:00:18. > :00:21.welcome to Question Time. Good evening to you at home, to our
:00:21. > :00:25.audience and our panel, the Universities and Science Minister,
:00:25. > :00:29.David Willetts, Labour's shadow health minister, Liz Kendall, Deputy
:00:30. > :00:35.Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Simon Hughes, former of the Centre
:00:35. > :00:45.for Policy Studies, co-founded why Margaret Thatcher, Jill Kirby, and
:00:45. > :00:53.
:00:53. > :00:58.comedian and columnist for the our first question. Do you agree
:00:58. > :01:04.with George Osborne's comment that the British economy is out of
:01:04. > :01:10.intensive care? Is the British economy out of intensive care. Liz
:01:10. > :01:14.Kendall, do you think so? You will not be surprised to hear me say no,
:01:14. > :01:18.I do not agree with that. We have failed to get the growth this
:01:18. > :01:23.country and this region desperately need to create the jobs, to get
:01:23. > :01:28.hanks lending to businesses again. We have had growth of 1% when the
:01:28. > :01:31.government thought it would be 6%. You have 10% of the population in
:01:31. > :01:36.the north-east unemployed, families facing a struggle to pay the bills
:01:36. > :01:40.at the end of the week. What I thought about this week's Spending
:01:40. > :01:44.Review was not only was it a sign of the past failure of this government,
:01:44. > :01:47.but it is really not building the country we need for the future. It
:01:47. > :01:53.is not, whatever the government said today, providing the infrastructure
:01:53. > :01:56.we need, the proper jobs programmes to help people get into work. It is
:01:57. > :02:02.not giving real power to the regions with the regional banks to get
:02:03. > :02:07.lending going here. And so I feel it is not only problem of the past, but
:02:07. > :02:13.people really want hope that things can be better in future and that was
:02:13. > :02:18.what sadly lacking. David Willetts, what did George Osborne mean by out
:02:18. > :02:24.of intensive care? It meant there is still a hell of a lot to do but we
:02:24. > :02:27.are making progress. We have eliminated about a third of the
:02:28. > :02:32.massive deficit we inherited, the biggest of any advanced country. We
:02:32. > :02:36.have succeeded in getting jobs growing, over 1 million extra jobs,
:02:36. > :02:39.but we want to do more. We have got the economy growing, but it is
:02:39. > :02:43.modest growth because there is this massive overhang of debt of the
:02:43. > :02:47.government and individuals. We are moving in the right direction but
:02:47. > :02:56.there is an enormous amount to do, and what George was talking about
:02:56. > :02:58.was the extra things we are doing. Out of intensive care, June 2013. In
:02:58. > :03:05.November 2010, George Osborne said Britain is out of the financial
:03:05. > :03:09.danger zone. March 2011, we can set off from rescue to reform. December
:03:09. > :03:15.2012, the British economy is healing. He can go on until he is
:03:15. > :03:20.blue in the face, but where is the evidence is Jamaat the danger zone,
:03:20. > :03:24.back in 2010 we have the same interest rates as Greece and Spain.
