02/02/2018 Daily Politics

Hello and welcome to

the Daily Politics.

Theresa May hails £9 billion worth

of trade deals as her three-day trip

to China comes to a close -

but has she done enough

to persuade her fractious party

that she has a vision

for Britain and Brexit?

Carillion collapsed -

now other private firms that deliver

public services could be in trouble.

Is the outsourcing model broken?

Labour councillors quit, saying

they've been bullied or intimidated

by pro-Corbyn activists.

Is Labour the new nasty party?

And one of the youngest Tory Leaders

chooses the youngest ever prime

minister as his political hero.

I first came across him from

Margaret Thatcher, can you believe?

All that in the next hour

and with us for the duration,

two political heroes of mine -

Harry Cole of the Sun

and Zoe Williams of the Guardian.

Welcome to the programme.

So, Theresa May is returning

to Britain with a fistful of trade

deals and talking up the UK's

prospects outside

the European Union.

But her trade tour of China has been

overshadowed by noises off

from her own MPs here in Westminster

and demands that she provides more

clarity on the UK's negotiating

position as the second stage

of Brexit talks begin.

Just before she boarded a plane

in Shanghai she spoke

to the BBC's political editor,

Laura Kuenssberg, who asked her

whether it was time to fill

in the blanks on what she really

wanted from Brexit.

We're now starting to negotiate that

free trade agreement

with the European Union.

We want that to enable trade to take

place on as frictionless

and tariff-free a basis as possible

across our borders.

But, of course, we also want to be

signing trade deals around

the rest of the world,

like here in China.

Prime Minister, there's

a fundamental choice,

though, here, isn't there?

Your Chancellor has said he believes

the changes might be very modest.

One of your former Brexit ministers,

who is on your side,

has said the Government is yet

to make clear choices and you're

risking ending up with something

that looks like meaningless waffle.

There are big choices here that

you haven't yet made,

or you're not willing to tell us.

The negotiations with the

European Union are in two phases.

We completed the first phase...

And we are in the second phase now.

Time is running out.

We've just entered the second phase.

If you look back to what happened

in the first phase, many people said

we wouldn't get a deal,

many people said we wouldn't be able

to come to an agreement with the EU

and many people said we wouldn't get

what we wanted.

That's been done and now we move

on and what people want to know...

Yes, but this is...

Laura...

But the point is...

It is fundamentally...

The point is that that deal,

which many people said

would not be done, was done.

We got what we wanted.

We ensured that we dealt with those

issues in that first phase.

Now we start the negotiations

for the second phase.

We want that free trade agreement,

we negotiate a free trade agreement

with the European Union.

We want that to be on as

tariff-free and frictionless

a basis as possible.

That will be good

for jobs in the UK.

But that also gives us the freedom

to be able to negotiate and to sign

up trade deals around the rest

of the world.

That's good for prosperity and jobs

and people in Britain, too.

Prime Minister, you know very well,

though, that the decision time

is fast approaching.

Now, our viewers can hear

when you are reluctant

to give any more detail.

I ask you again, which is

more important to you -

less disruption to the economy

or more control for our parliament

and our politicians?

Because the EU, many

people in business, many

members of the public,

many people in your party believe

you simply can't have both,

and you must now come clean

on what you really want

or it risks you looking

like you don't know what you want.

You see, I don't believe

that those are alternatives.

What the British people voted

for is for us to take back

control of our money,

our borders and our laws and that's

exactly what we are going to do.

And we're joined now by the veteran

Conservative Brexiteer Bill Cash.

Welcome to the programme. Does

Theresa May need to set out her

ambition for Brexit more clearly

now?

Brexit, she said, means Brexit.

We've got the Article 50 act through

by 499 in the House of Commons.

We've also got the withdrawal bill

through the House of commons by a

bigger majority on second reading.

The negotiations are running

parallel to this. It is bound to be

difficult. There is no question

about that. The European scrutiny

committee is looking into the ins

and outs of it. In terms of her and

the way it is all being conducted,

the fact is... I said recently we

need to have what I call a grown-up

discussion, knowing that there are

serious differences about the

endgame but, actually, if you look

what the EU wants, they want

political union. There was no way we

could stay in that EU.

So does

Theresa May need to set up what she

wants more clearly?

I would like to

see more emphasis on what the

objectives of the EU are entered as

a political union, the fact that

they run a system of making laws

which we couldn't possibly live with

behind closed doors, the democracy

that we represent, the terrific

opportunities that we have in the

global market, of which this China

deal is an example.

Are you

disappointed that she hasn't said

those things?

I'm saying at the

moment we are waiting for her to

make a big speech, which I think is

coming.

It is not, actually. She's

going to deliver a speech on

security but not a big speech in the

way you have characterised

I think

the moment is going to come when we

need to get that big vision out

there because I think a lot of

people are squabbling amongst one

another about what they want, where

is that the ultimate objectives in

the national interests are clearly

to repeal the 72 act, get the bill

through the House of Lords with

possibly some amendments, and the

bottom-line is that the really big

vision is about stopping our being

part of a union. We can't reverse,

we can't remain. We actually have to

get into the serious business of

having our own lawmaking, our own

borders, our own money.

You said the

party are squabbling. Has Theresa

May got a grip of the Conservative

Party?

I think there are too many

people who are running around at the

moment giving an impression, which

are really differences of opinion,

we hear it in the tea room and

elsewhere, but the reality is that

actually, when it comes to the

votes, rather than the arguments,

the votes are going through.

