Browse content similar to 22/05/2017. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Hello, and welcome to the Daily Politics. | :00:37. | :00:40. | |
In the last half-hour, Theresa May U-turns on social care | :00:41. | :00:44. | |
funding, announcing a big change to her manifesto after political | :00:45. | :00:47. | |
opponents labelled her plan a 'dementia tax'. | :00:48. | :00:50. | |
Labour announces it would scrap university tuition fees for students | :00:51. | :00:58. | |
in England this year if it wins the election. | :00:59. | :01:03. | |
The Green Party launches its manifesto for England and Wales, | :01:04. | :01:08. | |
promising a universal basic income, a four-day working week, and a final | :01:09. | :01:11. | |
And the SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon comes under pressure over funding | :01:12. | :01:17. | |
for the NHS in Scotland from a nurse. | :01:18. | :01:20. | |
Come in on the middle of any day, to any ward, any A department. | :01:21. | :01:27. | |
Come on in and see what we're up against. | :01:28. | :01:36. | |
All that in the next hour, and with me for the whole | :01:37. | :01:41. | |
of the programme today, the former Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa | :01:42. | :01:43. | |
Villiers, who was also a leading Conservative campaigner for Brexit | :01:44. | :01:45. | |
And Chuka Umunna, who was a leading light in Ed Miliband's shadow | :01:46. | :01:49. | |
cabinet until he joined Labour's backbenches under Jeremy Corbyn. | :01:50. | :01:52. | |
Let's kick off with the continuing fall-out from Theresa May's | :01:53. | :01:59. | |
election manifesto, and in particular her plans | :02:00. | :02:01. | |
for changing the way in which elderly people pay for care | :02:02. | :02:04. | |
The Conservative manifesto promised that the state will pay these costs | :02:05. | :02:14. | |
once an individual's assets dip below ?100,000. | :02:15. | :02:17. | |
But the policy has come under fire from political opponents, | :02:18. | :02:20. | |
who have variously described the plan as a 'death tax' | :02:21. | :02:23. | |
and a 'dementia tax', because old people who need care | :02:24. | :02:29. | |
wouldn't have their overall costs capped. | :02:30. | :02:33. | |
Well, in the last half-an-hour Theresa May has been | :02:34. | :02:35. | |
speaking in North Wales, where she announced her social care | :02:36. | :02:37. | |
plans would now include consulting on a life-time cap on how much | :02:38. | :02:40. | |
individuals would pay for their own care. | :02:41. | :02:43. | |
So I want to make a further point clear. | :02:44. | :02:47. | |
This manifesto says that we will come forward | :02:48. | :02:52. | |
with a consultation paper, a Government green paper, | :02:53. | :02:54. | |
and that consultation will include an absolute limit on the amount | :02:55. | :02:58. | |
people have to pay for their care costs. | :02:59. | :03:00. | |
So let me reiterate - we are proposing the right funding | :03:01. | :03:12. | |
We will make sure nobody has to sell their family | :03:13. | :03:15. | |
home to pay for care, we'll make sure there is an absolute | :03:16. | :03:18. | |
limit on what people need to pay, and you will never have to go below | :03:19. | :03:21. | |
?100,000 of your savings, so you will always have something | :03:22. | :03:24. | |
She has folded, it took 24 hours for her to perform a miraculous U-turn | :03:25. | :03:35. | |
on one of her key policies on how social care will be funded in the | :03:36. | :03:39. | |
future. The Prime Minister has obviously listened to the concerns | :03:40. | :03:43. | |
people raised and I think the introduction of a cap is a welcome | :03:44. | :03:47. | |
clarification of this set of proposals. We do need to reform the | :03:48. | :03:51. | |
way social care is delivered and funded. The greatest threats to our | :03:52. | :03:56. | |
ability to safeguard people in their old age is actually a weak economy | :03:57. | :03:58. | |
and that is what we would get if we elected | :03:59. | :04:14. | |
Jeremy Corbyn of Prime Minister and put him in charge of Brexit | :04:15. | :04:16. | |
negotiations. You call it a clarification, it was not a | :04:17. | :04:18. | |
clarification, it was a complete about turn. There was no mention in | :04:19. | :04:21. | |
the manifesto, just a couple of days ago, off their being a cap on the | :04:22. | :04:24. | |
cost you could pay if you had over ?100,000, there was just a floor. | :04:25. | :04:28. | |
This is a significant announcement... Was it the wrong | :04:29. | :04:33. | |
policy in the manifesto? I think it proved with the clarification that | :04:34. | :04:39. | |
cap will be consulted on. I think that was an important element of | :04:40. | :04:43. | |
previous debates over social care so I welcome the announcement today and | :04:44. | :04:47. | |
I believe that there will be many people out there who will also | :04:48. | :04:50. | |
welcome it. Although it was very clear it was a break with previous | :04:51. | :04:54. | |
stated Government policy that did say there should be a cap, and she | :04:55. | :04:59. | |
went against that, so why has she changed her mind? Because she has | :05:00. | :05:03. | |
listened to the concerns expressed about how the policy was set out in | :05:04. | :05:15. | |
the manifesto she has made a significant change, which I think | :05:16. | :05:17. | |
many people will welcome. It was called and hailed a dementia tax, | :05:18. | :05:20. | |
which is true, it was a world of the dice, if you were unfortunate enough | :05:21. | :05:23. | |
to get dementia in old age and at Ascot over ?100,000, you could see | :05:24. | :05:26. | |
all a bit potentially go, if you did not get dementia but another illness | :05:27. | :05:29. | |
treated on the NHS, even if you had valuable assets you did not pay | :05:30. | :05:34. | |
anything? I don't think it is fair to characterise the proposals as a | :05:35. | :05:38. | |
dementia tax. The reality is people already paid for their social | :05:39. | :05:41. | |
care... It doesn't include their house in the calculation, does it? | :05:42. | :05:47. | |
As I say, everything depends on a strong economy, only Theresa May and | :05:48. | :05:49. | |
the Conservatives can deliver a strong economy and a | :05:50. | :06:11. | |
successful Brexit. If we jeopardise that we won't be able to care for | :06:12. | :06:13. | |
our frail elderly population. Chuka Umunna, it was not that long ago | :06:14. | :06:16. | |
that Gordon Brown suggested a very similar policy that was dubbed a | :06:17. | :06:19. | |
death tax, you may say very unfairly by the Conservatives at the time, | :06:20. | :06:21. | |
with a maximum of ?20,000 paid after a person died to pay for the social | :06:22. | :06:24. | |
care a person may have used when they were alive, so what was the | :06:25. | :06:27. | |
problem? At the problem with this was there was no cap, as under the | :06:28. | :06:29. | |
original plans. I'm sorry, this idea that somehow the Conservatives, | :06:30. | :06:32. | |
people have sat in the Conservative cabinet since 2010, have been good | :06:33. | :06:35. | |
for social care, Theresa, what you have done for social care in my area | :06:36. | :06:40. | |
is absolutely criminal. What has happened is they have heavily, | :06:41. | :06:45. | |
heavily cut the budget of local authorities, which has meant in turn | :06:46. | :06:47. | |
they have not been able to provide the social care we need. That has | :06:48. | :06:51. | |
had a knock-on effect on the NHS because it meant more older people | :06:52. | :06:55. | |
going to A and when they go into hospital less likely to come out | :06:56. | :06:59. | |
because there is nowhere for them to go afterwards, | :07:00. | :07:10. | |
that is the reality of what you have done since 2010 and the only way we | :07:11. | :07:14. | |
can resolve this, first of all decent integrated care for elderly | :07:15. | :07:16. | |
people which looks after their mental, physical and social needs | :07:17. | :07:19. | |
together, and we all have to make a contribution, but the idea that you | :07:20. | :07:21. | |
dump the entire burden of setting out your social care with the | :07:22. | :07:23. | |
families concerned without the rest of society playing a role, that is | :07:24. | :07:27. | |
what your proposal originally was going to do, and this strong and | :07:28. | :07:31. | |
stable Government... Let Theresa answer because that was the reality, | :07:32. | :07:35. | |
that it was an inheritance tax, I think Ukip dubbed it a Conservative | :07:36. | :07:42. | |
death tax, an inheritance tax on anything over ?100,000? The reality | :07:43. | :07:45. | |
is people already contribute to the cost of their social care, that is | :07:46. | :07:50. | |
not changing as a result of the proposals in the Conservative | :07:51. | :07:52. | |
manifesto. But there was not a cap will stop one of the key reasons for | :07:53. | :07:57. | |
