11/12/2017 Newsnight

You got through series one -

the divorce deal.

Now get ready to enjoy

the full boxed set.

The Brexit trade talks that'll be

preoccupying us through 2018.

He asked about the trade deal,

about Ceta plus, plus, plus.

We've always said that we're not

looking for a deal that's Norway

and we're not looking

for a deal that's Ceta.

If you're struggling with Ceta,

Efta, and Norway minus,

fear not, we're on top of it.

With both expert and political

views, we'll look ahead

to where the talks will go,

and ask if the EU will give

us a choice anyway.

Also tonight, we visit

the Essex town of Tilbury.

A port built on the back of trade -

what does it tell us

about where we are now

and where Britain is heading?

It does annoy me the fact that how

much wealth the port has actually

brought into the country, how has

that wealth trickled down into the

town?

And is Britain suffering

an epidemic of loneliness?

We'll hear how it feels

and ask how we might help.

Hello.

If you thought voting

for Brexit meant you'd hear

no more about Europe,

look away now, because there

is still lots to talk about.

First, this morning,

we still didn't know

whether we had really resolved

phase one of the talks -

the divorce terms.

It looked sorted on Friday,

then there were conflicting

interpretations of what

we'd all signed up to.

That storm has been been calmed.

But then secondly, there

is what to expect from phase two,

the trade part of the talks.

We know Britain wants a deep

and special relationship

with the EU, but quite what that

looks like we don't yet know.

This afternoon, the Prime Minister

was in the Commons to show she can

carve a path on phases one and two,

that will reconcile

all competing views.

Did she succeed?

Nick Watt reports.

It's that chilly time of year when

we are reminded of some eternal

human truths, it's freezing out

there, but in that blanket of snow,

you can see uniformity or on closer

inspection, the endless variety of

nature. In the new world of

seemingly permanent protests, Tory

MPs have been voicing widely

divergent views on Brexit, but

today, they spoke almost as one.

May

I first of all, congratulate the

Prime Minister on her triumph last

Friday...

Here, here.

Can I join my

right honourable and learned friend

in congratulating my right

honourable friend in driving through

an improved agreement on Friday

against what many thought could not

have been feasible.

Today really was

an illustration about old Harold

Wilson cliche that a week is a long

time in politics. So how did Theresa

May go from humiliation in Brussels

to widespread praise on her own

benches. Well, the vast majority of

Tory MPs want to give her space

ahead of the EU summit in Brussels

this week. I am also told that the

crucial change in mood came over the

weekend when Downing Street offered

assurances to Euro-sceptics on one

of their main concerns from last

week's deal with the EU - this was

that the offer on Northern Ireland

could be used to smuggle the UK back

into the single market. They were

told this was not possible for one

very simple reason: If the UK

crashes out of the EU, with no deal

at all, then the specific

commitments on the Irish border will

no longary ply. -- no longer apply.

The text of this agreement now makes

clear that in the event a deal

Northern Ireland will not be

separated politically, economically

or by any regulatory requirements

from the rest of the UK, along with

the aim of no hard border on the

island of Ireland. In the event of

no deal, no overall deal, nothing is

agreed.

In Dublin, there was weary

acceptance.

The reality is that at

any point in this process, events

could very well intervened and

could, you know, make the agreement

politically impossible to deliver

on. I think that's the big risk with

all of this. You know, genuinely,

all parties entered into an

agreement that is considered to be

absolutely, you know, iron clad, but

in reality, political events in

these uncertain times mean that

nothing is really cast iron. It

can't be.

This week's mid-winter

chill shows no signs of letting up.

But Theresa May is benefitting from

a thaw in relations within her own

party, until the next Brexit

challenge arises.

Nick is here.

Nick, this point that she managed to

pacify this year on the part of the

Brexiteers that Ireland was going to

put us into the single market by the

back door, what argument did she

actually use?

There was this hiccup

yesterday when David Davis said that

offer on the border with a statement

of intent, he said that was much

more than a legally enforceable

thing. Dublin took fright at that.

David Davis went on LBC today

saying, yes, of course, I was saying

it's a statement of intent and

that's much bigger than the law

because we're good friends. He said,

of course it's elly enforceable. But

crucially legally enforceable within

the withdrawal agreement, Article

50. What that means, we were saying

last week, is that the offer of full

regulatory compliance with the UK

with those elements related to the

Northern Ireland-Irish Republic

border, that third element is

covered. Within Article 50 that is.