Use a

differences of opinion, it is more

than differences of opinion. Tempers

are flying left, right and centre.

There is a daily outpouring of Tory

MPs basically criticising the

opposite side when it comes to

Brexit and not just on Brexit. Even

your colleagues Jacob Rees-Mogg is

basically accusing the civil service

of not actually... Or betraying what

Brexit was all about, even though

the Government has tasked the civil

service with finding out what they

should be doing. Is that correct?

If

you look at what has happened over

Project Fear, I distinctly remember

how the information process was

begun and it is this... It was

agreed that it would be a completely

impartial process and it was not.

There is a kind of status quo,

institutionalised attitude within

parts of the civil service and, in a

way, you can hardly blame them, for

this reason. Actually, they have

grown up with this. When you heard

the secretary of the Cabinet saying

that the repeal of the 1972 act was

a dagger in his soul, that is the

kind of thing... Lyubov Waite, civil

servants, if they had a clear steer,

would be prosecuting that steered.

The problem is, nobody will tell

them what to do. You seem to have

missed something. They have got a

clear steer.

They don't even know if

you want to stay in the customs

union or not.

We're not going to be

a customs union or the single.

Don't

talk over each

talk over each other, and let Zoe

responded

When the council decision

was announced two or three days ago,

the fact is that in that document it

actually prescribes that we would be

in the customs union and in the

single market, that we would be

subject to the court of justice.

These are the really big questions

of the fact is that the Government

is saying we will not be the customs

union or the single market for one

reason, and that is if you repeal

the 1972 act, you change the whole

nature of the relationship.

The

problem is, and it is perfectly

demonstrated here, people are going

to project on the Prime Minister

what they want because there is a

vacuum. The problem for the Prime

Minister is that she's in a Catch-22

situation. Because of her gamble

last year, she has ended up in a

situation where there are 15 people

on the Remain side of the party, the

pro-EU wing, who wonders of Brexit,

and there are maybe 40 or even 50 on

the hard Brexit side who want a

pure, clean break with Brussels. At

this point, she has got upset one of

those wings. And she is trying to

juggle all these plates for so long,

eventually she has got to break.

This makes literally no sense. You

are both sitting here saying we are

completely resolved and leaving the

single market and the customs union.

If that were clear, there wouldn't

be a vacuum.

The vacuum is what

replaces it. The decision has been

made.

Let me ask your question. Is

Theresa May still the best person in

your mind to deliver Brexit?

I

believe so, because actually we've

got a programme, she is following it

through, you got the Lancaster House

speech. We are the transitional

period. There are a number of

questions... We are in the middle of

the associated what that is going to

mean.

Harry has just said, in a

political vacuum various wings of

the party are projecting out to the

party what they think Brexit should

be. Would Brexit be better delivered

by somebody who voted to leave the

EU in the referendum?

She has made

an even bigger transition in a

sense, from going for Remain to a

situation where she is pursuing a

policy, getting the bills and we

have already gone through.

Would

Brexit be better delivered by her or

somebody who voted to leave?

My view

is that she is doing a very good job

in making sure that we deliver the

votes in the House of Commons, and

that is what matters. Is

So why the

squabbling? Why this daily browing?

You tell me.

I am not a member of

the Tory body or an MP.

I am saying

that their arguments are the

inevitable. Would you be surprised

if they weren't going to argue?

We

have talked a bit about the civil

service. Brexit colleagues like

Jacob Rees-Mogg have been

denigrating civil servants who work

for your Government, and then we had

the unedifying spectacle of Steve

Baker, a government minister,

accusing civil servants of skewing

the data to undermine the case for

leaving the EU and then having to

apologise to the House because he

got it wrong. Let's have a listen to

Steve Baker.

Yesterday, I answer the question

based on my honest recollection of a

conversation. As I explained

yesterday, I considered what I

understood the question being put to

me as implausible because of a

long-standing and well-regarded

impartiality of the civil service.

The audio of that conversation is

now available and I am glad the

record stand corrected. In the

context of that audio, I accept that

I should have corrected or dismissed

the premise of my honourable

friend's question. I have apologised

to Mr Charles Grant, an honest and

trustworthy man. As I have put on

record many times, I have the

highest regard for our hard-working

civil servants. I am grateful for

this early opportunity to correct

the record, Mr Depp is bigger, and I

apologise to the House.

Which bit

did he get right? You said some of

it was true.

I'm saying that impact

when he may be apology, that, as far

as I'm concerned, draws line under

it. It appears from what I saw, and

I wasn't in the House at the time,

but my understanding of it is that

he was presented with a question

which was based on a degree of

hearsay and I think you

misunderstood the nature of the

question.

Do you have any comment to

make about the fact that he only

apologised once the audio was

released?

I haven't the audio.

Is it

right to deliberately accuse...

Sorry, accuse the civil service of

deliberately drawing up negative

assessments of Brexit?

During

Project Fear...

You do think it is

true so why did he apologise?

I'm

not saying that, I'm talking about

the past.

In these recent

assessments that were leaked to...

Steve Baker basically said, until

the audio was actually released

which proved to be wrong, he said

the civil service had

deliberately... How can an minister

get it wrong, accusing his own civil

servants of deliberately doing

something that they didn't do?

I

think you're putting a bit too much

emphasis on the word to

deliberately. I don't think from

what I saw that he had done it to

liberally. I think there was a

misunderstanding and I think it's

quite right for him to apologise but

leave it at that.

People are now

saying openly what they have been

saying privately since the

referendum, the wounds are still raw

among people like Steve Baker, an

arch Brexiteer and a very respected

person on that side of the debate.

