18/03/2014 Newsnight

Putin redraws the map and extinguishes the peninsulas's

Ukrainian identity. On the eve of the budget, does the Chancellor of

the Exchequer have room to wing a cat. He has obey the economic

realities and economic data. In the heart of Africa, an unreported

campaign of sectarian murder. This is a strategy the outside world is

unaware of, ethnic and religious cleansing on a massive scale. These

are the only remaining Muslims for hundreds of miles around, and these

gates and troops are all that is protecting them from likely death.

The author of Thinking Fast And Slow on how to make your mind up. Are you

good at making decisions? Not very! Shouldn't you be? No!

With a stroke of the pen the Russian President rewrote history today and

appropriated part of a neighbouring country. Crimea, he declared, was

once again an intergrel part of Russia. So much for what even

European Union ministers conceded are a rather toothless lot of

sanctions. Putin claimed the border had been redrawn without a shot

being fired. Not quite, for one Ukrainian was shot dead. Our

diplomatic editor is in the apple capital of Crimea where the incident

took place. What happened? Well, late this afternoon this operation

went ahead, on a sort of industrial estate, the place has been described

as base, it was more of an office, if you like. With around a dozen, we

think, Ukrainian service personnel in it. One of many, many sites that

has been be siegeed these past few weeks. We passed by as it was

happening, we're staying very close to it. Later on we went back as the

situation had become clearer and it seems that Russians went in there

and basically, forcibly, evacuated the place, there was some kind of

struggle and one man, named by the Ukrainian defence ministry as

Warrant Officer Kokurin was killed. The others were taken away in buses

after the incident was over. The Crimean authorities dispute that,

but from eyewitness reports it seems to be broadly correct. What is the

mood there? Well, of course, if you bear in mind that most people here

are Russian and want union with Russia it has been day of great

excitement. We went down to the southern part just near S version

eastipol, to watch the speech, it was a fascinating delivery of speech

and message and insight into his policy and mentality. One message

for the internal audience, if you like, the Russians, and another for

the outer, the wider world. The message to Russians full of

religious, historical and political references, justifying Russia's

claim to take over Crimea. Of course he said it was an inacceptable part

of Russia and the people in the of a cafe loved it, there were great

cheers as he finished his speech. The message to the wider world, he

was clearly trying to draw a line. He's clearly saying he doesn't want

to go further, the problem is that some of his messages to the Russian

audience send mixed messages that will be harder for the wider world

to read. Can you read how they are interpreting Russia's behaviour?

This incident tonight, obviously we believe it is resulting in the death

of a serviceman. It has brought a statement from Kiev, from the

Ukrainian Government saying that Ukrainian forces have now been given

orders they can use their weapons in self-defence. If you think about it

is pretty remarkable they weren't already under such orders given what

has been happening in the last few weeks. If you think about being a

serviceman, subject to rules of engagment that means you can't use

your weapon in defence of yourself. You will understand why many people

in those bases are demoralised. We spoke to a couple of people from one

of the bases recently, we got a real sense of the mood in there people

are dividing. Some are deciding they will turn their coats and serve with

Russia, others that they have to leave and go back to the Ukraine.

