11/07/2012 The One Show

Hello, welcome to The One Show with Alex Jones... And Matt Baker. I'm

not sure we have had a more decorated guest. We are going to

take a moment or two to embarrass her. She has broken 30 world

records. She has won 11 Paralympic cold medals. She holds that record

for the 100 metres, 200 metres, 400 metres and 800 metres. She has won

the wheelchair marathon a record six times. She is a dame and

Baroness. With at secret love of 80s soft-rock. A big round of

applause for the Dane Tanni Grey- Thompson! We cannot go on without

asking its. You have been at the House of Lords today. There has

been to-ing and fro-ing in Parliament. What is the atmosphere

like? Yesterday was really exciting. A lot of people were running up and

down the corridors, watching what is going on. Today has been a bit

more subdued. The vote did not take place. Most people want reform, the

huge argument is about what the reform will be. Time will tell!

Later we are going to be finding out what Tanni makes of this man,

Oscar Pistorius, who has qualified to run in the London Olympics and

the Paralympics. We also be seeing what Pat Butcher has been up to

since she left EastEnders. First, a young people are unwilling to work.

Not my words, what businesswoman Deborah Meaden things. But is it

their fault or their schools? To find out, wheat sent the dragon on

a quest to a school a stone's throw away from the Olympic Park.

Today, I enjoyed the trappings of success. But I started early and I

worked hard. By the time I had left school at 16, I had a job every

summer holiday. I was keen to start my own business. I have been heard

to say in the past that I am very worried that young people are

leaving school, not ready, not prepared, not willing to work. When

I talk to other employers and even in my own experience I find it very

difficult to attract apprentices into really good roles. I've been

asked by The One Show to look into this. I'm here at Cardinal Pole

School in Hackney. I am going to talk to some of the school-leavers

and find out if they are actually prepared to enter the workplace.

And they will need to be prepared. Youth unemployment is very high in

Hackney. 7% of the population is on jobseeker's Allowance, nearly twice

the national average. So, will these pupils be able to convince me

that they are good enough to get a job in such a challenging market?

want to do an apprenticeship in IT Engineering. I'll be studying ICT

and travel and tourism. I'd like to be a social worker. Recent figures

show that the number of teenagers leaving school at 16 has risen. So,

are they ready? Who feels that school has prepared them well for

the next step? You do? You do? Two people out of 13. Not encouraging.

How many of you have already done work, part-time jobs, summer

holiday jobs? Only two of them have had a Saturday job. I'm astounded!

Getting back to basics, how well can they fill out an application

form? Can I look at your application form? You told me

really interesting stuff, but in a slightly disorganised way. Let's

have a look at another one, pass it over here. Do you know, what you

have just done his classic. Being able to say I have had experienced,

I have learned about it, it doesn't tell me if you are good at it.

There is a difference between doing something and having the aptitude

for it. These students need guidance to build the basic skills

for applying for jobs. That falls to their head of it here. Out of 10,

how ready are they to go into the workplace? That really hard. Some

of them are 10 out of 10. Some of them are less ready. What more

could you do to get them more ready? One of the things I would

like to see is more work experience. One thing that all schools need to

start doing more of his to make sure that the same support is given

to children that are looking for jobs, instead of university places.

One of the obvious ways to get into the workplace is through an

apprenticeship scheme. But I get the impression that this route is

not encouraged or valued that highly. Do you think you are

offered academia rather than a condition? Do you think it is

considered a better thing to do, to stay on at school? Yes. And what

about those of you that have chosen the apprenticeship route? Do you

think it was offered as a genuine option? No. I find this quite

shocking. With no work experience under their belt, at least an

apprenticeship would get them out working and gathering the skills I

would be looking for. They seemed badly prepared for the big wide

world ahead of them. In a situation where schools are rewarded for

academic results, these students are often left to forage for

themselves. They look for a BTEC course, Level 1, some of them

actually find apprenticeships which are meaningful. But many others end

up on meaningless courses that keep them off the dole for a few years

but did not lead to the sort of jobs you want them to have. Have

you got a careers adviser? We have somebody visiting, 1.5 days a week.

How many young people today have to see? They will have to see the

whole of your 11. 160. Quite a tall You have to lose those inhibitions.

You have to say, this is what I am good at. There are times in life

when you have got to do that. Some of the pupils I met are good at

what they do. They awry even one or two I would offer a chance to. But

there are plenty who do not appear to have made any attempt to get

work experience. Just as it was in my day, I fear that schools are

concentrating on preparing kids for more education, not getting into

the workplace. Thank you very much for their

honest opinions and thanks to Deborah. She's great, very

inspiring. Soon, you will be commentating on over 4000

Paralympic events. Its on Radio 5 Live. Before we talk about the

Paralympics, let's have a look at you in one of your big races.

have plenty to choose from. We went for Atlanta in 1996. The break, on

the bend. Here comes Tanni Grey- Thompson. Classic 800 metre racing.

