04/07/2012 Newsnight Scotland


04/07/2012

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years. I wanted to make sure she was taken care of and so far it has

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Tonight on Newsnight Scotland - for "reprehensible" is how the Barclays

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boss Bob Diamond discredit the fixing of rates by his dealers. But

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could it actually be criminal? Fraud cases are much easier to

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prosecute in Scots law. So could we put the bankers on trial?

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And, the Higgs Boson - or something very like it - has been found. We

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will try to work out what that means.

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Good evening. MPs may have hardly landed a punch on Bob Diamond, but

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should he be afraid of legal action? The recently resigned head

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of Barclays faced the Treasury Select Committee this afternoon,

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and while some of the questioning he faced was quite aggressive,

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little new emerged from the session. Fraud is very difficult to

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prosecute under English law as it stands, but not so hard in Scotland.

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So could we put the bankers on trial? Jamie MacIvor reports. Bob

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Diamond may now have replaced Fred Goodwin as the banker has some love

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to hate. Last week it emerged Barclays had been rigging a key

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interest rate. It was fined �290 million. Yesterday Mr Diamond

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resigned in disgrace. Today he was quizzed by MPs. When I read the

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emails from those traders, I got physically sick. It was

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reprehensible behaviour and if you're asking me should those

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actions be dealt with, absolutely. Mr Diamond said Barclays had been

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the first to own up but believed other banks may be involved as well.

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As public concern over the banks continues, an inquiry is under way

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here which may lead to prosecutions. We can only speculate about what is

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actually being probed. The Crown Office says it has been

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investigating banks for a sometimes. It's serious and organised crime

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division is waiting the scope of that inquiry. But what is the

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scope? It is not saying publicly so we do not know and even some banks

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have been tried to find out. For instance, is the inquiry restricted

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to banks based in Scotland or could any bank which has customers here

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potentially be investigated for say an alleged crime committed in the

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city of London? To have jurisdiction in Scotland, there has

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to be an effect of the crime on individuals or a company in

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Scotland. For example, famously the Lockerbie case, the planning is

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perceived to have taken place in malts a, the individuals are

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perceived to have been from Libya and there was supposed to be

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planning in Libya, and the actions resulted in deaths and tragedy in

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Scotland. So you have a number of different elements but no one

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argued that the jurisdiction did not apply to Scotland. The same

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would apply to an individual who has lost out because of a fraud. He

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could make a complaint to the police in Scotland, despite the

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fact that the main commission of the crime was in England. So will

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the Crown Office look at the scandal fixing interest rates or

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might it looks for example at the events which led to the near

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collapse of Royal Bank of Scotland? Again, we just do not know. We do

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know it can be easier to take cases -- fraud cases to court in Scotland

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than England. So out of the border, there -- fraud is covered by a

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Fraud Act which is a form of words which covers behaviour. We do not

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have this in Scotland, we have the common law which allows you to

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decide whether a certain actions amount to a crime. That is a

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decision which is made by a judge on his own or by a judge and jury.

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While the kennel may speculate about what the Crown Office is

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actually investigating, the potential is vast. -- while we can

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only speculate. I'm joined now by Professor

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Alastair Bonington, and from London by the Principal of Hertford

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College Oxford, Will Hutton. What do you make of this announcement by

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the Crown Office that it is apparently conducting an

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investigation into the bank's? seems extraordinary that we have

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had this situation for about four years and they suddenly announce

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the same afternoon that I go on the radio and say nothing has happened

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even Scotland, the Crown had done nothing, they say actually we have

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been doing something but we just had not told anyone. I think it is

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a little bit odd. They did not spell it out. One sentence said the

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scope of the investigation will be extended as a result of recent

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developments, what do we make of that? It could be the rate rigging

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issue or it could begin the selling of financial instruments to small

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businesses. If it had been the case that there was an investigation

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taking place, surely, four hears, even with the Crown this would have

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resulted in arrests an inquiry is being made. The banks themselves

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are saying they know nothing about an investigation, no one has asked

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any questions of them. It is a very secret investigation if the people

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who are being investigated have not noticed. Matter of the lob - is it

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shrew that it is easy to prosecute for fraud. -- matter of the law.

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Absolutely. Back in 1996, one of the Law Lords in England

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specifically said how much easier things are in Scotland. Give us the

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very simple explanation. As Jerry Brown said, you use the common law.

