24/05/2016 The Papers

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

With me are Paul Johnson, the deputy editor of the Guardian,

and Tim Collins, a former Conservative MP and

managing director of Bell Pottinger Public Affairs.

Let's look at some of the front pages.

The FT leads on what it calls a European crackdown on tax paid

It says Google's Paris office was raided by the French authorities.

The Telegraph says Britain is spending almost twice

as much of its national wealth on foreign aid,

It also has a picture of the Duchess of Cambridge,

who's thanked midwives for delivering her children Prince

- saying attempts to woo young voters backfired for both sides

The Times leads on an investigation that up to 150,000 pre-school

children have been reported to social services, over fears

The paper says a series of abuse cases has led to a "climate of fear"

for those who refer their concerns to the authorities.

And the Guardian has a special report on Britain's tallest

residential skyscraper, The Tower, in London.

It says almost two-thirds of it's apartments are foreign owned,

We will get onto that story in a few minutes. But first, Tim, foreign top

spending. Is that because Britain are spending too much or other

countries are not spending enough? There is a lot to be proud of in

terms of what they do further children educated and the diseases

tackled and refugees helped but I think quite a lot of people in the

Conservative Party and this is picked up in the Daily Telegraph

story are asking the question, given the sheer scale of our deficit, that

made were borrowing and that meant we will expect our children and

grandchildren to pay, is every penny of the overseas aid budget

justified? As a proportion of our national wealth it is pretty much

twice as much as Germany and France, three times as much as Japan, the

USA and Italy. That might be fine when we were right at the crust of

the boom, lots of money to spend on public services at home. Is it

sensible for us to be giving money to India who today launched the

space programme? It is a Conservative Government who thinks

it is a good idea. And one that has the law making it a legal

requirement, but I think you may have noticed, Clive, Tories are

disagreeing with each other at the moment. On a whole host of things!

Paul, what is your reading of the story? We know it is 0.7% of GDP and

Tim is right in a sense, in that if you see the people, should we be

giving money abroad like this, a lot of people would question it. If you

see, however, this money enabled 9 million children to get into school,

saved 250,000 lives of unborn babies, helped combat Ebola, gave

drastically needed medical supplies for Gaza etc, then they start to

say, yes, it is quite a good idea, quite a popular thing. There is

another reason slightly hidden and one comparative is daft in this

case. We get almost ?1 billion to Syrian refugees. We do not take them

in the numbers that the Germans, for instance, do, so we spend that money

in Jordan on humanitarian aid rather than taking large numbers of

refugees. It comes out of this part. It depends how you ask the question

then, really, doesn't it? Are we sending too much money on foreign

aid? Actually the response depends on the phrase ology of the question.

And I think it also depends... I think you will find great public

support for spending money on that sort of things Paul is talking about

in some of the poorest countries in the world. Whether we need to be

giving that money to growing countries their own space

programmes, less easy to justify. Their argument is, yes, you will

have some film stars in Mumbai or whatever are doing well but actually

still have hundreds of millions of people -- millions of people,

certainly in China, who are still living below the poverty line. Yes,

but if we are cutting back our public services at home to cut our

overseas aid, it is perhaps reasonable for us to see perhaps

they could delay their space programme to educate their own

children. Are to the Financial Times. The raid on company mac's

Paris office, Paul? The French raising this text -- raising the

stakes when it comes to these taxes -- on Google's Paris office. Yes,

contrast with Britain, where Google paid a minuscule tax bill. You could

probably pay that minuscule tax bill, Clive, but what you would have

to do is pass your paycheque... I work for the BBC, all right! Pass

your paycheque to Dublin, then to the Netherlands, back to Dublin

again and it will end up in Bermuda. If you can get an arrangement like

that which is a bit tricky, you tax take goes right down. Exactly. The

French have decided they will play hardball and it was part of

Hollande's commitment in the election, that he would get tough on

companies not paying their taxes. As you said, Tim, the contrast with

Britain is very clear. I think most people rather admire the French with

this. And the figures... They do raise a bit of a mystery, Clive,

because apparently the French will go after Google for $1.6 billion, or

Euros, in back taxes. That slightly raises the question. How can Google,

and indeed Apple, how can they possibly sell anything in Europe

when the United States is not in the European Union? Apparently we are

told you cannot sell anything to the EU unless a member... I was hoping I

would not have to talk about that! Twisting it into Brexit. But it is

an important question. Maybe you can trade with Europe without being in

the EU. But there is a serious point here about the contrast in the way

the authorities here have treated the tech companies and the

authorities in France. And the authorities in Ireland, that is the

interesting thing. What company mac and Apple are trying to do is say

that our European HQ 's are in Ireland and all other European

revenues somehow get shuffled through Ireland and they have much

lower rates of tax than any rust -- Sierra Leone and Apple. -- Google

and Apple. Samak lets not cast a stone across the Irish Sea. George

Osborne described this as a major success. Google are going to pay all

that money in taxes. Most people did not think it was major success. But,

Paul, I thought we believed everything the Chancellor said at

the moment in the Guardian? George gets his numbers wrong? Really?