They are still fighting the battles

of the referendum, where they work

actually pretty much against the

entire British establishment who

wanted Britain to stay in and that

haven't healed. Located in the

context of this week. The Brexit

department were blindsided by this

leak Monday, and Steve evidently

didn't know that his own boss and

the Prime Minister had commissioned

this work, so you can start to see

that sort of conspiracy appearing.

It is so maddening. What is so

maddening about this is that every

single time it is like, oh, well,

the Remainers are doing this again,

the civil service Remainers are

doing that, exactly what they did in

the referendum. Weighted.

Isn't a

legitimate, given there is a track

record?

A won the referendum. And

they had a project, they could get

on and do it. What is derailing them

is not having a project and when

they are derailed by their own lack

of budget, they turn round and say,

the Remainers...

Hang on. There is a

legitimate claim to be made about

the civil service?

the civil service?

No, I am simply

saying if you look at the pass,

there is a book written by Michael

Charlton for the BBC, that is no

doubt when you we'd the recorded

interviews of people like Conor

O'Neill and others, you will see

they had an attitude of mind. They

wanted a certain objective.

Your

college was on the programme a few

days ago at the end of last week and

said that if, in the end, there is

drift towards a softer Brexit and

the Government does contemplate an

go ahead with remaining in the

customs union of some sort, with the

European Union, that there would be

ructions, he said, in the country

and it would be an existential

question for the Tory party. Do you

agree?

I think there are serious

questions inherent in the

distinction, as I would put it,

between as I said in the debate on

this the other day, between being in

the custom union and eight custom

union.

What he is saying is...

If we

were to stay in indefinitely, of

course there would be a massive row,

but that is not what is happening.

It looks very like the suggestion on

the table is really all of these

unions and then we create something

as much like them as possible and

then we joined those, at gargantuan

expense and a huge waste of time.

We

will leave it there.

Now it's time for our daily quiz.

The question for today is...

What nickname have the Chinese

given Theresa May?

Is it...

A - Mummy May?

B - Granny May?

C - Auntie May?

Or D - Sister May?

At the end of the show,

Zoe and Harry will give

us the correct answer.

377 job losses have been announced

this morning at the construction

and outsourcing firm Carillion that

went in receivership last mont.

That firm's failure has been

followed by profit warnings

and share price falls from other

companies in the sector.

So is the outsourcing model

that's been encouraged

by successive governments broken?

Last month, the construction giant

Carillion collapsed,

after it was unable to secure

financial support

to continue trading.

On Wednesday, more than £1 billion

was wiped off the stock

market value of Capita,

which also handles

government contracts.

Other firms - Interserve,

Mitie and Serco - have also

seen their shares slide as investor

concerns mount about the state

of the wider outsourcing sector.

Labour have called for

an end to what they call

the outsourcing racket.

Under their plans, the public sector

would be the default choice

for providing government services.

Jeremy Corbyn has also pledged

a wage cap on bosses

running the firms.

Companies bidding for public-sector

work would have to stop executives

earning more than 20 times the wage

of their lowest paid worker.

In the Commons yesterday,

Labour's Rachel Reeves put down

an urgent question on Capita.

Oliver Dowden, Minister

for the Cabinet Office, responded.

The issues that led

to the insolvency of Carillion

will come out in due course

but our current assessment

is that they primarily flowed

from difficulties in construction

contracts, including overseas.

By contrast, Capita is primarily

a services business and 92%

of Capita's revenues come

from within the United Kingdom.

Now, as members would expect,

we regularly monitor the financial

stability of all our strategic

suppliers, including Capita,

and as I've said, we do not believe

any of them are in a comparable

position to Carillion.

And joining us now from Derby

is the Labour MP Chris Williamson.

And we're joined here in the studio

by the former Conservative

minister Francis Maude.

Welcome to both of you. Chris

Williamson, Oliver Dowden said the

Government does not believe Capita

is in anyway in a common position to

Carillion. They are not the same,

are they? They would say that,

wouldn't they? Clearly, there is a

concern because Capita has issued a

profit warning and they are in some

difficulties, it seems to me. This

is the same pattern that was

followed by Carillion. I frankly

think that the outsourcing model is

broken. It is one that has been used

for the past four decades and I

think we

need to move away from it to a

system which is more trustworthy and

better value for money.

And that

means bringing everything into the

public sector, then, in your mind?

That should be the default position.

That is the Labour Party's position,

as you said in the opening package

there. I think it is more

cost-effective, accountable, and

transparent. These companies are

exempt from the Freedom of

Information Act provision. So these

people are getting away potentially

with murder, really. And we need to

call a halt to it and get better

value for money for the taxpayer,

and better democratic oversight of

these activities. We can't allow

these companies to continue going

bust and ripping off the public

purse.

Should more alarm bells be

ringing? Are you worried about the

state of Capita, bearing in mind

what happened to Carillion? Capita

has even more public sector

contracts than Carillion. It is the

system broken?

Noel. But it has to

be managed in a very active and

effective way. I don't know what is

going on in Capita. They are obliged

to be open about what is going on.

They have issued a profit warning

and all of flats is there on the

face of it. But outsourcing is not a

panacea for every ill. Chris is a

hardline ideologues who thinks

private sector bad, public sector

automatically good. I'm not someone

who thinks the reverse. I think it

is horses for courses. But if you do

outsource, you need to do it well.

Right. But it wasn't done well under

Carillion, was it? Because the

Government had the ball literally

pulled over its eyes.

