:00:22. > :00:25.Afternoon folks, welcome to The Daily Politics. As Gary McKinnon
:00:25. > :00:29.fights attempts to send him to the United States to face computer
:00:29. > :00:39.hacking charges, MPs debate a change in the law - is it too easy
:00:39. > :00:42.Another week, another crunch meeting for the eurozone. President
:00:42. > :00:52.Sarkozy and Angela Merkel are meeting in Paris - but what's the
:00:52. > :00:55.The kids are hooked to their games consoles - the grown-ups to their
:00:55. > :01:05.smart phones. But could our obsession with these digital toys
:01:05. > :01:07.
:01:07. > :01:13.be messing with our brains? We have now been in government for 500 days.
:01:13. > :01:16.Although, to be fair, it did take 499 of those for Gordon Brown to
:01:16. > :01:19.accept that he was no longer Prime Minister. The art of political
:01:19. > :01:26.speechwriting, and making sure they deliver them right. I'll be talking
:01:26. > :01:28.to one of David Cameron's former wordsmiths. And with us for the
:01:28. > :01:30.duration, the Prime Minister's former speechwriter Danny Kruger,
:01:30. > :01:39.who now runs a charity that works with prisoners, ex-offenders and
:01:39. > :01:41.young people at risk of crime. First this morning, MPs will debate
:01:41. > :01:44.a motion this afternoon which attempts to make it more difficult
:01:44. > :01:50.to extradite British citizens who are wanted for crimes committed
:01:50. > :01:52.abroad. The debate is inspired by the case of Gary McKinnon, who is
:01:52. > :02:02.alleged to have hacked Pentagon and NASA computer systems, and could
:02:02. > :02:04.face a prison sentence of up to 60 years if convicted. MPs claim this
:02:04. > :02:07.case highlights an intrinsic unfairness in the extradition
:02:08. > :02:17.treaty that's led to 25 British citizens being sent to the US but
:02:18. > :02:22.
:02:22. > :02:29.only five American citizens extradited to Britain. So, is it
:02:29. > :02:34.unfair? The figures suggest that there seems to be something unfair
:02:34. > :02:42.about the flowers of suspects. But this debate today, I understand, is
:02:42. > :02:46.also about a European aspect, which is parallel but unrelated. There is
:02:46. > :02:51.an assumption that simply because the European countries have their
:02:52. > :02:55.own rules, that they have a justice system which is as fair as ours.
:02:55. > :02:58.While I do not think the American system is corrupt or wrong, there
:02:59. > :03:03.seems to be something about the principle of any country being able
:03:03. > :03:07.to decide who was extradited and when. What we have is caught some
:03:07. > :03:11.ministers here being powerless to decide who should go abroad, and I
:03:11. > :03:15.think there's something wrong about that. There's justification for
:03:15. > :03:20.debating it. The Gary McKinnon case has been very emotive, it has been
:03:20. > :03:24.picked up by Fleet Street, he has his champions on this but it could
:03:24. > :03:28.be dangerous to change the law on the basis of one case. There's
:03:28. > :03:31.always human beings involved in these cases, and there's no reason
:03:31. > :03:41.why they should not talk about it. I think there is something wrong
:03:41. > :03:49.
:03:49. > :03:52.about this case. It is really an Now, Italy's new Welfare Minister
:03:52. > :03:54.showed governments all over Europe how to use empathy to sell
:03:54. > :03:58.difficult austerity policies. She burst in to tears yesterday when
:03:58. > :04:00.announcing an increase in the retirement age to 66 - part of a 30
:04:00. > :04:06.billion euro package aimed at shoring up Italy's finances.
:04:06. > :04:08.Meanwhile the quest to resolve the wider eurozone crisis rolls on.
:04:08. > :04:12.French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel
:04:12. > :04:22.are meeting in Paris now to thrash out an agreement ahead of a crunch
:04:22. > :04:31.
