31/05/2017 Newsnight

The Tories relaunch their campaign, this time with Amber Rudd,

The question in this election is whether we want a country for the

many, or just the few. I just have to take on some of Jeremy Corbyn's

fantasy economics. I mean come on he has this money tree wish list in his

manifesto. Meanwhile, as one pollster suggests there will be a

hung parliament, Labour refuses to tell us whether they will rule out a

coalition with the SNP. I'm not dealing with hypothetical is, I'm

sorry. Why not? It is a reasonable question. We are fighting this to

win. We're going to cancel a Paris

climate agreement. No decision yet, but it

looks like he will honour The first of our new series

of political bedtime stories. There was a prince called David, and

he ruled well. Well, we had the nearest thing

to a full-spectrum TV election Seven politicians, some of them

candidates for Prime Minister, lined up in Cambridge,

with the conspicuous absence of the actual

Prime Minister, Theresa May. She was replaced by Amber Rudd,

the Home Secretary, who did an effective job at looking Prime

Ministerial. The debate had some sparky

moments, and some recurrent Everybody on stage

had their highlights, Nick, how did it go? Well, obviously

Jeremy Corbyn's late decision to turn up at this debate put the

spotlight on Theresa May, who was a notable absentee. And there were

plenty of jokes about how the Prime Minister called this election the

most important in her lifetime and she could not be bothered to turn

up. To which the Conservative Party says, thank you very much to those

six parties, you are illustrating one of our key themes about the

selection, which is that if Jeremy Corbyn emerges as the leader of the

largest party on June nine, the UK will be governed by a coalition of

chaos. What would I say about the overall verdict? There was no clear

winner and there was no clear loser. Jeremy Corbyn did as he did in the

Channel 4 debate on Sunday, he spoke from the heart on matters dear to

him, food banks for example. Amber Rudd did what she did last year in

the referendum debate, had some pre-packaged sound bites, one on the

Monopoly board that didn't quite work. But she stood up well against

the six other parties and delivered her core message, which was the

choice, who do you want to negotiate Brexit? Jeremy Corbyn or Theresa

May? A bit of a question mark, because Theresa May wasn't here.

Before this debate, YouGov carried out another poll, and it makes

pretty interesting reading to night. That's right. A YouGov poll in The

Times tomorrow suggests the Conservative lead is now down to

three points, 42 the Conservative, 39 to Labour. There is a dramatic

tightening of the polls as far as YouGov is concerned. But that is not

being borne out in other polls. The ICM poll in the Guardian yesterday

gave the Conservatives a 12 point lead. I spoke to one senior Labour

source who said to me, we are clear that there is a pattern that the

polls are tightening. But as there being a dramatic tightening, well,

they say they're going to be really cautious. Thanks, Nick. We will be

talking about the polls and what's driving them a little later in the

programme. Well, there were strong moments

for everybody on stage, David Grossman was watching

as the argument progressed. Not since Captain Mannering's wife

has a character so dominated a scene while not appearing. Jeremy Corbyn.

