:00:16. > :00:24.There are too many schools in England where behaviour is bad and
:00:25. > :00:27.disruptive. Learning is hampered by teachers who can't keep control, the
:00:28. > :00:31.Chief Inspector thinks it is time to act. If they are persistently
:00:32. > :00:36.incompetent, and from school to school to school, yes they should
:00:37. > :00:41.and be deregistered. How the cost of energy is affecting almost the way
:00:42. > :00:46.everyone lives. The heating is on for a very short amount of time, we
:00:47. > :00:55.have extra bedding, we go to bed wearing quite a lot of cloths,
:00:56. > :01:00.almost as if you are going out for the evening. We talk to the couple
:01:01. > :01:10.who have Scientology declared a religion. There is Diane from Carson
:01:11. > :01:16.City. She's my aunt! And the Anchorman's weatherman. Tonight on
:01:17. > :01:25.Newsnight there will be an awful lot of me, probably too much! First the
:01:26. > :01:28.good news, schooling in England is getting better. Now the bad, there
:01:29. > :01:31.are too many children of poorer white families failing to reach
:01:32. > :01:34.their potential, and there are still far too many classrooms which are
:01:35. > :01:39.disrupted by low-level bad behaviour. Sir Michael Wilshaw,
:01:40. > :01:44.Ofsted's Chief Inspector of Schools is planning to launch unannounced
:01:45. > :01:48.inspections where it seems to be a real problem. He also wants the
:01:49. > :01:55.Government to reinstate national tests for 7-14-year-olds, cue
:01:56. > :02:01.predictable outrage from teaching trade unions. For years this school
:02:02. > :02:05.was failing, now a new headteacher is starting to turn it round. Tag
:02:06. > :02:10.rugby is just one of the ways children at Dover road Primary
:02:11. > :02:13.School in Gravesend learn team work and self-discipline. Key to better
:02:14. > :02:19.behaviour in the class and around the school. The school council were
:02:20. > :02:23.keen to tell me how buggying used -- bullying used to be rife, how
:02:24. > :02:27.classes were often disrupted and how it has changed now. I used to get
:02:28. > :02:31.bullied in class and they used to call me names. Now we have new
:02:32. > :02:35.teachers they have separated me from the people who call me names. The
:02:36. > :02:39.teachers understand you if you are upset, you get work done quicker
:02:40. > :02:44.because they make you happier. In the past when the teachers explained
:02:45. > :02:51.we still didn't understand and then we never would understand. The new
:02:52. > :02:55.teachers make it clear. I would wake up and tell my mum an excuse I'm
:02:56. > :03:08.feeling ill, I don't want to go to school, but now I'm up early and do
:03:09. > :03:15.all my work and really enjoy it. I'm smarter because of the teachers. And
:03:16. > :03:22.sometimes like, when I have been doing literacy I have made lots of
:03:23. > :03:31.mistakes on my handwriting and words, now I'm on to pen and I know
:03:32. > :03:35.most of the words. It was the local authority, Kent, who sent Catherine
:03:36. > :03:40.Ward to this school to assess it in January. She ended up staying as the
:03:41. > :03:46.school's head when Dover road became a sponsored academy last month. .
:03:47. > :03:51.The number one thing that made the difference for me is, it was an is
:03:52. > :03:55.the children. The children are delightful, they want to learn, they
:03:56. > :03:58.are eager to come to school and they were desperate for good learning.
:03:59. > :04:03.And so that was the fundamental thing and I thought right, that's
:04:04. > :04:07.what gets me out of bed every day. Ready and enrol, show me your
:04:08. > :04:12.character again, stop. Most of these pupils are from white British
:04:13. > :04:16.backgrounds, a high proportion are eligible for free school meals, the
:04:17. > :04:20.very group Ofsted said today are underachieving in English schools.
:04:21. > :04:28.The new head has brought in many new teachers and a new culture. For my
:04:29. > :04:31.first few weeks around the school I noticed there was a lack of respect
:04:32. > :04:36.for children with each other, a lack of respect for children with some
:04:37. > :04:43.adults. Different groups of adults as well. And that the manners, the
:04:44. > :04:46.fundamental manners weren't there for the children. I started
:04:47. > :04:53.basically saying we are not going to do this more, and we took it back to
:04:54. > :04:59.the basic manners of how we behave, to 0 please, thank you, opening
:05:00. > :05:04.doors for each other, taking turns, not jumping the queue, being
:05:05. > :05:09.responsible for each other, just a fundamental basic good manners. We
:05:10. > :05:12.only spoke to handful of parents, one was happy with the new
:05:13. > :05:16.discipline? Just this morning, tucking his shirt into his trousers,
:05:17. > :05:20.two or three weeks ago he wouldn't have been doing that, he wouldn't
:05:21. > :05:23.have cared. Now he's coming into school making sure he as smart and
:05:24. > :05:27.tidy and saying please and thank you. It's just brilliant. Others
:05:28. > :05:32.said their children were learning more and the school's reputation is
:05:33. > :05:36.improving? He's gone up a whole level in the last six months. And he
:05:37. > :05:41.was working at the same level for three years. I think positivity has
:05:42. > :05:47.really grown within the school and the school's name is changing. The
:05:48. > :05:49.changes here at Dover Road are what Sir Michael Wilshaw said today he
:05:50. > :05:53.would like to see across the country, the teaching has improved,
:05:54. > :05:57.the children's behaviour is much better and they are learning much,
:05:58. > :06:05.much more. This has to happen everywhere, according to Ofsted, if
:06:06. > :06:11.we are to compete with the rest of the world. The school is sponsored
:06:12. > :06:14.by an academy group set up by heads. In the last 12 months, thanks to the
:06:15. > :06:18.Department of Education, they have quietly taken over more than 20
:06:19. > :06:22.schools right across the country. We are about cautious growth. The
:06:23. > :06:26.question is can we help the school, do we understand the challenges it
:06:27. > :06:29.face, do we have the expertise and capacity in order for us to do. That
