20/04/2012 Newsnight

It's been yet another bad week for David Cameron's Government, rows

over extradition and Lords reform, coming after all that budget fall-

out, is fact following fiction? you, you're a BEEPing omnishambles,

you're like that coffee machine, from bean to cup, you BEEP up.

opposition stealing the line from a TV comedy, is David Cameron really

presiding over omnishambles. The latest outbreak of ill feeling in

the cabinet is from the European Court of Human Rights, we have some

fresh revelations. Inside the cabinet they have been

rowing and banging the table over whether to demand reform over the

court's powers, it is Keneth Clarke versus Michael Gove. Two

Conservatives who disagree on what is wrong with the coalition are

here. Given the catalogue of human rights

abuses in Bahrain, should Sunday's Grand Prix be stopped, should

Britain take a tougher line. We will hear from the Bahraini

Good evenings, every Government goes through the mid-term blues, a

few years in, unpopular decisions taken, and if they get it right, a

cople of more years, and then the wisdom is revealed and they are re-

elected. Sometimes it goes from bad to worse, in the view of David

Miliband it is going that way, he called it an "omnishambles",

something that owes itself to television comedy. The answer

Allegra Stratton will be finding out, the answer contains some very

strong language. This was in this building that

David Cameron invited people to join the Government of Britain.

is an invitation to the whole of Britain, we will give you the power,

be your own boss, sack your own MP. Nearly two years into power, the

prospect of people faking him up on that invite, if it was -- taking

him up on that invite, if it was ever credible, now looks a little

less. One of the things I take around with me today is the

Conservative manifesto, which indicates what they are delivering

and how much was in the manifesto. That is a notebook? It is the

manifesto from 2010. Conservative chairman's humour

reflects the mood inside Downing Street and the difficulties of

making coalition work. Conservative Party have some very

clear principles, the majority of the agreement, the coalition

agreement, and what we are delivering in Government, is part

of those principles, but then there are other principles, Lib Dem

principles, which do butt up against that. And yes, out of that

sometimes comes an incoherence. What is worrying for the Government

is the shifting sands of public opinion, those people who the

Tories they could once ask to join the Government, are settling. In

the first time in the history of a poll from YouGov, and any polling

kl 2007, Labour is ahead on points. For people inside Number Ten, life

is tense. That's great, that's fucking great,

that is another fucking thing right there, not only do you have a bent

fucking husband, and a daughter who gets taken to school in a sedan

chair, you are also fucking mental. You are a fucking omnishambles, you

are like that coffee finance, from bean to cup, you fuck up. So there

you have it, the word "omnishambles" first used in its

full glory. Since that programme, politicians of all stripes have

used it to describe things going their way as they might not like.

This week it was used by the leader of the opposition, David Miliband,

in the House of Commons. -- Ed Miliband. We are all pleased to

hear the Prime Minister's view, four weeks on from the budget, even

people from Downing Street, are calling it an omnishambles budget.

This week the events didn't let up, the dance with Abu Qatada might

once have been containable, but ministers fear the sight of Qatada

released could be a vivid image of impotence.

Coming in a week where attempts were suggested to change the

European Court of Human Rights, and rejected, it is thought that could

be lethal. Keneth Clarke gave a presentation on the reforms he was

going to get to the European Court, which, in the eye of some cabinet

ministers, tying their hands in the Abu Qatada case. Keneth Clarke said

the reforms were not going to be as radical as the Tories said they

would get. To the surprise of some, it was he had case secretary,

Michael Gove who said that was not -- Education Secretary, Michael

Gove who said that was not good enough, and Iain Duncan Smith and

others thumped support in this matter for the education secretary.

It was party night on Wednesday, a Cameroon leaving do, for the man

who dreamt up The Big Idea society, Steve Hilton has temporarily left

the Government, many think he has left a hole, even his enemies. His

departure marks the end of the first part of the coalition

Government, now there is a phase where everything has to be agreed,

with fraught negotiations. With no second programme of Government on

the horizon, the Government has created a vacuum. Looking to find

mid-term blues for the 1997 Government is pretty useless, they

basically govern in benign times. Looking at the 1979 Government is

more interesting, they only get their poll lead back in the time of

the Falklands War. Some of Cameron's allies point to this

period suggesting the best is yet to come. Things may be bumpy, David

Cameron's aides admit, ruefully, but soon the Prime Minister will

point out few people are argue beg their core policy, definite

reduction, and that, they think, is the key to the 20 15 election.