One of the

things I discovered when I had

responsibility for that area in 2010

was the way that public procurement

was being done almost double the

Ripley froze out small, newer, more

dynamic and innovative suppliers,

and we change that. There were rules

that you have two short three years

accounts, turnover threshold, things

that made it almost impossible for

smaller businesses to bid for and

winning Government business, and so

the big ones, the Giants, had far

too much of it their own way, and

actually too many of them became

that their principal competency was

not doing the work, it was winning

the business. That is not a healthy

position. We did reform that and one

of the things we put in place was

senior, private-sector crown

representatives, we called them, you

had a part-time role, but whose job

it was to be the kind of gatekeeper

with the big strategic suppliers to

Government to ensure this doesn't

happen.

Let me go back to Chris

Williamson on the question of

ideology. Is it, in your mind, Chris

Williamson, always the case that

public is good and Private Bag, that

all outsourcing should be stopped

because you are ideological is so

committed to the public sector,

whether or not one is better than

the other?

I'm afraid it is a

neoliberal ideology that has been

holding sway over the country for

probably since 1979. And if you

actually talk to most people out in

the country, they agree with us.

Most people don't like the fact that

the private sector is essentially

ripping off the public purse. Let's

remember that the first priority for

these companies is to make a profit.

And they are making billions and

billions of pounds in profit.

Surely, wouldn't it be better to

have these things delivered in-house

and then the dividends which are

dished out to the shareholders would

not be necessary, and that money

could then be reinvested and

improving the services? These

services that we all need.

Let me

put that to Francis. If in the end,

the companies are going to go bust

because of the system you have just

described, and they have made

billions in the process stop

described, and they have made

billions in the process stop.

billions in the process stop.

It

must be obvious what the problem is.

But they did pay themselves money,

even when the finances were looking

precarious and that is what has been

revealed.

They were not making

billions and billions of profit.

This has to be done right. You have

to manage the contract in the right

way and you have to open it up to

smaller companies and that is the

way to do it. But this idea that

somehow the public sector, because

it doesn't make a profit, is always

better, there is in the public

sector too much aversion to

innovation. There is a bias to

inertia rather than the buyers to

innovation. You do not get progress.

Chris Williamson, what do you say?

Well, Francis is just burying his

head in the sand. And is a stranger

to reality, it seems to me. Of

course, the public sector is

perfectly capable of innovation, but

what he is ignoring is the fact that

billions of pounds and the public

record shows that, having paid out

in dividends to shareholders. That

is a fact. Furthermore, the fat cat

executives at the top of these

organisations are paying themselves

colossal sums, and really

conservatives often wailing the

level of remuneration for local

authority Chief executives, and they

pale into insignificance against the

multi-million pound salary packages

packages that these objectives in

these private outsourcing companies

are receiving. The chief executive

of Capita, for example, the outgoing

chief executive, I think his

remuneration package was just under

£3 million. These are colossal

figures and it is being subsidised

by the public purse.

What evidence

have you got that the public sector

would run all of these services and

build all of the constructions that

having undertaken by private

companies in the meantime if there

hadn't outsourcing?

... Well, of

course.

course.

The model that existed right

to this was exactly that, and we

seem to manage perfectly well, if

not better. Indeed, the economic

performance of the country... I can

hear France's scoffing, but the

economic performance of the country

was at least as good if not better.

We are just talking about whether or

not these buildings would have been

made if there hadn't been

outsourcing.

It was this idea that

everything was fine before there was

outsourcing is complete nonsense.

Governments have struggled with this

and as the size of the state has

grown and the scope of state

activity has grown, it is essential

to find different ways of doing

things. Otherwise, you find

absolutely no innovation.

At the

beginning of the coalition, there

was a huge amount of noise around

small companies and contracts had to

be given where companies would bring

social value to the community. It

didn't make any difference. If you

look at something like the work

programme, all of the contracts were

taken off social value companies.

What are the facts, then?

I will

give you one example. When I took

over in 2010, 80% of the Government

spent was on national suppliers and

weak in sourced some of that. The

previous Labour Government had done

mass outsourcing. But we also opened

up procurement to smaller social

enterprises, smaller developers and

start ups, though actually by 2015,

you look at the map of suppliers to

the Government and there were lots

literally all over the UK.

I wanted

you to counterexamples. One of them

is the work programme. No, they

weren't just opened up. They were

divvied out to seven or eight and

this has had a massive impact.

The

problem that the Government has is

that people will be making these

arguments regardless of whether it

is going well and working or not.

The easiest way to talk down a

public company is to go on

television and attack it. The

problem was... Chris, for example,

was making these arguments even in

the good times. It is an ideological

thing for him. But the problem is

the Government need to start making

elegant defences of this, like

Francis has, because voters are

listening to people like Chris.

listening to people like Chris.

If

you talk over each other, nobody can

hear. So I will live on is likely to

talk about Theresa May. Can she stay

on as leader, with all of this going

on?

Clearly, she can stay on.

How

close is a vote of confidence?

I

have no idea. You would have to ask

Graham Brady, and he certainly won't

tell you.

At the moment, viewing it

from the outside, as you are, on her

leadership, does you need to be

bolder about what she says on

Brexit?

Actually, I think she's

getting a bad rap on the sprigs of

thing. This idea that the Government

hasn't said what it wants. That

seems to me to be nonsense. It has

said what it once. It wants the

maximum frictionless trading and

maximum access to the single market,

particularly for financial services,

and it doesn't want to have to pay

for it. Doesn't want to have to

accept free movement. It does want

to have its cake, perfectly

reasonably.