:04:31. > :04:34.European Council meeting later on this week. We hope to speak to our
:04:34. > :04:41.Paris correspondent shortly, but let me try and explain what's going
:04:41. > :04:43.on first. Just before we came on air, I spoke to our Europe
:04:43. > :04:46.correspondent, Christian Fraser. It's the sheer complexity of
:04:46. > :04:49.decision-making in the eurozone and the wider EU - with 27 member
:04:49. > :04:52.countries, some of which even have their own elected government - that
:04:52. > :04:55.makes this crisis so difficult to resolve. It's not just the French
:04:55. > :04:59.and the Germans who have one eye on their own domestic political
:04:59. > :05:00.concerns - here in Britain, the debate is also hotting up over any
:05:00. > :05:03.potential treaty change.The American Ambassador here, Louis
:05:03. > :05:06.Susman, has told MPs that the current arrangements are working
:05:06. > :05:09.well for both countries. So should David Cameron be playing a straight
:05:09. > :05:19.hand and aiming to help his fellow players fix the euro, while
:05:19. > :05:24.
:05:24. > :05:27.stopping the new euro union gaining too many powers? Or should he
:05:27. > :05:30.gamble that this is an opportunity to raise the stakes and demand the
:05:30. > :05:40.repatriation of powers from Europe that his party promised at the last
:05:40. > :05:43.
:05:43. > :05:46.election and many of his MPs would like to see? And if there is a new
:05:46. > :05:49.treaty on the cards, will David Cameron be forced to play his trump
:05:49. > :05:59.card, and call a referendum, potentially threatening to wreck
:05:59. > :06:05.
:06:05. > :06:08.the whole rubber? We can go over to Paris now, I spoke earlier to our
:06:08. > :06:17.Paris correspondent, and I asked him what was separating the French
:06:17. > :06:20.and German leaders. The German Chancellor obviously wants legally-
:06:20. > :06:25.binding limits on all eurozone countries, with automatic penalties
:06:25. > :06:28.for governments which break the budget rules. And she would like to
:06:28. > :06:31.take the decisions away from member countries, she would like the
:06:31. > :06:35.institutions of Europe to decide when those penalties are imposed.
:06:35. > :06:38.So perhaps there would be a move to get the European Court of Justice
:06:39. > :06:42.involved, there could be a stability commissioner, who would
:06:42. > :06:47.have an oversight of national spending plans and tax-and-spend
:06:47. > :06:50.policies in these countries. The French agree that there has to be a
:06:50. > :06:56.change in the system, because self- regulation obviously has failed.
:06:56. > :07:00.But they are nervous about transferring more power to Brussels.
:07:00. > :07:04.They would like to see power resting with the countries, perhaps
:07:04. > :07:08.in the shape of qualified majority voting. They would also like to see
:07:08. > :07:12.countries adopt decisions made within the round of the eurozone
:07:12. > :07:15.within their constitution, the so- called golden rule which President
:07:15. > :07:19.Sarkozy has talk about. Let's suppose that they do come to some
:07:19. > :07:24.kind of agreement, some kind of compromise, before the European
:07:24. > :07:29.Union summit later in the week - is there any evidence to indicate that
:07:29. > :07:37.the other members of the eurozone will be happy to have what is in
:07:37. > :07:42.essence their tax-and-spend policy controlled by an external body?