:03:24. > :03:28.And we had a larger deficit. The danger zone was going the way those
:03:28. > :03:33.countries have since gone, and we avoided that I having a plan and
:03:33. > :03:37.sticking to it. Yes, we were in a danger zone in 2010 and we are out
:03:37. > :03:40.of it echoes we have a credible plan. But there is still a lot to do
:03:40. > :03:47.to develop and deliver that plan, and that is why what we have done
:03:47. > :03:52.this week is to say, we are going to invest more in schools, in science,
:03:52. > :03:57.in roads and rail. So absolutely, we can raise the growth rate and keep
:03:57. > :04:01.on growing and create even more jobs. You talk as if it was extra
:04:01. > :04:06.spending but you are making cuts, aren't you? There seems some dispute
:04:06. > :04:10.about whether you are or not. continuing to bring down the
:04:10. > :04:14.deficit, and that takes time, but we are making progress, about a third
:04:14. > :04:17.of the way through. We are increasing the jobs. We are trying
:04:17. > :04:21.to get more investment coming into Britain and we are succeeding in
:04:21. > :04:27.that. We have to do better in the export markets that are growing,
:04:27. > :04:31.Brazil, China, Russia, and we are doing that, growing trade fair. But
:04:31. > :04:38.we were so far behind with such a massive amount of debt, that the job
:04:38. > :04:41.is not yet over. We will hear from the audience, but another member of
:04:41. > :04:46.the panel, Jill Kirby, do you think the government is on the right track
:04:46. > :04:54.rest Jamaat the debt is still getting bigger in real terms and as
:04:54. > :04:57.a proportion of GDP. George Osborne has not tackle the debt. The deficit
:04:57. > :05:00.has been peeled back in the last couple of years but since then it
:05:00. > :05:05.has drifted up again. He has not got anywhere with the biggest bubble he
:05:05. > :05:09.has to tackle. He made some of the right noises yesterday and is
:05:09. > :05:13.talking positively about the importance of growth and private
:05:13. > :05:16.sector jobs replacing lost public sector jobs. That makes sense in
:05:16. > :05:20.terms of getting the economy back on its feet, but he still has a
:05:20. > :05:24.hazardous path ahead. I think he is very well aware that the reason he
:05:24. > :05:27.is able to go on borrowing so much money is because interest rates are
:05:27. > :05:32.so low and he can get hold of that money partly because the government
:05:33. > :05:37.has fixed the market by endlessly printing money, and partly because
:05:37. > :05:44.it is forcing pension funds to invest more in government bonds.
:05:44. > :05:49.What would you have him do that he did not do? I would have Tim -- have
:05:49. > :05:56.him talk about cutting the amount of government expenditure. He is just
:05:56. > :05:59.managing the enormous expenditure. Where would you have him cut?
:05:59. > :06:03.would have him restructure the health service and consider to what
:06:03. > :06:06.extent there should be copayments. I would have him restructure the
:06:06. > :06:11.health care system to consider how we should payments on
:06:11. > :06:17.contributions, to a greater extent. Would he win an election on that
:06:17. > :06:22.Odyssey? I would have him cut some departments that the government
:06:22. > :06:27.cannot afford to fund. The Department of media and sport would
:06:27. > :06:32.be a good candidate. It is simply not realistic to go on borrowing so
:06:32. > :06:36.much money. The time will come when he will not be able to get hold of
:06:36. > :06:43.this cheap money. And then he will be forced, whoever is in charge by
:06:43. > :06:48.then, probably somebody else, will have to make emergency cuts.
:06:48. > :06:54.question I want to put to you is, what about the political dynamic of
:06:54. > :06:58.this? Can a chancellor do the things that you say, even if, in economic
:06:58. > :07:04.theory, you think you are right? In practical politics, would it be
:07:04. > :07:08.sensible? George Osborne came to power from the scene to look
:07:08. > :07:11.radically at the state of the deficit, to get the economy back to
:07:11. > :07:15.health by changing the way the government does things, doing a lot
:07:15. > :07:21.less through debt and is taxpayer money. He has not done that. And he
:07:22. > :07:25.missed the opportunity, which he had at the beginning. He knows now he is
:07:25. > :07:32.up against electoral terms so he has to create a sense of well-being for
:07:32. > :07:37.the next election. We reduced the deficit to �110 billion. I think we
:07:37. > :07:42.are following a prudent middle way between you, and we have to stick to
:07:42. > :07:49.that. Mark Steel, and then members of the audience because you have
:07:49. > :07:54.experience of what is being talked about. If it is out of intensive
:07:54. > :07:59.care, David, why are you making so many cuts to very often the poorest
:07:59. > :08:05.people in society? Why are you doing it? If it is out of intensive care?