If there's absolutely no deal, if we

crash out with no deal -

All bets

are off.

Those arrangements do not

apply. At that point, are you down

to a bilateral undertaking between

the UK and the Irish Republic.

We

start again on that one. OK, that's

phase one. Storm over, everything's

calm. That means we look forward to

phase two. The whole thing moves on

now.

We have the European Council

this Thursday and Friday and we

have, so far, the draft summit

conclusions. That looks forward in

two areas: First on transition. The

Council suggests the UK says it

wants to be for two years and the

whole body of EU law would apply for

two years. The UK view is that it

should be an implementation period.

Yes that body of law would apply

from the beginning but eventually

you move away from it and the

beginnings of the hints of the

restrictions that the UK will seek

to apply to the UK for the future

trade arrangements because the UK

has decided to leave the customs

union and the single market.

The

council is the big thing this week.

Thanks a lot.

Well, let's assume the big European

council meeting this week goes well,

that we move on to phase

two of the talks.

It can't be stressed enough

that this is the issue

which will define 2018.

So far, the British Government

has held its different

factions together,

by them all adhering to the goal

of building a deep and special

partnership - a bespoke deal

specially for Britain.

Not hard, not soft.

Something different.

It was set out in the Florence

speech by Theresa May.

Let us not seek merely

to adopt a model already

enjoyed by other countries -

instead, let us be creative

as well as practical,

in designing an ambitious

economic partnership

that respects the freedoms and

principles of the EU and the wishes

of the British people.

Everyone in the UK Government

can sign up to that.

But, if you listen carefully

to what the EU says,

they think it's more binary.

For our partners there,

the basic choice is you are either

inside the EU single

market, like Norway.

Or you are just a so-called

third country like Canada.

You can have a trade deal,

like Canada, but that's a long

way from where we are.

Those two existing

models keep coming up -

phrases from Michel Barnier,

on the single market,

such as, "Either you're

in or you're out."

Or, "Its integrity

is non-negotiable",

have been making this point.

Or this:

TRANSLATION:

It will not be possible

to combine the benefits

of the Norway model with the weak

constraints of the Canada model."

Well, let's for a moment,

imagine the EU means that.

What do these two options imply?

You can think of them as two ends

of a spectrum in which you choose

access to the EU market,

or automony to set your own

rules and regulations.

Norway has lots of access to the EU

market, but the condition

for that is compliance with EU

rules, including free movement.

And paying in to the EU budget.

For these reasons, Brexiteers -

and our government -

have ruled it out.

It would mean paying the European

Union billions of pounds every year

in perpetuity. It would mean

following EU rules with no say over

them. It would mean no divergence

from EU rules in the future

whatsoever. It would mean zero

control of immigration. I have to

say to the right honourable

gentleman that wouldn't make a

success of Brexit, that would be no

Brexit at all.

So, if you don't like that,

what about Canada?

Now here is the Canada deal

with the EU - CETA it is called.

The EU Canada Comprehensive Economic

and Trade Agreement.

So it has quite a bit of detail.

If you look, for example, I take a

page 155, article 20. 12, this is

about parties may make laws against

cam cording of movies in cinemas.

That's the kind of detail it has.

Because it has so much detail,

no-one thinks you can negotiate one

like this in a year,

but you could kind of take

this as the template,

tipex out the word 'Canada',

and replace it with the word UK.

The advantage is we'd

have more autonomy.

This is the full-English

proper Brexit.

But on access to the EU market,

it's not great for some

of our key industries.

And there is fact that you may

still need a physical border -

and we've pledged not to have

one in Ireland.

This Norway vs Canada choice is how

the EU want us to look at this -

they say we simply have to decide.

But is it just possible we can

get something better?

That is what the government wants.

Here's how David Davis described

the trade deal the government

is after.

An overarching free trade deal, but

including services, which Canada

doesn't. With individual, specific

arrangements for aviation, for

nuclear, for data, a series of

strands which we've worked out. Most

of them based on where we start now.

If the basic deal, I'm being crude

about this, is Canada plus the city

or something like that?

Canada plus,

plus, plus. We want a bespoke

outcome. We will probably start with

the best of can dark and the best of

Japan -- Canada and the best of the

Japan and South Korea and then add

the services.

