Browse content similar to 12/05/2016. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Afternoon folks, welcome to the Daily Politics. | :00:37. | :00:38. | |
High noon in the Welsh Assembly as members are locked in a stand-off | :00:39. | :00:43. | |
But this programme understands Ukip's leader in Wales | :00:44. | :00:49. | |
is in talks about a deal to throw his weight behind Labour | :00:50. | :00:54. | |
and split with the rest of the Ukip group. | :00:55. | :00:57. | |
We'll have the latest on this breaking story. | :00:58. | :01:00. | |
The Government unveils a major overhaul of the way the BBC is run: | :01:01. | :01:04. | |
an external regulator, more transparency on star pay | :01:05. | :01:08. | |
and licence fee guaranteed for another 11 years. | :01:09. | :01:13. | |
New analysis shows a sharp increase in short-term immigration from the | :01:14. | :01:22. | |
EU which isn't being picked up by official immigration statistics. | :01:23. | :01:25. | |
So, are we underestimating the true numbers coming here? | :01:26. | :01:32. | |
And, we speak to Bristol's new mayor on his plans for the city | :01:33. | :01:36. | |
And with us for the whole programme today is the Guardian Columnist, | :01:37. | :01:50. | |
ITV has announced it will host the it. V debate featuring David Cameron | :01:51. | :02:13. | |
and the Ukip leader Nigel Farage ahead of next month's vote. But the | :02:14. | :02:19. | |
two men won't go head-to-head. They'll appear one after the other. | :02:20. | :02:24. | |
However, the vote leave group has accused ITV of a stitch-up. Because | :02:25. | :02:30. | |
Mr Farage belongs to a rival eurosceptic cap pain and not the | :02:31. | :02:33. | |
Vote Leave campaign. Now to our correspondent. What's the | :02:34. | :02:38. | |
significance of all this? In is about a debate scheduled to | :02:39. | :02:48. | |
take place on 7th June. It will be David Cameron answering questions | :02:49. | :02:51. | |
from a studio audience and then Nigel Farage answering questions | :02:52. | :02:56. | |
from a studio audience. They wouldn't be going head-to-head. | :02:57. | :03:00. | |
Still, Vote Leave unhappy with what's going on. That's because, | :03:01. | :03:07. | |
they don't really like Nigel Farage. Vote Leave being the official Out | :03:08. | :03:13. | |
campaign, Nigel Farage had hoped his would be the official campaign. That | :03:14. | :03:18. | |
didn't happen. Vote Leave concerned Nigel Farage is at best a divisive | :03:19. | :03:23. | |
character who would butt off as many undecided voters as he would | :03:24. | :03:27. | |
persuades them to vote to leave. That's what they're worried about. | :03:28. | :03:31. | |
They have issued something of a rather ominous warning to ITV | :03:32. | :03:38. | |
suggesting that ITV had effectively joined the official In campaign it | :03:39. | :03:42. | |
there will be consequences for its future saying the people of Number | :03:43. | :03:47. | |
Ten won't be there for long. ITV deny any stitch-up and say Nigel | :03:48. | :03:51. | |
Farage has been campaigning to leave the EU for the past 20-odd years. | :03:52. | :03:57. | |
Nigel Farage has hardly pulled any punches this morning. | :03:58. | :03:58. | |
The official Vote Leave campaign are run by people who have tried | :03:59. | :04:01. | |
tried to exclude me from everything which, frankly, is ludicrous. | :04:02. | :04:05. | |
We cannot win the referendum if all we see are Conservative voices. | :04:06. | :04:08. | |
I'm delighted we've six Cabinet Ministers. | :04:09. | :04:09. | |
But we need Ukip, Labour and trade union voices. | :04:10. | :04:14. | |
We need a degree of unity if we're going to work together. | :04:15. | :04:17. | |
I'm sad to see what they've said about me. | :04:18. | :04:22. | |
And, frankly, Michael Gove is chairman of Vote Leave, | :04:23. | :04:29. | |
I would say to Michael, get a grip on your staff. | :04:30. | :04:39. | |
The vote leave campaign would like someone like Boris Johnson, Iain | :04:40. | :04:45. | |
Duncan Smith or Michael Gove to debate against the Prime Minister. | :04:46. | :04:48. | |
It works out well for Downing Street. David Cameron wants to avoid | :04:49. | :04:52. | |
too much blue on blue action. He doesn't want to debate those senior | :04:53. | :04:56. | |
Conservative figures. It is hardly good for Tory unity. There are other | :04:57. | :05:01. | |
debates in the offing. Channel 4, Sky and the bean with that huge | :05:02. | :05:05. | |
debate planned all coming up. Noshiateses still underway. I | :05:06. | :05:09. | |
suspect we haven't heard the end of all of this. These are usually the | :05:10. | :05:13. | |
threats politicians make against the BBC. It's a least a change to have | :05:14. | :05:20. | |
ITV in the frame instead. Takes the pressure off us for at least a day. | :05:21. | :05:25. | |
This really suits the Prime Minister really well though, the Prime | :05:26. | :05:29. | |
Minister gets to be the voice of Remain but rather than being up | :05:30. | :05:32. | |
against the Michael Gove or Boris Johnson, he gets to define himself | :05:33. | :05:36. | |
against Nigel Farage. He may be right or wrong but he thinks that | :05:37. | :05:41. | |
good for his side of the argument? It goes back to this idea of just | :05:42. | :05:46. | |
how divisive and how toxic is Nigel Farage as a figure for the Leave | :05:47. | :05:52. | |
campaign. Nigel Farage insisted he's quite good for those indecideds. He | :05:53. | :05:55. | |
plays well in the north and Midlands in the way maybe Boris Johnson | :05:56. | :06:00. | |
doesn't. There's a feeling this morning from the In campaign, | :06:01. | :06:03. | |
Downing Street, that Nigel Farage issing a of a toxic figures and | :06:04. | :06:08. | |
actually, to have him as the main point of argument against him | :06:09. | :06:13. | |
possibly a good thing for the Remain campaign. That that's the point the | :06:14. | :06:17. | |
official Vote Leave campaign are trying to make. | :06:18. | :06:19. | |
Now it's time for our daily quiz and it seems that yet again | :06:20. | :06:22. | |
the all powerful Daily Politics has notched up another | :06:23. | :06:24. | |
This time our fearless journalism has forced the Eurovision Song | :06:25. | :06:28. | |
Contest to back down on one of their more outlandish directives, | :06:29. | :06:35. | |
so our question for today is....what has eurovision | :06:36. | :06:38. | |
B) Allowing people to throw underwear on stage? | :06:39. | :06:46. | |
C) Allowing the show to be presented by yours truely? | :06:47. | :06:51. | |
D) Repealing its ban on the Welsh flag? | :06:52. | :06:59. | |
At the end of the show, Polly will give us the correct answer. | :07:00. | :07:08. | |
Don't do it now. Do you have a suspicion? I think I it's probably | :07:09. | :07:16. | |
not knickers! Don't go there yet! Sorry! I'll mark your card closer to | :07:17. | :07:20. | |
the time. You may be surprised. Now, back in February we covered | :07:21. | :07:23. | |
the curious discrepancy between official migration | :07:24. | :07:26. | |
statistics and the level of National Insurance numbers | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
issued to EU nationals. In recent years, there has been | :07:31. | :07:33. | |
a sharp rise in National Insurance numbers for EU nationals which has | :07:34. | :07:44. | |
led to claims that the true level of immigration from the EU | :07:45. | :07:47. | |
is being underestimated. The government has been under | :07:48. | :07:52. | |
pressure to explain why the two measures have been so different | :07:53. | :07:57. | |
for so long. This morning, the Office | :07:58. | :08:00. | |
for National Statistics One of those who has been pushing | :08:01. | :08:05. | |
for answers is the economist Jonathan Portes, who has been | :08:06. | :08:11. | |
pouring over the data. He's always been pouring over this. | :08:12. | :08:25. | |
Jonathan, it seems, we've just got this, the ONS is saying the main | :08:26. | :08:31. | |
explanation for the diversion is the people getting NI numbers are coming | :08:32. | :08:35. | |
