22/03/2014 The Papers

Duff has died at the age of 84. He worked with 16 world champions in

his career, including Frank Bruno and Joe Calzaghe.

With the are my guests. We can start with the Sunday Times. They say the

Conservatives are now neck and neck with Labour in the opinion polls,

after a positive reaction to the Budget. It prompted some Labour MPs

to criticise Ed Miliband's performance. The front page of the

Independent has a picture of the stand`off at that military base in

Crimea. The main story about a scientific breakthrough in energy

technology. The mail says an inquest has heard allegations that the TV

comedian groomed a teenager who later killed himself. And the

Telegraph says Islamic law will soon be enshrined in the British legal

system and guidelines for solicitors on drawing up Shari compliant Wills.

We start with the Sunday Times. This story that Tories are now neck and

neck with Labour. This article will have us believe we've got Labour in

disarray, the Tories thinking and outright majorities on its way. Is

that the true picture? As we will discover, the headline is so often

not quite what it seems. Although there is no doubt that this is a

pole, you grab pole for the Sunday Times, which put the Conservatives

just one point behind Labour. I think for the last, oh, it's been

ages they've been stuck. So it's not insignificant. It is very

significant, except it is only one point. What is significant is what

people are saying within the Labour ranks, some of whom are quoted, some

of those mysterious figures. It all comes down to presentation. Although

the subheadline says knives come out for Miliband, what it is saying is

they are urging Ed Miliband to stop waffling, to use clear, simple

language, to talk to people on the doorstep in language they

understand. I think the fact that all of these quotes are saying the

same thing, it's not about policy its presentation. It is quite an

interesting story. He is never going to have the Tony Blair factor. He is

not a man with jazz hands and a neat turn of phrase. He's a great

character but he's not Tony Blair, nor would he want to be Tony Blair.

This is bad news, this poll. At this time in the electoral cycle, you'd

really be thinking in terms of ten or 12 points ahead. He's been

hovering around seven or eight points ahead, so that's not great in

the first place. To be so close is not good at all. Two things have

happened. First of all, George Osborne's Budget. That has affected

it hugely. The second thing is, and this is some of the criticism there,

not so much the clear language, they've got to find the language

they need to use. They've lost the argument over the economy. It would

seem that people do accept that austerity was necessary, that we are

pulling out of recession, recovery is on the way, people now believe

that, they believe they're going to be better off. Of course, what the

Budget did was take away some of the elements of Ed Miliband's second

tier, the cost of living crisis. He's had a bad week in the sense the

Tories have had a great week. It might be this poll will be reversed

by next week, but those elements have caused this. One of the

criticisms is his lacklustre performance in the Commons in

response to the Budget. But it is terribly unfair because... The

opposition don't get to see the Budget, they are having to guess.

Given that, most of the public think, OK, it's tough but we

recognise we've got to do it and things are generally improving. What

have you got left to say? You can be a showman, saying this that and the

other, and hope that that is what happens. But what they are now

saying is they agree on the pensions changes. They should have said that

straightaway and then moved onto something else. They are saying he

needs different people around him, a reshuffle of his writers. Yes. We

know the Westminster world long enough that quite often it is those

advisers, some of whom will be quite young and enthusiastic, who perhaps

aren't listening, haven't got that new ones, that year to the ground.

Some of this criticism isn't new. You have John Mann, the Bassetlaw

MP, mining constituency. He is saying we don't want this hamster

language, we want the language of real people. Now the Independent on

Sunday. Their main story is about energy. I want to focus on that

picture, reporting on the seizing of that Belbek base in Crimea. We have

seen today this ramping up of the military force Russia in eastern

Crimea. Yes. It's quite a stark and rather startling photograph. The

Independent is always very good on its photographs, sometimes you don't

know what the story is but the photographs are amazing and it's

very clear what is. These are armed troops storming the Belbek base

yesterday. It's the last key Ukrainian installation in Crimea.