:07:42. > :07:45.I understand it, the smaller eurozone countries prefer the idea
:07:45. > :07:51.of Europe controlling that element of their budget, or having
:07:51. > :07:54.oversight, rather than Germany and France. Over the course of the last
:07:54. > :07:58.few months, they have been dictated to by Paris and Berlin. Politically,
:07:58. > :08:02.it looks better if it comes from Brussels. But obviously all
:08:02. > :08:06.governments have concerns about transferring powers to the centre,
:08:06. > :08:11.away from nationally elected governments. The problem I think
:08:11. > :08:15.also for the Germans is that unilaterally, they cannot be seen
:08:15. > :08:18.to be imposing austerity rules on the rest, so they do need the
:08:18. > :08:22.French alongside, although it is the Germans which are dictating the
:08:22. > :08:27.terms. Nonetheless, politically, it suits them to have the French
:08:27. > :08:32.alongside them, urging the others on. In that sense, President
:08:32. > :08:36.Sarkozy does have bargaining power. We're hearing that there will be I
:08:36. > :08:40.think an agreement between the two, probably to add something to the
:08:40. > :08:44.treaty, in the shape of a protocol, rather than root-and-branch reform
:08:44. > :08:54.of the Lisbon Treaty. With me now are the Conservative MPs Nadhim
:08:54. > :08:59.Zahawi and Bernard Jenkin. Let's assume, Bernard Jenkin, that the
:08:59. > :09:03.French and the Germans agree to some kind of fiscal union in order
:09:03. > :09:10.to attempt to keep the union together - what should the British
:09:10. > :09:14.response be to that? This represents a very fundamental
:09:14. > :09:17.change in our relationship with our European partners. It started at
:09:18. > :09:22.Maastricht, this is the conclusion. The Prime Minister says we should
:09:22. > :09:26.have had a referendum at Maastricht. Well, this is Maastricht plus. If
:09:26. > :09:31.we did not have a referendum then, we need one now. The question on
:09:31. > :09:35.the ballot paper is, do we support these terms of membership? Because
:09:35. > :09:39.we need to renegotiate our terms of membership. We have been asked to
:09:39. > :09:43.believe two completely incomprehensible things, firstly,
:09:43. > :09:47.that this does not represent any change in our terms of membership,
:09:47. > :09:51.and secondly, that when all of this is done and dusted, in two or three
:09:51. > :09:55.years' time, that's the time when we will go and renegotiate, when
:09:55. > :10:00.they have settled everything already. Those two propositions are
:10:00. > :10:04.ludicrous. But if the fiscal union applies only to members of the
:10:04. > :10:07.eurozone, of which we are not a part, why does it change our
:10:07. > :10:12.relationship with the wider European Union? We would not be
:10:12. > :10:17.bound by these fiscal laws. This is the the credit crunch point. This
:10:17. > :10:21.is about real power. At the moment, the institutions of the European
:10:21. > :10:25.Union are meant to serve all 27 member states. If, effectively,
:10:25. > :10:29.there is an economic state at the heart of the European Union, of 17
:10:29. > :10:33.members or maybe fewer, that is going to be their main
:10:33. > :10:37.preoccupation. They're already attacking the City of London, they
:10:37. > :10:40.already want a financial transactions tax, they already
:10:40. > :10:44.burdening our competitiveness with more and more regulation, they do
:10:44. > :10:47.not care about our interests. Are we seriously being asked to believe
:10:47. > :10:51.that we're going to have more influence in this new arrangement?
:10:51. > :10:55.Of course we are not, we're going to have far less influence, which
:10:55. > :10:59.is why ministers are talking about the threat to the single market. If
:10:59. > :11:04.now is not the time to renegotiate our membership, when will be a
:11:04. > :11:08.better time Question Time so, the theory is that come the time when
:11:08. > :11:11.it turns into a fiscal union, rather than just a monetary union,
:11:11. > :11:18.that is the time for Britain to reassess fundamentally its
:11:18. > :11:21.relationship with Europe? Bernard Jenkin is right to be passionate
:11:21. > :11:24.about this, but timing is everything. The point teammates,
:11:24. > :11:28.that there is going to be a paradigm shift in structures within
:11:28. > :11:34.Europe, everybody agrees about that. That will happen. But we need to
:11:35. > :11:40.see the detail of it. I think the timing, push and the crux of it, we
:11:40. > :11:43.are uniquely positioned, in Britain, I believe, more so than France, to
:11:44. > :11:50.put our arm around Germany and help them make the decisions they need
:11:50. > :11:55.to make to allow them to save the eurozone. Because their demons are
:11:55. > :12:00.the Weimar Republic of 1920, we are uniquely placed to help them.