So, the Ukrainian response to what has happened today has been to say

that this is entering a new phase, a military phase, but on the ground in

this particular place, the signs are that the campaign of pressure of

psychological warfare, if you like, on these garrisons, is slowly but

surely mopping them up. Thank you very much indeed. When I want a

decent review of my work I will write one, we're all familiar enough

with the problem of whether you can believe in apparently independent

assessment of a hotel or a restaurant or book or film which

appears in cyberspace. But aren't you entitled to expect more from a

website assessing healthcare. The idea that patients should be able to

rate and comment on hospitals is a key recommendation of the inquiry

into high levels of mortality among those being treated in Staffordshire

hospitals. Supposing the reviews haven't been written by patients but

by employees? That is rather what Newsnight discovered when we

investigated one such site. Gone are the days when patients were passive

recipients of their care. They are making their feelings now by leaving

comments on patient feedback websites. Patients can award stars

for things like cleanliness, a bit like rating a hotel. We all know

about authors reviewing their own books on-line, these new system, are

they open to the same abuse? Nottinghamshire Healthcare Trust

uses the website Patient Opinion, the Trust prides itself on how

quickly it responds to patients' comments. However, we have

discovered that half of the reviews, more than #00 in total, were posted

by staff on behalf of patients. But more troubling than that, the NHS

puts these same comments on its own site, but without making clear which

ones have been posted by staff. Your data has already shown that staff in

the NHS are reporting data. That is wrong. But the data they are

reporting is skewing the results. That has to be wrong. It is making

the data the public sees as almost meaningless. The NHS has now removed

all of the 6512 Nottinghamshire -- 652 Nottinghamshire reviews. In a

statement they said they acknowledged the postings needed to

be clearer about who is writing them and they are working on a solution

for this, internally and with patient opinion. Patient Opinion

told us it changed the site to make it clearer when reviews are posted

by NHS staff by patients. They accept that it must be clear to

everybody when a story has been added by staff. We decided to

broaden our investigation to see whether the NHS's new patient

feedback website, Care Connect, piloted in 18 hospital Hospital

Trusts is open to the same abuse. We started going through hundreds of

patient reviews, it wasn't long before they were suspicious about

some of the comments. "Very impressed with the surgeon, the

investigations were erformed so eVISHTly, so impressed", "the doctor

was so helpful, lovely staff", this one just had five stars. In order to

find out if NHS staff were posting the opinions, we had to find the IP

addresses, that is like a postcode. We were suspicious about nine

hospitals, through a Freedom of Information request, we got the IP

addresses and discovered that NHS computers were being used. Six of

the 100 most recent reviews came from hospital computers. We also

found that the reviews posted from NHS computers were more positive. A

whole star rating more positive than the other comments on the Care

Connect site. It was in the wake of the scandal that Mid Staffordshire

Trust, that Robert Francis QC called for fundamental change in the NHS.

It was a culture which trumpeted successes and said little about

failings. Relatives were ignored or even reproached. Our NHS is not safe

in their hands. But one year on, not everyone is convinced the NHS has

learned. We have known for a long time that the culture of the NHS is

one of staff feeling under pressure to deliver results. This is now a

symptom of that, that staff are putting on results that aren't

necessarily true and it is interfering with the results under

the marking system or the star-rating system we have got

today. That is the thing that we should be addressing. Hospital

truant budgets are linked to how well they are rated by patients, and

whether they would recommend them to families. Patients and families

think the NHS will tell them the truth. It does struggle hard to tell

them the truth. But if there is an inaccidentive to do little things --

incentive to do little things, like putting in this story that looks

good, it attacks the fundamental trust between citizen and health

service that lies at the core of what is a fantastic service at the

NHS. We don't know for certain why these reviews are being posted from

NHS computers. It could be just that NHS staff are proud of the work they

are doing. After all the negative publicity they have got in recent

years it is hardly surprising that some staff might want to boost the

ratings of their hospital. But, the problem with all of this is, is that

it undermines that transparency and openness that the NHS now says it

values so highly. We have the director of patient experience for

the NHS in England. You have to accept that you can't guarantee all

the reviews are genuine? We can't guarantee all reviews are coming

from patients and families, but we are very sure that the vast majority

are. You can't be sure, can you? We can. How can you be sure? Because

what was happening in Nottingham is a very interesting experiment

really, where what they have been trying to do is to help vulnerable

patients to have a voice. So what those reviews were doing, they were

coming from learning disability services, they were coming from

secure hospitals, they were coming from older people in mental health

wards and what staff were doing was writing up their feedback for them

and posting it on Patient Opinion. I have read a lot of the reviews, they

are not all positive, a lot of them have criticisms, a lot of them have

areas for improvement. The point is the NHS is leading the world in

regards to patient feedback. It is meaningless if you can't guarantee

its authenticity? It is not meaningless. If you look from

Nottingham, the two films are different issues, what you can show

is that what staff are doing is reporting issues for patients which

are often things that are going wrong, patients are saying we need

internet access, we need a better range of activities on the wards.

