03/03/2014 Newsnight

America warns it will isolate Russia, if it doesn't back out of

Crimea. But here the UK Government inadvertently shows its hand and

lets slip it has ruled out military action and tough financial sanction.

No wonder he looks confident and in command as he watches the Russian

army flexing their muscles. Here in Sevastopol Ukraine says Russian

forces have surrounded all of its bases on the peninsula, Russia

denies giving the Ukrainians an ultimatum to surrender by morning or

else. We will be live in Kiev asking the new Ukrainian Government what

they are going to do. We will hear from John McCain and voices from

around the world about where the crisis goes next.

The he had case secretary says he doesn't care how posh his cabinet

colleagues are, even if the voters do. It is an English disease to pay

too much attention to where someone went to school. From Benefits

Street, white White Dee, has the show changed her life and what does

the fame mean for her benefits? Good evening, reports tonight that Russia

has issued an ultimatum to the new Government in Ukraine to surrender

or face full military assault. In five hours that ultimate, then

denied by Russia, runs out. Tonight we will ask the interim Government

how it intends to respond. President Obama warned Russia it was on the

wrong side of history and threatened to isolate the superpower. Here a

document that has revealed the UK Government's hand and shows it is

unwilling to contemplate any military action or take tough

financial sanction. We have ask if the west has any power in this

conflict. First, Gabriel Gatehouse has been monitoring events in

Crimea, he joins us live. It is less than five hours now until

this supposed ultimatum runs out. The Ukrainians say they have heard

from Russians and they have been told their bases, now surrounded,

will be stormed if they don't vacate them by 5.00am local time. The

Russians say it is nonsense and they have no intention of doing any such

thing. Whatever the case this has perhaps the desired affect of making

everyone jittery, especially inside the bases. Interestingly, talking to

ordinary people here, despite all of this going on, many people genuinely

do feel pleased towards the presence of Russian forces here. But, they

know this is very, very tense and they know that any park could ignite

something and nobody here wants a war. We also heard today, again from

the Ukrainian authorities, about a supposed build up of Russian troops

on the east of the peninsula, just across Into Russia and many more

Russian troops coming over here, whatever the case we will see that

tomorrow. We have been travelling around the peninsula and seen that

the Russians have many of their own forces here, and many seem to have

come from the Black Sea base here in Sevastopol. Not a shot has been

fired. But in years to come historians may well write that this

was how Russia took back Crimea. What would once have been normal

every day scenes have now taken on a more frightening aspect. Russia's

Black Sea fleet leases its base here in Sevastopol from the Ukrainian

Government. Or at least it did. Now its forces aren't guests any more,

they have become the masters. On the road out of Sevastopol checkpoints

have appeared. These apparently manned by civilians, but they are

flying the Russian flag. Moscow's control now extends across the

peninsula. Ukraine says all of its military bases have been surrounded.

We were south of the capital shortly after the troops arrived. The

Ukrainian commander emerged from negotiations with his unseen Russian

counterpart. I asked him whether any of his men were prepared to

surrender? He told me no-one was surrendering, and it was a Ukrainian

brigade and that's that. And so, the stand-off began. The Russians have

called on the Ukrainians to vacate their bases. For now they are

holding out. Essentially they are prisoners behind their own gates.

The Russian troops are well armed and clearly well disciplined. Their

uniforms hold no clue as to their identity. But no-one is in any doubt

who they are. And many are glad they are here. TRANSLATION: We don't want

people to come here with their Molotov cocktails and create chaos

like they did in the capital. These troops are here to keep us safe. Not

everyone is in agreement. An argument broke out when one man

suggested the Russian soldiers were an occupying force. He was quickly

shouted down. As more Russian supporters arrived, Ukrainian

soldiers watched nervously from the top of the buildings. When we

returned today reinforcements seemed to have arrived, and yet more

flag-waving supporters blocking movement on and off the base. And

so, the Ukrainian troops are relying on locals to rePlehnish their

supplies. We watched a Lada deliver shopping to the besieged Ukrainians

with the tacit agreement of the Russians, every soldier understands

the need to eat. TRANSLATION: Everyone knows perfectly well whom

Crimea belongs to, says I can't imagine these guys are pleased to be

here es. He added that pointing to the Russians. These men are Crimeas

tartares, they fear a Russian takeover. To understand why you have

to come to this place. The capital of the Crimea area when the Tartas

ruled the peninsula from the 16th century, all of that came to the end

with Russia's southward expansion under the Tsars. For many crimian

people this is still their home and repositry of their history.

