01/02/2017 Newsnight

The ayes to the right, 498. The noes to the left, 118.

The Commons votes for Brexit, despite the fact that

an overwhelming majority of MPs campaigned against it.

Parliament and the public expressed different views, and it's

That is an event quite unprecedented in our parliamentary history,

whereby popular sovereignty is trumping parliamentary sovereignty.

To vote against the majority verdict of the largest democratic exercise

in British history, I think, would risk putting

an overwhelming vote for Brexit, Labour was split three ways

and hit by resignations, and there were hints

We'll ask Remainer MPs if now is the time

to submit to public opinion, or whether they should

Also tonight, the case of the Nigerian quadruplets born

in a British hospital at a cost of ?330,000.

OK, I do understand that it's a very difficult time for you, but we do

We'll debate the rights and wrongs of allowing

US soldiers dealing with their experiences in Iraq.

But the Taiwanese-born director has his own worries

It's nerve-wracking, very uncomfortable.

Well, we voted them in 21 months ago, and today MPs did

the country's bidding, taking an historic step

towards taking Britain out of the European Union,

against, for most, their own judgement on the matter.

Our political editor Nick Watt has been watching. 500 out of 650, the

speaker and the Deputy Speaker do not speak, it was a significant,

historical moment, quite an emotional time, I spoke to a

Remained visited just before voting and they said it was the worst but

they had ever cast and then I spoke to a happy The minister who said,

I've been waiting all my life to do that. Downing Street are delighted

with the vote, one reason is that they feel it is less likely that the

House of Lords can delay the bill, and that is significant because

Theresa May wants to get on and trigger Article 50 before her self

imposed deadline at the end of March. One possible date is the

European Council, March nine and tenth or before that because it

needs to be a lengthy formal letter from the UK. The reason they want to

get in early is that they have been advised that the European Commission

and the European Council will be able to give their formal response

before the first round of the French presidential election on April 23

but only if they go early. It's all happening, they'll have to worry. If

they don't go early the second round of the French election will be May

seven and or those who will be president of France by them. Not a

great day for Labour. Divided, 47 MPs defied a three line whip, three

members of the Shadow Cabinet resigned, although between ten and

13 Labour frontbenchers are still in place and as I understand it Jeremy

Corbyn is in no rush to do the usual thing, to sack them, he's going to

wait for next week and see if any of the amendments we see at the

committee stage of the bill will be accepted by the government or voted

on by MPs. The significance of that is, if that happens and if the bill

is amended, maybe some of those Labour MPs would be able to vote in

favour of it. The amendment that seems to be getting cross-party

support is by Chris Leslie, former Labour Shadow Chancellor. And this

would require the government to hold a parliamentary vote on whatever

emerges at the end of the negotiations, deal or no Deal, at

the moment they will only be a vote if there is a deal. And what former

Tory Remained ministers are saying to the government is, you will be

safe, it will be fine, how about a accepting this amendment? Blount

will be talking to one the Labour Shadow Cabinet who resigned in a few

minutes. Speech of the day George Osborne? I think we'd have to say

that. He did say that while he supports Remain he will vote for

triggering Article 50 because it would be a constitutional outrage if

he tried to thwart the will of the people. But then he made a pointed

intervention by saying that the government has decided not to

prioritise the economy and they are prioritising controls of immigration

and taking the UK out of the jurisdiction of the European Court

of Justice. That's quite a thing for a former Chancellor to say who

obviously decides to the Leeds. Believes that elections are decided

on the economy. Then there will be battles over what form Brexit will

take and he ended with the words, I will be in those fights in the

couple of years ahead. Nick, thank you. Having given us the referendum

most MPs felt they could not ignore it. Most MPs voted in favour of the

referendum and then 47 of them voted against invoking Article 50 is a way

of accepting the result. And some like Ken Clarke didn't want a

referendum in the first place and voted against the result of all.