:06:30. > :06:34.the answer for us is we will grow as long as we keep doing the good work
:06:35. > :06:39.we keep doing it. On a brief visit to this school we found no
:06:40. > :06:43.opposition to the change in status. Elsewhere parents have fought and
:06:44. > :06:47.are fighting campaigns to stop their schools becoming sponsored
:06:48. > :06:50.academies. They worry the schools won't be accountable to the local
:06:51. > :06:59.community and they want to know more about the groups who are now running
:07:00. > :07:03.them. Earlier I went to the Ofsted offices in central London to meet
:07:04. > :07:07.Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools, Sir Michael Wilshaw. I
:07:08. > :07:12.asked him why low standards had been tolerated so long? We need to step
:07:13. > :07:15.up several gears, if we are going to match the best in the world,
:07:16. > :07:20.certainly if we are going to match the Asian countries that came top of
:07:21. > :07:24.the league. We need to accelerate and put our foot down on the
:07:25. > :07:29.achievement pedal much harder than we have done. That is why in my
:07:30. > :07:34.report I said a few uncomfortable things. Like we have to stop this
:07:35. > :07:38.low-level disruption which irritates teachers and makes them think hard
:07:39. > :07:41.about their jobs. We have something like 1500 teachers from the state
:07:42. > :07:46.system leaving for the independent sector every year. I suspect if you
:07:47. > :07:50.talk to them they would say we have gone into the independent sector
:07:51. > :07:53.because we had enough of this low-level disruption we see in
:07:54. > :07:57.schools. I have heard teachers and you must have heard teachers say
:07:58. > :08:00.precisely that, that I just want to work somewhere when you call a class
:08:01. > :08:05.to order it is quiet. And everyone can get on with their work. I have
:08:06. > :08:11.heard them say, that you must have heard lots of them say that, why is
:08:12. > :08:15.it had being tolerated? It is tolerated by poor leadership. I was
:08:16. > :08:19.a headteacher before joining Ofsted and worked in tough inner city
:08:20. > :08:23.schools in London. I cracked down hard on poor behaviour. Children go
:08:24. > :08:26.to school wanting to succeed. It is the environment they go into that
:08:27. > :08:29.makes the difference. It is the quality of leadership that makes the
:08:30. > :08:32.difference, it is the quality of teaching they receive and the
:08:33. > :08:36.culture in the school. And the most important thing in a school is that
:08:37. > :08:40.leadership. A lot of people don't want to become head teachers aren't
:08:41. > :08:44.there? We should be optimistic, we have better people coming into the
:08:45. > :08:47.profession. A lot of them will want to stay there and become head
:08:48. > :08:58.teachers. It is now a well-paid job in way it wasn't years ago. The
:08:59. > :09:03.status has gone up. Presumably a lot more should have got rid of? Head
:09:04. > :09:07.teachers. There are 400,000 teachers in this country, and they are
:09:08. > :09:10.dismissed from the profession at the rate of 20 a year? I think there is
:09:11. > :09:14.a story behind that. I think what tends to happen is that head
:09:15. > :09:19.teachers write nice references for people they want to get rid of,
:09:20. > :09:26.rather than going through complex difficult Compat Tennessee and dis--
:09:27. > :09:29.componency and difficult disciplinary procedures, rather than
:09:30. > :09:32.saying you are not doing well here, I will write you a decent enough
:09:33. > :09:36.reference and off you go to another school. You have these poor
:09:37. > :09:39.low-performing teachers, circulating through the system and the old
:09:40. > :09:44.General Teaching Council did very little about it. So you think they
:09:45. > :09:47.should be got rid of from the profession all together, rather than
:09:48. > :09:51.another school to inflict their incompetence? Some of them if they
:09:52. > :09:54.are persistently incompetent and from school to school to school, yes
:09:55. > :09:59.they should and they should be deregistered. Do you know how many
:10:00. > :10:08.there are, roughly? No, when we go into schools and we see a poor or
:10:09. > :10:12.inadequate lesson and we would mention it to the headteacher. It is
:10:13. > :10:16.only the headteacher who knows if that teach certificate behaving
:10:17. > :10:20.poory day after day and month after month and then it is up to the head
:10:21. > :10:25.teachers to make decisions. Should that system be changed so that
:10:26. > :10:30.something could be done to weed out bad teachers? Again this is a policy
:10:31. > :10:33.issue, I know what I would do if I was the Secretary of State. What
:10:34. > :10:37.would you do? First of all I think it is right to raise the bar and get
:10:38. > :10:40.good people into the profession, whether they have qualified teacher
:10:41. > :10:45.status or not. Good people, we need to keep them in there and extend the
:10:46. > :10:49.probationary period. I think a probationary period of one year is
:10:50. > :10:53.too short. I think we should have a probationary period of three, four,
:10:54. > :10:59.five years, and then make a decision whether somebody really is, should
:11:00. > :11:02.be given qualified teacher status. There are great swathes of this
:11:03. > :11:06.country where people have very low expectations and there is a culture
:11:07. > :11:10.of low expectation, households where people don't expect ever to regain
:11:11. > :11:13.the sort of traditional patterns of work that exists in their
:11:14. > :11:26.grandparents' days. You really do believe a school can break that
:11:27. > :11:31.culture of expectation? You can break it I have seen it been broken,
:11:32. > :11:34.and this pupil premium giving children extra money will give the
:11:35. > :11:38.money for extension classes in the evening. I made it clear to the
:11:39. > :11:41.staff in my school that they were surrogate parents for a significant
:11:42. > :11:44.number of children, and if they wanted to be employed they would
:11:45. > :11:48.have to work in the evenings and weekends to compensate for the
:11:49. > :11:53.deficits at home. And that, and they would be paid well for doing that.
