:00:08. > :00:11.mattress - should you put your money? With the Bank of England this
:00:12. > :00:14.week indicating it's likely to keep interest rates low for years and
:00:14. > :00:23.volatility on the stock market, figures today suggest savers are
:00:23. > :00:26.increasingly trying to buy one of these. What's the impact on a
:00:26. > :00:29.debt-riddled economy when savers can't save?
:00:29. > :00:32.The extraordinary story of the woman who died in the 1950s and whose
:00:32. > :00:38.apparently immortal cancer cells made billions for the drug
:00:38. > :00:42.companies. The families claim for recognition
:00:42. > :00:45.ends in a deal. Why has it taken more than half a century?
:00:45. > :00:49.Plus New Jersey, Chicago, Brooklyn, and Uxbridge? When did our quietest
:00:49. > :00:53.suburbs become the hideout of choice for mafia dons?
:00:53. > :01:03.And who's the daddy? Why the extraordinary fascination with giant
:01:03. > :01:06.
:01:06. > :01:10.pandas? We're looking in on Good evening. The forward guidance,
:01:10. > :01:13.as they say in the jargon, coming from the Bank of England this week
:01:13. > :01:17.is that UK interest rates are likely to stay very low for some time,
:01:17. > :01:20.possibly until 2016, unless inflation begins to take off. That
:01:20. > :01:23.is great news for borrowers especially those with large
:01:23. > :01:28.mortgages but not good news for savers, the people whose thrift, the
:01:28. > :01:32.Government says, we require for a healthy economy. So are there any
:01:32. > :01:42.good choices for savers right now? And are the thrifty among us being
:01:42. > :01:42.
:01:42. > :01:48.penalised for their virtue? Robin Denselow reports.
:01:48. > :01:53.It is the end of the week. Friday evening at the historic golf club in
:01:53. > :01:57.Essex. A group of friends get together for a game and a little
:01:57. > :02:01.parting practice. Three of them are retired. They have paid off their
:02:01. > :02:04.mortgages and have savings. But what to do with them in a week when the
:02:04. > :02:11.new governor of the Bank of England gave a clear signal that interest
:02:11. > :02:15.rates will remain at a mere 0.5% for some time? Jack used to run a fish
:02:15. > :02:25.restaurant and has money in the bag. But the letters premium Bonds
:02:25. > :02:33.
:02:33. > :02:36.succeed, his savings are not likely to match the rate of inflation.
:02:36. > :02:38.have them if anything does go wrong but at the present time it does not
:02:38. > :02:40.give you encouragement to invest anywhere. This is the embodiment of
:02:40. > :02:44.the Thatcherite dream of a property owning democracy. 80% of homes here
:02:44. > :02:47.are owner occupied, the highest rate anywhere in England. The news from
:02:47. > :02:50.the Bank of England might be good for borrowers and those with
:02:50. > :02:56.mortgages, but it is not good for those who have worked all their
:02:56. > :02:59.lives and built up their savings. have a lot of people in this country
:02:59. > :03:06.who have put money aside over the past few years so that they will
:03:06. > :03:11.have an estate, something to live on, in their later life. They were
:03:11. > :03:15.trying to be sensible and prudent, as they were encouraged to be, and
:03:15. > :03:19.they were hoping to have an income from their savings. They have found
:03:19. > :03:24.the income has virtually disappeared and what we heard this week is that
:03:24. > :03:27.even over the next three years it is not likely that they will get any
:03:27. > :03:37.income at all. But if you have enough money it is argued he can
:03:37. > :03:44.still make money to put into property to rent out. Buy to let
:03:44. > :03:48.mortgages made up just 5% in 2002 of all new mortgages. It rose to 12% in
:03:48. > :03:55.2007 and then fell dramatically when the property market crashed. But it
:03:55. > :03:59.is now back to the 2007 levels. Would the golfers consider that?
:03:59. > :04:04.I was younger I would go into it in a big way but it is the young man's
:04:04. > :04:14.sport. You have to have quite a bit of money because for five years you
:04:14. > :04:41.