The interesting thing for me is that 550 staff were reading those stories

in Nottingham and acting on them. We can demonstratism improvements. That

-- demonstrate improvements. But we have no way of knowing, the comments

are anonymous and we are not sure who is posting them? We had to get

it in proportion. There are 300,000 comments from patients and carers on

NHS Choices. You can't tell me whether 299,000 of them are genuine?

Well, I think what guaranties the reliability of this information is

the scale. So there are 300,000 of comments from patients and carers on

NHS Choices, there is 1. 8 million from patients and in the friends and

family test. What you are talking about in patient opinion is 18,000.

The vast majority of those are from patients and carers and families

too. So that kind of scale you cannot gain it. So you assert. You

just have to read the feedback, it is interesting you didn't quote the

feedback in the film. The feedback a lot of it is about praise, a lot of

is about criticism, a lot is about suggestions for improvement. What we

have demonstrated? It doesn't matter who has posted it,

what is the point in quoting it? If you look at people have said, a

comment I read earlier, somebody saying that the staff were very

approachable on the ward but the activities were quite juvenile. They

wanted some support in the budgeting so when they went back home they

were able... That is as pointless as quoting anything else because you

don't know who wrote it? You do know in that instance it has clearly come

from a user of that service. So you assert? It is addressing

shortcomings in the service. Improvements have been brought about

as a result of that feedback being posted. Now I think what we have

done is we have removed the comments on patient opinion because the issue

here is transparency, as you say. We have to be clear that feedback has

either come from patients or that it has come from staff. And we haven't

been able to do that with this particular feed on to NHS choices.

We have suspended that feed until we have been able to sort that problem

out. But actually the vast majority are clearly from patients and carers

and families, you just have to read them to see that. Thank you very

much indeed. In the world of news, with all its drum beat urgency and

self-importance, it is rare to hear the line "there's nothing to

report". But in the case of the vanished Malaysian airliner it is

true. That of course is the point, how can an enormous aircraft, packed

with living human beings just vanish. Everything, accident,

hijacking, sabotage, mental breakdown of the pilot remains

possible. David Grossman doesn't know, but he's intrigued what

happens when demand and supply gets so madly out of kilter. Dozens of

theories have been put forward for what happened to this plane, some of

which there is little evidence for. There are a few firm facts like

take-off time, range, weight, passenger numbers and crew numbers.

The initial flight path and then there are a series of facts that

just prompt more questions, like the condition reporting system on the

plane, ACARS senting out its final signal at 01. 07. Previously the

Malaysian Prime Minister had said this ACARS system was switched off

before the crew made their last voice call at 01. 19, that it was

deliberately disabled by someone on board, fact not reported by the crew

in the last communication. Today however the authorities backtracked

saying they couldn't be sure precisely when the ACARS system

stopped working, but downplayed whether it mattered. Up until the

point it left military primary coverage the aircraft's movements

were consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane. That

remains the issue with the investigation team. It is also

important to note the precise time ACARS was disabled has no bearing on

the search operation. Accounts of what happened after the last voice

call are imprecise and often contradictory. We have reports that

the careful has turned west and been tracked with primary radar. All I

can say it is reports, we have all sorts of conflicting rumours at the

moment that the aircraft was flying at 5,000 feet, 45,000 feet, or

29,500 feet. We have the Malaysians saying they think it is the 777 and

it takes a week to analyse the radar take with some quite sophisticated

software in order to determine that. We don't know if they are

undertaking that analysis. The Malaysians say that radar signal

disappeared at O2. 15. But say radar experts, it is not clear what sort

of contact it was, was it a plotted others or unexpected dots. Malaysian

military defence system is very modern, it was only commissioned 12

months ago. And contains some of the most sophisticated equipment in the

world today. So you might expect some pretty good data to come out of

that military radar system? If they have it. Why haven't we got any more

concrete details yet from that system do you think, or are they

just not letting us know this stuff? That could be the case, or that they

have only got the spurious tracks. After that there is one more piece

of concrete information the authorities have to work with? We

have a satellite report, another communication system on board the

plane, autonomously sending back information. That has given us an

arc that the aircraft was in at the time that the message was received

and we know the remaining range of the aircraft if it had been there.