He wants more trade

than the Canadians have got -

but does he want to align with EU

rules to get it?

And will the EU listen?

Certainly they have offered

special deals to other

countries when they want to.

To Ukraine, for example.

And to Liechtenstein.

With me now are two

experts on all this.

Charles Grant, director

of the Centre for European Reform.

And Allie Renison, head

of Europe and Trade Policy

at the Institute of Directors.

Which sectors, British sectors, if

we went straight to the Canada deal,

which British sectors would really

suffer from that?

I think when you

look across the piece, the point

about Canada is that it's

effectively starting from a very

different vantage point. The market

access is nowhere near. They still

have tariffs. They're not

eliminated. Agriculture would be

particularly hit. Financial services

and services, professional services

sectors whereby you would have under

the Canadian deal have a local

office in a European capital to

access those markets.

In access

terms, I thought the goods makers,

on the goods, I thought that was

mostly sorted out on that, it was

just the services that were a hold.

The difference is if you are in the

automotive sector you tend to rely

on your ability, the vehicle

certificate agency can issue

approval for a car to be sold an

marketed throughout the entirety of

the EU. They have an agreement on

what we call conformity assessment.

You don't have that. That's the

differentiator between Canada and

Norway, you're not automatically

downloading EU rules.

But it's not

acknowledged that their things are

compliant either. In terms of a

border, what's the system? I mean

the Canadians have borders

presumably, it's just more or less

like at the at the moment?

When

goods leave Canada and come into the

EU, they have to go through the

customs controls on the edge of the

customs union, yes.

So, it doesn't

help you at all on that. A lot of

people are saying the Canada option

will allow us to remove the physical

border in Ireland?

No, that's not

right at all. There is a border

between Canada and the US, although

they're both in nafrta, have a Free

Trade Agreement, they have a border.

That's the gist of the difference.

Canada plus, plus, plus. What would

be the plus, plus, plus?

I think

even though we're not talking about

completely replicated passporting

for financial services, it is

something along those lines. Very

off the anyone trade agreements

between different countries they

don't tend to include anything

substantial on financial services.

You don't tend to have agriculture

for example, included. In the Norway

option the EEA doesn't really cover

agriculture. That's something that's

going to be critical to the Irish

border. This is going to be

different.

Charles, can we, do you

think they will offer us something

in the middle? They keep saying it's

Norway or Canada.

They say it's

Norway or Canada. The British will

probably ask for something that is

neither. We would almost be in the

single market. We'd be aligned with

EU rules. If we changed our rules

we'd allow us to punish us a bit.

Barnier will say no to that. I think

we will get Canada plus, which means

Canada as you describe, with

services added in, not single

market, but some access in aviation,

financial services, data flows, well

will have to -- we will have to pay

a price. That will be taking the

rules from the EU, paying money into

the budget and taking something like

the court of justice to tell us what

to do.

Do you agree with that?

When

you look at what the Swiss model, is

I think there is some wriggle room.

The Swiss aren't formal members of

the single market, but they have

pretty good access in terms of

goods. What we're talking about to

achieve that bespoke option is deep,

unprecedented cooperation between

the UK and EU.

It is right to say

you can have your autonomy or your

access, as far as you take a bit

more of one, but you lose another.

We can have Canada plus if we pay a

price for it.

Let's turned to the politicians.

With me in the studio is the former

Tory MP, Peter Lilley,

Conservative Brexiteer and a former

president of the Board of Trade.

He knows his way around these

negotiations.

And from Westminster,

Labour's Chuka Umunna,

who is chair of the All Party

Parliamentary Group on EU Relations,

and would really like us to remain

within both the single market

and the Customs Union.

Good evening to you both. Peter

Lilley, you would prefer Canada plus

plus to Canada plus?

I would prefer

as few barriers as possible. It is

in our interest, it is in Europe's

interest. I don't think we will get

maximum, optimum, because the

European Union has made it clear

they want us to appear at least to

be worse off than we are at present.

I find it difficult because actually

are exporters have got a 15%

advantage because of the exchange

rate. They will have to pay 4%

tariff if there is no deal at all.

15% outweighs 4% for most.

You would

prefer Canada to nothing, but you

would prefer Canada plus. But you

don't think they will give it to us.

The British government position is

they will give it to us.

Maybe they

know something I don't know. I

merely listen to the European Union

and take the at their word. We

should be prepared for the

probability that they want get

nearly as much as they are seeking,

and that quite possibly will end up

trading on WTO terms, which is a

good second best.