:11:54. > :12:01.And I used the additional funding to enhance their salaries. Melanie
:12:02. > :12:04.Phillips is a commentator with a long standing interest in education,
:12:05. > :12:10.Tom Bennett is a secondary school teacher and blogger for the Times
:12:11. > :12:14.Educational Supplement. Let's take the idea that some how there needs
:12:15. > :12:18.to be a thinning out of the teaching profession. What do you think about
:12:19. > :12:22.that? I think as with most professions there is always some bad
:12:23. > :12:28.eggs because any profession you work in you will find that. What the
:12:29. > :12:36.problem is I will de-Virgin slightly, it is not that there is so
:12:37. > :12:38.many bad teachers, it is there is a failure to deal with the issue.
:12:39. > :12:43.There has been failure for the school system and teacher training
:12:44. > :12:46.providers to face up to the fact that behaviour was bad. You were
:12:47. > :12:53.taught how to control a difficult class? No, I was taught very badly,
:12:54. > :12:58.I'm a prime example, I spent two years at being terrible at
:12:59. > :13:01.controlling behaviour, I kept my mouth shut to get through my
:13:02. > :13:08.probation and not get sacked. What do you think? I think in order to
:13:09. > :13:11.attend to achievement you have to attend to behaviour and it is a
:13:12. > :13:16.package. It is a problem in the teaching profession, there are
:13:17. > :13:20.cultural problems in the teaching profession, it is called the soft
:13:21. > :13:23.bigotry of low expectation. Where white working-class children these
:13:24. > :13:26.days, it used to be black working-class children written off,
:13:27. > :13:30.there is a more general problem with the adult world, the adult world has
:13:31. > :13:35.been terrified of children for many years now. It has decided it has to
:13:36. > :13:40.make friends of children, and it has to be very casual and informal, we
:13:41. > :13:43.call them kids. And teachers, I'm sure Tom is an exception, but
:13:44. > :13:48.teachers very often have trees Deed down, they have been very -- dressed
:13:49. > :13:51.down, and they have been casual and become like parents, the children's
:13:52. > :13:56.friends, children don't like that, they want respect. Do you think it
:13:57. > :14:00.makes a difference what they wear, he should be wearing a tie? It is
:14:01. > :14:04.the BBC afterall. He has dressed down for the BBC. Children need
:14:05. > :14:08.respect. One of the things I have often noticed that children who have
:14:09. > :14:12.come from terrible backgrounds where they have been excluded from school,
:14:13. > :14:16.they burned down the school and you asked them what was wrong with your
:14:17. > :14:19.school and they say immediately the teachers didn't treat me with
:14:20. > :14:25.respect. They didn't expect me to do hard things. They didn't tell me the
:14:26. > :14:30.rules, they want to be given that kind of set of bound lease, that
:14:31. > :14:34.makes -- boundaries, that makes them feel accepted. Does that chime with
:14:35. > :14:39.your experience? I would agree with what you were saying, it was said
:14:40. > :14:42.that there was a crisis of adult authority in mainly western
:14:43. > :14:46.authorities. There is definitely a problem there. That has infected the
:14:47. > :14:48.way in which we have raised our teachers and we have made our
:14:49. > :14:52.expectations in school sometimes a little bit too low. There are for
:14:53. > :14:58.instance two schools in every school, there is the school of the
:14:59. > :15:01.high status professional there for a long time with low timetable, and
:15:02. > :15:05.there is the supply teacher and occasional teacher and they are two
:15:06. > :15:09.different schools. You mean the supply teacher and less experienced
:15:10. > :15:13.teacher finds it hard to control a class? Enormously so. I remember
:15:14. > :15:23.when there was a report from Dispatches who went in and filmed a
:15:24. > :15:26.supply teacher and it was appalling. What about what was proposed in the
:15:27. > :15:29.interview that the probationary period be extended, up to five years
:15:30. > :15:33.before you can get a permanent job? I do think we need to be a little
:15:34. > :15:37.bit more stringent with how we pass teachers. Because by the time they
:15:38. > :15:45.get accepted on to courses there is an enormous pressure on teacher
:15:46. > :15:51.training providers to pass and certified -- certify them. I don't
:15:52. > :16:00.think one is ignore the impact of the last few decades, teachers led
:16:01. > :16:03.up the garden path where teacher training colleges have taught them
:16:04. > :16:07.unteaching. This small example this idea that a child's self-esteem is
:16:08. > :16:12.very important, I would personally agree, the idea that in order to
:16:13. > :16:16.protect the child's self-esteem heaven forbid you give them a
:16:17. > :16:19.problem they might fail, and you lower the bar all the time. Children
:16:20. > :16:24.are not stupid and they understand they are treated as more rans and
:16:25. > :16:28.they -- morans and they behave like that. If you expect they can achieve
:16:29. > :16:31.more and more they do achieve more and more, it is not rocket science.
:16:32. > :16:36.The other thing very striking is the way in which we have all seemed to
:16:37. > :16:40.accept that there will be always a low level of disruption in schools
:16:41. > :16:45.at some point. You say it is different experience for different
:16:46. > :16:49.teachers, but it is accepted as a precedent in many schools. Look at
:16:50. > :16:53.that fantastic school in Gravesend we saw in the report there, that was
:16:54. > :16:57.really impressive wasn't it. The strategy of it is that just about
:16:58. > :17:01.any school and any teacher can have great behaviour in in their lessons.