in just for a short time, less than a year, perhaps, to work and they | :08:36. | :08:38. | |
don't show up in the migration figures. Do you buy that as largely | :08:39. | :08:43. | |
the explanation? I buy it's largely the explanation. I agree with the | :08:44. | :08:48. | |
ONS on that. They have gone good work on that. I don't buy it is the | :08:49. | :08:54. | |
only explanation. I have a professional disagreement with them | :08:55. | :08:57. | |
on that. What they published today suggests there is some degree of | :08:58. | :09:02. | |
undercounting of long-term migration from the rest of the EU and some of | :09:03. | :09:07. | |
the figures they've published today, in my view, support that. It is not | :09:08. | :09:12. | |
the main explanation. It's not the case all the divergence is | :09:13. | :09:17. | |
undercounting. Most is short-term migration. There still remains, in | :09:18. | :09:23. | |
my view, some undercounting of long-term counting from EU member | :09:24. | :09:26. | |
states in these new statistics. Do we have any idea of the scale of | :09:27. | :09:31. | |
undercounting. Let's give our viewers of the figures. In the year | :09:32. | :09:37. | |
to June 2015, quite typical of recent years, we counted 260,000 | :09:38. | :09:42. | |
migrants coming in from the EU. In other words, people coming here for | :09:43. | :09:49. | |
over a year. But we gave out 697,000, almost 700,000 national | :09:50. | :09:53. | |
insurance numbers. That is a big discrepe Si. Do we -- discrepancy. | :09:54. | :10:00. | |
Do we have an idea what scale of that is accounted for by the ONS | :10:01. | :10:04. | |
explanation and how much that leaves? A much better idea. That | :10:05. | :10:09. | |
date is too recent to be analysed in any detail. Some of the people | :10:10. | :10:14. | |
you're talking about there don't know if they're staying for three | :10:15. | :10:18. | |
months or three years. They've only just arrived and not made their | :10:19. | :10:24. | |
minds up, quite legitimately. If we go back to 2013/14, we get a better | :10:25. | :10:29. | |
idea. There, we see the ONS migration statistics suggest about | :10:30. | :10:37. | |
74,000 -- 740,000 people came in. Whereas the figures recorded are a | :10:38. | :10:41. | |
bit fuzzy, suggest the numbers might be somewhere in the region of | :10:42. | :10:45. | |
900,000 to one million. There's a lot of uncertainty about that. There | :10:46. | :10:50. | |
are ledge the mat disagreements. I would say on the basis of this, | :10:51. | :10:53. | |
there is some degree of undercurrenting. We're talking not | :10:54. | :10:57. | |
more than tens of thousands but not many hundreds of thousands, if that | :10:58. | :11:02. | |
makes sense. I wonder, Jonathan, if part of reason for the | :11:03. | :11:09. | |
undercounting, is the international passenger survey, which is how we do | :11:10. | :11:14. | |
this, is it fit for purpose? It was really invented to work out how many | :11:15. | :11:18. | |
visitors and tourists were coming to this country. Do you have a problem | :11:19. | :11:22. | |
with your sound? Can you hear me all right? No, he can't hear me. He's | :11:23. | :11:30. | |
actually all of ten yards away. We've naturally lost the sound. If | :11:31. | :11:33. | |
he was in Baghdad, we'd probably have him. We'll come back to you. | :11:34. | :11:37. | |
What do you make of this? It is interesting. There's always been a | :11:38. | :11:41. | |
lot of confusion about national insurance numbers. Frank Field, the | :11:42. | :11:47. | |
great expert on this, long before he was much interested in migration | :11:48. | :11:51. | |
always complained about the need to clean up national insurance numbers. | :11:52. | :11:56. | |
They're very, very baggy. It's not quite clear, people can work for a | :11:57. | :12:00. | |
bit, go away. It's not clear what their significance is. This is | :12:01. | :12:03. | |
interesting. How many people do come in. For short-term agricultural | :12:04. | :12:08. | |
work, summer season. Tourist work. It's hard to know how much. My | :12:09. | :12:11. | |
understanding is still, and Jonathan, we have him back, we'll | :12:12. | :12:19. | |
get him to mark our card on this. We know the number of NI numbers the | :12:20. | :12:23. | |
Government release but not the number of NI numbers that are | :12:24. | :12:28. | |
active. That's true. We should know that to be in formed, shouldn't we? | :12:29. | :12:34. | |
I think we should. More information and more information and we can | :12:35. | :12:37. | |
analyse it better. But I do think it's interesting how many people | :12:38. | :12:42. | |
come here, work for a while in some God awful car wash, sleeping ten to | :12:43. | :12:46. | |
a bedroom and go home again with a little bit of money in their pocket. | :12:47. | :12:53. | |
But you know, I'll come back to Jonathan in a second, will be said | :12:54. | :12:57. | |
by the Leave, the official count of migration from. EU under estimates, | :12:58. | :13:04. | |
there will be an argument about how much, underestimates the numbers | :13:05. | :13:08. | |
coming here? I think Jonathan is the man who knows. If he says they are | :13:09. | :13:13. | |
underestimating it, I'm sure he's right. He's kept his finger most on | :13:14. | :13:19. | |
the pulse. Jonathan, you can hear me again now? I can, yeah. What I was | :13:20. | :13:26. | |
saying to you was is this the international passenger sir Vai, | :13:27. | :13:28. | |
which is how we measure people coming in, is it really fit for | :13:29. | :13:32. | |
purpose in this age of mass migration? It was originally | :13:33. | :13:37. | |
invented, as I understand it, to mesh you are the number of -- | :13:38. | :13:41. | |
measure the number of visitors coming here. The percentage within | :13:42. | :13:46. | |
that survey that are migrants short or long-term, is very small. Small | :13:47. | :13:50. | |
changes can make a huge difference to the outcome of the survey. Is | :13:51. | :13:55. | |
that fair? Well, it's fair. I wouldn't say it's not fit for | :13:56. | :13:59. | |
purpose. It's the best thing we have. If you look at this in the | :14:00. | :14:03. | |
round, it hasn't performed that badly. We may have been | :14:04. | :14:09. | |
underestimating the number of migrants in recent years. It is the | :14:10. | :14:13. | |
one survey which gives us the best picture of what's happening today. | :14:14. | :14:18. | |
We've stopmented that with some of the data held on Government systems. | :14:19. | :14:23. | |
There may have been some undercounting. But we shouldn't | :14:24. | :14:28. | |
chuck it in the bin. To follow up on what Polly was saying, going to the | :14:29. | :14:32. | |
wider picture. One thing which is very interesting, the reason all | :14:33. | :14:36. | |
this came about, the reason I started poking around in these | :14:37. | :14:39. | |
numbers, was the Prime Minister's claim that 40% of recently arrived | :14:40. | :14:44. | |
European migrants were claiming benefits in some form or other. One | :14:45. | :14:50. | |
thing this does do, it is buried in a footnote towards the end, it | :14:51. | :14:54. | |
explodes that. The Prime Minister's comments were wrong. He should | :14:55. | :15:01. | |
apologise and correct. Looking at this how much, tax EU migrants pay | :15:02. | :15:05. | |
during the period, it shows once again what I and others have said | :15:06. | :15:10. | |
for some considerable time, which is EU migrants, however many of them | :15:11. | :15:14. | |
there are, they don't come here to claim benefits. They come here to | :15:15. | :15:19. | |
work and make a strong positive contribution to the economy. Are we | :15:20. | :15:24. | |
able to tell what percentage of EU migrants take either in work or out | :15:25. | :15:28. | |
of work benefits and combine the two? Well, to be honest, there are | :15:29. | :15:34. | |
still details to be worked through there. We know it is considerably | :15:35. | :15:41. | |
less than the Prime Minister's 40%. He was assuming there were half a | :15:42. | :15:45. | |
million migrants when he made that calculation. The HMRC calculations | :15:46. | :15:50. | |
