07/01/2016 The Papers

Gulliver knocks out the defending women's champion. The latest tennis

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Hello and welcome to our look ahead to what the papers

With me are Rowena Mason, the political correspondent at the

Guardian, and Ben Chu, the economics editor at the Independent.

The FT leads on the turmoil in global financial markets.

The Metro reports on the killing of the actress Sian Blake

The Express focuses on house prices and the threat

The Independent says Whitehall officials signed off a controversial

letter by the NHS's top independent medic, questioning whether striking

junior doctors would be available to help in the event of a Paris-style

The Telegraph says health chiefs have been criticised

for producing nanny state alcohol guidelines that warn people against

The Guardian leads with that new advice.

The Times leads on the Syrian town besieged by President Assad's

forces, where 40,000 people are in danger of starving to death.

And the Mail says an organisation that backed

Jihadi John is now targeting young Muslims at their universities.

The Financial Times. Is China sneezing and we are about to catch a

cold? That is the worry because China has clearly had another

terrible day with its markets falling and having to freeze its

stock markets for the second time in a very short period and concerns

have been expressed today by George Osborne that there is this dangerous

cocktail of potential risks. The prospect of a global slowdown that

could affect us over here. The British economy has been doing OK by

several measures. Record job figures... The Chancellor says all

of this is in jeopardy now and that it might not necessarily be his

fault. It tends to do this when there are doubts about the strength

of the global economy. He will say that the UK for all the progress we

have made is not immune from global headwind. He did that during the

Greek crisis last year. I think it is essentially an insurance policy.

It is not that he expects things to fall apart but if they do, it will

be able to say that he specifically warned about these dangers and no

one can accuse him of being complacent. That is what he has done

today in Cardiff. In terms of the economics of it, it is all down to

the Chinese stock market falling and the domino effect. That is ironic

because there is no real correlation between the Chinese stock market and

the Chinese economy, which is the second biggest economy in the

world. If that stutters, that really will affect us. But it is not clear

there is any link between the Chinese stock market and the Chinese

economy. Is it that their economy is in turmoil or is having problems

because there is not enough growth in the economy? What is the issue if

it is not the market? China is a big source of global demand for

commodities but increasingly services and everything else.

Because we are an increasingly globalised economy, if the world's

second-biggest economy slows down, not even goes into recession, just

to slows down, that can have big effects. That is what people are

reading into the stock market frenzy. They think there is

something more serious happening in China. As a political correspondent,

the state of the British economy and the stewardship of it by George

Osborne, that very much determines whether he will be running the party

when David Cameron steps down. That is right. He will be in with a much

better shot if people see him as a safe pair of hands, particularly in

a time of economic turmoil, so it suits him to be able to point to

external events such as this potential slowdown in China as the

cause of any potential problems in the UK. If you look at what Labour

is saying, John McDonnell turned the Chancellor's metaphor on its head,

saying that if there is a dangerous economic cocktail, it is George

Osborne himself who has been mixing it. He says it is the level had

consumer debt and overseas borrowing and things like that that will cause

possible problems of the UK. -- the level of consumer debt. Whitehall

officials sexing up the case against junior doctors. We know that they

will be going on strike next Tuesday and this feeds into the acrimony

between the two sides in this dispute. Yes. A very senior figure

in NHS England wrote quite an incendiary open letter directed at

the junior doctors in November, saying that if there was another

Paris style attack and you were on strike, can we have any guarantees

you would be able to get back insufficiently QuickTime to help

those who were injured? The junior doctors took great umbrage at this,

saying that this was undermining their credibility as doctors. And

they always suspected Jeremy Hunt had something to do with this. They

seem to have found the evidence that he did have something to do with

this, that this was a co-ordinated piece of propaganda, if you like, on

the Health Secretary to undermine the image of the doctors and prevent

them from going on strike. This is a fantastic story and it really

emphasises what a massive public relations battle the whole thing

is. They both want the public with them. Sir Bruce Keogh, who is

supposed to be independent, one might assume that he would have from

time to time consultations with the Secretary of State as well as the

BMA. That is true. He is a member of the medical establishment, so he

does have an interest in trying to prevent the strike from going ahead,

but some of the language being used in these exchanges... One official

said that the risk of a major incident should be pressed quite

strongly in the media wants the strikers announced their intention

and Sir Bruce Keogh should be as hard edged as he could be on that.