:12:00. > :12:06.we are not close enough, our arm cannot reach that far. We are an
:12:06. > :12:10.economic powerhouse. Remember, we buy more from Europe... Did you
:12:10. > :12:14.hear the Autumn Statement last week?! We're having tough times,
:12:14. > :12:21.but we are still economically powerful. My point is that timing
:12:21. > :12:24.is everything. It is not the right time... You have just heard it,
:12:24. > :12:28.we're going to put our arms around Germany, and in a couple of years'
:12:28. > :12:32.time, Germany is going to agree to all of the things they have never
:12:32. > :12:37.agreed to for the last 20 years. This is ludicrous. This is the end
:12:37. > :12:42.game in Europe. This is the final act of desperation in the European
:12:42. > :12:47.integration project. One assumes that they are going to save the
:12:47. > :12:51.euro, but I very much doubt that myself. Unless we're going to
:12:51. > :12:56.negotiate and put our demands on the table now, when will we do it?
:12:56. > :13:00.If David Cameron was simply to say, look, this is so fundamental, this
:13:00. > :13:05.change in our relationship with the European Union, even though there
:13:05. > :13:08.is nothing which directly legally applies to us, this is so obviously
:13:08. > :13:13.the European Union changing the nature of itself, that we're going
:13:13. > :13:17.to have a referendum on this, and unless we can get the renegotiated
:13:18. > :13:23.terms which suit our national interests, we will be saying no.
:13:23. > :13:27.is unlikely, if the eurozone becomes a fiscal union, which means
:13:27. > :13:31.increasingly it will have a common tax policies, common budget deficit
:13:31. > :13:35.policies, Konnie regulations, all of which will be quite centralised,
:13:35. > :13:41.perhaps even quite onerous, it is unlikely they are going to agree to
:13:41. > :13:44.a kind of Hong Kong type Britain, deregulated, lower budget deficit,
:13:44. > :13:48.less government spending, floating off into the North Sea - they're
:13:48. > :13:53.not going to let that happen. not just Britain, you have got nine
:13:53. > :13:57.other countries, with Britain. some of them want to join the euro.
:13:57. > :14:02.Well, not all of them. A lot of them are legally bound to join the
:14:02. > :14:07.euro. Yes, but they have opted to be outside the euro. So, at the
:14:07. > :14:11.moment, there is an argument, essentially, for saving the
:14:11. > :14:16.eurozone countries first, and at the same time, as I said earlier,
:14:16. > :14:22.using that opportunity to negotiate a settlement which is advantageous
:14:22. > :14:28.to you, versus the eurozone countries. It sounds to me, Bernard
:14:28. > :14:31.Jenkin, from the Department of Honesty, do you not really think
:14:31. > :14:37.that if the eurozone goes ahead and becomes a fully fledged fiscal
:14:37. > :14:41.union, you basically think Britain should leave the EU. We do not want
:14:41. > :14:45.to leave the EU, for one simple reason. We are in something called
:14:45. > :14:50.customs union, and a lot of business depends upon that free
:14:50. > :15:00.movement of goods and services. But you do not have to beat in a
:15:00. > :15:01.
:15:01. > :15:04.federation, or monetary union, to enjoy the benefits of that. We are
:15:05. > :15:08.looking at a completely different template of membership, but
:15:08. > :15:13.personally I would not advocate walking out of the customs union.
:15:13. > :15:17.But interestingly, Turkey is not a member of the European Union, and
:15:17. > :15:21.they have a customs union agreement with the European Union. That is
:15:21. > :15:31.the kind of new relationship I am talking about. We would not be a
:15:31. > :15:32.
