Browse content similar to 06/03/2017. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
The Chancellor will set out his plans. | :00:00. | :00:08. | |
But as Mike Tyson famously said, everyone has a plan until they get | :00:09. | :00:12. | |
Phillip Hammond knows Brexit hangs over everything right now. | :00:13. | :00:17. | |
But can he carry on the job of getting borrowing down? | :00:18. | :00:21. | |
I think the public sector is coming to the point | :00:22. | :00:25. | |
where there are going to be large social costs from increasing amounts | :00:26. | :00:28. | |
We'll ask if austerity has gone as far as it can | :00:29. | :00:34. | |
Also tonight, the Netherlands prepares | :00:35. | :00:38. | |
Is an anticipated far right surge also an identity crisis | :00:39. | :00:45. | |
for a supposedly relaxed and liberal country? | :00:46. | :00:47. | |
That is the good thing about the carnival. | :00:48. | :00:58. | |
Right. What about the rest of the time? | :00:59. | :01:00. | |
I heard somebody say something about Obamagate. | :01:01. | :01:11. | |
Looks like it's time for us to investigate! | :01:12. | :01:15. | |
We'll hear from President Trump's more unusual internet | :01:16. | :01:19. | |
Hello. This is Budget week. | :01:20. | :01:33. | |
On Wednesday the Chancellor Phillip Hammond will take | :01:34. | :01:35. | |
to the dispatch box, and set out his plan for taxes, | :01:36. | :01:40. | |
for borrowing, for spending, for improving British productivity, | :01:41. | :01:42. | |
It's a strange one - perhaps the strangest for a while. | :01:43. | :01:46. | |
Brexit offers an excuse for a pause on painful decisions, | :01:47. | :01:49. | |
but at some point, if the Chancellor is to match the aims | :01:50. | :01:52. | |
set out by his party, he'll have to find a way | :01:53. | :01:55. | |
More public spending cuts are already written | :01:56. | :01:59. | |
into the government's projections, just as Article 50 is about to hit | :02:00. | :02:02. | |
Now helping out is the fact that the economic news has been good | :02:03. | :02:12. | |
But unfortunately he can't rely on bags of money | :02:13. | :02:15. | |
falling from the sky, and that means this is not an easy | :02:16. | :02:18. | |
Sometimes you want a safe pair of hands at number 11, a man who does | :02:19. | :02:28. | |
This is probably one of those times and in | :02:29. | :02:34. | |
the last few days, he has been out and about, sensibly managing | :02:35. | :02:38. | |
If your bank increases your credit card limit, I don't think you feel | :02:39. | :02:43. | |
obliged to go out and spend every last penny of it immediately. | :02:44. | :02:46. | |
I regard my job as Chancellor as making sure that our economy is | :02:47. | :02:53. | |
resilient, that we have got reserves in the tank, | :02:54. | :02:56. | |
so that as we embark on | :02:57. | :02:59. | |
the journey that we take over the next couple of years, we are | :03:00. | :03:02. | |
confident that we have got enough gas in the tank to see us through | :03:03. | :03:05. | |
There are two kinds of budget, those that have a specific problem to | :03:06. | :03:14. | |
solve, normally a crisis in the public finances. And there are those | :03:15. | :03:19. | |
where there isn't much to do, chances just have to stand up and | :03:20. | :03:23. | |
look like they've been keeping busy. Well, this one is more in the latter | :03:24. | :03:28. | |
category. Part of the reason for that is that breaks it is looming | :03:29. | :03:32. | |
over everything at the moment. The old slogan used to be, you must fix | :03:33. | :03:37. | |
the roof while the sun is shining. -- Brexit is looming over anything. | :03:38. | :03:42. | |
Today might be, there is no point in fixing the roof if you think a great | :03:43. | :03:45. | |
victory might come toppling down on top of it. You should wait to see | :03:46. | :03:51. | |
what happens. -- a great big three. Until Brexit getting it down was the | :03:52. | :03:57. | |
main goal of getting it down, the deficit, and it slowly came under | :03:58. | :04:01. | |
control. The idea is it carries on going down but the basic job is far | :04:02. | :04:06. | |
from done. It's fair to say that a lot of people, perhaps ourselves | :04:07. | :04:09. | |
included, were sceptical about the scope for the scale of public | :04:10. | :04:13. | |
spending cuts experienced over the last parliament, but those were | :04:14. | :04:16. | |
essentially delivered as promised without everything falling apart. We | :04:17. | :04:20. | |
don't need to panic about the level of public borrowing at the moment, | :04:21. | :04:25. | |
but we do, broadly speaking, need to get it down rather than let it go | :04:26. | :04:29. | |
up. So we can't expect to borrow more as an answer to all our | :04:30. | :04:34. | |
prayers. Yet, when you look at the public sector, it's beginning to | :04:35. | :04:37. | |
scream that it needs more money. So if you are a Chancellor at number | :04:38. | :04:42. | |
11, you look out there, it doesn't look like there are any easy answers | :04:43. | :04:49. | |
to the long-term problems. Finding public spending savings now, after a | :04:50. | :04:54. | |
period of six or seven years of efficiency savings, is a much more | :04:55. | :04:58. | |
challenging job to do without hitting front line services or | :04:59. | :05:03. | |
significantly increasing poverty. Imagine you were Chancellor. Where | :05:04. | :05:06. | |
would you go for further cuts? Defence? Just as Nato is being told | :05:07. | :05:14. | |