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You ask if there has been misrepresentation with the

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intention of producing a fraudulent result. If that is the case, it

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does not matter where it originated as if they affect is felt in

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Scotland, that is enough. The fact something happened in England or

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New York but there was an effective Scotland would allow us to

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prosecute. Why is the more difficult in England? They had

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these convoluted statutes. It has to fall within ambit of that Act.

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We do not have that problem. impressed were you about the

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investigator the ability of this bunch of MPs this afternoon? They

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did the best they could but they do not have the power of a judge to

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call for a mere mobile-phone calls, the text messages and the e-mail

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trail. They have to take what Mr Diamond says, or any other witness.

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When Mr Diamond said the first he knew about who was five days before

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the FSA publish their report, you have to take that on trust. When he

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says it is reprehensible and he felt sick, to the question how much

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did you know? They have no leverage. It does not work I do not think,

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not because they are MPs but because they do not have the

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forensic capability of a judge and a lawyer. As a lawyer, I am sure

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you were delighted to hear that. Yes, indeed I am and I am free for

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instructions at any point! He is absolutely right. Lawyers do it

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better. We are good at something I hope. But we can sometimes take a

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long time, like the Savell inquiry. Most of the people were dead by the

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time it ended. You have got to keep a tight rein but it can be done.

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The Levinson inquiry has been done very well. What are the arguments

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being made to? David Cameron once that same about it effectively to

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do his very short and sharp inquiry into the banking industry. Their

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argument was they would have the ability to have people appear under

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oath. Do you think that would make up for it or demean the apparatus

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Every MP has to have a go and it is very difficult to get them to hand

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the baton on. Secondly, offering a couple of extra people to work

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alongside the current secretary at of the committee to give it extra

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resource is not serious. I do not think the question of the oath...

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People are very adept at not falsifying information under oath

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but that does not mean that they are telling the truth. You have got

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to get at the underlying evidence base. I am just curious as to what

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vibes you are picking up in London as to whether there is a mood for

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prosecutions - not necessarily of Mr Diamond but, perhaps, of some of

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the people who have been involved in this libel fixing scandal. We

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already know that other banks will be involved. -- this great fixing

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scandal. We have heard about people who have spent months in prison for

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stealing a bottle of water and the lack of any similar action being

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taken against these traders. Four traders were sacked by Royal Bank

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of Scotland earlier this week because of their role in this

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inquiry. It occurred to me that this might be the case - that the

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Crown is investigating in Scotland. If your view of the law is as you

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describe it, I think he would have a very strong case and it may be

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that, actually, Edinburgh can bring people to book faster than London,

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which, in my view, would be good. Do you have any confidence that

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might happen? I think it could be done but I do not think there is

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the appetite to do it. You have to look at politics. One hates to dog

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about politicians on any civilised programme but nevertheless, it is

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very obvious that the SNP do not want it to be seen as Scottish

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banks have caused the near- bankruptcy of the United Kingdom.

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am not sure the last administration in Scotland would be any more...

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Perhaps they would not. But it is very clear that the present one

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feel that. In a way, this is quite a different thing to get your head

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around but it seems to have generated anger among the public.

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Isn't this about more than the law? The whole point about the way in

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which this particular rate is set is that it was never designed to be

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governed by law - it is informal process. I was trying to think of a

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comparison and the comparison is someone like a drug dealer, who has

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sufficient morals to steal from everyone else to finance their

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habit but not from their own family. This is a good drug dealer who

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steals from their own family - is that a bad analogy? The reason why

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everyone is upset about it is because, actually, it is naked

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manipulation of a price. The only way you can manipulate it is by

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doing the manipulating with others. They also did not like the e-mail

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exchanges. The point is, it is manipulation of a system with no

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safeguards, because when the system was set up, it would have been

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inconceivable that you would need any safeguards. You have got 16

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banks here - the biggest banks in the world and members of the

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British Bankers Association. Based at the base interest rate for 12

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currencies. -- they eat set up the base interest rate. You do not mess

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on your own backyard. What these people were doing was actually,

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they were literally messing up their own structure. And over and

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above that, the cascade effect on others was huge. And then the

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profits that were made from this were a huge and the bonuses that

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were made from this were huge, and Mr Diamond knew that of the kinds

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of profits made on the trading desk would also inflate his bonus. There

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was no incentive on him to do anything about it. In the three

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hours, he never volunteered a view of how it could be different. He

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just said that action should have been taken. By whom? It was

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extraordinary performance, I thought. The Financial Times was

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pointing out today that if this was a casino, its licence would be

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taken away. Indeed. When Peter Hagues propose the --