the pressure on social care is we are an ageing society. Theresa May | :07:58. | :08:01. | |
will take tough decisions to put that funding on a sustainable basis. | :08:02. | :08:07. | |
You have taken away the funding. What is crucial to doing that is a | :08:08. | :08:11. | |
strong economy which we will not get if Jeremy Corbyn is Prime Minister | :08:12. | :08:14. | |
and in charge of Brexit negotiations. You must ring one of | :08:15. | :08:19. | |
the MPs who voted no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn... Theresa bilious, we | :08:20. | :08:23. | |
are talking about the social care policy. Let me tell you something, I | :08:24. | :08:28. | |
always have far more confident in my Labour Party than your Tory party. | :08:29. | :08:32. | |
What is the cap that Labour would put in, because it is not clear from | :08:33. | :08:36. | |
your manifesto? It is true that Theresa May | :08:37. | :08:49. | |
has now said she has changed her mind, there will be a lifetime cap | :08:50. | :08:54. | |
on costs, but what is the cap in the Labour manifesto? There is no cap in | :08:55. | :08:56. | |
the Labour manifesto because we would do this differently. We would | :08:57. | :08:59. | |
put more money in social care... If you look at the social care policy | :09:00. | :09:02. | |
in the Labour manifesto, you would also have a floor and a cap, so in | :09:03. | :09:05. | |
that sense it is the same. I don't know what the cap is but the | :09:06. | :09:08. | |
difference is, would we take away the funding from local authorities | :09:09. | :09:09. | |
which provide social care for people? How much money would you put | :09:10. | :09:13. | |
back into local authorities? One thing I would agree with Theresa on | :09:14. | :09:18. | |
is we have a different economic policy and basically wouldn't | :09:19. | :09:21. | |
massacre public services. Look at Lambeth, where I have been | :09:22. | :09:25. | |
representing, it will mean our local authority will have decent funding | :09:26. | :09:29. | |
to provide the care elderly people in my community need, that would be | :09:30. | :09:32. | |
ripped away under the Conservatives and we see a role for society, | :09:33. | :09:36. | |
family, all of us playing our part rather than having the entire burden | :09:37. | :09:41. | |
sitting with their family. I know you don't know an exact cap, that is | :09:42. | :09:45. | |
fine, we now know Theresa May hasn't said what the cap would be, but it | :09:46. | :09:49. | |
does say in the Labour manifesto, we would seek consensus on a | :09:50. | :09:52. | |
cross-party basis about how social care should be funded with options | :09:53. | :09:57. | |
including wealth taxes, employer care contribution or a new social | :09:58. | :10:01. | |
care levy, so you are looking at the same options that Theresa May has | :10:02. | :10:06. | |
now clarified, to use your words? Well, we don't quite know what she | :10:07. | :10:11. | |
is proposing. What would you prefer out of the Labour manifesto? We are | :10:12. | :10:16. | |
looking at a range of options, I like the proposals put forward by | :10:17. | :10:19. | |
Andrew Deal not, who tried to come up with a cross-party solution on | :10:20. | :10:25. | |
this. Ultimately, one Government would be able to make a decision on | :10:26. | :10:29. | |
the future of social care, it will be a multiple Government thing which | :10:30. | :10:32. | |
is why we need to build a consensus on it. Let's go back to the issue of | :10:33. | :10:38. | |
leadership, the point is there is nothing strong or stable about the | :10:39. | :10:41. | |
leadership that Theresa May has shown when it has come to this | :10:42. | :10:45. | |
social care policy, because it looked like it was hurting their | :10:46. | :10:48. | |
election prospects, she has changed the policy, a U-turn. I would not | :10:49. | :10:57. | |
characterise it like that at all. She is the right person to be Prime | :10:58. | :11:00. | |
Minister and lead Brexit negotiations. If she was so strong, | :11:01. | :11:04. | |
why has she felt the need to change the policy? Because she has listen | :11:05. | :11:07. | |
to concerns that people have expressed over the weekend, it is | :11:08. | :11:12. | |
right that she does that, Prime Minister is entitled to listen to | :11:13. | :11:16. | |
concerns expressed about policy. And all of the stress and worry they | :11:17. | :11:20. | |
have caused older people. People have a choice, on the 9th of | :11:21. | :11:35. | |
June, do they want Jeremy Corbyn standing on the steps of Downing | :11:36. | :11:39. | |
Street, or Theresa May? 11 days after that we start Brexit | :11:40. | :11:41. | |
negotiations... I know you want to talk about Brexit but this is a big | :11:42. | :11:43. | |
policy change that has been announced today. Let's see how it is | :11:44. | :11:45. | |
playing with voters. Adam has taken the Daily Politics | :11:46. | :11:45. | |
moodbox to Birmingham. Adam, what's the moodbox | :11:46. | :11:48. | |
question today? Greetings from a slightly breezy | :11:49. | :11:56. | |
Birmingham, I apologise if you can hear any dreading or dilling. The | :11:57. | :11:59. | |
question is, before the Prime Minister did her speech today, is | :12:00. | :12:03. | |
which party leader do you trust to sort out the issue of adult social | :12:04. | :12:07. | |
care, is it Theresa May or Jeremy Corbyn? Worth remembering Jeremy | :12:08. | :12:12. | |
Corbyn's policy proposal is an extra 8 billion on social care by the end | :12:13. | :12:17. | |
of the next parliament and in the longer term to set up this social | :12:18. | :12:20. | |
care policy. Here is what the brumbies had to say about the issue. | :12:21. | :12:27. | |
-- what the Brummies had to say. Do you care about the issue | :12:28. | :12:29. | |
of care for the elderly? But you wouldn't need it | :12:30. | :12:32. | |
for about another 60 years? Which party leader do | :12:33. | :12:37. | |
you trust to look after Because, like, the Labour manifesto, | :12:38. | :12:40. | |
it's laid out well, it's costed well and it's done in a way that reflects | :12:41. | :12:46. | |
nicely on most of society and gives older people and young | :12:47. | :12:50. | |
people both a chance. Unlike the Tories, that | :12:51. | :12:52. | |
have their weird death tax thing, Have you been sent | :12:53. | :12:54. | |
here by Labour HQ? What do you think about their plans | :12:55. | :12:57. | |
for the whole ?100,000, including a house in the means | :12:58. | :13:00. | |
test for care? But, at the end of the day, | :13:01. | :13:03. | |
we've got a purse within which we have to live | :13:04. | :13:10. | |
in, and we have to cut There's not endless | :13:11. | :13:12. | |
amounts of money. Yes, it's going to | :13:13. | :13:15. | |
disadvantage some people. But, ultimately, as a society, | :13:16. | :13:16. | |
I think we have to get Which party leader do you trust | :13:17. | :13:19. | |
to look after your grandparents Care for older people, | :13:20. | :13:23. | |
the massive story at the moment. Some people are calling | :13:24. | :13:31. | |
it the dementia tax, Well, I don't think | :13:32. | :13:33. | |
they're going to... I don't think it'll | :13:34. | :13:39. | |
happen at all, really. I've got friends that work | :13:40. | :13:44. | |
in adult social care, We tried to get care for somebody | :13:45. | :13:48. | |
in my family and it hasn't really worked out because of the cuts | :13:49. | :13:53. | |
that we've had. Do you think this is going to affect | :13:54. | :13:55. | |
the outcome of the election? You can see there's | :13:56. | :13:58. | |
a swing towards Labour. But I don't think it will be big | :13:59. | :14:04. | |
enough to beat the Conservatives. When it really comes down to it, | :14:05. | :14:07. | |
I think a lot of people have an altruistic view, | :14:08. | :14:25. | |
except when they have Who do you trust to sort out | :14:26. | :14:27. | |
care for the elderly? Because I don't trust | :14:28. | :14:31. | |
a Conservative. Because I think he's | :14:32. | :14:35. | |
a more genuine guy. This whole issue about care | :14:36. | :14:39. | |
for older people, has it What did you think of | :14:40. | :14:41. | |
the system that was in place? Do you think it'll ever | :14:42. | :14:49. | |
get fixed, the system, Well, it's totally unscientific, | :14:50. | :14:52. | |
but it looks as if a big majority of people think Jeremy Corbyn | :14:53. | :14:59. | |
is the person who can sort out Thank you, Adam. Unscientific, but | :15:00. | :15:15. | |
anecdotally, Corbyn on the side of the elderly and the Tories and | :15:16. | :15:19. | |
Theresa May not. Was it just too complacent to bring out a proposal | :15:20. | :15:24. | |
like the social care one that was half baked? Well, the motivation | :15:25. | :15:28. | |
behind the proposal was too but social care on a sustainable | :15:29. | :15:32. | |