Katherine the great's conquests is celebrated here as a great

historical event, one that puts Crimea within the Russian umpire for

more than two centuries. But for the cry mean -- the people here, this

was just one in a series of tragedies that be fell them under

Russian rule. This woman is 84 years old, she was 11 when Stalin ordered

the whole population to be deported, he suspected them of collaborating

with the Nazis. They were herded on to freight trains bound for

Uzbekistan. The memory is still painful. The people only returned

after Ukraine gained its independence from the Soviet Union.

She says the thought of another conflict with the Russians is simply

unbearable. She wouldn't wish it on her worst enemy, just let there not

be war, she says. This evening Ukrainian naval officers began

barricading themselves inside their head quarters in anticipation of a

possible Russian assault. Earlier they gathered in the parade ground,

to hear an appeal from their new Admiral, not to heed Russian calls

to abandon their posts. They tried to break our lines of communication,

to break our lines of supply and to, they do a severe psychological

pressure on our personnel to betray our motherland. Many people here are

deeply suspicious of the new Government in Kiev, and the way in

which the previous one was overthrown. Russia may have lost an

ally when Viktor Yanukovych was toppled in Kiev, but in a sense they

got what they really needed out of him. One of the first things

Yanukovych did when he came into office in 2010 was to extend

Moscow's lease on this base, right into the middle of this century.

There were those Ukrainian politicians on the nationalist side

who argued against it and said this base was a Trojan horse, and so

indeed it has turned out to be. Not for the first time in history,

Crimea finds itself at an epicentre of conflict with great global

powers. While the west scrambles to calibrate a response, Russia is busy

creating facts on the ground. In Washington tonight, could we be

seeing signals of a tougher stance. President Obama's ambassador to the

UN promised to stand strongly and proudly with the people of Ukraine

at the UN Security Council meeting tonight. We will pass to Washington

and speak to John McCain, the former Republican Presidential Candidate

who sits on the Senate foreign relations committee. Thank you very

much for joining us. Are you hearing tough words from America tonight?

I'm hearing a lot of rhetoric, so far the only action to be taken is

to boycott the preparatory meeting to take place of the G8. There is a

lot of rhetoric, but I frankly don't see a lot of action. What do you

think should happen? I think we should do a lot of things, beginning

with a fundamental revamping of our policy towards Mr Putin. Our

President has been incredibly niave in his dealings with him. The reset,

the overheard conversation with him and Medevev, saying tell him he

would be more flexible. This is not east-west or Cold War, Mr Putin said

the greatest disaster of the 20th century was the fall of the Soviet

Union. He believes this is east-west, he believes it is Cold

War and he believes that Crimea and particularly the base is essential

to the old Russian empire which he continues to seek. How do you

respond to western powers who will rule out military I engagment, or

indeed tough financial sanctions? I rule out military action, it is just

not an option that would be viable. This is the result of five years

niave relations with Russia. If the Europeans decide that the economic

considerations are too important to then impose severe sanctions on

Vladimir Putin, which you get from the statement from Angela Merkel

today, then they are ignoring the lessons of history. If Vladimir

Putin is allowed to take this Crimea, because of protecting

"Russian population", do you remember back in the 1930s when

Hitler took Czechoslovakia and other places because of the German

population, and finally could I say there are significant Russian

populations in the Baltic countries and Poland and Romania. Russia will

say at this point that the west stood by whilst a democratically

elected Government in Ukraine was overthrown, not even stood by, but

supported that coup? I think that when you see what Yanukovych did

with his corruption and his repression and killing of people, he

forfeited all legitimacy in the eyes of anybody who has been objective

view. They can say that pigs fly, but the fact that Yanukovych

forfeited any claim he may have it to governing the country. Tonight we

saw developments from the UK Government, inadvertently, that

showed they were not for now supporting trade sanctions or

closing the financial centre to Russians, is that the right

approach? Of course not. Of course not. I'm not astonished, to be frank

with you. Disappointed but not astonished. Here in the United

States we have a bill which targets people with sanctions and with

penalties who are responsible. We can renew the missile defence

systems that we abandoned in an attempt to appease Putin and in the

Czech Republic and Poland. I think we can do a lot of things, if

necessary, unilaterally. Thank you very much indeed for your time for

joining us this evening. Our diplomatic editor joins me now,

and we have also been looking at the market implications. There is

diplomatic embarrassment here, certainly for the Government from

those documents that were spied, that essentially, removed some key

tools? Well, you have a situation and let as face it, it is not a new

one, where the members of the EU in particular, there was a foreign

ministers meeting today in Brussels of the EU not agreeing on the way

forward. You have Poland in particular in both EU and NATO

insitsing that people address this -- insisting that people address

this question and in a resolute American. On the other side of the

equation we know in this meeting, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands

