Browse content similar to 16/10/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Over the last decade �3 billion worth of UK sales, for the last | :00:14. | :00:18. | |
three years, not a bean in corporation tax. The coffee chain, | :00:18. | :00:22. | |
Starbucks, isn't the only one in the firing line over their rogue | :00:22. | :00:26. | |
tax rates, but they have done nothing illegal, so why should they | :00:26. | :00:30. | |
pay any more? It is not fair, if they are not paying it in the UK, | :00:30. | :00:33. | |
would they be able to operate their businesses in the UK if they were | :00:33. | :00:37. | |
paying the right amounts. Would harder enforcement just send | :00:37. | :00:45. | |
businesses elsewhere, or is the Government asleep on the job. The | :00:45. | :00:50. | |
BBC has asked a former judge to investigate the practices of the | :00:50. | :00:55. | |
BBC during Jimmy Savile's time there. And a report on the decision | :00:55. | :01:00. | |
by Newsnight to drop a report on Savile's sex abuse. The Government | :01:00. | :01:03. | |
will declare that thousands more schools in England aren't up to | :01:03. | :01:06. | |
scratch, what should happen to them, should they be forced to become | :01:06. | :01:10. | |
academies, or forced to be taken over by private firms. There are | :01:10. | :01:14. | |
6,000 schools that are satisfactory, and satisfactory is not really what | :01:14. | :01:18. | |
people think normally means as satisfactory, it is no longer good | :01:19. | :01:22. | |
enough. The former head of David Cameron's Downing Street team is | :01:22. | :01:27. | |
here to debate with the head of a head teaching union. As inflation | :01:27. | :01:31. | |
rises faster than wage, meet the people coping with the squeeze by | :01:31. | :01:36. | |
turning to discount supermarkets. You mean like my Pot Noodles, where | :01:36. | :01:41. | |
they are four for �26789 That is a lot of Pot Noodle! | :01:41. | :01:46. | |
The winner is: Bring Up The Bodies, by Hilary Mantel. We will hear from | :01:46. | :01:56. | |
:01:56. | :01:58. | ||
the Booker Prize winner, shortly, the first woman to win is twice. | :01:58. | :02:03. | |
Good evening, named after a character in Moby Dick, Starbucks | :02:03. | :02:07. | |
is the whale of the coffee world, very possibly the biggest coffee | :02:07. | :02:11. | |
house company on the planet, in the midst of a rapid expansion | :02:11. | :02:16. | |
programme in the UK, as drive-thru coffee becomes the next big thing. | :02:16. | :02:23. | |
Do the people who hand over the �3.55, including VAT, for their | :02:23. | :02:25. | |
large skinny mocha cappuccino, know that this company paid no | :02:25. | :02:29. | |
corporation tax in the UK at all in the last three years. This after | :02:29. | :02:33. | |
revelations about other giants and their corporation tax, including | :02:33. | :02:37. | |
Google and Amazon. Here is a man who knows how to | :02:37. | :02:41. | |
shave a few quid off his tax bill. Jimmy Carr, the renowned comedian | :02:41. | :02:48. | |
and tax avoider, here promoting Starbucks extra-strong coffee, | :02:48. | :02:53. | |
specifically for the British palate. Have a coffee. One suspect that is | :02:53. | :02:59. | |
many people who can't avoid tax will be frothing at the mouth today. | :02:59. | :03:03. | |
The world's most famous coffee chain told the UK tax man that it | :03:03. | :03:06. | |
hadn't made a penny in profit over the past three years. Which is | :03:06. | :03:11. | |
unusual for a company with a turnover of �1.2 billion, and | :03:11. | :03:16. | |
without highly-paid staff, nor heavy capital investment to deduct. | :03:16. | :03:20. | |
And while Starbucks concedes it has paid VAT and national insurance in | :03:20. | :03:26. | |
full, company House records show it has only paid �8.6 million in total | :03:26. | :03:30. | |
in corporation tax since 1998. That seems to clash with what Starbucks | :03:30. | :03:34. | |
is telling its shareholders, though. Who were told in multiple | :03:34. | :03:37. | |
conference calls that the UK business was highly profitable. | :03:37. | :03:43. | |
They have lapped up the 130% spike in share values over the past three | :03:43. | :03:53. | |
:03:53. | :04:08. | ||
years, despite a global recession. So how do they do it? All those | :04:08. | :04:12. | |
Starbucks didn't -- although Starbucks didn't invent coffee t | :04:12. | :04:21. | |
pays heavy patent fees to the headquarters T pays patent fees to | :04:21. | :04:27. | |
the Netherlands, for specific use of coffee beans, it pays Swiss | :04:27. | :04:30. | |
taxes which are lower for other services. Independent retailers | :04:30. | :04:34. | |
like this may not like it, but Starbucks has a legal | :04:34. | :04:37. | |
responsibility to minimise all its cost, that includes corporation tax. | :04:37. | :04:41. | |
The company told Newsnight that all the tax apayers were up-to-date | :04:41. | :04:45. | |
with HM revenue and custom, and indeed, it was audited as recently | :04:45. | :04:51. | |
as two years ago. If you think Starbucks is the only US mult | :04:51. | :04:55. | |
national minimising its corporate tax like this, think again. Only | :04:55. | :04:59. | |
last year it emerged that Facebook had paid an effective corporation | :04:59. | :05:06. | |
tax bill of one eighth of one periods of UK schools, by routeing | :05:06. | :05:14. | |
its profits by low-tax Ireland, as does Ebay and and Amazon. If | :05:14. | :05:19. | |
everyone appears to be avoiding tax, who is fuelly paying it? A study -- | :05:19. | :05:25. | |
actually paying it? A study from Oxford University found the larger | :05:25. | :05:31. | |
amount of tax is paid by 1% of companies. The larger firms can | :05:31. | :05:35. | |
avoid paying tax by moving losses to low tax countries and profits to | :05:35. | :05:42. | |
low tax companies. 15% pay no UK tax on their UK operations at all. | :05:42. | :05:49. | |
Do independent UK coffee owners begrudge Starbucks UK tax | :05:49. | :05:55. | |
chicanery? Yes, it is not fair. If they operated the UK, could they | :05:55. | :05:58. | |
afford to operate in the UK if the figures were the right amounts. It | :05:58. | :06:02. | |
is the Government's money, they are operating in the UK, it is the | :06:02. | :06:05. | |
Government's money, and there are people out there finding ways to | :06:05. | :06:07. | |
get round the Government. The Government needs to find ways of | :06:07. | :06:11. | |
simplifying the tax system, so you can't get away with these things F | :06:11. | :06:14. | |
they want the money. If someone is taking all that money away from me, | :06:14. | :06:18. | |
I would find a way to stop them doing it. Given how fickle | :06:19. | :06:22. | |
consumers are, could Starbucks now face a mini-boy got. We are | :06:23. | :06:28. | |
creating an unlevel playing field in the UK market here, where UK- | :06:28. | :06:31. | |