So why the in the party?

What is going on is a very public

negotiation and what is going on in

the Conservative Party, completely

understandably, is a bit of the same

thing. People staking positions in

order to try to influence where this

quite corrugated negotiation ends

up.

Has she got a grip of the party

in negotiation?

I shouldn't think

anyone could have a grip of the

party at the moment because this is

a very intense time. Whoever was

leading the party at the moment

would have a really difficult time.

I did think it is necessarily -- I

don't think it is necessarily a

problem. What the direct will have

to do is engage very seriously with

the EU negotiators and work out what

are the gives, what is the settling

point, and it won't be a linear

spectrum between hard Brexit and

soft Brexit. There are lots of

different strands, some of them will

be met and the settling point...

Should a Government minister be

accusing the civil service of

obstructing Brexit?

I do what was

going on here I barely noticed it

was happening.

Should government

minister be criticising the civil

service in the way Steve Baker do in

the dispatch box?

I frequently got

called up for criticising the civil

service because it is ridiculous to

have this idea that ministers can

never be critical of the civil

service. Of course they can. I don't

know what was going on there. I

think the point Bill Cashmore is

making, that there is in much of the

political and governmental

establishment a deep seated comfort

with us being in the EU and

discomfort with us leaving it, and

that in the sub conscious and

unconscious, possibly makes a

difference.

Do you think Theresa May

would be advised to set a departure

date now, saying she was going to

go?

That will be totally out of her.

Of course it is but do you think it

would be wise?

I think you could

argue it both ways and it would

probably be an inconclusive

argument.

And on that, Francis

Maude, thank you.

Now, this weekend Jeremy Corbyn

will be speaking at a conference

of Labour local councillors.

But it has been a turbulent

few weeks for the party

in local government,

with a battle over the reselection

between existing councillors

and Momentum-backed candidates.

And that tension came to a head

in one local council -

Haringey - this week.

On Tuesday, the Labour leader

of Haringey Council in North London,

Claire Kober, announced she will be

stepping down in May,

citing "sexism, bullying"

and "undemocratic behaviour"

in personal attacks on her.

She had been embroiled in a public

row with Momentum members

in Haringey over a £2 billion deal

with a private property developer

to build 6,500 new homes.

Labour's National Executive

Committee - which is now controlled

by allies of Jeremy Corbyn -

intervened to put a stop

to the development.

This decision by the ruling body

was met with criticism from several

Labour council leaders

across the country,

who publicly backed Ms Kober.

Now the former Labour leader

of Harlow Council, Jon Clempner,

who resigned last month,

has blamed his decision to stand

down on an active campaign

against his leadership by a Momentum

organiser - he also claimed

he was "called a neo-Nazi"

by someone wearing a Corbyn T-shirt

outside the Labour Party Conference.

This is what Haringey Council leader

Claire Kober had to say

about her decision to step down.

I'm in no doubt that the behaviour

and actions of certain individuals

at certain times meet the test both

sexes, bullying and

intimidatory behaviour.

-- of both sexism...

And I have to say, if I look

at the NEC's actions last week, this

is the National Executive Committee

of the Labour Party deciding

to debate an issue without having

the courtesy to contact me

beforehand, during or immediately

after the meeting to

understand better the issue

that they wanted to discuss.

Our political correspondent

Iain Watson joins us now.

What is happening at this moment in

Haringey?

As you pointed out, I

think division, deselection is,

denunciations have been dominating

the news in Haringey but what I've

been trying to do is move a little

bit away from that process and look

at some of the policies that might

emerge as the party moves to the

left, towards Momentum, getting

greater influence as expected, after

the council elections when a new

leaders announce. On Sunday, members

are talking about the first age of

the manifesto. It will come as no

surprise that one of the things they

intend to do is scrap that

controversial housing scheme you

mentioned, the public-private

partnership to redevelop a housing

estate, but there are some other

interesting ideas which may be taken

by other councils they move to the

left too. They are talking about

abolishing council tax entirely the

lower income families, extending

free school meals to everyone in

primary schools, setting up a

not-for-profit lettings agency in

competition with the private sector

to offer homes beneath market rent.

Also you have that great with Chris

Williamson and Francis Maude on

outsourcing. In line with John

McDonell's wishes, they would want

to take back everything that has

been outsourced in the borough back

into public ownership and they're

also looking at perhaps a big hike

in pay for workers, as well, which

Salford council has already done.

What is interesting is that there

are no costings attached to these

ideas in the moment and what is

interesting also is that people are

portraying Haringey in a particular

light, I'm picking up from sources

that they are averse to hiking the

council tax by a large amount which

would pay the sum of these things

because of the scrutiny Haringey is

under the moment and they think they

may be effectively tarred with the

brush of tax-raising, rather than

redistribution, so they are

sensitive to some of those issues

there is one caveat when you go

through these policies and that is

that whatever the local grassroots

decide, the existing Labour group

has to sign of that manifesto, that

is the one still run by Claire

Kober, who is standing down, run by

a majority who are not Momentum

backers, and they may simply delete

some of the more radical overseas

that they don't like.

Thank you very

much.

We're joined now by a former Labour

activist in Haringey,

Nora Mulready, who has

resigned her membership

of the party after 20 years,

and Labour MP and Corbyn ally

Chris Williamson is

still with us in Derby.

Listening to some of those ideas

that Ian was talking about, do they

sound like good ideas to you?