Today backbenchers are newly upset about money going from the UK to

the IMF. Few are sure whether they are dealing with mid-term blues, or

a longer term darker Hugh. My guest suggests that the Government is

fundamentally on track, and many of the problems are stirred up by the

website, Conservative Home, and calling it narrow faction. The

website's editor is with us. Do you accept that omni shambles is real,

and many problems are down to a basic lack of confidence?

really, I think the reporting of this crisis, called, has been

hysterical. It is very interesting, if you analyse where the criticisms

are coming from. It is not being created by the opposition, it is

coming from the Conservative Party right, and within that, it is from

a very small number of very deliberately offensive voices, that

are attacking the Prime Minister personally, and accusing Cameron of

some kind of betrayal. Did you mean him? What I argued in my piece in

the Telegraph, was that Conservative Home gave a lot of

credibility to this proposition. I think the half-a-dozen or so voices

on the Tory right really, they don't represent the mainstream

Conservative view, but they are given weight by Conservative Home,

which presents itself as the voice of the mainstream Conservative

Party, but is actually, under Tim Montgomerie, a brilliant man,

actually, really influential, but he actual low is a small right-wing

faction. Tim? I think we are returning the compliments here, I

think Peter is a brilliant columnist, but in terms of personal

attacks, Peter, it wasn't so long ago when you wrote in your

Telegraph column that until now it was easy to argue that Mr Cameron

was properly grounded with a decent set of values, but unfortunately it

is impossible to make that assertion any longer. I have never

made an take on David Cameron as strong as that. I think the

Government is facing serious difficulties, I think it is very

important for a website like our's, I love the Conservative Party, I

want it to succeed, to voice the concerns, not just of a few people

in Westminster. What we exist to do, and we have a panel of nine-and-a-

half Conservative members across the country that we regularly poll.

I put a lot of time into talking to Conservative MPs and others. There

is huge concern out there, it is not a crisis, it is fixable, but

there is a lot of concern. Peter said it is magnified by people like,

talking about a handful of these voices, serial attenders of think-

tank breakfasts, spectacular immaturity, waging a campaign

against Baroness Warsi, and you are stirring it up, it is

unrepresentative of the Conservative Party? We are far from

unprep presentive, I spoke to two - - unrepresentative, I spoke to two

people this week, who said half of the people are worried about

problems in David Cameron's leadership, and some are as worried

as in the John Major years. You mentioned the polls, UKIP taking

chunks out of the right flank. I think it is sortable, I think the

Government is doing many good things. It would be wrong to be

complacent at this time. Isn't it refreshing to hear some of

this, instead of the discipline of the Conservative Party falling in

line, it is a party that seems to be confident enough to have a row

with itself? I think there is a lot in that, I think that it is one of

the reasons why Labour, new Labour, couldn't produce something which

Tim has done. Because they were so on message that it wouldn't produce

the eclectic voices. You joint by he represents a meaningful strand

do you? If you lock at my readers, broadly Conservative, they are

people who read the newspapers over breakfast, they get on the commuter

train. They are civic-minded people. Lord Oakeshott, the great

Conservative fill loss fear of the last century, saying Conservatism

is about enjoyment, civic engagment and living life to the full. My

criticism of Tim is I think his website is very representative of a

small, very small group of very keen political obsessives. For them,

every political development which Allegra Stratton's brilliant

comment earlier portrayed, is a matter of intense importance. Now,

for the average Telegrapher, who is the mainstream Conservative voter,

he's thinking about his job, his family, the opera he's going to,

where he will spend the evening. There is a small group of

hysterical young men, very few women, who get terribly obsessed by

the latest political. Let me hear from the his kal young --

hysterical young man's leader? column written tomorrow by Peter

saying the wheels fell off the car ran have a of the coalition this

week. I'm not -- caravan of the coalition this week. I'm not sure

who is the most heir ter kal. Only -- hysterical. Only 10-15% of cuts

necessary have so far been made, we need a coalition focused on

economic competitiveness, and then we can sort these problems out.