There were quite a party leaders. One Westminster party leader, one

co-leader and a stunt double -- that work for party leaders. The first

question of the night, who is missing? Theresa May. The reason any

leading lady sends a stunt double is so she doesn't get damaged if things

go wrong. So with this, Amber Rudd's tactic was clear. Ignore the others,

but slammed Jeremy Corbyn hard at every opportunity. Jeremy, I know

there is no extra payment you don't want to add to, no tax you don't

want to rise. But the fact is we have to concentrate our resources on

the people who need it most and we have to stop thinking, as you do,

that there is a magic money tree. You have to be accountable for the

money you want to spend. Have you been to a food bank? Have you seen

people sleeping around our stations? Jeremy Corbyn managed quite a few

slams back. We cannot go on giving money away to the very rich. This

Government is proposing another ?60 billion in tax giveaways in the next

five years. Instead I say turn it round and invest in the future of

all the while people. With so many participants, the debate often

descended into chaos -- of all of our people. Particularly when they

were arguing about chaos. This is chaotic, chaotic. As the Government,

the Conservatives were doing the most defending. Judge us on our

record... LAUGHTER

We have cut the deficit. It wasn't the past that worried the Lib Dems

so much as the future. We have a general election in eight days,

Theresa May assuming a colossal landslide, that's why she thinks she

can ignore people and not bother turning up tonight. She is telling

people, we will take your house of you and we will allow you to know

how much you get to keep after your majority. If tonight you resolve to

vote Conservative on the 8th of June, you were resolving to give

Theresa May emission to do what you like. Remove university tuition

fees. Mike there are other parties to be judged on their record. You

have a Labour government in Wales that is charging students to go to

university. This is a UK Government... Labour is different in

the UK than in Wales? It's going to be a UK policy. It is unbelievably

cruel to using lives as bargaining chips. The Greens attack the

Government and the UK on Brexit. I want to make the case for free

movement, it has been the most wonderful gift, the ability to

travel and work and live and love in 27 other member states, and for them

to come here. I am sorry that the Labour Party now doesn't support

that. Frankly. Mike when the subject turned to terrorism, the Ukip leader

called for internment of suspect if necessary. 23,000 jihadis out there

want to do us harm. Lets not give our freedom and our liberty awaits.

British rights over the rights of jihadis. The question was about

terrorism and extremism, and Ukip went straight for more slums.

APPLAUSE -- went straight for Muslims. It

wasn't a Muslim that shot Jo Cox. At the end of the 90 minutes, two

questions hung in the. Was Theresa May harmed or helped by not being

there, and was a single voter's mind changed by any of it's David

Grossman. Well, as is traditional with these

things, the debate tonight was followed by rounds of frantic PR

from all sides afterwards It's all wrapped up now, but just

before we came on air I caught up with the Brexit Secretary,

David Davis. First, I spoke to Labour's Shadow

Foreign Secretary, Emily Thornberry. I started by asking her whether

Jeremy Corbyn taking part in the debate plays into those Tory

warnings of a coalition of chaos. Well, I think that's probably the

desperate attempt of Conservative Party Central office to try and spin

this. But, you know what, I think if I was Amber Rudd I would be going

back to Theresa May and saying, you really on me. I'm in front of all of

those people and I say, judge us on our record, and people laughed. I

had to be that a front that up, it should have been you, you are the

Prime Minister, you are supposed to be the one who is strong and stable

and able to negotiate Brexit, and yet you're not even prepared to

debate with pupils to what I want to push a little harder on the

coalition of chaos line. -- debate with people. Many people thought it

was rather effective, and the polls, which have had a surge for Labour,

the polls perhaps suggest a hung parliament is more likely than we

have bought. That means there could be a coalition led by the Labour

Party. You know what I'm going to say, Evan, you know, we don't

believe the polls, we don't pay attention to polls. What we're doing

is we are out there to win it. We do sense on the ground that things are

beginning to change and that they want to listen to us and that they

do see there is an alternative, and an alternative which is a potential

Government that has the vision for Britain and is about hope and is

about an alternative. It does not have to be that way, and the power

is in the hands of the people, they can decide that no, despite the fact

that you guys in the media and Evra Ross Wardle been saying, Theresa May

is going to walk it, it is just a question of how big a majority it

will be -- in the media and everywhere else. It is up to the

media to decide, and the people are beginning to listen to us and

realising that we are a serious alternative. It does not have to be

like this. Point made. You can just clarify for the hypothetical

situation in which it is a hung parliament, that Labour will not

have a collision agreement with the Scottish National Party, correct? We

can take that as read, that will not happen, and you can be clear about

that now and it would be a breach of the promised if there is one of two

the election? I'm not dealing with hypothetical is with you, I'm sorry.

Why not? It's a perfectly reasonable question. Because we're fighting to

win! We want to have a majority in the House of Commons and we want to

be the next government and we are putting for and our alternative to

the British people and it's for them to decide which government they

want. One thing is for sure, it's either going to be a Labour

government or a Conservative government, and that's how it is.