:15:32. > :15:40.member of the EU, we would be And what would that do took Nissan
:15:40. > :15:47.and other companies which invest here? We cannot give up our self
:15:47. > :15:50.government permanently which this is amounting to. Danny? Understand
:15:50. > :15:58.the Prime Minister has a responsibility as a Euro leader to
:15:58. > :16:06.save our biggest trading bloc from implosion and his mission this week
:16:06. > :16:13.is to try and renegotiate the eurozone and I think we should save
:16:13. > :16:17.the euro zone. The priority should be to save the eurozone because of
:16:17. > :16:22.that blows up the recession we are heading for turns into a
:16:22. > :16:25.depression? I don't think this is incompatible with saving the
:16:25. > :16:31.eurozone. The more flexibility we can give eurozone countries, the
:16:31. > :16:36.better for them. We can give them more flexibility if they give us
:16:36. > :16:42.the flexibility that we need as well. It is called quid pro quo.
:16:42. > :16:47.But his Latin! Who is closest to the Prime Minister on this issue?
:16:47. > :16:51.don't think we know the Prime Minister's mind. I don't know
:16:51. > :16:58.whether the Prime Minister believes we can save the euro. I think the
:16:58. > :17:04.Prime Minister knows the priority is to make sure that he acts. Is
:17:04. > :17:10.the closest to you or Bernard Jenkin? I think he is close to both
:17:10. > :17:15.of us. I would not like to see you fall out.
:17:15. > :17:22.Unaccustomed as I am, to public speaking, who wrote that? My guest
:17:22. > :17:26.of the day is not because he used to write the speeches for the Prime
:17:26. > :17:29.Minister. Now I come to think of it, I could blame the oratorical
:17:29. > :17:34.failings of this programme on the producers who write the scripts,
:17:34. > :17:37.rather than the chap who delivers them because obviously the delivery
:17:37. > :17:41.and timing is pretty close to perfection. Danny, perhaps you
:17:41. > :17:46.could give our producers a few words of advice on this. Here is
:17:46. > :17:50.somebody who writes his own scripts, Giles Dilnot on the art of
:17:50. > :17:53.political speech-writing. Sadly, there are not many who can
:17:53. > :17:59.do it but they do not do it alone. In the world of the political
:17:59. > :18:03.speech, the writers are also King's. You need a script editor, you need
:18:04. > :18:06.somebody who makes editor Errol -- editorial decisions, otherwise you
:18:07. > :18:11.have a script written by a committee which is not a good idea.
:18:11. > :18:15.A lot of Gordon Brown's speeches are like that. They are patchworks
:18:15. > :18:19.of a bit from this person, a bit from that person and even worse, a
:18:19. > :18:25.bit for this person and that person and you end up with no coherent
:18:25. > :18:30.argument. You do need one central writer but usually you will take
:18:30. > :18:34.the ketone from the person themselves. It will be about who
:18:34. > :18:39.has the strength, the judgment, the weight, the ideas for Britain's
:18:39. > :18:47.future in an uncertain world and we do. This party does. If you don't
:18:47. > :18:56.know what a central argument is, you do not have a good speech.
:18:56. > :19:02.Berate his speech for William Hague. Somehow, we managed to leave the
:19:02. > :19:10.key bit of his speech. He was congratulated by the Guardian so
:19:10. > :19:15.Leaving Las -- Even your mistakes can even work. High oratory has its
:19:15. > :19:22.place. A pastiche of Martin Luther King will not work on housing
:19:22. > :19:27.benefit so you have to write for the occasion. You have to write for
:19:27. > :19:32.the setting. You do not get to write I will fight them on the
:19:32. > :19:40.beaches very often. If the script is too heavy, what about a bit of
:19:40. > :19:44.at lib? The classic example was Tony Blair at the CBI. It is also
:19:44. > :19:48.why we cannot afford... That is probably the Chancellor on the
:19:48. > :19:52.phone there! By then he was so clear on speaking and what he
:19:52. > :19:58.wanted to say that actually we were no longer worried. And if you have
:19:58. > :20:03.got it, flaunt it. The image of Gordon Brown greeting his
:20:04. > :20:10.predecessor as an EU President was a Just William in 2008. The choking
:20:10. > :20:15.sensation as the words Mr President are forced out and then once in the
:20:15. > :20:21.Cabinet Room, the melodrama of when will you hand over to me all over
:20:21. > :20:25.again? When you work for William Hague, I think George Osborne said
:20:25. > :20:29.it was like taking free-kicks for Beckham and he is so good at him
:20:29. > :20:34.himself. Trying to be funny and failing is the worst thing you can
:20:34. > :20:40.do. We have been in government for 500 days although to be fair, it
:20:40. > :20:45.did take 499 of those for Gordon Brown to accept he was not Prime
:20:45. > :20:51.Minister. If you are not good at it and not funny, just don't do it.