:17:02. > :17:05.One of the things is many teachers don't know what to do. Often in many
:17:06. > :17:11.schools there aren't the structures to support teachers who do know what
:17:12. > :17:15.they are doing. A lot comes down to leadership? Head teachers. It has to
:17:16. > :17:20.come from them. They need to have leadership from the political class,
:17:21. > :17:24.the Ofsteds and from the whole sort of culture that supports them in
:17:25. > :17:29.being proper leaders. I know a lot of teachers who go through teacher
:17:30. > :17:33.training and have one hour's worth of behaviour management training and
:17:34. > :17:38.it is so central to great learning. The fact we have learned to ignore
:17:39. > :17:42.this is absurd. I must say I thought talking to Michael Wilshaw he had
:17:43. > :17:49.actually had a pretty upbeat picture of many areas of school anything
:17:50. > :17:59.this country. That it is not all a disaster? According to Ofsted eight
:18:00. > :18:03.out of ten schools is good or fairly better. It was only recently Ofsted
:18:04. > :18:09.told us their satisfactory category was unstreet. Frankly --
:18:10. > :18:13.unsatisfactory, Ofsted have led us up the garden path saying lots of
:18:14. > :18:19.schools are fine when they are rubbish so I take it with a pinch of
:18:20. > :18:22.salt. I think Michael Wilshaw talks sense but Ofsted has had a problem
:18:23. > :18:26.with the framework and the inspectors, it is a political
:18:27. > :18:30.institution and has to deliver to ministers improvement. It doesn't
:18:31. > :18:35.necessarily accord with reality. I would rarely qualify any school as
:18:36. > :18:39.rubbish. There is always variation within every school, pockets of
:18:40. > :18:43.excellence even with the schools in the most dire circumstances and
:18:44. > :18:47.situations. I think what Michael Wilshaw is very interesting and
:18:48. > :18:51.pointing out is that he's going beyond the very averaged out data
:18:52. > :18:54.that we see from places like Ofsted. Because he as a practitioner
:18:55. > :19:00.himself, he's wise enough to see that there is a big, big problem,
:19:01. > :19:03.not necessarily with schools and entire boroughs collapsing, but
:19:04. > :19:10.certainly there is pockets of problems in just about every school
:19:11. > :19:15.I would say. Do you find our industry slightly
:19:16. > :19:21.ludicrous? I think, yes. And I will say that to your face! Now to what
:19:22. > :19:24.has turned out to be the biggest story in politics this autumn. Every
:19:25. > :19:29.serious party has had to re-think what it plans to do about the cost
:19:30. > :19:34.of energy. According to the retiring boss of British Gas it's all a Punch
:19:35. > :19:37.and Judy show, damaging the poor energy companies. But the reason it
:19:38. > :19:41.has become such a hot political topic is the cost of keeping warm
:19:42. > :19:44.has become a matter of anxiety, right across the land, north and
:19:45. > :20:19.south, poor and those who wouldn't dream of calling themselves rich.
:20:20. > :20:28.I switched energy companies, cut down my payments on the promise that
:20:29. > :20:33.the fuel would be cheaper and some how have built up a debt. I'm now
:20:34. > :20:37.not only paying for what I'm using, but I'm paying for a debt I ran up
:20:38. > :20:43.last winter. The payments I'm paying now are double. They want them to be
:20:44. > :20:46.triple. I will be honest with you I'm frightened of putting the
:20:47. > :20:54.heating on. The amount of heating I would like to keep this house warm
:20:55. > :21:01.I'm just frightened. My income is ?7200 a year. I spent ?110 a month
:21:02. > :21:06.on gas and electricity, that nowhere near covers the cost of what I need
:21:07. > :21:11.to keep warm. The heating is on for a short amount of time every day, we
:21:12. > :21:14.have extra bedding, we go to bed wearing quite a lot of clothes,
:21:15. > :21:22.almost as if you are going out for the evening. We haven't really hit
:21:23. > :21:35.the main winter yet. If it gets much colder I don't know how we go
:21:36. > :21:41.forward. If you think about you go to a clinic and you have some tests
:21:42. > :21:49.and they say to you, it's possibly it is cancer, you go, you wait in
:21:50. > :21:53.fear. And eventually you are diagnosed it is a fairly rare
:21:54. > :21:57.cancer, cancer of the bone marrow basically. Chemotherapy means that
:21:58. > :22:01.you are going to change and you will feel the cold like you have never
:22:02. > :22:04.felt the cold before. And particularly extremities. You can't
:22:05. > :22:09.quite believe to what extent you need to keep warm. I try to keep
:22:10. > :22:13.busy because when you are busy you keep warm. But if you sit down in a
:22:14. > :22:17.cold room after about five or ten minutes you will start to feel very,
:22:18. > :22:21.very cold. And when it's freezing out there and last winter was
:22:22. > :22:31.dreadful, if we get the same this winter then I will be cold and cold
:22:32. > :22:36.a lot. I will deal with it. It is hard to get my head around I will
:22:37. > :22:48.feel ill, cold and isolated. It is scary time and a sad time for all
:22:49. > :22:59.the family. I feel for them more than I feel for myself. We are
:23:00. > :23:03.cutting back on everything, there is no basic activities back on the
:23:04. > :23:08.running costs. After the children go to bed I don't have the heating on
:23:09. > :23:13.any more. You get cold? Yes. Do you wish mum would put the heating on a
:23:14. > :23:16.bit more? Yes. But normally we would have to put a blanket round
:23:17. > :23:21.ourselves. Do you understand why you can't have the heating on? We just
:23:22. > :23:24.can't because it is too much money to pay. I do understand they have to
