10/06/2016 Newsnight


10/06/2016

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The wrong kind of relationship. England fans on the rampage in

:00:10.:00:23.

Marseille. It may be a fraud couple of weeks, but with the referendum

:00:24.:00:27.

campaign heating up, what affect will football fuelled search in

:00:28.:00:29.

nationalistic feeling have? Gabriel Gatehouse is

:00:30.:00:31.

in Marseille for us. Away from the football, who is

:00:32.:00:41.

scoring the goals in the campaign? I will ask my guest. And Britain's EU

:00:42.:00:45.

Commission gives his is experience of negotiating a trade deal. I

:00:46.:00:50.

wanted to do it quickly, the Americans wanted to do it quickly,

:00:51.:00:53.

and one narrow point, that took four years.

:00:54.:00:55.

And the world says farewell to Muhammad Ali.

:00:56.:00:58.

We will reflect on the man, the radical and his changing politics.

:00:59.:01:06.

There are some things common to most European nations,

:01:07.:01:10.

even including ours - universal health coverage,

:01:11.:01:12.

gun control, an expectation of at least four

:01:13.:01:14.

But more important than any of these, a shared belief that

:01:15.:01:19.

And that four-yearly feast of European football,

:01:20.:01:23.

the European Championships, is at last underway.

:01:24.:01:26.

France, the host nation, won the first match of the tournament

:01:27.:01:33.

However, this is an unusually interesting time for such a contest.

:01:34.:01:41.

Do we think we own Europe, do we hate it, or does our shared

:01:42.:01:44.

love of football bring us closer to the continent?

:01:45.:01:48.

the city hosting England's first game tomorrow evening.

:01:49.:01:57.

Good evening to you, Gabriel. Well, we have just moved back about

:01:58.:02:05.

one Street from where the confrontations have been happening.

:02:06.:02:08.

You can possibly see behind me the blue flashing lights of the police

:02:09.:02:13.

cars. The confrontations have been mostly between England fans and the

:02:14.:02:17.

riot police here. Quite a lot of drinking going on and some fans have

:02:18.:02:21.

been throwing bottles. The riot police have responded, as they do in

:02:22.:02:25.

France, quite quickly, with tear gassed sometimes, charging the fans.

:02:26.:02:29.

These are the kinds of confrontations that have been

:02:30.:02:38.

flaring up every now and then, mostly between England fans and the

:02:39.:02:40.

riot police, but we do now have also quite a few Russian fans walking

:02:41.:02:43.

through town, so the tensions are growing a bit. My impression is it

:02:44.:02:46.

is largely a minority who are involved in this. Most people here

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are in quite good spirits, good-natured, but some of the bars

:02:50.:02:54.

and cafes are now closing down and these confrontations do seem to be

:02:55.:02:55.

flaring up throughout the evening. For the second evening in a row,

:02:56.:03:03.

England is making itself heard in the centre of Marseille in a way

:03:04.:03:07.

that is making the locals nervous. The match doesn't even kick off

:03:08.:03:11.

until tomorrow. We filmed these celebrations just moments after

:03:12.:03:16.

police charged on a pub where fans were drinking and then throwing

:03:17.:03:19.

bottles. We saw three people arrested, at least one of them

:03:20.:03:24.

wearing an England shirt. Well, there is often a fine line between

:03:25.:03:29.

exuberant celebration and something more uncomfortable and this is right

:03:30.:03:34.

on that line. It is not clear where this is going now.

:03:35.:03:41.

Last night, police fired tear gas to break of a confrontation between

:03:42.:03:44.

locals, mostly young men, and some England fans. The violence was

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contained relatively quickly but in Marseille, these scenes are revoking

:03:50.:03:55.

uncomfortable memories. In 1998, there were running battles on the

:03:56.:03:59.

street when England play Tunisia here in their opening World Cup

:04:00.:04:03.

match. Dozens were injured, more than 100 arrested or deported. It

:04:04.:04:10.

was not England's finest hour. This year, with 24 nations taking part,

:04:11.:04:15.

these are the biggest European Championships ever. They come at a

:04:16.:04:20.

difficult time for France. There is the state of emergency, still in

:04:21.:04:24.

force after the attacks in Paris last year, then there are the public

:04:25.:04:26.

sector strokes over Labour conditions. A poll out this week

:04:27.:04:32.

suggest Euro scepticism in France is higher even than it is in Britain.