But it has suddenly, over the last, well, even over the last 12 hours,

it seems to have got a lot more violent. You sort of wonder, what is

Putin's game, where is this going? I don't find this a surprise. But if

you've got... We've gone through various stages here. Putin is with

Crimea, it is now part of Russia. It seems to be the next logical step

would be to make sure you don't have any Ukrainian troops in it. I can

understand what is going on. The worst side of it is the West is

totally impotent to stop any of this. So what will happen, and let's

hope it happens without too much bloodshed, is Ukrainian troops will

be taken out of Crimea, Russian troops will be in there. Then

perhaps we can calm down then. We will talk about Ukraine later. Let's

turn our attention to the Observer. It's not their main story, but

pension reform raising a Care Bill threat. A suggestion coming from the

Joseph Rowntree Foundation, saying that there's a risk if cash in your

pension for the Lamborghini lifestyle and don't go for the

annuity, you may find yourself open to a large amount of costs for your

care in old age. The Lamborghini bit first of all. It costs ?186,000.

Most average pension pots are about ?25,000. What they are talking

about, this idea... We need to see the detail of these pension

reforms. The idea that the charities are talking about here is if you

blow all of your money first off, don't expect free social care later

on. I don't quite understand this because I would have thought anybody

could blow their money, whether they've got an annuity or whatever.

The idea is if you need social care, that is what you will get. So

the idea that you will certainly have to try and find the money from

somewhere else and you haven't got it seems to me and possible.

Obviously, if you have an asset, a home, you will have to sell it to

provide for care in old age. Again, it's a story where the detail. We

were pondering this. It doesn't make sense at all because at the moment

there is a cap, around ?22,000, on savings. Up to that you get free

social care. But it's all based on this ill informed decision. It is

terribly patronising. The idea that the Tories were criticised for

having the bingo and beer poster, but this is frightfully patronising.

This idea that older people don't know how to deal with their money.

The Sunday Telegraph now. Their main story, Islamic law is adopted by

British legal chiefs. This is a suggestion that there's been advised

that out to solicitors on how to draw up Sharia law compliant Wills.

Once again we have a headline that slightly misleading. It's not

Islamic law that is being drafted into British law. They are talking

about a sharia law compliant will. All of us have the right to make our

will and decide who we want to leave our assets to. Sharia law will will

be no different from that. The difference there is it would be

drafted in the mosque, and that would then be accepted as a legal

document. I think it's going too far to suggest that suddenly Islamic law

is now going to be a part of British law. But the suggestion is that

lawyers and society in general might be twitchy about laws that come in

that somehow deny women certain right of inheritance and so on. Yes.

Ground`breaking guidance produced by the Law Society, high street

solicitors will be able to write Islamic world that deny women an

equal share of inheritance, exclude unbelievers, prevent children born

out of wedlock or adopted children. As Nigel says and as we all know, we

can do... Anyone of us can decide to leave all of our assets to the cat.

People do what they want. I think the problem is it's about

challenge. Hidden away in here is the guidance, it goes on to suggest

that the Sharia law principles could potentially oval rule British

practice in some disputes. I think that is where there may be the

nitty`gritty... We are in a different ball game should that

happen, yes. Let's return to Ukraine. They are reporting what the

Foreign Secretary, William Hague, has had to say about Putin, saying

he has been bullying, after the annexation of Crimea. Saying,

essentially, that the EU must stand firm. But there's a multitude of

positions in the EU. The idea of sanctions wrapping up seems to have

got to a certain rampant and no further. At the moment, we are in

the heat `` we are impotent. The answer from William Hague is that

Europe must invest in fracking. On the other hand, we are seeing that

they are in this terrible tangle. So many of the European countries want

to take this big stands, make a moral decision on what they are

doing, but we are so tied up we were almost I need. We can bring in

travel restrictions, to guide sanctions against a dozen people, or

however many it is, but it is not actually making any difference. He

is a belief. We will be back on 60 minutes to have another look through

some awe of the papers. Do stay with us. At 11.00pm we'll have more on

the crisis in Ukraine, as Russia tightens its grip on Crimea.

Hello and welcome. I am Zeinab Badawi. From here we send out

correspondence to bring you the best stories from across the