:08:05. > :08:09.It seems to me that this Spending Review is a continuation of the
:08:09. > :08:13.strategy the government has had since it came in, which has been to
:08:13. > :08:19.say that the country is in debt, so we need to get money back. And who
:08:19. > :08:22.are we going to get the money back from, the poor, that is who. It
:08:22. > :08:26.seems the belief of this government that the people with all the money
:08:26. > :08:29.in society are the poor. Mainstream economics in this country thinks
:08:29. > :08:34.that the poor are richer than the rich and so we have to get the money
:08:34. > :08:38.back from them. I wonder what world you are in when you say it is out of
:08:38. > :08:42.intensive care. The cuts that are happening, even more as a result of
:08:42. > :08:48.this review, talking about people like firefighters everywhere, fire
:08:48. > :08:51.stations shutting down. Were these the people that caused the debt?
:08:51. > :08:56.Firemen, running up bills of billions and gambling the economy on
:08:56. > :09:00.the stock exchange between fighting fires? There is a slimming pool in
:09:00. > :09:04.Newcastle that has been shot. Why should it be a summing pool in
:09:04. > :09:14.Newcastle that gets shot when it is the bankers that caused this. -- a
:09:14. > :09:17.
:09:17. > :09:23.swimming in the pool who were destabilising the currency by
:09:23. > :09:26.gambling half a billion on the stock exchange. The reason this is
:09:26. > :09:29.pertinent now is because the amount of money that is going to be saved
:09:29. > :09:35.by the government on this spending announcement this week is not that
:09:36. > :09:40.much. But it is important. It is important because it is about a
:09:40. > :09:44.culture that your government is managing to uphold which is a
:09:44. > :09:47.culture to say that it is the poor who are to blame, and we will make
:09:47. > :09:52.all the different sections of the people who are not the rich, who did
:09:52. > :09:56.not cause the crisis, blame each other. We will say, you are on
:09:56. > :10:01.benefits, so you are to blame. The people who have pensions, we will
:10:01. > :10:06.say they are to blame. Meanwhile, in the real world, where you cannot
:10:06. > :10:14.just say it is out of intensive care, there is a small minority of
:10:14. > :10:19.people who are richer than ever, and somehow you leave them alone.
:10:19. > :10:23.Hughes, do you have sympathy with what Mark Steel is saying? I have
:10:23. > :10:28.some sympathy, but he is wrong on the facts. It is good rhetoric and
:10:28. > :10:34.he is a good south London rhetoric and I stand by him. But let me take
:10:34. > :10:37.you on on some of the facts. My constituency, like many parts of the
:10:37. > :10:43.north-east, struggles economically. Lots of April on low income in south
:10:43. > :10:45.London in the old docks, working-class constituency. The
:10:45. > :10:49.reality is that pensioners have been specifically looked after by the
:10:49. > :10:53.government. The state pension has gone up more since the general
:10:53. > :10:58.election than since it was first created. They have been exempt from
:10:58. > :11:02.all the other difficulties in this Parliament. Secondly, of course
:11:02. > :11:05.people on the bottom struggle most. That is why we lifted the tax
:11:05. > :11:15.threshold so that nobody pays any income tax on any thing up to ten
:11:15. > :11:19.
:11:19. > :11:29.grand. Like you, I want to clobber the rich. Why don't you?The fact is
:11:29. > :11:38.
:11:38. > :11:43.position on the rich. I thought a mansion tax was your policy. Your
:11:43. > :11:49.party, when in government, dropped capital gains tax from 40p in the
:11:49. > :11:57.pound down to 18p in the pound. Your party had a lower high tax rate, top
:11:57. > :12:00.tax rate, 40p in the pound. Why are you cutting the 50p tax rate?
:12:00. > :12:06.the pound was the top tax rate for the whole period of the Labour
:12:06. > :12:11.government. It is currently higher than that and rich people pay more
:12:11. > :12:15.tax than in any year under Labour. The answer to both Mark and Liz, who
:12:15. > :12:20.come from different positions, under the Blair government we had the
:12:20. > :12:24.biggest bonuses, ridiculous success in the city, which was unacceptable.
:12:24. > :12:27.We were left with a less equal society in the north-east and
:12:27. > :12:37.everywhere else after a Labour government than even after the
:12:37. > :12:38.
