11/06/2013 The One Show

Alex Jones. And Matt Baker. Well, it's time to dig out the denim. Plug

in the air guitar and loosen up the shoulders to get down, down with

tonight's guests. # Down, down deeper and down

# Get down, deeper and down... # They've been rocking all over the

world for 50 years. Please, welcome Status Quo, and Rick Parfitt and

Francis Rossi. APPLAUSE

Lads, it's like you were saying, that was almost ten years ago.

natural audience there. A good ten years ago 12 years. I would never

know. We are so excited to have you here. Matt has been singing your

songs all day. More excited than anybody else is glory Hunniford. --

Gloria Hunniford. A little bird told us that maybe Gloria had a thing for

you Francis? We had a few moments. Gloria, it won't be long. You'll be

on the sofa very shortly. panting! ! We will also find out why

Status Quo have gone all Fijian on us. Can't wait to find out all about

it. That looks lovely. It's us to. It is. Have you ever heard of a

Phoenix company? Yeah.Good. Well, for you at home, here is Gloria to

explain all and how any one of us could lose money through no fault of

our own. Nearly two years ago, Colin paid �11,500 for this - his family's

second-hand motor home, but the very first time he took it away the

problems began. Now you've got your dream motor home. A great reason for

you to spend holidays with your family. What went wrong? The first

hieple we used it we noticed that as the British weather goes, we had a

little bit of rain and my daughter was actually sleeping in the above

and it's over the window as you can see. She complained that it was a

little damp. We'll go inside and look at the damage and everything.

Right. It turned out to be much more than just damp. Actually, there was

water in the light fixtures. So, Colin took the leaking motor home

back to the original seller. They were Rivershore Limited. They agreed

to fix it free of charge, but the next time they used it the water

came through yet again. I was assured that the leak had been

detected and that it had been repaired, it had been tested as

well. Because the company's repair job hadn't actually fixed the

problem, Colin was keen to get a second opinion from a different

caravan firm. But their assessment was worse than he feared. It

complied a detailed report, which described the caravan as maybe

unsafe to use and worse of all, that the total repairs could cost Colin

over �4,500,000. According to Colin, river shoe disagreed with the report

and said that the problems were to be expected for an ageing motor

home. Colin felt he had no choice but to pursue Rivershore in the

Small Claims Court. But then something really unexpected

happened. Because, the very day before he was due in court his

solicitor had a call from an insolvency company to say Rivershore

had gone into liquidation. This meant that Colin had little or no

chance of getting his money back. To add insult to injury, very soon

after Colin discovered that the firm was seemingly trading again, but

this time under a different name - calling themselves Craig's caravans.

As far as Colin is concerned, everything but the name was exactly

the same. I believe it's just changed the name. It's the same

company. It's the same premises. The phone was still the same. Everything

looked exactly the same as I remember it the last time I was

here. It's just absolutely unbelievable that people are allowed

to do this so easily. So, how is it that a company can cease trading one

day, leaving Colin in the lurk and seemingly just start trading again

with little or no responsibility to previous customers? Craig's Caravans

could be what is known as a Phoenix company. Typically assets are sold

from a failing firm to a new one. The new company may operate from the

same address, with the same directors. Now, this arrangement is

perfectly legal and allows the profitable elements of the failed

business to survive, offering some continuity to both suppliers and

employees. However, it's absolutely infuriating for people who believe

they've been left out of pocket, so because often the pot of assets that

is left is so small that there's nothing for the creditors to claim

back on. Carrying out the liquidation process is the

insolvency agent. They take charge of the company and it's their job to

settle any legal disputes, sell off the company's assets using any money

to pay creditors. They are also responsible for investigating why

the business has failed. It's quite common, particularly for

entrepreneurs in this country to try something and if it doesn't succeed,

to then try again. In many respects that is something to be encouraged.

In this case, is it worthwhile Colin getting in touch with the insolvency

company? Colin should definitely get in touch with the practioner who is

handling that case to set out his claim and to see if there is any

kind of remedy that the liquidator is considering. It may help bring

more money back into the pot for Colin to share. The One Show did ask

to speak to Craig's Caravans, but they declined to be interviewed.