:20:51. > :20:55.There you go, how to do it and how not to do it. Isn't it frustrating
:20:55. > :21:00.writing speeches, didn't -- don't you think you could do it better
:21:00. > :21:05.yourself? There is a bit of that. I left that job because ultimately,
:21:05. > :21:10.it is a terribly literary form unless you are writing the
:21:10. > :21:15.Gettysburg Address. The have three minutes to deliver, one simple
:21:15. > :21:18.point and it was an opportunity for hire oratory. Mostly you are
:21:19. > :21:24.talking about pretty mundane everyday things. The opportunities
:21:24. > :21:29.for literature are not great. going to say, Mr Blair, when we
:21:29. > :21:35.covered his party speeches, he in the end got rid of the verb. His
:21:35. > :21:38.speeches became almost a series of one-word sentences. I think it is
:21:38. > :21:45.actually OK if you are speaking, if you are delivering a speech.
:21:45. > :21:50.Because it comes better -- comes across better? Good communicators
:21:50. > :21:55.are good communicators. Blair could do it and Cameron can do it. One
:21:55. > :22:01.difficulty are always had was in the British political tradition, we
:22:01. > :22:05.do not do great oratory and except perhaps in times of the Second
:22:05. > :22:09.World War. You're writing boring stuff most of the time and you
:22:09. > :22:14.write great long speeches which are 20 minutes long, they bore
:22:14. > :22:17.everybody in the hall and they are ultimately only read by 20 or 30
:22:17. > :22:20.political journalists who are looking for the one or two lines
:22:20. > :22:24.which can be used in the headline. The main lines in the headline have
:22:25. > :22:29.been written by the press office and pre-release so what is the
:22:29. > :22:35.point of the 30 minutes? So you are glad you're not doing it any more!
:22:35. > :22:40.I can understand that. OK, where was I? Sorry, am I
:22:40. > :22:44.presenting a TV programme. I was reading some tweets. Is our
:22:44. > :22:50.constant exposure to computers having an impact on the human
:22:50. > :22:54.brain? I wouldn't have thought so. It is not expecting my brain. I
:22:54. > :22:59.think it might have. This evening, neuroscientist Susan Greenfield
:22:59. > :23:03.will use a debate in the House of Lords to ask the government to look
:23:03. > :23:11.into whether our brains are being changed by using things like this
:23:11. > :23:21.and playing games like this. think I am mad, but soon, you shall
:23:21. > :23:25.
:23:25. > :23:33.see that every move, every strike, was meant to bring us to this.
:23:33. > :23:38.If he is back on the grid, then so are we.