:23:25. > :23:30.make some profit, because they have to keep our lights and our gas, they
:23:31. > :23:34.have got to do that we have to have the lights and everything on. I
:23:35. > :23:40.understand that, but do they need all these vast profits? We all need
:23:41. > :23:45.fuel. So we don't really have a choice. We can cut it down and
:23:46. > :23:49.cutback and wear more clothes and we can try whatever tricks we want to
:23:50. > :24:00.keep warm, but we all essentially need it. Basically they are screwing
:24:01. > :24:05.us for something we need Cancer comes with a lot of fear, to sit at
:24:06. > :24:11.home feeling in pain and fear will you butt also freezing cold. I
:24:12. > :24:16.almost feel guilty I can afford the heat, I have never known a time like
:24:17. > :24:26.this, I'm 73 years old, I have never known a time when it is so in your
:24:27. > :24:30.face that how this poverty that how this fuel poverty is affecting
:24:31. > :24:35.everyone. What is it like to sit there with no food in the house or
:24:36. > :24:43.heating, and decide whether or not to heat. It must be dreadful. If
:24:44. > :24:47.they are saying that 31,000 people in this country will die of cold in
:24:48. > :25:05.the winter, is it right that should happen. We're supposed to be a
:25:06. > :25:08.wealthy country aren't we? The BBC's latest attempt to restore public
:25:09. > :25:12.confidence was to announce today that it's reforming its management
:25:13. > :25:15.structure. The corporation's chairman said that faith in the
:25:16. > :25:22.nation's biggest cultural institution had been rattled, more
:25:23. > :25:27.rattlement in the release on-line of a recording of the man who conducted
:25:28. > :25:31.the investigation into who knew what when in the Jimmy Savile scandal.
:25:32. > :25:36.The corporation welcomes this as much as you would welcome you
:25:37. > :25:41.stepped in dog Poe on the way to be made a member of the Order of Merit.
:25:42. > :25:46.It is a complicated story and one of the few men in England who can
:25:47. > :25:50.unravel it is with me here. The Pollard inquiry was called to look
:25:51. > :25:54.into the widespread belief, or suspicion that the Newsnight Savile
:25:55. > :26:00.investigation, which was canned, might have been stopped because of
:26:01. > :26:03.overriding corporate interests in the Christmas schedule, the tribute
:26:04. > :26:07.programmes to Savile, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. In fairness
:26:08. > :26:11.Pollard concluded very clearly that there was no such conspiracy, and I
:26:12. > :26:15.should say at the outset. Nothing in what I'm going to say should be
:26:16. > :26:20.taken to mean that conclusion was drawn into question, it hasn't been.
:26:21. > :26:25.Interestingly there was an awful lot of stuff in the Pollard report about
:26:26. > :26:28.who knew what when. Mark Thompson, the Director General at the time,
:26:29. > :26:31.maintained throughout although he was told, there had been an
:26:32. > :26:35.investigation to Jimmy Savile by Newsnight which was stopped, he was
:26:36. > :26:43.never told he, he maintained of the nature of it. He was never told it
:26:44. > :26:48.was about sexual abuse. You are about to hear a tape where Poland,
:26:49. > :26:52.who did the report, confirms to a journalist last February that he had
:26:53. > :26:56.received a letter there are Helen Boden, the director of news at the
:26:57. > :26:59.time, that is her picture there, a letter from her saying that she had
:27:00. > :27:03.in fact had a conversation with Thomson where she had told him that
:27:04. > :27:08.the investigation was about sexual abuse. So you will hear him
:27:09. > :27:15.decribing this to the journalist. Also interesting to listen, it is
:27:16. > :27:18.clear Pollard, the author of a ?3 million report, a public interest
:27:19. > :27:31.inquiry is choosing to try to correct the record by speaking to a
:27:32. > :27:39.journalist off the record. It puts you in a position where Helen Boden
:27:40. > :27:47.did tell the Pollard inquiry that she told Mark Thompson the nature of
:27:48. > :27:55.the allegations. I think it puts you in the position where you can't say
:27:56. > :27:59.in print how you know this, but you are watertight on the fact that is
:28:00. > :28:05.the case. There is Pollard confirming to the journalist there
:28:06. > :28:09.was this note from Helen Boden's lawyers, and he goes on to say he
:28:10. > :28:17.personally greats not having included any reference to this
:28:18. > :28:22.letter from the lawyers in the final report. It is a slightly awkward
:28:23. > :28:26.position for me it is something if I had thought about it immediately
:28:27. > :28:33.before publication and picked up on the significance of it, I think I
:28:34. > :28:37.would probably have put it in the report. That is slightly
:28:38. > :28:41.embarrassing, what are the BBC saying? Four trustees today listened
:28:42. > :28:47.to the tape recordings about five minutes long they listened to. They
:28:48. > :28:56.conclude and said while the trustee...
:28:57. > :29:04.They might have thought it would be preferable if Pollard told them the
:29:05. > :29:08.report was wrong before a journalist. What are the questions
:29:09. > :29:16.raised for this? For Poland why didn't he include it in the first
:29:17. > :29:19.place. It doesn't go to the principal underlying conclusion,
:29:20. > :29:23.nothing suggests a conspiracy. All the events, the conversation between
:29:24. > :29:29.Boden and Thomson, if such there was, and if what was said what Boden
:29:30. > :29:32.claims, by Thomson denies, or denies having recollection of it, this all
:29:33. > :29:37.happened after the Newsnight programme had already been canned.