There is one other difference between you two, you would Mike

David Cameron to be more ideolgical, and you -- would like David Cameron

to be more ideolgical, and you would like him to appeal more to

everyone. If you go back to the Labour Party in the 1980s, there

was the Campaign Group, they were very dogmatic, they were aridly

doctrineated, and Neil Kinnock had this wonderful phrase, I remember

in the mid-1980s, when he said politics is too important to mess

around with people's lives. I think this very, in a way, a politically

obsessive approach. Not good enough on this line. David Cameron is some

kind of right-wing story, who is as pure as the driven snow. Can I come

back on this. Let him come in on that? What we need to do as part of

the Conservative Party is walk and chew gum at the same time, it is

perfectly OK to be euro-sceptic, tough approach to immigration and

crime, the things that perhaps Peter would characterise as right-

wing, on the website we have also advanced much more involvement of

northern candidates in the party, when there was room for tax cuts

they should be focused on the low paid. We have taken something that

Peter criticised, we have been critical of the hyperactivity of

the coalition, unsettling the National Health Service, it is the

wrong time to reform the National Health Service. I think a blue

collar Conservatism, not a right- wing Conservatism, is the future of

the party, I think Peter was a little bit unfair about how he

characterised our position. Let's bring in Zoe Williams, do you think

Labour is missing a trick in not having a Labour Home? I have a lot

of sympathy with both of your positions, with the proviso that I

think you are all wrong! Neither can summon the quintessential Tory,

all you are doing is summon the Tory you want to summon. Neither of

you say you can speak for Conservatism, I wouldn't say. Now,

there is, you were talking about building a narrative, and how that

is telling a story, I agree with that, there is a fictionalisation,

when you build a narrative, there is also, it abides by a narrative

verity, there is a purpose to attacking the party, there is a

purpose to Conservative Home, it is a corrective to a party that's in

power. There would be no purpose to it for Labour. He used the word

"magnifies" the problem, that could be detable stablising it?

destablising it? The power in the press was suppressing it. Now, that

is no longer the case because of the internet, you can't put the

genie back in the box and say the press can suppress division, if the

press suppresses them, somebody like a website will air them. You

can't say this is hysterical young men who is briefing the young men.

Lord Ashley is oneing the show. -- Lord Ashcroft is running the

show. He supports the website generously, but he doesn't

interfere. You can't say on the one hand it is hysterical young men,

and then on the other say it is the old men locked out in the cold.

You made a reference to the health bill, you seem to think it was a

serious misjudgment for Conservative Home to attack it?

is very effective in attack on the health bill, it was the timing

which was so strange. It was pretty well on the third reading stage.

And suddenly, Conservative Home had a fit of nerves or a fit of

hysteria, perhaps, and demanded it should be dropped. It was

catastrophic if it was dropped stage. There was three cabinet

ministers on that. It was a good story. It was sourced in three

cabinet ministers. Let me get to this, the idea has got about that

Conservative Hope, particularly among BBC pro-- Conservative Home,

particularly among BBC producers, and that sort of person, that

Conservative Home represents the mainstream of the Conservative

Party. It represents a very, very, and I was just wanting, just to

produce a corrective, so that we understand that Conservative Home,

for all its merits, very, very interesting analysis and so forth,

represents a small group of quite intelligent, and completely

obsessed right-wingers. To be fair, I mean there is a point

here, you can't on the one hand say that Cameron isn't demonstrating

leadership, and he's being a front man and a sales person, and on the

other hand amplify the divisions in his party, it does weaken him, and

this stuff is self-fulfiling, if you attack the guy for being weak,

he will become weaker. The trouble with the idea of

keeping politics out of sport, is sport is so important to so many

people around the world, it can provide a platform for disconand

protest. The Bahrain Grand Prix has been scheduled for Sunday, and

there have been renewed calls for it to be called off. The glamour,

the speed, the daredevilry of Formula One, brought to a country,

seething with anger. On the track, tyres span today.