:04:41. > :04:44.the property market is very different. Not so many owner
:04:44. > :04:47.occupiers. This is buy to let territory. It is argued that if you
:04:47. > :04:49.have the money to buy a property to let it out, your returns will be far
:04:50. > :04:52.greater than putting the money in the bank. People with money in the
:04:52. > :04:55.bank are then getting capital growth at a later date if the markets start
:04:55. > :04:59.to recover, which they seem to be doing.
:04:59. > :05:06.There are a large number of properties available for rent here.
:05:06. > :05:12.An average house costs �152,000 and the average rent �7,800 a year. The
:05:12. > :05:16.result is a return on that rent of 5.13%, significantly above any thing
:05:16. > :05:22.a bank can provide. But in order to buy to read, you need enough money
:05:22. > :05:32.of course. That is no help for savers with modest means. As far as
:05:32. > :05:35.
:05:36. > :05:38.I can see, policy makers simply do not care about savers helped by the
:05:38. > :05:40.funding for lending schemes, the help to buy schemes, are actually
:05:41. > :05:43.going to be those with quite a bit of money. This is about helping
:05:43. > :05:49.those with lots of money to invest in another property. It is not about
:05:49. > :05:54.the ordinary average saver. So the message from ethics is this. If you
:05:54. > :06:03.saved a lot of money, you can make a lot more. If you saved a little, it
:06:03. > :06:06.will be different. Simon Rose from Save Our Savers is
:06:06. > :06:09.here along with the former banker and now financial writer Frances
:06:09. > :06:12.Coppola and Henry Pryor who is a property market analyst and writer.
:06:12. > :06:16.How tough things for savers? Impossible. It is impossible to
:06:16. > :06:20.preserve the value of your capital. People have been lamenting that they
:06:20. > :06:25.have put money buy for all their lives, hoping to eke out their
:06:25. > :06:32.retirement, and having terrible trouble. It is not as though savers
:06:32. > :06:37.are the only people missing out. Anyone with a wage is in that
:06:37. > :06:44.position. Yes, wages are back to the level of ten years ago. Anyone on a
:06:44. > :06:49.fixed income is even worse. What would happen to the housing market
:06:49. > :06:51.in this hypothesis? It would come under pressure. Those that have
:06:51. > :06:56.overextended themselves, and been taken in by the Government and
:06:56. > :07:02.powers that be, and been encouraged to invest in property, could be left
:07:02. > :07:05.as many people have a Northern Ireland nursing considerable losses.
:07:05. > :07:13.They are still looking at losses of 50% or thereabouts in the province
:07:13. > :07:17.since the crash of 2007. What would the political consequences of that
:07:17. > :07:21.be, horrendous? Armageddon. That is why regardless of whether the
:07:21. > :07:24.Government is right or wrong to be doing this, the Government is
:07:24. > :07:31.determined to put a floor under house prices and make sure they
:07:31. > :07:36.steadily increase, up to the 20 15th general election. Why does anybody
:07:36. > :07:39.saving this kind of market? You might as well spend it. I understand
:07:39. > :07:44.that people might want to spend their money rather than save it.
:07:44. > :07:47.There are two kinds of savings, what you put away for a rainy day to
:07:47. > :07:50.cover the washing machine breaking or something like that. I don't
:07:50. > :07:55.think most people would expect to get much return on that anyway, it
:07:55. > :08:05.is just a rainy day fund. We are talking about long-term savings, the
:08:05. > :08:15.
:08:15. > :08:18.kind of money people put away for retirement. People have got used to
:08:18. > :08:20.having high returns on savings because we have had strongly growing
:08:20. > :08:23.economy. That is not the case any more. So savers finding the economy
:08:23. > :08:25.cannot support the kind of income level they have got used to.