to raise spending? Prisons? Amid the current violence and disorder? | :05:15. | :05:20. | |
Police? Just last week the official inspector said they were in a | :05:21. | :05:23. | |
perilous state. In transport, we are meant to be getting Brexit ready by | :05:24. | :05:29. | |
spending more on infrastructure. In business we are trying to launch a | :05:30. | :05:31. | |
new industrial strategy and it's already on the cheap. Health? Good | :05:32. | :05:36. | |
luck with that. Social care? You need to find money and not cut it. | :05:37. | :05:41. | |
You have to go a long way to look for low hanging fruit nowadays. Most | :05:42. | :05:46. | |
of that was plucked in 2011 and 2012. There was probably a lot of | :05:47. | :05:50. | |
low hanging fruit there. If you want to go foraging for some more, the | :05:51. | :05:54. | |
places to look are presumably, and this isn't what I am suggesting you | :05:55. | :06:01. | |
should do, but you could look at overseas aid where spending has | :06:02. | :06:04. | |
risen very fast over the last five or six years, but we have | :06:05. | :06:07. | |
commitments in that direction. Secondly, spending on pensions and | :06:08. | :06:11. | |
pension benefits, all of which have been more than fully protected over | :06:12. | :06:15. | |
the last five or six years in contrast to most areas of spending. | :06:16. | :06:21. | |
Inside the Treasury, they have got a lot on their plate. Getting to the | :06:22. | :06:24. | |
next two years is hard enough, and then the long-term beckons | :06:25. | :06:29. | |
thereafter with some difficult decisions to be taken. | :06:30. | :06:34. | |
Our political editor Nick Watt is here. | :06:35. | :06:37. | |
A little bit of news on education spending is out as we speak. Theresa | :06:38. | :06:42. | |
May and Philip Hammond are saying they want to move on from the era of | :06:43. | :06:47. | |
George Osborne where we had big political announcements surrounding | :06:48. | :06:52. | |
a budget. These are serious and earnest affairs. Tomorrow's | :06:53. | :06:55. | |
front-page headlines on all the papers are a big announcement that | :06:56. | :06:59. | |
will allow Theresa May to say she is pressing ahead for plans for grammar | :07:00. | :07:04. | |
schools. Speculation that was on the back burner. The Chancellor will | :07:05. | :07:09. | |
plough ?320 million into expanding the government's free school | :07:10. | :07:14. | |
programme. The key point is that will create extra spaces and those | :07:15. | :07:17. | |
schools would be able to select on the basis of academic ability. That | :07:18. | :07:22. | |
is obviously the big headline they want to get out tomorrow. The | :07:23. | :07:25. | |
important thing to remember about this budget is that it is the last | :07:26. | :07:30. | |
spring budget. In the Chancellor's mind we will have the first autumn | :07:31. | :07:36. | |
budget later this year. In his mind, that's the big moment where you | :07:37. | :07:39. | |
would make any big tax changes. And you would have a bit of news about | :07:40. | :07:44. | |
Brexit by then. What would you look out for as the things he will be | :07:45. | :07:48. | |
interested in either in this one or autumn? The key thing to remember | :07:49. | :07:53. | |
about autumn is that Brexit negotiations will be underweight for | :07:54. | :07:57. | |
several months by then. The French and German elections will be out of | :07:58. | :08:01. | |
the way. And the belief is the negotiations will be bumpy. They say | :08:02. | :08:06. | |
to Eurosceptics, who say all those Treasury warnings from George | :08:07. | :08:10. | |
Osborne were overstating it, they were based on the assumption Article | :08:11. | :08:14. | |
50 would be triggered immediately. We are about to trigger it, so we | :08:15. | :08:19. | |
will see what happens. In the autumn budget, will when the funding of | :08:20. | :08:26. | |
social care is addressed, the Chancellor is wary of taxing | :08:27. | :08:30. | |
inheritance. No death tax is the cry that is evidently going around the | :08:31. | :08:35. | |
Treasury at the moment. He's more interested in an idea from Baroness | :08:36. | :08:39. | |
Altmann, the former tension as minister, who says it's like an ice | :08:40. | :08:42. | |
for social care. The Chancellor likes that idea, he is responsible | :08:43. | :08:49. | |
to put on working people. The other thing he is alive to his criticism | :08:50. | :08:53. | |
on the Tory backbenches that stamp duty reforms from George Osborne | :08:54. | :08:56. | |
slowing down the housing market and not yielding the revenues talked | :08:57. | :09:04. | |
about. The Chancellor will hear that, but he needs to see more data. | :09:05. | :09:08. | |
If the concerns are true, he will be happy to respond. | :09:09. | :09:11. | |
Labour MP Helen Goodman was a minister in the Department | :09:12. | :09:13. | |
for Work and Pensions and now sits on the Treasury Select Committee - | :09:14. | :09:17. | |
A good evening to you both. Helen, what would you cut at this point? As | :09:18. | :09:25. | |
we have seen, and as your package showed, I think it's extremely | :09:26. | :09:31. | |
difficult to cut public service now. Adult social care in crisis. Three | :09:32. | :09:36. | |
quarters of NHS trusts in deficit. I would be amazed if they would spend | :09:37. | :09:41. | |
money on grammar schools, because across the country individual school | :09:42. | :09:45. | |
budgets are being cut in real and cash terms now. I think that's very | :09:46. | :09:51. | |
surprising as a development. I think it's necessary now to go back to | :09:52. | :09:58. | |