:04:33.:04:39.

In politics and in football, the French are keeping a wary eye on les

:04:40.:04:52.

Anglais. There used to be very, very unpleasant but I suppose they have

:04:53.:04:56.

calmed down. And les Anglais have a habit of causing trouble in Europe

:04:57.:05:01.

as well. They can be difficult, but it is a matter of business, you see?

:05:02.:05:06.

They try to get what they want and we should all do that, actually. All

:05:07.:05:12.

over Europe, they are talking about Brexit. Some with trepidation, some

:05:13.:05:16.

with glee. The referendum takes place in a hiatus between the group

:05:17.:05:21.

matches and the knockout stages and so it is possible that England,

:05:22.:05:25.

Wales and Northern Ireland could crash out of the European Union

:05:26.:05:29.

before they get booted out of the European Championships. David Ginola

:05:30.:05:41.

is covering the football for a French channel. Could football bring

:05:42.:05:47.

Europe together? I doubt about this. Why? Because we are all talking

:05:48.:05:51.

about Europe but on the other hand, what is really Europe? We keep our

:05:52.:05:56.

identities, England, France, Spain. We have our past, our history and as

:05:57.:06:02.

a nation, Europe is not already a nation for me, as common history

:06:03.:06:13.

bringing things altogether. Fans are still making their way south across

:06:14.:06:16.

France for tomorrow's match. We stopped off in the town of Rhiems,

:06:17.:06:24.

two hours from Paris. And came across these guys. John, Murray, Ken

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and Loz are the official England's supporters' band and haven't missed

:06:34.:06:38.

a tournament England have played since France 1998. So we are very,

:06:39.:06:42.

very hopeful this could be the year. But could the footy have an impact

:06:43.:06:47.

on the referendum? As soon as I heard the date, I thought, positive

:06:48.:06:50.

England performance, everyone will be happy and they will vote in. What

:06:51.:06:58.

is your rationale behind that? And some may think that because the

:06:59.:07:03.

tournament is here, there will be, I don't know, hundreds of thousands of

:07:04.:07:06.

football fans out of the country and which way would they vote? So let's

:07:07.:07:11.

have it in the middle of the tournament. When you come out of a

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tournament like this, does it make you feel more English or more

:07:14.:07:19.

European? I see where you are going. It makes us feel more English. We

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argue constantly about this issue in the bus, travelling everywhere that

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we travel, all the time. Ken, for example, finds himself agreeing with

:07:34.:07:36.

David Cameron. Never done that before in his life. You see, the

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band is very lucky to have Ken with us because he has a degree in

:07:42.:07:46.

politics. He is setting is right, you see. It was a very long time

:07:47.:07:51.

ago. When you could buy them on the Internet -- couldn't buy them on the

:07:52.:07:53.

Internet. Let's get Marseille in perspective.

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This is not, at the moment, a repeat of 1998. Many of the fans seem to be

:08:04.:08:08.

channelling the spirit of Leicester City, a bit drunk still, perhaps on

:08:09.:08:13.

the nectar of unexpected success. It is mostly pretty good-natured stuff.

:08:14.:08:17.

Away from the city centre this afternoon, there was time for some

:08:18.:08:23.

cultural immersion for the opposition. Surrogate, Maxine and a

:08:24.:08:28.

surrogate have come from 1,000 kilometres east of Moscow to make

:08:29.:08:29.

friends with the locals -- Sir Guy. But despite all the national

:08:30.:08:40.

bravado, the divisions, there are still occasional glimmers of that

:08:41.:08:44.

cherished notion that football can be a force for unity.

