16/11/2013 Dateline London

committed during the last ages. `` last stage 's. Now it is time for

Dateline London. Hello and welcome to Dateline

London. Britain's economic recovery. Reforming health care in the United

States ` and the UK. And does it make sense to boycott the

Commonwealth summit over Sri Lanka's human rights abuses? My guests today

are Dmitry Shishkin of BBC Global News, Agnes Poirier of Marianne,

Michael Goldfarb of globalpost.com and Ian Birrell of the Daily Mail.

Welcome. Growth up. Inflation low. Unemployment falling. The figures

show Britain emerging from recession, and the government is

loudly claiming that the painful measures they have taken have begun

to create a platform for economic stability in the future. But Labour

points to what they call a crisis of living standards, with millions of

us feeling the pinch. Could this be a case in which the politicians on

both sides of the political divide are correct? The economy improves

but living standards do not. What is clear is that we can see shape in

the next election. The government will say the economy is growing and

they are correct to say that. It is coming out of the slump and some of

the indicators are looking good and that goes against what Labour has

been saying in terms of austerity killing of the economy. For a lot of

ordinary people, this is a service led growth that is driven partly by

housing will stop and Labour is raising the issue that people have

had a decade`long slump in earning is and for a lot of people they are

not seeing this growth come into their pockets. There are other

factors such as inflation coming into play but this is what we are

going to year for the next 18 months. And also I suppose the only

way in which living standards can get better is if we have above

inflation wage increases which creates other demand problems and

questions about how industrial relations will be in the next couple

of years. One of the factors was that Britain did not lose as many

jobs as was expected through the slump and one reason was because

productivity has fallen and that will have an impact on growth as

well. There are all sorts of interesting factors that come into

this. Ultimately I would argue that unless the economy grows, no`one

will have improvement in wages but the government had a challenge to

make sure that some of the growth and extra money does get into

everyone rather than stay in certain sectors at the top of that idea and

Labour's job is to shout very loudly that it is not happening. That is

one of the weaknesses that David Cameron sees, this whole narrative

over the past couple of years, they are out of touch, they are posh and

so on, and that is where Labour are going to go. It is clear from the

polling that a lot of people see the Conservative Party as a party for

the rich. Even when they like policies, they will not like them if

it is attached to the Conservative Party. I would argue that they were

wrong to cut the top reason of `` top rate of tax for political

reasons, not economic reasons. I have seen a few apocalyptic thoughts

from some people in the United States that the middle classes

finished. Which is sort of similar to this kind of story. On the very

day that some of these statistical numbers came out, I think they are

noise, not a signal, these numbers, they do not tell the truth. The

resolution foundation, a think tank in London which surprisingly thinks

at this think tank, put out an exceptionally good analysis of the

Anglo`American economy, they are so close in the way they approach the

economy, they could almost be linked, showing in detail how the

middle jobs, the middle jobs have just been hollowed out. Not just

since the crash in 2008, it is a process that goes back to the start

of the millennium and I would argue even further back than that. The

recovery has been based on, and in this country in particular, a growth

in jobs at the very low end of the spectrum and a growth in jobs, fewer

number of easily, at the top end of the wage spectrum. In the middle

where there are teachers, doctors even , some lawyers and journalists,

people who would have thought, I can effortlessly middle`class, those

jobs are disappearing. And until that is solved, and I don't know how

the markets of that, it has to be solved by policy, determined policy

from government, then the recovery is always going to feel like it is

not there yet. No matter what the numbers, the statistical numbers

say. This is one of the most interesting stories of the next few

years and generations. There is something going on here which is

some kind of major shift from everything we have seen after 1945

which is the decline of the middle`class. Absolutely. We are

talking about the UK recovery and look at the figures, but what is it

based on? You realise there is this miniboom in the housing market. But

benefiting the highest class and the middle`class is are leaving London

because they cannot afford to live there. And so it is going to provoke

a real social, social logical problem. It is also benefiting those

who are older because obviously the 20`year`old who had an aspiration to

purchase his own house 20 of 30 years ago could fulfil that possibly

rapidly compared to now. It is much more difficult now. Absolutely.

There is an interesting debate, it is more political than economic, and

an American economist at about it this week. He talked about the plot

against France because as you know, in the recent days, France was

downgraded once more from A+ to a. If you look at the numbers, it is

quite mediocre. Like everyone else in Europe. France has refused to go

down the austerity route, which George Osborne and David Cameron are

so proud of. It has done exactly the opposite, they refused to dismantle

the safety net and to protect the poor by tax increases rather than

spending cuts. It is ideological, rather than economic all, it is an

interesting one because the poor in France and the middle`class these

are more protected than in the US. `` economical. I don't agree. What

you are hearing is conservatism being expressed on the left, not the

right, and it is a nest Alger for the traditional past. Journalism is

not dying, there are more journalists than they used to be.