some of George Osborne's tax cuts. It's sensible to help people to save | :09:59. | :10:02. | |
for the long term for their care, but an inheritance tax cut that | :10:03. | :10:09. | |
enables people to leave ?1 million home? That is costing the Chancellor | :10:10. | :10:13. | |
?800 million. Capital gains tax, again reductions made by his | :10:14. | :10:18. | |
predecessor are costing him ?700 million. I would have thought he | :10:19. | :10:23. | |
would look there. You are saying, we have done enough on the spending | :10:24. | :10:29. | |
side, we have to look at taxes next. Chris, do you really believe, | :10:30. | :10:32. | |
because we haven't cut this year very much at all, there has been a | :10:33. | :10:37. | |
pause, can they do it and get the spending down? Putting the figures | :10:38. | :10:43. | |
in context, in 2016 real pounds, total government spending between | :10:44. | :10:49. | |
2010 and 2020 is about the same at ?760 billion per year in real terms. | :10:50. | :10:53. | |
People talk about the austerity of cuts, but in real terms the | :10:54. | :10:57. | |
government budget has stayed the same. In Helen's term, putting up | :10:58. | :11:02. | |
taxes willy-nilly, the way to clear a deficit is creating jobs and | :11:03. | :11:05. | |
growth. You help that by cutting taxes. One of the reasons | :11:06. | :11:11. | |
corporation tax receipts has gone up is because we have cut corporation | :11:12. | :11:15. | |
tax down from 28 to 20 and shortly 17%. That encourages businesses to | :11:16. | :11:20. | |
create jobs. It's not about government hand-outs or tax and | :11:21. | :11:23. | |
spending, it's about encouraging the economy to grow, which is what we | :11:24. | :11:27. | |
have done. Would you agree there is enormous pressure in many public | :11:28. | :11:31. | |
services at the moment? You see the headlines and you don't dismiss | :11:32. | :11:37. | |
that? Of course not. Social care is an obvious example. There is the | :11:38. | :11:43. | |
better care fund. ?3.5 billion more. Your government didn't manage to | :11:44. | :11:48. | |
make cuts this year, but the next three years it's intending that real | :11:49. | :11:52. | |
spending in departments, not welfare, but departments like health | :11:53. | :11:56. | |
and Home Office and so on, real spending cuts of 2% per head of | :11:57. | :12:02. | |
population per year. The fact is, the population of our country is | :12:03. | :12:06. | |
growing quite fast and that has put pressure on public spending, as the | :12:07. | :12:10. | |
public has told us. The population is growing at about 0.4% per year. | :12:11. | :12:19. | |
You believe that after six years of austerity, 2% cuts per head in real | :12:20. | :12:23. | |
terms spending is possible? Population is growing at 0.4% per | :12:24. | :12:29. | |
year. If you are freezing it, I think we can reduce public spending | :12:30. | :12:35. | |
per head after inflation by 0.4% per year and maintain services. Your | :12:36. | :12:39. | |
chart a few months ago showed how the government has progressively | :12:40. | :12:44. | |
reduced the Labour deficit from 2010 all the way down. The plan is to | :12:45. | :12:48. | |
continue that trajectory for the next few years until the deficit | :12:49. | :12:53. | |
hits zero. There is nothing responsible about raising more money | :12:54. | :12:58. | |
and sending the bill to our children. That's not what I | :12:59. | :13:01. | |
suggested. You need to take into account we have an ageing | :13:02. | :13:05. | |
population. The population is not what we had ten years ago. We have | :13:06. | :13:10. | |
more old people, they are older and more frail, so we have more NHS | :13:11. | :13:15. | |
needs. There are more adult social care needs. I think it's very hard | :13:16. | :13:20. | |
in a situation where we have food banks flourishing around the | :13:21. | :13:26. | |
country, to say, people must be allowed to inherit without any tax | :13:27. | :13:33. | |
at all, ?1 million inheritance. The inheritance tax will not be enough | :13:34. | :13:37. | |
to put money into the health service and pay for social care and get the | :13:38. | :13:42. | |
prisons and police and defence to levels people want. You have to do | :13:43. | :13:46. | |
have some proper tax increases on the average person as well as just | :13:47. | :13:51. | |
picking off a few... Not necessarily. As Chris says, for | :13:52. | :13:56. | |
example, we have already had ?6 billion of cuts in corporation tax | :13:57. | :14:00. | |
with another one in the spring. It raises more money. Maybe we could | :14:01. | :14:05. | |
leave corporation tax rate at 19% and not go to 17. Chris, what would | :14:06. | :14:12. | |
you actually cut? Give us a suggestion of something that would | :14:13. | :14:15. | |
save ?2 billion, which is the figure we sort of talking about. The | :14:16. | :14:21. | |
government is controlling spending in all areas. The biggest line | :14:22. | :14:24. | |
height is the welfare budget, and we have to get people off welfare and | :14:25. | :14:31. | |
into work. We have been successful. We have record employment, wages are | :14:32. | :14:34. | |
rising and we have record female employment as well. That's | :14:35. | :14:38. | |
ultimately the way you reduce public spending. We will have more of this | :14:39. | :14:40. | |
discussion on Wednesday, I'm sure. Now one of the more intriguing | :14:41. | :14:45. | |
suggestions that has been trailed as a budget possibility | :14:46. | :14:47. | |