suggest it is more like a million. He may have been off by a factor of | :15:51. | :15:52. | |
two. Thank you. Thank you, Jonathan Portes. I think | :15:53. | :16:02. | |
this is good to be a big story over the next couple of days. | :16:03. | :16:03. | |
For more on this we're joined by Ukip's immigration | :16:04. | :16:06. | |
spokesman Steven Woolfe, who's in Strasbourg. | :16:07. | :16:07. | |
And Polly Toynbee is still with me here. | :16:08. | :16:09. | |
Steven Woolfe, what is your take on the ONS explanation? Well, good | :16:10. | :16:20. | |
morning to everybody, I think these are pretty damning figures for the | :16:21. | :16:24. | |
government. I think it blows out of the water two things. First of all, | :16:25. | :16:29. | |
as everybody knows, they cannot control migration coming into the UK | :16:30. | :16:32. | |
from the European Union. It also blows out of the water that they | :16:33. | :16:36. | |
have any control of understanding how to calculate those people | :16:37. | :16:41. | |
working here and claiming benefits as Jonathan has just said. What we | :16:42. | :16:45. | |
have is a failure at the heart of government encapsulating an | :16:46. | :16:49. | |
understanding one of the most important things that matters to | :16:50. | :16:51. | |
people in the UK at the moment, immigration. But it seems that what | :16:52. | :16:57. | |
has come out from the ONS, and the figures will be pored over, but it | :16:58. | :17:06. | |
does suggest that most of the discrepancy is explained by | :17:07. | :17:11. | |
short-term migration, here and gone within a year, so they do not count | :17:12. | :17:20. | |
on the European definition. The UN definition of migration. And the | :17:21. | :17:22. | |
overwhelming number of migrants coming here come here to work, not | :17:23. | :17:32. | |
to live on benefits. I think what it shows is the reliance on a group of | :17:33. | :17:37. | |
hard-working people standing at airports with clipboards trying to | :17:38. | :17:41. | |
assess whether people are here for the wanton or not is not really the | :17:42. | :17:44. | |
most modern way of translating whether people stay here the long | :17:45. | :17:49. | |
term. Even just a simple example, some of the people they say are | :17:50. | :17:53. | |
short-term could come here and work this year for a short term, go home | :17:54. | :17:59. | |
and come back next year for work. We're not alkylating that. When you | :18:00. | :18:03. | |
start to analyse the fact that you are relying on clipboards rather | :18:04. | :18:07. | |
than proper assessment through technology, if we can count people | :18:08. | :18:11. | |
going on the tube is surely we should be able to assess who is | :18:12. | :18:14. | |
coming in and out of the country. We must address that. And I think the | :18:15. | :18:19. | |
argument is always suggested that those people who come from Europe do | :18:20. | :18:22. | |
actually work in the European Union. And this will be even greater when | :18:23. | :18:28. | |
we get the living wage, the ?9 here will act as a pool for people coming | :18:29. | :18:32. | |
from poorer countries, where wages are lower. But as we know from the | :18:33. | :18:42. | |
Bank of England's statistics, and from the UN, we know that | :18:43. | :18:45. | |
large-scale migration, in the way that we have it at the moment, | :18:46. | :18:50. | |
pushes down wages. And I know it is arguable, but there is some level of | :18:51. | :18:55. | |
job displacement. That is an important factor for people in the | :18:56. | :18:58. | |
economy, where we have a large amount of austerity. Let's leave it | :18:59. | :19:04. | |
there, there is such a long delay on the wind that it is hard to have a | :19:05. | :19:07. | |
conversation with you, but I am grateful to you for turning up and | :19:08. | :19:11. | |
asking these questions. It is early days and the figures have just come | :19:12. | :19:15. | |
out. It is very complicated but we will be poring over them and getting | :19:16. | :19:18. | |
more detail and we will come back to this subject, to work out if we have | :19:19. | :19:23. | |
a clearer picture of the national insurance figures and the migration | :19:24. | :19:27. | |
figures from the EU. These are figures that have just come out. And | :19:28. | :19:31. | |
even we cannot get over them that quickly. | :19:32. | :19:34. | |
Now, dramatic scenes in the Welsh Assembly yesterday. | :19:35. | :19:36. | |
An informal coalition of Plaid Cymru, the Conservatives | :19:37. | :19:39. | |
and Ukip successfully blocked a vote to re-appoint Carwyn Jones | :19:40. | :19:43. | |
as the country's First Minister, following the Welsh Assembly | :19:44. | :19:46. | |
elections last week in which Labour lost its overall majority. | :19:47. | :19:51. | |
However, this programme understands that Ukip's leader in Wales - | :19:52. | :19:54. | |
he's called Nathan Gill - has been in talks with Labour | :19:55. | :19:56. | |
about giving his support to Carwyn Jones in return | :19:57. | :19:58. | |
for a proposal to scrap the tolls on the Severn Bridge. | :19:59. | :20:01. | |
Now, if this were true, it would deny the chance | :20:02. | :20:04. | |
of Plaid Cymru's leader becoming Wales's First Minister. | :20:05. | :20:11. | |
We can talk now to Simon Thomas, an Assembly Member for Plaid's Cymru. | :20:12. | :20:17. | |
-- Plaid Cymru. Simon Thomas, have you heard that Ukip is about to do | :20:18. | :20:26. | |
this is maybe even going to split on the matter? No, we have not heard | :20:27. | :20:32. | |
anything formally about that but it does not surprise me. Ukip have | :20:33. | :20:36. | |
clearly been split since Neil Hamilton challenged the leadership | :20:37. | :20:39. | |
of the group. But Nathan Gill remains the leader in Wales. Labour | :20:40. | :20:44. | |
have a clear choice, now, of course, they can do a deal with individuals | :20:45. | :20:48. | |
like Nathan Gill and Kirsty Williams or they can talk to the mainstream | :20:49. | :20:51. | |
parties about being a proper minority government with a set of | :20:52. | :20:55. | |
policies about which there is consensus. How much would Leanne | :20:56. | :21:01. | |
Wood like to be first Minister? It would be a minority administration | :21:02. | :21:05. | |
of some kind, but does that not have some dangers? Yes, and there is | :21:06. | :21:13. | |
always danger when you take risks in politics but we set up Leanne Wood | :21:14. | :21:20. | |
as a alternative to Carwyn Jones yesterday. Both parties are talking | :21:21. | :21:25. | |
about minority administration is, having to deal and negotiate with | :21:26. | :21:28. | |
other parties in the assembly. Clearly Labour have the largest | :21:29. | :21:32. | |
number, but they have to have a majority. In a parliamentary system, | :21:33. | :21:37. | |
we would expect them to try to form a majority of confidence in the | :21:38. | :21:40. | |
parliament, and that has not happened yet. That is why yesterday | :21:41. | :21:45. | |
we did not come to an agreement. What kind of arrangements did Plaid | :21:46. | :21:50. | |
Cymru have with Ukip to get this vote yesterday? None whatsoever. We | :21:51. | :21:56. | |
told them we were putting up Leanne Wood as First Minister, and they | :21:57. | :22:00. | |
took their own decision as to whether they would support him or | :22:01. | :22:14. | |
Leanne Wood. This is the first election since the proper parliament | :22:15. | :22:16. | |
has been established in Wales, and I think we are starting to be more | :22:17. | :22:21. | |
interesting. A Plaid Cymru administration would certainly shake | :22:22. | :22:25. | |
things up. Many may regard this as more interesting. But it could also | :22:26. | :22:29. | |
be rather unstable if you are dependent on conservative and Ukip | :22:30. | :22:37. | |
votes. What you have just described, Leanne Wood is a pro Europe | :22:38. | :22:43. | |
socialist. Depending on the Conservatives and Ukip does not | :22:44. | :22:50. | |
strike me as a firm base. I think that is a fair point. But neither | :22:51. | :22:59. | |
