Alan Johnson MP - UK Home Secretary 2009 - 2010 HARDtalk

mastectomy. In an article in the New York Times, she said that her

doctors had told doctors had told her she had and

87% chance of developing breast cancer and so she made the decision.

A now on BBC News, it is time for HARDtalk.

Welcome Welcome to HARDtalk. I N Stephen

Sackur. The British public appears increasingly alienated from

mainstream politics and politicians. short-term

short-term frustration or something deeper? Like yesterday, Alan

Johnson, held a series of Johnson, held a series of cabinet

He is that rare breed, a politician who grew up in poverty and work his

way up from the bottom. As today's professionalised class of

politicians have lost touch with Alan Johnson, welcome to HARDtalk.

politics a few years ago, you have spent an awful lot of time

remembering and researching your remembering and researching your

I was wondering why, why was it so important for you to go through

were several options. Publishers wanted a book. Would it be a

political memoir or a diary? I kept my child would which has been, I

suppose, exposed a bit during my chose

chose to go with that because I wanted to try to recreate my mother

who died young and who has no memorial. There is no great or even

They take away the plaque if you do recreate her and tell the story of

recreate her and tell the story of my sister? Another incredible

woman? Could I do it in a way that brought to life the Notting Hill of

place from the Notting Hill now. We did not bum?I ? did not bum?I

A fascinating time. For people who do not know Notting Hill, it is one

of the most expensive neighbourhoods in modern London.

neighbourhoods in modern London. When you were brought up in the

neighbourhood in the 50s, you with and that was around. There was

always an upstairs and downstairs In that time, it was more. There

in the mid-19th century and condemned in the 1920s or 1930s

meant for you. Your family, you and your sister and your mother and

rooms with no indoor sanitation, no Be generally didn't want to visit

but occasionally had to send buckets of urine into the rooms.

In the end, these buildings were all brought down in the 1960s. They

probably should have gone earlier. Or what is striking for me is that

you have regretted that world and humanity. Actually, what you were

your mother and your sister. There is not a sort of burning sense of

anger or resentment about the way anger or resentment about the way

anger or resentment about the way upbringing. I did not feel that

upbringing. I did not feel that there are chips on my shoulder. Or

there are chips on my shoulder. Or on any shoulder. Because this was

not asked him once little house and everyone el?I ? everyone ellife o

affluence, everyone did like that affluence, everyone did like that

affluence, everyone did like that area. It was a very poor part of

London. There was also a vibrancy to it. I think the photographs

really pick up that vibrancy. There By there was a community spirit,

By there was a community spirit, no-one else was going to help you

out. You had to help yourself and help each other. My mother made us

do errands for the older citizens. If we dared?I ? If we daredor it,

my sister once took a twopence and my mother much around and made her

my mother much around and made her give it back when she found out.

There was a feeling that money and wealth was and the central point.

used to be interesting phrase, self help, which I want to come back to.

help, which I want to come back to. I used the word resentment and you

say that that really was not a big your father? I do not understand

why you're not more bitter about his role? He'd used a mother. He

used physical violence. He left home for long periods and lied

constantly to her. Hto her. H aband abandoned the family, including you

when you were just 12 or 13. when you were just 12 or 13. Why

are you not filled with bitterness towards him? I suppose that there

is a certain amount of bitterness. I was very young. I was eight when

it bikie that. I never saw him again after that. -- eight when he

left. You try and understand what these problems are. ems are. dread

dreadful things, not least of all was that he was a gifted musician

and a gifted pianist. He only had to here at the Sydney's it to

pubs. -- the only had pubs. -- the only had to here at

piece of mu? I piece of mu. We piece of mu? I piece of mu. We

piece of music to reproduce it. We had an old honky-tonk piano and he

kept the key. My sister and I could not access and he did not help arts

channel his musical ability. I find that extraordinary, as a father. I

just felt embarrassed just felt embarrassed in his

company. He did company. He did not mean much to me.

almost as a biography of these two, my parents Lee and Steve, to try

and distance myself a bit from that. -- lily. To try and tell my

mother's story which I think is heroic. My father is not heroic. He

was part of the problem. Iqbal was in the book, that would not be the

kind of story that people want to read. -- if I

read. -- if I was just to show. I were to read any politician's

pork. You are still a member parliament and you may be a member

of a future government. -- politician's pork. I

politician's pork. I cannot help but think about the issues thabout t

faces the party today. He used the phrase, self-help, and the attitude

that your parents instilled in you. -- a mother instilled in you.

-- a mother instilled in you. You had to do what ever you could to

raise yourself up. Isn't the message of Alan Johnson and his

emergence from chronic poverty from the bottom that actually self-help

did work. The state did you nothing. You actually achieved what you did

through your own efforts, from beginning to end. That is not true.