:12:38. > :12:43.Tories. Come on! Newcastle has seen its central government grant funding
:12:43. > :12:50.for local councils cut by �218 per person, compared to a national
:12:50. > :12:58.average of 130, and �27 cut doctor my point is that inequalities are
:12:58. > :13:06.widening because of what is happening. Let's hear from the
:13:06. > :13:12.people from Newcastle and what they say. In your experience. I think the
:13:12. > :13:16.purpose of tax in some ways is to try to get as much as possible for
:13:16. > :13:22.the health service and education and so forth. The problem is that if you
:13:22. > :13:29.tax the rich, which sounds good in principle, they will leave. They
:13:29. > :13:33.have the ability to go abroad. They have the ability to avoid tax in
:13:33. > :13:38.certain ways. So it can be very difficult to say, tax the rich and
:13:38. > :13:44.get money. Do you think the economy is out of intensive care? Are you
:13:44. > :13:49.optimistic? Traditionally, when people come out of intensive care
:13:49. > :13:52.they are not flat-lining. Usually, that means they are dead, so I do
:13:52. > :14:00.not think we can really say it is out of intensive care if it is not
:14:00. > :14:05.growing as much as we would like. The woman with spectacles. I would
:14:05. > :14:11.like to know what the Conservatives are going to do from mothers and
:14:11. > :14:15.fathers that have children they need to look after. The job creation that
:14:15. > :14:22.they have created our temporary jobs. All we get is temporary jobs,
:14:22. > :14:27.and the jobs that we have two have are the most inappropriate jobs. My
:14:27. > :14:30.son has to go to an after-school centre for me to go to work. And I
:14:30. > :14:37.have to pay for that myself because I get nothing from the government
:14:38. > :14:41.whatsoever. The cars apparently I earn too much money. -- because
:14:41. > :14:46.apparently I earn too much money. What is your idea of a good job for
:14:46. > :14:50.a mother? The job I have to do, I have to work in the afternoon and my
:14:50. > :14:57.son has to go to an after-school centre which I have to pay for, so
:14:57. > :15:00.basically I'm going to work for nothing. I do not know what your
:15:00. > :15:05.income is and what your personal circumstances are, but we still have
:15:05. > :15:10.tax credits. We have increased the element of the child tax credit that
:15:10. > :15:16.is of most value for lowering come families. But we are having to take
:15:16. > :15:20.tough decisions to save overall on tax credits and welfare, and I would
:15:20. > :15:24.like to respond to what Mark said, because you cannot carry on
:15:24. > :15:29.indefinitely borrowing �120 billion a year, because you are spending
:15:30. > :15:33.more than you are receiving in tax. You cannot do that indefinitely. Any
:15:33. > :15:41.mature government has to confront the reality that that is no way to
:15:41. > :15:45.run an economy. We inherited 160, it is down to 110 and it is still going
:15:45. > :15:49.down. Mark raised a fair challenge, that the cuts are falling
:15:49. > :15:52.disproportionately on low income people. The independent analysis of
:15:52. > :15:57.the decisions announced this week shows the opposite. It shows that it
:15:57. > :16:03.is the richest 90% of the population who will lose the most as a result
:16:03. > :16:07.of these decisions. And we are endlessly trying to make these
:16:07. > :16:12.incredibly tough decisions in a way that does least damage to the social
:16:13. > :16:16.fabric of the country. We inherited a mess, as we often do after labour.
:16:16. > :16:23.We are trying to sort it out in a way that preserves the social fabric
:16:23. > :16:27.and strengthens the economy. woman in pink to the second row to
:16:27. > :16:31.the back? I would like to know what you guys thought with regard to the
:16:31. > :16:34.Chancellor's previous comment about being out of the dangers zone? How
:16:34. > :16:39.do you feel about whether society is going to be in the danger zone with
:16:39. > :16:43.policing, courts and prisons, having budgets cut yet again?
:16:43. > :16:49.Well, just on that... Let Simon Hughes answer that one because you
:16:50. > :16:53.are both in the coalition, so to speak, up to a point. Simon?
:16:54. > :16:57.joined the coalition, there wasn't a majority of any, Labour lost the
:16:57. > :17:02.election because... We know that. Because we wanted to deal with the
:17:02. > :17:06.crisis which was enormous. The answer to the lady eats question is,
:17:06. > :17:09.thank goodness crime figures have come down in the last four years
:17:09. > :17:13.than ever in my lifetime. Mercifully, we may not need as many
:17:13. > :17:18.people in frontline as we did and I hope it goes on in that direction.