based companies are losing out, suffering unfair competition from | :06:31. | :06:35. | |
international companies not paying tax, and that is going to create a | :06:35. | :06:39. | |
backlash, not just from consumers, I suspect. But very much from small | :06:40. | :06:42. | |
business organisations, and small business itself, who will be | :06:42. | :06:46. | |
turning around to MPs and saying, hang on, how have you created a tax | :06:46. | :06:49. | |
system, that penalises me from trading in my own country, and | :06:49. | :06:54. | |
which favours a foreign company. Starbucks is a by-word for frothy | :06:54. | :06:57. | |
coffee all over the world, and has many friends in high place. But in | :06:58. | :07:02. | |
a time of tax rises for most, and cutbacks for all, will those | :07:02. | :07:06. | |
friends stay loyal? Especially if it becomes obvious that we are not | :07:06. | :07:11. | |
all in this together. Joining me are Roy Hodgson, the | :07:11. | :07:14. | |
chair of the Public Accounts Committee, and John Whiting, George | :07:14. | :07:20. | |
Osborne's tax simplification Tsar. The thing is, they are doing | :07:20. | :07:24. | |
absolutely nothing illegal, and moreover, Starbucks has a duty to | :07:24. | :07:27. | |
their shareholders to pay as minimal amounts of tax as they can? | :07:27. | :07:31. | |
That is true, but if you are an ordinary person, watching that film, | :07:31. | :07:37. | |
Kirsty, and you pay your tax, unquestioningly, I think you will | :07:37. | :07:41. | |
be really frustrated, and absolutely furious, that you find, | :07:41. | :07:46. | |
yet another, global company, making big profits, and managing to avoid | :07:46. | :07:50. | |
paying their fair share of tax. It is just not fair. You, John Whiting, | :07:50. | :07:56. | |
are in charge of tax simplification, yet there is all sorts of different, | :07:56. | :07:59. | |
myriad ways, that they actually manage to post a loss in Britain. | :07:59. | :08:05. | |
Whatever it is, over �398 million worth of sales, last year. And not | :08:05. | :08:10. | |
a meny of profit? It does raise a lot -- Not a penny of profit? | :08:10. | :08:15. | |
does raise a lot of questions, I'm quite sure HMRC will be watching | :08:15. | :08:19. | |
this programme, looking. If I could just interrupt a second, if they | :08:19. | :08:24. | |
may be watching it, but it took a Reuters investigation to find it? | :08:24. | :08:29. | |
That misthe point. The tax money is routine -- misses the point. The | :08:29. | :08:33. | |
tax money is routinely checking companies, checking the cross- | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
pricing referred to in the report. I know there are different branches | :08:37. | :08:43. | |
of HMRC, isn't the problem, it is a lot easier for HMRC to go after the | :08:43. | :08:46. | |
pensioner who has forgotten a couple of investments and goes over | :08:46. | :08:50. | |
the threshold and get �90 off her, than the bigger companies? This is | :08:50. | :08:54. | |
one of the great issues, that a challenge for HMRC is to show they | :08:54. | :08:58. | |
are applying the tax law, evenly, equally, fairly to all. We all are | :08:58. | :09:03. | |
supposed to pay tax, under the law, that's the core thing. HMRC, seem | :09:04. | :09:07. | |
to find it very difficult to work this one out? There are three | :09:07. | :09:11. | |
things I would look to the future, how to deal with the continuing | :09:11. | :09:15. | |
problem with tax avoidance as well as tax evasion. The first thing I | :09:15. | :09:18. | |
would say is we have to have better transparency, I have been arguing | :09:19. | :09:23. | |
for some time, for example, with the FTSE top 100, public companies, | :09:23. | :09:26. | |
there ought to be complete transparency by what HMRC think | :09:26. | :09:32. | |
they should pay, and what they end up paying. Everybody hides behind | :09:32. | :09:35. | |
taxpayer confidentiality. Can I say something about this particular | :09:35. | :09:39. | |
company. This company filed accounts in companies House that | :09:39. | :09:44. | |
said they were making a loss -- Companies House, that said they | :09:44. | :09:49. | |
were making a loss and then told shareholders they were making 50% | :09:49. | :09:54. | |
profit. Is this global capitalism, maybe you have to suck it up? | :09:54. | :09:56. | |
think Companies House should be tougher in insisting that the | :09:57. | :10:00. | |
filing of accounts are a true and honest reflection of what happened. | :10:00. | :10:04. | |
That is the first thing, transparency, the second thing is | :10:04. | :10:08. | |
simplification, I'm delighted John is doing that work. The problem is | :10:08. | :10:12. | |
it has got so ruddy complex, people find ways around it, there is an | :10:12. | :10:15. | |
army of very highly-paid barristers who do that. Isn't there an army | :10:15. | :10:20. | |
behind you, that is what I want to know. We have tax lawyers, we have | :10:20. | :10:24. | |
tax specialists, only hired to make sure that companies pay minimal tax, | :10:24. | :10:27. | |
how many people have you got working on the tax simplification | :10:27. | :10:33. | |
system? We have a staff effectively of slightly under six. Six?! It is | :10:33. | :10:38. | |
doing certain projects, I have a lot of back-up with colleagues at | :10:38. | :10:42. | |
the Chartered Institute of Tags taxation as well. Does George | :10:42. | :10:47. | |
Osborne know you only have six? set us up, it is all credit to the | :10:47. | :10:50. | |
Government in saying, we are an experiment, saying can we make a | :10:50. | :10:53. | |
difference. There is a lot of credit to George Osborne and David | :10:53. | :10:58. | |
Gauke, our sponsoring minister, for saying we do need to tackle | :10:58. | :11:01. | |
simplification and make a difference. I wopbl make a | :11:01. | :11:05. | |
difference in simplifying the whole sis -- won't make a difference in | :11:05. | :11:08. | |
simplifying the whole system in the relative five minutes we have got. | :11:08. | :11:12. | |
We can make a start. Maybe things like this show we need to get hold | :11:12. | :11:15. | |
of it. Isn't there a danger that the companies are always ahead of | :11:15. | :11:20. | |
what John Whiting is doing? That is the third thing, I think | :11:20. | :11:24. | |
transparency, simplification, and the third thing, you have to have | :11:24. | :11:28. | |
enough people in HMRC, actually who have the right and appropriate | :11:28. | :11:32. | |
skills to take on the lawyers and the accountants, who make a lot of | :11:32. | :11:36. | |
money. We need HMRC properly staffed. We need it to be open. At | :11:36. | :11:40. | |
the moment we don't see it. Later in the programme we're going to | :11:40. | :11:43. | |
have a film about what happens in a recession, and discount shop to go | :11:43. | :11:50. | |
get the cheapest deal. I wonder, if we always see people with cups of | :11:50. | :11:54. | |