It's very interesting that you won't rule out a collision with the SNP,

and anybody listening to you will say, if we don't agree with Emily

Thornbury that it may be a hung parliament, then we'd be right to

think they will do a deal with the SNP. We have put our faith in the

British people and in our ability to be able to put forward our arguments

and alternative vision. The fact is, you know, this is the biggest star

that we have in our show, which is a series of ideas and an alternative

vision for Britain. Let me just take a couple of points in there. If you

want to wave the manifesto... The manifesto says, it is very carefully

costed. It's not that funny! It says it's carefully costed. Sorry, I'm

laughing because I know you're going to start asking by numbers. Believe

me, I'm not trying to test you on your numbers, I'm not. However,

there are some policy areas, policy areas where it is simply not costed.

Our benefits going to be operated or not? Because working age benefits,

on Monday Jeremy Corbyn said they would be but there is no cost in

there for that, that is not a costed manifesto, is it? If we have a great

honour of taking over as the next government, we will need to go into

the Department of and look at the chaos that is currently Universal

Credit, and we need to look again at how well it is working, how that it

is, and how the cuts will be effecting real people's likes. We

have set aside ?2 billion per year in order to be able to look again at

Universal Credit and sorted out and make sure it is there. There is a

series of benefits that we will. The cuts off, I can reel them off if you

want. It starts with the bedroom tax and how unfair that is. It's just

the operating of benefits. Some of your plans are carefully costed and

they are there. -- the operating of benefits. This is not costed and it

is quite expensive. This is when you have basically changed on the hoof,

you have you turned on your manifesto, it is not in there.

Jeremy Corbyn says it is on the TV. That is different to your manifesto.

The reason we put into the manifesto by the focus on Universal Credit is

because this is another vehicle that people will be getting their

benefits, we want to make sure it is done fairly and properly. Emily

Thornbury, we are out of time, thank for joining us.

Also doing his duty at the Spin Room tonight

was the Brexit Secretary, David Davis.

I asked him how he felt Amber Rudd did this evening standing in for her

leader. I think she did astonishingly well, she was

straightforward, calm, sober, answered questions directly. It was

a metaphorical comparison with the coalition of against her, noise and

the argument, she was the voice of calm in the middle of it, she did

very well indeed. Theresa May did well not to go because she would not

have done as well as Amber Rudd. Well, I don't think that is true,

bear in mind a couple of things: she appeared on the same programme as

Jeremy Corbyn on Monday, doing the same again Friday, she has done 5500

miles of touring around the country, answering loads of questions from

public and journalists. Do you think she watched tonight, do you know if

she watched it? Honestly, I don't know.