Shannon is not finished yet. But look at this, she is going to come

away and win the gold medal for Great Britain. That was judged

absolutely perfectly. The time is very fast as well. Tanni Grey-

Thompson wins, in a new world record time. How does it make you

feel, looking back to 96? The worst thing is when you see the clock in

the bottom of the screen, how old it looks. Some of it feels like

yesterday. I'm glad I don't do it any more. I'm glad I get to sit and

talk about it instead. Do you ever get out onto the track? Yes, it's

miserable. I no longer fit in my racing chair because my bottom is a

bigger than it used to be. It is miserable, so horrible going slow.

You can still remember what it feels like to push quickly. I hate

it. Would you rather be commentating or competing? That's a

hard one! At this stage in your life, I suppose... If I could have

competed in London, eight years younger, it would have been amazing.

Actually, as an athlete, you get to see nothing. You train and compete.

Actually, working for Five Live, I will be able to watch loads of

athletics. That's fantastic. I'll be there from first thing in the

morning, right and the last thing at night. Two weeks to go, a lot of

talk is about the Olympics. For some people that have not

experienced the Paralympics, what do they have to look forward to?

It's amazing. It is elite sport. One person winning and everybody

else not. If you look at the sports, we are going to have medal winners.

It means such a lot to compete on home soil. You know, rugby is

amazing, basketball is incredible. Athletics, I'm a bit biased about

that. Incredible danger as well, in some of these sports. The

basketball, they don't pull punches? You get a few smashed

fingers. It depends what the referee sees. Those sports are

really dynamic. Wheelchair racing, there are often crashes. Luckily,

nobody is ever hurt too badly. That is the drama of sport. You go to

the Velodrome to see if there is going to be a crash and you see

that in wheelchair racing as well. The Paralympics starts on 26th

August. Is there an argument for having it before the Olympics?

quite like being after. We tease the Olympic guys and say that they

are the warm-up for us. It worked out pretty well. More people come

to watch the Olympics, although that is changing hugely. There are

more tickets sold for these games than ever before. 1.6 million have

been sold for the Paralympics, there has never happened before. It

works really well, we built the excitement through the Olympics and

Bennett kicks off again. With Five Live, you can listen 24 hours a day.

It will be wall-to-wall. You're not going to get much sleep!

This week, the Rolling Stones celebrate 50 years of rock and roll

and ridiculous backstage demands. Demands that DJ Andy Kershaw

It was July 25th, 1982. 30 summers ago. The Rolling Stones set Leeds

alight with a ground-breaking concert. It transformed the live

music industry. It changed the way we saw and heard mega dance. And it

The Rolling Stones were the biggest rock and roll band in the world.

The Leeds concert was their final date at the end of a two year world

tour. They wanted to go out with a spectacular, and they did, in front

of 120,000 fans on the stage the size of an aircraft carrier. I was

right at the heart of it, 22 years old. I looked about 15. I was

grandly titled backstage Labour, ordinator. Because outside concerts

on this scale were unprecedented, we will, necessarily, making it up

Look at me, back then. Would you have trusted me with a world-famous

Music Act? The scary truth was, many people already had. I had been

entertainment secretary at Leeds University for two and-a-half years,

booking the bands and organising and running their gigs. I booked a

more, from dire Straits to do clash. I inherited a fantastic legacy. It

was well before my time, in 1971, when even the mighty Storms

considered Leeds University to be a bigger venue. But more than a

decade on you were not going to find them queuing on a dirty

basement staircase. The live music industry had grown up and put on

muscle. The Rolling Stones had become a Corporation. My beloved

Leeds University refectory could not hold any more. I was at the

university when I got a call from Harvey Goldsmith, the leading

concert promoter. Did I want to work for The Stones this summer?

And could I bring my university stage crew? On that Sage Group,

Neil Hunt and Dawn Collins were two of the team that's enough to follow

me to Roundhay Park. A little quieter than last time we were

standing here. What was your job? Blowing the balloons up, do you

remember? Thousands and thousands! We had two frames that we had to

fill with balloons. Did you get to see any of it? I saw some of the

Stones. But I was put in fences up, as fast as the punters could tear

it down. It was a lot to do with what colour it was. How many times

did I have you painted? It was the recurring task. The site co-

ordinated decided that it was not just the wrong colour, it was the

wrong shade. He said if it is still the same shade of green come Sunday,

Mick and the boys will walk off the stage! It was not just balloons and

fences. The Rolling Stones, giving as two days notice, insisted on a

Japanese water garden for the backstage area, complete with a coy

carp. In an age before DIY superstores, we needed somewhere to

get supplies. Believe it or not, this humble hardware shop came to

the rescue. By the time the crowds were packed into Roundhay Park, it

was nuts and bolts from Stanton's hardware that was held in giving

together, including the stage itself. Were you aware that without

this remarkable little hardware shop, the Rolling Stones gig at

Roundhay Park could not have happened? There are all these

places like B&Q, nothing like Stanton's. It was a huge relief

when we finally got them on stage, just here, on the Sunday afternoon.