coffee in their hand in the streets, I wonder with a number of these | :11:54. | :12:00. | |
companies that the consume point of view makes a difference and you | :12:00. | :12:05. | |
will see boycotts. If you had greater transparency, and people | :12:05. | :12:11. | |
know Starbucks isn't paying its fair tax. It is legally paying fair | :12:11. | :12:15. | |
tax? It is not paying fair tax, I'm not buying Starbucks, you think | :12:15. | :12:19. | |
everyone should buy Costa. Last night, the Labour leader, Ed | :12:19. | :12:22. | |
Miliband, called for a public inquiry into the allegations | :12:22. | :12:25. | |
surrounding the late Jimmy Savile, the BBC, the NHS and other | :12:26. | :12:29. | |
institutions. Today in the House of Commons, the Deputy Prime Minister, | :12:29. | :12:33. | |
Nick Clegg, said there may be a case for one. Today, we also got | :12:33. | :12:39. | |
more details on the two independent inquiries, the BBC has set up into | :12:39. | :12:43. | |
the historic allegation, and in the decision on Newsnight to drop the | :12:43. | :12:48. | |
investigation into Jimmy Savile last year Jim is here with more. | :12:48. | :12:51. | |
The BBC first announced the two investigations at the tailend of | :12:51. | :12:55. | |
last week. End to we are getting a lot more detail about both of them. | :12:55. | :13:05. | |
:13:05. | :13:06. | ||
Two separate inquiries, as you say, set up by the BBC the. --. The | :13:06. | :13:11. | |
first one is Dame Janet Smith, best known for the Harold Shipman | :13:11. | :13:14. | |
inquiry, she will look at the broader inquiry, looking at the | :13:14. | :13:18. | |
culture of the corporation, the practices of the corporation, at | :13:18. | :13:21. | |
the time when Jimmy Savile was employed there. It will also hear | :13:21. | :13:26. | |
evidence, importantly, from people who say they were abused by Mr | :13:26. | :13:29. | |
Savile on BBC premises. It won't start work straight away, it will | :13:29. | :13:32. | |
delay the start of the inquiry until the police give it the go | :13:32. | :13:35. | |
ahead, so it doesn't get in the way of a criminal investigation. That | :13:35. | :13:38. | |
is the one that doesn't start until the police investigation is over, | :13:38. | :13:40. | |
more immediately is the other investigation into Newsnight's | :13:40. | :13:44. | |
handling of the story? This one will start straight away, with the | :13:44. | :13:50. | |
utmost urgency, say the BBC. will be chaired by the former head | :13:50. | :13:55. | |
of Sky News, Nick Pollard, a broader review than we thought. Its | :13:55. | :13:59. | |
primary objective is to look at if there were any failings in the way | :13:59. | :14:04. | |
that Newsnight report last year was handled. There was suggestion that | :14:04. | :14:11. | |
is BBC representatives put pressure on Newsnight, because there were | :14:11. | :14:16. | |
tribute programmes in the run-up to Christmas last year. In the broad | :14:17. | :14:23. | |
look at issues, what is going to happen? Two key areas we weren't | :14:23. | :14:26. | |
100% expecting. One was the BBC's handling of material in this | :14:26. | :14:30. | |
investigation, that could have been passed on to the police and other | :14:30. | :14:35. | |
relevant authorities, it isth will look into that. And whether the BBC | :14:35. | :14:39. | |
should have broadcast the two tribute programmes. If the BBC | :14:39. | :14:43. | |
executives knew Newsnight was in the process of putting an | :14:43. | :14:46. | |
investigation into process on Jimmy Savile's actions. The Government | :14:46. | :14:50. | |
has made big promises of getting rid of failing schools, a crucial | :14:51. | :14:56. | |
part of the plan will be tougher to be tougher when it comes to rating | :14:56. | :15:01. | |
schools' performance what do you do with problems schools. David | :15:01. | :15:07. | |
Cameron's former Head of Policy has set set out in a report for Policy | :15:07. | :15:11. | |
Exchange, his first since leaving Government, he says schools | :15:11. | :15:15. | |
shouldn't be taken out of local authority control and made into | :15:15. | :15:23. | |
academies, but turned over to not for profit firms. | :15:23. | :15:27. | |
There used to be a time when schools to be "satisfactory", now | :15:27. | :15:33. | |
you can get satisfaction, it is not very satisfactory. As the Stones | :15:33. | :15:37. | |
didn't sing. As of January, a new regime for schools, has decreed | :15:37. | :15:42. | |
enough isn't enough. Schools well regarded under the old regime are | :15:42. | :15:46. | |
now no longer. The new inspection regime will mean | :15:46. | :15:50. | |
that more schools will fail. Many hundreds of schools could fail. So | :15:50. | :15:56. | |
what do you do with those schools? Until a year ago, this man was the | :15:56. | :15:59. | |
Prime Minister's Head of Policy inside Number Ten. Now outside of | :15:59. | :16:03. | |
Government, James O'Shaughnessy thinks the failure rate in schools | :16:03. | :16:08. | |
will sore in -- soar in coming years, and his former colleagues | :16:09. | :16:13. | |
haven't worked out how to deal with this. There are 6,000 schools that | :16:13. | :16:17. | |
are satisfactory, and satisfactory is not really people think norm | :16:17. | :16:19. | |
yeahly means satisfactory, satisfactory is no longer good | :16:19. | :16:23. | |
enough. For the idea he has come up with, is schools should be turned | :16:23. | :16:26. | |
around like this place, which 20 years could have been described as | :16:26. | :16:31. | |
a sink school. This is now an academy, and part of a Shane. James | :16:31. | :16:37. | |
O'Shaughnessy thinks more schools could be turned out like this. This | :16:37. | :16:41. | |
is one of the Harris academies, a not for profit network of 19 across | :16:42. | :16:45. | |
London, growing to 24 next year. This man was once the headmaster of | :16:46. | :16:50. | |
one of the academies, then he was headmaster of three, that became a | :16:50. | :16:54. | |
bit unwieldy, he's chief executive of the lot. Of the 19, 11 were | :16:54. | :16:59. | |
found to be outstanding by Ofsted. There are 3,000 applications for | :16:59. | :17:02. | |
the 180 places that line these corridors. I think that groups of | :17:03. | :17:06. | |
schools, working together, collaborating, generating economies | :17:06. | :17:10. | |
of scale, sharing good ideas, is a model that would work for the whole | :17:10. | :17:14. | |
country. And the evidence is that groups of three or more schools | :17:14. | :17:17. | |
working in a federation produce better results, more quickly, than | :17:17. | :17:22. | |
schools working on their own. Collaboration, and pooling ideas | :17:22. | :17:27. | |
and resources, is common sense, I think. The first thing we know is | :17:27. | :17:30. | |
academies work, the academy programme has been around for ten | :17:30. | :17:36. | |