:08:25. > :08:27.Successive governments have always said savers are so marvellous. It is
:08:27. > :08:30.great to have them. We must rebalance the economy in favour of
:08:30. > :08:32.saving rather than consumption. But it does not happen. It does not. In
:08:32. > :08:36.order to get the recovery you need people to spend more, more economic
:08:36. > :08:40.activity. The value of saving to the economy, quite apart from helping
:08:40. > :08:44.people to prepare for their futures and so forth, to support themselves
:08:44. > :08:49.in their retirement, is also so we can get some investment into the
:08:49. > :08:53.economy, into small businesses, into productive investment. That is
:08:54. > :09:00.really what we need capital for. But to do that, savers must be prepared
:09:00. > :09:06.to take some risk. Do you take that point? The problem is we are
:09:06. > :09:10.undermining savings. Savers have contributed �285 billion, they are
:09:10. > :09:15.that much worse off, and they are propping up an alien economy that
:09:15. > :09:19.they are not responsible for. If we have three years more, then savers
:09:19. > :09:24.will have contributed �500 billion, four times the annual deficit of the
:09:24. > :09:30.Government. But what about Henry's point, that if things were done to
:09:30. > :09:34.make you happy, there could possibly be a housing crash? We got into this
:09:34. > :09:44.crisis because of that and we have continued to stay in debt. We are
:09:44. > :10:13.
:10:13. > :10:16.now being encouraged to take on even more debt. We are becoming ever more
:10:16. > :10:19.dependent on this sort of pain relief of low interest rates. We
:10:19. > :10:21.have now got to the stage where the patient is not being treated. It is
:10:21. > :10:24.kept on pain relief until it is totally dependent on it. What do you
:10:24. > :10:27.make of that? I have sympathy for that point of view. Ramping up
:10:27. > :10:29.consumer debt again is not the way to recover from this. We need
:10:29. > :10:32.investments and for that we do need people to be putting money aside,
:10:32. > :10:34.into the economy, investing in business. We need people to be doing
:10:34. > :10:37.that. Where does buy to let come into this? You cannot just take
:10:37. > :10:39.savings and buy a house. We are taking people from being savers and
:10:39. > :10:41.turning them into speculators. The housing market might have a
:10:41. > :10:43.reasonably rosy short-term view. We respect has prices, especially when
:10:43. > :10:46.stage two of the controversial help to buy scheme from the Government
:10:46. > :10:48.kicks in, whereby people can borrow money to buy houses up to �600,000
:10:48. > :10:51.that are second hand, not just new build as the scheme works at
:10:51. > :10:55.present, which will add further stimulus to the frothy housing
:10:56. > :11:02.market and will drive up prices. That is attracting speculators,
:11:02. > :11:12.people looking at buy to let. It is an alternative to 0.5% returns at
:11:12. > :11:23.
:11:23. > :11:25.the bank. That is all as it is great and one day it will not be. As long
:11:25. > :11:28.as the music keeps going, we're happy, but it. . All bubbles
:11:28. > :11:30.eventually burst. So what should savers do? You want the Bank of
:11:30. > :11:32.England to do something but what are the alternatives for savers now?
:11:32. > :11:35.individual savers should get the best possible savings rate. They are
:11:35. > :11:37.all terrible but some are even worse. Some people took a bonus on
:11:38. > :11:40.the account, it has gone and they have not realised they are getting
:11:40. > :11:43.next to nothing. If you want cash savings, not speculation, you are
:11:43. > :11:47.going to be losing money. Do you see the argument for going into
:11:47. > :11:50.speculation? I can see why it happens. Savers are getting
:11:50. > :12:00.increasingly desperate. But inflation, everybody is losing the
:12:00. > :12:10.
:12:10. > :12:13.value of their money. The pound has depreciated in value one third over
:12:13. > :12:16.the last ten years. If this carries on, we will get to the stage where
:12:16. > :12:18.people understand it is not worth hanging on to money at all, and then
:12:18. > :12:21.we have really serious problems. What can savers do? It depends what
:12:21. > :12:24.they want to do. If they are saving for the long-term, to my mind money
:12:24. > :12:27.is not the thing to invest in for the long term anyway. You need to
:12:27. > :12:29.look at financial and hard assets and things like that. I don't think
:12:29. > :12:32.buy to let is a particularly good strategy for people that are iffy
:12:32. > :12:35.about risk, simply because we should not forget the crash in 2008.
:12:35. > :12:40.Bradley and Bingley actually failed because the bottom fell out of the
:12:40. > :12:50.buy to let market. It happened before and it can happen again. This
:12:50. > :12:58.