is an increase in National Insurance It kind of makes sense at one level | :14:48. | :14:49. | |
as the self-employed people do pay less National Insurance, | :14:50. | :14:54. | |
and the government thus loses revenue when people switch | :14:55. | :14:56. | |
from employment to self-employment, which has been happening | :14:57. | :14:58. | |
more and more. But does it make sense | :14:59. | :14:59. | |
to Kevin Green, the Chief Executive of the Recruitment | :15:00. | :15:02. | |
Employment Confederation - the professional body | :15:03. | :15:04. | |
for the recruitment industry Their members place self-employed | :15:05. | :15:05. | |
contractors into jobs. Good evening. Just explain to | :15:06. | :15:21. | |
everyone, what is the difference between employment and | :15:22. | :15:25. | |
self-employment. In relation to National Insurance, if you're | :15:26. | :15:29. | |
self-employed, you pay 9% and if you are employed, you pay 12%. That is | :15:30. | :15:34. | |
what the Chancellor might go after. The much bigger gap, is that my | :15:35. | :15:42. | |
employer is paying 13%. You do not have an employer if you're self | :15:43. | :15:47. | |
employed. If you look at some of the business models like Cooper, they | :15:48. | :15:50. | |
will not be paying National Insurance contributions for the | :15:51. | :15:55. | |
people who work for them are self-employed and that is a | :15:56. | :15:57. | |
significantly bigger number. It is about 16% gap. Would it make sense | :15:58. | :16:04. | |
to do something in this budget to deal with that? The way it has been | :16:05. | :16:08. | |
positioned it looks like he will go after the worker rather than the | :16:09. | :16:12. | |
business and I think some of that is because it is much more complex when | :16:13. | :16:16. | |
you get into the business. We have a number of NEETs that we are waiting | :16:17. | :16:22. | |
for decisions on like Uber... They do not seem to have done anything | :16:23. | :16:27. | |
wrong. There is a definition about whether they are workers... | :16:28. | :16:30. | |
Employment tribunal 's have said that they are self-employed. No, | :16:31. | :16:37. | |
they said they were workers. We have got a fundamental problem between | :16:38. | :16:41. | |
employment regulation and taxation policy. Employment regulation you | :16:42. | :16:44. | |
have three definitions, self-employed, employed and worker | :16:45. | :16:50. | |
and taxation is self-employed or employee. Fundamentally, is there a | :16:51. | :16:56. | |
good case for charging self-employed people, basically 15 or 16% less tax | :16:57. | :17:03. | |
overall on the value of their Labour at the Newchurch employed people? | :17:04. | :17:08. | |
Clearly in relation to self-employed there is pension contributions, | :17:09. | :17:15. | |
holiday pay... The key is how do we, but the system which recognises some | :17:16. | :17:18. | |
of the risk about being self-employed, gives them some kind | :17:19. | :17:22. | |
of tax advantage but creates clarity and at the moment we have huge grey | :17:23. | :17:28. | |
areas in relation to tax for employers, employees cover the whole | :17:29. | :17:30. | |
thing is a mess and what we are looking for is the government to | :17:31. | :17:34. | |
come up with a systemic way of coming up with a fair taxation | :17:35. | :17:39. | |
policy for businesses and for employees, which actually aligns | :17:40. | :17:42. | |
these things so that we get the right tax for people. You're not | :17:43. | :17:48. | |
against aligning them will stop at some point over time. If you are | :17:49. | :17:53. | |
this government, you're not going to put 3p or 3% National Insurance on | :17:54. | :18:00. | |
the poorest least secure workers who are driving a cab for Uber or | :18:01. | :18:03. | |
working for Deliveroo, you will not say you will be paying more tax. | :18:04. | :18:08. | |
They are the ones they're trying to help! The Chancellor is clearly | :18:09. | :18:13. | |
looking for ways to raise tax. The issue at the moment is is this fair | :18:14. | :18:18. | |
or transparent? If you're employed, should you be paying more tax than | :18:19. | :18:23. | |
someone who is not employed? You are right, if the government is looking | :18:24. | :18:27. | |
at the tax from self-employment, it should go after the businesses and | :18:28. | :18:30. | |
really look that their model as well is looking at the workers because | :18:31. | :18:35. | |
the workers take more risk, they need to have some kind of incentive | :18:36. | :18:38. | |
to continue and we do not want to undermine our Labour market which | :18:39. | :18:42. | |
has been hugely successful. Kevin Green, thank you very much. | :18:43. | :18:44. | |
President Trump news now, and he has formulated | :18:45. | :18:46. | |
a new executive order to replace his old travel ban. | :18:47. | :18:48. | |
Remember, that was struck down in the courts. | :18:49. | :18:50. | |
This one takes effect in ten days time. | :18:51. | :18:53. | |
The executive order signed by the President earlier today, | :18:54. | :18:56. | |
protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry into | :18:57. | :18:57. | |
the United States is a vital measure for strengthening | :18:58. | :19:00. | |
It is the President's solemn duty to protect the American people. | :19:01. | :19:09. | |
And with this order, President Trump is exercising his rightful authority | :19:10. | :19:11. | |
Professor Stephen Legomsky was President Obama's Chief Counsel | :19:12. | :19:20. | |