years, there has been various academic research that shows it | :17:36. | :17:39. | |
improves results. It doesn't turn around all schools, some problems | :17:39. | :17:44. | |
are too deep. We have this new fep no mam number, academys chains, | :17:44. | :17:48. | |
three or more schools, that look like they are better at improving | :17:48. | :17:51. | |
standards than single academies, if turning into an academy doesn't | :17:51. | :17:57. | |
work, you need to put those schools into successful academy chains. | :17:57. | :18:01. | |
Finally there needs to be an option f that doesn't work, state hasn't | :18:01. | :18:04. | |
worked, voluntary sector hasn't worked wrecks should look at the | :18:04. | :18:08. | |
private sector and asking them to come in - worked, we should look to | :18:08. | :18:12. | |
the private sector and ask them to come in on performance contracts | :18:12. | :18:22. | |
:18:22. | :18:26. | ||
and asking them to turn the school At this last count 31% of Britain's | :18:26. | :18:31. | |
secondary schools, that's 963 schools were graded "satisfactory", | :18:31. | :18:36. | |
while they won't be retrospectively accused of failing, a repeat | :18:36. | :18:38. | |
performance at their next inspection, would be considered a | :18:38. | :18:42. | |
fail. There is, however, a fierce debate about whether academies do | :18:43. | :18:49. | |
actually deliver better results. Bringing in a three-teir, cascading | :18:49. | :18:55. | |
systems, which sees failing schools added to a chain or private | :18:56. | :19:03. | |
provider, shows that as James O'Shaughnessy feels the academies | :19:03. | :19:07. | |
can't deal with all problems. It is thought by some that it sets | :19:07. | :19:11. | |
schools up to fail. This is a false story about schools. Some are doing, | :19:11. | :19:15. | |
by and large very well, some schools need extra support, and | :19:15. | :19:18. | |
some schools with children who are poor. The Government needs to do | :19:18. | :19:21. | |
something about the poverty many children face. It isn't the case | :19:21. | :19:24. | |
that our schools, by and large, are doing badly. They will not be | :19:25. | :19:29. | |
improved by this profit-making firms taking them over. If we don't | :19:29. | :19:32. | |
do something about it, you are telling thousands of schools, and | :19:33. | :19:35. | |
more importantly the children in the schools, we think you are not | :19:35. | :19:39. | |
good enough, but we don't have the wherewithal to do anything about it. | :19:39. | :19:42. | |
That is a real world problem for those children. Politically that | :19:42. | :19:47. | |
makes you look incompetent. Looking incompetent, in the years | :19:47. | :19:52. | |
and months ahead of a general election. Will there be more | :19:53. | :19:55. | |
failing schools will it mean this Government has failed. | :19:55. | :19:59. | |
Author of that Policy Exchange report, James O'Shaughnessy is here, | :19:59. | :20:02. | |
he was director of policy to David Cameron in Number Ten after the | :20:02. | :20:09. | |
general election. Also Mary Bousted, the General Secretary of the the | :20:09. | :20:13. | |
national head teachers union. More breaking news tonight? | :20:13. | :20:18. | |
front page of the times says Michael Gove will rewrite the rules | :20:18. | :20:22. | |
on A-level, we have done this story on the programme before. GCSEs are | :20:22. | :20:25. | |
out, they are being refashioned, A- levels are also being refashioned. | :20:25. | :20:29. | |
What is new about the story, we can say with more certainty what is | :20:29. | :20:33. | |
going. We now know, it has confirmed this evening, that resits | :20:33. | :20:37. | |
in January will go. Or rather moduals taken in January will go, | :20:37. | :20:43. | |
resits will go. All resits? I think so. The Government is trying to put | :20:43. | :20:47. | |
universities back in control of some kind of standards. And this, | :20:47. | :20:51. | |
our story reflected, and this reflects, that universities don't | :20:51. | :20:54. | |
feel this brings forward to them the calibre they would like. The | :20:54. | :21:00. | |
particular emphasis of this means there will be an A-Bach, the | :21:01. | :21:05. | |
Baccalaureate, the Times says it is the scrapping of A-levels, it is | :21:05. | :21:09. | |
not, the A-level will remain, but the form of what you will sit. If | :21:09. | :21:13. | |
you are a science student you will have to sit some arts, if you are | :21:13. | :21:17. | |
an arts student you will have to do a lot of maths. We want to talk | :21:17. | :21:22. | |
about the pressure in schools, this is going to presumably put massive | :21:22. | :21:25. | |
pressure on schools. A better, clearer idea of putting | :21:25. | :21:29. | |
universities back in charge, not endless resits? The problem with | :21:29. | :21:33. | |
this is, if you do exam reform properly, you have to take time, | :21:33. | :21:36. | |
get a political consensus and get schools on board. Our experience, | :21:36. | :21:39. | |
what we are hearing from universities, is actually, they | :21:39. | :21:45. | |
don't want to get that involved. They are not given the time. They | :21:45. | :21:48. | |
want better exams and higher standards, but they don't want to | :21:48. | :21:52. | |
get involved in the nitty gritty of A-levels and the syllabuses. So, | :21:52. | :21:56. | |
you know, this is, yet another, very hurried announcement, released | :21:56. | :22:00. | |
through the media, not take schools or teachers seriously. From your | :22:00. | :22:05. | |
point of view? We will see the real concert. If it is getting rid of | :22:05. | :22:09. | |
resits and modual, that means more rigour, that is a good thing, | :22:09. | :22:12. | |
universities certainly need to have more input, that is how, they are | :22:13. | :22:17. | |
the recipients, if you like, of A- level students, and breath is a | :22:17. | :22:22. | |
good thing. The Bach breath is one of the downsides of A-levels is | :22:22. | :22:31. | |
specialising too early. This is interesting tough stf. Let's turn | :22:31. | :22:39. | |
to -- interesting stuff. You might debate about the schools failing, | :22:39. | :22:43. | |
we have a radical education secretary, but you want to bring in | :22:43. | :22:48. | |
for-profit for failing schools? problem has been described by the | :22:48. | :22:53. | |
head of Ofsted, the school inspectorate, decribing 2,000 | :22:53. | :22:58. | |
schools out of 20,000 schools. is primary and secondary? Which are | :22:59. | :23:03. | |
called satisfactory, it is rating. It is not just my view, he's a | :23:03. | :23:07. | |
former excellent headteacher, it is a view of lots of people in the | :23:07. | :23:11. | |
system. England is described as having a long tale of | :23:11. | :23:15. | |
underachievement in the system, this is the base of mediocrity that | :23:15. | :23:24. | |