Which enables us to design some search patterns to look for the

aircraft. Beyond that at the moment there is an awful lot of

speculation. Which leads us tonight, with teams from 24 flayingses --

nations searching an area of 22 square nautical miles. They could

use surveillance satellites, they are not GS stationary, they are

moving around the earth. These are mainly military, they contain a

sophisticated radar which is called synthetic aperture radar. That maps

everything underneath it. There is one final fact we can say for sure,

the search for the flight is the longest in modern commercial

aviation history. Once upon a time there was a

Chancellor of the Exchequer who resigned because he disclosed what

was going to be in his budget before he told parliament. Only less than

20 years ago when the Daily Mirror was sent the budget speech the day

beforehand. The newspaper sent it back unpublished. Last night you

could hardly set foot on a London street without some dodgy

propagandaist thrusting an exclusive into your hand and any reporter.

Today they came over a bit more coy. They have gone quiet haven't they?

It is like tumbleweed out there. It is deathly silent and for exactly

the reasons you have just laid out. Last year, particularly, was very

leaky and the fingers were being pointed at the Liberal Democrats.

Today they have all sort of held back, the only public

preannouncement we have had is the very visible sign of the deputy PM

and the PM wanting to do this shoulder-to-shoulder. One tiny bone

we have been thrown is this new ?1 coin, 12-sided, two colours. They

are calling it the most secure in the world. I wonder if there is a

subliminal message in there, that the Chancellor can stand up and say

my secure pound and your secure money, or maybe, I don't know, there

is a thistle on it and they are trying to get the Scots on side for

later. But there is very little tangible stuff. What is the theme

likely to be tomorrow do you think? I get the impression that the

Chancellor is going all out to have a sort of blue collar budget. That

might be a phrase you detest. But there seems to be measures that will

be aimed very SCOMBARL at low-paid workers. -- squarely aimed at

low-paid workers. Bingo will have its rate lowered, it sounds like a

small thing, it only costs ?20 million. Which is nothing in

Chancellor terms. It is a small thing? But it is played by ?3

million people in the country, two million are women. And in a week

where we have seen the Eton mess line, the "how many Eatonians do you

need to run a cabinet? ". All the stuff about high end expenses and

the row over the 40p tax bracket, this could be a shrewd signal by a

Chancellor who we know is a politician before anything else,

that is aimed directly at saying we need to get those swing voters back

on side, the working-classes that Margaret Thatcher landed when she

was in power. Everybody budget speech is the

biggest since the last biggest, but the fact of the matter is that while

George Osborne may be a wealthy man, it is not his money, and there is

not that much of it. We take a look at his room for manoeuvre.

The Chancellor would love to give away some proper goodies in the

budget tomorrow. A big tax cut or major spending project. George

Osborne does want to be re-elected afterall, but he can't. He has to

obey the economic realities. He has to obey the economic data. The

economy is growing again, we are in recovery. But it always takes a

little bit of time for an economy to grow back to where it was before it

was in recession after it was in recession. This is the shape of the

recovery that took place after the early 80s recession. This is the

shape of the recovery from the early 1990s. This is the shape of the

recovery we are in right now. It is going to take until some time later

this year for our economy to grow back to where it was in 2008. That

was never the plan. When the coalition took office, it hoped that

weak sterling would mean that exports would rise very quickly,

that would be one of the things that would power a quick strong recovery.

Unfortunately that strong export growth never really materialised.

Largely because the world economy is so weak. There are things about

Britain's economic performance that economists are quite baffled by

though. So take productivity. That is the amount of stuff that workers

can make in an hour. It hasn't really been growing as everyone

expected it would after the recession. What about austerity? You

can't find OK two economists who actually agree about what the effect

of the Government spending cuts has been on the British economy.