were all against taking sanctions against Russia. Having heard all

that we see the documents, glimpsed on the way into Downing Street for a

National Security Council meeting, excluding on the one hand anything

that would have a negative effect on trade relations between the two

countries, and then, with regard to what NATO might do, ruling out even

planning for some sort of military preparation. Even the window

dressing, if you like, was ruled out by the British Government. In this

situation, once again, we look at precedents like the Balkan wars,

people will look to the Americans, and judging from the language being

used in the UN tonight by their ambassador and by President Obama

today, there is more likely to be some substantive American movement

on this issue, perhaps Magnitski act or clauses, perhaps something that

goes the G8 issue. I think we should look to Washington in the next day

or two on this. Laura, I'm wondering how relevant any of these threened

sanctions are from bodies and Governments when the facts on the

ground in terms of the markets are so stark? As the diplomacy grinds

away ineffectively, the markets are different, they are live beasts. We

have seen a harsher verdict on what is going on and Putin's credibility.

The rouble fell to record lose, Russian stocks had huge amounts of

money wiped off them. On the streets of Russian cities there were stories

of exchange booths running out of dollars, as some Russians themselves

sought to get their roubles out and turn them into a safe currency. We

are kidding ourselves if we think this is some how happening in

isolation. One former director of the Bank of England says he thinks

it is certain Ukraine will default. One of our biggest companies, BP,

huge stakeholder in the biggest oil company in the world. It lost huge

amounts of value from its company today. The biggest thing is oil

prices, already in the last couple of weeks they have been shoved up.

That has been impact on almost everything, our FTSE, the French,

the German markets. The markets are nervy and they don't like it. This

is hurting Russia too, what does Putin's end game become. We have

heard several things where is it going? The whole question is so

repleat with history. We saw in Gabriel Gatehouse's report, the

sense in which Ukraine and Crimea are part of Russia's history. There

are people in Russia who want to reabsorb the country, that is

clearly not on the cards in the near future. I think the key things that

Russia wants in the near future is to have an important influence in

the shaping of this country and of the Government that follows. Some

people think they are trying to get the constitution turned into a more

federal one, where Russian speak he is in the east of the country have

far more -- speakers in the east of the country have far more influence

and can influence decision making in the Ukraine. With Crimea with

separate status within Ukraine, the question has to be open whether that

will be in some sense absorbed by Russia. That's the theory, what do

those on the front line make of it. Joining me down the line from Kiev

is Ukraine's interim economics minister. Was there an ultimatum,

what did you understand by it earlier today? Can you repeat the

question once again? We understood there was an ultimatum issued from

Russia? It seems like the ultimatum has expired and nothing serious has

happened. We survived the first ultimatum, it is not the first and

won't be the last one. How do you read what Russia has done so far? We

read if that is not an intervention, then what is? How will you respond?

We respond like during the last week, keeping calm, we believe that

this escalation has to be deescalated. Exclusively and only

through the peaceful means. Through negotiations, through the

discussions, we want to figure out what is the reason of this

escalation. The Ukraine is governing itself. Like any other nation it

discusses in a democratic way, we don't really understand why Russia

is so concerned. Russia is on your military base, do you call that

negotiation? Well we do not particularly like that Russia is at

our military bases, it should be at its own military base. How far will

you let Russia go before you take action we really hope that Russia

will seize these actions. These unfriendly actions. Come on, we live

together, virtually peacefully almost through the whole history

that we had. We are brotherly and orthodox nations, so I think that it

is some kind of you know, we treat it as some kind of misunderstanding

maybe Russia did not read properly the signals and events happening in

Kiev. For some reason they took it as the offence against them as if

they were moving completely westward, against Russia, which is

absolutely not true. What was happening in the main square in

Midan is our absolutely internal issue, we were just protesting

against the corruption and against the violation of human rights and

actually killing human lives. That is what we are protesting against.