we are facing. We are talking about a base of mediocrity, and 6,000 | :23:24. | :23:27. | |
failing schools, is that your experience? There are 6,000 schools | :23:27. | :23:31. | |
that are satisfactory. They will not be satisfactory in the future? | :23:31. | :23:37. | |
It depends on what they get in the Ofsted report, many may have | :23:37. | :23:40. | |
improved greatly. That is a 6,000 figure plucked out of the air. Of | :23:40. | :23:44. | |
those schools, the characteristic of a satisfactory school is the | :23:44. | :23:48. | |
quality of teaching in children departments uneven, it is not that | :23:48. | :23:52. | |
they are routinely failing students, it is the quality across the board | :23:52. | :23:56. | |
is not high enough. It is not random figure, 6,000 schools are | :23:56. | :23:59. | |
satisfactory at the moment, 3,000 have been satisfactory more than | :23:59. | :24:03. | |
once, they are coasting schools, not going anywhere. The Ofsted | :24:03. | :24:06. | |
regime has got tougher. So these schools are more likely to be | :24:06. | :24:09. | |
falling into this kind of category. I think there is a real problem | :24:09. | :24:13. | |
here that we need to address. Unless you accept the nature of | :24:13. | :24:17. | |
that problem. Then you can't move forward on to solution. What you | :24:17. | :24:23. | |
are saying, when schools become academies, that in itself doesn't | :24:23. | :24:27. | |
solve the problem, you need chain of academies to create a culture. | :24:27. | :24:31. | |
You are saying if the schools get the new requirement to improve, | :24:31. | :24:36. | |
then actually, there should be no ifs or abouts about it, they are | :24:36. | :24:41. | |
just put out -- buts about it, they are just put out for profit? These | :24:41. | :24:44. | |
academies have been around for ten years, there is plenty of evidence | :24:44. | :24:51. | |
they work, and better than average in improving standards, than other | :24:51. | :24:59. | |
ways, leaving local authority control. I would suggest that these | :24:59. | :25:03. | |
chain add academies to improve results, the results are patchy. | :25:03. | :25:06. | |
Are there enough academies sponsor and chains, to take on board and | :25:06. | :25:09. | |
turn around the thousands of schools that might be told they | :25:09. | :25:12. | |
need to sort themselves out. I'm worried they won't be, we need to | :25:12. | :25:18. | |
be open minded about who can come in and offer help. A for-profit | :25:18. | :25:24. | |
company? There are huge problems, this is James's second go at for- | :25:24. | :25:28. | |
profit in schools. Which was the first one? The Policy Exchange | :25:28. | :25:33. | |
report earlier this year. That wasn't mine. This is the second go | :25:33. | :25:38. | |
at for-profit. My first go! issue is this, the international | :25:38. | :25:41. | |
evidence does not bear out that for-profit schools raise standards. | :25:41. | :25:46. | |
It hasn't happened in the USA. And Sweden, it has plummeted down the | :25:46. | :25:50. | |
interNational League table, and now there is a parliamentary inquiry | :25:50. | :25:54. | |
into for-profit schools. What is the problem in Sweden? The problem | :25:54. | :25:59. | |
with for-profit schools is money which should be spent on pupils is | :25:59. | :26:06. | |
spent sweating the assets so shareholders get a profit. The | :26:06. | :26:10. | |
Miami Herald, $4 million taxpayer dollars goes into for-profit | :26:10. | :26:16. | |
schools, they found students taught in sheds and students charge today | :26:17. | :26:21. | |
graduate. There is a broader point, which is, does the money go into | :26:21. | :26:23. | |
the classroom? Here is an interesting fact N some local | :26:24. | :26:27. | |
authorities a third of children with special educational needs, | :26:27. | :26:30. | |
some of the most vulnerable children are taught in for-profit | :26:30. | :26:33. | |
independent schools. That is something that is a feature of the | :26:33. | :26:38. | |
system. About half of nursery care is delivered by a mixture of | :26:38. | :26:42. | |
charityability and profit-making providers. Elsewhere in the | :26:42. | :26:46. | |
education system, let alone public services. You are not talking about | :26:46. | :26:49. | |
ten schools, you are talking, essentially, it seems to me, that | :26:49. | :26:53. | |
you might be talking about 3,000 schools going out. Do you really | :26:53. | :26:57. | |
think there is the expertise in the for-profit sector? It is a question | :26:57. | :27:02. | |
of scale. To say, the percentage of special schools are very small, | :27:02. | :27:05. | |
they are highly-specialised provision. You would accept some | :27:05. | :27:09. | |
schools are failing children in the state system? Absolutely, there are | :27:09. | :27:12. | |
some schools that need to improve. It is how you do it, you should | :27:12. | :27:17. | |
focus on teaching, not on structures. There are, of course, | :27:17. | :27:21. | |
some brilliant for-profit providers, it is crazy not to call on their | :27:21. | :27:25. | |
help when we need them. A little earlier this evening, the winner of | :27:25. | :27:28. | |
the 2012 Man Booker Prize was announced, Gavin is there, he spoke | :27:28. | :27:33. | |
to Hilary Mantel moments after the announcement. | :27:33. | :27:40. | |
I'm here now in the glild hall with the 2012 and 2009 winner of the Man | :27:40. | :27:44. | |
Booker Prize, Hilary Mantel. Congratulations. To win once is | :27:44. | :27:48. | |
pretty good, to win twice is pretty extraordinary? It is astonishing, I | :27:48. | :27:52. | |
could not be more surprised. What did winning the first time do for | :27:52. | :28:00. | |
you in your career, 2009, until now. It was a huge change in the way I | :28:00. | :28:05. | |
think my fiction was perceived, and a huge change in the public | :28:05. | :28:11. | |
perception of my books. I had a respectable critical press, always, | :28:11. | :28:17. | |
I never had book sales. Wolf Hall bought me 30 foreign publishers. | :28:17. | :28:23. | |
And just an astonishing explosion of interest in my work all together. | :28:23. | :28:27. | |
With Bring Up The Bodies we have already had very gratifying sales, | :28:27. | :28:36. | |
because it is obviously the middle book of a trilogy. It is difficult | :28:36. | :28:41. | |
for me to predict now. I think I had had a good idea that it was a | :28:41. | :28:48. | |
great turning point, when I won in 2009. And this, it is new country, | :28:48. | :28:52. | |
we mains to be seen. Sir Peter Stothard, the chair of the judges | :28:52. | :28:56. | |
said you were inventing the historical novel for the 21st | :28:56. | :28:59. | |
century. One of the things that struck me was the technology of the | :28:59. | :29:03. | |
1530s was very different, but the human relations are something that | :29:03. | :29:07. | |