Bearing in mind she has got to run the country at the same time, she

has homework to do. Do you think she watched the debate? I don't know,

but I wouldn't necessarily assume so. It is embarrassing if you are

the leader of the party, the Prime Minister, and somebody stands in for

you, and to some extent, shows you up, by answering the questions so

nimbly, which is not characteristic of Theresa May in this campaign. I

don't think that shows her up, one of the real underestimated

characteristics, of great leaders, is they have good people around

them, good people around her, Amber Rudd is one of the stars, that is a

very good thing. Amber was able to be straightforward because we have a

strong argument, a strong case, she made it well. One of the things she

said related to your department. She said, when it comes to Brexit, you

have a plan. Yes, we do. I thought that you had a set of objectives,

but having objectives is not the same as having a plan. I plan is

what you do when they do not like your objectives! Well, we have both,

the manifesto, has a page and a half, what it refers to is well over

100 pages. Two White Papers, major speech, that long letter. Behind all

of that, those are the aims, the idea of a agreement, customs

agreement, idea of continuing counterterrorism cooperation, all

those things are there but underpinning that, there is also

chairing a meeting today, as I was, first steps of the plan, where we

hope we win the election and we start, 11 days later, into the

negotiations. Great, maybe, as it is the Brexit election by your own

admission, maybe you can share with us some aspects of the plan, maybe

you can tell us what your immigration policy will be, once we

leave. First thing we have said is that we will bring control back to

Britain. That is not a policy, it is a phrase, David...! Wait a minute,

let me get to the point, Evan, people voted for control the borders

and money and their own laws in the referendum, all of those matter, in

the control of borders, we are talking about bringing control back

to Britain's Parliament can decide on eventually what the immigration

policy is and we have said clearly that the aim is to bring it down to

sustainable levels. That is not a policy, with respect, that is not a

policy. A plan... Too often the commentators want to go into the

weeds and the details... LAUGHTER What? The outcome will be that. You

have told us no deal is better than a bad deal, but you have not told us

how bad a deal has to be... I just want to ask you, would you walk

away, literally say, no deal, if, for example, the European court of

justice had to be involved in the European aviation agreement that we

sign, or something like that. No deal is better than a deal that has

anything...? Many components of a bad deal, we will not draw the lines

for you so that our negotiations partners on the other side nowhere

to push it too, but I will say that we will not have the European court

of justice ruling on issues inside Britain. This is not a plan, it is a

lot of things that you say, that you are going to do. Set of demands that

are unpleasant and not compatible, is that what you are talking about?

Why would... Not at all, why would they be presented with incompatible

and unpleasant things, we are looking for the best deal possible,

a free-trade agreement, customs agreement, an agreement on

counterterrorism and security, those are not unpalatable things, and in

addition, will seek to open up free-trade agreements with the rest

of the world, those are all very good things, not very bad things.

The last one, another poll this evening, YouGov poll, 3% difference

between the Tories and Labour. What are you reading into this, into this

surge, too much Theresa May and not enough Amber Rudd on the campaign?

You have been a television commentator, radio commentator, for

a long time, you are very numerous, above all people, you should know

how untrustworthy pulsar. What it reminds people is that if you do not

have Theresa May going to that negotiation, 11 days after the

election, it will be Jeremy Corbyn. -- very numerate. The people

watching your programme have got to make a decision, which do they want?

I know which, it is clear to me. Well, this has not been the election

the Tories thought it would be An easy cruise to a much enhanced

majority, all based on the broad the party seems to be

in the midst of a wobble. Although still in the lead

according to the polls, it's hard to think of an election

campaign that has seen a more

dramatic turn against But, the Conservatives

are a party keen to get a grip, And campaign chief Lynton Crosby has

been given an enhanced role for the final week, Newsnight has learned.

Nick Watt looks at what is next for Theresa May.

VOICEOVER: Just a few short weeks ago,

Theresa May was banking on a Blue

surge sweeping her back into Downing Street

It turns out that a few weeks is now an eternity in British politics.

With just eight days to go, our strong and stable

Prime Minister is stumbling towards the finishing line.

Elections rarely work out as they're meant to work out.

It looked like this was going to be a very boring campaign,

I think, in lots of ways, what the Conservatives have

Because actually I think they're looking at this

huge problem of care, which is growing because -

luckily, I'm growing older myself - we're all living longer,

and it's a problem that has to be addressed sometime.

But to do that kind of in the middle of an election campaign isn't

And that's made it a much more interesting campaign.

The new pressure on the Prime Minister followed an estimate

by the pollsters YouGov that Theresa May could lose 20 seats.

Tory high command is disdainful of the findings.

They believe the Prime Minister is still on course for a decisive

victory on the grounds that Jeremy Corbyn is not seen

For all of the bullish talk amongst senior Tories,

Cabinet Ministers acknowledge that their campaign did

experience a wobble last week after Theresa May's U-turn

But rare nerves in the May camp led to one major change,

Sir Lynton Crosby, who masterminded David Cameron's victory in 2015,

has taken sole command of the Tory election campaign.

Everybody bar the Prime Minister now answers to him.

Under Lynton Crosby's leadership, there has been a renewed focus

on the original issue the Prime Minister said

who is best placed to deliver Brexit?