I heard the boom of explosions and all of those balloons, thousands of

them, were released into the sky. A wave of euphoria swept around. The

Roundhay Park concert set the precedent and troop the blueprint.

The mega gig is now the norm, because we were daft enough to try

It said on the BBC website that they actually meeting up for

rehearsals. Fingers crossed, they might do a tour next year. Anyway,

on to dismantle stop Oscar Pistorius. He is the first Abbey to

run it to qualify for but the Paralympics and the Olympics. Some

say that his blades help. Others say there is a disadvantage. Where

It is probably too different. He is definitely slower out of the box

but he improves the speed as he goes along -- out of the blocks. He

is amazing because he has done so much for the profile of the

Paralympics. People are coming to watch the games because they want

to see him run. As we go forward, we probably need to think about

which events should be at the Olympics and the Paralympics.

you think there will ever be a point when disabled runners will be

at an advantage? I think we are fairly close with the design of

some of the prosthetics. Barath is to have competed at bows before,

but Oscar is the first one with a huge global profile -- there are

athletes who have competed at bows before. It just looks really call.

The Paralympics start on 29th August, sorry about that. Who

should we be watching out for? There are loads. The first one, J

Jones, my husband coaches, she is great. She is 16 and doing quicker

times than I was at the peak of my career. She has broken the 400

metres record. Are you helping with the training? I dip in and out, my

husband thinks I don't know anything about it. What does he

know? Lea Pearson, he has won nine golds at the Paralympics. If he

wins another three he will be the most decorated Paralympian. And

Jonnie Peacock. He has just got the 100 watt record, could he beat

Oscar Pistorius? It is going to be amazing. Oscar, in the 400, it is a

case of how many he is going to win by. In the 100 it will be the most

amazing race. There is also an American athlete called Duran

Singleton. -- Jerome Singleton. He is an amazing guy, a triple

graduate, he has worked at NASA, if he has worked in the Hadron

collider and he is quite a good runner. That will be the one to

watch. Thank you ever so much. To coincide with the Olympics, there

have been some spectacular and some time rather strange events going on.

From boats being made entirely from bits of donated wood, to an island

being towed all the way from the a la tick -- the Arctic to Weymouth.

Whatever next, setting fire to Stonehenge?

The 2012 Olympic Games has inspired some oppressive -- impressive

arenas, creating a new skyline across London. Head 100 miles west

and you will find another structure that has been wowing us for 5,000

years. Stonehenge needs little introduction. Even though its

precise origins are still a mystery, its draw is global and enduring.

Now, as part of the 2012 Cultural Olympiad, it has been opened up to

a group of extraordinary French performance artists. Compagnie

Carabosse specialise in constructing elaborate fire gardens

in iconic landscapes. Gerard is their artistic director. Can you

explain what it is you are trying to create? It is to try to give the

meaning of the stones. So we try to create atmosphere, pictures and a

good feeling for people. They can walk into the fire, feel the heat

and smell the wax which is burning. The idea was when we think about

this place, sulphur is quite important. So we decided to make a

sulphur installation. Where do you go after this? Milton Keynes. Which

should be very different. It is 9 o'clock and the sun is starting to

set over Stonehenge. Thousands of years ago, they could have been the

cue for some sort of sun worship. Tonight, people are gathering to

Ruth Mackenzie, director of the 2012 Cultural Olympiad, explains

the importance of events like this. How does an event like this fit

into the Cultural Olympiad? One of the highlights of our finale, which

is the London 2012 festival, has been a load of commissions to

artists around the world to create special one-off spectaculars like

this at Stonehenge. As you can see, thousands of people have come.

do these cultural events fit in with the Olympic Games? In ancient

Greece, the artists as well as athletes in the games and we wanted

to put artists back at the heart of the Games. We have a celebration of

the greatest artists from around the world, all over the UK, with 10

million opportunities to take part. Just being this close to Stonehenge

is a treat in itself. To see it lit up so beautifully is a truly

unforgettable experience. I think it is absolutely fantastic. I like

it when the guys are over there make it blow up. Fabulous,

absolutely incredible. It is kind of mystical as well. It looks

incredible. Unfortunately, tickets for Stonehenge have sold out for

tonight. Lucy is here, so that is good. To compensate! There is not

much money around for things like the arts at the minute. How much

has this Cultural Olympiad cost? is going to come in at around �105

million. A few eyebrows will be raised but split between three

agencies, the Arts Council England, legacy Trust UK and the Olympic

lottery distributor. The organisers say when you think about the effect

this will have, lots of young people involved, or 60 million

people in Tel two, and it is incredibly complex -- in total.

