:00:19. > :00:31.Piers Morgan. Not pretty, but that Now we can join the news
:00:32. > :01:19.You are quite posh. Did you hope it would develop from the phrase,
:01:20. > :01:26.fiver, darling? It was one of my first jobs out of drama school. I
:01:27. > :01:38.think I was called Carmen. I faxed a note to the producer saying, my
:01:39. > :01:44.surname should be Rollers. Talking of Eastenders, we have got some big
:01:45. > :01:48.news. Team rickshaw will be riding into Albert Square at the end of
:01:49. > :01:51.their 700 mile journey from Larne in Northern Ireland. In fact, the whole
:01:52. > :01:57.of Children in Need night will be coming from the home of Eastenders
:01:58. > :02:01.on November the 15th, including the One Show. We will be live from the
:02:02. > :02:12.Queen Vic. Can you imagine how you will feel at the finish line? As
:02:13. > :02:22.well as talking to Amanda tonight, we will be finding out what happened
:02:23. > :02:30.to this lard. I set the room on fire. I went upstairs and set the
:02:31. > :02:36.beds on fire. There was a person in the house. It was your dad that
:02:37. > :02:39.time, was it? Back then he was an 11-year-old arsonist locked up in a
:02:40. > :02:43.secure unit. He is here tonight to tell us how he turned his life
:02:44. > :02:48.around, with the help of the man who made the original BBC documentary.
:02:49. > :02:52.First, the storms overnight cost for macrolides, left over 600,000 homes
:02:53. > :02:58.without power and played havoc with travel plans. Our storm Hunter,
:02:59. > :03:06.Lucy, spent the day in the West Country. Overnight in Somerset,
:03:07. > :03:08.hurricane force winds have been recorded and there's been a
:03:09. > :03:12.significant amount of rain. But it's not just here that has taken a
:03:13. > :03:17.battering. There's been widespread power cuts, disruption to travel.
:03:18. > :03:22.This morning, the Isle of White recorded a wind speed of 99 mph.
:03:23. > :03:29.Meanwhile, over 200,000 homes were left without electricity. During
:03:30. > :03:35.1987's storm, 15 million trees were blown down. We don't yet know how
:03:36. > :03:39.many this storm has claimed, but in storm affected areas there are teams
:03:40. > :03:43.working around the clock to clear the debris. Somerset highways agency
:03:44. > :03:47.is just one team that has had a long night. Simon White is in charge of
:03:48. > :03:53.keeping the roads clear in this area. What is the extent of the
:03:54. > :03:57.damage in Somerset? We've had about 75 trees down across the county in
:03:58. > :04:03.the space of the last 12 hours. Tell me about the history of this brewer
:04:04. > :04:07.fella. You'll a-macro this came down at around 5:30am. It has not rested
:04:08. > :04:13.very well, so this is one of our most challenging trees to get down.
:04:14. > :04:17.It shows the power of the wind we had last night. 65 of those 75 trees
:04:18. > :04:21.are gone and the roads are opened. Once like this which are more
:04:22. > :04:26.complex, we've got to bring specialists in an deal with things
:04:27. > :04:30.like this. Something this big, once you cut it, give got to get it off
:04:31. > :04:38.site, so you've got to have a digger. These guys are not just
:04:39. > :04:42.moving the trees from across the highway. There are branches that
:04:43. > :04:47.have been dislodged in the storm. They have to get up with a tree with
:04:48. > :04:50.a chainsaw right at the top and they have to cut them all off to make
:04:51. > :04:54.sure they are safe. It is incredible. As today has shown,
:04:55. > :05:00.fallen trees and branches can have fatal consequences. We knew it was
:05:01. > :05:07.coming and seemingly we were better prepared than in 1987. But when it
:05:08. > :05:10.hits, the St Jude storm was highly localised, creating pockets of
:05:11. > :05:15.destruction in certain parts of the country. Where the effects will be
:05:16. > :05:20.felt for some time to come. John Hammond is here to talk a bit more
:05:21. > :05:27.about this. It was predicted as the biggest storm since 19... Oh, my
:05:28. > :05:34.poppy has blown off! The wind is still going! The biggest since 1987.