It seems that they were egging him on. To sex it up. One could say

that. Alcohol guide. Health chiefs attacked over nanny state alcohol

guides. And quite tough as well, these new suggestions on the part of

the authorities on how much alcohol we should be consuming. I don't

often find myself agreeing with libertarian think-tanks, and when I

saw their name mentioned in this article... But we are talking about

booze! LAUGHTER. On this one, they do have a point. The recommended

weekly allowance of alcohol is down from 20 minutes to 14 units, which

works out to about a pint a day. -- 20 units. But the evidence does not

seem particularly strong. It does seem that the medical establishment

has taken it upon itself to decide that the level of safe risk is lower

than many people are consuming. That is fair enough if this were not

sanctified as being official advice. If people could make it

their own mind, that would be fine, but the scientific evidence of risk

does not necessarily back this up. Yes, but it is incumbent on any

society to protect its citizens and if the authorities feel that

drinking a pint a day... It is obviously a strongly held view.

There have been many warnings in recent years some experts on alcohol

that everybody is drinking too much and there has been a lot of pressure

on the government to bring in minimal alcohol pricing. --

minimum. There is no getting away from the fact that we do have a

large health problem with alcohol in our society. We might not like it,

but they are telling us that is what is best for us. Is there a

psychological thing going on? They say that scientifically maybe two

points of the cable will tell everyone is on point because we know

they will want to have 2 bytes. -- ten pints will be OK but we will

tell everyone that one pint is the... -- two types. You have got to

treat people like adults and say that these are the scientific risks

that we know about. Be informed but take the decision yourself. The

Guardian. Clinton and Tony Blair's special relationship. Transcripts of

conversations they had when they were both in power have been

released. This is fascinating. I would advise anyone to go and read

the complete transcripts of these conversations. This article is full

of eliminating snippets of conversation, including the death of

Princess Diana. -- illuminating. They are calling each other body --

bud and mate. You sometimes wonder how they found the time for all of

this medicine in Smalltalk, but it is really interesting. And at the

same time, -- all of this small talk but it is really interesting. He was

certainly comfortable with whoever was in the White House. Remember

that famous advice he gave to the Washington ambassador? To get up the

cars of the White House and stay there. -- to get up the INAUDIBLE.

I'm sorry? ! I'm not sure there is anything that is particularly

surprising here. What isn't it surprising is the prescience of Bill

Clinton talking about stateless terrorists. This was back in 1997.

He was spot on about that being an evolving threat. And he talked about

his concerns for the children of Princess Diana at the time, that

they would have a tough time in life. Yes. There is a conversation

that happened just after the death of Princess Diana in which Tony

Blair was calling her a rock of stability in the sense that she

connected with the outside world. Talking about how William is quite

like her. Clinton replies by saying that he feels so bad for her. He

says she was just getting hold of her life... The Mirror. The ?2.7

billion pension cash grab. Experts warn that poverty may follow. I did

see quite a few Lamborghinis... Apparently lots of pensioners are

cashing in pensions. Is a sense, this is what the Chancellor wanted

to happen when he unveiled his organisation policy. He wanted --

liberalisation policy. He wanted people to take control of their

money. There were concerns at the time that everyone would spend

irresponsibly and would have to fall back on state support in later

years. These figures out today suggest that many people did draw

money down and that a minority bought annuities with them. I'm not

clear what people will do with the money they have drawn down. They may

invest it. It is not quite a clear slam dunk, saying that people have

gone crazy and behaved irresponsibly, but I do think that

the most important statistic to come out of this is that only 20% of

people consulted the government advised that this about what to do.

That is the same to watch. -- the thing to watch. And talking about

pensioners, although not you specifically, the Daily Mail. Still

sprightly at 183. The oldest creature on earth. This is Jonathan

the tortoise. He has recently been living a healthy, low alcohol

lifestyle. And he has a new lease of life after being put on a more

nutritious diet of apples, carrots, cucumbers and guava. I just wonder

if he has drawn down his pension yet. Yellow Lamborghini in the back

of the photograph. Coming up next,

it's time for Sportsday.