It is not true of my mother. My mother spent the whole of her short

life on the council waiting list. The is and that

The is and that there.? They too were brought up in that terrible

were brought up in that terrible housing condition... The book

finishes wh? I finishes whng finishes when I'm 18 and getting

married. If? I married. If married. If it were not - back in

Notting Hill, getting married back in that slum - if it were not for

that opportunity for a council house which is the next phase on a

big council estate in Slough, that was the only escape for me. It

was the only escape for me. It is in praise of council housing which

is nowadays, if someone lives in council hou?I ? council hou?I

they are a loser in life. That is interesting. I

interesting. I do not know if you hours, a new report has come out

from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation looking at attitudes towards those

on the bottom of the pile, the poorest, those depended on welfare.

The headline in the Guardian newspaper, left-leaning paper, but

Labour Labour

Labour voters are Labour voters are increasingly

Party believe that

believe that welfare recipients are undeserving and that the welfare

state encourages dependence. What is going on here? When you reflect

on the attitudes and cultural of the 1950s when you were very poor

and today's attitudes to the very poor, what is going on? What is

going on the kind of -- is the

the kind of -- is the kind of calls you hear

George Osborne has set out specifically to try and said the

public against a group of people. He says in

He says in the morning that the go to work and they look at the

neighbouring house as a shirker with the blinds drawn. He used

divisive way to look at society. people going

people going to work at 6am, many of them will be cleaning offices

and Parliam?I ? and Parliam are on benefits?I ? on

so low. Is it not a bit easy to blame your political opponents for

ceding a message that you think is unpleasant? Is there not some truth,

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 143 seconds

among Labour-supporting people that As a genuine

As a genuine working-class politician, how disappointed are

you about the growing inequality? look at housing inequalities, the

health of everyone improved during our time in office, and the health

health of the health of the prosperous, but there

was still a gap. If you look at the was still a gap. If you look at the

increased earnings of the poorest, minimum-wage, tax credits,

pensioners in particular, with pension credit, and abject poverty,

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 143 seconds

�70 a week with income support. are all kinds of reasons for that.

You could a?I ? You could a David Milib?I ? David Milib?I

has gone down in the annals conversational history and politics,

when you or when you or Tony Blair

when you or Tony Blair where tatin once, you were swapping stories.

You both had young children at a time. He heard you say, it is worth

remembering, when I remembering, when I was 20, I was

already living in a council house, married with three children. Tony

Blair did a double-take. He said, my gosh, you are working class,

aren't you? I did aren't you? I did not. He did not

pretend to come from any poorer background than he did come from.

This was in?I ? This was ind of feeling that I said

feeling that I said to him, the working-class would not have a

population explosion. He is emblematic of the professionalised

political class, which seems so far removed from most British people's

experience. They are living in a life. What Tony was trying to do.

life. What Tony was trying to do. It should become inconceivable for

poor people to leave school that only. Britain is a more middle

class plays on whole. But this is a bit of an identity problem for the

Labour Party. I want to bring in the key challenges. Len McCluskey,

the leader of the biggest union, he said to the Guardian, and this was

a great sense of regret, I do not think that Labour is a working-

class party any more. Does that matter? I do not think that he is

an authority on this. I do not time. It wo? I time. It would ma

time. It would matter if we duly trade unionists who formed the

trade union?I ? trade unionformed Labour Party, they specifically

took the decision not to took the decision not to become the

class party, in the , in the , in th were a narrow party of protest. The

day when the Labour Party says, we do not allow anyone in our ranks...

wall be the day they are finished dilemma. More

dilemma. More than 80% of Labour the relationsh

the relationship with the unions and yet what -- move away from

agree with, agree with,

working-class people the first

the first k? I the first k the first k? I the first k

the first kind of feel you get for politics. T

get trade union members and people, and

and and people from a poorer background,

helping them to do that. It is part of the social mobility story that

has now been hampered by the fact that

that trade ?I ? that trade ot have as many members.

have as many members. have as many members.

that trade ?I ? that trade ot have as many members. that trade ?I ? that trade ot have as many members.

that trade ?I ? that trade ot have as many members. that trade ?I ? that trade ot have as man? I have as man

of of James Callaghan, Dennis

of James Ca? I of James Canner, they all came...

they all came... let it -- the getting down the waiting class --

getting down the waiting class -- getting down the waiting class --

the waiting list, it is the waiting list, it is

the waiting list, it is that helps ? I that helps t it

that helps ? I that helps t it that helps the poorest. And yet it

is dismissed as if 1d as if 1d as ifd is dismissed as if 1d as if 1d as ifd

only about the statistics that you cited. The two challenges, one is

getting into a position where they they are going to promise a

referendum on Europe in 2017. Should Labour also be committing to

a popular referendum in that issue? No. Why do the Tories want to do

for working people, for working people, they do not

like the fact that you have got the right...