:08:45.:08:57.

He never loses a chance to show off his Russian on this programme.

:08:58.:09:06.

Well, it's not exactly clear how the football

:09:07.:09:08.

will affect the campaign - or the fans' behaviour -

:09:09.:09:10.

but it is clear that it has been a good week for the Leave campaign,

:09:11.:09:14.

the latest polls giving a considerable lead to Brexit.

:09:15.:09:16.

The pound fell this evening on the news.

:09:17.:09:18.

Tis' the season for football pundits, we have two

:09:19.:09:20.

I'm joined by Anne McElvoy from the Economist

:09:21.:09:24.

Let's just talk about how the football affects the referendum. So,

:09:25.:09:39.

if England does well, do people like one of those guys suggested, do we

:09:40.:09:45.

vote to stay in or does it make us confident and stay out? Probably not

:09:46.:09:48.

very much at all either way, if you want the honest answer, but I think

:09:49.:09:52.

if you look at it in a grand historical sweep, in the 1970s, when

:09:53.:09:57.

we joined the European economic community, it was because Britain

:09:58.:10:00.

was thought to be in permanent decline. We have the troubles in

:10:01.:10:04.

Northern Ireland, we were being written off as an economic power,

:10:05.:10:07.

still coming to terms with our loss of empire and we felt we needed

:10:08.:10:16.

something new, I think, and partly motivated Europe. I think today we

:10:17.:10:19.

feel are much more confident nation, London's success, generally Britain

:10:20.:10:21.

growing faster than Europe and I think we don't need Europe in some

:10:22.:10:25.

way and if we do well in the football, it reinforces the sense of

:10:26.:10:30.

we can survive on our own. Do you agree? I am not so sure, not that

:10:31.:10:35.

you would ever put me as a regular football pundit and if any if this

:10:36.:10:38.

is to be linked to the fortunes of the England football team, I

:10:39.:10:41.

wouldn't be confident that will turn out to good, but I think that's

:10:42.:10:45.

likely nationalistic surge, not necessarily what you showed in

:10:46.:10:50.

Marseille, this idea of yes we could give it a go alone, it is probably

:10:51.:10:54.

more use to Brexit in the short term but it will get the pushback from

:10:55.:10:57.

people who perhaps feel it is not the way that they want the country

:10:58.:11:01.

to be perceived. They are happy to go along with it at Eurovision or in

:11:02.:11:04.

the football, but I think they will also want to be more risk averse. It

:11:05.:11:10.

is the timid voters I am interested in. If it looks like you can run the

:11:11.:11:15.

show, though, you can stay in, if it looks like you are the boss of

:11:16.:11:18.

Europe you want to be in the club. Let's move onto this week. Do we

:11:19.:11:24.

believe these polls? The slightly unusual polls, 10% lives and stuff

:11:25.:11:29.

like that. I don't believe it, I party don't believe it, because we

:11:30.:11:33.

have no idea of the level of turnout and I think Nick Watt explained this

:11:34.:11:37.

on the programme the other night, if the turnout is relatively low, it

:11:38.:11:41.

favours Leave, because they are much more 90s elastic. If you start to

:11:42.:11:47.

move up, it favours Remain. But if you move up a further point, it

:11:48.:11:52.

flips back to Leave, because people who generally don't vote in

:11:53.:11:55.

elections, if they are brought out, people who prefer football to

:11:56.:11:58.

Newsnight, if they come out, they will Vote Leave macro. It is clearly

:11:59.:12:02.

a close race, I think that is all we can tell from the opinion polls. I

:12:03.:12:10.

think ten points is way beyond where Leave really are, but what is

:12:11.:12:13.

interesting at this point is momentum and where we are going. If

:12:14.:12:18.

we sat here a week ago on the Friday night, big debate, Michael Gove was

:12:19.:12:22.

on fire, it did look like a great time for Leave and I thought it

:12:23.:12:26.

would be nibbled away at this week because it was clear Remain wanted

:12:27.:12:30.

to get back to the risk factors, they are still wheeling out the

:12:31.:12:35.

heavy artillery and right to do so because the disruption would be

:12:36.:12:38.

considerable, they need to get their point across, and yet this figure,

:12:39.:12:44.

very odd figure of 350 million a week that we are supposed to pay to

:12:45.:12:48.

the EU, even though we get almost half of it back again one way or

:12:49.:12:52.

another, it does seem to have caught fire again for Leave. Yes, they have

:12:53.:12:56.

come under pressure about it but I haven't had the feeling that...