does a Labour coalition, with support from the Lib Dems. We saw | :23:00. | :23:03. | |
yesterday that they cannot you get support. It is beholden of the | :23:04. | :23:10. | |
opposition to see whether we can reach out and get consensus with | :23:11. | :23:15. | |
other parties on some of these issues, including the health service | :23:16. | :23:18. | |
and the steel crisis, things we need to move upon. At the moment we have | :23:19. | :23:22. | |
to be frank. We did not get a consensus on that yesterday and | :23:23. | :23:27. | |
neither do the Labour Party. All things should be discussed but I | :23:28. | :23:31. | |
would be amazed if the Labour Party were prepared to do a deal with an | :23:32. | :23:34. | |
individual Ukip member like Nathan Gill and it just shows you the level | :23:35. | :23:38. | |
of desperation of the Labour Party at the moment. We will come back to | :23:39. | :23:43. | |
you for one minute to mark your card on how do you think this will play | :23:44. | :23:48. | |
out. It sounds quite obligated. What is your take on this, Olly? It is a | :23:49. | :23:54. | |
difficult situation. It looks utterly absurd for Plaid Cymru to be | :23:55. | :24:02. | |
going in there with the consent of Ukip. If there is a split in Ukip, | :24:03. | :24:10. | |
we're not surprised because they are right back. I was on to say that the | :24:11. | :24:16. | |
Hamilton was an unexploded bomb but he is a completely exploded bomb. I | :24:17. | :24:21. | |
think you can expect a lot of interest from the Welsh Assembly. It | :24:22. | :24:26. | |
does make it interesting. Let me go back to Simon Thomas. Tell us, how | :24:27. | :24:31. | |
do you think this will work out come up and what will be and when will it | :24:32. | :24:38. | |
come, the Welsh administration? We have three weeks to agree this, | :24:39. | :24:41. | |
otherwise there will be a new election. I don't think anyone is | :24:42. | :24:45. | |
looking for a new election. We are all very well paid, and I think the | :24:46. | :24:49. | |
people of Wales expect us to reach an agreement. But that agreement has | :24:50. | :24:53. | |
two reflect that no single party won a majority and it has to reflect | :24:54. | :24:57. | |
that no single party can rule and have a First Minister and a | :24:58. | :25:01. | |
government without the consent of at least one other substantial party. | :25:02. | :25:07. | |
And I think that goes beyond individuals and it is beholden on | :25:08. | :25:13. | |
Plaid Cymru to talk with other parties, if necessary the other | :25:14. | :25:18. | |
parties about wider issues including revitalising democracy. Whatever the | :25:19. | :25:21. | |
government is suggesting we need to hold them to better scrutiny than we | :25:22. | :25:26. | |
have done in the past. Thank you for joining us. A fascinating situation | :25:27. | :25:27. | |
in Cardiff. World leaders are meeting | :25:28. | :25:30. | |
in Central London today for an anti-corruption summit | :25:31. | :25:32. | |
organised by the British Government. David Cameron says he called | :25:33. | :25:34. | |
the summit because corruption is "the cancer at the heart | :25:35. | :25:37. | |
of so many of the world's problems". The Prime Minister has also | :25:38. | :25:42. | |
announced a raft of policies For example, foreign owners of UK | :25:43. | :25:45. | |
properties will be forced to join a so-called "public register | :25:46. | :25:54. | |
of beneficial ownership". That is so that people will be able | :25:55. | :26:06. | |
to see who is behind the company, who owns that particular property. | :26:07. | :26:10. | |
Let's hear what the Prime Minister had to say at the summit this | :26:11. | :26:12. | |
morning. If we want to see countries escape | :26:13. | :26:18. | |
poverty and become wealthy, we need to tackle corruption. If we want | :26:19. | :26:23. | |
countries that have great natural resources, to make sure that they | :26:24. | :26:27. | |
use those to the benefit of their people, we need to tackle | :26:28. | :26:30. | |
corruption. If we want to defeat terrorism and extremism, we have to | :26:31. | :26:33. | |
recognise that corruption and lack of access to justice can often be | :26:34. | :26:36. | |
the way that people are driven towards extremism. So that was the | :26:37. | :26:42. | |
Prime Minister kicking off the anti-corruption conference. | :26:43. | :26:44. | |
Martin Tisne is a transparency expert | :26:45. | :26:48. | |
who's been advising the government on their anti-corruption policies. | :26:49. | :26:51. | |
He joins us from the summit at Lancaster House in London. | :26:52. | :26:56. | |
Just down the road from here. Let's come to you right away. What could | :26:57. | :27:05. | |
be the single most important thing to come out of this summit? I think | :27:06. | :27:11. | |
the single most important thing to come out of the summit is to have a | :27:12. | :27:17. | |
change so that we know who the real owners of anonymous companies are. | :27:18. | :27:20. | |
What we need is to create a global war so it is simply no longer | :27:21. | :27:26. | |
possible to hide behind a company. -- global law. At this point in time | :27:27. | :27:32. | |
anonymous companies are getaway car for criminals and terrorists. If you | :27:33. | :27:36. | |
steal ?100, you can put it under your mattress but if you steal ?10 | :27:37. | :27:40. | |
million, what did you do? You set up an anonymous company and buy a big | :27:41. | :27:45. | |
house in Notting Hill. The UK commitment is fantastic, which is | :27:46. | :27:49. | |
that foreign countries seeking to enter into contracts with the UK | :27:50. | :27:52. | |
government will need to disclose their owners are. The real point of | :27:53. | :27:57. | |
the summit is to have systematic global action on this, so that we | :27:58. | :28:01. | |
change the law. Otherwise the risk is a game of whack a mole. We do it | :28:02. | :28:07. | |
and others don't and the companies will register in other | :28:08. | :28:09. | |
jurisdictions. This is a really exciting moment, the first time in | :28:10. | :28:13. | |
the 21st century that global leaders at a high level have come together | :28:14. | :28:17. | |
specifically to fight corruption. Last year the New York Times | :28:18. | :28:24. | |
reported that 85 billion pounds of property had been bought in London | :28:25. | :28:34. | |
alone with cash. Would what is being proposed bring more transparency to | :28:35. | :28:39. | |
transactions like that? Absolutely. I think there are two things going | :28:40. | :28:43. | |
on here. Transparency is good but not in and of itself. What we need | :28:44. | :28:48. | |
is prevention. So we are hoping that it will make it much less likely | :28:49. | :28:51. | |
that it will act as a deterrent for those who are using these ill gotten | :28:52. | :28:56. | |
gains, this cash to buy properties in London and elsewhere. But the | :28:57. | :28:59. | |
second point is equally important. We are hoping that we will have | :29:00. | :29:03. | |
information not only on the real owners of companies but also on | :29:04. | :29:07. | |
contracts. 60% of bribes in the whole world come from public | :29:08. | :29:11. | |
contracting. Those companies, much of the money comes from public | :29:12. | :29:19. | |
contracts and so that is why we welcome the announcement by the UK | :29:20. | :29:21. | |
and also by the Nigerian government to shine a light on public | :29:22. | :29:23. | |
contracts. That means that the information will go to the right | :29:24. | :29:26. | |
people at the right time in the right format, and leads to | :29:27. | :29:31. | |
corruption prosecutions. There are two angles, prevention, deterrence, | :29:32. | :29:35. | |
people will be less likely to buy properties in London with money from | :29:36. | :29:38. | |
ill gotten gains, and also law enforcement, journalists and other | :29:39. | :29:42. | |
bodies will be able to piece together the information. Who owns | :29:43. | :29:48. | |
the company? How is the money spent to avoid prosecution? That is what | :29:49. | :29:51. | |