Chuka Umunna, how

much of a disaster, do you think,

Canada would be? If we went

something straight -- if you went

straight to something like Canada.

How bad would that be from your

perspective?

I think it would be

pretty disastrous. It may be

appropriate for a Canada, but we are

the sixth biggest economy in the

world and they are our biggest

trading partner. My preference would

be the Norway option. A fully to

leave the European Union, which

means we are -- we stay in the

single market of the least. I would

like to stay in the Customs Union as

well. But the government has chosen

to do away with that, which is the

best option. The problem with

Canada, first of all it took a long

time to negotiate, up to seven

years. Secondly, it doesn't cover

services really. That is 80% of our

economy. Thirdly, potentially you

could have foreign investors and

large multinationals suing the

British government if they felt we

were not opening up the public

sector, the NHS in particular, to

further marketisation. And I don't

think any that is particularly

attractive to the British people.

It's just not appropriate. And us

having an FTA Canada style FTA...

Sorry, free trade agreement. That

would preclude us from staying in

the Customs Union. One of the parts

of the agreement that was reached on

Friday was that we should have a

backstop position of being able to

observe customs union and single

market rules as a solution to the

Northern Irish border.

You said so

much. I want to let Peter Lilley

respond.

Can I just knock on the

head of this idea that because the

Canadian agreement took eight years

to negotiate, it would take a long

time for us to negotiate something

similar. The Canadians had ten

different -- 10,000 different tariff

lines. The EU have 15,000. They have

to decide how rapidly they can be

traded off against each other. They

start off with 20,000 specifications

for goods and services. They had to

decide which to align. We start with

zero tariffs. We want to end up with

zero tariffs. Ten minutes. All we

have to negotiate is a diversion is

mechanism.

Chuka Umunna, do you

think there is any possibility of a

Norway option that would allow any

restriction are any kind of change

to the free movement rules? Because

that in many respects is seen as the

true red line of the British voters.

That is where your Norway option

forms. They won't give you Norway

but without free movement.

Let's not

forget free movement is a bit of a

misleading phrase. It suggests that

it's unconditional. Free movement is

conditional. There are things we can

do within the existing free movement

framework to better restrict

immigration. So, for example, the

Belgians require people to register

when they come to their country.

They have been there for more than

three months. We don't require

people to do that. We could require

people, if they have been here for

three months, haven't been able to

get work and don't have the prospect

of work, we can require them to

leave but we don't do that.

Lichtenstein, which as the Norway

option, as it were, it is part of

the European free trade Association,

they actually have called has

applied to the numbers of EU

immigrants they have come to their

country. You can restrict it, yes.

Charles Grant, do you think there is

a possibility, if we are confronted

with the stored -- stark choice,

that they would say, you can have a

Norway option but with a little bit

of concession on free movement?

One

can fiddle with the margins of these

details but the broad principle is

we would have to accept free

movement. EU believes these are

insoluble in length and you can't

have one without the other. That is

an ideology for them.

Peter Lilley,

for the last year the government has

hung the coalition of the

Conservative Party together with

this promise of a deep and special

partnership. One wonders if as you

suspect if it isn't going to be on

offer, is that going to be difficult

for the Conservative Party, or will

we just comfortably Sablon Canada or

WTO?

It is not about the

Conservative Party. It is about

Britain. It would be better for

Britain and Europe if we end up with

what the government are aiming for.

If we don't, it will be because the

EU don't want it. The way the

engineer that is by saying you can

have free trade but on conditions

you will be able to accept being

Sub-Organist to the European Court

of Justice or pay money. It would be

some, nation of those three. And the

British people voted against that.

So we would be going back. It would

be going back on Brexit.

We are

going to leave it there. I guess we

will return to it in the future.

Thank you all.

Because as 2017 draws to a close,

many pundits and commentators find

themselves reflecting on how -

yet again - they've been caught

out by more political

shocks and surprises.

Keeping up with shifting public

sentiments has not been easy.

But Jack Shenker, a journalist

and author, is currently working

on a book which attempts to map out

how the political terrain has

shifted so dramatically,

and he believes that part

of the problem is that analysts look

in the wrong places for answers.

He spent several months

in Tilbury in Essex,

which sits within one of the most

marginal parliamentary

seats in the country.