financial basis. -- to put social care on a sustainable financial | :15:33. | :15:36. | |
basis. This is a real contest, it is not easy to predict the outcome of | :15:37. | :15:40. | |
the election. Was it complacent? Should she not have put out a policy | :15:41. | :15:46. | |
that was going to be controversial at the least, brave at best? What | :15:47. | :15:50. | |
people should draw from this is that the protest vote for Labour or the | :15:51. | :15:54. | |
Lib Dems involves a real risk that Jeremy Corbyn will be our Prime | :15:55. | :15:57. | |
Minister. Did it help that your party didn't come clean about which | :15:58. | :16:02. | |
pensioners would be affected by means testing the winter fuel | :16:03. | :16:10. | |
allowance? I don't think... That is obviously an issue that we will need | :16:11. | :16:14. | |
to address as part of a consultation on how to implement these proposals, | :16:15. | :16:19. | |
if we are re-elected. That consultation will look at the level | :16:20. | :16:22. | |
at which arrangements on the winter fuel payments are correlated. You | :16:23. | :16:29. | |
say this so casually. More than 7000 older people in the constituency I | :16:30. | :16:34. | |
have been representing since 2010, about 72% of older people could be | :16:35. | :16:37. | |
affected by what you are talking about. You're just casually talking | :16:38. | :16:42. | |
about these things, oh, well, we can sort it. Why should wealthy | :16:43. | :16:49. | |
pensioners get those allowances? Hang on... Well, answer that | :16:50. | :16:53. | |
question. I'm answering the question. If you look at what Labour | :16:54. | :16:58. | |
had been proposing in the last general election, yes, more wealthy | :16:59. | :17:02. | |
pensioners will be affected by this. You are talking about 72% of old age | :17:03. | :17:06. | |
pensioners that receive the winter fuel allowance. Hang on, they | :17:07. | :17:10. | |
haven't put a limit. What should it be said at? Until you put a limit, | :17:11. | :17:15. | |
or say where the means test is going to fall, a bit like the social care | :17:16. | :17:19. | |
policy, people will think it is going to affect them. In due course, | :17:20. | :17:25. | |
if we are re-elected, we will set out a threshold. Should it have been | :17:26. | :17:30. | |
done in the manifesto? You know, it's not a decision that was taken | :17:31. | :17:34. | |
easily. But the reality is that we need, in an era where resources are | :17:35. | :17:41. | |
limited by the deficit, that we inherited in 2010, we need to make | :17:42. | :17:47. | |
sure that we spend taxpayer money... Are you really blaming Labour for | :17:48. | :17:51. | |
something that happened in 2010? We left government seven years ago, and | :17:52. | :17:55. | |
your mug has borrowed more in that seven years than the Labour | :17:56. | :17:59. | |
Government did in 13 years. You were proposing the same bringing down of | :18:00. | :18:03. | |
the deficit as happened under the Conservatives and coalition? We | :18:04. | :18:06. | |
would have achieved our target. Well, we won't know, of course. | :18:07. | :18:10. | |
Vicki Young is where the Prime Minister was giving his speech. How | :18:11. | :18:13. | |
has it gone down, the big change and you turn on social care policy, not | :18:14. | :18:18. | |
just a floor of ?100,000 in care costs, but now there is going to be | :18:19. | :18:24. | |
a cap? Yes, pretty incredible stuff. Just four days after the | :18:25. | :18:29. | |
Conservative manifesto was launched, Theresa May is urging us to look at | :18:30. | :18:33. | |
page 65. She says there is no change, well, that is not the way I | :18:34. | :18:38. | |
see it. If you look here, you can see in this document that they talk | :18:39. | :18:40. | |
about the fact your house will be taken into account, they talk about | :18:41. | :18:44. | |
deferred payments, they talk about the fact you will be able to keep | :18:45. | :18:49. | |
?100,000, ultimately. No mention of a cap. That is such a fundamental | :18:50. | :18:58. | |
part of this kind of policy. It is not like work has not been done on | :18:59. | :19:00. | |
this. There have been numerous reports into social care and the way | :19:01. | :19:03. | |
that you can fund it in a different way. Caps have been talked about, | :19:04. | :19:06. | |
David Cameron was due to bring in a cap of ?72,000 in 2020. No mention | :19:07. | :19:12. | |
of that in this document. Theresa May, insisting nothing has changed, | :19:13. | :19:15. | |
the principal stay the same and she is going to tackle the issue of | :19:16. | :19:18. | |
social care, because everybody agrees more money needs to go in the | :19:19. | :19:22. | |
system. Instead, she has accused Jeremy Corbyn and Labour of | :19:23. | :19:26. | |
spreading fake claims, fear and scaremongering over people losing | :19:27. | :19:29. | |
their homes. Everybody is free to read this document, everybody will | :19:30. | :19:32. | |
look at that and see that there was no mention of a cap. The fact that | :19:33. | :19:38. | |
yesterday Damian Green, her pension secretary, said there would be no | :19:39. | :19:41. | |
rowing back from these proposals, that they had been decided. Was the | :19:42. | :19:45. | |
fact that she hadn't really consulted many of her ministers a | :19:46. | :19:49. | |
problem, in terms of putting out what her critics have called a half | :19:50. | :19:53. | |
baked policy that ended up looking like a dementia tax? Yes, that is | :19:54. | :19:59. | |
the criticism from some in the party, that she has very close | :20:00. | :20:02. | |
advisers, that she relies on them too heavily, rather than talking to | :20:03. | :20:09. | |
some Cabinet ministers around her. Damian Green not just saying there | :20:10. | :20:13. | |
would be no rowing back, he criticised the idea of a cap. What | :20:14. | :20:17. | |
she is saying, although I have to say, she sounded very rattled, she | :20:18. | :20:21. | |
sounded under pressure and she does not usually. She has made such a big | :20:22. | :20:26. | |
deal in this campaign about being strong, stable, any kind of U-turn | :20:27. | :20:29. | |
or significant change like this is going to be absolutely seized upon | :20:30. | :20:33. | |
by her opponents. She will say it is all about taking tough decisions and | :20:34. | :20:38. | |
she will say she has been willing to tackle an issue many others have not | :20:39. | :20:45. | |
been willing to do. Thank you. I am joined by two top-notch political | :20:46. | :20:46. | |
journalists. correspondent for the Telegraph, | :20:47. | :20:53. | |
and Jim Waterson, political editor We have been looking for campaign | :20:54. | :21:02. | |
drama for a while. Now we have a screeching U-turn from Theresa May. | :21:03. | :21:06. | |
I don't think she expected this. Talking to Tory MPs, they were | :21:07. | :21:09. | |
saying on the doorstep that this was actually coming up. They are a bit | :21:10. | :21:13. | |
rattled. The text messages I have been getting from people in marginal | :21:14. | :21:16. | |
seats, we are confident we are going to destroy Jeremy Corbyn, take seats | :21:17. | :21:20. | |
we have never taken before, suddenly there were dealing with pensioners | :21:21. | :21:23. | |
that were really concerned. People didn't necessarily know what the | :21:24. | :21:26. | |
policy was, they didn't like what they heard about it. They didn't | :21:27. | :21:29. | |
know the details, but they didn't like the idea that somebody was | :21:30. | :21:32. | |
going to get hold of their house and it was not going to be their kids. | :21:33. | :21:37. | |
Presumably, it was because they made a link between tightening the polls | :21:38. | :21:40. | |
over the weekend at the announcement of this policy on Thursday? Yes. It | :21:41. | :21:45. | |
was not a good weekend for the Tories. Everybody has been boasting | :21:46. | :21:56. | |
about how well they are doing, but this week we saw, over the weekend, | :21:57. | :21:59. | |
that they only have a 9-point lead. That's the first time it has been a | :22:00. | :22:01. | |
single number since Theresa May announced the snap poll. I think | :22:02. | :22:04. | |
they got pretty nervous. We will always expecting a bit of a wobble | :22:05. | :22:07. | |
at some point. I think a lot of candidates were thinking like | :22:08. | :22:09. | |
Theresa May was being a bit cocky. They knew they were doing well, they | :22:10. | :22:12. | |
kind of thought, let's go for it, let's go out there. All of the polls | :22:13. | :22:14. | |
over the weekend, specifically on the dementia tax, as shown it is | :22:15. | :22:18. | |
unpopular and Labour are doing better. They have the key message | :22:19. | :22:21. | |
out there. They have used the phrase dementia tax and it has been | :22:22. | :22:29. | |
incredibly damaging. If we look at other issues, Jeremy Corbyn came | :22:30. | :22:31. | |
under fire over the weekend for his association with the IRA and he | :22:32. | :22:35. | |