:12:57.:13:00.

There is a theory about that 350, that you have, which is that we keep

:13:01.:13:05.

banging on about it and we say it is a lie and repeated.

:13:06.:13:13.

A few years ago, Matthew Elliott ran a campaign on changing the electoral

:13:14.:13:18.

system, the thought was that the cost would be a few hundred million

:13:19.:13:23.

pounds and that should be spent on nurses, most people in Westminster

:13:24.:13:26.

thought, what a ridiculous thing to focus upon when we are talking about

:13:27.:13:30.

the grand notion of the electoral system but we are in a period of

:13:31.:13:34.

austerity, people object to any of their money going to things they do

:13:35.:13:37.

not want it spent on. Some people are offended by that ?350 million

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figure may not be accurate but many more people are offended about

:13:43.:13:48.

sending 200 million, ?100 million to Europe, of course it is inaccurate,

:13:49.:13:51.

because it understates the truth will stop if we wrote to remain, I

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hope we won't, but if we do, you can be sure that they will be asking

:13:57.:14:07.

more. The Economist, where I work, is pro-remain, but the Chancellor

:14:08.:14:11.

has come out and said it is going to cost ?300, ?4000... He did not quite

:14:12.:14:24.

add on that is Evan pens... ?4300. If it goes one is those were the

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other. -- he did not quite add on 37p. Where is meant, momentum feels

:14:30.:14:38.

more strongly there. Remain, with the exception of the television

:14:39.:14:42.

debate last night, when there was a lot putting the boot in, a lot of it

:14:43.:14:49.

was too personal and particular to the Tory party, if I look at remain,

:14:50.:14:54.

who is meant to be the start of the show? I don't know. The start of the

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show is David Cameron but we have a YouGov poll in the Times which is

:14:59.:15:02.

only 18% of people trust him on Europe. You have this person who is

:15:03.:15:08.

on the television all the time and he is a huge turn-off to voters,

:15:09.:15:11.

what they need is Jeremy Corbyn out there, the big story, I think, the

:15:12.:15:15.

Labour voters not supporting what their party leadership. The constant

:15:16.:15:23.

equivocation... Must it be Jeremy Corbyn? You have a front bench team

:15:24.:15:29.

on labour who can tell their voters. One person it should not be is Tony

:15:30.:15:34.

Blair. We have seen him, his trust ratings are incredibly low. We may

:15:35.:15:39.

need to find somebody like Martin Lewis, consumer rights expert. They

:15:40.:15:44.

deployed him. On the other side, James Dyson, who is, I think, in an

:15:45.:15:50.

opinion poll, the second most trusted person on these issues and

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he is coming out emphatically for leave, business person, successful

:15:55.:16:02.

entrepreneur, saying that we can thrive, that is going to continue

:16:03.:16:07.

the momentum. When people do not like political elite will, it is

:16:08.:16:11.

difficult to say that you have a campaign with more political elite

:16:12.:16:16.

oral! When Barack Obama came I did not like the rhetoric. Imagine how

:16:17.:16:24.