He thinks that if you understand

Tilbury, you probably

understand Britain.

So we asked him to make

a film about it, for us.

Come on.

It's much excitement of

seeing the pigeons home. -- come

home. Pigeons first. More football!

As my wife said, pigeons or football

first. The kids, grandchildren.

Anything else?

No! Charlie Lawrence

is always gone back to Tilbury, a

small dog town in Essex on the banks

of the River Thames, 20 miles east

of central London. He has lived here

in the same council house for 50

years.

I have lived in Tilbury my

life. I love Tilbury. I walk out of

here, go down this road, don't go

down that street and everybody would

be like, hello Charlie. A real

community.

Charlie knows Tilbury

better than anyone. He takes me on a

tour of the -- but the town he grew

up in is now almost unrecognisable.

That there is the fire station in

front of you.

And that has closed

down?

That has been shut a few

years. On the left as you go round

here, the blue and grey building,

that is the police station. That is

now shut. The railway pub used to

have good entertainment every night.

Now it is completely shut. Waiting

to be bombed out.

Most of the spaces

that once glued this community

together have disappeared. Today, a

private martial arts Academy is one

of the few places young people can

gather indoors. Although this too

could be earmarked for closure.

It's

the social life really. They are not

a lot of the pubs down. That was a

big part of Tilbury. I think that is

what caused everybody to be so

close-knit, being able to socialise

in your own town.

David Gold is

ranked 15th in the country for a

kick boxing. And he is intensely

proud of his hometown.

I was a Jack

the Lad, to be honest. I used to be

wheeling and dealing. Tilbury has

got quite a bad name for itself. In

terms of theft and crime and stuff

like that. But unless you are

actually from here, you don't know

this. It is all hearsay.

Tilbury has

a chequered reputation. In 1980, the

sun newspaper ran an inflammatory

spread headlined aggro Britain,

which describes the town has a

great, desolate place, where local

skinheads roam the dark land like

Kruppke rats. More recently, the

Economist magazine introduced

residents as a polyp of hard of

mostly white people with a deep and

justified sense of inferiority.

David feels his town has been

misrepresented and he is determined

to show a different face of Tilbury

to the world.

Next year I am hoping

to hit the top and take my team with

me and put this town on the map,

big-time.

But Tilbury was once on the map,

known far and wide as one of the

country's most important connection

points to the rest of the planet.

Some of Britain's greatest historic

milestones unfolded here, including

the landing of the Ampara Windrush.

Why have you come touring and?

To

seek a job. Any type so long as I

get good pay. -- why if you come to

England?

I first started reporting from

Tilbury in the autumn of 2016,

against a backdrop of President

Trump's election and the UK decision

to leave the EU. It was clear then

that the political landscape was

changing fast beneath our feet.

Tilbury, where the pro-Brexit vote

was among the highest in the

country, helped tell the story of

that transformation.

This is called

the gateway to the world, Tilbury?

So it is important, although it is a

little bit downtrodden. And it does

annoy me, the fact that how much

wealth the port has actually brought

into the country, how that wealth

has trickled down into the town.

This system of packing goods for a

shipment into boxes is hugely

efficient.

I think it started in the

60s. You had the electrification of

the railway line. Once the line was

electrified, you didn't need so many

workers. The port became

containerised. Therefore you didn't

need so many dock workers. That is

when it has been downhill ever

since. Probably the same sort of

feeling in mining villages.

And yet

Tilbury is not in northern mining

village. It's the backstage of the

capital and its port today is busier

than ever. On paper at least this

time should be a poster child for a

certain model of global frictionless

capitalism, sandwiched between the

docks and the largest Amazon

distribution centre in Europe. But

in the past wealth has passed

through Tilbury all too quickly,

leaving resentment in its wake.

I

was born in Nigeria. Before I ever

arrived in Tilbury, because I knew

about the Empire Windrush Landing

here, I feel like me being here, I

feel privileged to be honest with

you, to be a councillor in Tilbury.

She is fiercely positive about her

town. The Tilbury's two council

wards are some of the most deprived

in the region. She has faced white

nationalist opposition at every

election, even serving alongside the

BMP.

-- BMP. I think the BNP was the

party of division. I am here because

a majority of people in Tilbury

don't think that way.