Gentlemen, please. I left my gavel in the other room but I will bring

the next time. OK, let's go to the Guardian, Paul. This really I

suppose goes to the heart of -- heart of Britain's housing crisis at

least in certain parts of the South East, of course London. Foreign

investors using the London housing market as basically a safe haven for

their investments? We looked at London's tallest tower block, call

the tower,, down in the Battersea area, and it is the lack has 2014

flats in it and nobody is registered to vote there. Two thirds of them

are foreign-owned, at least one quarter are secretly owned offshore

in tax havens. This is quite a remarkable... It is an eerily empty

place day in, day out. People say they go down to the swimming pool or

gym and nobody is there. In the concierge offers at the basement,

there are three clocks on the wall and they shall the times in Moscow,

Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong. It is sucking the life out of the area

around it. And is this indicative of what is going on in other

developments across London, across the UK? Or is it only London? Sinai

we think so. There is massive in red investment, people buying flats --

yes, we think so. It is exacerbating the housing crisis in the sense that

London, in actual fact, went back last year. 9% fewer houses built

than in the year before. This is causing an enormous squeeze and is

also having social consequences as well. Mean well, Tim, if you're are

firemen, policemen, teacher, you cannot afford to live in central

London? I think there is a real challenge and local authorities both

Tory and Labour are coming up with -- trying to come up with ways of

tackling it but of course what you do not want to do is kill the golden

goose. Developers are required, with put a building like this up, they

have to put up tens even hundreds of millions of pounds sides of the

local authorities can build affordable housing. The new mayor of

London, Siddique Khan, has a target for homes to be built in the capital

and he wants all of those to be paid for by developers. Developers will

have to build skyscrapers to do that, but I think there are real

questions about whether it can be appropriate for all of them -- Sadiq

Khan. I agree with Paul, this is a good piece. For all the residents to

be people who do not seem to spend much at any time in the UK. I think

that is a challenge even for people like me in favour of inward

investment. The emphasis does need to be... Ameen, it will be

interesting to see what Sadiq Khan does, but let's build homes for

people who live and work in London rather than for ghosts -- I mean, it

will be interesting. The subject of the day now.

The sujet du jour. LAUGHTER

. Blitz-mac migrants picked up in Europe. The crisis is dwindling. --

this is the kind of thing via Brexit ears are going to have to focus on

if they are going to convince the British people that out is the way

forward, because immigration, migration, it resonate with people

-- set-mac. Yes, for the Remained tied it is the economy and for the

leave side it is the immigration -- for the Remain side it is the

economy and for the Leave side it is immigration. Further down the court

Iain Duncan Smith at this point to the bigger problem. A couple of

months ago he was serving very happily, it seemed at the time in

David Cameron's Cabinet -- they quote. He is quoted as saying, the

refusal to engage in a fair contest is the definition of cowardice. That

is quite strong language. The issues being raised in this referendum I

think will not be resolved on May the -- to the 23rd and patching the

Tory party together will not be easy. At all? Yes, Tim is very

shaken by that Telegraph Pauls poll which assures it is almost game

over... I am delighted by the Times poll tonight which shows a swing to

the back. There are a number of Q, and, sure, but the leadership

of the Tory party are assembled in a firing squad, in a way, and as much

as I would like to see David Cameron debating Boris Johnson, Boris

Johnson, the man who accused the prim minister of "Demented

scaremongering", that would be quite lively but I do not think they will

do it. Blue on blue, we would call it, good for the entertainment, but

I think it shows the desperation of the situation they are in, to be

honest. The Metro. Who EU Kiddin? It has backfired somewhat? Yes,

firstly, the Remain camp came out with a totally patronising video

today which is on you tube and other places, speaking about raving,

working, earning, and I think the best response was from someone, I

suspect a young person, who tweeted back and said, shockingly, young

people do sometimes used the letter g.

LAUGHTER I see that the pro-Brexiteers have

this group set up and when they found out what it was for and

because they hotfooted it pretty quickly. I think we will be left

with Michael Gove and Boris Johnson onstage saying that -- singing that

old Animals hit, you know, we've got to get out of this place. Thank you

for joining us for a look at some of tomorrow morning's front pages. Much

more coming up. Thank you for watching The Papers. Good

Night. Good evening. A nice day for most of us. A bit of a breeze

perhaps but I hope you made the most of it. Some sunshine and a cool

breeze of the North Sea. Across the other side