for US Citizenship Immigration from 2011 to 2013. | :19:21. | :19:30. | |
evening to you. Do you think this new executive order will get through | :19:31. | :19:38. | |
the courts? Very difficult to say. There are two kinds of provision in | :19:39. | :19:42. | |
this executive order and some of them deal specifically with refugees | :19:43. | :19:45. | |
and others deal with immigrants generally. On the refugee site, the | :19:46. | :19:52. | |
two main changes are eliminating the indefinite ban on Syrian refugees, | :19:53. | :19:57. | |
all of whom are still subject to the 120 day moratorium and all refugees | :19:58. | :20:00. | |
and the other thing they did was to eliminate what had been an exception | :20:01. | :20:05. | |
for people who are persecuted because of their religion but only | :20:06. | :20:08. | |
if their religion was a minority religion. This was widely derided, | :20:09. | :20:14. | |
as a back door attempt to save Christians over Muslims and my guess | :20:15. | :20:18. | |
is that the courts will not be fooled by it. The religious | :20:19. | :20:23. | |
discrimination claim is still there and the evidence and pre-tax will | :20:24. | :20:26. | |
still be a stroll. Why do you say that? Now, it is a country | :20:27. | :20:31. | |
discrimination, it is not a religious discrimination. He surely | :20:32. | :20:35. | |
is entitled to say no immigrants but this country or that country, | :20:36. | :20:38. | |
legally? Absolutely and we do that all the time. What makes this | :20:39. | :20:43. | |
different is that the plaintiffs are arguing that even though the | :20:44. | :20:48. | |
document is neutral on its face, it is motivated by a different pre-tax | :20:49. | :20:53. | |
and to back up that claim they cite multiple statements from President | :20:54. | :20:57. | |
Trump about his intention to institute a Muslim ban, there is a | :20:58. | :21:03. | |
statement by his closest adviser, a former New York City Mayor, Rudy | :21:04. | :21:06. | |
Giuliani to the effect that the troubled campaign reached out to him | :21:07. | :21:11. | |
to find a way to package the Muslim ban and then there are also the | :21:12. | :21:16. | |
comments indicating a desire to protect persecuted Christians. The | :21:17. | :21:19. | |
job for the plaintiffs will be to convince the court that although the | :21:20. | :21:24. | |
order has changed, it is nonetheless religious discrimination and since | :21:25. | :21:28. | |
those statements were made in the past, they really cannot be taken | :21:29. | :21:31. | |
back. The question will be whether the courts by the argument or not. | :21:32. | :21:35. | |
The courts surely look through his words, they do not listen to what he | :21:36. | :21:39. | |
said, they look at whether it is a bad weather he said it was and they | :21:40. | :21:43. | |
will look at this and say it is pretty different to the previous | :21:44. | :21:48. | |
one. The differences are fairly cosmetic foot, it is true that the | :21:49. | :21:52. | |
Syrians have been eliminated as a separate group and it is true that | :21:53. | :21:55. | |
they have eliminated the religious minority exception but on the | :21:56. | :21:59. | |
refugee site, everything stays the same and on the general side there | :22:00. | :22:04. | |
is still a 90 day ban on entries from nationals from six countries, | :22:05. | :22:08. | |
Iraq is off the list and the questionnaire again is whether this | :22:09. | :22:14. | |
is motivated by religious pretext or whether it is a genuine national | :22:15. | :22:18. | |
security measure. The process this time, it has been a few weeks | :22:19. | :22:23. | |
coming, this executive order and it has a ten day lead time, are you | :22:24. | :22:27. | |
impressed that they got the process side of this more in order than they | :22:28. | :22:32. | |
did last time? They have clearly made improvements, the 10-day | :22:33. | :22:36. | |
lead-in is important and in addition, they have exempted very | :22:37. | :22:41. | |
important categories, for example people who have lawful permanent | :22:42. | :22:45. | |
residents starters in the UK -- US are exempted as are those who hold | :22:46. | :22:49. | |
valid current visas and that will go a long way toward strengthening the | :22:50. | :22:53. | |
government case on the question of whether or not due process or what | :22:54. | :22:56. | |
would be called natural justice in the UK has been observed but I do | :22:57. | :23:03. | |
not know whether that gets them past the religious discrimination | :23:04. | :23:04. | |
argument. Thank you for talking to us. | :23:05. | :23:06. | |
We've been talking a lot about France and its impending | :23:07. | :23:09. | |
But there are Parliamentary elections in the | :23:10. | :23:11. | |
In the country often described as the most liberal in Europe. | :23:12. | :23:15. | |
They used to joke, "do you know what's illegal in the Netherlands? | :23:16. | :23:18. | |
Polls suggest many people will vote for Geert Wilders, | :23:19. | :23:22. | |
a right-wing populist who wants to pull the country out | :23:23. | :23:25. | |
of the EU and ban immigration from Muslim countries. | :23:26. | :23:27. | |
He might even win the largest number of seats. | :23:28. | :23:29. | |
So what happened to the supposedly tolerant, easy-going Dutch? | :23:30. | :23:33. | |
We've heard from the populists on this programme, | :23:34. | :23:35. | |
but Newsnight's Gabriel Gatehouse grew up in Amsterdam, | :23:36. | :23:37. | |
and he's been back to try to find out what liberals there make | :23:38. | :23:40. | |