Americans would feel if it went the other way. Is a very respected

:16:25.:16:29.

figure, ratings up at the moment, it would in some way have a halo

:16:30.:16:37.

effect. Maybe the message carriers need to change. Time is getting

:16:38.:16:38.

short. Thank you very much. Well, you may feel you've heard

:16:39.:16:45.

a lot of the same voices popping up Each side seems to field

:16:46.:16:48.

a smallish squad. But what of the voices

:16:49.:16:51.

from Brussels? There have been increasingly shrill

:16:52.:16:53.

warnings as to what Brexit might German Finance Minister Schauble

:16:54.:16:56.

warned today that Britain would not be able to be in the single

:16:57.:17:00.

market if we vote out. But one British man at the heart

:17:01.:17:03.

of the institutions is the UK's EU Commissioner, Lord Hill,

:17:04.:17:06.

who is responsible for financial I sat down with him to talk though

:17:07.:17:08.

the implications and asked him whether British banks would be able

:17:09.:17:13.

to operate in the single the only way you could then have

:17:14.:17:16.

access to it would either be through

:17:17.:17:28.

something that is called by which the rules that would then

:17:29.:17:30.

be operating in the UK have to be deemed

:17:31.:17:35.

equivalent by the EU, or they would have to go in,

:17:36.:17:37.

each country that they wanted to go in, country by

:17:38.:17:40.

country, rules by rules. Those would be long,

:17:41.:17:42.

uncertain processes. I think they would add cost

:17:43.:17:44.

and that is why, I think, if you take your example

:17:45.:17:46.

of the banks, the banks say very clearly that if we leave,

:17:47.:17:49.

they are going to be cutting jobs. What I know, from having to go

:17:50.:17:52.

through equivalence processes with, say, the United States,

:17:53.:17:55.

where I have recently done one and where I wanted to do it quickly,

:17:56.:17:57.

the Americans wanted to do it quickly and one narrow point,

:17:58.:18:01.

that took four years. Is it your view that the rest

:18:02.:18:17.

of the EU would not take a constructive mind,

:18:18.:18:20.

put a constructive face Are you saying they would play

:18:21.:18:22.

hardball, because that is what some I think that if you put the boot

:18:23.:18:26.

on the other foot and you think of this as it would be,

:18:27.:18:32.

as a straightforward Trade negotiations aren't

:18:33.:18:34.

about love, they are about power. Business negotiations

:18:35.:18:37.

are about power. So if you think that you have,

:18:38.:18:44.

on the one hand, a group of nations who want Britain to stay,

:18:45.:18:48.

we would then say, no, we don't want you, we haven't been

:18:49.:18:50.

particularly flattering in some of the terms we have

:18:51.:18:53.

described some of these countries during the debate,

:18:54.:18:55.

and then we say, OK, now we want you to give us exactly

:18:56.:18:57.

what we want when you want it. I think it is a human reaction

:18:58.:19:01.

when you go through a divorce not then to fall over to give people

:19:02.:19:04.

the thing they are asking for. I think you also have to recognise,

:19:05.:19:07.

in financial services, which is our export industry,

:19:08.:19:10.

biggest contributor to taxation in the UK, that the shape

:19:11.:19:12.

of the financial services industry in France or in Germany is very

:19:13.:19:15.

different from the UK, so the rules that they would come up

:19:16.:19:17.

with would be different from the rules that they come up

:19:18.:19:20.

with with Britain in the EU. Is there the recognition

:19:21.:19:28.

in Brussels, in your view, as someone who has been there now

:19:29.:19:31.

for a couple of years, that the EU has a problem

:19:32.:19:34.

of overextending itself? It signs up for things

:19:35.:19:41.

without filling in the details, like a euro, like a single currency,

:19:42.:19:43.

or a Schengen zone without borders or without a common immigration

:19:44.:19:47.

policy or asylum policy, and then is kind of bewildered,

:19:48.:19:49.

bamboozled, when it all goes wrong ten years down the line,

:19:50.:19:52.

because they haven't actually thought it

:19:53.:19:53.

through when they did it? I think what there is is

:19:54.:19:59.

a recognition that we need to have a more bottom-up

:20:00.:20:02.

approach than before. I mean, personally, it is something

:20:03.:20:04.