Also the news stories it generates, far far away from the UK. It is

hard to put a price on these things. It is not a new idea. It is kind of

bang on the money when you think about what the originators of the

modern Olympics had in mind. The Cultural Olympiad has been around

properly since 1952 as we would recognise it. Beijing upped the

ante. It culminated with 1500 young musicians playing on the Great Wall

of China. So there is a lot to live up to, put it that way. What big

events can we look forward to? will look for work -- we will live

up to it, ours are none too shabby! In Coventry there will be a huge

carnival, performance and festival on 28th of July to awaken Lady

Godiva from her sleep of 1,000 years. They will awaken her with

this massive performance, she will be in the former by gigantic carbon

fibre puppet. We don't know what she will look like -- the form of a

Foot a massive British cultural heroine, saviour of the poor.

Famously rode through Coventry naked. What we know is that she

will be wearing a coat. He does as well with the rain. Maybe that is

it! Lots of pockets in the Tote filled with messages from young

people of Coventry, then she will be peddled to London. This is

important, in Gateshead on Sunday, a giant edible map of the UK, lots

of landmarks in cake, Scarborough seafront, Blackpool Tower, the

Olympic Stadium. Not too far from where you live, nip along for a

slice. Thank you! Pat Butcher and Pam St Clement couldn't be less

alike. It turns out that Pam is much more at home with a waxed

jacket and a walk in the woods. For the last couple of decades, Pam

St Clement has put most of her time and effort into the life of Pat

But since their character's dramatic exit this year, she now

has time to spend on a real passion, wildlife -- since her character.

For the last 25 years, you have been shouting and yelling at

everybody in Albert Square. In many ways, you are more at home watching

wildlife, aren't you? I am afraid I am. I think I know more about

animals than Pat. I think the nearest pad would get to animals is

wearing them. She would hate the fact that animals might mess up her

home. I was brought up on a farm on Dartmoor. They were very much part

of my everyday life. Now she has a keen interest in the wildlife

around her home near the Chilterns. There is one bird that has been

particularly intriguing her. She first saw it 20 years ago on her

way back to Dartmoor, the red kite. The plumage is stunning and I

thought I had to find out about bees. That is when I discovered

they had been just newly introduced to the Chilterns. I thought, why?

Why the Chilterns? Red kites were once common in Britain but by the

end of the 19th century they were hunted to near extinction. From the

late 80s they were reintroduced to a number of sites around the

country. To appreciate why Pam's sees them so often in the Chilterns,

we need to get up in the eye -- in the air. We are climbing up to 1500

feet. We can appreciate why it is so perfect for red kites, lots of

lovely mature trees for them to build their nest. You don't see it

so well from the road, you don't realise how much would there is.

suspect there is a red kite down there. The first red kite from the

air. Red kites are primarily scavengers, feeding off dead

animals. The Chiltern hills give them the updraft to reach the

heights they need to spot their next meal. Their eyesight is so

good, it is like having a pair of binoculars strapped to their face.

Between 8 and 10 times better than ours. It is phenomenal. Off to the

right, look at the speed it is moving. I hate to say it, they are

more manoeuvrable than you are! I like most birds of prey, red kites

are quite sociable -- are like. Like vultures they will watch where

others find food and dive into the share the meat. There is a lot of

food on offer as local people leave food out for them. I have seen red

kite on a lot of occasions but never like this. Extraordinary, I

have never seen so many together. There is obviously food down there,

they are taking it on the wing. I didn't think I would see this, all

these feeding together. One thing that worries me is having this

amount, we have put a species back here, but have we have a balanced?

The original intention was for the kites to spread out across the

south. But because of the free handouts, they have hung around the

Chilterns, and that is causing concern for conservation groups.

How many pairs of red kites are there in the locality? In the

Chilterns it is hard to tell because there are so many, it is

hard to tell with certain sea. The best estimate with its -- with

certainty. The best estimate is 600 pairs. It is an astonishingly high

number for such a small area. The generous local residents have been

living out food for the birds, which has encouraged them to stay

put. The next stage in helping kites around here would be for the

local people to start to think about withdrawing that feeding, and

helping the kites to spread out into the wider countryside, and

give more people the opportunity to see kites, as we have done today,

in the wild. You see that red tail, isn't that beautiful? I think they

are wonderful. They certainly are mesmerising.

Thanks to our guests. Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, the Paralympics

start on the 29th and they will be covered on Radio 5 live and 5 live