Let me just clarify then, it sounds from what you are saying that you

are ruling out any kind of military response to what is going that there

now, is that right? The Ukrainian Government does not plan to use any

kind of military response because we do not believe it is the right way

to solve the issue. This issue should be solved only through

peaceful means. We are being provoked already for five or six

days, and I really command the calm and the strength of the Ukrainian

forces that did not allow to be provoked.

Let's hear now from the Kremlin former adviser, and Ming Campbell.

We did have the former US Ambassador but he has sadly just left our

studio without an explanation, perhaps we can shed a bit more light

on that. You have heard the charge against you, five or six days of

provokation on sovereign Ukraine land. What is Russia doing there?

First of all you are forgetting that we have had a coup in Kiev. Which

was financed and encouraged and senator McCain was there during the

protests, encouraging those protesters to continue. With

protesters killed on the streets? And protestors shooting at police,

and by the way 20 police dead means protesters were armed. We have to

stop and count the dead people. I think the problem here is this,

everyone is asking what is President Putin's end game, I would like to

ask in return what is the west's end gam What is the end game of the

Government in now in Ukraine because it was waiting for billions to come

from the west. And now it doesn't know what to do. All day the

ultimatum the western press was banging on about, it was denied by

the minister of defence in Russia and said it was nonsense, yet it was

reported all day. You are showing the Security Council of the UN

gathering, who called for that meeting? Russia, not a word

anywhere. Let me set something straight, Yanukovych wrote to Russia

saying military action is visible in the Ukraine in Crimea, is this is

what happened? Yanukovych it doesn't matter what he wrote. He was the

legitimate President and Joan thrown by a coup. What he wrote, if he was

a legitimate President what he wrote was obviously of significance. What

do we want? We want the people of Ukraine to have the opportunity to

determine their own future without the influence of Russia. And of

course we know, last time round, it was south Ossetia, there is always

an excuse for intervention for political reasons. I think it is

inexcusable in the UK that a document is photographed going into

Downing Street. It is particularly significant in this case, since

military options are ruled out and there are not many shots in the

locker but economic sanctions would be one of those. That was foolish on

two counts? You show your hand in a democratic exchange of this kind

uncertainty is enormously important and significant. Particularly when

we hear that the Moscow Stock Exchange has collapsed and the

rouble is under severe pressure, the economy is the soft underbelly of

Russia in this matter. I wonder how you think this is going for Putin

now, when you look at the state of Gazprom shares or the rouble, is

this going according to plan? Putin had to respond. It would have been

political suicide for Putin not to respond. It could be economic

suicide the way he's going? That would be a disaster. A

western-backed coup would have been a disaster. A western-backed

disaster? The credibility of the country is not based on President

Putin. There is a breach of the United Nations charter, they are

talking about regime change. These are the very people when it came to

President Assad's regime in Syria, allow me to finish. What about Libya

and Syria. Let him finish his point. You can't talk about that on Ukraine

on your conscience there is Iraq, Libya and Syria, I'm sorry. I have a

conscience about Iraq and I will not take any challenge to the contrary

from you. But these are the people who when it came to trying to deal

with President Assad's regime said they, went out of their way to veto

or said they would veto any suitable UN resolution. Why? Because they

said it would amount to regime change, they are practising regime

change at the moment. There is me moral authority with Putin's actions

it looked like bare-chested thuggery? No it doesn't, nobody is

planning to invade. They have invaded. So this is not invasion? Of

course it is not an invasion. What do you call this when you occupy or

stand on the edge of every single military installation? I would call

an invasion is Kiev when armed thugs were killing policemen and troops.

Did you hear any shot fired in Crimea, or anyone hurt or anything.

The reason the bases are surrounded because in other cities in the

Ukraine they stole arms from those bases. This is a very strange set of

affairs, we have not had one shot? That's a good thing. We shouldn't be

surprised by that. Of course I'm responding to this here? Because in

circumstances like those we are talking about, provokation or

miscalculation can result in a shot. If we have one shot we will probably

have a conflag grace. Does it tell you that Putin's approach is a

benign one if he doesn't want to make sure of the people of Crimea? I

must say the use of the word "benign" in these circumstances does

take me aback. The garrisons are being surrounded, people are being

told by their commanding officer they have to give up their loyalty

to Kiev, give up their loyalty to Ukraine and subordinate that loyalty

to Putin and those acting on his behalf. That is not benign in any

circumstance. Where is safe, if Crimea is not safe from this kind of

approach, where else in the Ukraine is safe, are there any borders?