:05:35. > :05:39.Was it what you expected, was it not as strong? Pretty much as we
:05:40. > :05:44.expected. The Midlands and Wales got off lightly. But through that zone
:05:45. > :05:49.from south-west England, southern England towards the London area,
:05:50. > :05:53.East Anglia, we saw gusts that we were expecting. You've got all this
:05:54. > :05:58.new technology now that helps you to be a lot more on the button and you
:05:59. > :06:04.would have been back in 96 dashed back 1987. Does that mean there will
:06:05. > :06:10.be no surprises from now on? Afraid not. The atmosphere is inherently
:06:11. > :06:14.chaotic. Despite advances in understanding the atmosphere, we
:06:15. > :06:18.occasionally are not going to get it right. But we've gone a quantum leap
:06:19. > :06:22.since 1987 to how we are now in terms of the technology, the
:06:23. > :06:27.computing power and knowledge of the atmosphere and how we get the
:06:28. > :06:30.warnings out as well. We do a lot of liaising with emergency responders
:06:31. > :06:34.to get those warnings out early. We had them out at the back end of last
:06:35. > :06:47.week. Even though the storm hadn't formed, we were confident it was
:06:48. > :06:49.going to. Nailing down exactly where the path of the worst destruction
:06:50. > :06:52.was going to be is a more difficult job. It's remarkable when you look
:06:53. > :06:55.at what the computers do. Tell us about the sting jet. One of the
:06:56. > :06:57.advances in our understanding of the atmosphere is the sting jet, a
:06:58. > :07:02.phenomenon. We got the storm forming, the torrential rain. At the
:07:03. > :07:07.back-end of the storm we have this sting jet, air rushing down from the
:07:08. > :07:10.stratosphere. It spreads out in the form of big gusts. Although the
:07:11. > :07:15.coasts normally get hit by strong winds, inland the sting really
:07:16. > :07:19.ploughs a path across southern England, including your patch at
:07:20. > :07:26.home, and the London area and into East Anglia. Those sorts of speeds,
:07:27. > :07:31.with trees fully laden with leaves, bound to cause problems. Amanda, you
:07:32. > :07:38.were saying your friend's trampoline was there but now it's gone. Yes,
:07:39. > :07:43.she woke up and it was gone. Someone has either nixed it for Christmas or
:07:44. > :07:47.it has flown somewhere and done probably horrible damage. This storm
:07:48. > :07:51.has whistled across the North Sea, gone through Scandinavia, it's
:07:52. > :07:56.moving that fast. The gusts in Scandinavia were worse than here.
:07:57. > :08:02.You were in a hotel last night right near to the weather studios so you
:08:03. > :08:06.could get to work. We were. We had to be there for when it hit this
:08:07. > :08:12.morning. But I've got to go home tonight. I don't know what the
:08:13. > :08:18.damage will be like. You've got no electricity, have you? No, the power
:08:19. > :08:25.is out at home. Fittingly, Mary Poppins said that she would stay
:08:26. > :08:29.with the Banks family until the wind changed. A new story starring Emma
:08:30. > :08:31.Thompson tells the story of the woman who created the world's host
:08:32. > :08:39.famous nanny. # A spoonful of sugar helps the
:08:40. > :08:51.medicine go down. Walt Disney's Mary Poppins has
:08:52. > :08:56.charmed audiences for decades. Julie Andrews plays the most famous nanny
:08:57. > :09:00.in cinema history. Disney gave her big-screen break in 1964. But you
:09:01. > :09:04.might be surprised to know that a childminder with magical powers had
:09:05. > :09:10.a lifelong before Hollywood came calling. Mary Poppins first appeared
:09:11. > :09:14.in book form in 1934 a fictional creation of author PL Travers, who
:09:15. > :09:18.was quite surprised to find her story being published at all. It
:09:19. > :09:22.never occurred to me that anyone would want to publish it. I was
:09:23. > :09:27.writing it really for myself. I thought, well, a publisher won't
:09:28. > :09:30.want this, but apparently he did. A fiercely private woman, her
:09:31. > :09:35.background was long shrouded in mystery, with the writer Brian
:09:36. > :09:41.sibling knowing her well. He knew her secrets. She was born in new
:09:42. > :09:46.south wales Australia. She grew up very much caught up in the world of
:09:47. > :09:51.storytelling. How did she end up in England? She wanted to escape from
:09:52. > :09:55.Australia. Her father died when she was seven, her mother tried to
:09:56. > :10:00.commit suicide when she was ten. It was in London that she wrote the
:10:01. > :10:04.first of the stories. The books were very successful, successful not just
:10:05. > :10:08.in Britain but America. It captured the imagination of the daughter of a
:10:09. > :10:12.Hollywood producer, none other than the king of animation, Walt Disney.