:12:58. > :13:00.looks like an overheating bubble to me. It needs some care that people
:13:00. > :13:03.should not be expected to put large amount of money in a bank account
:13:03. > :13:05.and leave it there by way of long-term savings. It is not a good
:13:05. > :13:08.use of bank accounts. It is interesting listening to the three
:13:08. > :13:11.of you, the human capacity for making mistakes over and over again
:13:11. > :13:14.is enormous. It is bad enough when we do not learn from history but
:13:14. > :13:16.when it is only six years old, it is really scary. There is no doubt that
:13:16. > :13:19.this Government is intent on feeding the house price inflation that we
:13:19. > :13:21.can see coming down over the next three to five years. Commentators
:13:21. > :13:26.are talking about steady if not reasonably spectacular house price
:13:26. > :13:29.inflation. Investors, speculators, those looking at buy to let, they
:13:29. > :13:38.are looking at possible return is not just the yield, which is very
:13:38. > :13:44.marginal in some parts of the country, they are just investing
:13:44. > :13:47.purely for capital gain. That is what they are hoping for. Thank you.
:13:47. > :13:50.Now an extraordinary story about a woman who died in the United States
:13:50. > :13:54.in the 1950s and whose cells are still being used for medical
:13:54. > :14:01.research. An agreement has finally been reached in a long running row
:14:01. > :14:05.about how her cells may be used. The tobacco farmer and mother of five
:14:05. > :14:10.was just 31 years old when two died of cervical cancer. During
:14:10. > :14:15.treatment, some of her cancerous cells were removed without her
:14:15. > :14:18.consent, not unusual for the time. What was unusual was that the cells
:14:18. > :14:26.from that biopsy did something that scientists had never seen before.
:14:26. > :14:30.They continued to live and grow indefinitely. The cells seemed to be
:14:30. > :14:33.immortal. Over the last six decades, these cells have been used
:14:33. > :14:42.in nearly 75,000 studies to develop treatments for conditions including
:14:42. > :14:47.polio, leukaemia, haemophilia and Parkinson's. Making healthy profits
:14:47. > :14:50.for pharmaceuticals companies. But Henrietta's family had no idea of
:14:50. > :14:54.her legacy until 20 years after her death when they were contacted by
:14:54. > :14:59.scientists looking for a blood sample. Earlier this year,
:14:59. > :15:04.researchers in Germany decided to publish the full DNA code. The
:15:04. > :15:07.family, worried that this could violate their own medical privacy,
:15:07. > :15:13.took her concerns to the National Institutes of Health, the US
:15:13. > :15:19.Government agency that oversees medical research. The family asked
:15:19. > :15:24.not for money, but for some control over scientist access to the DNA
:15:24. > :15:27.code, which was granted this week. Finally, more than 60 years after
:15:27. > :15:37.Henrietta's death, it seems her contribution will finally be at
:15:37. > :15:40.
:15:40. > :15:43.Joining me now from Chicago is Rebecca Skloot who has written a
:15:43. > :15:53.book about Henrietta Lacks and her family, and was involved in the
:15:53. > :16:02.negotiations which led to this settlement. This is an amazing
:16:02. > :16:07.story. How important has this been for medical research, do you think?
:16:07. > :16:11.Oh, you can't overestimate how important the cells have been for
:16:11. > :16:15.science. They laid the foundation for so much of what we rely on now.
:16:15. > :16:19.Her cells were the first ever cloned, her jeans with a first-ever
:16:19. > :16:24.mapped. Some of the most important cancer medications... The list goes
:16:24. > :16:28.on and on. They also laid the foundation for lots of basic
:16:28. > :16:32.science. It is interesting that all of these good things are based on
:16:32. > :16:40.something which sounds very brutal nowadays, taking the cells from
:16:40. > :16:43.someone dying of cancer and using them without her permission. Yes, it
:16:43. > :16:48.was absolutely standard at the time to take samples from people without
:16:48. > :16:52.their permission. Sometimes much worse. We did not have the concept
:16:52. > :16:56.of informed consent in the 50s. While it does sound shocking by
:16:56. > :16:59.today's standards, a lot of what happened was pretty standard for the
:16:59. > :17:04.day. What was different was when they went back to her children in
:17:04. > :17:07.the 70s and did research on them without their consent. We did have
:17:07. > :17:12.consent practices back then. In the 80s, their medical records were
:17:12. > :17:17.released to the press and published without consent. His latest chapter
:17:17. > :17:27.of the gene only in released without their consent is just one in a long
:17:27. > :17:28.