:17:18. > :17:21.We have got to keep paying for the key drops, the firefighters in
:17:21. > :17:27.London should be kept and it's Boris's plan to reduce the spending
:17:27. > :17:34.for them which is wrong. The economy - I think it's very gently easing
:17:34. > :17:39.out of intensive care. I'm not overoptimistic or naive, I know the
:17:39. > :17:43.unemployment situation in the north-east but in the north-east
:17:43. > :17:47.unemployment has fallen, but in the north-east we are the only region
:17:47. > :17:51.which net exports more than it imports and Hitachi and Nissan and
:17:51. > :17:55.other companies are investing. I understand the lady saying about
:17:55. > :18:02.proper jobs, but they are going to have to be private sector jobs,
:18:02. > :18:05.that's why we try to encourage the sector... Sorry, but... Thank you.
:18:05. > :18:11.I'm not accusing you of making a speech, don't think that for a
:18:11. > :18:16.moment, but all the Pammists, if you could speak more briefly we'd hear
:18:16. > :18:23.more from the City of Newcastle. Either party can't decide whether
:18:23. > :18:28.it's going to spend more or last. Last Saturday little Ed said we
:18:28. > :18:31.agree now finally for the need for expenditure cuts. It was ironically
:18:31. > :18:35.called disciplining the party, because within 24 hour, big Ed
:18:35. > :18:42.decide yes we will spend more, yes we will borrow more and how you get
:18:42. > :18:44.out of debt by borrowing more is beyond me.
:18:44. > :18:48.APPLAUSE These people should never be allowed
:18:48. > :18:52.to go to the gates of Downing Street again. Liz Kendall, what is the
:18:52. > :18:56.answer? We have been very clear we are not going to borrow more on
:18:56. > :19:02.day-to-day spending in 2015-16. Sorry, can I give you the quote.
:19:02. > :19:08.Would Balls borrow more and he said "of course". On day-to-day spending.
:19:08. > :19:12.I think that people can see the I think that people can see the
:19:12. > :19:16.difference between investing In our roads, rail, infrastructure, school
:19:16. > :19:22.building, all of those sorts of things which are about building for
:19:22. > :19:26.the future. People are see the difference between investing.
:19:26. > :19:31.investing... The Government is already borrowing more. The IMF
:19:31. > :19:38.says... Are you going to borrow more, let me understand this?
:19:38. > :19:43.for the day-to-day spending. But you are still borrowing the money
:19:43. > :19:49.billion. Are you going to borrow more? �245 billion more than they
:19:49. > :19:53.said. What the IMF has said is, we should be bringing forward �10
:19:53. > :19:56.billion of investment in this year and next to get the economy going
:19:56. > :20:01.again. My worry about what the Government's done on infrastructure
:20:01. > :20:05.is, these are projects for five, six, seven years' time. All the
:20:05. > :20:09.announcements today, many of them they made two or three years ago.
:20:09. > :20:15.They said in this region 31 schools were supposed to be built as part of
:20:15. > :20:20.the priority schools programme, not a single one's started.
:20:20. > :20:25.It doesn't make sense. What do you make of borrowing more to invest,
:20:25. > :20:28.does that sound economic economics in your view? I'm sceptical as you
:20:28. > :20:31.about the infrastructure announcements we had today, a lot
:20:31. > :20:35.were recycled. In the end, the debt is continuing to grow. As I said,
:20:35. > :20:39.George Osborne has debt on easy terms at the moment which won't
:20:39. > :20:42.last. The situation will get very difficult. What is going to happen?
