently no doubt t will be. I

suspect we are looking forward to a rather stormy period in the next

20-30 years. Thank you very much. With us now are the Labour MP, and

historian, Mr Hunt, Eamonn Fingleton from the times, and Julie

Meyer, founder and CEO of the investment company.

Why are all the party leaders talking suddenly about responsible

capitalism? Because when there is so little growth people think about

fairness. They think about weather what

people are getting out is related to what is going in. It doesn't

occur to them in the good times? is less of an issue. When

capitalism is producing a lot, people are getting a lot out. They

don't worry how other people are doing, if they are doing better

than them. What do you make of the talk? When we are beginning to see

the bonuses come out of the City, there is a very real sense of the

inequality of the system. What is interesting, in a sense, this

debate has only begun at such intensity now, when we have had the

ramifications of it for the last three years. It is getting very

interesting. It seems to me that the perameters of the debate are

centre left and progressive. About how we remodel the neo-liberal

capitalist model we have had for the last 30 years. For those of us

on the left it is a very exciting time. Do you think there is a

crisis in capitalism? I don't F we mean capitalism as a market economy,

where profit is the motive, you have to drive things to

profitability. You can't tax a loss, you tax a profit, in order to have

money for public service, you have tob to have profitability as the

goal. What we have seen over the past 30 years capital markets have

lifted a million people out of poverty. They continue to do that.

If you speak to people in their 20s they take it for grant in their

lives that they have the freedom to engage in the market. We're the

market. You can't say there is something wrong with the freedom to

pursue your livelihood, every day. The capitalist model lefting people

out of poverty in Brazil, in China, in India, is very different to what

we have here in western Europe. The point about capitalism is it has

these many manifestations, capitalism changes over time. The

great achievement of Marx was to hissor size capitalism, and put it

in -- historicalise capitalism and put it into history. The Soviet

Union in the end. These are trivial and as if siel points about a

historian's record that you -- facile points about a historian's

record. It was true and that was the thrust of his career, and the

Soviet Union ends up in a position where it couldn't print off the

paper to write down the people it was executing. It was debating

points about capitalism. It is about trying to identify the

alternative, when you heard criticisms about capitalism, some

of which are true, I didn't understand what Eric Hobsbawm's

solution, when he did it was a catastrophic one. It is Germaine,

you can't say capitalism is in crisis or has to be replaced, go

and sit outside St Paul's, and ask what do you propose instead, say it

is childish to ask. There are bad people in the world, we will never

get rid of them. I personally think it is 5%, not 50% of the people. We

live in a world where capitalism, market economy reflects human

nature, we can't change that. We can only encourage positive

behaviour. We will never, ever, in the history of the world, change

the fact is there will be bad people who try to rip people off.

When you talk about this being an exciting time to be on the left,

there isn't any alternative that most of us can see being canvased

anywhere? There is not an alternative in the sense of are we

going back to the Marxist model of socialism of the 1850s, and the

reason that is not going to happen is because we have lost faith.

Socialism ultimately is an act of faith. Any place it was implemented

it was an abject failure? models of socialism that were

implemented were very different to Marxist thinking. The point of this

is we were discussing earlier. me a favour. The interwar years. We

were discussing in some of the contributions, the progressives of

the 1890s and the 1900s, the way you tackle inheritance tax and

inequality those are the centre left arguments. That is where David

Cameron, the ultimate PR man who has very little structured beliefs

can see where the debate is going, and wants to be there. The PR man

doesn't sit with the childish sixth form debating point you made

earlier. You are misunderstanding what people think about fairness.