Whatever the causes of Britain's economic weakness, there has been

one really big effect in so far as the Treasury is concerned, that is

on the deficit. This is how much they hoped that the deficit would be

this year, and this is how much it looks like it is going to be. The

fact that it is taking longer to bring the amount that we are

borrowing each year down is why the Government has already pencilled in

austerity well into the next parliament. Still, there is good

news. Unemployment never really took off during this recession. In the

way it has during previous downturns in this country or in our European

neighbours. Growth is picking up at a pretty good rate too. That is why

Labour has been focussing its attention on the cost of living.

Incomes haven't been rising faster than prices, that means real

salaries are declining. But, even that affect may be coming to

answered, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says that wages are turning

a corner, real incomes are about to start rising. Still, we're not out

of the woods quite yet. Yes it is good news that growth is strong, yes

it is good news that lots of people are in work. But there is real

concern about what economists call spare capacity. The issue is, how

long the British economy can keep going at this sort of rate before it

starts to overheat. If it is the case that we can't keep the recent

levels of economic growth going into the coming years, then it probably

means there's more austerity on the way. Don't expect too much detail on

all of that from George Osborne tomorrow, he does have an election

to win. Don't expect any goodies any time soon either. Here to proVite

context on the -- provide context on the budget is Gillian. Let's start

with the one thing they are banging on the new coinet's start with the

one thing they are banging on the new coin. There are not goodies to

give away so they are trying to give away something you can touch which

is a coin. It is a gimmick? It is playing to patriotism, it is

designed on the 3p piece, for the older voters is a message of

security, solidity and timeless value, and a good distraction

device. Will it make up for a lack of content in the budget? Really

hasn't got a lot of things to give away. As Chris alluded to in the

piece, the same problems that dogs many economies today, there is

growth in the UK. The OECD came out recently and said the UK economy

will be the fastest-growing in the second quarter of the year among the

G 7s, the big industrialised nations. The question is, firstly,

is it just a sugar high. They have pumped a lot of glucose into the

economy in the form of easy money, is it sustainable or not? Secondly

does it affect anyone other than a tiny elite. Right now for many

ordinary British people it feels like just the rich are benefitting.

Do we understand why the economy appears to be growing? That is a

very good question. Certainly on the international stage the fact that

the UK has rebounded so fast is something of a surprise to many

bodies like the IMF. Not least because the UK has been more active

in promoting austerity than many other countries like America. There

is a lot of suspicion there is a sugar-high, to go back to taking a

body and pumping it full of glucose to create the look of energy. House

prices have been recovering and easy money has been flooding in. The

question is whether it is enough to get businesses investing and exports

going to create a sustainable recovery. Productivy growth is --

productivity growth is pathetic? If we needed reminding that economics

is as much an art as science that is it. Maybe productivity growth was

never that high before 2007 was the banking sector was creating the

illusion and inflating it. Maybe there is such a flexible work force

that companies are hanging on to workers and paying them nothing and

unemployment not rising as much as expected. It could be that. The

reality is we don't know. As Chris has pointed out. If it is a case

that productivity is very low we may have got to the stage where the

spare capacity has been eliminated, in which case it will be very

challenging to maintain the feel-good sentiment going forward.

Challenging meaning? It will be very tough. Either inflation will come

back and create a good old fashioned inflationary squeeze or growth will

taper off. Thank you very much. Now if you are looking for an example of

a failed state, the Central African Republic will serve you better than

most. The era of the deranged Emperor Picasso, father of 62

children and reported cannibal is over, but the country is now ravaged

in what some human rights groups describe as ethnic cleansing.

Christian mill ligses on the Muslim -- militias on the Muslim majority.

Under the watchful eyes of Christ and his apostles, the battered

remnants of a population being hunted to distinction. This church

is the refuge for 1,000 stragglers, in an historic exodus from the

central Afghan Republic. But they are not Christians. They are all

Muslims. Victims of a barrous militia that wants every one of them

gone. Many walked weeks to get here, attacked along the way with

unspeakable viciousness. This is a tragedy the outside world

is barely aware of. These are the only remaining Muslims for hundreds

of miles around. These gates and troops are all that is protecting

them from likely death. A small contingent of African Union

peacekeepers keeps guard here in this remote town. They wouldn't be

enough to beat off a determined attack. Though this is apparently a

Christian-Muslim conflict, the fugutives's real saviour is a

priest. He had death threats from the nominally Christian militia.

