Browse content similar to 16/06/2016. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Just before one o'clock today, Jo Cox, MP for Batley and Spen breath, | :00:07. | :00:22. | |
was attacked near Birstall. I am now sadly informing issue has died from | :00:23. | :00:24. | |
her injuries. The murder of a sitting MP | :00:25. | :00:26. | |
in her constituency near Leeds, the first in this country | :00:27. | :00:28. | |
for over two decades. Jo Cox had not been in parliament | :00:29. | :00:31. | |
for long, but was a good example of a how accessible | :00:32. | :00:34. | |
and down to earth MPs can be. across from the library | :00:35. | :00:36. | |
where Jo Cox was murdered and a little over a mile | :00:37. | :00:41. | |
from where she was born. We'll have reaction from the local | :00:42. | :00:44. | |
area and I'll talking to the MP Angela Smith - one of Jo Cox's | :00:45. | :00:47. | |
close friends and colleagues, And we'll ask if it's time to give | :00:48. | :00:51. | |
MPs more security and more respect, Also tonight, we look at child | :00:52. | :00:57. | |
marriage in Bangladesh, where one in two girls are married | :00:58. | :01:04. | |
before reaching adulthood. It's not a day for arguing, | :01:05. | :01:22. | |
campaigning, and definitely not a day for | :01:23. | :01:24. | |
insulting political opponents. Politicians put differences aside | :01:25. | :01:27. | |
today in light of the fatal attack The first murder of a sitting MP | :01:28. | :01:30. | |
since the death of Ian Gow It left Westminster - | :01:31. | :01:36. | |
and much of the country - in shock. Yes, politics can be brutal, | :01:37. | :01:41. | |
but we pride ourselves on keeping it largely free | :01:42. | :01:44. | |
of personal violence. And indeed, we pride ourselves | :01:45. | :01:48. | |
on our ability to prevent the violent or mentally | :01:49. | :01:51. | |
ill obtaining guns. Jo Cox was a popular MP, | :01:52. | :01:53. | |
one who had worked for Oxfam before A perfect example to remind us that | :01:54. | :01:56. | |
whatever bile is thrown at the political class, | :01:57. | :02:01. | |
many are down to earth, Far from cutting themselves off | :02:02. | :02:03. | |
from the population at large, indeed, that is an issue that | :02:04. | :02:10. | |
will perhaps be examined now. Before we go to Yorkshire, | :02:11. | :02:15. | |
here's Nick Watt on Jo Cox herself. And whilst we celebrate our | :02:16. | :02:29. | |
diversity, the thing that surprises me time and again as I travel around | :02:30. | :02:33. | |
the constituency is that we are far more united and have far more in | :02:34. | :02:38. | |
common than that which divides us. British politics was brought to a | :02:39. | :02:41. | |
sudden standstill today when one of the shining lights of the next | :02:42. | :02:47. | |
generation was extinguished. Jo was full of love, love for her family, | :02:48. | :02:53. | |
love for her constituency, love for her job, she loved being an MP, and | :02:54. | :02:57. | |
love for the issues she campaigned so tirelessly on and for that love | :02:58. | :03:04. | |
to be destroyed in a mindless attack, a premeditated attack, | :03:05. | :03:07. | |
motivated it appears by hate, is absolutely sick. In a brief | :03:08. | :03:11. | |
statement this afternoon, police confirmed that Jo Cox, who had only | :03:12. | :03:15. | |
been the Labour MP for Batley and Spen for just over a year, had | :03:16. | :03:20. | |
become the first MP to be murdered since the IRA blew up Ian Gow in a | :03:21. | :03:26. | |
car bomb attack in 1990. Just before 1pm today, Jo Cox, MP for Batley and | :03:27. | :03:33. | |
Spen, was attacked in market Street, Birstall. I am now very sad to | :03:34. | :03:39. | |
report that she has died from her injuries. The Lord is my shepherd, I | :03:40. | :03:45. | |
shall not once... Not since the death of the late Labour leader John | :03:46. | :03:50. | |
Smith in 1994 has there been such a genuine outpouring of grief amongst | :03:51. | :03:54. | |
MPs across the spectrum at the loss of one of their own. The whole of | :03:55. | :04:00. | |
the Labour family are devastated tonight. Jo Cox has been killed | :04:01. | :04:04. | |
doing her duty, doing her work, as a constituency MP. She is somebody who | :04:05. | :04:10. | |
dedicated her life to human rights and to justice and she leaves behind | :04:11. | :04:15. | |
two young children, two young children who will never grow up to | :04:16. | :04:22. | |
see them again. They can be proud of what she was, they can be proud of | :04:23. | :04:27. | |
what she did and they can be very proud of everything that she stood | :04:28. | :04:32. | |
for. She was a bright star, no doubt about it. A star for her | :04:33. | :04:35. | |
constituents, a star in Parliament and right across the House. | :04:36. | :04:40. | |
Campaigning was suspended in the EU referendum and George Osborne ripped | :04:41. | :04:43. | |