They think of fairness as putting something in and getting something

out. A fair exchange, no robbery, the market accords well with the

idea of that fairness. When the markets fail, as they have done,

and where they see people taking out outsize rewards not related to

their input, they begin to ask right questions, and they require

reform. There has never been a socialist alternative to property

rights and exchange. Nor has there been a socialist idea of fairness

that challenges the idea that you put in and get out. That is why

socialism intellectually has been a failure, not in the 1850s, but in

the 1950s and the 1990s. This is a charicature of socialism, we had

strong elements of socialism in the British society in the 1940s, 50,

60s, some were strofpblgt the welfare state is an achievement of

socialism. It is an achievement of Lloyd George, Churchill and

Bevanage. It is a socialist achievement, most people would

regard it as the same. This is fine territory to discuss it. We are

seeing a failure of the City model of the last 15, 20 years, I

represent Stoke-on-Trent, you go and see ministers today, and

Treasury civil servants today, they are still in hock to the

traditional City interests. There is no programme from this

Government on manufacturing or industry. When people express

objections to capitalism, it is always focused on people in the

financial institutions, it is not focused on James Dyson or Richard

Branson? It is true in this country our industrial policy is

concentrated too much on the financial sector. The financial

services sector should be a service sector to industry. It should back

the industrialists of the day. For all of the people who want to get

upset about the size of City bonuses. It should be noted you pay

62% of that away. But the point is, really you have to be creating

wealth, and all of society benefits from that. It is not about the

bankers, it is about backing the industrialists. The point today

about it being a moral mechanism too, do you believe it is a moral

mechanism? Absolutely, I think it is the moral mechanism, to give me

the freedom to choose to live my life the way I do. If I want to

work 80 hours a week, choose my livelihood. What is more moral than

to allow me to do. That what is not moral is if all of the people

occupying St Paul's Cathedral, angry at the bankers' bonuses could

see the wastage in Government. There is no evidence that

Government is an efficient steward of our money. That is where they

should turn their anger. efficiency a moral good in itself?

If dupls down to my money and how the Government -- if it comes down

to my money and how the Government spend it, it should be very moral.

When it comes down to you and your friends undermining a great deal of

the real economy with real jobs and mortgages and businesses who over.

We drive money into the revenues of the financial coffers of this

country. �4.8 -- 4.8 million SMEs, I'm an entrepeneur not banker.

couldn't do it properly, we are all clearing up. This is why the state,

Government had to step in. 6% of businesses create 50% of new jobs.

You are talking about this moral point that David Cameron made, that

the market in itself was a moral mechanism? It can be. In a sort of

beautiful Adam Smithian world were the butcher, the baker and the

candle stick maker are having a lovely relationship. The way to be

moral is to regulate it. You have wicked and evil people. Without

property rights and exchange people starve to date. -- death. You know,

for my father, who came here from a Soviet prison camp, Brent Cross

shopping centre is a moral institution. Being able to feed

your family is a moral institution, so I just don't accept the argument

that there is some socialist alternative to that. If you haven't

got an alternative to that, we simply end up arguing about how to

regulate capitalism, to ensure it acts in the interests of all. Of

course there have been failings. But I still don't understand what

your alternative is to either the elevated rhetoric level or the

prosaic level to capitalism. fine with that debate, I do not

believe, I lack faith, I can't move from the king dom of necessity to

the king dom of freedom. I'm in favour of the market, it is how you

regulate it. Can you trust this Government, Prime Minister, son of

a stock broker. Come on, you speak as an MP of a party whose leader

talked about a golden age of parliament. It funds the party, can

you trust them to sort out this mess. You are quoting Eng les and

Marx and attacking sons of stock brokers doesn't get you very far as

a Labour Party. Certainly not with the young people. This country need

to hear be jealous of people who work hard and make money. That is

not what we need young people to hear. This is really about the size

of the state, what we should try for an alternative, just for an

experiment, try the Laufer Curve, people should pay a lot of tax. How

do you increase tax, you drop the percentage, you optimise tax, not

putting it up, you up it. It is a continuum. You pay 15% if you are

very, very rich f you work and do the right thing you have to pay 25-

30%. The problem is Art Laufer drew the graph on a napkirpbgs there was

a reason, he hasn't data points, we don't know where we are on the

curve. It is a continuum. We are talking mechanics here. Can

you imagine, within any of your lifetimes, any of our lifetimes,

some sort of alternative philosophy. You say it is a great time to be on

the left. Is there going to be some sort of alternative, seriously

canvased to a moderated market mechanism? What we have to do is

move away from the traditional shareholder model. Nick Clegg's

speech was very interesting, employee-ownership, John Lewis

model, co-operate co-optives. I don't think the Conservative Party

is anywhere near of it. It is the circle partnership, taking over

failed NHS hospitals by giving employee ownership to circle

partnership to revolutionise healthcare. He started with the

principle that everybody has the right to great care. Those models

are out there. Capitalism is changing as I call individual

capitalism, it is not big business it is around the individual.

have collapsed from the great rhetoric about capitalism a few

minutes ago, into let's have some more mutuals and co-operatives,

everyone is in favour of, that it is your imagination of the

Conservative Party isn't. You can't imagine any kind of alternative

philosophy? I'm still waiting. The attack on consumerism, which seems

to me to look at the great history of pest lins and starvation and war.