I

think that one of the things that

when you spend time in Haringey you

realise is that at some point, not

Momentum activists are going to come

into contact with reality and that

is going to probably dramatically

change what they are suggesting can

happen. And I mean in terms of

money.

Why did you resign your

membership?

Er... A lot of different

issues. I think within the Labour

Party now there are two main things

going on - one is a battle for the

kind of political soul of the Labour

Party, and for my senses it is

between the people who are kind of

pragmatic left-wing people, like

Claire Kober and the Labour

councillors who are prepared to use

any tools available to try and

poverty while people, and people

like Chris, for example, who are...

Who plays a kind of ideological

commitment to an antipathy to the

private sector and to state delivery

of everything, above the needs of

people. So that's the politics, but

the other side of it, which, again,

Clare talked about, is the sheer

brutality of the discourse within

the Labour Party now, emanating from

Momentum. The fact is, if you stand

up to Momentum in Haringey and...

I've been contacted by people from

all over the country who have

experienced this, what is thrown at

you is abhorrent.

Is that

acceptable, Chris Williamson?

That

is not my experience and what we

have is a Labour Party which is a

mass movement now. The introduction

to this item talked about some of

the ideas that the members in

Haringey are looking at and that is

a fantastic exercise in democracy

and we should be celebrating that,

the fact that we are bringing people

into the party to discuss ideas and

hopefully move forward in a

consensus after a debate and

discussion has taken place. Surely

we should be celebrating that. I

need to correct you on one thing,

Jo, because you said the NEC had

intervened to stop the HDD from

going forward it but is not the

case. The National Executive

Committee of the Labour Party

debated about the NEC hasn't got the

power to stop it, they merely asked

the Labour group to pause and

consult on it.

I take your... The

question I ask you is about the

response of the brutality of the

discourse. Is it acceptable that

Claire Kober resigned and that Nora

Mulready has resigned her membership

because of claims of bullying and

sexism that they have personally

felt within the party?

If they felt

that, they need to report it and the

party will always investigate any

issues of concern about those sorts

of things but, as I say, it is

certainly not my experience and the

party now is a huge organisation. It

has more members than every other

political party put together. It is

very much reaching out to the wider

general public and people are

genuinely enthused and it's not

about being extremists. The Labour

Party is the mainstream. What the

Labour Party is now advocating is

what the vast majority of the people

want in this country. In all of the

opinion polls, they agree with us.

It is not extremism, it is the

mainstream.

That is correct in terms

of the swell of the membership, the

party is the biggest party and is

reaching out to the public in

reaching out to the public in a way

not seen before. To you accept what

Chris Williamson says?

No,

absolutely not, I'm sorry, Chris. To

give you some examples, Claire Kober

was repeatedly called an ethnic

cleanser and social cleanser as a

result of wanted to regenerate one

of the most deprived communities in

the borough. Not a single person was

going to be moved off that estate.

Every of them was promised the right

to the rights to have a property as

part of the regeneration. Sorry,

every council tenant had been

offered that. But she was routinely

accused of social cleansing and even

ethnic cleansing by members of the

Labour Party, so in terms of the

bullying it is not a case of simply

coming up to be blinded timidity on

them in that sense. The actual

brutality that language was

disgusting and it was never ever

called out by anyone within the

hierarchy.

I'm going to come to you,

Zoe, in a second. Should it be

called out, Chris Williamson? Are

you shocked to hear that sort of

allegation levelled within the

Labour Party?

Nora is making those

allegations right now and if people

have got concerns and evidence...

But does that concern you, that

Claire Kober was called a social

cleanser and an ethnic cleanser by

people with the Labour Party?

Publicly, they have written

articles.

Let him answer., Chris,

what do you say?

Obviously, I think

people need to moderate their

language and begin a comradely way

to people. But this isn't a fringe

activity or a handful of extremists

who are pushing this agenda. The

proposition that was being put

forward by the Labour group on

Haringey was opposed by the local

MPs, it was overwhelmingly rejected

by the vast majority of people, as I

understand it, living in Haringey,

and that's why this exercise in

democracy has taken place in

Haringey. It should be celebrated.

The criticism is about the way the

discourse has been handled. Do you

think there should be an

investigation? Your colleague the

shadow Brexit minister Jenny Chapman

said two days ago that there should

be in inquiry into the allegations

that Claire Kober has made in the

weight she was bullied.

Claire Kober

needs to make those allegations to

the...

She has, but should there be

investigation? Jenny Chapman said

there should be did

The NEC will

have to review that and see if there

is any merit in further

investigation.

Is that a yes or a

note in your support for an inquiry?

I've not seen the evidence, all I've

said as he is it.

This is the

problem...

Saying look at the

evidence and allow the people who

are charged with allsorts of

investigations. It is not helpful

for people like me to be

pontificating on the sidelines.

Are

you on the sidelines? Let me bring

Zoe in. Rhead I want to play Relate

for a second because I think part of

the problem is that it has been

taken as an interparty battle of

such proportions that one side of

the party has to be wrong in order

for the other to survive.

The

situation in Haringey, replicated in

London boroughs across London, is

that PF ideals have not delivered

the things that they promised to

residents and residents do feel

incredibly angry and this idea that

councils can't afford to pay care

workers properly, they can't afford

to do this, this is the new reality,

we're basically dealing with a

Conservative austerity programme and

the argument...

But should it have

ended with the leader of the council

resigning?

Wait, wait. The people

are quite angry and it is not

Momentum. It is an actual housing

group. Of course they're going to be

angry because there is a huge

amount...