David Cameron's former Director of Communications believes

They're willing to check to go over the top with him

and go in the direction that he sets.

lots of people just wanted to follow what he said

and were prepared to listen to him and hear what he had to say.

But he was also very clear in 2015 - I'm in charge.

The dominant role now played by Lynton Crosby shows how

the architect of the original social care policy, the Prime Minister's

Joint Chief of Staff, Nick Timothy, has been damaged by the U-turn.

One minister told Newsnight that after the election,

there will be calls to curb the unconstitutional

dominance of Timothy and his colleague Fiona Hill.

Ministers say the Prime Minister's authority has taken a knock.

but only if she secures a decisive victory.

is a parliamentary majority of at least 50.

about why the Prime Minister inflicted this election

Welcome to the BBC Election Debate 2017.

Theresa May's less-than-perfect campaign was forced

onto the defensive again tonight over the television Leaders' Debate.

We invited the leaders of seven parties to take part.

Some are here, others chose to send senior representatives.

The election battle in Scotland is heating up. Signs are that Nicola

Sturgeon's party remain somewhere ahead, but she has not had it all

her own way in this campaign, accurately softening her demand for

an independence referendum as seen last year. How is it going down,

Kirsty has been on the road with Nicola Sturgeon today, as she

campaigns for votes in Fife. The morning after the SNP manifesto

launch. If I was to tell you that instead of going on this cruise, you

can see Nicola Sturgeon, would you get off the boat? Would you be quite

keen to see her? Probably wouldn't seek her out, but if she was here to

chat, I would say hello. Apparently she is also coming here for a bite

to eat. Important visitor in the fish bar today? Yes, I believe so.

Any special recipe? Obviously, a traditional haddock and chips is the

most popular, award-winning. One mile away, still more than 30

fishing boats. This fisherman voted to leave the EU, but he is for the

SNP. Tell me, what you think of Nicola Sturgeon? She is good, aye,

puts herself across well, talks to the point. Back in town, Nicola

Sturgeon is doing what she and Theresa May say they like doing

best, campaigning. The thing with the general election campaign, even

if you are First Minister, any photo opportunity is better than no photo

opportunity especially when they are young and cannot speak back!

One resident has concerns about education. What are her policies?

Generally, they're not bad on the whole, but education... And there

have been repeated questions during this campaign about what the SNP

have done with their decade in government. I sat down with the

First Minister. Two years ago you said you wanted to be judged on your

education record. Dropping our position in Scotland since 2006 on

several key indicators, tenth to 19th position internationally on

science, 11th to 23rd on reading, Scotland overall is average. For a

country that once prided itself on its literacy and numeracy, that is

pretty disastrous. That's why I've said we've got improvements to make.

That study is two years old. But you have been in power for ten years!