-- And shopping as the great social ill. That movement of consumerism

has come up with no alternative to property rights, rule of law and

fair exchange. What you are suggesting, all perfectly debatable,

comes within that debate, but they are not an alternative.

The secretary for international development has admitted to

Newsnight that his department betrayed the name of an anti-

corruption whistle-blower. The information was passed on to a

private equity firm he had accused of investing in corrupt company. It

was said to be an inadvertant error, and issued an apology,-to-the man,

who was investigated by private investigators and his children

followed to school. Corruption is the curse of the

developing world. In Nigeria corruption is seen as perpetuating

poverty, violence and crime. Britain committed to help change

things. This is what happened to man who warned the Government it

may have been investing in corruption.

Instead of investigating my report, the people who I accused, to place

me on their investigation. The whole idea of protecting my

confidentiality was thrown out of the window, right from the winning.

Ology Oloko has just found out that every aspect of his own life, his

birth in England, his education in businesses -- and businesses in

Nigeria, has placed under investigation. He was secretly

watched and photographed. That was just the start. They came to my

house, take pictures of my family members, follow me to my children's

school. What is that about? What do you think about following you to

your children's school? I think I'm very, very upset about that, and

very outraged about that. I cannot see the bearing, how that bears on

my children. I can't see how any investigation into me, what has

that got to do with my children, their school, their identity.

had been worried that British tax- payers' money, intended to help

Nigeria were he worked, was being invested in companies thought to be

involved in money laundering. Three years ago, on a Christmas visit to

Brighton, he took his concerns to a Government department, it was a

brave step, according to his friend. It takes great courage to come

forward and expose corruption in a country like Nigeria. The head of

Nigeria's main investigative agency was forced into exile after being

threatened with death, because he was probing corruption.

So we're not talking about the cosy atmosphere of exposing something in

Britain. We are talking about people putting their lives at risk.

He knew this, and before presenting the dossier of allegations, he

insisted they didn't pass on his identity. You have to understand, I

knew I was putting myself at risk, and I made, I went to a lot of

effort to try to protect my identity. To get assurances that my

identity would be protected. Yet, it was leaked. At the root of what

went wrong is the relationship between DFID, the department for

aid, and its private enterprise arm, the Commonwealth Development

Corporation, the CDC. Where DFID delivers aid for infrastructure,

schools and hospitals, CDC puts money into private companies,

aiming to build up a country's enterprise culture. In the past

eight years CDC's assets have doubled to �2.7 billion T has

achieved this financial success through private equity funds.