Isn't this democracy in

action?

It is not even the Labour

Party. Half of them are Greens.

I

found Chris Preddie chilling there

because he is completely deadpan

damn the camera. He is hearing the

allegations. -- I found Chris pretty

chilling. He is just saying,

reported to the NEC. We all know the

NEC has just been taken over by and

Momentum supporters and they run the

complaints service. The most

dangerous thing for the Labour Party

is this...

Let him finish the

sentence.

The problem for the Labour

Party is that Jeremy Corbyn seems

this nice, bearded, fluffy guy who

are sized animals, doesn't eat meat

and doesn't drink and it is all very

nice but on the ground, as soon as

his supporters get any sniff of

power, it ends up with situations

like this.

I need to let Chris

Williamson respond. Briefly, we are

running out of time.

Of course. That

is a ludicrous proposition, to

suggest that the Labour Party is

being taken over by Momentum. It is

an exercise in democracy. People put

themselves up for election and were

overwhelmingly returned by the

Labour Party membership. Let's

celebrate democracy!

While you are

celebrating, yes or no, do you

regret that people like Nora had

left the party and that Claire Kober

has resigned?

Well, the Labour Party

is a Broadchurch.

I said yes or no,

do you regret it?

I would sooner

people stay in the party and work

together to beat the Conservatives.

We are going to have to leave it

there. Nora and Chris, thank you

very much.

Now, who's your political hero?

We've all got someone we admire -

and politicians are no exception.

Elizabeth Glinka sat down

with former Conservative Party

leader William Hague to talk

about his favourite

political figure.

William Hague, who is

your political hero?

My hero is William Pitt the Younger,

the youngest Prime Minister ever

in the history of this country,

24 years old, written

off at the time as just

a mince pie Prime Minister,

a Prime Minister for

Christmas and then out,

and he served 19 years.

When did you first come across him?

Was it at school?

I first came across him

from Margaret Thatcher,

would you believe?

When I had my own fit

of youthful endeavour

in politics as a 16-year-old...

It is all right for some of you.

Half of you won't be

here in 30 or 40 years' time.

I was hauled off to see

Margaret Thatcher and she said

to the assembled press,

"We might be standing

here with another William Pitt,"

so I thought, "I'd better go

and find out about

this William Pitt."

Well, as I did over the following 20

years, I became a great admirer.

Pitt the Younger, so styled

because his father, another William,

had also been Prime Minister.

He was a prodigy.

He graduated from Cambridge at 17

and became an MP four

years later, in 1781.

A reformer, he considered himself

not a Tory but an independent.

He seems to me to be

an undervalued figure in history

and his name would come up

in an episode of Blackadder.

Mr Pitt is the Prime Minister, sir.

Oh, go on!

Is he?

Young snotty here?

Actually, he was this

towering figure who stood

alone against Napoleon.

He plotted naval strategy

with Nelson, he dealt

with the most extraordinary

range of circumstances.

Pitt took over as Britain

was rocked by the loss

of its American colonies.

With the national debt

spiraling, Honest Billy set

about steadying the ship.

He would later introduce income tax

and the first paper money.

This was much mocked at the time,

that just like they said how

Augustus had found Rome of brick

and left it marble, so he had found

England made of gold

and left it made of paper.

His keeping the country

creditworthy, the inexhaustible

credit of the City of London

and Britain at that time,

that allowed it to overcome

Napoleon in the end,

because the French could hardly ever

run out of men and Britain

could hardly ever run out of money.

And that rivalry with the French

emperor would come to

define his premiership.

Pitt was the great figure

in the world, opposing Napoleon,

and you can see the illustrations

of the time of Pitt and Napoleon

carving the world between them.

Despite his success, Pitt

was famously aloof and even shy.

He never married and his devotion

to his country consumed his life.

His drinking contributing

to his death at just 46.

Becoming so powerful so early

in life actually stunted his growth

as a human being in other ways.

You don't make new friends

or develop new interests if you are

at the heart of government.

And you talk about how his coming

to power at such a young age

may have affected his

persona, his personality.

You were party leader

very young, mid-30s.

Did that affect how you portrayed

yourself in the public sphere?

All of us who are in those

situations experience a bit

of what William Pitt did.

Most of us have periods where we go

out of office and we see

life in a different way

and when the world looks rather

monochrome as a senior politician,

it all gets its colour again

when you leave politics.

People described him as sort

of buttoned up and stoic.

Is that something that

resonated with you?

Well, hopefully I'm not like that.

Something that I do identify

with is that he really

gave full vent to his

personality in Parliament.

And this is an age when the House of

Commons had in it Charles James Fox,

Richard Brinsley Sheridan,

Edmund Burke, William Wilberforce.

This is an age that makes

today's parliament look

pedestrian in the extreme.

I suspect I would have been happier

in the 18th-century parliament -

although much less likely to be

in it, of course - than in the late

20th century Parliament.

And is it that steadiness, then,

that you really admire?

Is that the core of it?

Yes, I do.

He is the pilot who

weathered the storm.

He said he would prefer to die

at his post rather than desert it -

not something we often associate

with political leaders.

And he did, indeed, die at his post.

William Hague, thank you very much.

Thank you.

William Hague there on his political

hero, Pitt the Younger. Other films

in the series are available on the

website.

Earlier this week Donald Trump

gave his State of the Union address

to Congress, where he hailed

the "new American moment"

and struck a conciliatory tone

towards the Democrats, calling

for them to work together.