With rivershore ceasing to exist as a company, the courts will never get

a chance to decide whether or not Colin would have won his case. In

any event, Colin is now stuck with a motor home he can't use and can't

afford to repair. Well, Gloria is here. You said there

in the film that Craig's Caravans didn't want to mention anything in

an interview. Have they said anything at all? Nothing. In actual

fact, I feel so sorry for Colin, because he's ill and he has put all

his money from a pension into the home and he took it back originally

when it was the original company and they allegedly fixed it, but the

next time he took it out, bad as ever. Now, he has an independent

report, but it's just a shrugging of the shoulders. The day before he was

due to go to the court the company shut down and re-opened. As an

individual, this is my opinion, I find it incredible that a company

can go bust one day and re-open the next with the same directors in some

cases, and I'm generalising and I'm not talking about this company, same

produce and products and directors in the same spot, but it's legal.

And just taking the best bits. legal. Providing the insolvency

company, which by the way is booked by the company in question, but

actually the onus is on the public. They are due to take the public's

interest into account, providing they've done the search that there

hadn't been unsuccessary asset stripping or fraud, it is perfectly

legal to open up again the next day, which I think to the individual just

seems incredible. Colin's situation, it's terrible, isn't it, but how can

we then as individuals protect ourselves from this type of thing

happening? Well, for example, if you were going to perfect something else

and the most logical thing, although it's tricky in a way, you have to be

arduous, you can go to companies house and get details on any limited

company, so you can check that out and you can check out the credit

rating through Status and you should check out directors to make sure

that they have haven't been -- they haven't been involved. They call it

Phoenix companies, because they rise from the ashes, as one dies the

other rises up. You have to do a lot of homework to make sure you're

trading with a legit company. thought if you were bankrupt you

weren't allowed to have a bank account. That might be individual,

but in this case you are dealing with a limited company. The people

are supposed to check out this stuff out when you think the system's got

it all done already? What happens in any of these cases, and I use Colin

as an example, it's the small person that suffers. The company goes bust

through a legitimate insolvency agency, you know, employed by the

company, but working on our behalf allegedly, but what they would say

now for Colin and this would apply to anybody, is that you should never

give up on it, because you have got a few after news. You should lodge

your complaint with the insolvency company that is acting in this case

for the motor home company. You should also go to the Financial

Services Authority, or to the Financial Ombudsman to fight your

case, but as in any of these schemes, I'm not saying this is

necessary a rip-off, but we call it such, you have to have tenacity and

you have to keep at it. What about the money? If you are working,

because it costs people money? does. Colin, who can't work at the

moment because of dealing with his cancer, he has taken �11,500 out of

the pension to buy a motor home and yet he's the one now who is out of

bobbinget. We wish Colin all the best. We'll put a lot of links on

the website. -- pocket. We wish Colin all the best. We'll put a lot

of the links on the website. Now, the new film Behind the Candelabra

celebrates Liberace's life and today it's no secret that he was gay.

Incredibly back in 1956, when a newspaper columnist called him

fruit-flavoured it resulted in a nasty court case. In showbiz an

artist's reputation is paramount. There are many who have gone to

court to protect it. But perhaps the biggest libel case of all dates from

1959, when the world's highest-paid entertainer, Liberace, sued the

country's highest-selling newspaper the Daily Mirror. Liberace began his

career in the late 1930s. A flamboyant showman busting with

music flare with his flirty wink he charmed the world and found knee

kneeal popularity, especially among women. -- phenomenal popularity,

especially among women. Now a new film tells a different story, about

one of his many love affairs with a man. I love to give people a good

time. On the platform at Southampton are one or two music lovers.

1956, Liberace toured the UK, but some traditional British voices

disapproved of the American's camp razzamataz. And dropped a heavy hint

that British women were waisting their -- wasting their time trying

to catch his eye. Do you like my gold jacket? I'm glad, because you

bought it. He was the summit of sex and the pinnical of masculine and

feple mine neuter. This fruit-flavoured mincing help of

mother love, he's the biggest sentimental vomit of all time. This

is what William Connor, also known as Cassandra, wrote in his famed

column in the Daily Mirror. The article Liberace was hoax sexual --

homosexual. It was illegal in the United Kingdom then, so Liberace

sued for libel. Why did he choose to go to town about Liberace? I don't

think anyone can be certain about why he alighted on that. It provided

him with a wonderful piece of propose. It's very, very nasty, but

it's also, if you rise above it, very funny and clever. Most of the

time, he had his finger on the popular pulse and he had a big

streak, but he also had the deeply, dark conservative streak, what we

would now call homophobia and he thought, "Here's a popular figure

and isle take him apart." He misread the audience and most importantly

the determination of Liberace himself. This QC has studied the

case. Liberace was in character in court. He was asked some interesting

questions by the barrister, and right in the middle he was talking

about being fruit-flavoured and it well known that fruit in America

meant gay and the key question in the case must have been why did you

use the word if you didn't mean to say he was a homosexual. Are you a

homosexual? No, sir. He was asked if he had indulged in homosexual in

actions. He replied no. After seven days of trial, the jury decided that

the article did indeed impune Liberace's sexuality. He was awarded

a report �8,000 in damages, plus costs an eye-watering �500,000 in

today's money. The case was a libel landmark and the aftermath for those

involved was difficult to deal with. Bill was showbiz editor of the Daily

Mirror and met Liberace. Bill Connor was winded by the experience?

psychologically damaged. You rather fefle that Liberace was somebody --

felt that Liberace was somebody who lied in court and the lie actually

damaged the life of a journalist, who actually was telling the truth?