Although the

BMP appears to have been seen off

here, more mainstream expressions of

the popular strike continued to win

support. Tilbury's Parliamentary

constituency of Thurrock remains

Ukip's top target seats nationwide.

And the appeal of radical

alternatives is not limited to one

end of the political spectrum. With

successive governments prioritising

markets over communities, voters

like Charlie have been searching for

something, anything different.

I would love him and Corbyn to run

this country. They are straight

down-the-line. There ain't no

telling lies with them. They tell it

how it is.

Charlie's concerns at how

Britain has changed economically are

written onto the landscape here. As

a young man, he helped build the

stacks of the old power station.

Recently, he watched them being torn

down.

Oh, look at that. Ah, look.

Look at that. Well, well, well.

Corr, look at that. Hardly any dust,

look. My good God. Mate, that's it,

end of an era.

I worked there for 16

years. Met lots and lots of friends.

Honestly, it was like one big

family. It wasn't like going to

work.

Charlie is now helping to

train agency workers to drive fork

lift trucks at the new Amazon plant

at the other side of town.

Amazon

won't be like a big family. It will

be people will be working, leaving,

working, leaving. I don't think

you'll ever get people that will be

working there for years, like we had

here. Not just Amazon. That's

everywhere. I don't really think

youngsters deserve what they're

getting now, you know. How can you

have security? One minute you've got

a job, the next minute, because it's

all through agencies, you're there

one minute, there another minute.

Your 6-2 one day. 2-10 the next day,

nights the next day. That's no good

for people.

For Dave, this sort of

precarious existence is a reality

which is already all too familiar.

Yeah, I went for a few jobs, yeah. I

couldn't find my comfort zone. They

weren't permanent. They were zero

hour contracts, because they just

drop you in as and when they need

you. There's no guarantee you're

going to get the work. Sometimes you

could be working three days out of

the week. Sometimes you might not

get work for a couple of weeks. I

wanted something with a bit of

meaning to it and actually have a

purpose of being there, you know?

As

well as working and training, Dave

has moved back into his childhood

home to care for his father, who has

parkin sons and is bed bound after a

fall.

It was hard to accept at

first. I mean, my dad's always been

fully independent. He's done all his

own stuff his whole life. He's never

really been one to ask for help or

anything like that. I sit and look

at him and see what he went from to

where he's gone to now and it's

really disheartening. It would have

been nice to have an actual solid

job, you know, whilst I had the

rough times with my family, having

the consistency, money constantly

coming in and being able to take

compassionate leave and stuff like

that, it would have been nice. But

I've dealt with it. I mean, I just

take life as it throws it at me, you

know.

With the arrival of Amazon,

Tilbury is clearly on the cusp of

another economic leap forward. The

question is whether the work on

offer is here to stay. Up to 15

million jobs in Britain are

vulnerable to automation over the

next two decades. Charlie's

generation has already lived through

one great era of mechanisation,

which transformed the town

completely. As another dawns,

optimism here is tinged with fear

that without a concerted effort to

ensure its fruits are shared, life

may only become more insecure. A

certain vision of liberal modernity

have transformed our political

landscape in the process. Here,

where the contradictions of that

vision have been exposed most

starkly, it's obvious that the old

world is not coming back. What's

less clear is in whose interests the

new one is being built. Tilbury was

once dismissed as a relic of the

past. In reality, it's a window onto

the future, one that will affect us

all.

We end up talking a lot

about Brexit and the economy,

as we've just demonstrated.

Arguably, we should

spend more time talking

about things that really

matter - like loneliness.

The Labour MP, Rachel Reeves,

co-chairwoman of the Jo Cox

Loneliness Commission,

has raised the issue, arguing that

"in the last few decades,

it has escalated from personal

misfortune into a social epidemic".

Something like half a million older

people go at least five or six days

a week without seeing or speaking

to anyone at all.

Here's a brief clip of a video

made by the Campaign to

End Loneliness, in which they

asked a younger person

Now, we might think it's

not the sort of thing

the government can do much about,

but let us to talk to two people

with different experiences

of isolation or loneliness.

I am joined by Sue Symth,

who experienced loneliness

following the death of her husband.

And Becca Maberly, who started

A Mother Place, a community

which helps mothers

like her prepare and cope

with feelings of loneliness.

Very good evening to you both. So

Sue, your husband's death goes back

a very long way. Take us through

your experience.

My husband died 27

years ago. So it's been a long

journey, yes. I didn't really know

anything about depression until

then.