I argue for the whole time, a bit less of a grandiose vision,

:20:05.:20:07.

a few less grands projets and a bit more find out what people want,

:20:08.:20:11.

deliver it on the ground, bit by bit, and try

:20:12.:20:13.

and get momentum going. In different countries,

:20:14.:20:20.

people remain committed to the euro and they recognise that Britain

:20:21.:20:31.

is never going to join and I think one of the things that has come out

:20:32.:20:34.

of the settlement that Mr Cameron struck with the other leaders

:20:35.:20:37.

is a better balance between eurozone and non-eurozone countries,

:20:38.:20:40.

so non-eurozone country, UK, our vital interests more safeguarded

:20:41.:20:41.

and eurozone countries, I think we all need them

:20:42.:20:43.

to integrate further. Right, so it is a project,

:20:44.:21:02.

more integration, but Britain is not That gets to one of the other

:21:03.:21:05.

sophisticated critics of the way this is going,

:21:06.:21:09.

that you're going to end up with a very lopsided federation

:21:10.:21:12.

with, let's call it, small Britain on the edge and a kind

:21:13.:21:14.

of union of 400 million members acting in unison called

:21:15.:21:17.

Eurozone, or Euroland. Is that going to work

:21:18.:21:19.

for the British? Well, first of all, I'm not certain

:21:20.:21:31.

that the premise of your question But you just said there

:21:32.:21:35.

is going to be more No, what I said was for the eurozone

:21:36.:21:38.

to work better, there needs to be further progress with banking union

:21:39.:21:43.

and more integration around the eurozone,

:21:44.:21:45.

but it does not follow from that that the argument that some

:21:46.:21:47.

people make, I think, which is that you have,

:21:48.:21:49.

on the one hand, one country, the United Kingdom, with one set

:21:50.:21:52.

of views and on the other, you have 27 countries

:21:53.:21:55.

with a Federalist blueprint in the top of every drawer,

:21:56.:21:57.

who are completely committed to grinding relentless

:21:58.:21:59.

further integration. That is not what it feels

:22:00.:22:02.

like on the ground at all. Now you might remember that last

:22:03.:22:19.

year, Newsnight documented the journeys of two

:22:20.:22:26.

families to this country, refugees from

:22:27.:22:27.

the Syrian civil war. They were in camps in Jordan

:22:28.:22:29.

and were brought here via the official British programme

:22:30.:22:31.

to rescue the most vulnerable people Well, we've been following

:22:32.:22:34.

the fortunes of those families and we have to report that for one

:22:35.:22:37.

of them, The teenage son of that family

:22:38.:22:39.

was in court today, charged with sexually

:22:40.:22:43.

assaulting a 14-year-old girl. It is too early to say very much

:22:44.:22:45.

about the circumstances but John Sweeney has sent us this

:22:46.:22:48.

report from Newcastle. VOICEOVER: How we cope with

:22:49.:22:55.

the refugees from a pitiless war is a test

:22:56.:22:58.

of humanity for Europe causing great stress,

:22:59.:23:01.

both for the politicians The British Government's response

:23:02.:23:04.

was to allow in 20,000 refugees over five years from countries like

:23:05.:23:08.

Jordan, shown here, and Lebanon. The refugees were selected by UNHCR

:23:09.:23:12.

and fast tracked if they were deemed We are proposing that Britain should

:23:13.:23:15.

resettle up to 20,000 Syrian refugees over the rest

:23:16.:23:20.

of this Parliament. In doing so, we will continue

:23:21.:23:22.

to show the world that this country is a country

:23:23.:23:25.

of extraordinary compassion. But at a time when immigration

:23:26.:23:32.

is perhaps the nation's some have warned of the risks

:23:33.:23:35.

of countries taking in large numbers of people

:23:36.:23:43.

from a very different culture. Ukip leader Nigel Farage has drawn

:23:44.:23:45.

widespread criticism this week by raising the spectre of sex

:23:46.:23:47.

attacks by immigrants What's happened is a very large

:23:48.:23:50.

number of young, single males have settled in Germany

:23:51.:23:55.