What is dying of some of the old traditional forms not delivering the

news and the content, such as newspapers and there is a struggle

to figure out how to monetise it. What is dying is getting paid for

some of it. There are new forms such as Buzzfeed. It is a change and

shift. London is growing, it is growing very, very fast. London is

also driving the growth in the British economy and that is

delivered partly by the housing boom which is a factor and a concern that

the government should not be feeling it, but also by the success of

service industry and Britain is incredibly successful and a service

led economy and that service ranges from everything such as city

finances and the country's incredible structure. In The

Financial Times weekend edition, there is a picture about how

big`city Christmas parties are back in fashion. `` a feature. There is

no shame in the city. That is very clear. What would be really helpful,

I offer this suggestion to the office of National distance takes,

but start publishing these monthly and quarterly figures with London

and the Home Counties separated from the rest of Britain. `` Office for

National Statistics. So we can see in the new billet in that goes to

economic correspondence and much of the growth in the British economy is

generated out of this area. It is never reported the way you say.

Scotland is doing well. That is true. House prices in 2012 continued

to drop. Which is surprising. I have been up there and I thought it looks

better here, but apparently some things are not so good. The point

is, when we say service economy, what does it mean? The person who

brings you your plate of food or the guy who is in a hedge fund office in

Mayfair shifting money around? There doesn't that they are both in a

service economy. It is the media, the technology sector, all of these

are part of the service economy. One final point. Ian used the word

nostalgia and conservatism for Francois Hollande. Why is he so

unpopular? I am not saying he is on the right track. I can just saying

that there are two ways of delaying the economy and I don't think one is

better than the other. What is based on ideology. I quite like a country

which, I mean, because we are talking spending cuts, it has a real

effect. In London, my local library is closed. That has an impact on

people's lives. Also, rubbish collection is now only collected

once a week instead of three times per week, that had an impact on

people's lives. The economy is booming in the UK, or at least in

better condition, but the actual daily life is less good. Let's move

on. Barack Obama's health care plans have suffered the most ignominious

fate of a grand idea, trying to get into work proving a shambles. With

his core domestic policy in trouble and strong criticism of his foreign

policy, is Obama 's leadership in question, there is people on the

left saying he is not leading. The latest is just the proof. There has

been disgruntled amongst his initial supporters for a while, mostly over

foreign policy issues, begin not like the dawn targeted killings that

go on and a variety of what they would see as illegal actions

overseas and they pinky caves easily easily in negotiations with the

Republicans. `` they think he caves in. The affordable care act, Obama

care, those of us who covered its creation knew from the get go that

it was not just a dog 's dinner. It was a dog's breakfast, lunch and

dinner, it was a dreadful piece of legislation that needed to be

watched very carefully if it was going to be in play netted in a way

that would deliver the benefits it was supposed to deliver. What has

happened is the White House did not pay attention. This leads to the

second point, which is really important to understand what is

happening to Obama. `` second point. He has had a narrow circle of

advisers around him and it has got narrower in the second term. Many of

them do not have the political knowledge. It is one thing for the

president to say, I don't want to do business the way Washington has been

doing business for the last 20 years. Many people would agree with

that. But he needs some advice as I who know how to do business. They do

not. What is stunning is, if you are going to put your eggs in one

basket, you have to look after the basket. That is absolutely right.

What got him in trouble, it launched the computer systems crash. Some

people who support Obama care were writing from their perches, this

proves how successful it is. 50 million inquiries. Of course it

crashes the computer system. Something worse happened this week.

It emerged that one of his key campaign pledges, running for

re`election, was, if you have health insurers already, you will be

allowed to keep it. Unfortunately, under the law, that is not the case.

A lot of policies are simply being cancelled because they do not need

to be legislated demands of the new law. Until people are getting

notices saying, you are no longer covered and he said it was, he said

it over and over again. No`one on his staff took him aside and said,

you know, bass, that is not entirely decayed and now he is paying the

price. Even Bill Clinton is saying, you may have to read after this

controversial piece of legislation in order to change that back to what

you have said. I feel like saying, with the distance we have from

Europe, don't throw the baby out with the bath water because the

problem is not the idea. Sitting here, many more million Americans

benefit from health insurance, they are a bare minimum. We don't know

how lucky we are in the UK or France to have universal health care. I

figured is very important and they should implemented now. `` I think

it is very important. They are in a big mess but for administrative,

almost technicalities, surely if it is an IT problem, there might be a

solution. We should ask the NSA, perhaps they could resolve the

problem. All governments are having huge problems at the moment in

grappling how to develop a modern health care system, America has a

very bad one. There are big problems in that, clearly Obama has fallen

down, when you make big changes you have big troubles will stop

government is very bad and we see this in many countries at doing big

IT projects and here is one more example of that. In Britain, we have

blown ?10 billion on 80p and resistant to unify the NHS which has

been scrapped. We kind of have formed there. We cannot lecture

them. The one saving grace is that... What we noticed is that

accident and emergency in`hospital is in crisis and the doctors have

realised that. In Britain, the government tried to make some moves,

this became a political firestorm and they ended up with a bungled

mishmash compromise ridden approach which has made matters worse.