up his annual Mansion house speech to remove any mention of Europe. | :04:44. | :04:48. | |
Instead, he paid a moving tribute to Jo Cox. Jo fought to help the | :04:49. | :04:54. | |
refugees from the Syrian civil war and she gave a voice to those who | :04:55. | :04:59. | |
are the leader whose cry for help she felt was not being heard -- to | :05:00. | :05:03. | |
those whose cry the help she felt was not being heard. The changed | :05:04. | :05:07. | |
attitudes and I noted contributed to a change in policy. She will never | :05:08. | :05:12. | |
know how many lives she helped transform. Today, doing their job, | :05:13. | :05:17. | |
she senselessly lost her own life. As a former head of policy at Oxfam, | :05:18. | :05:22. | |
Jo Cox was admired by colleagues as a passionate campaigner, but she was | :05:23. | :05:25. | |
not afraid to challenge her own party, as she did last autumn when | :05:26. | :05:29. | |
she said there was a strong case for military intervention in Syria. Jo | :05:30. | :05:36. | |
was not afraid of speaking out and standing up for what she believed | :05:37. | :05:41. | |
in. She was a strong campaigner. This evening, her husband Brendan | :05:42. | :05:45. | |
Cox hailed his wife's work, but reminded the country, in a | :05:46. | :05:49. | |
statement, that while she would be remembered as a great campaigner, | :05:50. | :05:52. | |
her first thoughts were always with their children. He said... | :05:53. | :06:13. | |
The dignity of the response to Jo Cox's death stands in stark contrast | :06:14. | :06:21. | |
to the intense and sometimes ugly whirlwind of political battles. | :06:22. | :06:25. | |
Perhaps the pause for reflection will lead to a kind of politics. -- | :06:26. | :06:30. | |
a kinder politics. Well, the murder occurred | :06:31. | :06:32. | |
in broad daylight, on the streets of Birstall, | :06:33. | :06:34. | |
outside the town's library. There are lots of questions | :06:35. | :06:37. | |
about the mental health and potential far right | :06:38. | :06:39. | |
links of the suspect. Jo Cox wanted to be as accessible | :06:40. | :06:41. | |
as possible to her constituents many of whom she would have | :06:42. | :06:47. | |
known since childhood. Today, she came to this library | :06:48. | :06:52. | |
to her monthly surgery, it would have been advertised, | :06:53. | :06:54. | |
no appointment was necessary. Here she would have felt | :06:55. | :06:58. | |
in no danger as she dealt There is a huge sense of disbelief | :06:59. | :07:01. | |
and profound sadness John Sweeney has been speaking | :07:02. | :07:10. | |
to people in the town. And has the story of how the day | :07:11. | :07:13. | |
unfolded. Tonight, a brilliant star of British | :07:14. | :07:21. | |
politics lies dead. Instead of life and argument, Jo Cox is commemorated | :07:22. | :07:28. | |
by candlelight. How could it be that anyone would want to murder this | :07:29. | :07:32. | |
mother of two? The prime suspect is Tommy Mair. No one we have spoken to | :07:33. | :07:37. | |
ever suspected he might be capable of murder. What is so extraordinary | :07:38. | :07:43. | |
about the murder of Jo Cox is that everything has happened very | :07:44. | :07:46. | |
locally. The killing itself took place about a mile from here, but | :07:47. | :07:51. | |
this is the home of the suspect behind me. As you can see, there are | :07:52. | :07:55. | |
a couple of police officers and behind them, some forensic officers | :07:56. | :07:58. | |
who are obviously going through the House. I have spoken to some of the | :07:59. | :08:03. | |
neighbours, they knew this man, the suspect. They say he is quiet, | :08:04. | :08:08. | |
ordinary, no trouble. One of them said she saw him walk past her house | :08:09. | :08:14. | |
this morning. Nobody here can understand how one of their | :08:15. | :08:17. | |
community could have done this thing. Jo, the Labour MP for Batley | :08:18. | :08:24. | |
and Spen, was talking to constituents in the local library | :08:25. | :08:28. | |
when the assault began around 1pm today. I heard a loud noise behind | :08:29. | :08:35. | |
me, it sounded like a car backfiring. Obviously became aware | :08:36. | :08:39. | |
it was a gunshot. As I turned around to look at what the noise was, I | :08:40. | :08:43. | |
heard a woman screaming and a guy was bent over the woman, I could see | :08:44. | :08:49. | |
her leg sticking out, it looks like a gun in his hand. He proceeded | :08:50. | :08:52. | |
again to shoot her on the floor. She was crawling away. Two men were | :08:53. | :08:57. | |
wrestling the man. He then wielded the knife. The killing of Jo Cox | :08:58. | :09:03. | |
occurred as far as we can tie with foresight. Immediately behind the | :09:04. | :09:07. | |
library was where Jo was talking to her constituents. A man assaulted | :09:08. | :09:12. | |