None of us can remember an occasion like it. We know how the nation

divides and Brexit but the most striking gap is between MPs and

their electorate. Here is the public vote, yellow for Remain, blue for

leave. This shows how different local authorities went in the

referendum. And here is that the equivalent map for MPs looks based

on their declared positions in the referendum. There have often been

gaps between rulers and ruled yet the historic norm is that the rulers

to get their way. Not this time. The referendum outcome shows how very

out of touch the House of Commons is with the people. The only parties in

favour of leaving work Ukip, with one MP, and the Democratic Unionist

party in Northern Ireland, that makes nine MPs out of 650. The

consequence is that for the first time in its history MPs have to vote

for a policy which the vast majority of them, around three quarters,

oppose. That is an event without precedent in our long parliamentary

history. Other countries are familiar with direct democracy, the

most famous case in recent decades proposition 13 in California,

capping property taxes against the views of the political

establishment. The death penalty was reimposed there as well as a public

demand. Until recently in the UK, we have tended to go for representative

democracy, vote them in and vote them out again if you don't like

them. Then came the first Europe vote in 1975. It's beginning to look

as if we may not have a single No venting area in Britain itself...

But in that case nation and Commons have the same majority view. Europe

has driven a coach and horses through the British constitution. We

would not have had the idea of a referendum in the first place if not

for Europe in 1975, when Harold Wilson used it to hold together a

divided Labour Party, just as David Cameron used it to hold together a

divided Conservative Party but in this case, by contrast with 1975,

the people have voted against the wishes of the government. The

Article 50 debate reflected the cognitive dissidents that our

legislators feel. The point has been made to me that we are not delegates

but when all your neighbours, local business people, local pharmacists,

health professionals, your political allies and indeed your political

opponents make a point that you have to take a stand on an issue, I feel

this is the right course of action. I do accept that Lambeth voted

overwhelmingly for Remain but as I have made it very clear this was a

UK referendum, not constituency -based referendum... But and in the

country how did Remain voters feel the MP should have voted? -- out in

the country. Know we've come to the process and had a referendum and a

democratic process and people have decided to leave I believe we should

follow that process. Our MP is Tim Curran, the leader of the Liberal

Democrats. He's going to the wire over the issue of a second

referendum -- Tim Farron. Although my party has a three line whip in

Westminster it does not have a three line whip on my views so I am very

happy with my MP. We lost, that's the way of it, we have to make the

most of it and try to unite again as a country and deal with the

situation as we find it. He's decided to abstain because he wants

to reflect his voters. Their beliefs. I don't believe he's

reflecting them enough. I think he should have the courage of his

convictions he should be representing us because it is his

job. His job to represent us, his constituents. Certainly some mixed

views from Remain voters. Was today the day for them to fold behind the

majority? Earlier I spoke to two MPs who have campaigned to Remain yet to

different decisions today, Nicky Morgan, the former Education

Secretary, voted in favour of Article 50, she said, to avoid a

constitutional crisis. In Rachael Maskell who resigned as a member of

the Labour Shadow Cabinet to read against Article 50. I first asked

Nicky Morgan if she had found it Well, I was quite clear

from the autumn onwards, that we needed a short sharp bill

to trigger Article 50, that Parliament really,

if which we were going to avoid a crisis in our democracy,

needed to respect the democratic But of course, as many of us said,

we'd really rather not have been in the situation of having this

debate and having to Well, Rachael Maskell,

you voted against triggering Article 50 last year,

before last year you I came here to make sure

the people I represent in York What we're trying to do is mesh

together a referendum which is one process with a Parliamentary

democracy, another process, and through the referendum

we saw clearly the way that our constituents voted,

and therefore it is incumbent on myself to bring that voice

into Westminster, which But you voted for a national

referendum, you didn't vote for a referendum in York Central,

you voted for a national referendum, do you want to apologise

to the public for voting for a national referendum,

for which you were not willing We got a question put

before us today in a bill, to move forward into a process,

where we will be coming out of the single market and out

of the customs union. Now I can't even remember that

being on the ballot paper last June, and therefore we have an unelected

Prime Minister, now moving forward to put forward her own position

on how we should move forward. I think what is really important

is we listen to where people Because that question was not

on the ballot paper. That question wasn't,

but the Brexit was, and there's only one model of Brexit on the table

and you're voting against it. We know right back last summer

there are so many models of Brexit and that's why the different Brexit

campaigns couldn't Where we are moving