The Netherlands is having an identity crisis. | :23:41. | :24:14. | |
I don't remember people agonising over this question in the past. | :24:15. | :24:25. | |
We are all the same, and we're very tolerant. | :24:26. | :24:38. | |
And we drink and eat and play and dance together. | :24:39. | :24:43. | |
That's the good thing about Carnival. | :24:44. | :24:45. | |
Some people are not so the same as other people. | :24:46. | :25:00. | |
I think the whole Islamic thing means that we are more | :25:01. | :25:03. | |
Geert Wilders, the Netherlands' answer to Donald Trump, | :25:04. | :25:09. | |
wants to ban the Koran, close the mosques, and the borders. | :25:10. | :25:19. | |
In defence of their tolerant way of life, many Dutch people | :25:20. | :25:22. | |
are apparently willing to vote for some pretty intolerant policy. | :25:23. | :25:30. | |
When I was growing up here in the 1980s, the Netherlands, | :25:31. | :25:34. | |
and Amsterdam in particular, felt like this sort of inclusive | :25:35. | :25:38. | |
space, a place that was open and tolerant, where anything goes, | :25:39. | :25:41. | |
and anyone, really, can come and be themselves. | :25:42. | :25:46. | |
It doesn't really feel like that any more. | :25:47. | :25:48. | |
So I've come back here to try and find out what's happened | :25:49. | :25:54. | |
to that peculiarly Dutch brand of liberalism. | :25:55. | :26:08. | |
This feels like a country on a difficult journey | :26:09. | :26:10. | |
A country that has suffered a sudden loss of faith | :26:11. | :26:18. | |
in a set of truths it once held be self-evident. | :26:19. | :26:23. | |
On the outskirts of the city, an abandoned shipyard has been | :26:24. | :26:26. | |
ADM, as it's known, is a community of artists and performers, the sort | :26:27. | :26:34. | |
of people for whom Amsterdam was once a haven. | :26:35. | :26:40. | |
It used to be a town with a lot of empty spaces. | :26:41. | :26:43. | |
It was a paradise for people who want to make things | :26:44. | :26:45. | |
It was really a part of, a sort of Utopia. | :26:46. | :26:53. | |
# When I'm hungry, I eat out of the dumpster. | :26:54. | :26:56. | |
# When I'm thirsty, is that your beer? | :26:57. | :26:59. | |
# When I'm tired, I find an empty house to sleep in. | :27:00. | :27:03. | |
# And if you don't like it, lock you! | :27:04. | :27:07. | |
But the welfare state that nourished that Utopia | :27:08. | :27:09. | |
These days, there's less space for squatters, | :27:10. | :27:16. | |
Under pressure perhaps, the collective now has | :27:17. | :27:22. | |
a surprisingly strict membership policy. | :27:23. | :27:26. | |
Everyone is allowed in, but we should be able to send them | :27:27. | :27:29. | |
out if it's not working, and close the gate behind. | :27:30. | :27:32. | |
If that sounds like something Geert Wilders might like, well, | :27:33. | :27:35. | |
he's not popular here, but perhaps the fate of the squat | :27:36. | :27:38. | |
in some ways mirrors that of the country. | :27:39. | :27:44. | |
The group is small enough to control ourselves, | :27:45. | :27:46. | |
and now we begin this fantastic, nonconformist little town. | :27:47. | :27:53. | |
Squatters were once a defining force in radical Dutch politics. | :27:54. | :28:06. | |
The squatter riots of the 1980s are a vivid and sometimes | :28:07. | :28:08. | |
In an apparent attempt to defuse the situation, | :28:09. | :28:15. | |
a policeman dressed as Santa Claus was lifted off the roof by crane. | :28:16. | :28:21. | |
Against the backdrop of Reaganomics and Thatcherism, the movement | :28:22. | :28:23. | |
These were battles over the concept of public versus private space. | :28:24. | :28:34. | |
As the squatters fought the riot police on the streets, | :28:35. | :28:36. | |
an architect specialising in school design was having a similar fight | :28:37. | :28:39. | |
I was in the first class of pupils to go to school here. | :28:40. | :28:54. | |
The architect, Herman Hertzberger, believed that buildings had | :28:55. | :28:56. | |
His aim was to foster a more egalitarian relationship | :28:57. | :29:04. | |
And I always had the enormous fight for every square metre, you know? | :29:05. | :29:12. | |
And this is not necessary, because the classrooms, | :29:13. | :29:14. | |
The teacher is saying, this is the way the world works, | :29:15. | :29:22. | |
But I said classrooms is one, but there's also the idea | :29:23. | :29:32. | |
of doing things together, seeing what the others are doing. | :29:33. | :29:34. | |
And so we must try to get space also for this communal thing. | :29:35. | :29:48. | |
The architecture of the Netherlands tells us | :29:49. | :29:57. | |
Walk along the canals in Amsterdam, you see not one or three | :29:58. | :30:04. | |
You see thousands of small palaces, of citizens. | :30:05. | :30:12. | |
At the heart of Dutch liberalism lies a fundamental tension, | :30:13. | :30:18. | |
between the sometimes competing notions of liberty and equality. | :30:19. | :30:21. | |
Of individualism versus the common good. | :30:22. | :30:25. | |
They are not individual portraits of a king or a count or something. | :30:26. | :30:31. | |
These are portraits of very proud citizens. | :30:32. | :30:35. | |
We drink together, fight together, without a king, without a leader. | :30:36. | :30:39. | |
When we talk about being liberal, it was also economically liberal. | :30:40. | :30:47. | |
Yes, that's deep in the genes of the Dutch. | :30:48. | :30:51. | |
Descartes, who lived for quite a long time in Amsterdam | :30:52. | :30:54. | |