Critics say that has meant big money for fund managers, but little

for the intended beneficiaries, the world's poor. I think all of the

evidence does suggest that CDC is not operating with anything like

the proper oversight one would expect. It is, if you like, going

rogue. Dotun Oloko was promised his identity would be kept secret, it

wasn't, his dossier was handed by DFID, to the CDC, who handed it to

the private equity firm whose investments he had questioned. Then

capital partners, they boast of delivering returns to investors,

including CDC, faced with the allegations, they told investors

that he was mill illusionious and criminal, and they were --

malicious, and criminal, they were hiring private investigators to

uncover his motivations. The secret surveillance began, they captured

him at his home, his children's school and church. In Nigeria they

interviewed his school friends and colleagues. Everywhere Dotun Oloko

was beyond reproach. There was no issues of reputational concern, he

was described as a proud, principled, fun-loving and upright

businessman. Meanwhile he himself was told by friends that questions

were being asked. He suspected DFID, the development department, had

leaked. But for over two years they denied it. The development

secretary, Andrew Mitchell, told Dotun Oloko's MP, his allegations

had been thoroughly investigated, concluding, that DFID had gone as

far as it could. He hoped the extremely comprehensive response

drew a line under the matter. has written me many letters where

he has tried to draw a line under this, and saying he hoped it

signals an end to the course pond dense. You say he should have known

what was going on? He should have found out, and investigated it a

lot more than he clearly did. Matters came to a head when Dotun

Oloko was sent a copy of Control Risks's investigation report. Are

you worried now? I was worried from the winning, now I'm even more

worried and concerned. All my family members have now been

dragged into it. This week, following Newsnight's inquiries,

the development secretary changed his position. Offering an

unreserved apology. He confirmed his department, DFID, had an

advertantly passed on Oloko's original doss yes, unaware his name

could be found in the electronic properties. He said there will be a

full review of procedures. CDC say the same and apologise for the

Harris rasment to him and his family. -- harassment to him and

his family. They shudder raise the name, the first thing you do when

you have a sensitive document. You don't send on original versions of

sensitive documents. You should always get rid of the name. If you

and I went to DFID, through a freedom of information request, and

asked for e-mail correspondents, most of the names would be blacked

out. They are well used to doing this. The question is, why, in this

instance did they not go through that simple scrubbing procedure.

When we were in Nigeria, just a few weeks ago, we found the kind of

poverty the UK's aid is supposed to alleviate. What of that private

equity firm, boatsing billions invested in nigh -- boasting

billions invested into Nigeria, the people who set their investigators

They needed to understand his underlying motivations, they said.

In their words, they refute entirely his allegations about

their investments. They add that while they know of no reason why Mr

Oloko's life should be in danger, the company expresses its sincere

concern for him, that he should feel that it is the case.

I don't think DFID deserve to be called a development finance

institution, or somebody that is helping the emerging countries.

They are making the situation worse. Do you feel vulnerable? Very much

so. I don't know how else to put it, at some point or the other I will

have to pay the price for what I have done. What do you mean? Maybe

some form of retribution. Dotun Oloko, the whistle-blower, whose

cover was blown, says he's now fearful of going back to Nigeria.

In his absence his businesses have collapsed, all he has left is his

reputation. Established beyond doubt, by the private investigators

who turned over his life. Poor Fred Goodwin, that is Fred

"The Shred", the man awarded a Knighthood from the last Government,

pour services to banking, faces having -- for services to banking,

faces having it taken away or not. The Prime Minister has left it in

the hands of civil servants, many of whom might have a going in the

great British Hon Norse' system. For critics the extravagant title

says it all, the grand cross of the order of the bath, the Knight

commander of the order of St Michael and St George. The most

noble order of the gart ter. JG Ballard put it, a system of

antiquated medal that is belong on a Christmas tree. Whether you agree

with the assessment or not, the Knighthood awarded to the former

RBS chief, Fred Goodwin, for services to banking, has done

little for the system's credibility. Today David Cameron welcomed news

that MPs will consider stripping Sir Fred of his Knighthood, though

he passed the buck on who should do it. There is a committee in terms

of honours that exists, and will examine this issue. Obviously it

will want to take into account the Financial Services Authority report,

which I think is material, and important. Because of what it says

about the failures at RBS and what went wrong, and who was responsible

and all the rest of it. There was a committee, they should do the work,

rather than the Prime Minister. it may not be that simple. The for

theure committee normally only considers -- for fitture committee

normally -- foregeture committee normally only considers those who

have been jailed. The boxer, Nasim Hamed, lost his

MBE after a driving conviction. Yet Jeff free Archer is still in the

House of Lords -- Jeffrey Archer is still in the House of Lords despite

serving two years in jail for perjury. There have been many

attempts to reform the honours over the years. Changing OBE from

"empire" to "excellence" is as far as it goes. And clarity on when

somebody should be striped of an honour should have to wait too. We

are joined from Cambridge by Matthew Hancock, who has called for

Sir Fred to lose his Knighthood. Here in the studio is the poet,

Benjamin Zephaniah, who publicly turned down an OBE in 2003.

Mr Han, incompetence, it -- Mr Hancock, incompetence isn't a crime,

why should he lose his Knighthood? Sir Fred Goodwin was guilty of more

than incompetence, it was recklessness at the helm of an

institution, whose failure not only damaged it, but the entire economy.

Recklessness also isn't a crime, is it? No, but if there is something

that somebody has done, who has been bestowed one of these great

honours, that have huge respect across the country by most people.