her. She ran down the hill and there was a kind of running battle. Her | :09:13. | :09:15. | |
shoes and handbags were taken away by the forensic people a bit ago. | :09:16. | :09:23. | |
Then she turns right into a car park and that is where she -- he stabs, | :09:24. | :09:28. | |
that is when she goes down. The words I heard him say it were | :09:29. | :09:33. | |
"Britain first" or "Put Britain first", but Britain first was what | :09:34. | :09:37. | |
he was saying, he said it at least twice. Jo Cox was certified dead at | :09:38. | :09:42. | |
1:48pm. Steven Lees has known the suspect Tommy Mair since childhood. | :09:43. | :09:47. | |
Sometimes in the shop I could see his hands were red raw and maybe his | :09:48. | :09:51. | |
face and his forehead was a bit red and his brother used to tell me when | :09:52. | :09:54. | |
he had been gardening or cooking or something like that, he would attack | :09:55. | :09:58. | |
his hands and his face and his head with a nail brush, to clean himself. | :09:59. | :10:06. | |
So much that he hurt himself? He would rub the skin off. Where was | :10:07. | :10:12. | |
his politics, did he talk politics to you? He would never talk | :10:13. | :10:16. | |
politics. I never once thought he was into politics. He didn't seem | :10:17. | :10:19. | |
the type to be into politics. I never heard him express any opinions | :10:20. | :10:25. | |
about politics. So a loner, odd, peculiar, but not to the people who | :10:26. | :10:30. | |
knew him a killer. Over the coming days, we will learn more about the | :10:31. | :10:36. | |
killing of Jo Cox. Only one thing is absolutely clear tonight. Our | :10:37. | :10:41. | |
country has lost a brave and singular politician. | :10:42. | :10:45. | |
Well I am joined the now here in Birstall by one of Jo Cox's good | :10:46. | :10:52. | |
friends and colleagues, Angela Smith. I'm so sorry for your loss | :10:53. | :10:57. | |
tonight. Hard-working, popular, how would you describe her? Jo was just | :10:58. | :11:04. | |
a very warm, lively, engaging personality and everybody who met | :11:05. | :11:09. | |
her just became friends with her almost instantly. You know, it was | :11:10. | :11:13. | |
never hard to get to know Jo, never difficult. She always had plenty to | :11:14. | :11:18. | |
say. Some politicians now are criticised the coming straight into | :11:19. | :11:22. | |
politics, she had a huge career, policy director at Oxfam, work on | :11:23. | :11:25. | |
the White ribbon campaign and maternal deaths. Absolutely and her | :11:26. | :11:31. | |
personality actually made her very effective campaign and I have spoken | :11:32. | :11:34. | |
to many people today who actually would say that Jo was at the | :11:35. | :11:47. | |
forefront of the battle to get the 0.7% of GDP aunts aid spending. She | :11:48. | :11:56. | |
went out to dar four and helped this country build a consensus around | :11:57. | :12:00. | |
this, she fought for women's writes, for women refugees who were raped | :12:01. | :12:03. | |
and assaulted and all of her life, she has done that and that is what | :12:04. | :12:07. | |
makes today so tragic in many ways. We have lost Jo as a human being but | :12:08. | :12:12. | |
we have also lost a fantastic campaigner. Also, what I was saying | :12:13. | :12:16. | |
at the very beginning, reading about her, she was so determined to be | :12:17. | :12:21. | |
accessible. So people would walk into her surgery, she didn't want to | :12:22. | :12:25. | |
feel she was apart from the people she had grown up with. That is right | :12:26. | :12:29. | |
and I think most of us want to work that way. I do appointments in my | :12:30. | :12:33. | |
surgeries. We all want to be as open as possible and we are not going to | :12:34. | :12:36. | |
close the doors to our constituents. We all do the job the way we feel | :12:37. | :12:42. | |
most comfortable with. But do you feel that MPs, in recent years, are | :12:43. | :12:47. | |
more vulnerable and people feel they can have a go at them, have an issue | :12:48. | :12:52. | |
with them? You get a lot of that online, you get a lot of e-mails and | :12:53. | :12:56. | |
stuff on social media in that vein, but actually when you meet most | :12:57. | :13:00. | |
people face-to-face, they are absolutely fine and one thing I am | :13:01. | :13:05. | |
sure about, I am not going to have my professional life or my personal | :13:06. | :13:09. | |
life circumscribed by events like this. And nor would she have wanted | :13:10. | :13:14. | |
that. In a moving tribute, her husband wrote about the love she | :13:15. | :13:18. | |
would want to be shown to her children, but he also said she would | :13:19. | :13:21. | |
want us to unite against the hatred that killed her, eight does not have | :13:22. | :13:28. | |
creed, race or religion -- hate. Indeed. Someone may have killed Jo | :13:29. | :13:32. | |
