24/02/2014 The Papers

England will be without their number eight for the rest of the Six

Nations because of injury. That is after the papers.

Hello, and welcome to our look ahead to what the papers will be bringing

us tomorrow. With me are Dame Joan Bakewell and The Times columnist,

Hugo Rifkind. We are going to start with the Metro, that claims HSBC has

awarded its boss and ?8 million pay package in an attempt to get round

the cap on bankers' bonuses. The Guardian gives more detail on that

story, saying the bankers will get a ?32,000 per week bonus. The express

is leading with a health story that the new pill could save millions of

people from developing type two diabetes. The Daily Telegraph has

learned that David Cameron wants to make a manifesto pledge not to sign

a second power-sharing agreement even if they fall short of a Commons

majority at the next election. The daily Star has a pun in reference to

Piers Morgan, whose Cheryl has been axed. The Daily Mirror leading with

the story that the Queen and Prince Charles cash in on housing benefits.

No manifesto after the next election, one assumes the

Conservatives have polled to an inch of their lives on this. For a

fleeting moment I assumed even David Cameron was assuming there would be

a Labour majority. We know he is worried, he watches the opinion

polls and he takes measure of what the public are saying and he is

frightened of UKIP and clearly frightened of the Labour pitch so it

is a very strange move that he should do this because if he is

promising there will be no coalition and there is a hung parliament, does

that mean he will just not negotiate? It is a very strange

hostage to fortune. Is he perhaps being clever? The polls suggest the

public don't want another coalition. Nobody votes for

coalition, on -- unless you vote for Lib Dem, I suppose you do. The idea

of entering this election saying it is a clear choice, you can see how

that might concentrate the minds of the tiny percentage of people who

vote UKIP, if not necessarily anybody else, but the really

confusing thing is that this is a new world and we now have fixed term

parliaments. Nobody is quite sure how they work. In the past, we had

minority government and it fell and if it lost the vote it was

replaced. Now, what happens? I thought it was very ill thought

through, this fixed term parliaments. Given the fact he has

so many more months ago, he is making promises that don't really

mean anything. How can you promise there won't be a coalition? It is

not inconceivable a minority government could fall and be

replaced by a coalition of the other two parties without an election even

happening. A coalition of UKIP and the Lib Dems, how about that! We

have seen demonstrably the Liberal Democrats and Labour 's darting to

cosy up to each other, preparing the ground for a possible coalition. Is

he trying to distinguish the Conservatives from the other two in

that regard? I guess he is saying if you are going to vote Liberal

Democrat, which is a strange place to start because nobody is, don't

think you will get a tempo down version of the current government,

what you will get is Prime Minister Ed Miliband. The Coalition has put a

lot of checks on Tory policies and they have not been able to carry

them through which has irritated the backbenchers. David Cameron is

appeasing these people, those people, the people in the north, he

doesn't know where he is. I think he is confused and worried. Is he also

saying the current relationship hasn't worked? He didn't have an

option. The backbenchers are saying he could have ruled as a minority

government and that is the point. How long would a minority government

last? Who knows? The thing is that it doesn't... I mean they have done

quite a lot, this Government. The Tories may have not done everything

they meant to but there have been a lot of changes, a lot of deficit

reduction, it has happened so I don't think he can be that unhappy

with how it has panned out. It is the fixed term parliament business,

they have a whole year of election campaigning now. He has very

ungrateful backbenchers. They wanted it to go further and further and the

more he concedes, the more they demand so it is a sign of weakness

in a leader if you constantly concede to your extremes, isn't it?

Someone wrote not that long ago that Tony Blair picked a fight with his

party and ground them to dust, David Cameron picks a fight with them and

then gives in to them, which is a strange way to behave. An

interesting story on the front of the Daily Telegraph, Mike, Zara and

baby Mia say hello to a fortune. Zara Phillips is not technically a

royal, she has got to earn her keep and riding horses doesn't earn that

much. Selling your story is not earning money! It is a celebrity

circuit and she decided to join it. Families and celebrity circuit

overlap a great deal now so that's fine. She can do that if she wants.

Dame Joan has spoken! It is OK! She can reserve hoping to see in the

future if she chooses to do so but it turns out she may not choose to

do so. This story may make people's blood boil, the HSBC chief dodges EU

bonus cap, the bank pays 1 million plus to its staff of 239. Twice the

average salary. It is really Draconian, isn't it? The banks are

getting around this by bundling money in other ways. The chief

executive of HSBC is now getting allowances worth 32 -- ?32,000 per

week on top of his salary. 239 HSBC bankers who received more than ?1

million last year, I don't understand why they give them all

the money. That's not true, I do understand because the people who

give the money are getting the money. The shareholders have a good

amount of it as well, in this crazy circus of over rewarded people.

Remember his name, Stuart Gulliver. We are taking note of your name and

your pay, and the fact you think 200% bonus is not enough. It is

crazy. They are living in a different world. He would argue he

is in the global market, HSBC has staff around the world and he has to

have the best people so he has got to give them oodles of cash. It is

important! They might all leave, 230 people would walk out of this bank

unless they have more than 200% of their bonus? How hard can it be?

When footballers are massively rewarded you can see the logic

because you can see the money they directly bring into the club. You

say it is a global world but the EU is putting a cap on bankers'

bonuses. Everybody thinks that should happen. Except the banks!

Because they can. Stuart Gulliver, remember the name. He can go on his

travels all around the world, first class. Onto the express. Hence may

change school term dates to end holiday rip-offs. This is holiday

companies who whack up the prices because they know a lot of families

have to travel at certain times of the year. I remember when I was a

child in Lancashire, when it was one week the factories would close and

everyone would go to Blackpool, then come back, and the next week another

set of factories would close and they would go to Blackpool so the

factories staggered their closing so everybody had a decent spread. What

is happening here? I don't quite understand why school terms can't be

staggered between the summer months. From the beginning of July to

mid-September there is decent weather anyway. They can be

staggered now. It is up to the individual school apparently. That

seems reasonable. It is what they do in Holland, which is why when you go

on holiday there are thousands of Dutch people because the schools are

staggered. I don't see lots of Dutch people. You don't go to Holland! I

was at school in Scotland and there were holidays at different times.

Speaking as a parent, it is incredibly expensive going on

holiday during holiday time. That is an interesting issue which we will

look at further in an hour, I expect, when we will have another

stab at the stories behind the papers. Stay with us for that.

Coming up at 11 o'clock, we will have much more on BBC News including

the special report from inside the Damascus refugee camp, where 20,000

people are struggling to survive with little food or medicine. Stay

with us for that. Coming up next it is Sportsday.

Hello and welcome to Sportsday. I'm Hugh