Yes, absolutely. After all, he was a purgerer and he lied constantly

through his life to protect himself that it was totally untrue. In a

case based on money and lies, maybe truth was the biggest victim.

Although, the Mirror had to pay up, the circulation didn't go down and

eventually Cassandra was knighted axT as for Liberace, well, famously

he cried all the way to the bank. -- and as for Liberace, well, famously

he cried all the way to the bank. We are joined by a man who knew

Liberace well, his publicist, John Rimmington. Why did you first start

working with Liberace and secondly, John, where did you get the suits?

Well, he gave me that as a gift for a wedding present. It was made by

his costume lady and she gave my through him, as a gift, she gave my

wife a fur coat. Fair enough.I started in 1972. Up until 1986.

you still wear it? No, I sold it. Why ever not? I sold it to a music

master at Eton college. Rick, you were saying that your mother was a

big fan of Liberace? She was. We used to have the Liberace Show on

every Sunday afternoon about 4.00pm. I was only a small boy, but I

remember watching it on the black and white and she used to see him

regularly at the pal laidium and I think he was the first person to

come to this country with the waterfall, the coloured dancing

water on stage. Fantastic.My mum saw it. She was soaked! John, I'm

guessing that you knew that Liberace was gay then? Was it difficult for

you over that period of time to keep it covered up? I had my suspicions.

Yes, it was difficult. I think mainly because he feared and in

those days correctly, that if he either openly came out or it was

suggested in the media that he was gay, it would ruin his career.

Didn't he go to massive lengths to try to stop it coming out? Yes.

had a sort of pretend girlfriend didn't he? Debbie, yeah. That is

true. There she is. He introduced her mid-way through one of the Vegas

performances as the girl I'm mad about. He admitted later to me that

she was very feple minute and she would make a wonderful wife and --

feminine and she would make a wonderful wife. As it so happened,

my story went to the British press first of course and it sparked off

rumours that he was going to get married. That wasn't the case.

got married and did you honeymoon in his house? He loaned us his house in

Hollywood. My wife, Joyce and I spent a week there in the company...

It's just like home. It looks quite plush. Is it - Just a little bit.

Was it quite nice or a bit Gaudi? called it the Buckingham Palace of

Beverly Hills and I'm sure the Queen has better taste. I would hope so.

We'll leave it there. Diplomatic. Thank you, John. John's book,

Liberace is nought now. As well as the Liberace film, the other music

epic of this summer, you know where we are going, features Status Quo

and it's called Bula Bula Quo. We'll look at this. What does it mean?

# It's been a long, long time, since I felt so fine

# Is it always here when I'm sane # You can ask me how and I know

right now # Here I am on stage... #

Come on, what does it mean? Hello. They say Bula in Fiji. You have to

be very careful with it. It's a load of Bula. Are you making a film or

you were out in Fiji to make the film and where did it come from?

When we did Coronation Street many years ago the stunt co-ordinator,

Stewart St Paul taught us to beat Les up and so we wanted to make a

movie. It first came along and it was -- Wasn't it a Bruce Lee movie?

More violent. It was going to be shot in Bangkok. I loved the idea.

We didn't, so we waited for the new script and it did and it was a

modicum of humour and shooting it in Fiji, so we went off. We do it a

lot, this silly humour and it appeals to young people. I mean

young people. Are you singing a lot in the movie? We have written, nine,

ten, 11 songs for the album song track. There's quite a bit of

singing, but it's more of a chase, I guess. Yeah, we being chased by

Wilson. He's a baddie. Actually, when you see John on the screen he's

mesmerising. We were both taken with him. He did one of those on shot

when he shouldn't. It's a caper. What happened to your hair, Rick? It

has grown back. I had a bit of a rash on my skin a couple of years

ago and I went to the doctor and he told me to steak the steroids. I

took them and my skin was beautiful, but all my hair fell off. Literally,

just as I was starting the movie, I was combing my hair. It started

growing again. Did they put it into the storyline? No, not at all. As

the movie was going on, my hair got shorter and shorter and by the end I

didn't have any hair. It is all cut short. For me, it was a frightening

experience, because I've had long hair all my life and all of a sudden

it's coming out by the comb-load so I'm trying to grow it back axT at my

age, it's ridiculous. I watched it coming out day by day. Marvellous.