refused to condemn IRA bombing without equating to other parties. | :22:36. | :22:38. | |
Does his position on Security and defence negatively impact on the | :22:39. | :22:44. | |
retail offers that Labour was making? There are problems, | :22:45. | :22:46. | |
certainly in the seats where they are fighting with the Tories, the | :22:47. | :22:51. | |
Midlands and the North. While the interesting things with the IRA and | :22:52. | :22:53. | |
Jeremy Corbyn is the way the has developed. If you are under 40, | :22:54. | :22:59. | |
perhaps you associate the IRA and things like that more with the Good | :23:00. | :23:02. | |
Friday agreement and the peace process, so it is less of a toxic | :23:03. | :23:06. | |
association. For a lot of older voters, the sort of people the | :23:07. | :23:08. | |
Conservatives need to get onside, that is where it hits home. | :23:09. | :23:11. | |
Depending on the generational gap, it is behaving slightly differently. | :23:12. | :23:18. | |
What about Labour's university tuition fees policy. How popular is | :23:19. | :23:23. | |
that? I think it will be very popular. Labour are clearly | :23:24. | :23:26. | |
targeting the younger generation. That is where Mr Corbyn's supporters | :23:27. | :23:30. | |
are from, mainly. They are saying they're going to scrap them | :23:31. | :23:33. | |
entirely, from September there will be scrapped so that students do not | :23:34. | :23:37. | |
deferred. It is going to be popular with young people and we know that | :23:38. | :23:40. | |
young people are who Jeremy Corbyn is targeting. But do they vote? Good | :23:41. | :23:47. | |
question. Today is the final day to get people to register to vote, and | :23:48. | :23:50. | |
there is a reason why they announced today. Normally, people are going to | :23:51. | :23:58. | |
benefit in the next generation. Now you can say, vote Labour, get your | :23:59. | :24:01. | |
education for free. This was supposed to be the Brexit election, | :24:02. | :24:05. | |
as Theresa May build it, she returned to that theme today, no | :24:06. | :24:09. | |
doubt to distract from the change on social care policy. She was the one | :24:10. | :24:14. | |
that decided to make it about public services, to a large extent. Is her | :24:15. | :24:18. | |
decision broadly parking her tanks and Labour's lawn, backfiring? Well, | :24:19. | :24:25. | |
Labour is gaining in the polls. The Tories still have a massive lead. | :24:26. | :24:31. | |
There are a lot of issues around the campaign, polls tend to swing back | :24:32. | :24:36. | |
to the government. It's hard to argue that Jeremy Corbyn has not had | :24:37. | :24:40. | |
a surprisingly good campaign in the eyes of a lot of people, but still | :24:41. | :24:44. | |
has a long way to make up. Theresa May would be much happier if this | :24:45. | :24:48. | |
was all about Jeremy Corbyn, and about Brexit, than things like | :24:49. | :24:51. | |
social care. That is what we are seeing today. Thank you to both of | :24:52. | :24:53. | |
you. Now, as we've just been hearing, | :24:54. | :24:58. | |
Jeremy Corbyn's attitude to the IRA So when it comes to the Labour | :24:59. | :25:01. | |
leader and other members of his inner circle, | :25:02. | :25:05. | |
what exactly is their record As a backbencher in the 1980s, | :25:06. | :25:07. | |
Mr Corbyn was criticised for his activities with the controversial | :25:08. | :25:13. | |
Troops Out movement, which campaigned to end British | :25:14. | :25:15. | |
military involvement in Northern He's also been questioned | :25:16. | :25:17. | |
about his links to a magazine called London Labour Briefing, | :25:18. | :25:20. | |
which in 1984 published an article celebrating | :25:21. | :25:22. | |
the IRA's Brighton bombing, In the 1980s, during some | :25:23. | :25:24. | |
of the most violent years of the Troubles, Mr Corbyn | :25:25. | :25:32. | |
and the current Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell | :25:33. | :25:34. | |
met the IRA on a number They said the meetings | :25:35. | :25:36. | |
were part of their attempt The IRA declared | :25:37. | :25:42. | |
a ceasefire in 1994. Diane Abbott, now Shadow Home | :25:43. | :25:46. | |
Secretary, has been criticised for comments she made in a 1984 | :25:47. | :25:48. | |
interview, when she proclaimed "Every defeat | :25:49. | :25:51. | |
of the British state... Then, in 2003, John McDonnell | :25:52. | :25:53. | |
praised the "bombs and bullets...that brought Britain | :25:54. | :26:02. | |
to the negotiating table," comments Well, yesterday Mr Corbyn was asked | :26:03. | :26:04. | |
again about the IRA, and refused five times to condemn | :26:05. | :26:09. | |
them specifically for their role in the Troubles, saying only that | :26:10. | :26:12. | |
"all bombing is wrong". Let's hear a section | :26:13. | :26:16. | |
of that interview. Do you condemn | :26:17. | :26:18. | |
unequivocally the IRA? But you condemned | :26:19. | :26:21. | |
all bombing, there. Can you condemn the IRA | :26:22. | :26:28. | |
without equating it to... No, I think what you have to say | :26:29. | :26:33. | |
is that all bombing has to be condemned and you have to bring | :26:34. | :26:36. | |
about a peace process... Wait a minute, can you | :26:37. | :26:38. | |
let me finish, please? In the 1980s, Britain was looking | :26:39. | :26:42. | |
for a military solution in Ireland. Ask anyone in the British | :26:43. | :26:45. | |
Army at that time. Therefore, you have | :26:46. | :26:49. | |
to seek a peace process. You condemn the violence of those | :26:50. | :26:53. | |
that laid bombs that killed large numbers of innocent people, | :26:54. | :26:56. | |
and I do. So can you condemn the IRA, | :26:57. | :27:00. | |
who were responsible... I've just condemned all those | :27:01. | :27:02. | |
that did bombing... If you let me finish | :27:03. | :27:05. | |
as well, after I've just... Chuka Umunna, your leader had five | :27:06. | :27:19. | |
opportunities in that interview to condemn the IRA specifically and he | :27:20. | :27:21. | |
refused to do so. Was that a mistake? Anybody watching the clip | :27:22. | :27:27. | |
will have seen him condemn the IRA and all bombing. I am very clear, | :27:28. | :27:32. | |
unequivocally, the bombing and all of the violence which they brought | :27:33. | :27:38. | |
upon the whole of the UK is totally, totally awful and an acceptable. I | :27:39. | :27:43. | |
think that is basically what he said, whilst also talking about the | :27:44. | :27:46. | |
loyalists and what others did. The problem some people might have, and | :27:47. | :27:50. | |
I'm not saying everybody, some people might have, is his inability, | :27:51. | :27:55. | |
his seeming inability to condemn the IRA. Saying all bombing is wrong, | :27:56. | :27:58. | |
well, everybody would say all bombing is wrong. If you can't | :27:59. | :28:03. | |
condemn the IRA... Do you really think Jeremy Corbyn is somebody who | :28:04. | :28:06. | |
wanted to see death and destruction in Northern Ireland? Are you going | :28:07. | :28:09. | |
to buy the front of the Daily Mail today, Tory supporting papers, the | :28:10. | :28:12. | |
Telegraph, or take at face value what he said? Would it have been | :28:13. | :28:18. | |
easier for him to then, and this was not an interview from years ago, | :28:19. | :28:21. | |
this is yesterday, what was preventing him just saying yes, I | :28:22. | :28:26. | |
condemn the IRA bombing. You will have to ask him that question. But | :28:27. | :28:32. | |
he is the leader of the Labour Party. If you want to talk about the | :28:33. | :28:35. | |
Labour Party in Northern Ireland, I am extremely proud of the record of | :28:36. | :28:38. | |
the last Labour government are helping to bring about peace. And | :28:39. | :28:44. | |
John Major as well. But he was not in that government. I was six when | :28:45. | :28:52. | |
these things were said. You are a young man, but might it be a problem | :28:53. | :28:57. | |
for some voters to listen to an interview like that, Jeremy Corbyn | :28:58. | :29:00. | |
was not part of the government that you were talking about, under Tony | :29:01. | :29:03. | |
Blair, that dealt with the peace process. Is it difficult to sell, as | :29:04. | :29:08. | |
I asked the journalist before, Labour's off on the doorstep if | :29:09. | :29:11. | |
people have reservations about what they might feel is biased towards | :29:12. | :29:18. | |
one side or the other about Northern Ireland, bearing in mind that this | :29:19. | :29:21. | |
man wants to be the next Prime Minister? If you're talking about | :29:22. | :29:24. | |
being biased towards one side or the other, he condemned the IRA and the | :29:25. | :29:27. | |
loyalists. Do you have an issue with the fact that when he was condemn | :29:28. | :29:31. | |
any IRA, he also condemned the loyalists? If that is a big issue | :29:32. | :29:34. | |