He argued with the militia, bought them off until the peacekeepers

arrived. This man is now an orphan, he

watched them go from door-to-door killing in every home.

Just outside the town we find the force that he ran from. Fresh they

boast from more killing. They want revenge for atrocities by a largely

Muslim rebel group that briefly won power last year in this

predominantly Christian nation. They believe these cattle, from local

herders of the Pearl Tribe, and these women, are their just rewards.

SDMRT back at the church the Muslim survivors must clear out every

Sunday morning to make way for mass. It is an uneasy moment as the

worshippers arrive, it is in the name of Christians like these that

the militia want Muslims eradicated. For all the preaching of love, hate

has spread through this once fairly tranquil country since last year's

rebellion by Muslim-led forces. Many of his flock has suffered and

want revenge! It is an extraordinary situation here, on the one hand of

course it is an ultimate act of Christian charity, protecting people

of another faith. On the other hand you can really feel the tension

between the people inside here and the Muslims sheltering all around

the outside. The moment the mass is over the fugutives move back,

rearranging their meagre possessions. They have been fed

mainly by the church, little has come from outside agencies. They

can't stay much longer. The vast majority of Central Africa's

Muslims, hundreds of thousands, have already left, thousands are dead.

But there is no force yet willing or able to evacuate them, they are

still waiting to be rescued. Or killed.

Saudi Arabia is about to astonish the world tomorrow by reforming its

human rights laws. It is famously a country keen on floggings and

beheadings, punishments said to have been decreed by God and not at all

keen on women doing things like driving cars. So what is the country

now planning? Joining us from Geneva is our guest. He's the deputy Saudi

Arabian minister of labour. What is the thing that most excites you

about these reforms? Thank you for having me on your programme.

Tomorrow we're having a significant report. I can say that the data and

the reports will show that we have made a very big step and towards the

human rights achievements of Saudi Arabia. Most have been accepted. And

you know maybe half of these accepted already in and now

implemented. I can mention especially with the recent

initiatives that have been put in place in Saudi Arabia, the first one

is about the ratificaton of 138 of the IOL regarding the minimum

working age. The second one is the significant step that has been

brought in Saudi Arabia, by signing an agreement with sending domestic

workers into Saudi Arabia, and this agreement to protect the rights of

the workers. We signed the agreement with the Philippines, India, Sri

Lanka and Indonesian. I'm confident this report is making a very big

step and the progress is part of what's happening in Saudi Arabia.

And you are going to allow women to travel I believe, that's going to be

big, they are driving around? Travelling for women in fact and

also the issue of women we are taking it very seriously. And we are

taking this you know issue as a holistic issue, we are empowering

women that only with travelling but also different aspects. Education is

a very important part. Also the second one is employment. If you can

see that in the last 30 years we had only 50,000 of our women in the

private labour market, and by the end of last year in December of

2013, eight-fold that number, almost more than 400,000 of our women

participating in our private labour market. Are they going to be able to

drive now? In fact as I said, I mean we are taking, you can see

tomorrow's report we have taken practical steps in order to empower

women in all aspects of life. So they will be able to drive? As I

said I would ask your audience to read the report tomorrow. You will

see that a lot of things have been done as practical steps in our

society. When you look at your society now and you think of it

maybe 20, 30 years time how westernised to you think it will be.

Do you think you will still have capital punishment and floggings and

many of the things that you say are culturally important to you, or do

you think you will be like western Europe? No, no, we don't think that,

we are not just copying what is in the western, we will see everything

good in Europe, and we have also our values, and also just an issue. We

have taken that very seriously in fact. Saudi Arabia made a big reform

in our justice system. In fact that is something we looked at seriously.