:10:13. > :10:22.He became convinced a film version of the story would make a fortune.
:10:23. > :10:24.Disney was used to getting his own way, but Pamela Travers was no
:10:25. > :10:27.pushover when it came to negotiating the film rights. It took nearly 20
:10:28. > :10:30.years to get those rights. She didn't like the idea of Mary Poppins
:10:31. > :10:35.becoming an animated character. At that time, Disney only made animated
:10:36. > :10:40.films. It was only when he persuaded her he could make a movie of Mary
:10:41. > :10:45.Poppins that wasn't a cartoon. Was it the money that persuaded her?
:10:46. > :10:49.That was part of the equation, and was away re-establishing the fact
:10:50. > :10:51.you was the author of this well-known character. People knew
:10:52. > :10:57.the character but didn't know who the author was anymore. Production
:10:58. > :11:01.began in 1963. While the characters were having fun on screen, tensions
:11:02. > :11:21.on the set were brewing right from the start between Travers and
:11:22. > :11:23.Disney. The didn't really get on. It was very stormy. It really was a
:11:24. > :11:25.head-on collision between two very charismatic, very powerful, very
:11:26. > :11:27.independent people. She was somebody that wasn't going to be brushed
:11:28. > :11:30.aside. She had long and very difficult consultations. A lot of
:11:31. > :11:32.what she said founded into the film. The film premiered in 1964 and
:11:33. > :11:34.received a rapturous five-minute standing ovation. Disney felt
:11:35. > :11:38.vindicated. He had a huge hit on his hands. But there was one woman in
:11:39. > :11:43.the auditorium who was not clapping. Far from it, she was in floods of
:11:44. > :11:52.tears. Pamela Travers. She hated the cartoon elements of the film. And a
:11:53. > :11:57.lovely thing she is too! Travers was so appalled, she vowed never to work
:11:58. > :12:01.with Hollywood again. 50 years on, her story has been turned into a
:12:02. > :12:08.film starring Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson. Well, Pamela Travers. You
:12:09. > :12:15.can't imagine how excited I am to finally meet you. My name is Mrs
:12:16. > :12:20.Travers. What do you think that PL Travers union would have made of
:12:21. > :12:24.this new film? She would have been appalled, outrage and horrified. But
:12:25. > :12:28.somewhere underneath, I think she would have been secretly quite
:12:29. > :12:33.pleased. But she would definitely have notes for everybody about how
:12:34. > :12:43.it should have been done! Let us begin. She has a lot of ideas. What
:12:44. > :12:50.kind of ideas? No, that is not a word. We made it up. PL Travers
:12:51. > :12:53.wrote another seven Mary Poppins novels but none of them match the
:12:54. > :12:57.success of the first. The film version made her a multimillionaire
:12:58. > :13:06.race, but it was a high price to pay for such a very private person. You
:13:07. > :13:14.can find out more about PL Travers and Mary Poppins in a special on
:13:15. > :13:19.November the 30th on BBC Two. I was never a fan of those cartoon bits.