Cox today but they haven't killed what she stands for, it is | :13:33. | :13:35. | |
impossible, because we will absolutely carry on working and | :13:36. | :13:40. | |
fighting for what Jo Cox stood for. She stood for human rights, | :13:41. | :13:45. | |
equality, international justice. Nobody can kill that. Do you think | :13:46. | :13:49. | |
that, had she lived, she would have been possible prime ministerial | :13:50. | :13:54. | |
material? Jo would have achieved great things and hip she was here | :13:55. | :13:58. | |
today, she would say, "Me, Prime Minister? Come on!" She was the type | :13:59. | :14:05. | |
of person who just wanted to get on with everybody and achieve what she | :14:06. | :14:09. | |
believed in and fight for the principles he believed in. What | :14:10. | :14:12. | |
impact you think this will have on politics immediately? I think it has | :14:13. | :14:17. | |
changed politics forever. There is talk of a recall of Parliament and I | :14:18. | :14:22. | |
would welcome that. I recall soon. Yes, and I would welcome that | :14:23. | :14:29. | |
because I would like to pay tribute to Jo and for her colleagues to | :14:30. | :14:32. | |
reconvene and use Parliamentary democracy to demonstrate that | :14:33. | :14:36. | |
democracy will not be beaten by this. We will continue to represent | :14:37. | :14:40. | |
our constituents in Parliament and that is the best tribute possible | :14:41. | :14:43. | |
that we could pay to Jo. Angela Smith, thank you very much. | :14:44. | :14:46. | |
You can't read too much into a ghastly attack like this, | :14:47. | :14:50. | |
at least not on the information we have at the moment. | :14:51. | :14:53. | |
Mental health could be the primary issue, or malign political purpose. | :14:54. | :14:56. | |
Sometimes, frankly, there's a blurred line between the two. | :14:57. | :14:58. | |
But do we owe our MPs more security for the risks they take, and more | :14:59. | :15:02. | |
The anger and unpleasantness that characterises some of the discourse | :15:03. | :15:05. | |
But does it stoke up unhealthy feelings of hate that can spin out | :15:06. | :15:13. | |
Our political editor Nick Watt is with me. | :15:14. | :15:19. | |
Let's start with, you spoke to some other friends of Jo Cox this | :15:20. | :15:30. | |
afternoon, proof that emotions are running high. I spoke to four of her | :15:31. | :15:35. | |
closest parliamentary friends, people who have known her for 20 | :15:36. | :15:41. | |
years and worked with her. In a very moving joint interview they paid | :15:42. | :15:44. | |
tribute to her as a great human rights campaigner but also somebody | :15:45. | :15:49. | |
who exuded humanity and great human warmth. To be honest I think what | :15:50. | :15:57. | |
stood out for me was Jo's amazing energy, she always had a smile, a | :15:58. | :16:02. | |
new idea. We would call her the Energizer Bunny, she wanted to fight | :16:03. | :16:05. | |
and do things and make things happen, she wouldn't take no for an | :16:06. | :16:11. | |
answer and that defined her. She was working hard every day. She was | :16:12. | :16:18. | |
tireless in the things she cared about. She was also such good fun to | :16:19. | :16:26. | |
be around. She was an amazing MP but we've lost a really good friend | :16:27. | :16:29. | |
today and I can't believe she's gone. I can't imagine what Brendan | :16:30. | :16:35. | |
and the family are going through now. Walking through and her not | :16:36. | :16:42. | |
being on the benches. It doesn't seem real. How good, somebody who | :16:43. | :16:50. | |
was full of demanding energy, full of life, who frankly set an example | :16:51. | :16:55. | |
for us all, how can that person be gone? It would be so common to see | :16:56. | :17:00. | |
Jo arriving in the nick of time for a vote because she had been cycling | :17:01. | :17:05. | |
like a maniac, in her cycling gear, she would always be there for her | :17:06. | :17:09. | |
kids, always taking them in, getting the evening meal. I can't imagine | :17:10. | :17:16. | |
what the family are going through. It is such a massive loss. And it is | :17:17. | :17:23. | |
what she would have done next, she had only been here for a year and | :17:24. | :17:26. | |
she had done so much, especially refugees and money for Syria. A | :17:27. | :17:35. | |
conviction politician as well as being a fully paid-up member of the | :17:36. | :17:39. | |
human race, representing the best of what politics should be about and | :17:40. | :17:44. | |
what humanity is about. It isn't just us who have lost someone, it is | :17:45. | :17:47. | |
those who are most vulnerable in the world who have lost their most woman | :17:48. | :17:51. | |
double champion. That's what we've lost. We need to realise what we've | :17:52. | :17:59. | |
lost, one of the gutsiest and most principled, intelligent, brilliant | :18:00. | :18:01. | |