:23:38. > :23:47.Attacks were triggered across Europe. Reports of the death toll
:23:47. > :23:54.are at 100. That was a clip from Modern Warfare
:23:54. > :23:59.3. It is the latest in a series called Call of Duty. I don't think
:23:59. > :24:03.anybody will mistake it for Andy Pandy. It sold 55 million copies
:24:03. > :24:08.around the world. I don't know if that should cheer you up or make
:24:08. > :24:13.you very, very depressed. It is the kind of video game which is often
:24:13. > :24:16.blamed for violent behaviour. It is one of the concerns that Susan
:24:16. > :24:22.Greenfield who joins me now has along with Tom Chivers. He writes
:24:22. > :24:27.about science for the Daily Telegraph. What impact do videos
:24:27. > :24:33.and games like that have on children's brains? That is a very
:24:33. > :24:38.big question. There is a lot of work going on about it. Let's look
:24:38. > :24:44.at a so called Metro analysis. This was 130 papers which encompasses
:24:44. > :24:47.130 subjects using 100 or so tests and the broad conclusion was there
:24:47. > :24:52.is an increase in aggression, an increase in recklessness, high
:24:52. > :24:57.levels of arousal and a decrease in social behaviour. However, this
:24:57. > :25:04.paper has been critique as biased. That is the nature of scientific
:25:04. > :25:08.evidence. Do you think it is right? As a neuroscientist, it is a given,
:25:08. > :25:13.the brain adapts to the environment. The human brain is exquisitely
:25:13. > :25:19.involved, more than any other species to adapt where it is placed.
:25:19. > :25:27.It follows that if the environment chefs with only hearing and vision
:25:27. > :25:32.being accessed, the brain will be changed. -- if the environment
:25:32. > :25:37.shifts. Let's unpack the different issues that comes from that. What
:25:37. > :25:41.do you say about that? I think you are right, no one disputes the
:25:41. > :25:48.brain changes to its environment. But that has always been the case
:25:48. > :25:53.and just because our environments involve lots of screens and
:25:53. > :25:59.computer games, that is accepted it will change our brains but there is
:25:59. > :26:04.a lot of evidence and studies into these things and as far as I am
:26:04. > :26:12.aware, there is no solid evidence either way. They have been some
:26:12. > :26:16.pieces which suggest. I would suspect that most parents would
:26:16. > :26:21.think instinctively, if my child has got a constant diet of this
:26:21. > :26:26.sort of thing, it must affect them in some way. Let's just think of
:26:26. > :26:30.two separate things. One is the anecdotal evidence and I am yet to
:26:30. > :26:34.make -- meet apparent he says it is great that they Kidd spent so much
:26:34. > :26:39.time on the computer. Secondly there are the statistics. In a
:26:39. > :26:46.recent study in the United States, between a child's 13th and 17th
:26:46. > :26:50.birthday, over half were spending 30 plus hours a week not giving
:26:50. > :26:59.someone a hug or looking summoning the ire or walking along the beach,
:26:59. > :27:06.not feeling the sun on your face -- not looking someone in the eye.
:27:06. > :27:11.That is not true. It is not true that 30 hours in front of a screen
:27:11. > :27:18.does not mean you are talking to a friend. You are not talking to a
:27:18. > :27:25.person, you're talking to a screen. You do not look them in the eye of.
:27:25. > :27:30.You do not do that when you talk on a phone. Their art some -- there is
:27:30. > :27:38.some evidence that people who have active lives on social media have
:27:38. > :27:44.active real lives as well. That would surprise me. Also, you look
:27:44. > :27:50.at other papers like a report from the United -- the University of
:27:50. > :27:54.Michigan. We can look at different papers. A whole point being that it
:27:54. > :27:58.is never the case in science way you have the conclusive paper. What
:27:58. > :28:03.you have to do is rate and evaluate and think and discuss and be
:28:03. > :28:07.specific in what you are asking. What I want to do this evening is
:28:07. > :28:10.ask the government for a co- ordinated initiative. Ordinary
:28:10. > :28:15.human beings who are not scientists, who are parents, teachers,
:28:15. > :28:18.employers, there is aiming for them to understand what is happening so
:28:18. > :28:24.they can question and challenge what is happening and we can go
:28:24. > :28:28.forwards. Our work with ex offenders and youths at risk and
:28:28. > :28:31.they spend a lot of time playing Call of Duty. They accept it is not
:28:31. > :28:37.good for their brains like they accept that smoking and cannabis is
:28:37. > :28:41.not good but they still do it. will come back to this. Thank you
:28:41. > :28:46.for joining us. That is it for today. Special