forward to is important. What we have been saying,

a people's Brexit is very different from a Theresa May Brexit,

where she is going to take us out of the single market,

out of the customs union and nobody Do you accept that point you could

vote against Article 50 and say, until I get the kind

of Brexit I support, I'm not You could have taken

that position today. Look, I think we all thought

about that, but I don't agree, It is a difficult thing

to stand down from a job, in the shadow front

bench, everything else. I do think it was incumbent

on Parliament to understand how people voted and to pass the bill,

and I think that's what hopefully we will see

by the time we get to March. There is a separate debate to be had

and that's why the publication of the White Paper tomorrow

is important, about the terms of Brexit, and I think that

many of us in Parliament and many, many thousands, tens of thousands

of people outside have very firm views on that,

which I hope the Government But you're not going

to get that debate. If you nod through Article 50

you are going to get Theresa May's Brexit,

so you, I mean that is Theresa May has set out the 12

pillars in her speech and they will be in the White Paper,

but there is a negotiation Parliament needs to be involved

in that, not in the process because she will negotiate

and Government will negotiate but keeping Parliament updated,

keeping an eye on what is happening in our economy, and what people

are saying outside is going to be tremendously important,

and that's where MPs can really add Hang on, you have just voted not

to activate a referendum result. I voted according to the way the

people who elected me asked me to. If an amendment comes up,

for example, Nicky Morgan, that says yes, we will invoke

Article 50, but we negotiate our way Would you support

something like that? You clearly believe it,

it is consistent with what the public voted for,

it is a Brexit model, You would struggle

not to vote for that? I wouldn't, because I think

that the bill is a process bill I do think that there are amendments

down about Parliamentary scrutiny and about the vote at the end

and they will be debated next week. I think there is a separate

White Paper process about the pillars that the Prime Minister

has set out, and I do think, as I say, that Parliament has

a really important role in informing ministers about what's happening

on the ground in our constituency, what people are saying

about the effects on their economy, their businesses, regulations,

I am getting lobbied all the time by people who are saying how

is this going to work? Can we make sure there is no cliff

edge for example, in March 2019? Those things are important

ministers hear. Rachael, do you think this indicates

a computer collapse of discipline You voted what, threeways, for,

against, in between, the party frontbenches,

whips, everybody voting What does that say about the state

of Labour at the moment? I think you'll find next

week as we're talking through the amendments

that we will be absolutely solid and making sure we have the process

in place to call the Government to account, what we've been trying

to do today is to put referendum into a Parliamentary democracy

and we need to make sure that systems work as we move forward,

because reality is there are two systems that clash, one which is

about empowerment and clearly that is what I was doing,

empowering the people You are empowering your constituency

but ignoring the majority vote in the country that

you voted to have. Every single MP has the right

to represent those that elect them to Parliament and therefore

that was absolutely right that MPs chose to do that today,

but as we move forward we clearly are going to have amendments

which put the scrutiny process behind this bill,

which is absolutely crucial. We have amendments in there,

particularly at the end of the process to make sure

that the negotiation strategy, You are talking a brave talk here,

Rachael, but the truth is your party has been all over the shop,

basically, hasn't it. It does come down to the fact that

some of them believe you have to stick with the result

of what the voters said, and some like you have said,

I want to go my own way or the way We're really clear as a party

that we do not want a hard Brexit, a Theresa May Brexit,

where she has gone and determined And what we have said,

is that a people's Brexit would be incredibly different

from what she has set out. She hasn't followed

the will of the people, she has set out her own terms

and we saw, just over the weekend, how easy it is that she could give

away that power, to other countries and if you're signing trade

agreements I would have to say where is the Parliamentary democracy

in those processes? So there is much to discuss over

the coming two years and we will certainly be

at the table for that. Rachael Maskell, Nicky

Morgan, thanks both. It seems more than twelve days since

President Trump's inauguration, and the new normal arrived

in US politics. Well, you can look at polls,

the approval ratings But even better than polls,

you can talk to people. Particularly those

who voted for him. Yalda Hakim is in rural

Pennsylvania, trying to find out Pennsylvania, Donald

Trump's heartland. I can't believe that,

I thought our country has progressed so much and we took

like three steps back. If we stand up to other countries,

we have to make America great again, It was counties like this facing

a decline in manufacturing, shrinking population and rising

immigration that moved heavily towards Donald Trump and his message

of national restoration In his first week-and-a-half