:13:20. > :13:26.We were a massive fan of Mary Poppins. Lexie, my daughter, is
:13:27. > :13:33.learning a song from it as we speak. She's watching at home. You
:13:34. > :13:37.dedicated your autobiography, No Holding Back, to Lexie and Holly.
:13:38. > :13:41.It's interesting how things started for you. Your mum had a very
:13:42. > :13:46.different experience to you, bringing up your daughters. It was
:13:47. > :13:50.pretty tough for her. It was heroic. She was on her own a lot of the
:13:51. > :13:54.time. She had to cope with so much. She gave us the most amazing
:13:55. > :13:59.childhood. I always remember being happy. She used to let me and my
:14:00. > :14:04.sister, Debbie, very cutlery and crockery in the garden to keep us
:14:05. > :14:08.happy! Weeks later we would dig things up. I remember digging up a
:14:09. > :14:19.stainless steel teapot and giving it to my grandad for his birthday. He
:14:20. > :14:22.must have been thrilled! You say in the book that you wouldn't allow
:14:23. > :14:25.your daughters to do that. My mum said, I did it to keep you quiet.
:14:26. > :14:29.She had three jobs at one time. I don't blame her. There's no way my
:14:30. > :14:33.daughters are allowed out of the house with crockery, no! What is
:14:34. > :14:38.really obvious from the first chapter is you were surrounded by
:14:39. > :14:47.lots of strong women. The one I Love is your gram. She's amazing. Tell us
:14:48. > :14:51.about her. She is 93. She lives in Gloucestershire. She is completely
:14:52. > :14:57.independent, she's at home is still on her own, stubborn to the point of
:14:58. > :15:02.annoyance. But that generation don't want any help, they don't want to
:15:03. > :15:08.make a fuss. My mum is fantastic with her and my mum's sister, always
:15:09. > :15:12.visiting. She sends them away all the time and says, you've got your
:15:13. > :15:18.own lives, dear. Is that the grandparent whose cat you named? My
:15:19. > :15:24.mum keeps telling me off because she says it's not true. My Nan had a cat
:15:25. > :15:29.called Mandy. Towards the end of its life it was just this mattered,
:15:30. > :15:36.mangled creature. It was very sad. But I was due to be borne any minute
:15:37. > :15:41.and my mum called me Amanda. Mandy and Amanda. My mum says it was from
:15:42. > :15:45.a sitcom, which is probably true. But the fact is Chris calls me
:15:46. > :15:52.Mandy, everyone does, just to annoy me. There are lots of funny bits in
:15:53. > :15:57.the book, but there is a serious side as well because at the
:15:58. > :16:01.beginning it tells us about the difficult childhood you had. Did
:16:02. > :16:07.that play a part in how driven you were? I honestly think it did. Even
:16:08. > :16:13.though we were so happy and had a great upbringing, I think it was
:16:14. > :16:22.that matriarchal line that me and my sister had. We had a feistiness
:16:23. > :16:26.installed in us to survive and keep moving forward, and I think that
:16:27. > :16:31.came from my mother and her work ethic. She was incredible and did a
:16:32. > :16:38.great job. When you got on stage it was not because you wanted any fame
:16:39. > :16:41.celebrity. Yes, every celebrity says that but we did not have those
:16:42. > :16:46.celebrity magazines when we were growing up. We did not have the same
:16:47. > :16:51.culture as we had now where everybody wants to be famous. All I
:16:52. > :16:57.wanted to do was be on stage so I would sing in the back garden and
:16:58. > :17:03.annoyed the neighbours. I would charge people 5p to come and watch
:17:04. > :17:10.my production! It was the production of Aladdin when you got turned down,
:17:11. > :17:16.was it not? Angie, who has been on the show before, you threw her out,
:17:17. > :17:22.I wanted the lead, and she did not give it to me. I was absolutely
:17:23. > :17:27.mortified, and she gave me a sherry to calm my nerves. I will not say
:17:28. > :17:32.how old I was! My grandma used to make me very weak martinis! My
:17:33. > :17:40.mother did not even know, she was appalled. What have your friends and
:17:41. > :17:45.family made the book, then? What did they say, what with their reaction?