:29:38. > :29:40.None of it predated it all happened afterwards, and it doesn't relate to
:29:41. > :29:43.the underlying thing. There are questions for Pollard, why didn't he
:29:44. > :29:48.include it. Secondly he still maintains and the BBC still maintain
:29:49. > :29:55.that Pollard's report is essentially correct, when he said he had no
:29:56. > :30:02.reason to question Thomson's version of events. Whether Boden is correct
:30:03. > :30:05.or not, the mere fact of the letter to the lawyers was she told him it
:30:06. > :30:09.was about sexual abuse, which Thomson still denies, must raise a
:30:10. > :30:13.doubt about Thomson's version of events. The other question for him
:30:14. > :30:16.is what is he doing talking to a journalist about it, for the BBC,
:30:17. > :30:20.this goes on forever. The first article based on the conversation
:30:21. > :30:25.was published last February, nobody appears to have noticed. The MPs'
:30:26. > :30:29.letters from rod Wilson Tory MP certainly since August, transcript
:30:30. > :30:33.sent to the Trust in September, a recording in November. Here we are
:30:34. > :30:39.mid-December, finally they get round to sorting it out. A another
:30:40. > :30:43.question that sits there both Thomson and Boden can't be both
:30:44. > :30:48.right. It is not the main conclusion but it is a question. Has the
:30:49. > :30:52.journalist to whom Pollard spoke to said anything? We spoke to him
:30:53. > :30:58.today, and I put it to him that nothing in what he had discovered
:30:59. > :31:03.whatever else he said, he maintains there are important questions to be
:31:04. > :31:07.asked still, but he did accept this does not upset Pollard's fundamental
:31:08. > :31:13.conclusion that there was no corporate conspiracy. That is true
:31:14. > :31:16.but he still had the ability to ask questions about what the
:31:17. > :31:21.investigation entailed and who they had spoken to, and he could have
:31:22. > :31:28.prevented in theory the tribute programmes to stop them going out.
:31:29. > :31:34.As traditionally the case, bad luck follows bad luck, today is when the
:31:35. > :31:38.BBC announced the result of its governance review, clarity,
:31:39. > :31:42.accountability and transparency. If this story shows one thing, it may
:31:43. > :31:47.just be bad luck or it may be that the leopard has yet to change its
:31:48. > :31:52.spot It doesn't show transparency, that's for sure. It is three decades
:31:53. > :31:56.since an English judge ruled that Scientology is not a religion but
:31:57. > :32:00.dangerous cult. Yet today the highest court in the land ruled it
:32:01. > :32:06.is a religion and therefore a couple can marry in its called chapel. The
:32:07. > :32:09.organisation founded by a science fiction writer who is said to have
:32:10. > :32:14.decided that the way to get seriously rich is to start a
:32:15. > :32:24.religion and is delighted, as doubtless are his disciples, with
:32:25. > :32:36.the likes of Tom Cruise and others. For a very new fate, Scientology has
:32:37. > :32:41.traditional ideas about a relationship. But, at its new London
:32:42. > :32:49.headquarters the church might have its own chapel, its own ministers,
:32:50. > :32:52.but it has no wedding license. Scientologists have been fighting to
:32:53. > :32:56.use this place for marriages for some time. Back in 1970 the Court of
:32:57. > :32:59.Appeal ruled that Scientology services were not an official act of
:33:00. > :33:03.worship, because they don't involve a recognised God. That clause has
:33:04. > :33:11.been used by officials to stop this place, or church, as the
:33:12. > :33:15.Scientologists would describe it to be used for official wedding
:33:16. > :33:19.ceremonies. Today that changed, the Supreme Court ruled that Louis
:33:20. > :33:23.Hodkin can matter year her Scientologist boyfriend in that
:33:24. > :33:28.chapel. Bringing the law in England and Wales in line with the law in
:33:29. > :33:33.Scotland. The couple plan to tie the knot in spring after an extended
:33:34. > :33:37.engagment. It is similar to most western marriage ceremonies, we have
:33:38. > :33:40.a congregation, there is an aisle, she will stand in a white dress, and
:33:41. > :33:45.we just have our own religious service. But again it is quite
:33:46. > :33:51.normal, you might say, there is still "I dos" and that sort of thing
:33:52. > :33:56.in it. In terms of walking up the aisle? Absolutely, bridesmaids
:33:57. > :34:00.everything. Beginning with the question of whether... Giving his
:34:01. > :34:04.judgment Lord Toulson said the definition of worship as veneration
:34:05. > :34:12.of a supreme being was out of date and any attempts to stop
:34:13. > :34:15.Scientologists marrying in a chapel would amount to religious
:34:16. > :34:20.discrimination. That is good news for the church after a year of bad
:34:21. > :34:26.publicity, linked to the split of poster boy Tom Cruise and his wife
:34:27. > :34:29.Katie Holmes. Critics of Scientology have long argued the religion is
:34:30. > :34:33.nothing more than a cult based on the work of a science fiction
:34:34. > :34:37.writer. There will be plenty of people, and you know there will be,
:34:38. > :34:41.look these two people have been completely brainwashed, that anyone
:34:42. > :34:45.who believes the human race started 75 million years ago when a
:34:46. > :34:49.spaceship came to earth, these people cannot be treated seriously
:34:50. > :34:54.and the fact they are allowed to be married undermines the whole idea of
:34:55. > :34:57.marriage. What is your reaction to those people? I personally don't
:34:58. > :35:04.believe that the human race was started when a spaceship came 75
:35:05. > :35:09.million years ago. That is not Scientologiy teaching? It is not, we
:35:10. > :35:11.believe man is spirit, that is the simplicity, the soul in most
:35:12. > :35:15.religions we consider that to be you. I believe I am myself as
:35:16. > :35:22.spirit, that is actually the essence of Scientology. The church says it
:35:23. > :35:26.now has 8,600 missions in 165 different countries, with 13 centres
:35:27. > :35:32.in the UK, including its headquarters in East Grinstead. The
:35:33. > :35:37.last census shows only 2,418 people identified themselves as
:35:38. > :35:40.Scientologists in England and Wales. Scientologists are treated
:35:41. > :35:46.differently in different countries, in America fairly recently it got
:35:47. > :35:50.tax exempt status, so it is treated as a religion and doesn't pay taxes.