:17:28. > :17:32.line of things that have happened to the family. So what managed to get
:17:32. > :17:37.them to this agreement? There were several things. The first question
:17:38. > :17:41.when they found out that this gene had been published, what does it
:17:41. > :17:46.mean for us? What information is in there? They knew there was
:17:46. > :17:51.information about Henrietta in there. Her children inherited half
:17:51. > :17:55.of her jeans and her grandchildren half of those. They wanted to know
:17:55. > :18:03.what the public could learn about them, what science could learn about
:18:03. > :18:08.them from looking at the cells. Disease, things like that. But what
:18:08. > :18:12.we know from history, every few decades something big happens with
:18:12. > :18:17.these cells. Scientists and up going back and involving Henrietta
:18:17. > :18:21.Lacks's family, usually without consent. The research has been
:18:21. > :18:29.looked at over and over. They were also saying, enough. This is the
:18:29. > :18:34.last time our generation should be the ones that this happens too. So
:18:34. > :18:39.that our grandchildren are not shocked down the road when it
:18:39. > :18:44.involves us. Why is that? I know that attitudes have changed, the way
:18:44. > :18:47.that patients have been treated has changed, but is it basically because
:18:47. > :18:54.she happened to be an impoverished African-American woman in the 50s
:18:54. > :18:59.and people thought they could do what they like? In some ways that is
:18:59. > :19:03.certainly part of it. She was seen in what they called the public
:19:03. > :19:06.ward. That is where people went if they did not have money or they were
:19:06. > :19:10.black because this was during segregation. She could not be
:19:10. > :19:15.treated anywhere else. More research was definitely done in those places
:19:15. > :19:19.than in the institutions where white patients with money ended up. In the
:19:19. > :19:23.70s when they did the research on her children, I think race played a
:19:23. > :19:27.more significant role in some ways. In the 50s they were taking cells
:19:27. > :19:32.from anyone they could get their hands on and trying to grow them. In
:19:32. > :19:35.the 70s, had her family been white, not being a black family who did not
:19:35. > :19:39.have much money, and think the chances are things would have been
:19:39. > :19:45.pretty different for them. Thank you very much for joining us from
:19:46. > :19:49.Chicago and telling us that extraordinary story.
:19:49. > :19:52.News that one of Italy's most wanted Mafiosi has been holed up in
:19:52. > :19:55.Uxbridge sent us wondering whether the London suburbs really are a good
:19:55. > :19:59.place for Cosa Nostra. Domenico Rancadore was sentenced to seven
:19:59. > :20:02.years in prison in Italy and the Italian authorities want him back. A
:20:02. > :20:06.court today heard that Mr Rancadore used the name Marc Skinner and did
:20:06. > :20:16.not go out much. Stephen Smith has been to Uxbridge to see how they are
:20:16. > :20:35.
:20:35. > :20:42.-land, at the end of John Betjeman's beloveds Metropolitan
:20:42. > :20:45.line. A slumbering dormitory at the western extremity of Western London.
:20:45. > :20:51.Christine Keeler was the most notorious person to come out of
:20:51. > :20:57.Uxbridge until now. But it has emerged that the retired
:20:57. > :21:03.schoolteacher who lived behind his head had been hiding for 20 odd
:21:03. > :21:07.years. The man the neighbours knew as Marc Skinner was really Dominica
:21:07. > :21:15.Rancadore, alleged Sicilian Mafia boss. Do you feel that you are
:21:15. > :21:20.living in an episode of the Sopranos? Not really. He is the last
:21:20. > :21:26.person that you would suspect. He certainly did not appear to be a
:21:26. > :21:33.wise guy. People, some say unkind people, have said that Uxbridge is
:21:33. > :21:39.just about the dullest place in London. So good camouflage? I would
:21:39. > :21:46.dispute that. Why did think it is that dull here. But you never know,
:21:46. > :21:49.do you? -- I don't think. He built up the conifer trees and put the big
:21:49. > :21:59.gate on the front but we always thought he was Spanish and was
:21:59. > :22:09.