:20:42. > :20:46.We can't keep borrowing money to pay welfare bills, for example. Whilst
:20:46. > :20:50.the lady rightly points out it's hardly worth her while going to work
:20:50. > :20:53.in order to pay for childcare, the situation is that where is the money
:20:53. > :20:56.going to come from, should the Government borrow money more to pay
:20:57. > :21:00.for your childcare so it's worth you going out to work? I don't know,
:21:00. > :21:03.it's a difficult test because when you look at the amount of money
:21:03. > :21:07.that's being used now to service the debt interest, it's more than we
:21:07. > :21:11.spend on education every year. A hell of a lot of money just going to
:21:11. > :21:17.service debt and that will only grow unless we start looking differently
:21:17. > :21:21.at it. You said that the spending on the NHS, which the Conservatives or
:21:21. > :21:26.the coalition have ringfenced, was something which should be looked at.
:21:26. > :21:30.David Willetts, is this guaranteed to ringfence protect the NHS and
:21:30. > :21:33.education and overseas aid, is that something that will last beyond the
:21:33. > :21:37.next election? Is this a permanent can commitment or just for the
:21:37. > :21:42.moment? Well, every Government sets out their plans for life. I know
:21:42. > :21:45.that, that is I'm asking the question. I would be very surprised
:21:45. > :21:49.if we did not repeat our commitment on the NHS because it's incredibly
:21:49. > :21:53.important to this country. When we go to the election, we'll set out
:21:53. > :21:56.our expenditure. You will be surprised that it's not yet decided
:21:56. > :22:01.if it's Tory policy? Conservative Party is committed to
:22:01. > :22:05.the NHS, we have set out plans. not the same is it? We have set out
:22:05. > :22:10.our plans for 2015-16, after that we believe in the NHS of course and I
:22:10. > :22:13.would be very surprised if when we produce our plans, they don't
:22:13. > :22:19.involve maintaining the process. We have a clear view that you can't set
:22:19. > :22:26.out the plans until after the next... What about... I think that
:22:26. > :22:31.we could get much better value for money if we join together the �105
:22:31. > :22:38.billion on the NHS and the �15 billion in social care. If you had a
:22:38. > :22:43.system where instead of further and further cuts to the help disable and
:22:43. > :22:47.elderly people need for help at home and if that's cut, they end up in
:22:47. > :22:54.hospital. That is terrible for them and their families and ends up
:22:54. > :22:57.costing more. What you've done is, you've taken �3 billion, which you
:22:57. > :23:02.have already wasted on a top down reorganisation in the NHS and said
:23:02. > :23:05.we'll join it up with social care, but that's a tiny amount compared to
:23:05. > :23:09.the �120 billion, we could get better care and value for money if
:23:09. > :23:11.we got the services working together.
:23:11. > :23:16.APPLAUSE Mark Steel? There must be a lot of
:23:16. > :23:19.people who're going to be hit by some of the announcements this week
:23:19. > :23:25.who'll wonder what on earth this conversation is about. One
:23:25. > :23:29.announcement was that, unemployment benefit will now be paid a bit later
:23:29. > :23:34.than it was, it will go up another three days, is that right? Now, it
:23:34. > :23:37.was presented as if this means now it will be three days after you
:23:37. > :23:41.become unemployed before you receive the murntion although it's already
:23:41. > :23:43.three weeks so it's three days beyond that, so it's
:23:43. > :23:47.three-and-a-half weeks now before you receive anything. That might not
:23:47. > :23:49.be much to the people opt panel. To the people suffering, that is
:23:49. > :23:59.absolutely disastrous and the only people who're going to win out of
:23:59. > :24:02.that will be the payday loans people, the Wonga people.