:35:51. > :35:53.In France and Germany it is different. In German if you are a
:35:54. > :35:57.Scientologist you can't work for either the state Government or local
:35:58. > :36:00.Government. You can't even about be a school teacher. In Britain the
:36:01. > :36:05.Supreme Court's decision today, I think it is still up in the air what
:36:06. > :36:10.the reprecussions of this will be. How will it affect tax, rates and
:36:11. > :36:13.all sorts of things, will the Charity Commission make a different
:36:14. > :36:18.decision about how Scientologists will be treated. I mean this case
:36:19. > :36:22.was about us getting married, hi to get the church's support, they have
:36:23. > :36:25.helped us, by west is fantastic, but it is always about the fact we
:36:26. > :36:29.wanted to get married in our church. You have been backed by the church
:36:30. > :36:33.through the whole process? How much have they been telling you what to
:36:34. > :36:39.do how to proceed? It hasn't been the church. Our lawyers, they have
:36:40. > :36:43.been the ones proceeding with all the legal stuff. You have got some
:36:44. > :36:50.high-powered lawyers, how are they being paid for? Well, the church is
:36:51. > :36:55.supporting us in our case. Financially? By paying for your
:36:56. > :36:59.lawyers? Yeah. And by paying for quite expensive PR people to bring
:37:00. > :37:03.you in here today? We wanted help because obviously when we got the PR
:37:04. > :37:08.man came out of the High Court we didn't know what to do, we are just
:37:09. > :37:12.normal people. Ministers are now worried the ruling will open the
:37:13. > :37:15.door to greater recognition of Scientology, with talk of the
:37:16. > :37:19.organisation being able to clawback millions in tax breaks, this might
:37:20. > :37:25.just be one wedding, but the significance could be far greater
:37:26. > :37:29.than that. We asked the representative of the Church of
:37:30. > :37:35.Scientology to join us to discuss today's court ruling but nobody was
:37:36. > :37:40.available. I am joined from Denver by Mark Headily, who came involved
:37:41. > :37:44.in the Church of Scientology when he was seven years old. He spent 15
:37:45. > :37:48.years working at the headquarters in California before turning away from
:37:49. > :37:53.the organisation and campaigning publicly against it. When you were
:37:54. > :38:04.in the Scientologists, did you consider it a religion? It is funny
:38:05. > :38:10.you ask that. In 1953 L Ron Hubbard wrote in a book he did he wrote that
:38:11. > :38:13.Scientology is not a psychotherapy nor a religion. Throughout the years
:38:14. > :38:22.that I worked there, I worked there for 15 years at the international
:38:23. > :38:26.headquarters, it was always a public relations campaign to represent
:38:27. > :38:29.Scientology as a religion, so that there would be, they could play the
:38:30. > :38:37.persecution card or they could get a break on the taxes and even L Ron
:38:38. > :38:44.Hubbard himself in 1962, he wrote "it is entirely a matter for
:38:45. > :38:49.accountants and solicitors" with regards to them being called a
:38:50. > :38:52.religion as opposed to a business or clinic. When you were a
:38:53. > :38:59.Scientologist did you consider it to be a religious experience or a way
:39:00. > :39:04.of belief? No, for my experience in not only being a member of
:39:05. > :39:13.Scientology when I was a child to then becoming a member of the elite
:39:14. > :39:16.organisation called the Corg, which ran Scientology nationally, it
:39:17. > :39:28.really comes off as a business, it is a money-making business. Even the
:39:29. > :39:36.headquarters they are referred to as organisations, we never referred to
:39:37. > :39:39.them as churches I think you have alluded to this already, why is it
:39:40. > :39:43.that the Scientologists themselves want to have their, whatever it is,
:39:44. > :40:00.beliefs system, their organisation considered as a religion I think it
:40:01. > :40:06.is so they can get around the laws or taxes that a normal business has
:40:07. > :40:10.to adhere to. As soon as you play the religion card you are not paying
:40:11. > :40:14.taxes or following the same rules as other organisations, you are
:40:15. > :40:17.basically getting privileges and getting benefits that any other
:40:18. > :40:25.money-making operation would not get. What's the money for? Well
:40:26. > :40:31.that's a really good question, I know when I was there in the early
:40:32. > :40:36.2000s, they built a multimillion dollar mansion for L Ron Hubbard for
:40:37. > :40:44.him to live in when he returned from wherever he went to have in 1986
:40:45. > :40:49.when he passed away. They spent tens of millions of dollars on a new
:40:50. > :40:53.building and new living quarters for the leader, the current leader of
:40:54. > :40:59.the Scientology movement. He does spent a lot of money on motorcycles
:41:00. > :41:04.and motor homes and luxury limousines for himself. I'm not sure
:41:05. > :41:08.besides lavish new buildings that are sitting empty around the world.