The address is an annual speech

where the President gets to set

out his agenda for the next year

and talk about what

he's achieved so far.

Here's a flavour of what he said.

Tonight, I call upon all of us

to set aside our differences,

to seek out common ground

and to summon the unity we need

to deliver for the people.

This is really a kid.

These are the people

we were elected to serve.

And just as I promised

the American people from this

podium 11 months ago,

we enacted the biggest tax cuts

and reforms in American history.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

We repealed the core

of the disastrous Obamacare.

The individual mandate is now gone.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And we're joined now by former

Conservative MP and Trump

Twitter-critic-in-chief

Louise Mensch.

What a catchy title. Welcome. Did

you welcome the more conciliatory

tone in his address?

I paid quite

literally no attention to it.

What,

the address at all?

Not really, no.

I know what is coming down in the

investigation. At the time

investigation. At the time this

year, he got half a day's news cycle

like he is getting now. Then the

general Flynn news cycle. Today, the

news has already moved on to the

giant fighter Donald Trump is having

with the FBI.

You have already

tweeted in response to Donald

Trump's tweet. The top leadership of

the FBI and the Justice Department

have politicised the sacred

investigative process in favour of

Democrats and against Republicans-

something that would have been

unbeatable just a short time ago.

Rank and file are great people.

Bob

Mueller, Republican. He will have a

really hard time making this case.

And of course criminals don't like

cops. That is what you have got

there. He can to eat all day long.

Nothing is going to change. Do you

think it is all coming down the

track to Donald Trump?

I don't know.

I've been making predictions and may

never come true. I think this does

have some traction. I actually did

quite interesting and nuanced speech

about how America first doesn't

necessarily mean America alone. But

he is always unable to keep it up

very long.

But he did extend a hand

to the Democrats. He spoke of a tide

of optimism. It is an improvement if

you're looking at it from your

perspective, Louise, in terms of the

rhetoric?

But at some point, he is

going to come up against the

investigation and up against into

stations which will hold on to some

sort of account. -- up against

institutions.

The difference with

the speeches and the improper to

question session and the speeches is

that somebody else writes the

speeches.

Funnily enough, that's not

the biggest revelation to make an

politics.

They're not authentic. The

tweets are.

What about his core

base? He has delivered to that core

base.

The tax plan has been

delivered. And people are finding

out it's not as bad as all that,

which is why some moderate

Republicans I think about it for

that tax plan. I'm completely

uninterested in politics because we

are in the middle of Watergate and

that is what I am completely focus

on.

But he has the core behind him.

But does he really? They have him

rated at a gigantic high but he got

the lowest approval ratings or any

president since polling began for

his first year.

Sure, but he's not

going to care about that

particularly at the moment. They

will point to in the White House 2.4

million jobs, people will have more

money in their pockets, you talked

about the tax cuts, growth is up.

It's the economy, stupid.

Then, why

aren't his ratings higher? When you

come to an all-time high of only

42%, that's just not very good.

That's what this programme is about.

You have only just realised then

that is the end of the show.

It is

the same thing with Brexit and David

Cameron said it so well, it's not

what everyone would have chosen, but

actually it hasn't been as bad as

everyone would have predicted it to

be. Really, has it?

You thought it

was going to be better, did you?

The

only thing I am slightly surprised

about is that it has taken this

long. I think Orange will be the new

orange. You said on Twitter, I am

enjoying this thoroughly. Good

things are about to happen. Rats

bared their fangs because they're in

a corner. Get your champagne and

popcorn ready. What things are going

to happen?

Well, we will see what

happens after the state of the

union. The real author of this memo

suddenly announced that he is going

to step down. Oh, what a surprise!

He was undoubtably forced into that,

and I think what you see here is the

Justice Department is not taking any

rubbish from him over this

ridiculous attempt at a smear.

If

that were getting the champagne and

popcorn out?

No, I think the Mueller

interview with Trump will be worth

that.

It is not a done deal, is it?

Exactly as you said about cornered

rats showing their teeth. If he goes

into a situation which it had

blasted his way out of, then I think

we will start seeing the sort of

things we are also scared about

anti-Cameroonian it is not as bad as

it looked -- and the quote from

David Cameron it is not as bad as it

looked like not be true.

Is it as it

begins to spill into the conspiracy

theory arena and then you start to

lose people, and then they don't

trust what you are saying.

I really

don't care about that because what I

am reporting is true. Conspiracy is

not a theory. Mueller already has

three convictions from people who

have admitted it and only Paul

Manafort is denying it. Just

yesterday, Rick Gates decided to

flip and cooperate with prosecutors.

Watergate was a lot of nothing until

all of a sudden there were tens of

indictments handed out in a single

day and this is what you will find

out -- this time too.

Do you think

Theresa May can last the course of

Brexit?

Yes. I hadn't

Brexit?

Yes. I hadn't played paid

much attention but she always seems

to be going out and then doesn't.

She is a steady hand. And as all the

chaos that is going on, I struggle

to think they would get to replace,

so I think she will fine.

There's just time before we go

to find out the answer to our quiz.

The question was ...

What nickname have the Chinese

given Theresa May?

Was it...

A - Mummy May?

B - Granny May?

C - Auntie May?

Or D - Sister May?

So, Harry and Zoe,

what's the correct answer?

It's Auntie May!

That's all for today.

Thanks to my guests.

The one o'clock news is starting

over on BBC One now.

Sarah Smith will be back

on Sunday on BBC One at 11

with the Sunday Politics.

And I'll be back here

on BBC Two on Monday at midday

with more Daily Politics.