we are very familiar with. There is mean and nasty, and it speaks to us | :29:07. | :29:10. | |
now, that is one of the reasons, it seems to me, that the book really | :29:10. | :29:16. | |
strike as cord? Yes, it is about regime change, it is about the | :29:16. | :29:22. | |
political process at its grittyist and bloodiest. I don't force | :29:22. | :29:26. | |
contemporary resonances, but if people want to pick them up, that's | :29:26. | :29:33. | |
fine. It's boo two of a trilogy, there is no pressure on -- book two | :29:33. | :29:36. | |
of a trilogy, there is no pressure on the third book, have you begun | :29:36. | :29:41. | |
it? I have begun, he can't say how far along I am, because my method | :29:41. | :29:45. | |
of writing is not that systematic, it is more like making a collage | :29:45. | :29:50. | |
than making a book. I will work on it intensely for the next year, | :29:50. | :29:53. | |
this is my top priority now. As you can imagine. I know there is a | :29:53. | :29:58. | |
great deal of pressure on a Booker winner to go here, and swan about | :29:58. | :30:06. | |
in the world smiling at people. But my dearest wish now, it may not | :30:06. | :30:13. | |
sound grateful to say so, but my dearest wish is to be back at my | :30:13. | :30:16. | |
desk, I have so many ideas, I want to capture them and get to the end | :30:16. | :30:20. | |
of the third book. I was going to ask you something along those lions, | :30:20. | :30:23. | |
I was going to ask you, do you like this kind of stuff. It has been | :30:23. | :30:27. | |
very good for you, it is lovely to be received so well. But you are a | :30:27. | :30:30. | |
writer, and actually that is quite different, it is lonely and | :30:30. | :30:35. | |
different from this? Well, the self who is here tonight, seems to have | :30:35. | :30:40. | |
no real relation to the self who sits at my desk. Because, as I said | :30:41. | :30:46. | |
earlier, when you sit at your desk, you just are a beginner, it is | :30:46. | :30:51. | |
always the first day, prizes don't count, applause doesn't count. It | :30:51. | :30:56. | |
is just you and the struggle with your material. To get out of it | :30:56. | :31:04. | |
what you can. And to serve it, to give it the best view. I know this | :31:04. | :31:09. | |
will all fall into perspective. It won't seem irrelevant, it will be | :31:09. | :31:14. | |
ungrateful to say that. It will get to seem rather beside the point. | :31:14. | :31:19. | |
Once I'm steeped in that world again. Well, thank you very much | :31:19. | :31:23. | |
for talking to us, and congratulations again. Hilary | :31:23. | :31:28. | |
Mantel, 2012 Man Booker Prize winner. | :31:28. | :31:31. | |
For three years now, the average worker has been getting worse and | :31:31. | :31:35. | |
worse off, with pay lagging behind the cost of living. This morning we | :31:35. | :31:38. | |
learned that the official measure of inflation, the consumer prices | :31:38. | :31:42. | |
index, fell in September to 2.2%. But it's still higher than the | :31:42. | :31:46. | |
average increase in wages. Many economists, who think September was | :31:46. | :31:49. | |
as low as inflation is likely to get for a while, with higher bills | :31:49. | :31:53. | |
and food prices likely to push up again. With money buying less than | :31:53. | :31:57. | |
it used to, how are people coping. We have been to south Yorkshire to | :31:57. | :32:05. | |
find out. It's 7.00am, and staff are | :32:05. | :32:11. | |
preparing for the latest chapter in one of the greatest retail success | :32:11. | :32:15. | |
stories in the past five years, the rise and rise of the discount | :32:15. | :32:18. | |
supermarket. Thank you very much for coming to the opening of our | :32:18. | :32:23. | |
brand-new store, and our very first star in Barnsley. | :32:23. | :32:29. | |
This is Britain's 600th Lidl, by 10.30am, this is how busy it is. | :32:29. | :32:34. | |
This is how the people who turn up for the opening try to resist the | :32:34. | :32:39. | |
pressure of the most sustained squeeze on living standards in 70 | :32:39. | :32:46. | |
years. Those turkeys are not bad, they are dearer than that anywhere | :32:46. | :32:53. | |
else. Apple juice �3.50, that is a lot. 99p for the cheap version at | :32:54. | :32:59. | |
Aldi. Some of them, give them a try. More than three quarters of us use | :32:59. | :33:02. | |
discount supermarkets like this one. Who is coming here? What financial | :33:02. | :33:06. | |
pressure are they under? And how are they dealing with it? We turned | :33:06. | :33:11. | |
up in Barnsley and asked them. In the recession that began four years | :33:11. | :33:16. | |
a the average person got better off, as fuel prices dropped and interest | :33:16. | :33:19. | |
rates fell, that meant your take home pay would buy you more than | :33:19. | :33:23. | |
ever before. Since then, the average take home pay, in real | :33:23. | :33:29. | |
terms, has fallen. If you are in the low-to-middle income bracket, | :33:29. | :33:32. | |
you are not better off than you were in 2001. That is why there is | :33:32. | :33:36. | |
such a need for people to come to stores like this and try to save | :33:36. | :33:46. | |
:33:46. | :33:46. | ||
every penny they can. Jane is what can only be described | :33:46. | :33:52. | |
as a canny shopper. I like steak pies. They are not bad. We will | :33:52. | :33:58. | |
have some of them. She needs to be, Jane knows exactly how much she has | :33:58. | :34:02. | |
left after her mortgage and bills to spend on food, after years | :34:02. | :34:10. | |
living on a part-time cleaner's wage, she has developed a talent. | :34:10. | :34:20. | |
:34:20. | :34:20. | ||
Ready Brek, that is cheap, it is �2.95 in more sons, �2.80 in Asda, | :34:20. | :34:27. | |
and �2.92 in Iceland. The hunt for bargains on her end, requires a | :34:27. | :34:32. | |
sharp memory and relentless concentration. This milk is cheaper | :34:32. | :34:40. | |
than Iceland, Morrisons, and Asda. This is how a globalised economy | :34:40. | :34:44. | |
hits you, right in the shopping basket. | :34:44. | :34:51. | |
That pork price on the shelves, reflects a 40% wholesale price in | :34:51. | :34:57. | |
the price of meat since 2007. If you thought it's killing you, think | :34:57. | :35:04. | |
about the pigs, this year's US poor maize crop meant the price in | :35:04. | :35:10. | |
keeping pigs jumped, it led to a slaughter of pigs because farmers | :35:10. | :35:15. | |
can't afford it keep them. Analysts predict a 30% increase next summer. | :35:15. | :35:18. | |
Jane is slightly embarrassed to show us what happens when you are | :35:18. | :35:23. | |
really keen on bargain. You mean like my Pot Noodles, where they are | :35:23. | :35:31. | |
four for �2. That is a lot of Pot Noodles. They were 50p each rblgs | :35:31. | :35:37. | |
usually �1.80 --, usually �1.80 for two. After two divorces and seven | :35:37. | :35:42. | |