:41:09. > :41:13.I'm not sure what they would be spending the money on besides you
:41:14. > :41:16.know personal things. Can I ask you very briefly one question, what did
:41:17. > :41:21.you think when you were a Scientologist, what did you think
:41:22. > :41:29.would happen to you when you died? Well, they tell you that when you
:41:30. > :41:33.die you come back again and even for the C-organisation members, we had
:41:34. > :41:36.to sign one billion-year contracts so that when we died in this
:41:37. > :41:42.lifetime we would still be on the hook to come back and work for them
:41:43. > :41:45.the nice lifetime, so that's actually what they commonly believe,
:41:46. > :41:51.that they will come back again. Thank you. Do you believe what you
:41:52. > :41:56.see on the news? In Britain television news presenters rightly
:41:57. > :42:00.take their place at tables somewhere well below the salt. In the United
:42:01. > :42:07.States they are somewhere between George Washington and Francis of
:42:08. > :42:11.Assisi, the anchorman's world of hair spray and platitude is ripe for
:42:12. > :42:16.parody, and few have done it better than Ron Burgandy and his team of
:42:17. > :42:21.anchormen, among them Steve Carrell. They have been talking to him.
:42:22. > :42:32.Linda, I want to introduce you to Ron Burgandy. Hello Mr Burgandy. Oh,
:42:33. > :42:39.black, you're black. I'm terribly sorry I don't know why I can't stop
:42:40. > :42:43.saying... Black. Is this for real Freddie. Linda I'm sorry. So you
:42:44. > :42:50.have a black boss, and is it freaking you out. Are you freaked
:42:51. > :42:58.out? A little bit, to be honest. She has a knife. I think you scared him,
:42:59. > :43:02.you can't shout at him. Anchormen have provided a rich seam of work
:43:03. > :43:07.for you, why is that? I don't know why, the first news-related thing
:43:08. > :43:10.was a show I did in the states called The Daily Show, a mock news
:43:11. > :43:18.show, and I played a mock reporter, it was essentially a die, a roving
:43:19. > :43:24.reporter that would go out and do these stories that were found by our
:43:25. > :43:28.research department. And I had no experience as a journalist and
:43:29. > :43:34.certainly no right to be doing what I was doing. And none of us did. We
:43:35. > :43:39.were actors and impro-advisers, we were completely -- improvisers, we
:43:40. > :43:43.were completely out of our debt, and we would go out and pretend to be
:43:44. > :43:48.legitimate news people and pull the wool over people's eyes. Do you find
:43:49. > :43:53.our industry slightly ludicrous? I think, yes, and I will say that to
:43:54. > :44:01.your face. I think there is a lot of fodder for comedy, I will put it
:44:02. > :44:05.that way. I think that it can be absurd at times. It is a necessity,
:44:06. > :44:12.and it is something that people, news is something that people need.
:44:13. > :44:17.But I think what, specifically in Anchorman 2, the way the news is
:44:18. > :44:21.depicted it is the advent of 24-hour news, there is a lot of time to
:44:22. > :44:27.fill, and there is a lot of inconsequential news. There is a lot
:44:28. > :44:32.of news that is there only to gain ratings. It sort of pokes fun at
:44:33. > :44:39.that aspect of the news. That it is more corporate controlled. And less
:44:40. > :44:46.about actual newsgathering and more about earning the, you know, the
:44:47. > :44:50.ratings priz You are saying corporate-controlled, we are
:44:51. > :44:56.avoiding the word "Murdoch" I didn't say anything! A stab in the dark
:44:57. > :45:02.here, does it feel like a Fox satire? You know I think the, I
:45:03. > :45:07.can't speak for Adam and Will who wrote the script and the template
:45:08. > :45:12.for certain people in the movie are. I'm sure he was one of the
:45:13. > :45:20.inspirations for the corporate head of this conglomerate that runs this
:45:21. > :45:24.new 24-hour news station. With an Australian sound? It is an homage,
:45:25. > :45:30.nothing more. It is certainly not to take anybody down. Does anybody else
:45:31. > :45:37.speak Australian. Can you I get you to say with me "how bloody are you"!
:45:38. > :45:44.The movie isn't a really harsh indictment of news, but but I think
:45:45. > :45:48.it makes some valid and intelligent points about how news has changed
:45:49. > :46:00.over the years. I want to talk about your character, Brick a -- brick, a
:46:01. > :46:04.bit. He's not quite there. Did you feel uncomfortable at all about
:46:05. > :46:09.getting laughs there are someone who is, the old fashioned word is
:46:10. > :46:17."retarreded"? I never thought of him that way I thought of him as ernest
:46:18. > :46:20.and childlike. One of the things I like about the group and the four
:46:21. > :46:23.characters together is there is a real affection between them. There
:46:24. > :46:29.is a real support and there is, you know, they look at Brick as a
:46:30. > :46:36.brother and they are there to help and support him as opposed to say
:46:37. > :46:39.anything or make him feel awkward. Brick is liability when it comes to
:46:40. > :46:42.going on air? They are all liabilities, they are all buffoons,
:46:43. > :46:49.that is the other thing. They are all idiots. And so Brick is just
:46:50. > :46:54.sort of the most niave of the bunch. Thank you so much. Time for us to go
:46:55. > :46:58.now, it emerged today that parts of yesterday's memorial event for
:46:59. > :47:02.Nelson Mandela weren't quite what they seemed. Baffled deaf people
:47:03. > :47:06.there are Canada to China are still trying to work out what the supposed
:47:07. > :47:11.sign language interpreter was saying, the organisers are trying to
:47:12. > :47:14.work out who on earth he was. Because whatever he was doing with
:47:15. > :47:19.his arms, according to people who know it, it wasn't sign language. We
:47:20. > :47:24.had no idea either, so we guessed. Good night.