for you, that he would not condemn the IRA on its own, I am not sure | :29:35. | :29:39. | |
that for most people this is an issue. I have been on the doorstep, | :29:40. | :29:43. | |
not just my own constituency, but in Birmingham... He was condemning the | :29:44. | :29:47. | |
British Army as well? The issue, which has been known about for a | :29:48. | :29:51. | |
long time, was not brought up. Was this not the point, it is just a | :29:52. | :29:54. | |
convenient weapon with which to attack Jeremy Corbyn? For his past | :29:55. | :30:00. | |
associations with the organisation, with the IRA, to distract from what | :30:01. | :30:04. | |
is actually going on in this election? That is not what is | :30:05. | :30:08. | |
happening here. I met many victims of IRA violence. There will be upset | :30:09. | :30:13. | |
and distressed by the fact that someone is holding himself out as | :30:14. | :30:18. | |
our next Prime Minister, potentially, and will not | :30:19. | :30:21. | |
unequivocally condemn... He condemned all bombing. Didn't he? | :30:22. | :30:24. | |
What is wrong with that? He condemned both sides. Isn't that | :30:25. | :30:28. | |
what you want? Somebody who is impartial, prepared to condemn | :30:29. | :30:30. | |
wrongdoing on both sides? Maybe it wouldn't be such a big | :30:31. | :30:41. | |
problem if he didn't have this track record on these matters and his | :30:42. | :30:45. | |
Shadow Chancellor praised the bombs and bullets of the IRA and yet | :30:46. | :30:50. | |
people are being asked on the 8th of June to trust these people with the | :30:51. | :30:54. | |
security of our nation. Remember Jeremy Corbyn also refers to groups | :30:55. | :30:59. | |
like Hamas and has bomber as his friends. Well, he has said that | :31:00. | :31:05. | |
wasn't the case, even if he used the word Brenkley he was talking more | :31:06. | :31:11. | |
generally about people that were at conferences in the past, not | :31:12. | :31:15. | |
specifically members of Hamas. But, again, Chuka, doesn't it make your | :31:16. | :31:20. | |
job much, much harder if this issue is going to come up time and time | :31:21. | :31:25. | |
again and people are unsure about where Jeremy Corbyn stands? It gets | :31:26. | :31:30. | |
raised time and again in the Telegraph and other Conservative | :31:31. | :31:35. | |
supporting newspapers but people on the doorstep are not asking about | :31:36. | :31:39. | |
the IRA, they are talking about the dementia tax, tuition fees, they | :31:40. | :31:43. | |
like the tuition fees proposals, they have asked about the public | :31:44. | :31:46. | |
sector pay cap which we will abolish, they ask us about many | :31:47. | :31:50. | |
other things. I haven't had anybody bringing up the IRA on the doorstep | :31:51. | :31:54. | |
and that is not just in my constituency but several other | :31:55. | :32:00. | |
regions as well. If Jeremy Corbyn is Prime Minister, you will have to | :32:01. | :32:03. | |
deal with the British military, he will have to deal with policies in | :32:04. | :32:12. | |
Northern Ireland. On the basis of what Theresa de Villiers said, how | :32:13. | :32:15. | |
difficult will that be with his track record? As I said, you ass | :32:16. | :32:17. | |
with a question, I answered it, it is not an issue on the doorstep. But | :32:18. | :32:21. | |
if he became Prime Minister, how difficult would it be in his | :32:22. | :32:23. | |
dealings with the British military, for example? I think the British | :32:24. | :32:31. | |
military will work with whoever is elected, that is why we have an | :32:32. | :32:34. | |
impartial civil service and an impasse or set of Armed Forces, that | :32:35. | :32:38. | |
is how it should be. Are you not making much more of this, Theresa de | :32:39. | :32:43. | |
Villiers, for party political purposes. Jeremy Corbyn and John | :32:44. | :32:49. | |
McDonnell had meetings with the IRA in the 1980s, perhaps that was | :32:50. | :32:52. | |
far-sighted, we now know that the British Government did it but in | :32:53. | :32:55. | |
secret, so perhaps it made perfect sense because it led to peace? | :32:56. | :33:00. | |
Jeremy Corbyn has a 30 year track record of voting against measures to | :33:01. | :33:04. | |
protect security. When he was asked by a journalist, would he think it | :33:05. | :33:07. | |
was correct for a police officer faced with a gun-wielding terrorist | :33:08. | :33:13. | |
to fire at that terrorist, he wouldn't even support a police | :33:14. | :33:18. | |
officer. He is not capable of dealing in a responsible way with | :33:19. | :33:22. | |
our security service. That is not actually true, if you watch the | :33:23. | :33:25. | |
interview that I think you are referring to with Laura Kuenssberg | :33:26. | :33:29. | |
Cobbe said, if you are going to have police officers using lethal force | :33:30. | :33:32. | |
then there has to be a reference to a set of rules and guidelines under | :33:33. | :33:36. | |
which they do it. Your interpretation there is a deliberate | :33:37. | :33:40. | |
untruths, I would argue. The question that I put to you is, what | :33:41. | :33:44. | |
is wrong with talking to armed dissidents, what is wrong with | :33:45. | :33:53. | |
talking to people that you want to get around the negotiating table? | :33:54. | :33:55. | |
That is what the British Government did so what is the difference? It is | :33:56. | :33:58. | |
clear the IRA and Sinn Fein were not allowed to be included in formal | :33:59. | :34:02. | |
peace talks until they adopted the Mitchell rules and agreed not to | :34:03. | :34:07. | |
resort to violence but the key thing here is who is going to be the Prime | :34:08. | :34:11. | |
Minister who will face got our security? Theresa May have a track | :34:12. | :34:16. | |
record of Home Secretary, one of the most successful in history, the | :34:17. | :34:20. | |
choice is between her keeping our country save or vesting this in the | :34:21. | :34:25. | |
incapable hands of Jeremy Corbyn. The Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams, | :34:26. | :34:30. | |
at the manifesto launch of Sinn Fein, has defended the Labour | :34:31. | :34:33. | |
leader, defended Jeremy Corbyn, following the row that we have been | :34:34. | :34:41. | |
talking about, and that that Mr Corbyn was on the right side of | :34:42. | :34:43. | |
history. If that helpful to the Labour campaign? I don't think | :34:44. | :34:47. | |
people will be seeking the advice of Gerry Adams or anyone else in my | :34:48. | :34:52. | |
constituency as to how they vote. In the end they will look at the | :34:53. | :34:55. | |
policies being offered by the Labour Party, they are popular policies and | :34:56. | :34:59. | |
they will make a judgment. Because this is a difficult area? In the | :35:00. | :35:04. | |
end, when we look at the history of Northern Ireland over the last few | :35:05. | :35:08. | |
decades and much longer, should the Conservative Party be seeking to | :35:09. | :35:11. | |
play party politics in the middle of a general election with this issue | :35:12. | :35:20. | |
when we have seen so many people on both sides lose their lives? | :35:21. | :35:22. | |
Personally I think it is rather distasteful and I don't think they | :35:23. | :35:25. | |
should be doing this. Let's leave it there. | :35:26. | :35:25. | |
Let's get a round-up of all the rest of the election campaign | :35:26. | :35:28. | |
The sun is shining, it is nice and warm but we don't have time for that | :35:29. | :35:33. | |
because there are only 17 campaigning days left of the | :35:34. | :35:36. | |
selection. Another couple of manifestos today but another more | :35:37. | :35:39. | |
urgent deadline looming, the deadline to register to vote, that | :35:40. | :35:43. | |
is at one minute to midnight tonight to do so if you have not done so | :35:44. | :35:47. | |
already, so quick, hurry up! Here is Norman. | :35:48. | :35:52. | |
It is something our ancestors fought and died for, fundamental to our | :35:53. | :35:58. | |
democracy, in the mother of all parliaments, the right to vote. But | :35:59. | :36:04. | |
if that is not reason enough, there is always free beer. Pubs across the | :36:05. | :36:08. | |
country are offering free pints to young people who have registered to | :36:09. | :36:11. | |
vote ahead of the deadline tonight. Here is one user who has taken | :36:12. | :36:15. | |
advantage. Labour board their manifesto was so good that they | :36:16. | :36:19. | |
launched it twice. The Tories did it in a warehouse. The Lib Dems stood | :36:20. | :36:24. | |
on some flags. Today it was the turn of greens, here, unveiling their | :36:25. | :36:28. | |
plans for a softer Brexit. Vote Green for a competent and caring | :36:29. | :36:34. | |
Britain. The Lib Dem leader Tim Farron was trying to up the anti on | :36:35. | :36:38. | |
being anti-Tory plans for social care funding suggesting it would | :36:39. | :36:42. | |