is absolutely clear and the exciting thing coming out of this. So to take | :29:52. | :29:59. | |
your example of the expensive property in Notting Hill. At the | :30:00. | :30:05. | |
moment, all we know is that this ?25 million house has been bought by the | :30:06. | :30:12. | |
no name company. So after these changes, we find out that it is | :30:13. | :30:16. | |
owned by John Smith or some other name. How do we then establish that | :30:17. | :30:25. | |
John Smith's money is corrupt? This is exactly it. That is the point. Mr | :30:26. | :30:30. | |
Smith owns a company that owns a big house in Notting Hill but what we | :30:31. | :30:33. | |
then need to know is where did that money come from? That company, what | :30:34. | :30:38. | |
other companies is it related to? This is why we are excited to have | :30:39. | :30:42. | |
France and the Netherlands and other countries commit to public | :30:43. | :30:46. | |
registries so we need to know what company they are connected with. But | :30:47. | :30:49. | |
he has probably not brought the money in from France or Holland, has | :30:50. | :30:50. | |
he? No, So how do we find out? We've | :30:51. | :31:02. | |
information on whole real owners of those companies are in a global | :31:03. | :31:07. | |
register of beneficial owners of companies so we can trace the chain. | :31:08. | :31:14. | |
Many times these companies go through 12, 13, changes of | :31:15. | :31:17. | |
companies. We find the beneficial owner. That's the one at the end of | :31:18. | :31:21. | |
the chain, not in the middle of the chain. We know where the money came | :31:22. | :31:26. | |
from because we've information on public contracts in Nigeria, the UK | :31:27. | :31:29. | |
and elsewhere. Stick with us. One final question. What do you make of | :31:30. | :31:34. | |
this, Polly? It's an excellent move. High time. It is sad America and | :31:35. | :31:41. | |
Britain wagged their fingers the whole time at the Third World for | :31:42. | :31:44. | |
corruption and we don't shut every door we could. The Cayman Islands | :31:45. | :31:51. | |
refuse the parities pace. In America, Delaware is one of the | :31:52. | :31:57. | |
great tax evasions. And Nevada. We should do that first. Through those | :31:58. | :32:01. | |
places comes a great deal of this corruption. We could turn off the | :32:02. | :32:06. | |
taps immediately to the Cayman Islands and British Virgin Islands. | :32:07. | :32:09. | |
The Government says it is not democratic. We could tell our banks | :32:10. | :32:15. | |
you will not deal with money from those countries, we do not trust it. | :32:16. | :32:20. | |
The whole financial industry would be dead. General de Gaulle, when he | :32:21. | :32:25. | |
was angry at Monaco for their tax cheating, he surrounded the place | :32:26. | :32:29. | |
with troops and turned off their water supply. We could do the same | :32:30. | :32:35. | |
by turning off their banking supply. Going back to being their colonial | :32:36. | :32:41. | |
masters? They have to be transparent. Britain are taking | :32:42. | :32:45. | |
certain positions. There are like-minded countries at that summit | :32:46. | :32:48. | |
behind you. Maybe not all like-minded. Most of the countries | :32:49. | :32:52. | |
in the word are not represented there. How far away are we from a | :32:53. | :32:59. | |
register of beneficial ownership being global? I understand the logic | :33:00. | :33:04. | |
of that. It would seem to me that will be very difficult to do and | :33:05. | :33:08. | |
we're probably quite a long way away from it? I think there's two things | :33:09. | :33:14. | |
here. This is a really big step in the right direction towards having a | :33:15. | :33:18. | |
global registry of beneficial owners. And the summit very much is | :33:19. | :33:23. | |
about both the developed and developing countries tackling this | :33:24. | :33:26. | |
global issue together. In order, you're right, there are 40 countries | :33:27. | :33:30. | |
coming to the summit today, one of the next staging posts of global | :33:31. | :33:33. | |
summit of open Government partnership in December in Paris, | :33:34. | :33:38. | |
the open Government partnership brings together 70 countries. If we | :33:39. | :33:43. | |
had all those members commit we would have 70 countries in the | :33:44. | :33:47. | |
world. We would be a long way or a closer way to building a global norm | :33:48. | :33:51. | |
to fight the scourge of corruption. Thank you for joining us from the | :33:52. | :33:57. | |
anti-corruption summit at Lancaster House in London | :33:58. | :33:58. | |
Now, the Culture Secretary John Whittingdale has been outlining | :33:59. | :34:00. | |
the government's plans for the future of the BBC this morning. | :34:01. | :34:03. | |
The BBC's Royal Charter - the agreement which sets | :34:04. | :34:05. | |
the broadcaster's rules and purpose - expires in December. | :34:06. | :34:08. | |
And today's White Paper outlines how the corporation will be run | :34:09. | :34:12. | |
Let's take a look at the main proposals: | :34:13. | :34:19. | |
The Trust governing the BBC will be abolished and a new board set up | :34:20. | :34:22. | |
Culture Secretary John Whittingdale said this will create a "new, strong | :34:23. | :34:31. | |
unitary board" in charge of the BBC with some government appointments, | :34:32. | :34:36. | |
but at least half the board members decided by the BBC. | :34:37. | :34:41. | |
Ofcom will become the BBC's external regulator and arbitrate on | :34:42. | :34:47. | |
impartiality and accuracy complaints. | :34:48. | :34:51. | |
And the BBC will release details of the salaries of stars | :34:52. | :34:54. | |
The licence fee - which is currently set at ?145.50 a year - | :34:55. | :35:07. | |
It will rise in line with inflation for the next five years. | :35:08. | :35:27. | |
In future, -- 202 I 2 viewers will need to pay the licence fee | :35:28. | :35:38. | |
to use BBC iPlayer - closing a loophole which allowed | :35:39. | :35:40. | |
The charter renewal period will be extended from 10 to 11 years, | :35:41. | :35:45. | |
to make sure any future decisions about the BBC | :35:46. | :35:47. | |
will not clash with election campaigns. | :35:48. | :35:54. | |
And the new charter will "enshrine diversity" measures | :35:55. | :35:58. | |
to ensure the BBC reflects its audiences on and off screen. | :35:59. | :36:03. | |
Let's take a look at what the Culture Secretary has said | :36:04. | :36:05. | |
The new charter will create a unitary board for the BBC that has a | :36:06. | :36:20. | |
much clearer separation of governance and regulation. The board | :36:21. | :36:24. | |
will be responsible for ensuring that the BBC's strategy, activity | :36:25. | :36:27. | |
and output are in the public interest and accord to the mission | :36:28. | :36:33. | |
and purposes set out in the charter. Editorial decisions will remain the | :36:34. | :36:37. | |
responsibility of the Director General and his editorial | :36:38. | :36:42. | |
independence will be explicitly enshrined in the charter while the | :36:43. | :36:46. | |
unitary board will consider any issues or complaints which arise | :36:47. | :36:51. | |
post transmission. That was John Whittingdale issuing a statement | :36:52. | :36:55. | |
very different from much of the speculation that has gone on | :36:56. | :36:59. | |
beforehand about what was in store for the BBC. Let's speak to Damian | :37:00. | :37:04. | |
Green, chairman of the parliamentary all-partiy group of the BBC. Didn't | :37:05. | :37:09. | |
know we had one. And foal low Conservative MP Andrew Bridgen. A | :37:10. | :37:11. | |
critic What's not to like about this? Not a | :37:12. | :37:22. | |
lot. The only shock is they don't pay you more than 4 #50?,000. It is | :37:23. | :37:27. | |
an outrage. Probably the first thing you and I have ever agreed about. | :37:28. | :37:32. | |
Thank you for that! It is broadly sensible. The key thing for me was | :37:33. | :37:39. | |
maintaining the BBC's editorial independence. There were a lot of | :37:40. | :37:44. | |