at the beginning of the 17th century, said already, | :30:55. | :30:59. | |
everybody is only occupied here with earning money, nothing else. | :31:00. | :31:04. | |
Money, money, that's the big go-to here. | :31:05. | :31:06. | |
The Bergers of the Golden Age turned the Netherlands into the biggest | :31:07. | :31:09. | |
This new prosperity was driven by immigrants - | :31:10. | :31:17. | |
Protestants and Jews fleeing persecution in Catholic Europe. | :31:18. | :31:23. | |
Because we are a society full of minorities and groups, | :31:24. | :31:26. | |
That creates a society which has to be tolerant, | :31:27. | :31:30. | |
Growing up, we were taught that tolerance was as much a part | :31:31. | :31:44. | |
of Dutch culture as eating mayonnaise with your chips. | :31:45. | :31:46. | |
And that had less to do with the 17th century | :31:47. | :31:48. | |
I used to live in one of those buildings over there, number ten, | :31:49. | :31:53. | |
Before I lived there some other people did, whose | :31:54. | :31:58. | |
names are commemorated here in these plaques. | :31:59. | :32:01. | |
Seven of them, who were murdered by the Nazis | :32:02. | :32:05. | |
during the Second World War because they were Jewish. | :32:06. | :32:08. | |
There were similar plaques all along the canalside here, | :32:09. | :32:12. | |
and during the War one tenth of the population of this city were | :32:13. | :32:15. | |
The German occupation had a huge impact on how | :32:16. | :32:21. | |
Discriminating against people because of their religion, | :32:22. | :32:27. | |
their cultural or ethnic background, that was something that other | :32:28. | :32:29. | |
I grew up in a time when all of us in this country were still very much | :32:30. | :32:38. | |
under the impression that we lived in the most liberal, | :32:39. | :32:40. | |
I used to actually, literally say this to people - | :32:41. | :32:48. | |
that I'm from Amsterdam, so I live in the best | :32:49. | :32:51. | |
country in the world, the best city in the world, | :32:52. | :32:53. | |
and anything goes, and you are free to be whoever you are. | :32:54. | :32:56. | |
However, now when I look back I think, oh no, | :32:57. | :32:58. | |
there was definitely a lot going on under the surface that | :32:59. | :33:01. | |
Beneath the surface, many people felt uncomfortable | :33:02. | :33:06. | |
Fuelled by Geert Wilders, the debate has focused on Islam. | :33:07. | :33:18. | |
A lot of people think that Islamophobia, | :33:19. | :33:21. | |
or anti-Semitism and racism, they are all different things. | :33:22. | :33:26. | |
Sylvana Simons has set up a political party trying | :33:27. | :33:32. | |
to highlight what she says is a hidden current | :33:33. | :33:35. | |
Death threats is what I have received just for simply | :33:36. | :33:43. | |
That doesn't sound like the most tolerant, | :33:44. | :33:49. | |
the most progressive country on earth. | :33:50. | :33:52. | |
We used to take pride in saying we are so tolerant. | :33:53. | :33:55. | |
We've been tolerant, we have been tolerating. | :33:56. | :33:59. | |
And tolerating means accepting something that you really don't | :34:00. | :34:02. | |
actually agree with, but you are just, | :34:03. | :34:04. | |
Here's one thing that has definitely changed since I was at school. | :34:05. | :34:12. | |
People seem to have stopped believing that the future will be | :34:13. | :34:15. | |
I am from a generation that was just thinking everything | :34:16. | :34:24. | |
is going to be better, more, and that stopped now. | :34:25. | :34:30. | |
And we feel that our next generation will have more difficulties | :34:31. | :34:35. | |
It's still optimistic, but it's not an optimism of, | :34:36. | :34:44. | |
It's now an optimism of, when we do our best, | :34:45. | :34:52. | |
So, conservatism and hard work has won out over progressive | :34:53. | :35:04. | |
This really is a different country to the one I remember. | :35:05. | :35:13. | |
At the squatters' camp, it feels like the party is almost over. | :35:14. | :35:20. | |
Don't be surprised if a crack in the ice appears under your feet. | :35:21. | :35:26. | |
Because you are hippie and tolerant and everything is possible. | :35:27. | :35:35. | |
Even in ADM, we had a problem, and I was one of the people | :35:36. | :35:39. | |
always defending everyone, until I found out it's not | :35:40. | :35:41. | |
A hippie community can burst because everybody has taken too much | :35:42. | :35:47. | |
drugs or everybody has went to sleep with everybody, and | :35:48. | :35:51. | |
Perhaps the idea of the Netherlands as free space was never anything | :35:52. | :36:03. | |
Now, in an age of identity politics, the Dutch are asking themselves some | :36:04. | :36:09. | |
And does the Netherlands still want to be a place | :36:10. | :36:20. | |
We are discussing the same topic day after day in many different | :36:21. | :36:37. | |
manifestations. For opponents of President Trump, | :36:38. | :36:40. | |
particularly those without much imagination, it is hard | :36:41. | :36:42. | |
to understand how anyone "What are they thinking?", is | :36:43. | :36:44. | |
a sentiment quite widely expressed. The idea that a person of colour | :36:45. | :36:47. | |
might support him would seem Well, two black women - | :36:48. | :36:50. | |
siblings and keen supporters of President Trump - have made a big | :36:51. | :36:57. | |
impact on social media. They've even appeared | :36:58. | :36:59. | |
at his rallies, as the They are Lynnette Hardaway | :37:00. | :37:01. | |