affect nine in ten English homes. This is a devastating death tax | :36:43. | :36:47. | |
trumped up on the back of an envelope. It is not often Ukip agree | :36:48. | :36:51. | |
with the Lib Dems on anything. Funnily enough Patrick O'Flynn did | :36:52. | :36:55. | |
not mention the pledge by another Ukip candidate that he would push | :36:56. | :36:59. | |
for asteroid belt mining and a spaceship capable of interstellar | :37:00. | :37:03. | |
travel if he was elected. Do you want housing? Do you want care? They | :37:04. | :37:08. | |
were there to see the libertines, they got this rock star instead. We | :37:09. | :37:13. | |
can achieve it together! Thank you very much! | :37:14. | :37:18. | |
CROWD CHANTS. Whatever happens on June the 8th, | :37:19. | :37:22. | |
there is always Glastonbury. Something to look forward to. | :37:23. | :37:24. | |
And I'll be talking to the Green Party leader | :37:25. | :37:26. | |
Caroline Lucas about her party's manifesto on the programme tomorrow. | :37:27. | :37:29. | |
Now, last night the first Scottish television debate | :37:30. | :37:31. | |
The six party leaders clashed on big issues such as Brexit | :37:32. | :37:35. | |
But it was the question of funding for the NHS that provoked | :37:36. | :37:39. | |
the most fiery exchange, when one member of the audience - | :37:40. | :37:42. | |
a nurse - criticised the SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon over | :37:43. | :37:44. | |
We have not heard from Jeremy Corbyn... | :37:45. | :37:50. | |
How do you expect somebody to live on that? | :37:51. | :38:08. | |
Do you think that's what nurses go into nursing for? | :38:09. | :38:12. | |
I'm telling you now, I would rather leave nursing | :38:13. | :38:17. | |
as would many more of my colleagues, than have to strike. | :38:18. | :38:20. | |
You have no idea how demoralising it is to work within the NHS. | :38:21. | :38:25. | |
Don't come on your announced visit, come in on the middle of any | :38:26. | :38:30. | |
day, into any ward, any A department. | :38:31. | :38:32. | |
My sister works in the National Health Service. | :38:33. | :38:43. | |
Believe me, she tells me exactly what she thinks about those matters. | :38:44. | :38:51. | |
If you listen to me, I'm actually agreeing with you. | :38:52. | :38:54. | |
We've had a really difficult period with public spending. | :38:55. | :38:56. | |
We've also, in Scotland, unlike in the rest of the UK, | :38:57. | :39:00. | |
had a policy of no compulsory redundancies in the NHS | :39:01. | :39:04. | |
and the wider public sector to try to protect jobs. | :39:05. | :39:13. | |
I'm joined now by the SNP's Drew Hendry, who is in Inverness for us. | :39:14. | :39:19. | |
Do you have some sympathy with the nurse who was in the audience in | :39:20. | :39:26. | |
that debate? I think, as you heard Nicola Sturgeon saying, she agreed | :39:27. | :39:29. | |
that because of rising inflation, because of the austerity policies | :39:30. | :39:34. | |
that the Tories have been wedded to across the UK, there is | :39:35. | :39:38. | |
unsustainable pressure now on the cost of living, and that | :39:39. | :39:44. | |
inflationary process means that there are already meetings in the | :39:45. | :39:48. | |
staff side of the NHS to look at the issues and Nicola Sturgeon said she | :39:49. | :39:53. | |
was looking to remove that. She is open to looking at it, should nurses | :39:54. | :39:57. | |
be paid more in Scotland or not? Nurses are being paid more in | :39:58. | :40:02. | |
Scotland, ?300 per year roughly compared to nurses in England... I | :40:03. | :40:06. | |
mean, should they be paid more than they are currently in Scotland? If | :40:07. | :40:10. | |
you look at information going up, as it is at the moment across the UK | :40:11. | :40:22. | |
and the affected will on wages, of course, as I have just said, that | :40:23. | :40:24. | |
pay restraint is now unsustainable... You have the power | :40:25. | :40:26. | |
to increase pay for nurses, don't you? That is what we have done in | :40:27. | :40:29. | |
Scotland by making sure nurses are paid more in Scotland than in the | :40:30. | :40:33. | |
NHS... Nicola Sturgeon agreed there that pay has not gone up, she agreed | :40:34. | :40:37. | |
with the nurse who said they have not had a pay rise since 2008. The | :40:38. | :40:42. | |
1% pay cap has been in place for a while, there have been rises in pay | :40:43. | :40:48. | |
but pegged to that 1%... So I say again, you have the power to pay | :40:49. | :40:52. | |
over and above that, why haven't you? Pay restraint has been a | :40:53. | :40:57. | |
necessary effect of the austerity policies from the Tory Government... | :40:58. | :41:00. | |
Not to do with the Government, you have the power to do something | :41:01. | :41:12. | |
different. If you feel that nurses should be paid more, then you have | :41:13. | :41:14. | |
tax-raising powers, health is devolved, you could have done | :41:15. | :41:16. | |
something entirely different. There are a range of people who need to be | :41:17. | :41:19. | |
paid more and the budget that comes to the Scottish Government is meted | :41:20. | :41:23. | |
out in order to make sure we meet the needs of people, employees | :41:24. | :41:27. | |
across the nation. The Scottish Government don't forget built in the | :41:28. | :41:31. | |
real living wage for all public sector employees to make sure people | :41:32. | :41:35. | |
had a decent chance of a good living. That is something that has | :41:36. | :41:38. | |
not happened across England and Wales. We have a proud record of | :41:39. | :41:41. | |
being able to tackle though play whenever it is in our gift and as I | :41:42. | :41:46. | |
said the issue around pay restraint, because of the rising inflation, it | :41:47. | :41:53. | |
looks unsustainable, Nicola Sturgeon said clearly she would do something | :41:54. | :41:58. | |
about it. The nurse said she had to use food banks. Is that acceptable? | :41:59. | :42:03. | |
Despite what you have just read, is it acceptable that a nurse working | :42:04. | :42:07. | |
in the NHS in Scotland have to use a food bank? It is not acceptable that | :42:08. | :42:12. | |
anybody has to use a food bank. But you could do something about it, | :42:13. | :42:16. | |
which you have conceded. Let me just ask the question, you talked about | :42:17. | :42:20. | |
pay restraint and austerity, you blamed the | :42:21. | :42:35. | |
Conservative Government for that and talked about inflation, which makes | :42:36. | :42:38. | |
it sound like the Scottish Government has no power at all and | :42:39. | :42:41. | |
is impotent in terms of trying to alleviate the pressure is on page | :42:42. | :42:43. | |
four people who live in Scotland, why don't you raise income tax if | :42:44. | :42:46. | |
you want to pay people more? I have told you about some of the measures | :42:47. | :42:49. | |
we have taken to make sure people get a real living wage, as opposed | :42:50. | :42:52. | |
to that put forward by the UK Government. We are actively doing | :42:53. | :42:54. | |
things like that, but you cannot get away from the fact that when the | :42:55. | :42:57. | |
budgetary system is run in the way it is in the UK and money comes to | :42:58. | :43:01. | |
Scotland, in order to make sure we are paying for services we need to | :43:02. | :43:04. | |
make sure that money is going to protect people and that is what we | :43:05. | :43:09. | |
have done in terms of pay and we have made sure that we have | :43:10. | :43:13. | |
introduced the living wage, that nurses get paid more in Scotland | :43:14. | :43:17. | |
than in England, and we are actively looking at the pay restraint issue | :43:18. | :43:20. | |
because of the fact that inflation now makes it look completely | :43:21. | :43:24. | |
unsustainable. There was a suggestion by some SNP members that | :43:25. | :43:30. | |
the nurse we were talking about was married to at Conservative member, | :43:31. | :43:40. | |
that is untrue. Is that the kind of thing that should be put forward by | :43:41. | :43:45. | |
your party? Somebody said something onto it and almost immediately | :43:46. | :43:48. | |
apologised for it, that was the fact of the matter. But do you agree that | :43:49. | :43:53. | |
that was unacceptable and inappropriate? Of course, it is | :43:54. | :43:56. | |
never acceptable to use that kind of thing. But can I come back to what I | :43:57. | :44:00. | |
was going to say about universal credit, because this is an issue of | :44:01. | :44:04. | |
pay and the ability of people to live their lives in Scotland. | :44:05. | :44:17. | |
I have just come from a meeting of universal credit in Inverness, where | :44:18. | :44:21. | |
it has been rolled out early across this area, it is coming to the rest | :44:22. | :44:24. | |
of the UK shortly and we have got people, because of the universal | :44:25. | :44:26. | |
credit changes that the UK Government are making, working | :44:27. | :44:28. | |