and in Sweden, who come from cultures

:23:56.:24:00.

where attitudes towards And the issue of how we as a country

:24:01.:24:01.

handle the tension between common humanity and social cohesion has

:24:02.:24:09.

come into focus here in Newcastle. In the Crown Court here today,

:24:10.:24:12.

three young men have been charged with sexual assault

:24:13.:24:14.

against a 14-year-old girl. One of them is also charged

:24:15.:24:19.

with sexually assaulting All the accused have

:24:20.:24:24.

pleaded not guilty. But at least one of those young

:24:25.:24:32.

men is a Syrian refugee on the Government's resettlement

:24:33.:24:35.

programme. People in Newcastle

:24:36.:24:36.

are aware of just how Newsnight has been following

:24:37.:24:38.

the family of one of those His name is Omar, 18,

:24:39.:24:43.

originally from Damascus. The family fled to Jordan,

:24:44.:24:52.

where they were selected by UNHCR to be resettled in Britain,

:24:53.:24:54.

where they have lived A fourth youth aged 16 has also been

:24:55.:24:57.

charged with sexual assault. and a sixth has been

:24:58.:25:12.

released without charges. When this case comes

:25:13.:25:23.

to trial later in the year, and not just by people

:25:24.:25:27.

in the north-east. Its outcome could have serious

:25:28.:25:30.

consequences for the Government's resettlement programme of Syrian

:25:31.:25:32.

refugees and also for the already and we will of course follow

:25:33.:25:35.

developments in that case. It was just as you would

:25:36.:25:59.

have expected He was greeted by crowds lining

:26:00.:26:01.

the streets, his body carried in a black limousine

:26:02.:26:06.

through the streets of his past, They were throwing flowers

:26:07.:26:09.

and chanting his name, some running alongside for segments

:26:10.:26:11.

of the journey. But how do you remember

:26:12.:26:13.

Muhammad Ali? The gentle man struggling

:26:14.:26:15.

with Parkinson's, or the younger, grittier, angrier

:26:16.:26:17.

political campaigner? We saw some of that persona in his

:26:18.:26:18.

interview with Michael Parkinson after beating George Foreman

:26:19.:26:21.

in the most famous boxing match in history,

:26:22.:26:23.

the Rumble in the Jungle. Muhammad Ali! The interview was a

:26:24.:26:35.

glimpse into Muhammad Ali as a performer and as a person. I told

:26:36.:26:40.

him, OK, Sakho, I am backing up, take your best shot, show me

:26:41.:26:44.

something, show me something, kid, you are not doing anything, you

:26:45.:26:48.

ain't got nothing, show me something, you are just a kid! --

:26:49.:26:53.

sucker. At times, he runs rings around Parkinson. Why do you fight

:26:54.:26:57.

people quite obviously not in your class? Like for example, who? Let me

:26:58.:27:10.

put an even better question to you, and... Did you see him... Let me put

:27:11.:27:22.

it another way, er, uh... LAUGHTER Not all of the interview was

:27:23.:27:26.

conducted in good humour. You are a white man, how are you going to get

:27:27.:27:34.

me on the TV and trapped me? Ain't no way, you can't beat me

:27:35.:27:39.

physically, nor mentally. You are really a joke, I am serious, this is

:27:40.:27:44.

a joke. During the at times fraught interview, Muhammad Ali makes

:27:45.:27:48.

controversial statements about race and integration, this is when the

:27:49.:27:52.

topic moved onto miniskirts. What man would want his woman covered up?

:27:53.:28:00.

He can go to work knowing that she is not being chased for her behind

:28:01.:28:05.

parts. I don't think there is any problem... That is because you are

:28:06.:28:12.

white. John Nater... Your nature is not righteous. It is not because I

:28:13.:28:18.

am white and you are black... That is nonsense and you know it. A

:28:19.:28:25.

radical campaigner, and by the time that he died, a national treasure,

:28:26.:28:26.

one man who was joining me now, Chuck D. Do you feel

:28:27.:28:39.

that perhaps the more radical past of Muhammad Ali has been forgotten

:28:40.:28:47.

this week, people like Donald Trump bemoaning his past, I wonder if you

:28:48.:28:50.

think something of his past has been lost? If you cannot talk about

:28:51.:28:59.

racism for a few days, that is truly Muhammad resting at peace, but the

:29:00.:29:05.

reality, it still exists, and especially in the United States of

:29:06.:29:10.