Last year, it was the 50th anniversary of the band starting

out. You all got together at Wembley. How was that for you?

good. It was difficult, I think. But it was seeing the audience, the way

they took it. There were people crying, whether it was that bad, I

don't know what it was, but we were both taken with the way the audience

were taken with seeing us four together again. People came from all

over the world. I can't believe it. It was like Led Zeppelin and people

were saying the same to us, it was the same sort of thing. Your music

has been soundtracks to people's lives. There are 100 singles.

It's weird. It just goes by. It's best not to think about it. Me and

him never think about it. It's just people come up and give us the

statistics. Someone said after taking a photograph and 100 singles

and we carried on. We had no idea. You made this documentary as well to

coincide with the 50th and you found that you had a few closet fans, one

of them being Paul Weller, surprisingly. How did that come

about? You remember Paul. I always thought Paul, to his credit, he was

very much instrumental in helping the guys when they were first

learning to play and they've held a thing that he never admitted. He put

it right. I gave him an amp and he has never given it back to me when

he started out. Gosh. It is incredible, because you were saying

about your dad. He has been influential for you. Very much so. I

started in the working men's club and I joined an association at

holiday camps and I met Francis and we teamed up and here we are.

at it. That's movie two. Right, on we go. It turns out we should have a

new-found respect for this, the humble pen pencil. Marty Jopson

explains how this could re-write the future. The familiar gadgets of

everyday life, they get faster, slicker and slimmer. But an maizing

new material discovered by British scientists will transform this

technology forever. It will allow us to slim it all down, so thickness

will be the thickness of a piece of paper. It's called graphine. It won

a Nobel Prize for the two scientists who found it and it's been lauded as

the miracle material of the 20th century. It's stronger than diamond

and more conductive than copper and flexible than rubber and it's so

thin you can barely see it with the naked eye. It's made from the stuff

in your pencil, graphite. And graphite is millions of microscopic

layers of tightly packed carbon. When I put my thumb into the graph

graphite, and give it a rub around, it gets covered in a layer of it. If

I then press that back on to the paper, millions of layers are peeled

off. If I keep smudging my thumb across the paper the layers of

graphite get thinner and thinner. And if I keep going eventually I'll

end up with a layer of graph ITV1 atom thin thin and at that point I

have graphine. This doctor -- graphine one atom thin and at this

point I have it. This Dr Works with the men who found it. It is 200

times stronger than steel. To demonstrate the properties, Aravind

dissolves graphite and injects is into a special printer cartridge.

This sprays a thin layer on to a cellophane backing, which holds the

thin layer together. What we have here then is cellophane coated with

a layer of graphine. Are you sure? Yes. On its own cellophane cannot

conduct electricity, but when graphine is added, something

remarkable happens. We have an LED lamp there and as soon as you wire

it up. It starts to glow. It means that there is current flowing

through the piece of plastic. is so thin, there is very little

lectical resistance, making the most conductive material ever created.

Allowing scientists to shrink our circuit boards, leading to smaller

phones and computers. But it has another key property flexibility.

You can pick it up and you can bend it and you can twist it and still

the current flows through it and the lamp stays on. It's incredible. This

flexibility is getting electronics giants excited. Prototype an maces

show it applied to super-thin bendy plastics, making phones and tablets

foldable. This is really revolutionary. This will change

things? Yeah.The thinness also means it is 97% transparent.

Tackling a problem we face with touch-screen technology. Today's

mobile phones contain an element called indium, to make the touch

screens work. It is rare and becoming more expensive and the

coating that it makes is brittle in inflexible. On the other hand, super

bendy, conductive and transparent graphine is made from carbon which

is abundant, but high quality is currently hard to manufacture on a

large scale. Any imperfections in the process reduces the

conductivity. If scientists it crack this problem it won't just be

consumer technology that will change. Electric car batteries built

from millions of layers of graphine will charge in minutes thanks to the

high conductivity. Microscopic sensors in our body could detect

harm harmful mie coeBs -- microbes. It may well be the biggest

revolution since the silicone chip. It's the future. Incredible. Thank

you. Thanks very much to Rick and Francis and Bula Bula Quo is out

now. You can see The film on 5th July. Sir Tom Jones will be here on

Friday and we are trying to find children of other dads called Tom