scare stories,er certainly things that sounded Luke crews, including | :37:45. | :37:48. | |
not allowing the BBC to make popular programmes at peak times. But also | :37:49. | :37:52. | |
this thought that the Government would appoint a majority of the new | :37:53. | :37:57. | |
board members. That's gone away. Clearly a majority of the board | :37:58. | :38:00. | |
members will be appointed by the BBC. The Director General will be | :38:01. | :38:05. | |
explicitly alone responsible for editorial content. That seems to | :38:06. | :38:10. | |
preserve the independence of BBC which is the cornerstone of its | :38:11. | :38:17. | |
appeal. Andrew, has John Whittingdale bottled it? I don't | :38:18. | :38:22. | |
think so. It is a good White Paper. One of my problems with the BBC is | :38:23. | :38:26. | |
the lack of trust in the BBC Trust. You can't have your regulator as | :38:27. | :38:30. | |
your biggest cheerleader. Off cock being brought in to deal with | :38:31. | :38:35. | |
regulation and complaints, that's all very healthy. So, you have no | :38:36. | :38:41. | |
reservations about what's being proposed? Because it bears no | :38:42. | :38:45. | |
resemblance to many of the ideas that were floated in the run up to | :38:46. | :38:49. | |
this White Paper when all sorts of things were meant to be in play for | :38:50. | :38:56. | |
the BBC? Well, as you know, I favoured decriminalisation that led | :38:57. | :38:59. | |
to the David Perry review. It was concluded that the BBC could not | :39:00. | :39:03. | |
cope with decriminalisation and the effect it would have on its revenue | :39:04. | :39:10. | |
stream. We have to be pragmatic. The changes we have here are opening the | :39:11. | :39:15. | |
door to closing the judicial loophole, iPlayer. The BBC accident' | :39:16. | :39:20. | |
get all it wanted. Most people can charge for the goods and services | :39:21. | :39:23. | |
they provide. Sometimes the BBC think they can charge for what their | :39:24. | :39:30. | |
rivals provide. The BBC wanted people to buy a license if they | :39:31. | :39:35. | |
accessed through iPlayer etc. That was reisted by the Government. | :39:36. | :39:40. | |
Damian, there will be concerns inside the BBC about Ofcom | :39:41. | :39:45. | |
regulation and even the National Audit Office, what exactly the | :39:46. | :39:50. | |
detail operational detail it may be able to reveal of things the BBC may | :39:51. | :39:55. | |
think is private. If you step back from all of that, is it not | :39:56. | :39:59. | |
remarkable that the licence fee, which 15 years ago many people | :40:00. | :40:03. | |
thought would not really have much longer to go, hoes now been | :40:04. | :40:08. | |
enshrined and largely linked to inflation for another 11 years. It's | :40:09. | :40:12. | |
there now until the middle of the next decade at the very least. That | :40:13. | :40:15. | |
is quite a remarkable result, is it not? Historically, completely | :40:16. | :40:22. | |
remarkable. I remember in the 1990s, I advised the BBC for a time in the | :40:23. | :40:26. | |
run up to a charter review. It was a given then because of the internet | :40:27. | :40:32. | |
and all that was about to happen that certainly by 2006, nobody | :40:33. | :40:36. | |
thought the BBC licence fee would be sustainable. Here we are, it will | :40:37. | :40:41. | |
still be there in 2027. What's happened is classic British Prague | :40:42. | :40:47. | |
fattism. If you're inventing a theoretical system you would try to | :40:48. | :40:52. | |
fund public service broadcasting some other way not through the | :40:53. | :40:58. | |
license knee. Because it broadly works, by and large the BBC is a | :40:59. | :41:02. | |
hugely important national institution, widely loved in this | :41:03. | :41:05. | |
country. Wyely respected around the world. Actually, doing anything to | :41:06. | :41:11. | |
damage it would be an act of cultural vandalism. We end up with | :41:12. | :41:17. | |
anomalies like the licence fee. It was once called worse than the poll | :41:18. | :41:22. | |
tax? Something worse than the poll tax will enshrine in law and index | :41:23. | :41:29. | |
link to inflation for five or six years, the inflation bit and the | :41:30. | :41:33. | |
licence fee for another 11 years. Worse than the poll tax for another | :41:34. | :41:38. | |
11 years. It is the last gas for the licence fee. It doesn't matter what | :41:39. | :41:43. | |
the Government funding mechanisms. It is about the ninth last gasp over | :41:44. | :41:48. | |
the years. Technology would move forward and will drive the demands | :41:49. | :41:52. | |
of the consumer. That's what I was told at the end of the la charter | :41:53. | :41:58. | |
renewal. After this charter renewal people will be streaming their | :41:59. | :42:03. | |
content online and the BBC can charge for their iPlayer services. | :42:04. | :42:07. | |
They need to charge for that service around the world and bring the back | :42:08. | :42:12. | |
cat lot of BBC World online and use it as a revenue stream. That will be | :42:13. | :42:15. | |
the revenue stream by the end of this charter review. Should all | :42:16. | :42:20. | |
these luvvies that turned the BAFTA awards into a north Korean Communist | :42:21. | :42:25. | |
Party rally get back in their box? Basically, yes. All those who were | :42:26. | :42:29. | |
saying this would be terrible and this Government was going to destroy | :42:30. | :42:34. | |
the BBC, actually, wrong. Go and read the White Paper. Hear what the | :42:35. | :42:39. | |
BBC say. This gives the BBC the chance to carry on doing what it | :42:40. | :42:44. | |
does, what people love, for another ten years with a stable, if slightly | :42:45. | :42:50. | |
anone louse funding regime, which broadly speaking works. It is not | :42:51. | :42:55. | |
like the poll tax. I doubt the Secretary of State or Government | :42:56. | :42:59. | |
will get an apology from the luvvies any time soon. That's also possibly | :43:00. | :43:06. | |
true. We've Richard Wilson on This Week tonight. We'll see. Andrew is | :43:07. | :43:12. | |
happy overall with what's happened. Are you sure you're happy? It is the | :43:13. | :43:17. | |
best deal the Secretary of State could have cut begin the situation. | :43:18. | :43:20. | |
I like the idea of a health check after five years. It has to work. | :43:21. | :43:25. | |
The BBC has huge power. It needs accountability. It is getting the | :43:26. | :43:30. | |
thick end of four billion of taxpayers' money. They deserve more | :43:31. | :43:35. | |
transparency and accountability from the BBC. If it's not, this won't be | :43:36. | :43:40. | |
the solution. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us. Polly, I would | :43:41. | :43:45. | |
suggest what's happened here, I've lived through it several times, | :43:46. | :43:48. | |
Governments come into power. They're determined to do something about the | :43:49. | :43:52. | |
BBC. I remember John Major telling me he was going to do it in 1992. Mr | :43:53. | :43:58. | |
Whittingdale seems to want to do it this time. Even Harold Wilson wanted | :43:59. | :44:03. | |
to do something to the BBC. What happens is, more important events | :44:04. | :44:07. | |
take over and even if it was the right thing to do, it is just not | :44:08. | :44:11. | |
worth the candle? Don't underestimate what has happened to | :44:12. | :44:15. | |
the BBC. Doesn't surprise me flakey rebels on the Tory side are backing | :44:16. | :44:21. | |
off. Which one? Andrew Br architis dge negotiation. No, Damian Green. | :44:22. | :44:26. | |
Andrew has it right. Got most of what he wants. There was a decoy out | :44:27. | :44:32. | |
there. We'll decide how to scheduled bake-off and Strictly. What really | :44:33. | :44:37. | |
matters is governance. Never before has the BBC's day-to-day running, | :44:38. | :44:43. | |
its editorial decision-making, been run by political appointees. It is | :44:44. | :44:48. | |
not. It will be enshrined in the BBC who will be given special protection | :44:49. | :44:52. | |
to be independent. The board, will not be able to get involved in | :44:53. | :44:57. | |