women I've ever had the honour in my life to know. All we care tonight is | :18:02. | :18:06. | |
how on earth we carry on without Jo by our side because she kept us | :18:07. | :18:13. | |
going. Jo was brave, she endured, a lot of us get difficult times on | :18:14. | :18:18. | |
social media, but she stood up because she was doing what she | :18:19. | :18:21. | |
believed in and that was testament to her, the difference she was | :18:22. | :18:25. | |
prepared to make. We talked about it on Tuesday night, as Brendan, her | :18:26. | :18:32. | |
husband said in his statement, no regrets about anything she has done | :18:33. | :18:39. | |
in her life. She woke up every day thinking about how she can change | :18:40. | :18:42. | |
the world and she got stuck into it. That is the example we have to | :18:43. | :18:46. | |
follow and it's that spirit we have to take and run with. There are | :18:47. | :18:52. | |
people who are safe in the world because of Jo and that is what she | :18:53. | :18:56. | |
stood for. She lived that every day and we have to keep fighting for | :18:57. | :19:02. | |
what she believed in. Politicians as human beings. Nick, security, in the | :19:03. | :19:06. | |
house, out in their constituencies, it has to be an issue now? Important | :19:07. | :19:12. | |
to render that in the last 15 years, two MPs have been subject knife tax, | :19:13. | :19:17. | |
Nigel Jones and Stephen Timms. -- knife attack. But in recent years, | :19:18. | :19:26. | |
concerns have been raised by MPs in the light of these Syria vote and | :19:27. | :19:30. | |
the attacks on them in MPs online and concerns are being expressed. | :19:31. | :19:36. | |
One of the parliamentary democracy, the direct contact between MPs and | :19:37. | :19:38. | |
constituents leave them very vulnerable. The parliamentary | :19:39. | :19:44. | |
authorities have agreed to pay in recent months for security at MPs' | :19:45. | :19:50. | |
homes and offices in their constituencies but there are real | :19:51. | :19:53. | |
concerns that while Parliament is a fortress, the authorities there are | :19:54. | :19:59. | |
not taking the potential threat in constituencies enough and there are | :20:00. | :20:03. | |
concerns that perhaps the message isn't getting down to local police | :20:04. | :20:06. | |
forces, who think that MPs are predicted in Parliament, not seeing | :20:07. | :20:12. | |
that those MPs are still vulnerable once they are in their | :20:13. | :20:15. | |
constituencies. What about the big political issue, the tone of our | :20:16. | :20:20. | |
politics, the vitriol, the demonisation of them? The license | :20:21. | :20:25. | |
people feel, really, to be very nasty about MPs in their language | :20:26. | :20:29. | |
and on social media. Has this crystallised thoughts? Important to | :20:30. | :20:34. | |
say that we don't yet know the motive for the murder but clearly | :20:35. | :20:37. | |
what is happening now is that British politics is taking a step | :20:38. | :20:41. | |
back. There is a pause for breath and one thing people are looking at | :20:42. | :20:46. | |
is the very aggressive tone on social media. I was talking to a | :20:47. | :20:54. | |
very senior Labour MP, a lady MP who said that MPs are very open, | :20:55. | :20:57. | |
advertising their movements on social media, and she said that she | :20:58. | :21:02. | |
feared that the aggressive personalised tone on social media | :21:03. | :21:06. | |
really is having a very negative effect on policy and individual | :21:07. | :21:07. | |
safety. Well, on that point about vitriol | :21:08. | :21:10. | |
in politics and social media, it has become an issue today, | :21:11. | :21:12. | |
even without us knowing exactly Let's just play a clip from Labour | :21:13. | :21:15. | |
MP for Bermondsey, Neil Coyle. from the news about Jo Cox, | :21:16. | :21:20. | |
but he drew a line from hate-filled social media, through to rhetoric | :21:21. | :21:28. | |
about migrants and what he sees as the demonising of foreigners, | :21:29. | :21:31. | |
right through to components of the Leave campaign | :21:32. | :21:34. | |
in the referendum. He's not the only one | :21:35. | :21:35. | |
to have done that today. I think that the kind of nonsense | :21:36. | :21:38. | |
they inspire online from anonymous accounts and actually the core | :21:39. | :21:48. | |
content of the posts accounts and actually the core | :21:49. | :21:55. | |
content of the poster that they launched today, | :21:56. | :21:57. | |
look at what they are putting out. I think they are a very dangerous... | :21:58. | :22:07. | |
They risk inspiring extremist elements on the hard right in this | :22:08. | :22:08. | |
country. Labour parliamentary | :22:09. | :22:10. | |
candidate in 2015 Anne McElvoy, senior | :22:11. | :22:13. | |
editor at The Economist, and Jonathan Freedland, | :22:14. | :22:16. | |