Off it t they went up in smoke. Last year's Bahrain Grand Prix was

cancelled, after the kingdom's police battled pro-democracy

protestors at the start of the Arab Spring. Today, the Crown Prince,

owner of the rights to the events, insisted this year's would go ahead

on Sunday. Cancelling the race empowers extremists. For those of

us trying to navigate a way out of this political problem, having the

race allows us to build bridges across communities, get people

working together. It allows us to celebrate our nation. Bahrain's

western-orientated rulers are highly image conscious, the Grand

Prix was intended to show a country returning to normal, ironically, it

has ended up reminding the world about the unrest. Today, tens of

thousands blocked a major highway, to demand that the race be stopped.

This sport, especially Formula One, is the ruling elite sport, it is

the Crown Prince's sport, it is the son of the king's sport. You know

you are in a country that does not have institutions, does not have

systems. The ruling family are everywhere, they are the rulers,

the economy, the politics, everything. What was our demand, is

for Formula One not to help the ruling elite to come out of

isolation. They have committed a lot of crimes and they should be

politically punished for those crimes. They should not be helped.

Now Formula One is coming, it is not a good message for the people

in Bahrain, or the people who lost their loved ones. According to

Amnesty International, there have been at least 60 protest-related

deaths, since the uprising began in February last year. At least five

people have died from torture in cuss towedy. At least 500 civilians

have been convicted in military courts.

Now, 11 members of the security forces are known to be facing

charges for human rights violations. But as far as is known, none of

them hold senior positions. Theless, the appointment of an

Independent Commission of Inquiry, which reported last November,

proves, the authorities say, that they want reform. If we hold

internal investigations with external investigators, and we say

that we are not perfect, then I hardly think we are trying to gloss

over real issues that exist in our country. And Bernie Ecclestone,

Prince of Formula One, thinks there is no problem with freedom of

expression in Bahrain. I don't want to be rude at all, but I think

sometimes it is a little bit silly putting the race on, it has given

the protesters an incredible platform to talk tou. They say they

talk about democracy, which is freedom of speech, they say, they

have had all the freedom in the world to talk to you guys.

In the impoverished villages outside Bahrain's capital, the

country's largely Shia Muslim population, resentful of the elite

says freedom is a long way off. Amnesty International say they the

ruling powers haven't committed themselves to human rights. Bahrain

is not Syria, and there is a process of reform under way, and

that Government backs and wants to promote the reform. Behind that

aspiration, is there a desire to maintain good relations with a

stragically placed king, in which the United States and UK have had

strong military links. Half a million of UK licenses were revoked

last February when the uprising began for equipment that could be

used against protestors, since then a further �1.5 million have been

licensed, including items that can be used in dealing with civilian

unrest. Such as body armour, weapons sights, small arms

ammunition, rifles and silencers. The Commander-in-Chief of the

Bahraini army recently told a local newspaper that Britain had been one

of several countries trying to put pressure on Bahrain by curbing arms

sales. But he said he personally phoned a senior person in the

British army and threatened to cancel military co-operation in

Bahrain, unless the curb on arms exports was lifted. According to

him, he boasted the policy had been changed within a month. I don't

know if the time frame is right, but it seems that pressure had some

impact. The British Government would deny any such pressure, as

for the authorities, they have been firm in dispersing protests, this

man was hit in the face with a teargas cannister. Any activists

detained in the last three or four days, to clear the way for Formula

One, many of those activists were tortured, some were kids. Now only

I have just come from the house of somebody, 14 years old boy, who has

bleeding in the brain, because of the torture he had by the security

institution, and he's in a critical condition.

Opposition leaders say they won't try to stop the race, but

demonstrations will continue. Not surprising, perhaps, then, that

there is increasing nervousness on the part of some teams and sponsors.