America, you guys over at the BBC, in the UK, you are shaking your head

:29:11.:29:15.

is over what is going on over there. Monstrosity in politics. And a

:29:16.:29:23.

presidential quest going on in the United States. Muhammad Ali, in all

:29:24.:29:29.

walks of life, allowed us to speak and rage against such

:29:30.:29:35.

ridiculousness. The anger and the expressions that he used, a lot of

:29:36.:29:38.

the language you would say is inverse racism, when he talks about

:29:39.:29:43.

whites in very generalising terms, but you think anybody can do that

:29:44.:29:48.

now, even someone who felt there was injustice? Is that kind of language,

:29:49.:29:52.

that kind of behaviour, is that acceptable today? Racism changes, it

:29:53.:30:00.

changes in shape, it changes in regions, it changes its complexions

:30:01.:30:04.

in a lot of different ways. You should speak out when you feel like

:30:05.:30:08.

something is an just out there. Favouring one over another. -- an

:30:09.:30:20.

just. -- unjust. Somebody who feels their faces being stepped on, they

:30:21.:30:26.

should be able to speak out. The answer to racism, when it feels like

:30:27.:30:30.

radiation. There is a lot of different ways in which racism

:30:31.:30:34.

exists, Muhammad Ali, speaking in the 60s and 70s, he took advantage

:30:35.:30:38.

of that voice, he spoke out, people were like, my goodness. When I did

:30:39.:30:46.

it in the 1980s, being a musician, they thought that it was shocking.

:30:47.:30:51.

But we learn from Muhammad Ali, what we have learned is that you need to

:30:52.:30:55.

be able to be beyond yourself if you think there is injustice going on.

:30:56.:31:01.

Use your platform. It was not just a national voice, it was seeing things

:31:02.:31:07.

that were unfair around the planet. That is the way that it should be,

:31:08.:31:13.

when it is not that way, why not speak out? How far do you think

:31:14.:31:16.

America has come from his day, what percentage of the issues that were

:31:17.:31:22.

facing him have now been resolved? There are still problems but how

:31:23.:31:28.

far? 21st-century does not exist in the same way it is it about new

:31:29.:31:31.

things have popped up, you look online, you see a lot of people

:31:32.:31:35.

using the same language that people used 60 years ago, and they say, it

:31:36.:31:41.

is called because it is socially accepted, but it is racially

:31:42.:31:46.

derogatory. That is the seed of a problem. When you see people running

:31:47.:31:49.

for the presidency of the United States and they talk about groupings

:31:50.:31:55.

of people like they are inferior... That is a problem. That guy got a

:31:56.:32:01.

public platform. You see racism behind closed doors. We as artists,

:32:02.:32:07.

entertainers, athletes, we learn from Muhammad Ali, in the 1960s, we

:32:08.:32:11.

speak out against that, we go further back, to people like Harry

:32:12.:32:20.

Belafonte and Paul Robeson to transcend ourselves. Taking

:32:21.:32:27.

advantage of the opportunity for the few to speak for the many.

:32:28.:32:35.

That is all we have time for, but we do leave you with the news that

:32:36.:32:41.

veteran crooner and no longer forever young Rod Stewart has been

:32:42.:32:45.

given a knighthood. In the New Year 's Honours list. Good night.

:32:46.:32:48.

Europe in just a moment but here at home, a messy picture.

:32:49.:32:55.

Showers from the word go, it will not take much sunshine and warmth to

:32:56.:33:02.

develop more showers during the day and some could be heavy

:33:03.:33:03.

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