:17:46. > :17:51.Overall, it is OK. My family found it difficult because I am in the
:17:52. > :17:55.public eye and they are in my life so they have to be dragged into it.
:17:56. > :18:01.Overall, they are quite happy about it. They are a massive part of the
:18:02. > :18:07.story, and I would not have survived if it had not been thanks to them.
:18:08. > :18:11.There is a sense that you have written it all down to... It is
:18:12. > :18:20.there for my daughters to read when they are older. I have not held back
:18:21. > :18:27.and I have been very honest. No Holding Back is out in the shops
:18:28. > :18:31.now. In 1975 the BBC aired a fly on the wall documentary featuring an
:18:32. > :18:35.11-year-old arsonist whose future was being decided by psychologists
:18:36. > :18:39.and social workers at the secure assessment centre in County Durham.
:18:40. > :18:43.Mini and Me was directed by Franc Roddam and had an impact on the
:18:44. > :18:46.public. It is being shown on BBC for tomorrow and in a moment we will
:18:47. > :18:51.catch up with Franc Roddam and Mini. First a flavour of the
:18:52. > :19:05.original documentary starting with an explanation of why he was locked
:19:06. > :19:11.up. You are here following two offences of arson. It is a school
:19:12. > :19:17.for maladjusted children. Michael set fire to his home while his
:19:18. > :19:23.father was asleep upstairs. Two months later he returned to the
:19:24. > :19:28.house and set fire to what remained. Michael and squandered 18 times. He
:19:29. > :19:38.received regular psychiatric treatment through this period. There
:19:39. > :19:51.was a box of matches their and I said, I will have them! There was
:19:52. > :19:57.too much time to burn the down. It was lucky there was not a person in
:19:58. > :20:03.the house. What do you think about it? You think it is a good thing to
:20:04. > :20:15.do? To me, it is. To others, it is not. Do you understand what you are
:20:16. > :20:27.saying? Yes. What if you set a fire to somebody's house? You think you
:20:28. > :20:32.should be allowed to do that? No. Well, I can tell you what has not
:20:33. > :20:39.happened. You are not going back home. We are not sending you to an
:20:40. > :20:47.ordinary school. What is going to happen is that you going to be here
:20:48. > :20:52.for the next three or four weeks. We will find out who is going to have
:20:53. > :21:00.you. I will let you know myself, all right? I promise I will tell you
:21:01. > :21:11.where you are going. I will tell you who is going to work with you, OK?
:21:12. > :21:19.Yes. Well... As I said before, I do not think it would be right for you
:21:20. > :21:28.to go back to an ordinary school. It would not be good for you, it would
:21:29. > :21:37.not be good for other people. In view of the history of
:21:38. > :21:42.anti-social behaviour and the serious risk that Michael presents
:21:43. > :21:46.to himself and the community, he would require long-term treatments
:21:47. > :21:53.under conditions of physical security.
:21:54. > :21:59.Well, Mini and Franc Roddam are here. It is a powerful documentary.