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Peter Higgs proposed the existence of the Higgs boson particle, he had

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little expectation it would be discovered in his lifetime. It has

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taken the work of over 10,000 scientists but today, the discovery

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of a "Higgs-like" particle was announced at CERN. It is a relation

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between electromagnetic waves and particles. One of the man who

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invented the theory struggles to explain it, you know you are

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dealing with difficult stuff. have a quality which is called the

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Higgs boson. That is a particle that is believed to give other

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particles mass. Heggs bosons crumb empty space, creating a cosmic

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trickle. Some scientists believe they feel the waves more than

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others and that a greater be ripple, the greater the mass. Scientists

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announced today they have enough evidence to be almost certain that

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the Higgs boson or something like it exists. We have a discovery. We

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have discovered a new particle. Most probably a Higgs boson. Define

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the Higgs boson, scientists looked at more than 1000 trillion protons

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inside the Large Hadron Collider. When the battles collide, there is

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a high energy explosion and the degree of each explosion is

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analysed for evidence of the particle. For Peter Higgs, the

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validation of his the was an emotional moment. I would like to

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add my congratulations to everybody that help with this tremendous

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achievement. For me, it is really an incredible thing that has

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happened in my lifetime. scientists around him, the question

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is firstly whether they can confirm the discovery and secondly, where

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it will lead. I am joined by a Dr Aidan Robson, who is part of the

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Glasgow University team at CERN. They are saying they have

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discovered something like the Higgs boson. What is the significance of

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those two words, "something like". It is accepted we have discovered a

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new particle, which is probably a Higgs boson. The moment of

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discovery is when you just have enough data to say that there is

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something there. The challenge now is to collect a lot more of these

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particles, to make precise measurements and see whether they

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actually have the properties that are predicted by the Standard Model,

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which is the theory of particle physics. So, we do not yet have

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enough knowledge from this discovery that something is there,

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rather than what it is, to know that this Higgs boson does the work

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of the theory which has to explain how massive rises. That is correct.

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We have discovered this new particle which seems to have the

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right electric charge to be the Higgs boson, and has a mass which

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is more or less consistent with being the Higgs boson. We are not

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sure about another property, which is the spin. So far, everything is

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consistent with this part of being a Higgs boson but the idea now is

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that we make a lot of precise measurements by putting them

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altogether, seeing whether they are consistent, to pin down whether

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this is a standard model Higgs boson or something a bit more

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exotic. We hope that these precise measurements will. As in the

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direction of further new discoveries. Which is more exciting,

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from the point of view of theoretical physicists? Is a more

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exciting if this turns out to behave exactly as the standard

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model predicted it will behave? All, actually, if it behaves a bit like

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that but there is something going wrong, which maybe means that it

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could prompt new theatrical -- theoretical discoveries? Be is

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exciting to see anything at all. The second case would be more

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exciting, where we were opening up a halt realm of new physics to

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investigate. Where does this go? 95% of the stuff in the universe is

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unaccounted for, isn't it? How does the Higgs boson relate for the

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Cirque -- relate to the search for that? As you say, only about 4% of

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the universe is the normal matter that we know about, so the search

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for dark matter, which we think is about a quarter of the universe, is

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clearly the next goal for particle physics. The Large Hadron Collider

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can address that in a couple of ways. You could try to create dark

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matter particles directly, like we did with this new particle that we

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have been talking about today. matter, despite its name, is not on

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observable. -- unobservable. Yes, and we could be created at the

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Large Hadron Collider. The reach of the current collider is not enough

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to make it directly but we would hope to be able to observing it

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through its effects on particles that we do know. That is where the

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Higgs boson comes in. We need to be very sure that we have a complete

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consistent standard model of particle physics, and then we can

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read pregnancy what may be beyond that. -- we cannot really probe and

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see. This goes to the heart of the theory of relativity, which

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explains gravity and how space and time work, and the quantum theory

:20:07.:20:11.

of sub-atomic particles. We are still in the realm of quantum

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mechanics here. To join those two forces, or gravity and relativity

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on one hand and quantum mechanics and the other, you have to go to

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very, very high energy Scales, which are not bridgeable from

:20:25.:20:30.

colliders. But we hope that from the lower energies at colliders, we

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can see the trajectory of weather theories are going and try to work

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out what is happening at a high energy scales. If this is a Higgs

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boson that we have discovered, there is plenty of room between the

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energies we can reach out and the highest energies for an entire new

:20:48.:20:50.

spectrum of physics to be discovered.

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