editorial matters until after anything has been broadcast, which | :44:58. | :45:01. | |
was the situation under the governance. Nevertheless, it's far | :45:02. | :45:07. | |
closer. There is only one board. That's what it used to be like. They | :45:08. | :45:11. | |
are making decisions about deployments of all kinds. Before, it | :45:12. | :45:16. | |
was are arm's length. A peculiar brand of... The Government appointed | :45:17. | :45:21. | |
all the trustees. Trust was none on... They appointed the governors | :45:22. | :45:28. | |
before the days of the treesees. The majority of people on this board | :45:29. | :45:31. | |
will be appointed by the BBC. The Government will have no say over | :45:32. | :45:37. | |
these appointees? Do you think the BBC will appoint six anti-Government | :45:38. | :45:41. | |
people? Of course they won't. Boards are not like that. They may appoint | :45:42. | :45:45. | |
six independent people. Who's independent? Everyone has their own | :45:46. | :45:49. | |
views. They'll appoint a balance, the BBC is very balanced. The | :45:50. | :45:54. | |
Government gets to a to appoint six people to this board. The chairman, | :45:55. | :45:58. | |
vice-chairman, four from the nations and regions. They'll have to go | :45:59. | :46:02. | |
through the northern procedures. Gone are the days where the Home | :46:03. | :46:06. | |
Secretary calls up his best mate from school. Then the BBC, with the | :46:07. | :46:12. | |
DG leading the way, gets to a point more than six. | :46:13. | :46:17. | |
But they will not necessarily be anti-government people. You seem to | :46:18. | :46:22. | |
be denying that the government is now a huge step closer to the | :46:23. | :46:27. | |
day-to-day running of the BBC than it ever has been in the past. We | :46:28. | :46:31. | |
never had to put up with this. But it is the job of the management | :46:32. | :46:36. | |
committee, not the board, the job of the executive management committee | :46:37. | :46:39. | |
to run the BBC's day-to-day business. The board will not run it | :46:40. | :46:44. | |
like that. But you are closer than ever. Chris Patten has the right | :46:45. | :46:49. | |
idea. He said that these important bodies, Channel 4, Ofcom, the BBC, | :46:50. | :46:54. | |
where editorial decisions are being made, the appointments should be | :46:55. | :46:57. | |
made by an independent commission like you have an independent | :46:58. | :47:00. | |
commission for appointing judges, away from government. The head of | :47:01. | :47:05. | |
Ofcom, and all of these other broadcasting bodies, should be | :47:06. | :47:08. | |
decided entirely independently by a separate commission. Then we would | :47:09. | :47:12. | |
know... Do you think this is a bad deal for the BBC? I think it is a | :47:13. | :47:18. | |
worse deal than it looks. Ofcom is now run by a reputable civil servant | :47:19. | :47:21. | |
but at any point the government could put in somebody else, as they | :47:22. | :47:26. | |
did with the charities commission. Can I just point out that the BBC | :47:27. | :47:30. | |
will have a majority of people on the board. There will be no | :47:31. | :47:35. | |
scheduling at all. There will be no change in the budget deal that has | :47:36. | :47:40. | |
already been done. The licence fee is there for another 11 years. It is | :47:41. | :47:45. | |
index-linked and there is a remit to increased adversity. There is more | :47:46. | :47:50. | |
pressure for the BBC to be distinct, which is what public service | :47:51. | :47:55. | |
broadcasting is. And there is a special independent protection for | :47:56. | :48:00. | |
the Director General. No top sizing and nonpayment of the licence fee is | :48:01. | :48:03. | |
still an offence. True. These are things that have not changed. They | :48:04. | :48:08. | |
have not undermine the BBC. I think the BBC is undermined by the nature | :48:09. | :48:12. | |
of it all, by direct political appointees. I also think it is | :48:13. | :48:16. | |
somewhat undermined by putting it under Ofcom, which is a competition | :48:17. | :48:20. | |
regulator. The BBC is not in a commercial market. Others have to | :48:21. | :48:24. | |
sail along beside it as best they can. But it is in a market. Not | :48:25. | :48:30. | |
really. The idea that lawyers from outside broadcasting would come in | :48:31. | :48:35. | |
and challenge Ofcom to say that the BBC is anti-competitive on this or | :48:36. | :48:39. | |
that or the other. That is a real new arena. The idea that they are | :48:40. | :48:43. | |
told they must be distinctive takes us back. Then, should they really be | :48:44. | :48:51. | |
doing strictly? It is looking at the BBC as if they should be doing only | :48:52. | :48:54. | |
the things that nobody else wants to do. That is not what distinctive | :48:55. | :49:01. | |
means. I'm not sure what the point of public service broadcasting is if | :49:02. | :49:04. | |
you are supposed to be distinctive. It is distinctive and it is the best | :49:05. | :49:06. | |
at what it does on the whole. All eyes may have been on London's | :49:07. | :49:08. | |
election at the weekend. But about 100 miles | :49:09. | :49:12. | |
west of the capital, another race for Mayor | :49:13. | :49:14. | |
was playing out. And it was another success | :49:15. | :49:20. | |
for Labour, as Marvin Rees was elected to the top | :49:21. | :49:22. | |
job in Bristol. After two rounds of voting, he won | :49:23. | :49:24. | |
by a majority of around 30,000 votes, and ousted the incumbent | :49:25. | :49:27. | |
independent Mayor George Ferguson. So who is Marvin Rees and what does | :49:28. | :49:38. | |
his new role allowed him to do? Well, he is 43 and he was raised and | :49:39. | :49:44. | |
born in Bristol. He is married with three children, and in a former life | :49:45. | :49:47. | |
he was a journalist, so we can to be a bad person at all. He worked in | :49:48. | :49:51. | |
public health before switching to politics. No mayor of the city, his | :49:52. | :49:55. | |
responsibility is for local transport policy, housing and local | :49:56. | :49:58. | |
spending. So quite a lot of important things that matter to the | :49:59. | :50:03. | |
people of Bristol. His annual salary will be about ?65,000. And he joins | :50:04. | :50:08. | |
me now. Welcome. Were you expecting to win? I think the omens were good. | :50:09. | :50:14. | |
And what we heard on the doorsteps and the streets. And I think that we | :50:15. | :50:19. | |
anticipated that with a higher turnout, we would stand a stronger | :50:20. | :50:23. | |
chance of winning. How strong pitch, because we had this period of time | :50:24. | :50:27. | |
where you were an independent mayor, independent of major parties, is | :50:28. | :50:35. | |
that being seen as a success or, given that the people have returned | :50:36. | :50:40. | |
to a party nominee, was that an aberration? I think a number of | :50:41. | :50:46. | |
people came to question what independence meant. There is no such | :50:47. | :50:49. | |
thing as independent thought, really. I don't want to pick over | :50:50. | :50:54. | |
the bones of my predecessor because he has been very gracious moving on, | :50:55. | :50:59. | |
but I think there was an element of disappointment between the level of | :51:00. | :51:03. | |
delivery and the promise that was made, that politics would be | :51:04. | :51:08. | |
transformed. I think real political transformation is not just about | :51:09. | :51:11. | |
abandoning political parties, it is about new people from a wider range | :51:12. | :51:15. | |
of backgrounds taking a position of influence. In a sense, we're | :51:16. | :51:19. | |
beginning to see this happen with Sadiq Khan's Victorian London, and | :51:20. | :51:24. | |
your own victory in Bristol. There are new faces to British politics in | :51:25. | :51:31. | |
the 21st century. I think so. And that does not pass me by. Sadiq Khan | :51:32. | :51:36. | |
is the son of a bus driver. As he has told us several times! Was your | :51:37. | :51:42. | |