Crimea is part of the country. Because not a single time in the

past the people of Crimea were given a chance for a referendum,

Khrushchev, a murderous thug, hold on, threw away Crimea to the

Ukraine, you know why? Because he killed and presided over the MRDers

of so many Ukrainians, he had to give them a President. Nobody asked

the people in Crimea where theyn't wanted to be, they were given them

away. Nobody asked the people of Georgia, or South Ossetia, they

should have been the subject of a Russian takeover. I'm sorry. They

were provoked. It was with American money and weapons. They were

provoked into doing it, you know that.

We will leave it there, thank you very much we understand that John

Bolton had a prior engagment he had to hurry away to.

The English are obsessed with their old school, suggested the Education

Secretary today, calling the habit an English disease. Michael Gove

defended the number of old Eatonians in the cabinet, and said it was

indefensible that so many actors and board members were privately

educated. He dismissed his critics of state schools as being a bit di

As far as higher education is going on the visit to Formula One

manufacturers, McLaren, he told us that middle-class parents should

aspire for their children to be apprentices and insists businesses

provided more places. You have said this morning there is no excuse for

businesses not to take on apprentices, what happens if they

don't? Business has said in the past, apprenticeships have been too

bureaucratic and the method of funding apprenticeships hasn't

necessarily suited us. We have removed that. There is no excuse.

And if businesses choose not to engage they will have to justify

themselves in the public square. Should there be any comeback. You

say they ought to justify themselves in the public square, what do you

mean, should there be comeback for those who want to engage? It

shouldn't be that we penalise them, it is in the self-interest of any

company to engage with the apprenticeship programme. We should

ask business what they are doing to play a bigger part in the education

system. In policy terms I would say it is a nudge rather than a direct

intervention. If you look at a Rolls-Royce or British air he row

space apprenticeships, it is better to go there than a university. It is

a superior option to university, it provides not just an experience of

the work place and income, but also with the level of intellectual

challenge greater than some universities. Many apprenticeships

are noin that sphere. Today advertised on the Internet swathes

of apprenticeships, they were jobs but are now apprenticeships paying

?2. 90. Are you saying you want parents to aspire to that for their

children in the same way as they would aspire to universities?

Absolutely situate rite that parents should want their children to have

the option certainly to go to university, at the same time I don't

think there is anything wrong and there is a lot that's admirable

about saying you want to experience the world of work. You are in a

sense trying to change aspiration. You in your speech made a link

between vocational and academic education and working and

middle-class children. It is a class issue isn't it? We have had, I

think, a damaging view in this country that success, narrowly

designed as academic success, is only available to a limited number.

As you know, that view doesn't hold and hasn't held in other countries

from Scotland to Singapore. It is not a class issue, it is an England

issue. It is one we have to overcome if we're going to make sure that

every child achieves their full potential. Specifically an English

issue in your view? It is an English problem that we have not valued the

practical and technical in the same way as we value the academic. I

think it is an English issue that we have an unequal education system,

with opportunity distributed in such a way as to mean that children who

go to independent fee-paying schools and the best state schools have many

more opportunities than children who have gone to other state schools,

but that is changing. Some people might suggest that the picture has

gone into reverse around the cabinet table, even many of your own MPs

believe that the very top bracket of politics, the cabinet table and the

Prime Minister's team is far too dominated by those who have been

privately educated? It is a consequence, isn't t of the

education system that we have inherited. David Cameron isn't

responsible for the school to which he went, neither is George Osborne.

The fact that we had social mobility go backwards in this country was a

consequence of some mistic it is a we made in the education system in

the 1960s and 1970s. Are you suggesting there aren't people with

equivalent abilities in the rest of the Conservative Party. There are

many Conservative backbenchers who argue this is a problem? There are

certainly people, it is an English disease to pay too close attention

to where someone went to school, but, since we are, if you are

sitting round the cabinet stable, then some of the voices who are most

influential come from those people who have not come from guilded and

privileged backgrounds. It is defensible to have so many private

companies run by public schoolgirls and boys. Is it defensible that so

many actors, sports stars to whom our children are encouraged to

aspire come from private schools. It is not defensible, of course, so we

need to change. Does it disappoint you that the warm-up for the next

Conservative leadership contest, which is evidenced all over the

place now also seems to be playing out between two public school boys?