:22:09. > :22:15.trying to produce a little courtyard community around Uxbridge. This chef
:22:15. > :22:20.is from Elan himself and patrons at this restaurant have been digesting
:22:20. > :22:26.the news. -- from Milan. Is it semi-glamorous to have someone from
:22:26. > :22:30.the Mafia living amongst you? Or is it awful and terrible for the
:22:30. > :22:35.neighbourhood? American culture has probably had a great influence on
:22:35. > :22:40.how British people see things. The Sopranos, everyone thinks it is sexy
:22:40. > :22:44.and glamorous to lead a crime boss life. Maybe if they come back and
:22:45. > :22:49.think about that, they will think it is quite scary to have someone
:22:49. > :22:53.involved in these very serious things, allegedly, lives round the
:22:53. > :22:57.corner. The obvious thing is that we do not know our neighbours and that
:22:57. > :23:02.is the key thing here. I am not saying that people should be careful
:23:02. > :23:12.and paranoid. I am just impressed, a little, that he has managed to evade
:23:12. > :23:14.the authorities for such a long time. Marc Skinner, or Rancadore,
:23:14. > :23:18.was a model citizen as far as his fellow townsfolk new, frequenting
:23:18. > :23:25.coffee shops, buying flowers at the stall outside the station. He is not
:23:25. > :23:31.the first person to live a double life you. In 1922, under an assumed
:23:31. > :23:36.name, someone was living just 100 metres from somewhere near where
:23:36. > :23:41.Rancadore was living, at RAF Uxbridge. That person was actually
:23:41. > :23:46.Lawrence of Arabia. If you want to be anonymous, it is a quiet in place
:23:46. > :23:50.to fade into the background. Westminster Magistrates Court,
:23:50. > :23:53.Rancadore was served a warrant for extradition to Italy where he has a
:23:53. > :23:57.conviction for belonging to the Mafia. His wife and daughter heard
:23:57. > :24:03.that he will be remanded in custody following a full extradition hearing
:24:03. > :24:09.in November. Uxbridge is in the spotlight now, deservedly so, some
:24:09. > :24:19.might say. What do we need to know about your town? If there are any
:24:19. > :24:23.more fugitive Mafia dons out there, please get in touch.
:24:23. > :24:26.Now here's one for the Jeremy Kyle Show. The father is either the
:24:26. > :24:30.live-in lover in Edinburgh, who doesn't seem to want to make much
:24:30. > :24:33.love. Or he is a dead German whose sperm was flown in. Nobody is even
:24:33. > :24:37.sure if the mother is pregnant. We're talking giant pandas here and
:24:37. > :24:41.the news that the female Tian Tian in Edinburgh Zoo may be preparing
:24:41. > :24:45.for the patter of tiny claws. We can go over almost live by panda cam to
:24:45. > :24:49.her mate in Edinburgh who may or may not be the father. It's not quite
:24:49. > :24:53.Royal Baby Watch but there's no doubt that pandas are among the most
:24:53. > :24:56.photogenic zoo stars. But is that a bit unfair to some of nature's more
:24:56. > :24:58.aesthetically challenged creatures? Helen Arney is a member of the Ugly
:24:58. > :25:02.Animal Preservation Society, a comedy night with a conservation
:25:02. > :25:05.twist where she argues that pandas get too much attention and that more
:25:05. > :25:08.help should be given to some of the less cuddly but equally endangered
:25:08. > :25:13.species. She joins us now from Edinburgh where she is playing at
:25:13. > :25:19.the Fringe. This is the biggest news about pregnancy since the Duchess of
:25:19. > :25:22.Cambridge. But do we care too much about pandas, is that what you are
:25:22. > :25:27.saying? With no offence to Edinburgh Zoo and the great work they are
:25:27. > :25:30.doing with pandas, there is much more to the animal kingdom than
:25:30. > :25:34.black and white bears. I have been watching the band camera for most of
:25:34. > :25:38.the afternoon and frankly I would rather watch black and white paint
:25:38. > :25:43.drying. There are much more fascinating animals out there that
:25:43. > :25:48.are not beautiful. They are creepy, Crawley, ugly, grey, weird, but much
:25:48. > :25:56.more interesting than the standard panda. You have made the case for
:25:56. > :26:01.the purple pig nosed frock. We are looking at that now. You would not
:26:01. > :26:10.buy your children are stuffed one of those four are present. You would
:26:10. > :26:18.buy a panda. Pandas used to be the underdog. He used to sit around
:26:18. > :26:23.eating bamboo, unable to do its business with its mate. But it is
:26:23. > :26:28.not about what they look like, it is what they do. They do very little.