in office we have come here to ask He resonated with the working class,

I mean this is a blue collar town, you have a lot of industry here,

hard-working people, everybody who comes to this place, punches a time

clock. That is pretty much the way it is. Marty welcomes Donald Trump's

tough stance on immigrants. It a privilege to come to the United

States. I don't mean that in a way other than, that it is not a right

to come to the United States. That's the price of what freedom is. The

United States. If it takes a year, it takes two years, that is what the

price of living in this country is. We have freedom here. It is a topic

many people here feel strongly about. I am an hen sieve. They are

volatile country, you have to be apprehensive. If we are letting you

in, it is like, pay your dues like my ancestors did, line anybody

else's did. They sat at Ellis "land for days because they wanted to be

part of this country. Don't think you deserve the right, I mean I

don't go over there. Jessica who works at the bar is one

of the few people in this town who didn't vote for Donald Trump. I am

appalled by it actually. I don't think it's right. I think it is

unconstitutional. People have been becoming more and more outspoken

about their racism. I have heard everything in this bar being said

that racial slurs that I haven't heard in, I have lived here many his

whole life and I haven't heard ever. They are outspoken because they

think it is OK to use hate speech and hate language and hate people. I

am not about that, you know. On the face of it the new policy seems

straightforward. Immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries

have been restricted from entering the United States, for 90 days.

Some have viewed this as a ban on Muslims.

Across the County, in the town at the local jewellery shop we meet

Glenn. A lot of people are saying that Muslims are targeted, that this

is a Muslim ban. Yes, once again I think you have to start somewhere

and you look at 9/11, you look at bin haar den, you look a the Boston

massacre, the terrorist attack on boss toe. -- bin haar den. They were

all Muslim. It is hard you have to cat grinds that specific, but I

think that it is a start. Do you think it is creating division in

America? I think they have done that, not us. Because there are a

lot of Muslims who live in this country. Yes, there definitely is, I

think that they have done that, we haven't done that, that's, that is

their brand, the brand they are portraying.

Hi, nice to meet you. This woman is a Syrian American, and

was born and raised in this town. She feels Donald Trump's stricter

immigration policy is counter productive. I don't know how you

could call it something, but worse than that, I feel it's, against

every principle that the country was, our country was built on, when

you divide you create mosh confusion, more mistrust, maybe

hatred, you know, between two different kind of people who were

brought up differently. Now, how is that going to prevent terrorism as

opposed to create more? As Donald Trump attempts to shake things up,

his hard line policies seem to be continuing, to resonate with many

The government says it is going to try far harder to recoup the cost

of NHS healthcare given to foreigners in Britain.

The issue was in the public eye today partly because of the BBC 2

documentary, Hospital, that revealed a rather unusual case

of a Nigerian woman and her quadruplets born prematurely.

She had been refused entry to the US, and was taken ill

on a plane but ended up costing the NHS ?330,000.

The thing is, Priscilla, the hospital bill is

You're going to be in England for a while, aren't you.

So, your husband, is your husband in Nigeria?

Will he be coming over at all, under these circumstances?

I do understand it's a very difficult time for you, you know,

but we do need to talk about the charges for treatment.

Also today, the Public Accounts Committee of MPs has said the system

The words "health tourism" are used a lot in this talk -

It's not people coming here specifically to use the NHS

Give us the scale of it The Government commissioned research

into the cost of people specifically coming to the UK just to use the

NHS, the so-called health tour ribs and what they found was it is a

relatively small part of the generalised cost of foreign people

coming to the UK and happening to be ill here, so, if we put up a graph,

what we can show is that back in 2013, what the Government estimated

was around ?200 million was spend on so-called health tourrieses, that

was a bit less than if we look at the cost of just European people

getting ill in the UK, so it is EU people, that is about 300 million,

if you look at students who are not from the EU, that is about 450

million, and finally, if you look at people who have come to the UK from

elsewhere, it is about 1 billion we spent on care for them, while they

are here. We get some of that money back. That is is right. These are

gross number, we are basically, we are part of a scheme with other

countries that means we are able to charge their state, we are not good

at recouping that, if this was the 300 million we could have got, we

only got about 50 million back, we can also charge patients from, we

can't charge students but we can charge patients from elsewhere in

the world for some of their care, again we only charge about ?25

million in that specific year, so that why the Government is keen to

clamp-down on this. The money they are oing to get, is that going to

make a big difference, small difference, Tyne Griff presence to

NHS budge bet? These are small numbers so the total was 2 billion.