I'm being frank both about where we have made good progress in

education, I'm not going to sit here and except that they're not areas

where progress been made. I can point you to lots of things were

over the 10-year period we are seeing improvements. I can cite the

fact that there are fewer young people from our deprived communities

leaving school with no call of occasions, that number has halved

since we took office. We have regular numbers of young people

going into education the attainment gap is starting to narrow. In the

election manifesto, the rich and independents just once and there was

absolutely no reference to the referendum. -- you mentioned

independence just once. This is not a vote winner. This is one of the

strange things about Scottish politics just now. My political

opponents say that I talk about nothing but independence. The fact

of the matter is, my position on giving people a choice at the end of

the Brexit process is clear. But I'm also fighting a Westminster election

where I think it's also really important to talk about what SNP MPs

can do to stand against further Tory cuts and to strengthen Scotland's

hand in the Brexit negotiations. If the Tories take target seats, say

ten of the target seats, you may even lose your deputy leader if that

happens, would you then except that this has been a high watermark for

independence? Look, I hear these things all the time. We had an

exceptional election result in 2015. I hope we can repeat that we are

working hard to do that. But you know this well. Before that election

result, the most MPs the SNP had ever had in our entire history was

11. We had six in the parliament before we got 56. I get people

saying to me now, if you only get 50, 45, 40, that somehow a disaster,

it's a ridiculous way of looking at things. In The Times today, there is

a poll which suggests a hung parliament. In that scenario, would

you do a deal with Theresa May? No. I wouldn't put a Conservative Prime

Minister into office. Even if she said, Nicholas Durden, I'm going to

give you top billing next to me at the Brexit negotiations -- Nicola

Sturgeon. In my lifetime, Tory governments have been damaging for

industry, public services, public finances in Scotland. I think I've

got a duty to be honest with people, I wouldn't support a Conservative

Prime Minister. You have already said there could be some kind of

accommodation with Labour, but could you really do a deal with Jeremy

Corbyn, a man you said is not fit to be Prime Minister? Seriously. I'm

trying just to be frank with people. I said it in 2015, if the arithmetic

made a Progressive alliance possible, I would want to explore

the SNP, not being part of a formal coalition, but I also have to deal

with reality. I think what I seen over the last few days, she

wrong-footed herself in calling this election. I think it has been

bizarre watching the Prime Minister, who called this election, appear to

be the most unprepared of the leaders for the selection. She can't

answer basic questions. She has spent the election trying to dodge

scrutiny, avoiding talking to real voters. I think if Theresa May has

wrong-footed anybody, it's herself, and she's probably already starting

to regret it. Nicola Sturgeon may be confident, and if the polls are

right, it's a fairly safe bet that the SNP may win a majority of seats

in Scotland. But if as predicted, the Conservatives increased their

toehold, the danger for the Nationalists is that they may be

seen to lost the momentum for independence. But with just over one

week to go to the election, that is something that Nicola Sturgeon is

just not prepared to swallow. Kirsty Talkington Nicola Sturgeon. We

should say that we have approached the other main parties in Scotland,

and we will be hearing from the other leaders before the election.

Maybe they will be eating chips as well extract the world has been

waiting with a degree of trepidation for Donald Trump to make up his mind

on whether the US will withdraw from the Paris climate change agreement.

He has been teasing us a bit to date with a tweet. I'll be announcing my

decision on the Paris Accord over the next few days. Make America

great again! Make of that what you will. Is the US ready to walk out of

the deal, and what difference would it make to the planet if it did? A

climate change adviser to Barack Obama joins us of the internet from

Boulder Colorado. The Danish government's environmental

Institute's the sceptical environmentalist has reservations.