Everyone knows the problem. Our health care system was built for the

1940s world of infant mortality, infectious diseases, fighting those.

Now, we need to abide complex, long`term, multi`delivery care,

often in the community rather than the old`fashioned hospitals. The

shift to get from there to here is a painful process in a democracy, with

so many vested interest, whether they are social, medical, political.

We are seeing the same problem in every Western country.

Canada, India and Mauritius have chosen to a boycott the Commonwealth

head summit in Sri Lanka over the government's treatment of the Tamil

minority. Is engagement the right policy, and what does the

Commonwealth really mean it in this century? You are French, you admire

that the former colonies have still got some relationship with dear old

mother England? It is like former slaves meeting once a year to have

tea with their master. The Commonwealth is a strange idea. You

have a series of statements of good intentions, Prince Charles going for

the first time. He will be the head of the Commonwealth one day. If it

survives the next two years. What did they do? What is it for? In 20

or 30 years past, I think it really worked towards the end of apartheid

in South Africa, but today, why did they meet? It is a public relations

disaster. Sri Lanka used the Commonwealth as a rehabilitation

operation. They were quite astute and did that well. David Cameron had

to go and let down Prince Charles. He said he was going to shine a

spotlight on human rights and he went to the north of the country

where he was received well. In the end, I don't know what the

Commonwealth is for. America, obviously you could rejoin. Now that

our authors are eligible for the man Booker prize... Former secretary

generals of the Commonwealth always say it is great for dialogue. People

have certain common cultural ties, including legal systems which are

very similar. I've lived here long enough now to shed a lot of my

American scepticism about why it continues. It seems a worthwhile

organisation in a world where there aren't enough really effective

talking shops for leaders to get together at a national level. The UN

is poor at this now. It seems completely reasonable. Agnes's point

about the colonial thing, we probably should discuss this in

terms of Sri Lanka as well. It did bring pressure on Mugabe. It did not

necessarily succeed. Shared history is not always terrible. With that,

we can perhaps reason at a level that others cannot. IU pro

Commonwealth? `` are you. Well, they have allowed Amanda in. `` Rwanda.

And that was never a part of it. It is absurd on many levels. But I

think it is easy to market and actually it is quite good. It is

very different to the way that France sees a lot of Africa as its

backyard. I would've said it was wrong the David Cameron two of gone

to Sri Lanka. I don't think because of the pressure of other people

kicking up and not going, I think his going has attracted far more

going `` attention, and he's made sure the world has looked on much

more closely at a horrible regime. If you wanted to make a stand, would

you not have said, we will not hold it in Sri Lanka? People have known

about these human rights abuse allegations. Do you think that will

make any difference? There is more focus on it. Britain has kind of

woken up any more public way, did `` but does it make any difference?

Well, we've never talked so much about Sri Lanka and its abuse of

human rights in the last two days. That's right. So there is an element

of, you should we got it, no, you should engage. It is like the

economy, there are two ways of going about it. Some people boycotted it

and that forced others to engage in a much bigger way. Maybe that is a

model for future. You would not find even an engaged American who knew

about Sri Lanka at the end of the Civil War. That is despite ranking

moon certifying that tens of thousands of civilians were shelved

after being told to go to a safe area. `` despite Ban Ki`moon. At

least on the left, there is a borough going cynicism now about

Britain or the US preaching human rights to a country like Sri Lanka

because of the tobacco in Iraq. `` the debacle. But it should be

universal. We should be able to say, what you did should not be

tolerated. Even this week in America, people are paying attention

to what happened in Sri Lanka. It is a tough decision for the Prime

Minister, but on balance I think he probably made the right decision by

going. Prince Charles is 65, there is a lot of press coverage about

that here and elsewhere, some of which is saying that 65 is when you

retire, but he is still not doing the job for which she was born. His

birthday was two days ago and listening to the BBC news, that was

the biggest item. Why should we talk about his Earth Day? `` birthday? I

guess there is a transition now. I think we can say this, the head of

state, the Queen, is 87. She is now delegating to the king in waiting.

It will be a momentous moment in Britain, although obviously it is

quite quaint, seen from the view of the French Republic. He will become

King and then we will see. Will Australia or even Canada remain? I'm

not sure. Do you take the view that he has handled this difficult

non`job well? Would you think, it can't be that difficult to be be

aired to the throne? `` heir. I think here's lived the 65 years in

the public days, worldwide, not just here. He's done some things that I

would have problems with, such as his intervention with government

business or promotion of alternative medicine. But he also campaigned for

the environment, promoted racial integration in this country and

youth employment way ahead of other political figures. So he has used

the platform. Yes, some I agree with and some I won't, but he's used the

platform skilfully. I think that is why actually Barry is not much fuss

being made about some of these issues now. `` actually there is.

That's it from us by now. We're back at the same time next week.

I'm afraid there will be a lot of cloud this weekend, producing not

too much rain initially, but, where the cloud breaks, there is a