children, staying in the black is part of survival. What are the big | :35:42. | :35:49. | |
financial pressures? My mortgage. �408.77, council tax, �14 a week, | :35:49. | :35:54. | |
my electricity, with I pay �20 a week on, water is �500 a year. | :35:54. | :36:00. | |
After you have paid all that, what are you left with? About �150 a | :36:00. | :36:05. | |
month. Enough to have fun with? Because I have to buy food. So the | :36:05. | :36:11. | |
food comes out of that. Yes. After the bills. When you pay for food | :36:11. | :36:16. | |
how much do you have left? About �60. For the whole month. Yeah. But | :36:17. | :36:22. | |
I don't drink, I don't smoke. you been on holiday recently? | :36:22. | :36:25. | |
in 13 years. Can't afford it. haven't been on holiday. No, can't | :36:25. | :36:30. | |
afford it. Inflation was far higher in the 70s | :36:30. | :36:35. | |
and early 80, but back then, wages largely beat inflation, while | :36:35. | :36:39. | |
pensioners fell behind, now it's the opposite. State pensions went | :36:39. | :36:49. | |
:36:49. | :36:50. | ||
up by 5.2%, average wages by less than half that. 69p, that's quite | :36:50. | :36:58. | |
cheap. -- 49p, that's cheap. If you are on | :36:59. | :37:03. | |
the minimum wage like Dawn, you might envy pensioner, she works at | :37:03. | :37:13. | |
a local shop, where her pay is going up 1.8%, or 11p an hour. | :37:13. | :37:18. | |
Since 2009, the average household income has fallen in real terms by | :37:19. | :37:24. | |
�2,400 a year, or �46 a week. Supermarkets protect their profits, | :37:24. | :37:28. | |
typically making a margin of anything between 2p and 6p in the | :37:28. | :37:33. | |
pound. How do discounters get their prices so low. We only offer the | :37:33. | :37:37. | |
customer one type of sweet corn, we only produce one type of labelling, | :37:37. | :37:41. | |
one can plant, one production run, also with the economies of the | :37:41. | :37:44. | |
number of stores we have, it means we can really get economies of | :37:44. | :37:48. | |
scale, without compromising on the quality. By having one type of | :37:48. | :37:52. | |
sweet corn, rather than ten, you maximise your buying power and | :37:52. | :37:57. | |
bring the price down. That is how we do it, nothing to do with the | :37:57. | :38:00. | |
quality, but more on how to buy the product. By cutting the number of | :38:00. | :38:06. | |
staff that have to handle the product, Lidl can cut its wage bill | :38:06. | :38:09. | |
and the prices. The other way discounters drive down prices is by | :38:09. | :38:15. | |
cutting out the cost of paying someone to unpack the goods and put | :38:15. | :38:20. | |
them on the shelves, they go from the warehouse, on to the lorry, on | :38:20. | :38:25. | |
to the pallet, and on to her, ready to sell. Have you noticed changes | :38:25. | :38:29. | |
in the cost of living in recent times? Yeah I have. Noticed it the | :38:29. | :38:33. | |
last couple of years. Everything seems to be going sky high. Access | :38:33. | :38:37. | |
to cheap prieks at all supermarkets helps people in Dawn's position | :38:37. | :38:40. | |
doing without. Even with a husband earning, the bills have been | :38:40. | :38:44. | |
rocketing, and there is not much left for fun. Wefrpblgts don't go | :38:44. | :38:51. | |
out often together. We might -- don't get out often together. We | :38:51. | :38:55. | |
might get out once or twice a year. Sometimes we might go out for a | :38:55. | :38:58. | |
couple of hours together on an afternoon. That is not often. | :38:58. | :39:02. | |
much do you have coming in from the part-time work? Just over �140 a | :39:02. | :39:09. | |
week. What does that have to cover? I buy most of our food. I pay TV | :39:09. | :39:13. | |
license, and water. And then my husband he pays the rest of the | :39:13. | :39:18. | |
bills. When I have been paid I sit down and sort it all out what I | :39:18. | :39:24. | |
have to pay out. That is when I find out how much I have left. | :39:24. | :39:31. | |
For now, Dawn's content with zumba twice a week as her quota of fun, | :39:31. | :39:35. | |
her real wage might be falling, but with a son at home, she doesn't | :39:35. | :39:39. | |
want full-time work, as if there was much. | :39:39. | :39:43. | |
Barnsley used to rely for work on mining and manufacturing. Now, the | :39:43. | :39:48. | |
big employers of the public sector, and an internet fashion company, | :39:48. | :39:52. | |
and retailers, around 11% of people here are unemployed, three points | :39:52. | :40:00. | |
above the national average. Two for �2.50 as well. They are | :40:00. | :40:10. | |
:40:10. | :40:16. | ||
dearer, them pork chops, I think it is cheap Tory get them at Tescos. | :40:16. | :40:20. | |
Michael and Becky Lewis are raising four children on benefits. Lately, | :40:20. | :40:24. | |
they have been feeling the financial pinch. When we were | :40:24. | :40:31. | |
shopping at Morrisons it was costing us �140, �150 a week. We | :40:31. | :40:35. | |
couldn't give the kids anything nice like biscuit and things that | :40:35. | :40:38. | |
kids like, the treats. We were having proper meals, but we were, | :40:38. | :40:44. | |
we had to budget so, we couldn't get luxuries. | :40:44. | :40:48. | |
Now I write a shopping list and work out what meals every day we | :40:48. | :40:53. | |
will have. If we have pasta three or five times a week it is cheap, | :40:53. | :41:00. | |
that is cheap. We have to know what we are spending and where we are. | :41:00. | :41:03. | |
Becky has been diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder, | :41:03. | :41:08. | |
something that robs her of sleep and keeps her on her feet all day. | :41:08. | :41:12. | |
She jokes that in the supermarket it has itss. I have calculated it | :41:12. | :41:19. | |
on my phone, because I'm that worried about overspending, we have | :41:19. | :41:26. | |
three ways round and I have been putting things back. | :41:26. | :41:32. | |
If a drought in the US forced up the price of maize, the floods here | :41:32. | :41:39. | |
in Britain have forced up the price of spuds. Floods have forced | :41:39. | :41:46. | |
importation of -- twice as much in the last few years. When you import | :41:46. | :41:51. | |
you pay higher transport costs. Michael had worked for 20 years in | :41:51. | :41:56. | |
a company when the financial crisis hit. He had been struggling with | :41:56. | :41:59. | |
some of the work because he had been plaged by back injuries, and | :41:59. | :42:03. | |
was selected for redundancy. couldn't do the work, some days I | :42:04. | :42:08. | |
went to work I couldn't even bend over. We are ashamed we have to | :42:08. | :42:13. | |
live on benefits. It just happens that we have been dealt a raw deal. | :42:13. | :42:22. | |
I lost my house. I had a house for 13 years, we had everything. It is | :42:22. | :42:26. | |