They are looking in their dream they are looking to recoup 5 million and

that is coming from taxing students mainly. Fundamentally, they are

giving the NHS hospitals incentives to find foreign people to charge and

foreign people whose bills we can get for another state to pay, but

it's counter-cultural for lots of #350e78 who work in hospitals to

check the passports of people in their care. Thank you.

Joining me now is the Chair of the Royal College of GPS

Professor Helen Lampard Stokes, and the cancer surgeon

Meirion Thomas, who is a campaigner on health tourism.

We saw in that clip, an NHS person saying to a mother who had lost her

child or two children I think, at that point, we need to talk about

the bill. Are you comfortable with that as a kind of ethos in the NHS?

Well, that case, is exceptional and there is some tragic elms to that

case, perhaps we can just set that aside for just a moment, but the

fact about maternity tourism is it is very common, for example last

year, at St George's Hospital it was reported 1800 foreign lady who had

delivered babies there will be and in represent speck 870 of those

approximately were ineligible for NHS care. What would you do in those

case, because those people, you are probably not going to be able to

recoup a large amount. You can chase them. You won't get very much. What

is the practical thing, you ask them to show their passport. The point

about passports, it is just to do with non-urgent care, for elective

cases. It is very little you can do for maternity cases because the

Government is determined that anything to do with maternity is

immediately necessary, and therefore they have to be treated. They are

charged as you say, but, we know that only 16% of invoices that are

issued are honoured. Right. Helen, why is it so difficult to just

charge people at least the none elective, the non-emergency, the

elective care. What is wrong with that? We don't have the

infrastructure to do it. Because our NHS, wonderful NHS is free at the

point of need, we don't have a charging system set up, there is no

universal way of finding out if a patient should or shouldn't pay, so

when you walk into a hospital, you and I don't carry any ID because we

expect free treatment. When you see your GP you don't carry anything,

there is no reason to. If we wanted to charge every body who would need

to pay something, we would have to set up a huge infrastructure. You

could have to ask me... Is that so difficult? Well, 1.3 million

patients see their GP every day, let us get this in perspective. In

England we have 7,500 GP surgery, that is a heap of infrastructure.

Not, let alone, would you issue ID cards? Would you use passports. That

would be an idea. That would make it easier. It would. It happens in

other country, other countries charge people. Because they from the

the charging structure, they don't have a health system pee at the part

of need. This is small amounts of monument if we want to put the

infrastructure in and spend hundreds setting it up we could do it. It

would be a long time to get the return on investment. It does take

infrastructure, ID cards, it is a huge change, and it St really a

relatively small amount. It is not small amount, the whole

point is, what these management companies were saying in their

reports that they accepted only a tiny number of people identified,

the problem is much bigger than the government thinks. What I have

suggested is that for elective care in hospitals, I know it is not all

of the patients and I fully understand it does not involve or

doctors but I suggest the patient should present a passport and a

utility bill in the name when they register. Loads of people don't have

utility bills in the name! Every hospital has an overseas visitors

offers. I am suggesting there is a screening tool, that is all. Does it

work? Could you receptionist check on sweaty's utility bill? Do you

know how difficult it is too identify passport? There are subtle

features. I am certainly not trained to do it. You need proper equipment

to scan it and say it's legitimate. That is what we're dealing with,

passports are not the answer. If I said you won't make this happen

until you have ID cards which have residents's entitlement in the UK

would you go for that? It's going to have to happen in some form or

other, they will have to be personal identification to prove that you are

entitled to NHS care. Any health system comparable to ours, Sweden,

Holland, France, Germany, wherever you go, we have to have it. OK.