columnist at The Guardian. Thank you for joining us. Is a very | :22:17. | :22:26. | |
sad day. Let's start with the most pointed of all the criticisms, that | :22:27. | :22:30. | |
somehow it is elements of the political campaigns we are seeing at | :22:31. | :22:36. | |
the moment which have been most vicious and spreading viciousness. | :22:37. | :22:39. | |
Jonathan, do you agree that there is a read-through from that into | :22:40. | :22:43. | |
political violence? It predates what's going on now, the Brexit | :22:44. | :22:47. | |
debate, it is the political culture. We don't know what is in the mind of | :22:48. | :22:52. | |
this individual but the idea that the debate has got more course has | :22:53. | :22:57. | |
been undeniable. Expenses was a watershed moment where suddenly it | :22:58. | :23:04. | |
was casual and routine to depict MPs as venal and grubby and entirely | :23:05. | :23:11. | |
self interested and that has congee into an accepted received wisdom, | :23:12. | :23:15. | |
all the same as each other, you can't trust them, all liars -- has | :23:16. | :23:23. | |
congee. If you have that poison injected into the bloodstream | :23:24. | :23:26. | |
eventually you will have consequences. -- congealed. In the | :23:27. | :23:36. | |
Guardian tomorrow, Polly Toynbee has written an article, very much on the | :23:37. | :23:41. | |
same lines, that they there is possibility, not for the attack, but | :23:42. | :23:46. | |
for the mood, for the inflammatory language, overt racism, a noxious | :23:47. | :23:53. | |
brew with a dangerous anti-MP stereotype. Do you believe that? I | :23:54. | :23:58. | |
haven't read the column, so I don't want to comment in any detail. It | :23:59. | :24:09. | |
depends who the they is. Step back and look at the tone of our | :24:10. | :24:14. | |
politics, but I think it is a bit tendentious, that leap into the | :24:15. | :24:18. | |
permissive environment where everything you don't like then | :24:19. | :24:22. | |
becomes in some way the slippery slope to this most terrible murder. | :24:23. | :24:28. | |
Even if we get to know a bit more about the man and his political | :24:29. | :24:32. | |
affiliations, by an unlikely to be wholesome and that has gone over | :24:33. | :24:36. | |
many years, many decades and different democracies have had to | :24:37. | :24:39. | |
confront it on the far left and the far right. Anything that goes | :24:40. | :24:43. | |
outside the democratic norm and feeds violence is wrong. I feel we | :24:44. | :24:48. | |
should stand up for that as the democratic principle. One | :24:49. | :24:53. | |
interesting counterfactual, I covered Germany and east German | :24:54. | :24:58. | |
unification, in 1990, a man who is now the very eminent Finance | :24:59. | :25:03. | |
minister was attacked, brutally attacked, he has been in a | :25:04. | :25:07. | |
wheelchair ever since. That was in the mood of 1990, very het up, | :25:08. | :25:12. | |
reunification. The political discourse in Germany was by our | :25:13. | :25:16. | |
standards very gentle, almost herbivorous. It came out of the time | :25:17. | :25:25. | |
but what is the link we are drawing? I wonder if we are trying to draw | :25:26. | :25:30. | |
too much, trying to imbue this with too much meaning. It could be an | :25:31. | :25:34. | |
isolated man with severe mental health problems. It's nothing to do | :25:35. | :25:40. | |
with politics, with the Brexit debate, I wonder if that's the way | :25:41. | :25:45. | |
to look at it? It might be but we have suspended campaigning and we | :25:46. | :25:51. | |
have an opportunity to decide, once we start campaigning again, whether | :25:52. | :25:54. | |
we will continue in the same way because let's be honest, there are | :25:55. | :25:57. | |
patriots on both sides of the debate. We need to have a more | :25:58. | :26:02. | |
respectful kind of debate. I was on the bridge, Westminster Bridge being | :26:03. | :26:08. | |
the rather unedifying flotilla fight in the river. Yes, it makes for some | :26:09. | :26:14. | |
fun, for some entertaining sketches, but with those kind of | :26:15. | :26:16. | |
gesticulations between two millionaires, let's be honest, I | :26:17. | :26:22. | |
waved at Jo and Brendan and their children in their rib from the | :26:23. | :26:28. | |
bridge while I saw people shouting traitor at each other. That kind of | :26:29. | :26:33. | |
language is the only bad for politicians but it is bad for each | :26:34. | :26:36. | |
other and the national conversation. We need to be better than that. A | :26:37. | :26:41. | |
lot of people saying that this is spirited politics and the more you | :26:42. | :26:45. | |
give voice to people's anger and emotion and passion, the less likely | :26:46. | :26:49. | |
you are to have hideous outbursts. You can do that, you can have | :26:50. | :26:53. | |