Earlier I spoke to representative for Bahrain's information affairs

authority, and the son of -- the son of a jailed dissident. Bahraini

forces have killed 60 people, and tortured five to death in the last

year, why should you be allowed to stage the Grand Prix? I take issue

with the figure of 60, the independent report listed 35, five

were members of the security forces. Amnesty International's report says

otherwise, we won't quibble about the figures, you have killed a

number of protestors and tortured five to death, why should the world

let you pretend everything is normal in Bahrain? The Government

abhors torture of any kind, it stands against human rights

violations, that is why it has commissioned the Independent

Commission of Inquiry, which made its findings very public in a

public ceremony. It was accepted by His Majesty the king, it is

available on-line in Arabic and English, many say it is damaging

for the Government. The Government has acknowledged its mistakes and

taken responsibility for the wrongs and has been fast in implementing

measures and the report's recommendations. You are not a

normal country, you use shotguns against protestor, political

opposition is banned? No, actually, the largest opposition party, just

resigned 18 seats in parliament. It had 17 seats in the last

parliamentary session. I mean, one must not forget that we are a new

transitioning democracy. Our parliament is on its third session.

You say you are in transition, should we wait until the transition

is more peaceful before allowing the Formula One Grand Prix to give

you this great political boost? have made great leaps over the past

ten years. We have had the national charter, the bicameral parliament,

and constitutional reforms are coming as a result of the dialogue

in June, that have gone through the lower house. Have they made great

leaps? Let me just mention that the Bahraini regime has not killed only

65, they killed more than 80, and they arrested doctors and nurses

and they destroyed more than 35 mosques, and Bahrain is now under

occupation since 17th of March 2011, and they are still oxfied. At the

moment now...He Made the point that they have admit add lot of mistakes,

and allowed to open themselves up to scrutiny. This Grand Prix will

turn the spotlight on the issues you are talking about? At this time

more than 20 villages by the police forces. Right now, you mean? Right

now, at the moment. I mean every day they attack their people. I

want to mention as well, that teargas made in the UK, and I want

to mention that, I mean, unfortunately, the UK Government

supports Bahrain by ...Making teargas and other things. Let me

put that now, the attacks on villages are still going on, they

are going on now, he says? Again, I mean there were a few allegations

there on the past comments that I don't necessarily agree with and

believe to be true. Such as Bahrain being under occupation or invasion.

Now the right approach -- the right to protest is guaranteed to the

citizens, this right has been exercise, non-stop, since the

events of last year. But you are shooting them? Come on, that is

really unfair to say. We have had very large protests, you know, some

numbing in the tens of thousands, gathering every week without

disruption, or without interference by the police. There is a line

between peaceful protest and legitimate expression of opinion,

and violent assaults against policemen. The point is, you want

the overthrow of the Bahrain Government? Is it wrong for people

to demand to elect their Government. It is wrong to attack and shoot

police officers? No, we didn't attack anybody. We don't have any

arms. Since 14th of February, we have moved peacefully, as the BBC

will say, and CNN, and amnesty international mentioned that the

protestors were peacefully moving, and the Government, as Bassiouni

said in his report, they tortured the youths in prison, and they

killed them. Would you accept that the Formula One, grand pro-, which

you want cancelled? Yes. Wouldn't you accept it has done the world of

good for the opposition, because everybody is looking at Bahrain

because it is going on, it is a good thing? Everybody knows what

happened in Bahrain, that is why they should stop, what the police

force is doing, they attack every village. Are you saying that is not

true, that while the Formula One preparations are going on, your

forces are not attacking any villages? Won coming to protest, it

is important to say that -- when coming to protest, it is important

to saying, there are protests happening before Formula One, and

will continue during. I have to say that many people, especially in the

opposition, have expressed strong support for the Formula One, they

have acknowledged its use to the economy and will not act as a

weapon against it. Only a small minority offer a risk. Kirsty is

standing by with the review show. Two of our finest actresses, Glenn

Close and Janet McTeer, go head-to- head in Nobbs, and Anjelica Houston

and others bring magic to Smash, my guests are here, join me in a