people who are suffering because of cuts to those benefits that are | :44:29. | :44:30. | |
coming out, it is also affecting the disabled and the unemployed as well. | :44:31. | :44:33. | |
Just because I have not that that much more time with you, let's have | :44:34. | :44:37. | |
a look at your manifesto, which is coming out tomorrow, I understand. | :44:38. | :44:41. | |
Can we look forward to an end to the public pay freeze in that manifesto? | :44:42. | :44:45. | |
I'm not going to pre-empt the manifesto launch tomorrow but what I | :44:46. | :44:48. | |
can tell you is that our manifesto will be looking after people with | :44:49. | :44:53. | |
fairness and equality at its heart, unlike what we have seen from the | :44:54. | :44:57. | |
Tory manifesto which attacks pensioners... We have done that, I | :44:58. | :45:01. | |
am more interested in your manifesto. We will see it tomorrow | :45:02. | :45:05. | |
and we will no doubt talk to you again, thank you very much. | :45:06. | :45:10. | |
As well as discussing all of the main parties contesting | :45:11. | :45:13. | |
this general election, we're also looking at the platforms | :45:14. | :45:15. | |
of the smaller parties and today it's the turn | :45:16. | :45:17. | |
The BNP is a nationalist party and it says it wants | :45:18. | :45:21. | |
They are pledging to stop all immigration into the UK, | :45:22. | :45:29. | |
and offer grants to people of foreign descent who volunteer | :45:30. | :45:31. | |
They want to stop what they call the "Islamisation of the UK" and ban | :45:32. | :45:38. | |
hijabs, burkas and the building of new mosques. | :45:39. | :45:41. | |
They also want to abolish anti-discrimination laws, | :45:42. | :45:43. | |
and be tough on law and order by re-introducing the death penalty. | :45:44. | :45:46. | |
We've been joined in the studio by party spokesman and general | :45:47. | :45:48. | |
I am joined by Adam Walker. It is reported your membership is down to | :45:49. | :45:59. | |
a few hundred. In the last election, you lost 99.7% of your vote share, | :46:00. | :46:03. | |
winning just 1600 votes and the party has been riven with infighting | :46:04. | :46:07. | |
and defections. Why is the party in such a perilous state? Yes, it has | :46:08. | :46:12. | |
been quoted that our membership is right down. Isn't it? No, it is at | :46:13. | :46:19. | |
about 3000. What we have to remember is that every month and every year | :46:20. | :46:23. | |
for the past seven years, we have actually operated in a profit. We | :46:24. | :46:25. | |
are doing quite well in that respect. How many members have you | :46:26. | :46:31. | |
got? About 3000, but it is growing. We are doing a lot better since the | :46:32. | :46:37. | |
collapse of Ukip. Doing better since that? How much, though? There has | :46:38. | :46:46. | |
been a decline in membership in the last few years. How much of that is | :46:47. | :46:49. | |
down to your leadership? It is not down to my leadership. We have Ukip, | :46:50. | :46:52. | |
who have been promoted by the mass media. They are doing better than | :46:53. | :46:55. | |
you and are more appealing? They have done in the past. What we have | :46:56. | :47:00. | |
seen with the collapse of Ukip since Brexit, we are gaining members from | :47:01. | :47:04. | |
them and we are pleased about that. One of your policies is zero | :47:05. | :47:08. | |
tolerance for drug dealers and violent thugs. But you were given a | :47:09. | :47:13. | |
six-month suspended sentence in 2012 after verbally abusing three young | :47:14. | :47:17. | |
schoolchildren, chasing them in your 4x4 and slashing the tyres of their | :47:18. | :47:22. | |
bikes with a knife. You were a schoolteacher at the time? If that | :47:23. | :47:28. | |
is not thuggish behaviour, what is? EU the judge described it as a Rush | :47:29. | :47:31. | |
of blood to the head, I apologise that the time. Are you the right | :47:32. | :47:38. | |
person to be the party leader? I do apologise for that and I said I | :47:39. | :47:41. | |
apologise. If we look at criminality, we need to look at the | :47:42. | :47:48. | |
recent programme, talking about the criminality happening in towns... | :47:49. | :47:51. | |
You can't brush it to the side like that. You are the chairman of the | :47:52. | :47:57. | |
British National Party and yet that sort of behaviour, you think, can be | :47:58. | :48:00. | |
excused by a brief rush to the head? It can't be excused at all, I | :48:01. | :48:05. | |
apologise that the time... But you had a six-month suspended jail | :48:06. | :48:08. | |
sentence. If we want to look at criminality, look at what has | :48:09. | :48:14. | |
happened in Rochdale... And those people were convicted and went to | :48:15. | :48:18. | |
jail. Would you be happy for one of them to be in charge of all the | :48:19. | :48:23. | |
chairman of a party? If we want to look at other criminals, we cannot | :48:24. | :48:27. | |
get Tony Blair, who took us to an illegal war under the pretence of | :48:28. | :48:31. | |
weapons mass destruction. I believe, and members of our party believe, | :48:32. | :48:35. | |
that he should be up in court as a criminal. They are not here, and you | :48:36. | :48:40. | |
are, fielding candidates at this election. You have been banned from | :48:41. | :48:44. | |
teaching... I have not. You still teach karate, should you? Of course | :48:45. | :48:53. | |
I should. After you chased three children and slashed tyres with a | :48:54. | :48:56. | |
knife? I have recommendations from people that come to my club. I teach | :48:57. | :49:02. | |
children and have international champions that train from my club, | :49:03. | :49:05. | |
nobody has a problem. Let's move away from your character and onto | :49:06. | :49:09. | |
policies. You want to offer repatriating grants to encourage | :49:10. | :49:12. | |
people for dissent to leave the country? We believe Britain is full. | :49:13. | :49:17. | |
Who would be eligible? There are enough people in Great Britain now. | :49:18. | :49:22. | |
I have taken my other guests through specific policies, who would be | :49:23. | :49:26. | |
eligible? There are far too many people in our country at this point | :49:27. | :49:30. | |
in time. There is enough... The infrastructure can't deal with the | :49:31. | :49:33. | |
amount of people coming in and we need to make sure that they... How | :49:34. | :49:39. | |
would you do it? What the Government should have done, consecutive | :49:40. | :49:41. | |
governments beforehand, they should have done a feasibility study to | :49:42. | :49:48. | |
find out how many people are needed in infrastructure, schools, | :49:49. | :49:52. | |
hospitals, emergency departments. Sure, I take your broad point, that | :49:53. | :49:58. | |
you feel hospitals, schools, they are under pressure. But what I am | :49:59. | :50:02. | |
asking you, you are wanting to offer repatriating grants to encourage | :50:03. | :50:06. | |
people of foreign descent to go back, in your words, to the country | :50:07. | :50:10. | |
you think they came from. Who would be eligible for the grant? I have | :50:11. | :50:16. | |
spoken to parents recently on the school gates and they are really | :50:17. | :50:21. | |
concerned about the amount of people that are being allowed to come in... | :50:22. | :50:24. | |
Are you just offering simple solutions that don't add up to a row | :50:25. | :50:29. | |
of beans? If you would be eligible? Would it just be people who were | :50:30. | :50:35. | |
born abroad? Certainly not. Who would it be? Can you tell me? We | :50:36. | :50:40. | |
could use some of the money that we currently spend on foreign aid, I | :50:41. | :50:43. | |
think nobody has mentioned that one so far in the election debates. I | :50:44. | :50:48. | |
think it is about ?13.5 billion that is being spent in foreign aid to | :50:49. | :50:53. | |
some of the most corrupt countries. But which people do you want to | :50:54. | :50:57. | |
leave the country? If talking about? We're not saying that we want people | :50:58. | :51:03. | |
to leave. We are saying that we want to halt immigration... What is a | :51:04. | :51:08. | |
repatriation grant for? We need to find out who is in this country | :51:09. | :51:12. | |
legally and who is here illegally. Once we have done that, we can... | :51:13. | :51:17. | |
Move on from there. You are going to pay people who are here illegally to | :51:18. | :51:22. | |
go back to where you think they have come from? Well... We have far too | :51:23. | :51:27. | |
many people in the country at this point in time and we need to stop | :51:28. | :51:30. | |
it. People are suffering on the streets. I have spoke to people on | :51:31. | :51:35. | |
the streets. I even spoke to a Jamaican lady the other day, and she | :51:36. | :51:40. | |
is fed up of immigration. But this is one of your policy solutions. | :51:41. | :51:44. | |