You link the depression and

the loneliness, the two are -

Yeah,

I think it's a combined thing.

Isolation, loneliness and depression

is a threesome.

You've had, you

would say you've experienced that

pretty well all the way since you

lost your husband? Yes, yes. It's

been a difficult journey, lots of

things, yeah.

You were working?

Yes, up to three

years ago, yeah. I lived in the

States for a few years after my

husband's death because I had a law

suit going against him. Against his

death. I had to stay in the country.

So you came back here. You were

working

Oh, yeah.

And now you're

not.

No.

And how do you fill your

day?

Well, at the moment, it's

getting better because I'm starting

to get more mobile. A couple of

years I was house bound with

illnesses. And different things, I

was waiting for a big operation,

fighting with the hospitals to get

that sorted out and everything. My

health went down. I have a history

of leg ulcers and things. Spiralled,

I was house bound for 18 months, two

years. That's when the isolation and

loneliness and depression starts.

Your experience is very different,

when you had young children.

Yes,

mine was a temporary experience.

Mine was the result of becoming a

new mother and perhaps having

unrealistic expectations about what

it's like to go from having a busy

professional life, a social life, to

suddenly being at home all day,

every day.

Your life has meaning and

it has a kind of focus.

Yes, it

does. But when the focus is a really

cute baby that doesn't do much apart

from dribble and to, it doesn't give

a lot back. It's -- and poo.

And

you've set up this group, you're

speaking to people.

It's an online

community which is helping to

support and educate women who are -

and fathers - who are starting with

parenthood and just being honest and

saying, you know, it's not like the

picture post card. It's not as

romantic as it might look.

Be

prepared for what you're about to

get into, because you'll be...

Yeah

it's about realistic expectations.

One thinks of it as a busy time,

you're not out and about meeting

other mothers in the park?

Yeah,

definitely. But you can't be out and

about Monday to Friday, 6am when the

baby wakes until, you know, your

partner gets home on a Friday night

at 8pm. So you can't schedule

something every minute of every day.

The daily drudgery associated with

just being at home with a baby on

your own, without - Sue and I were

talking about, the lack of mental

stimulation. If you're used to

having adult company.

You were

saying how much you noticed the

noises in your house?

Yes. When

you're on your own you do. When

you've got a family or kids or a

dog, when you're on your own

completely, a house makes its own

noises. You pick it up when you're

on your own. You do. You worry about

things. You take things on board

more.

What's Christmas for you this

year?

I'm going to a church that

I've been to for about three years

that does a lunch. Then I'm hoping

to go to some very good friends for

tea, afterwards. They've got two

lovely little girls. They make me

feel very much a part of their

family, which is lovely.

Good. Is

this getting worse? Because

obviously we have busy lives. We

have perhaps socially disconnected

lives. Maybe we don't know the

neighbours as well as we used. To I

don't know.

We're not living in the

same family units that we used to.

People don't live so close to their

families any more. You've got lots

of couples living in a small flat,

within a building, on a busy street.

They don't know their neighbours.

Also so many working mums who

perhaps, I don't want to say they're

too proud to ask for help, but it's

not in their nature to.

There's a

bit of a stigma, one might feel.

Yeah.

I wonder whether technology

helps. Because you have a

smartphone, I think, don't you?

I

do, yeah.

You've got a Gmail

account.

I do.

You're laughing

though.

Doesn't get used very much.

But I do have the account.

Is that a

way of connecting people more?

I

still think we should reach out to

each other more. I really do. I

really do. I think technology is

great in one way, but it's the human

touch. I feel with the isolation and

loneliness and depression, you've

got to reach out to people, in the

local community. If somebody you

know of is perhaps isolated or on

their own or people -

Go and visit.

People don't do that, perhaps people

are frightened if they don't do it,

they'll get involved or something.

It's something we've got to do hands

on. I think technology is wonderful,

but it's not the answer. It's not

the same as reaching out one to one.

Good luck both of you with it and we

need to leave it there. Thanks very

much indeed for coming in.

That's almost all from us.

Emily is here tomorrow.

But before we go, in case you hadn't

noticed, there's been a bit of snow

falling around the country recently,

bringing with it the usual mix

of delighted children

and grumpy commuters.

It may have created childcare

headaches and nightmare journeys -

but it doesn't half make

the country look pretty.

Goodnight.

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