spirited politics without resulting Dyer resorting to the language of | :26:54. | :27:01. | |
toxicity. -- without resorting. MPs on social media have been on the end | :27:02. | :27:04. | |
of death threats and rape threats, you can think of that as sealed off | :27:05. | :27:09. | |
in the online world, but sometimes there are real-world consequences. | :27:10. | :27:13. | |
You are right to want to separate the day, which we don't moan about, | :27:14. | :27:18. | |
we can only mourn about it -- which we don't know about. We should think | :27:19. | :27:27. | |
about it. The interesting example from Germany, the thing about | :27:28. | :27:31. | |
demonising a category of people involved in politics. I covered the | :27:32. | :27:35. | |
aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing in America in 1995, there | :27:36. | :27:40. | |
was a building of federal bureaucrats and 167 of them were | :27:41. | :27:45. | |
killed. The lead up to that, the phrase federal bureaucrats became | :27:46. | :27:52. | |
almost an insult. Talk radio work demonising them as if they were the | :27:53. | :27:56. | |
source of America's problems. After Oklahoma City, people pulled back | :27:57. | :27:59. | |
and thought, maybe we shouldn't talk about these people like that any | :28:00. | :28:03. | |
more. Maybe we should think about how we talk about politics and | :28:04. | :28:08. | |
public servants. In a rambunctious political culture where we allow | :28:09. | :28:13. | |
liberalism, that is very much at stake here, we will never agree. | :28:14. | :28:17. | |
Even you and I, we are closer than some of the people watching, to the | :28:18. | :28:22. | |
left and to the right of us, there will be things where they will say | :28:23. | :28:25. | |
that we have crossed the line and we have to stand up in a democracy for | :28:26. | :28:29. | |
the right to offend as well as be offended. That's fine, but the | :28:30. | :28:33. | |
reality is that politics and democracy is supposed to be an alter | :28:34. | :28:38. | |
native to violence. What I'm worried about is starting to see a language | :28:39. | :28:42. | |
in the national conversation which facilitates and allows violence to | :28:43. | :28:47. | |
be legitimised. That's a problem. Whether it is the specifics of | :28:48. | :28:51. | |
today. Overall, politicians and many other people who are doing good work | :28:52. | :28:57. | |
like Jo did, she did it in refugee camps, people at food banks can find | :28:58. | :29:00. | |
themselves in the face of histolytica because of the way that | :29:01. | :29:03. | |
decisions are being made. That's not good enough. -- in the face of | :29:04. | :29:10. | |
hostility. Can we talk about the security of MPs? Is it possible to | :29:11. | :29:15. | |
have accessible MPs who are meeting their constituents, as available as | :29:16. | :29:22. | |
Jo Cox was, and give them some help and security? I think it's going to | :29:23. | :29:26. | |
be a very difficult trade-off. That sounds like a tough thing to say | :29:27. | :29:29. | |
after such a promising young woman has been struck down but one of the | :29:30. | :29:35. | |
things, having been to different countries and covering different | :29:36. | :29:40. | |
politics, I would stand up for that slightly... Go to the | :29:41. | :29:43. | |
constituencies, however grand they are in Westminster, the person has | :29:44. | :29:47. | |
to use in a slightly grubby room and meet you manatee with a lot of | :29:48. | :29:51. | |
problems, they don't always come in in the most polite form -- meet | :29:52. | :29:58. | |
humanity. It comes with a risk but I think it is important. Of course, | :29:59. | :30:03. | |
Nick what was important, talk to police forces and make sure that | :30:04. | :30:07. | |
there are sensible caveats in place but the good thing is that this is | :30:08. | :30:11. | |
not Russia or China, you can talk to your MP, if you are crossed, you can | :30:12. | :30:17. | |
tell them so. I think that's right, the legacy should be that Jo | :30:18. | :30:20. | |
achieved so much as a campaigner before she was elected. The thing we | :30:21. | :30:24. | |
must remember is that she achieved things and we want to make sure that | :30:25. | :30:28. | |
people like Jo can become politicians again and what I'm | :30:29. | :30:34. | |
worried about is that if we have this national conversation, becoming | :30:35. | :30:38. | |
so toxic, people like Jo will not stand as MPs in the future. Thank | :30:39. | :30:39. | |
you for joining us. Every year around the world, | :30:40. | :30:42. | |
15 million girls are forced to marry Bangladesh has one of the highest | :30:43. | :30:48. | |
rates of child marriage where over half of girls marry | :30:49. | :30:52. | |
before reaching adulthood. These girls often face sexual | :30:53. | :30:54. | |
violence, dangerous childbirth The government in Bangladesh | :30:55. | :30:56. | |