That brings into it, as you said, into the package, into disrepute,

the whole system. Of course it should be revoked. This has been

done. It is not quite true what was in the package. It has been done on

a number of occasions, for people who haven't been convicted of

things, but who have obviously been inappropriate holders of such

honours. Anthony Blunt, for instance, he was never convicted of

being a spy, when he admitted to it. It was clear he wasn't the sort of

person. Andrew Blunt a spy spy, Jeffrey Archer went to prison and

still a peer? Whether someone has to leave the House of Lords, that

is a seat in parliament. It is an honour? MPs who go to prison for

more than 12 months automatically get kicked out, maybe the Lords

should look at a similar sort of system. That is a question of a

seat in parliament, we are talking about honours? That is exactly it,

we are talking about Hon Norse, and Hon Norse, for the -- honours, for

the system to work, honours need to reflect that someone is of high

standing, has done excellent work, and has put something into society.

This last discussion that you just had with Danny Finkelstein and

Hobsbawm and others, it was all about the fact that as well as

making money there is more to life, there is duty. As a society we

recognise that in this honours system. Benjamin Zephaniah what do

you think about Fred Goodwin's Knighthood? It should be taken away.

Why? I think the whole honours system should be scrapped. It is

not just poor old Fred. He got a Knighthood for services to banking.

So some people recognise that he was doing great services to banking,

they were all wrong too. If Fred should be punished, the people that

nominated him and gave him references are also wrong. There is

not much more we can take away from Gordon Brown, having taken away the

Prime Ministership? I neen the system is flawed and -- I think the

system is flawed and it reeks of corruption. Corruption is a strong

word to use, every society hasg ongs it gives to people, doesn't

it? Yes it does. I rejected mine openly, I'm amazed at the amount of

people who rejected their's quietly. There is lots of people in the

country who don't give it the respect. Perhaps they are more

discreet or better mannered than you? I'm being honest. I'm a poet,

that throughout my life has been writing about slavery and empire

and how empire impacted upon my people. It is a dam right cheek to

have somebody then offer me a medal that is called "Order of the

British empire". They have renamed it since, you were instrumental in

getting it renamed, it is Order of the British excellence now?

point is we have to acknowledge the great work people do in our country.

Some fascinating people do really great things in our country. I

think that the way we honour them should be divorced from state and

monarchy. I have no problem with the monarchy or politician giving

out an award, if they exist. But the award coming from the monarchy

or state, that is where I have my problem. Mr Hancock, is there some

other mechanism that could be devised, then, if Fred "The Shred"

has made such a monkey out of it. Is there other mechanism -- #Isms

there? I think there is, a group of -- mechanism there? I think there

is. It is people like me and most in the country who think an

honours' system to publicly thank people who have done good things

for society, it is people like me who defend an honours system and

promote it and think it is a good idea, who should also be keenest on

taking away honours where they are obviously deeply inappropriate.

That is why I think it is important that in the case of somebody like

Fred Goodwin, who is a symbol of everything that went wrong in the

financial crisis, that his should be taken away, because nobody likes

the idea that he's still got a Knighthood, and there is lots of

criticism that he was given one by the Labour Government. It is a

classic political point that is made very often. It doesn't help

the honours system, and other people, like certificate Henry

Sasoon who just got an award. last word? I would like to ask you

what you think of Jeffrey Archer's position, shouldn't he be derobeed?

Because it's a seat in parliament, as well as. We're only talking

about the title. The title goes with the seat in parliament. I said

maybe that should be looked at it in the same way MPs get kicked out.

We have to find a new modern way of biging up our people when they do

great things. We have a great system. It turns the year 4 709,

marking the Chinese new year, it is the Year of the Dragon w a series

-- We hit the buffers on my Of the enormous number of things

made in the workshop of the world, this relationship between

Government and citizen is surely one of the very, very oddest.

A communist regime that feeds its citizens by satisfying western

consumerist capitalism. But maybe, if you have enough to eat, not

having a vote doesn't really matter. That's it, we will be back tomorrow.

The film pioneer, cod dak, the company that invent -- Kodak, the

company that invented the hand held camera have applied to take shelter

from bankruptcy. It may be that Kodak became associated with happy

memories, it was a well liked brand. This is one of their first

advertisments. Good night.

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