:26:28. > :26:34.The axolotl is my favourite animal, fascinating. It lives in a single
:26:34. > :26:40.lake in Mexico and is so endangered. It actually regenerates itself. If
:26:40. > :26:44.you chop a little bit off, but don't do this at home, it will rebuild it
:26:44. > :26:48.perfectly. If its skull gets crushed, it will rebuild it
:26:48. > :26:53.perfectly. Scientists could use this to cure cancer and find out about
:26:53. > :27:03.ageing. Fascinating stuff. We are looking at a picture of one of them
:27:03. > :27:04.
:27:04. > :27:11.now. It is one of the most handsome ones I have seen in a long time!
:27:11. > :27:15.That is actually logistic. Normal ones look like a block of concrete.
:27:15. > :27:19.But are we missing out on these great animals that are much more
:27:19. > :27:24.interesting by looking at the cuddly ones? Pandas is the only thing you
:27:24. > :27:34.think of when you think of conservation, it is like URA DJ who
:27:34. > :27:37.loves music but only plays Justin Bieber. -- like you are a DJ.
:27:37. > :27:42.Conservation is not exotic. It is not something that comes from
:27:42. > :27:46.far-flung countries. The European eel is one of the animals that has
:27:46. > :27:53.lost 90% of its population in the last 40 years. Its travels 5000
:27:53. > :27:57.miles. It migrates a huge journey. That is in the Thames. It is not
:27:57. > :28:01.endangered because people have been serving it up in jelly in East and
:28:01. > :28:05.restaurants. It is endangered because its habitat is being
:28:05. > :28:09.destroyed. There is so much more interesting stuff out there than the
:28:09. > :28:13.panda. The panda has been amazing for bringing attention to
:28:13. > :28:20.conservation. Of course it is the logo for the WWF. Mostly because it
:28:20. > :28:25.is black and white and very cheap to photocopy. Indeed! We have an animal
:28:25. > :28:30.where we spent a lot of money trying to get them to conceive. They don't
:28:30. > :28:37.seem to be willing or able to do it by themselves. In the end, there is
:28:37. > :28:42.not much hope for them, is there? be absolutely honest, I think anyone
:28:42. > :28:47.would have trouble having a full relationship with their partner, who
:28:47. > :28:50.they have only met recently, when there were cameras on them and they
:28:50. > :28:57.were living in somewhere completely different to their normal habitat.
:28:57. > :29:03.You or I would have exactly the same problem. Right, we will avoid the
:29:03. > :29:09.panda camera. Thank you very much. Let's look at the front pages. The
:29:09. > :29:16.Times has Robert Mugabe selling uranium to Tehran in a secret deal.
:29:16. > :29:21.The Telegraph has fetching picture, not of an axolotl but the panda on
:29:21. > :29:27.the front page. And the panda is also on the front page of the
:29:27. > :29:37.Guardian. And police investigating 169 sex abuse investigations. A move
:29:37. > :29:38.
:29:38. > :29:43.to tackle predatory offices. A royal exclusive with the new father
:29:43. > :29:47.allowed on a stag weekend. And the Daily Mail, the European flag to be
:29:47. > :29:51.stamped on the UK birth certificate. All babies born in Britain could