rubbish now, to what it used to be like. Can you hope it might, some | :42:26. | :42:31. | |
day, get back to better? I hope things pick up, yeah. | :42:31. | :42:35. | |
It is not only those on the lowest incomes who are under pressure to | :42:35. | :42:39. | |
hunt down the cheapest groceries they can find. Lidl's car park has | :42:39. | :42:43. | |
no shortage of some what pricey cars, and Aldi's sales have grown | :42:43. | :42:49. | |
by a third in just a year. I was just having a look to see what was | :42:50. | :42:59. | |
:43:00. | :43:00. | ||
on special, grapes, two for �3, that is all right. | :43:00. | :43:04. | |
Julian Thomson wouldn't say he's exactly hard up, he has two house, | :43:04. | :43:09. | |
one with the mortgage paid off, and thousands of pounds saved up, the | :43:09. | :43:17. | |
fruit of more than � 20 -- of more than 20 years as a driving | :43:17. | :43:21. | |
instructor. He's not getting any richer. In March Julian had to stop | :43:21. | :43:29. | |
work and take ill-health retirement, his income dropped by �500 a month. | :43:29. | :43:33. | |
Stkpwhro the worst financial pressure for Julian is paying -- | :43:33. | :43:35. | |
the worst financial pressure for Julian is paying for petrol. | :43:36. | :43:39. | |
Remember when the Chancellor said he would put fuel in the tang of | :43:39. | :43:43. | |
the British motorist, putting off the 3p rise in fuel duty until | :43:43. | :43:47. | |
January. That will kick in quite soon now, meanwhile, the prices at | :43:47. | :43:51. | |
the pumps are already higher than when the Chancellor made that | :43:51. | :43:55. | |
announcement. You could hope that the global slowdown would mean | :43:55. | :44:00. | |
reduced demand for fuel, and that would bring prices down. That is | :44:00. | :44:05. | |
the economic theory, so far it is only a theory. | :44:05. | :44:10. | |
Motorbikes were once Julian's life. These days he watches carefully | :44:10. | :44:14. | |
while his son rides one. Trying not to think what happened to him in | :44:14. | :44:19. | |
2002. Coming up to a round about to turn left at the round about, a | :44:19. | :44:25. | |
lady in the car basically drove straight into me as if I wasn't | :44:25. | :44:30. | |
there, and shunted me into the round about. That is where it | :44:30. | :44:35. | |
pulled everything in my neck and back. I have always thought I could | :44:35. | :44:39. | |
get myself, I could try to get myself better and everything else, | :44:39. | :44:44. | |
and literally I have just got worse and worse and worse, as time has | :44:44. | :44:49. | |
gone on. Did you want to stop work? I went back to work, I was off | :44:49. | :44:53. | |
nearly six months in total from the accident. When the pain got too | :44:53. | :44:57. | |
much and he was forced to retire, a Civil Service doctor told Julian he | :44:57. | :45:00. | |
couldn't do any Civil Service job, yet now Government reforms mean | :45:00. | :45:04. | |
that someone else in the Civil Service is telling him his | :45:04. | :45:06. | |
Employment and Support Allowance will be stopped in February, | :45:06. | :45:12. | |
because one day he might be able to work. | :45:12. | :45:17. | |
My Employment Support Allowance rate will stop. How much is that | :45:17. | :45:22. | |
worth? That is about �400 a month. Just cut off. Just stopped. Despite | :45:22. | :45:27. | |
what happened to his dad, his son, Lewis, feels he doesn't have an | :45:27. | :45:30. | |
alternative to riding a bike. Aren't you tempted to go for | :45:30. | :45:34. | |
something safer, like a car, instead of a bike? I'm not tempted | :45:34. | :45:38. | |
at all, because the insurance is much, much higher than on a bike. | :45:38. | :45:43. | |
Also the petrol usage, the tax, the parking fees. How much would it | :45:44. | :45:49. | |
cost to insure yourself with a car? It depends, it ranges from about �8 | :45:49. | :45:57. | |
though to you to �51,000 -- �8,000, to about �51,000 for some insurers | :45:57. | :46:01. | |
to insure me. The Government reports to action it has taken to | :46:01. | :46:04. | |
lift the pressure of the big squeeze on living standards, like | :46:04. | :46:08. | |
raising the personal tax allowance, but so far those measures haven't | :46:08. | :46:10. | |
brought economic growth. We have known about the squeeze on living | :46:10. | :46:13. | |
standards for a while now. Measures have been taken to try to ease it. | :46:14. | :46:17. | |
We have been hunting for bargains, the supermarkets have been bearing | :46:17. | :46:22. | |
down on price, even the Government has been trying to lift people out | :46:22. | :46:25. | |
of taxation, but the measures aren't always well targeted on the | :46:25. | :46:30. | |
people who are getting squeezed the most. It is not really until global | :46:30. | :46:34. | |
commodity prices start to come down, that the pressure on our living | :46:34. | :46:41. | |
standards will start to lift. The economic storms blowing across | :46:41. | :46:45. | |
from the eurozone crisis, and the rest of the world, should have had | :46:45. | :46:48. | |
a silver lining, reduced demand for fuel and food, should bring the | :46:48. | :46:54. | |
cost of living down, but that's yet to happen. Here in Lidl Britain, we | :46:54. | :46:58. | |
now need our bargains like never before. | :46:58. | :47:02. | |
That's all for tonight. I will be back tomorrow, hope you can join me | :47:02. | :47:12. | |
:47:12. | :47:35. | ||
then. From all of us here, good It will turn into a pretty wet end | :47:35. | :47:41. | |
to the night for most place. Heavy rain marching on a strong south- | :47:41. | :47:44. | |
westerly wind. Arriving in Scotland in the morning, it will stay there. | :47:44. | :47:48. | |
For the rest of us, things perking up nice low, in the middle of the | :47:49. | :47:57. | |
afternoon. Sunshine, the odd shower, most of us dry. 14-16 degrees, | :47:57. | :48:03. | |
breezy but windy towards most ars areas. The west coast of England | :48:03. | :48:06. | |
and Wales could be battered by gusts up to 60 miles an hour. | :48:06. | :48:09. | |
Warnings from both the Environment Agency and the Met Office, because | :48:09. | :48:15. | |
we have high spring tides, the risk of coastal flooding, and with the | :48:15. | :48:20. | |
grounds saturated trees could come down. After a wet night the rain | :48:20. | :48:23. | |
could break up into showers. The hope of brightness, but not across | :48:23. | :48:26. | |
the heart of Scotland. It looks like a cold and bleak afternoon | :48:26. | :48:30. | |
here, and temperatures really held back by north-eastly wind. Looking | :48:30. | :48:34. | |
further ahead into Thursday, across northern areas, a fairly mixed | :48:34. | :48:38. | |
picture, still the threat of some showers, particularly for Scotland | :48:38. | :48:41. | |
and Northern Ireland. Dry weather before rain threatens the south- | :48:41. | :48:47. |