Do you imagine giving up capital punishment? For tomorrow the report

will see that. We waved capital punishment for miners, and for that

punishment we are keeping it for the more serious crimes. And also we

have a view for these cases in order to see and check about the

apublicability for this If bat and ball cost ?1. 10 and the bat is ?# 1

more than the bat how much is the ball. All of us answer 10p. It is an

example of what the Nobel Prize winner calls fast-thinking, in this

case it is also wrong thinking, of course the wrong answer is 5p, which

you might get to by what he calls slow-thinking. His book Thinking

Fast and Slow has won garlands around the world and sold by the

shedload. I went to see him and asked him what was wrong with

fast-thinking? Fast-thinking is better at what it does than

slow-thinking. Slow-thinking is you know, not wonderful. Fast-thinking

is mostly accurate, on occasion it is wrong. Can a snap judgment of the

find that you can make in fast-thinking, can it be a good

judgment? Most of the time it is. You make life and death decisions on

whether or not to cross the street and you make them very well and with

complete confidence. In that case I'm bound to you ask you why have

you written the book? Part of my motivation for writing the book was

to correct the mistake about my reputation. I'm known as a student

of human error. And I don't want to be known that way. The balanced view

of the human mind is certainly not negative, certainly not in my view.

But you seem to be suggesting that on many occasions slow-thinking is a

much more effective way to operate? Well, it is the more effective way

to operate when fast-thinking is going wrong. Then the only way to

fix that, if there is any, is by thinking slower. This is rare,

occasionally under some predictable circumstances, actually. When you

don't know the answer and you don't have the expertise a thought comes

to your mind very fast and those you want to watch. If we apply this to

political judgments where sometimes momentous decisions are made by

statesmen and they always claim they are acting from principle and

generally speaking they have an identifiable set of core beliefs and

act in accordance of those and tend to not act out of accord with them.

That's fast-thinking isn't it, it is not necessarily wrong is it? No it

is not, fast-thinking, as I keep saying is not necessarily wrong.

Indeed slow-thinking could lead to paralysis? Easily and often does.

But sometimes you get people acting fast, you know, the standard example

is I think for the next few decades until there is another one is the

Iraq War. But this is a decision made on a gut feeling, which where

the gut feelings should not have been trusted. And that is an example

of fast-thinking going astray. Do you think Obama is a perpetrator of

slow-thinking? Yes. I think it hurts him grievously. He seems indecisive?

Yes. The public prefer leaders who decide quickly. So the public

doesn't like slow-thinking in a leader. What about Putin, is he a

fast or slow-thinking? My impression on what is happening now is that

he's acting on emotion more than on calculation. So he's not thinking at

all really? I think he is thinking, short-term. Can I ask a little bit

about an area of the book where you deal with well being, happiness,

this is becoming of some interest to political figures in this country

and you propose that there could be a sort of well being index, as a

well of measuring how a country is doing. How would that work, what

would be in it? My preferences about what should be in an index of well

being are not exactly what is being done currently. I would prefer to

focus on misery rather than on well being. And I think misery can be

measured and misery should be reduced. If there was a misery

index, what sort of things will you measure? Oh, I mean you would

measure, people can report on how much they have been suffering today.

And whether the dominant emotion in their life has been positive or

negative. You can count the number of people who are suffering. Can I

ask you a personal question at the end of this, are you good at making

decisions? Not very! Shouldn't you be? No! I mean you know I should be

clever enough and I hope I am to know that I'm not very good at

making decisions. So I would not be a good manager, not at all! I would

probably not be a good risk taker, but you know I don't have to be so.

I'm an old academic and we don't have to make many decisions that

matter. That's it, we leave but a bit of noise, the organ at the Royal

Festival Hall on the South Bank in London is black at full -- back at

full blast. Two-thirds of it have been almost unplayed for years, now

it is restored to its former glory and their resident organist couldn't

wait to perform the Newsnight theme. Good night.

Good evening, for many there is fine weather around on Wednesday, others

seeing more cloud, northern and western areas seeing the thickest