What do you say to those that claim you are a racist party? It is | :51:45. | :51:48. | |
nonsense, it is not racist to oppose mass immigration. The Archbishop of | :51:49. | :51:52. | |
Canterbury said himself that is not racist to oppose mass aggression. | :51:53. | :51:56. | |
But you haven't been able to explain one of your key policies, a | :51:57. | :52:00. | |
repatriation grant. We are not racist, it is just a label that has | :52:01. | :52:04. | |
been put on us over the years. It is not racist to oppose mass | :52:05. | :52:10. | |
immigration. It is a numbers game. A few years ago, Nick Griffin, the | :52:11. | :52:13. | |
leader of the party, said we are a racist party. Is he joking? That is | :52:14. | :52:19. | |
why he is not the leader any more. Because he was wrong? Why did he | :52:20. | :52:24. | |
think the BNP is a racist party, his own party? I don't know what Nick | :52:25. | :52:27. | |
Griffin thought. You say you wanted to stop the Islamisation of Britain, | :52:28. | :52:34. | |
banning the burqa, the building of new mosques, wider focus on Muslims? | :52:35. | :52:37. | |
We don't think Islam is compatible with our way of life, as we said rig | :52:38. | :52:49. | |
saw recently. What about... What about British Muslims is not | :52:50. | :52:53. | |
compatible? There are a small number of Muslims that are extremist and we | :52:54. | :52:56. | |
think the government job is to protect the people of Great Britain, | :52:57. | :53:02. | |
protect them in a way that is suitable for them. Do you not think | :53:03. | :53:07. | |
there are extremists in all walks of life? Yes, but if we look at the | :53:08. | :53:11. | |
recent events that have happened here, just down the road, somebody | :53:12. | :53:16. | |
was mown down by a Muslim extremist. We have female genital mutilation, | :53:17. | :53:21. | |
acid attacks, people that our gang raped. Are you an extremist? | :53:22. | :53:26. | |
Certainly not, I am the opposite. Thank you very much. | :53:27. | :53:27. | |
Throughout this week we'll be talking to representatives | :53:28. | :53:29. | |
of the five main parties seeking election in Northern Ireland. | :53:30. | :53:31. | |
We start with the smallest of the five, the Alliance Party, | :53:32. | :53:34. | |
and its deputy leader Stephen Farry joins us live from Belfast | :53:35. | :53:41. | |
Welcome to the Daily Politics. What would you say is a success in this | :53:42. | :53:48. | |
election for you? In the past we have had elected MPs in Northern | :53:49. | :53:51. | |
Ireland, our current leader, and we are hopeful to get one or two seats | :53:52. | :53:57. | |
this time around. We are in a very confident place, we had a very good | :53:58. | :54:00. | |
election in the recent assembly election in Northern Ireland, where | :54:01. | :54:04. | |
we had an almost 50% increase in our vote in the space of 12 months. The | :54:05. | :54:11. | |
main liberal cross community party in Northern Ireland, we are in a | :54:12. | :54:14. | |
good place. The politics are in a precarious situation. In 2016, you | :54:15. | :54:20. | |
didn't win any seats and you lost your only one, Naomi Long, who you | :54:21. | :54:24. | |
mentioned. What are you offering this time that makes you confident | :54:25. | :54:27. | |
that the results are going to be better? Well, we offer a clear | :54:28. | :54:32. | |
alternative. We are not a unionist or Nationalist party. Insofar as | :54:33. | :54:36. | |
politics in Northern Ireland can be very polarised, we are the response | :54:37. | :54:39. | |
to that in the sense that we are offering a different type of | :54:40. | :54:44. | |
approach, focusing on the region of northern Ireland as a whole, | :54:45. | :54:47. | |
representation of the entire community, bringing it into the 21st | :54:48. | :54:52. | |
century. We have a track record of success on the ground, when we have | :54:53. | :54:55. | |
been in government in Northern Ireland in the past. And we have | :54:56. | :54:59. | |
been in Westminster, in the past. In 2015, our vote went up, although the | :55:00. | :55:04. | |
breaks did not fall for us in terms of winning seats. You have been | :55:05. | :55:07. | |
critical of the Conservative Party plans for Brexit, do you accept that | :55:08. | :55:10. | |
if they win this election they will have a mandate from the people for | :55:11. | :55:15. | |
what you would call a hard Brexit? Well, there is a mandate from the | :55:16. | :55:19. | |
referendum last year and, potentially, through the general | :55:20. | :55:22. | |
election. The reality is, no matter what happens for the UK as a whole, | :55:23. | :55:26. | |
Northern Ireland is a special case. We do have the option, the option to | :55:27. | :55:33. | |
rejoin the European Union through a united Ireland at some stage, if | :55:34. | :55:37. | |
that is what the people of Northern Ireland choose. We have the Good | :55:38. | :55:40. | |
Friday agreement and Northern Ireland only works on the basis of | :55:41. | :55:43. | |
sharing and interdependence. Brexit is about putting up new divisions | :55:44. | :55:47. | |
and barriers. There has to be some sort of special arrangement put in | :55:48. | :55:49. | |
place for Northern Ireland, not least because of the fact that we | :55:50. | :55:53. | |
have a land border with the remainder of the European Union | :55:54. | :55:57. | |
through the Republic of Ireland. As you say, that could be the focus of | :55:58. | :56:01. | |
the Brexit negotiations, the issues you just outlined. This election | :56:02. | :56:07. | |
takes place amid a background of uncertainty for devolved | :56:08. | :56:09. | |
institutions. Do you think that might help your party, ironically? | :56:10. | :56:13. | |
Certainly, people are very concerned and frustrated at the lack of | :56:14. | :56:16. | |
progress we have seen in recent years. The issues we have fallen out | :56:17. | :56:21. | |
over are very narrow. But the divisions between the parties are | :56:22. | :56:24. | |
very deep. Indeed, they are very bitter. It is a real tragedy this is | :56:25. | :56:29. | |
happening at this time. We need our own local executive to stand up for | :56:30. | :56:32. | |
Northern Ireland, particularly with Brexit negotiations looming. There | :56:33. | :56:35. | |
is a real desire on the half of the European Union to address the Irish | :56:36. | :56:40. | |
issues at the forefront of the negotiations. Are you reassured by | :56:41. | :56:44. | |
the fact that all the parties, pretty much all of them involved, | :56:45. | :56:48. | |
have said that Northern Ireland and the border issue will be one of the | :56:49. | :56:52. | |
first issues they will try to resolve in the Brexit negotiations? | :56:53. | :56:56. | |
We are reassured in the sense that everybody is saying that. In | :56:57. | :57:01. | |
practice, whenever you try to avoid this frictionless border on the | :57:02. | :57:06. | |
island of Ireland, there is a lot of platitudes, no return to the borders | :57:07. | :57:10. | |
of the past. Nobody to date has really spelt out how we can avoid | :57:11. | :57:15. | |
that, when the UK leaves the customs union. There is no example anywhere | :57:16. | :57:19. | |
else in the world where there is not a physical border and a customs | :57:20. | :57:24. | |
frontier. We will be talking to representational the other Northern | :57:25. | :57:28. | |
Ireland parties later this week. Now, as part of the BBC's general | :57:29. | :57:31. | |
election coverage our very own Andrew will be interviewing | :57:32. | :57:33. | |
a different party leader in-depth And first up is the Prime | :57:34. | :57:36. | |
Minister, Theresa May. That's The Andrew Neil Interviews, | :57:37. | :57:39. | |
with Theresa May, tonight We didn't have time earlier to give | :57:40. | :57:49. | |
you the quiz. You thought you were getting away with it! | :57:50. | :57:53. | |
What do you think is happening in this picture? | :57:54. | :57:58. | |
Do you know what the answer is? I don't! I thought you were going to | :57:59. | :58:10. | |
say yes. What does it look like? Is it to commemorate the signing of a | :58:11. | :58:14. | |
deal? It looks like something out of a sci-fi film. | :58:15. | :58:19. | |
Donald Trump was with King Salman of Saudi Arabia and President Sisi | :58:20. | :58:22. | |
of Egypt at the ceremonial opening of the Global Centre | :58:23. | :58:25. | |
for Combating Extremist Ideology in Riyadh, during the US President's | :58:26. | :58:27. | |
Of course(!) What do you mean, you didn't have a clue! It looks more | :58:28. | :58:40. | |
like a seance. The other worrying seen, waving swords around. | :58:41. | :58:43. | |
Thanks to Theresa, Chuka, and all my guests. | :58:44. | :58:45. | |
The One O'Clock news is starting over on BBC One now. | :58:46. | :58:48. | |
I'll be here at noon tomorrow with all the latest | :58:49. | :58:51. | |
election campaign news - do join me then. | :58:52. | :58:54. |