has pledged that within it'll eliminate the child marriage | :30:57. | :30:59. | |
of girls under 15 years old. Farhana Haider has been | :31:00. | :31:04. | |
to the capital Dhaka to meet girls on the outskirts of Bangladesh's | :31:05. | :31:22. | |
capital city Dhaka said this slum, where girls have to grow up fast. | :31:23. | :31:29. | |
TRANSLATION: Millions of girls here in Bangladesh | :31:30. | :32:04. | |
face a similar story. In fact, One in Five girls are married by the | :32:05. | :32:10. | |
time they reach their 15th birthday. All too often, they come from the | :32:11. | :32:13. | |
poorest areas, where girls are seen as a burden. | :32:14. | :32:20. | |
It is a patriarchal society, where a girl's reputation is everything. | :32:21. | :32:26. | |
Unmarried young women face harassment simply walking down the | :32:27. | :32:31. | |
street. So millions of girls are forced to marry before the legal age | :32:32. | :32:33. | |
of 18 to preserve family honour. In the slum, 40,000 people are | :32:34. | :32:46. | |
crammed onto a tiny plot of land. It is a city within a city, a | :32:47. | :32:49. | |
self-governing community where marriage is determined not by law | :32:50. | :32:56. | |
but by circumstances. In this maze of alleyways are one room tin | :32:57. | :33:00. | |
shacks, where entire families live. Births, deaths and marriages happen | :33:01. | :33:05. | |
here. For teenage girls living in this slum, life is tough. In the | :33:06. | :33:16. | |
heart of the slum leaves 13-year-old Molika, with her mother. | :33:17. | :33:22. | |
Molika is due to get married at the end of the week. | :33:23. | :34:10. | |
It is a false sense of security. Once married, the problems faced by | :34:11. | :34:15. | |
the girls often get worse. 16-year-old Sharmin was death by her | :34:16. | :34:31. | |
husband last year when she was four months pregnant with her baby. | :34:32. | :34:36. | |
Buried deep under the bed, Sharmin keeps her wedding clothes. | :34:37. | :35:01. | |
These girls are married off because their families can't afford to keep | :35:02. | :35:08. | |
them. Yet the reality is that once they are married, husbands start | :35:09. | :35:12. | |
demanding dowries they simply can't afford. So they are abandoned. | :35:13. | :35:17. | |
15-year-old Regina was married last year to a man 12 years older than | :35:18. | :35:19. | |
her. The Bangladesh Government estimates | :35:20. | :35:36. | |
that 87% of married women here face some form of physical or mental | :35:37. | :35:43. | |
abuse. Regina's husband left her a few months into the marriage, so her | :35:44. | :35:46. | |
father turned to the police for help. | :35:47. | :36:00. | |
He says he had to pay the police ?60, which is more than his monthly | :36:01. | :36:04. | |
income. Money and marriage go hand-in-hand | :36:05. | :36:27. | |
here. 17-year-old Ustma was married two years ago. | :36:28. | :36:47. | |
Ustma's husband left her after five months of marriage. But, like | :36:48. | :36:55. | |
thousands of other girls here in the slum, work in garment factories is | :36:56. | :37:01. | |
offering Jo at offering them independence. -- offering them | :37:02. | :37:04. | |
independence. The forced marriage of young girls | :37:05. | :38:13. | |
around the world will continue unless attitudes towards young women | :38:14. | :38:17. | |
change and they are allowed to fulfil their potential. | :38:18. | :38:27. | |
Let's take a quick look at the newspapers. The Times, they are all | :38:28. | :38:35. | |
obviously leading on Jo Cox, the murdered MP had faced a string of | :38:36. | :38:40. | |
security threats. Police were reviewing her protection, they say. | :38:41. | :38:43. | |
The Guardian, she believed in a better world, she fought for it | :38:44. | :38:50. | |
every day, the arrested man shouted "Britain first" according to | :38:51. | :38:56. | |
witnesses. The Sun takes the personal angle, husband's moving | :38:57. | :39:00. | |
tribute with a picture of the suspect on the front. The Daily | :39:01. | :39:06. | |
Mail, devoted mother of two, dedicated public servant, a | :39:07. | :39:08. | |
remarkable woman, what a tragic waste. And the Financial Times also | :39:09. | :39:14. | |
leading on it, the killing of Jo Cox brings abrupt halt to a referendum | :39:15. | :39:19. | |
-- the referendum campaign, which is suspended until Saturday. I love | :39:20. | :39:23. | |
that a couple of the continental papers, French and German, and on | :39:24. | :39:27. | |
their websites, they were leading on that story -- I looked at. Tonight, | :39:28. | :39:32. | |
democracy was continuing and today was the tooting by-election and | :39:33. | :39:36. | |
after the vote, the memorial to Jo Cox, they held a two minute silence | :39:37. | :39:39. | |
in her memory. We leave you tonight with a section of that. | :39:40. | :39:45. |