I'm not aware of any speculation about leadership other than the

choice between David Cameron and Ed Miliband in the next election.

Haven't you been reading the papers? You will have to quote me the

speculation, the only leadership question that counts is whether or

not we want David Cameron or Ed Miliband leading this country after

the next election. You described in this speech this extraordinary place

as being like a Bond villain's layer. Do you care that quite

significant swathes of the educational establishment,

professional people, see you as a bit of a villain in terms of what

you are doing, does it bother you? I don't go out of my way to solicit or

invite opposition, you will never get unanimity about any set of

political changes until after the politician driving them through has

long left the field. The argument I find is that some people say

sometimes your changes are too great in scope and introduced too rapidly.

But no-one, that I'm a ware of, has been -- aware of has been able to

argue against higher standards in schools, more autonomy for head

teachers, and or rigorous exams. The opposition you allude to tend to be

the inertia of defenders of the status quo, rather than a desection

of anything we are doing. -- desection of anything we are doing.

She was the biggest thing to come out of Benefits Street, a Channel

four reality show that showed one street in Birmingham that rocked to

infamy. Today we ask White Dee, the self-styled mother of the street

what she made of the show and how it has changed her life and community.

She has been described as the Queen of Benefits Street, the one-woman

citizens advice bureau, and the patron saint of drug addicts and

dropouts. White Dee became the star of Benefits Street with their fourth

right advice on everything, from staying sober to dealing with the

benefits office. Suspending your claim because there is a change in

your income. Don't worry about it. The self-pro-claimed mother of

Benefits Street, a convicted street who has been out of work for seven

years, has divided opinion and generated headlines almost as much

as the series itself. Since it has broadcast, the show has triggered

impassions debate, about the exploitation of poor people for

entertainment, the rights and wrongs of the benefit system in its

entirety. And whether or not the show's protaganists were misled

about the show. It was clear about the nature of the programme, why

they were and the end product. What does the unlikely celebrity at the

heart of it, now with a PR manager, calling her a "working-class hero",

really feel about how they were portrayed. With news of a music

deal, a plus size modelling opportunity and Big Brother house,

and a chance to become an MP, what now for White Dee and her benefits.

How has your life changed over the last couple of months? It hasn't

personally changed in the way that I'm still, you know, I'm still a mum

of two children. But it is like being thrown into the limelight when

you are just not completely, you are not used to it at all, is just a

real shock. Does it feel like -- Does it feel like things are better

or worse? Busier, I wouldn't say better. Everyone knows you, the

street has turned into a bit of a tourist attraction. You cannot drive

up and down that road on a Saturday or a Sunday. So this is the poverty

porn in action is it, do you understand why that phrase came

about? Not particularly. We still dispute the fact and we would argue

to Channel four that at no time whatsoever did they tell us it was

in any way related to benefits. With regards to "poverty porn", we don't

class ourselves as in poverty. We are fine we survive with the help

and support of each other. So they never told you it was about

benefits? No they did not. When did they tell you it was going to be

called Benefits Street? About two weeks before the show aired. It

wasn't done officially. Somebody just let slip that it was called

Benefits Street and that's when we all went absolutely mad. We went...

What did you think it would be called? They asked us for

suggestions as to what maybe we think the show would be called. Some

said Friends With Benefits, others said We Will Survive. The kids made

their Ghetto This, the teenagers. Why bother asking us if they knew

what they were going to call it. When you found out it was going to

be called Benefits Street, you said you went mad. Did anyone try to

change that or pull the show or step in? Obviously we hadn't viewed the

episodes by the time, when we actually found out it was going to

be called benefits street. We did make calls to Channel four and Love

Production. Not just me a few of the residents. At the end of the day

they had named the show what they wanted to name the show. So no

matter what we did, they had no intentions of pulling it or renaming

it. They told us that this was a fair and balanced reflection of life

on the street, would you go with that? No. What would you call it?

How could it be fair and balanced when basically all they are doing is

focussing on four or five people. Most of the people they have

focussed on don't actually live on the street. They spent time with

many a working couple, pensioners. So they didn't live on the street?