and Rochelle Richardson, former Democrats who style | :37:02. | :37:06. | |
themselves Diamond and Diamond on the left, | :37:07. | :37:07. | |
Silk on the right, and asked them why they thought that | :37:08. | :37:13. | |
African Americans didn't, African Americans did go out | :37:14. | :37:16. | |
and they did march to those voting polls and they voted | :37:17. | :37:25. | |
for President Donald J Trump. The problem that we | :37:26. | :37:27. | |
have is the left. The Democrats, the Liberals, | :37:28. | :37:32. | |
that keep pushing an agenda They love that people burn | :37:33. | :37:37. | |
down their communities. President Trump wants to build | :37:38. | :37:45. | |
back these communities. President Trump wants | :37:46. | :37:47. | |
to stop the violence. He is going to be a President, | :37:48. | :37:52. | |
a good President not just for black You will know, he just lied | :37:53. | :37:55. | |
about how many people were at the inauguration, | :37:56. | :38:23. | |
everyone can see that it Let me go ahead and stop | :38:24. | :38:25. | |
you and we will get you straight. We were there, there were thousands | :38:26. | :38:30. | |
upon thousands upon thousands We were there, we saw | :38:31. | :38:34. | |
it with our own eyes. Honestly, Diamond, I think | :38:35. | :38:38. | |
it was easier to see it from the camera positions | :38:39. | :38:41. | |
and you really could see, there were more people there under | :38:42. | :38:43. | |
Obama than there were under Trump. OK, so, OK, why are you debating | :38:44. | :38:46. | |
me with this question I suppose I'm just interested | :38:47. | :38:48. | |
in what you think, He sometimes on occasion just | :38:49. | :38:52. | |
says stuff that is just Excuse me, my President, | :38:53. | :38:58. | |
wait a minute, my President never That's what's wrong | :38:59. | :39:02. | |
with you left people. You always want to be | :39:03. | :39:05. | |
so politically correct, well he is not politically correct, | :39:06. | :39:07. | |
he is honest and we love Many people are saying he has had | :39:08. | :39:10. | |
a slightly rocky start, he lost Michael Flynn, | :39:11. | :39:14. | |
obviously Jeff Sessions, the Attorney General, | :39:15. | :39:16. | |
has had to recuse himself Lots of questions over | :39:17. | :39:18. | |
the original travel ban, do you think it has been a bit | :39:19. | :39:24. | |
messy, who do you blame for that? Do you blame Donald Trump | :39:25. | :39:28. | |
for that or who you blame? I blame the media for taking | :39:29. | :39:30. | |
and conjuring up a story about the Russians and insulting | :39:31. | :39:33. | |
the American people, the millions that got out | :39:34. | :39:37. | |
and voted for our President, President Donald Trump, | :39:38. | :39:40. | |
it was not the Russians that hacked the elections, | :39:41. | :39:42. | |
the American people hacked it, we went to the polls | :39:43. | :39:44. | |
and we voted for him. Is there anything this guy could do | :39:45. | :39:47. | |
where you would not say You wouldn't get in a car | :39:48. | :39:50. | |
and let him drive you over Is there anything this bloke | :39:51. | :39:55. | |
can do that is wrong? You think it's wrong | :39:56. | :39:59. | |
because it's not your way. He is trying to secure the border | :40:00. | :40:07. | |
to keep people safe. He is trying to keep people | :40:08. | :40:13. | |
from coming into our country wanting The people that come from these | :40:14. | :40:15. | |
certain countries that do not like Americans, | :40:16. | :40:19. | |
he is trying to create the atmosphere where people | :40:20. | :40:23. | |
are thriving again, where the inner and urban cities are | :40:24. | :40:25. | |
being built again. So we, the American people we love | :40:26. | :40:27. | |
it, so there is nothing my President The thing is, everybody makes | :40:28. | :40:33. | |
mistakes, it would be very odd if Donald Trump did not make some | :40:34. | :40:43. | |
mistakes and I am just wondering if you can think of anything, | :40:44. | :40:47. | |
can you think of anything he has If you can't, it probably tells us | :40:48. | :40:50. | |
that you are, you know, you're just big fans and you're | :40:51. | :40:55. | |
on his side, come what may. Well you know what, the only mistake | :40:56. | :41:01. | |
that I can think of is the mistake of not continuously every single | :41:02. | :41:04. | |
day, all day, keeping He needs to do it on a regular | :41:05. | :41:08. | |
basis, every day. Tweet it out all day every | :41:09. | :41:13. | |
day about the fake news We are very loyal to our President, | :41:14. | :41:16. | |
we trust his decision, we trust that he will make the right | :41:17. | :41:22. | |
decision and the way that it will affect American people, | :41:23. | :41:25. | |
we trust that he wants to do things that are going to benefit | :41:26. | :41:28. | |
us and not hurt us. We trust his judgment, | :41:29. | :41:31. | |
that's why we voted for him Can I ask, do you two ever disagree | :41:32. | :41:34. | |
yourselves between the two of you or do you always | :41:35. | :41:40. | |
agree on everything? We agree to disagree | :41:41. | :41:43. | |
when we have a disagreement. Diamond, Silk, thank | :41:44. | :41:46. | |
you so very much. We've run out of time | :41:47. | :41:50. | |
for anything except this, news of the official confirmation | :41:51. | :42:06. | |
from Guinness that German Engineer Albert Beer and his Robot, | :42:07. | :42:09. | |
named Sub 1, are now the world As a political side note, | :42:10. | :42:12. | |
they beat Ed Miliband's 90 | :42:13. | :42:16. |