dad a bus rather? I will not say what my dad did. He was a guy in | :51:43. | :51:52. | |
town. My mum lived in a refuge for a while. Looking at the report an | :51:53. | :51:55. | |
elitist Britain, I should not be here. But that is one of the reasons | :51:56. | :51:59. | |
why I am here, because I do not want a city that is built on chance. And | :52:00. | :52:07. | |
it may be that local government or elected mayors is a way of doing | :52:08. | :52:11. | |
that. I said this to Andy Burnham once, when he was running as mayor | :52:12. | :52:16. | |
of Manchester. We have a picture viewer Jeremy Corbyn, who came down | :52:17. | :52:21. | |
to see you before the victory. Was he an asset or a liability for you | :52:22. | :52:26. | |
on the doorstep? I would say he was incredibly supportive. And in terms | :52:27. | :52:30. | |
of my motivation, he was absolutely supportive. Bristol is a diverse | :52:31. | :52:36. | |
city and in some areas, Jeremy had incredible traction and in other | :52:37. | :52:40. | |
areas, he did not have so much traction. Overall, his contribution | :52:41. | :52:43. | |
to the campaign was incredibly positive and I am grateful for the | :52:44. | :52:47. | |
support from him. Why do you think he came to see you rather than Sadiq | :52:48. | :52:51. | |
Khan? I will not take the question away. I welcome anyone to come to | :52:52. | :52:54. | |
Bristol. Where would you rather be on a sunny day, in Bristol or smoky | :52:55. | :53:03. | |
London? We see a lot of this through the prism of the London mayoral | :53:04. | :53:06. | |
campaign. And we always have had big figures, Ken Livingstone, Boris | :53:07. | :53:13. | |
Johnson, how much was this about you as an individual? And how much was | :53:14. | :53:19. | |
it you as the Labour candidate? It was a lot about me. It was my | :53:20. | :53:23. | |
frustration in the last campaign, with this whole thing of | :53:24. | :53:27. | |
independence. I never crossed the line and ceased to be Marvin who has | :53:28. | :53:31. | |
my background and my network of friends, I was a guy who joined the | :53:32. | :53:36. | |
Labour Party in my mid 30s, and took up the challenge of getting elected, | :53:37. | :53:39. | |
to make things happen through electoral politics. And that element | :53:40. | :53:45. | |
of my appeal outside the party boundaries brought me incredible | :53:46. | :53:48. | |
support and sometimes costly challenges. Was I really Labour or | :53:49. | :53:52. | |
was I a guy who jumped on the train late in the game? I think the Labour | :53:53. | :53:55. | |
Party is about people coming together around shared values. The | :53:56. | :53:59. | |
values of my upbringing are the values that I found among people in | :54:00. | :54:03. | |
the party and I can rally with them and try to get things done for | :54:04. | :54:06. | |
people left behind. We will see how it goes. It is an exciting time. | :54:07. | :54:08. | |
Thank you very much. Time now for the answer to | :54:09. | :54:09. | |
our question. I forgot to brief Polly on its! What | :54:10. | :54:12. | |
rule has been overturned? B) Allowing people to throw | :54:13. | :54:24. | |
underwear on stage? C) Allowing the show to be presented | :54:25. | :54:28. | |
by yours truely? D) Repealing its ban | :54:29. | :54:31. | |
on the Welsh flag? Do you have an idea, Polly? I don't | :54:32. | :54:40. | |
think it is knickers. It is perhaps the Welsh flag. It is. Apparently it | :54:41. | :54:46. | |
was revealed on the Daily Politics that there was a revealed that there | :54:47. | :54:51. | |
had to be nation state flags are supposed to national flags, like the | :54:52. | :54:58. | |
Scottish sole tyre. I'm sorry it is not you replacing Terry Wogan. It | :54:59. | :55:03. | |
would be fun but now one can replace Terry Wogan. He alone was the reason | :55:04. | :55:05. | |
for watching it. So, as you have seen from our quiz, | :55:06. | :55:06. | |
politics and passions run particularly high | :55:07. | :55:08. | |
round Eurovision time. This year, even more so, as the EU | :55:09. | :55:10. | |
Referendum hangs over the contest. If we do get 'nil points' again, | :55:11. | :55:13. | |
is this a message that we're not wanted in the Union, or shall we | :55:14. | :55:18. | |
just put it down to With us now is Chris West, | :55:19. | :55:21. | |
who's written a definitive book on the politics of Eurovision, | :55:22. | :55:26. | |
and BBC presenter Paddy O'Connell who's in Stockholm covering | :55:27. | :55:29. | |
the competition for BBC radio. Chris West, are you going to be nice | :55:30. | :55:43. | |
to the UK this year? I think so. I think we have a good song, and good | :55:44. | :55:49. | |
singers. So yes, I think they are going to do OK. You think we might | :55:50. | :55:53. | |
have a chance of maybe not winning but still high up there are? Top | :55:54. | :56:01. | |
ten, very well. Paddy, you are our man in Stockholm. What is the mood | :56:02. | :56:05. | |
among the competition? Is the referendum being talked about? | :56:06. | :56:09. | |
Notice was ugly but there are echoes. Every year there is a leave | :56:10. | :56:18. | |
remain argument about the contest. This year, Russia is controversial. | :56:19. | :56:31. | |
They are not sending in a bare-chested Vladimir Putin, the | :56:32. | :56:34. | |
ascending in a younger man. And the bookies say that they were when. So | :56:35. | :56:38. | |
the Russians are the -- so the Russians are the favourite? | :56:39. | :56:42. | |
Interesting. Stockholm is one of the internet capitals of Europe but | :56:43. | :56:45. | |
clearly, with our connection, not today. You have written about the | :56:46. | :56:50. | |
soft power of Eurovision. That it is a strong political force and will | :56:51. | :56:54. | |
betide any country that ignores it. What do you mean by that? If it was | :56:55. | :56:58. | |
a country like Sweden, over the last ten years, they have put themselves | :56:59. | :57:05. | |
forward as a progressive, creative and well organised, competent | :57:06. | :57:08. | |
country. They have done very well, they have had very good singers. | :57:09. | :57:12. | |
Their entry in 2012 has sold records around the world. I'm sure my age | :57:13. | :57:18. | |
with records! Downloads, whatever. There is a lot of good stuff about | :57:19. | :57:22. | |
Sweden that comes through the Eurovision Song contest. Are the | :57:23. | :57:28. | |
Swedes happy to host this? It is a huge expense. It is a very expensive | :57:29. | :57:34. | |
events to mount. It is. They are even joking about it from the stage. | :57:35. | :57:39. | |
There is a lot of irony on the stage about how expensive it has been. And | :57:40. | :57:46. | |
they take six weeks to nick their national entry here, so in a way | :57:47. | :57:54. | |
they will be quite happy to bump along the next few years. And do you | :57:55. | :57:57. | |
go along with the bookies favourite? If it is not the Russians, who are | :57:58. | :58:02. | |
the other two or three that we should keep an eye on? I love | :58:03. | :58:08. | |
Austria because they are singing in French, it is a French song. And | :58:09. | :58:14. | |
Chris is nodding. We will keep an eye on Austria as well. And if you | :58:15. | :58:19. | |
like country music, the Netherlands, the artist is basically singing | :58:20. | :58:27. | |
British, and the whole contest is bonkers than ever. There are more | :58:28. | :58:35. | |
thighs on the stage than now knows. -- Nandos. | :58:36. | :58:38. | |
The One O'Clock News is starting over on BBC One now. | :58:39. | :58:44. | |
I'll be on This Week with Alan Johnson, Michael Portillo, | :58:45. | :58:47. | |
and DJ Annie Nightingale joining me from 11.45pm tonight. | :58:48. | :58:54. | |
And I'll be back here at noon tomorrow with all the big political | :58:55. | :58:57. | |
Drinking small amounts of alcohol isn't without risk. | :58:58. | :59:06. | |
Eat more of this, drink more of that - | :59:07. | :59:14. | |
can we really eat and drink our way to better health? | :59:15. | :59:19. | |
Because my mother had dementia, there's always that anxiety - | :59:20. | :59:23. |