Helen, Meirion, thank you both. If you've missed it,

the story so far is that all week we've been bringing you two-minute

opinionated monologues, Tonight, the author Lionel Shriver,

best known for her novel It's time to say

what we really mean. Left-leaning pundits decry both

Brexit and Trump as the fatal So, when the left wins it's

a triumph of democracy. A rabble brandishing pitchforks,

Barbarians at the gate. The Oxford Dictionary defines

populism as "support for Yet lately, populism seems

a byword for voters not To Remainers who want to rerun

the referendum until Brexiteers get their minds right,

populism means leaving important Of many ideological hues,

populism classically urges common people to unseat

an unjust governing class. So the American civil rights

movement and Occupy Wall Yet especially since the EU

referendum, commentators use one-size-fits-all populism to lazily

lump together desperate Italy, Hungary, Austria,

Holland, Germany, Denmark, Missing all the nuances,

the American press makes no distinction between Ukip

and France's National Front It's this one word that makes Brexit

and Trump seem - mistakenly - The term is troubling

because it's loaded. Since anyone who questions

unfettered immigration is a suspect and backward,

populist has become wink and nod It's polite code for

racist, xenophobic, Some Trump voters may deserve these

pejorative connotations So before reaching for

the euphemism "populist", let's try substituting "bigoted",

because if that's what we mean, Film director Ang Lee

made gay cowboys popular with Brokeback Mountain,

he made Life of Pi where the action is all confined to a small boat,

he took a Taiwanese language film and made it mainstream,

with Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. He is no stranger to taking risks,

and for his next trick the three-time Oscar winner has

taken on the Iraq war. He's cast a British unknown

in the lead, and experimented Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

is based on real events, about a group of US soldiers

who are given a heroes' welcome at home, but struggle

with the memories of what had really The film - out here this month -

has been met with proverbial Ang Lee has been

speaking to our culture For the first time in my life

I feel close to somebody. In Ang Lee's new film,

a platoon of US soldiers are flown back

from the battlefields of Iraq and paraded

as But they are not

prepared for all the attention or the deafening

pyrotechnics. All these explosions catapult

them back to being in combat, in theatre,

don't they? I got that from talking to the soldi

the veterans who work The thing they talk most

about is the sound, and they The other things, the celebration

is a bother to them. When people thank

them, so often when people come and thank the soldiers

for their service, that's the line When people thank them,

because they feel they Also what motivated me to make

the movie is really the sympathy to the soldiers

who are being misunderstood. That's what really moves me,

more than timely or Ang Lee has taken on a war

unpopular with the American public, as he has discovered

at the box office. He also gave himself the technical

challenge of shooting at 120 frames On the big screen, it

gives greater definition, Such as making gunfights

look convincing. I had the idea to have

them shoot real bullets! It's sort of weird being honoured

for the worst day of your life. The special effect person,

they provided the armour, they were very smart,

but this little spring, It's very exciting,

a close-up of shooting, There are a ton of ways

you could get shipped home, or I mean, you're

a decorated hero, Billy, For stars including

Kristin Stewart, there was no make-up on set, to suit

the unforgiving high-speed cameras. So, no pressure then

on the young British newcomer Joe Alwyn,

who was cast in the lead after producers had

seen hundreds of other hopefuls. You don't have money men saying,

get somebody famous in that part? This movie's not expensive

but it's not cheap either. There are some hesitations,

there were, but I was It took a week or two

to convince the And you have a few Oscars

on your shelf so that The extraordinary Life Of Pi

picked up four Oscars but what about accusations of racism

at the awards, when the director's earlier adaptation

of a Jane Austen novel was winning prizes,

he was overlooked. When I did Sense And

Sensibility it got seven nominations, and it won a lot

including Golden Globes, best producer called me, she was crying,

we've got seven nominations. But in the long run,

I think they didn't know me. I just don't think they

know me, I think it's Ang Lee was born in Taiwan,

so does he appreciate Donald Trump's overtures to Taiwan, which

seem to have upset the Chinese? By the way, I'm having

Taiwanese passport. I'm not American yet,

it's not my president, And we are a minority,

it's a very small place, not recognised

as a country, but it has its own sovereignty,

and I'm just afraid that it will be used

as a chip, a bargaining element. After reinventing the martial arts

movie with Crouching Tiger, could Ang Lee be persuaded to work

his magic on the British equivalent, From childhood I always

imagined a Bond movie, it is But I think it's a brand

you don't want to mess with, Don't seduce me any more,

I might just want to do it! The Broccolis, if I've got that

right, they watch this programme. Steven Smith with the film director