:22:00. > :22:04.The fact that it was about your life, it is quite upsetting. There
:22:05. > :22:12.was a real public reaction after that, was there not? There was a
:22:13. > :22:16.strong reaction towards him. I do not think much has happened since
:22:17. > :22:24.then. The documentary had a big impact and I think it is because
:22:25. > :22:31.Mini has a strong personality. You were thinking that this kid should
:22:32. > :22:39.not be locked up. All of the letters that came in for Mini, he had no
:22:40. > :22:43.idea, did he? No, it was Franc some years later who told me that there
:22:44. > :22:46.were lots of letters at the BBC. My understanding was that the
:22:47. > :22:49.authorities got rid of them. Were you not allowed to watch the
:22:50. > :22:55.documentary interview 21? How did you feel the first time you saw the
:22:56. > :23:03.documentary, especially the end bits that we saw there? It had an impact
:23:04. > :23:09.on me. I was watching it as a 21-year-old man. Part of me wondered
:23:10. > :23:17.where that boy had gone too. By that time, I felt like my psyche had been
:23:18. > :23:26.fractured slightly. I was watching this young boy the speak with such
:23:27. > :23:33.confidence. I was struggling myself at that time. What did happen to
:23:34. > :23:39.you? You did not go down south, did you? No, the authorities did a
:23:40. > :23:45.U-turn. There is that finale to the documentary where, unanimously, they
:23:46. > :23:52.are saying that I need to be locked up. They did the complete opposite
:23:53. > :23:58.and sent me to the other side of the campus with no bars on the windows
:23:59. > :24:03.or locked doors. Franc, Mini spent his life in and out of prisons and
:24:04. > :24:10.hospitals but you believed that it could have been so different. It is
:24:11. > :24:13.interesting. If he had come from a middle-class family, he would not
:24:14. > :24:18.have been locked away. I remember the psychiatrist in the film had
:24:19. > :24:21.said that I should get rid of the romantic notion that people can be
:24:22. > :24:25.cured. He said that some people should be managed and he put Mini in
:24:26. > :24:32.that category. I disagreed with him and I think that is why we formed a
:24:33. > :24:39.friendship. We finished the film and Mini said that this was a great
:24:40. > :24:48.moment. He started jumping on trains and coming to London. In 18 months,
:24:49. > :24:54.he ran away 18 times, I think. My wife and I gave him some supper and
:24:55. > :24:57.we took him back. We formed a long friendship and the authorities told
:24:58. > :25:02.me that I cannot see him any more because I am disrupting his
:25:03. > :25:07.treatment. I said, OK. They did not tell Mini. He thought that I had
:25:08. > :25:14.abandoned him. We got together ten years later, I think. They actually
:25:15. > :25:18.told me that it was Franc's idea that we did not meet. You have
:25:19. > :25:27.written it down in an autobiography. How cathartic was it for you to
:25:28. > :25:35.write that? Hugely. It was an opportunity to have an expression,
:25:36. > :25:42.vent some anger in a positive way. Obviously, as a child setting fires,
:25:43. > :25:52.that was my expression. Franc came along and gave me a voice. He told
:25:53. > :25:57.me to be myself. It was an invitation to good to refuse. It
:25:58. > :26:03.reconnects you with what you were thinking of as a boy, I guess? Yes.
:26:04. > :26:09.When I had written the book, I felt like I had got the strength back
:26:10. > :26:15.that I had when I was ten years old. You talk to Fire Services and all
:26:16. > :26:26.sorts now? Yes. Well, listen, we wish you the very best. The book,
:26:27. > :26:30.Mini and Me by Michael Cooper is out now and you can see Alan Yentob's
:26:31. > :26:36.Mini: A Life Revisited tomorrow night on BBC Four at 10pm. Thank you
:26:37. > :26:43.to M No Holding Back is out now. We mentioned a trampoline that had
:26:44. > :26:51.flown away. We have found the! No way! Somebody has contacted us. We
:26:52. > :26:58.are a public service! Before we go, David Bowie has been paying tribute
:26:59. > :27:04.to Lou Reed who died yesterday, aged 71. In 1997, the BBC elaborated with
:27:05. > :27:12.the singer on a special version of the song, Perfect Day. It went to
:27:13. > :27:24.number one. He said that he had never been more impressed with the
:27:25. > :28:17.performance of one of his songs. # Just a perfect day. MUSIC: "Perfect
:28:18. > :28:27.Day". # It's such a perfect day, I'm glad I spend it with you.
:28:28. > :28:33.# Such a perfect day you just keep me hanging on. # You just keep me