No, they did, but quite a few people that were shown in the programme

don't live on the street. They told us that contributors were briefed

extensively before the show was aired. And they had been in regular

contact since? They didn't brief us extensively about the name of the

show. They briefed you about the show? No, basically we have a local

councillor who has written confirmation saying the show is

about community spirit. There are quite a few people who have it in

writing what the show was supposedly about and it wasn't benefits. At the

end of this experience, how do you view Channel 4 and the show itself

then? They were very clever. Obviously we can't regret. We have

done it, it has happened. People are talking about it. But basically I

think it is just the fact that it is sort of them against us. You know.

We have no reason to lie, you never said it to us. Did they lie to you?

Yes they did. People will be watching this and saying you, many

on your street have done pretty well from this, you have rocketed to

fame, you must be making money from this now aren't you? Not

necessarily. It is, a lot of people do presume, they presume that the

second you appear on the telly, all of a sudden you are getting money.

It doesn't work like that. Am I getting paid for sitting here

tonight? Your agent said that you have had a lot of offers as a result

of this? I have had a lot of offers, yeah. Are those offers that you are

getting paid for? Not all of them, no. But you are getting paid now? If

I accepted the offers then yes I would, I haven't accepted anything

at all at the moment. So you haven't made any money yet from this? As of

this precise moment in time, no. Why not? Because I don't know, it is

like if someone offers me to go on a radio station, basically I will go

on the radio station. I'm having to justify myself. And say what you

have seen is a little bit of my life. You are still on benefits now,

do you intend to stay on benefits? Not if I start getting an income. Is

that the direction you would like to go in now, you would like to earn

money from this now and come off benefits? Not necessarily from this.

But obviously I would like to get a job, yeah. A lot of people will be

watching and saying hang on a second, you are on ?214 a week, why

carry on claiming those when you, offers have been coming in, we know,

we have spoken to your agent that says there are offers on the table

now which could mean you could leave the life behind, why wouldn't you

take that? I don't want to leave my life behind. Your life on benefits

though? That is a different kettle of fish. Just because there are

offers on the table it doesn't mean I'm going to get money today,

tomorrow or next week. But you are still getting money from the

taxpayer then as things stand? I'm still on benefits because I'm not

receiving any other income at the moment. You have been asked to be on

Big Brother, is that something you will take up? Not necessarily. I

have a lot to think about, it is like they have approached, they

haven't made any offer. I don't know any figures involved. I haven't

signed anything. What about other jobs, the doors must be open to you

to do a lot of other things now. Are you applying for other jobs now? I'm

not applying for jobs at the moment. I still have my down days and up

days. I have just been thrown into the public and I just I'm not 100%

sure how to cope with it, I have never been in this situation before

with people wanting to talk to you and interview you and I have just

never, you know, it at thes completely new to me -- it's

completely new to me. Thank you for coming and talking to

us. We're going to take you through a look at some of the papers before

we da tonight. There is one which has taken the front page of the

Daily Mail. Child porn Number Ten aide arrested. They are saying one

of David Cameron's closest aides has resigned after being arrested on

child pornography allegations. Perhaps we can go to Laura. You have

been looking at this, can you shed any more light? Number Ten has

confirmed that one of David Cameron's advisers, Patrick Rock,

the deputy director of policy was arrested in the middle of last month

over allegations of child pornography and potential abuses

relating to child abuse imagery. He resigned immediately and not in his

post, Number Ten has arranged for police officers to go in and look at

files or IT that they see as being appropriate. From what we understand

there were previous allegations of harassment made against Mr Rock

while he was working in Downing Street where he has been since 2011.

Not associated to these potential charges, but interesting

nonetheless. This is tricky, embarrassing loss for Number Ten.

Not just because of the humiliation of the police having to go into

Downing Street over such kinds of allegations and also because when he

went into Downing Street he was seen as someone well trusted. He had been

in the Conservative Party for a long time and had been close to David

Cameron for a long time. They were special advisers together back in

the late 1990s. This is an embarrassment and blow for the Prime

Minister. , the I arrest of his -- the arrest of his fixer, Patrick

Rock. Any word from him th evening? No official statement. One of the

things that makes it doubly awkward is he was involved in advising the

Prime Minister on child internet pornography. Anything awkward but

right to point out we have no official statement from Mr Rock

himself. That is all for tonight, but Kirsty is here with much more

tomorrow. From all of us here good night.