Good riddance to Paris, is that your take on it? Fundamentally we know

that even if everybody did everything they promised in Paris,

which is not going to happen because Trump has announced he is not going

to do the clean power plan, but even if everyone did it, it would only

get us 1% of the way of what politicians have promised us. It was

already a very expensive treaty that would do almost no good. The whole

conversation we are having right now, is Trump going to leave or not,

is not going to make much difference. It's just a difference

between an ineffective treaty and a very ineffective treaty. It does

offer as an opportunity to start talking about, is there a smarter

way forward? Yes, there is a much better way to try to help the

climate change is that of going down... Let me put this to Paul, it

is true, Paris is not the saving of the planet, is it? Paris is

necessary, but not sufficient. It goes at the end of 24 years of trial

and error to try and come up with a flame work -- a framework for

nations, it is a long-term framework. The pledges that were

made only go to 2030, they will be followed by other pledges for the

future. Already the 2030 pledges will put down the global emissions

curve so that it is significantly less, it is a foundation to build

on, it's not sufficient but the best hope we have got. Paul Bodnar, what

do you think the rest of the world should do now? If America leaves,

should they play hardball? Should they have sanctions against American

goods that are made in industries that don't face the same

environmental constraint that our industries do? How do you think they

should play it? The rest of the world has made quite clear that they

intend to carry on. One of the changes that happened over the last

15 years or so, since Kyodo and Copenhagen, is that countries have

realised that making this transition to a clean energy economy is in

their economic interest. If you look at the size of the global green

energy market for goods and services, already about $1.5

trillion and growing rapidly, it is a huge economic opportunity for

Chinese and European firms, and they will be only too happy to pick up

the slack from the United States in that regard. It's rather sad for our

exporters and our businesses, however. Bjorn, I saw you scoffing

as Paul was saying all of that. I'm sorry, we've just got to get back to

reality. Look, the point is that right now the International energy

agency tells us that we are spending more than $150 billion every year to

subsidise this green economy that Paul is telling us is already

effective. No, it only works because we are putting lots of money into

it. We have got to us, are we getting much climate benefit out of

it? The answer is no, of a next 25 years the International energy

agency estimate will be spending $3 trillion just for subsidising

inefficient soul and wind. By the end of that time we will have a tiny

fraction, less than 3%. If we believe what Paul is saying, it's

not going to make much difference, the Americans leaving. The rest of

the world will carry on with this, and that is the fact. You're not

going to get rid of it just by letting the second biggest emitter

in the world leave. There is a couple of things we need to realise.

One is, long-term trading has already stumbled at the first

beginning when the US leaves. But also we have a situation where many

developing countries have signed up basically because they were promised

$100 billion per year starting in 2020. There's no chance in hell that

is ever going to happen, so they are also going to start considering, do

we want expensive, inefficient green technology, or do we want the cheap.

Fuel economy? What we really need to understand is, we're doing a repeat

of the Kyodo treaty. Back in the 1990s everybody told us that Kyodo

was the solution. We knew that it wasn't but we wasted 15 years. I

worry we are going to do the same thing with Paris. Paul, do you think

the US, if it does leave now, we'll ever find itself wanting to come

back into this thing? First, let me say that you have heard a lot of

incorrect alternative facts and Bjorn, in particular about the cost

of green energy, which is now cheaper than fossil fuels in many

parts of the world. I think it would be very hard for the US to claw

itself back from a second departure from the international stage on

climate change. And most of the costs of withdrawing will fall on

the United States in the form of a void and market opportunities. But

also we are the second largest emitter in the world. Our emissions

matter. If we stall out instead of continuing to aggressively reduce

emissions, the biggest impact of all will be on the poorest and most

honourable in the world. That's why you hear a unanimous chorus from

those countries urging the Trump administration to stay in the

agreement. Paul and Bjorn, thank you. We need to leave it there. That

is it for this evening. Almost. Because we have a final piece of

political argument for you. But it's not a political argument as you know

it. Good politicians need to be good storytellers. They need tails and

anecdotes to make their arguments. For the next few nights we have

Asuncion your politicians to tell us a story. One preferably with a

point. It is up to them to interpret their brief. The story can be true

or false, abstract or literal, personal or political, just as long

as it is a story. It is for those of us brought up on Jackanory. We're

starting with the Lib Dems and Vince Cable's bedtime tale. Goodbye.

Once upon a time, there was a prince called David. And he ruled well with

a team of very wise advisors. But one day he decided he wanted to roll

on his own. So he got rid of his advisers, and he sought help from a

snake oil salesmen. In a far-away country called Australia. And the

snake oil salesmen created for him a special chaos proof armour. And he

told him to wear it at all times. And the Prince's sycophantic

advisers told him that if he did that, he would be completely

infallible. So to prove his strength he decided to wage war on a

rebellious tribe in a place called Farage land. And he went into

battle, and he lost. His once United Kingdom started to break apart. The

currency collapsed, merchants and craftsmen moved away to other lands.

And he was forced to resign. And he went to live in a remote forest. A

new leader was chosen called Princess Theresa, she wanted to

prove her strength, so she made peace with Farage land and decided

to go to war with another tribe, called the Euros. And as she

prepared for battle, she had a call from the same snake oil salesman

from Australia. And what he said to her is that you should wear my

special improved chaos proof armour. And he said, if you wear this in

battle, you're bound to win. She hesitated, and thought. And then she

said... Yes. Hello there, good evening. Tomorrow

morning we start off at 14 degrees