:24:02. > :24:07.APPLAUSE Two things about that. First of all,
:24:07. > :24:11.Ed Balls has been on the television on the radio as well all day saying,
:24:11. > :24:15.of course we won't change that and being very equivocal about it. He's
:24:15. > :24:19.supposed to be the opposition. Someone should slap him and say,
:24:19. > :24:21.remember, you are the opposition, you are allowed to oppose, you are
:24:21. > :24:24.allowed to do that. APPLAUSE
:24:24. > :24:29.The other thing, coming back to the gentleman over here who said this, I
:24:29. > :24:33.mean, this is the comment that we get quite often. We can't tax the
:24:33. > :24:36.rich and so on because they'll go away. We are talking about people,
:24:36. > :24:41.for example, and that's why the culture of this is so important,
:24:41. > :24:45.Phillip Green, for example, who paid himself �1. 2 billion in one pay
:24:45. > :24:53.cheque and paid it through an account in his wife's name in
:24:53. > :24:57.Monaco, which meant that he saved �300 million many tax in one go. Why
:24:57. > :24:59.aren't the Government having a go at him about that? Of course, the
:24:59. > :25:03.answer comes back... APPLAUSE
:25:03. > :25:11.The answer comes back every time, well we can't do that because we
:25:11. > :25:15.have to be prepared to... Mark, it's complete nonsense. One of the other
:25:15. > :25:19.measures the Chancellor's announced is absolutely more steps to tackle
:25:19. > :25:23.the problem that people aren't paying due taxes and we are
:25:23. > :25:29.expecting to collect more because we are being more energetic. More
:25:29. > :25:34.people in HMRC doing the means testing of child benefit than you
:25:34. > :25:39.have on cracking down on tax havens, the it doesn't make sense. What we
:25:39. > :25:45.are doing is going after all the tax avoiders and people and all the
:25:45. > :25:47.people... Why haven't people taken a single Internet company to court?
:25:47. > :25:54.That's not the culture. ALL SPEAK AT ONCE
:25:54. > :26:04.One at a time. One at a time. Listen, if you all speak at once,
:26:04. > :26:09.nobody can hear any of you. I believe you probably go home every
:26:09. > :26:14.night and think think, what on earth am I doing. The man second row from
:26:14. > :26:18.the back. Silence on the panel first. I wonder if more austerity
:26:18. > :26:23.cuts are needed to accelerate the payments of deficitlet back to the
:26:23. > :26:27.people who they're lending it off. You think there should be more cuts?
:26:27. > :26:32.I think slightly more extreme cuts so it will accelerate the payment of
:26:32. > :26:35.the loan back to the actual... would be interesting to know what
:26:35. > :26:39.the audience thought. Do you think that expenditure is being savagely
:26:39. > :26:44.cut, as most of the press and media tell us? Do you think these are
:26:44. > :26:50.savage cuts? Would it surprise you to learn that the total public
:26:50. > :26:55.expenditure cuts over four years represent about 2% and back in the
:26:55. > :26:59.1970s, Dennis Healey cut public expenditure by 4% in one year.
:26:59. > :27:04.Currently, public expenditure is more than double what it was in real
:27:04. > :27:09.terms. We are talking of 2% over four years. That is not savage
:27:09. > :27:15.cutting. It's true that we'll have spent more as a total expenditure on
:27:15. > :27:19.public expenditure on this Government percentage than Labour
:27:19. > :27:24.did under Tony Blair. I don't think anybody here would support what you
:27:24. > :27:27.are arguing for, which is we start dismantling the welfare state. You
:27:27. > :27:32.have to get a balance and basic things you have to support.
:27:32. > :27:37.Therefore, the answer to our friend over there is, you can't tart paying
:27:37. > :27:41.back the deficit overnight even though we were borrowing a pound for
:27:41. > :27:46.every �30 or �4 we were spending. you want to come back on the point?
:27:46. > :27:52.Why can't we semi privatise the NHS like, make the people who can afford
:27:52. > :27:58.it pay for it and the lowest, like put a cap on it? Let him make the
:27:58. > :28:03.point. It's not working is it?David Willetts, answer his question?
:28:03. > :28:06.is a clear middle way here. Liz thinks we should borrow more, Jill
:28:06. > :28:10.and you think we should borrow less. We have a plan for bringing
:28:10. > :28:16.borrowing down and we have got to bring it down steadily so interest
:28:16. > :28:20.rates we main low. Do it faster, as Jill is suggesting? We have a track
:28:20. > :28:23.which has enabled us to keep interest rates low. It's not
:28:23. > :28:27.working? In other words we can borrow this amount and the markets
:28:27. > :28:34.believe we have a plan we are sticking to to get a grip on the
:28:34. > :28:44.public finances. You are borrowing a huge amount more, �245 billion. A
:28:44. > :28:44.
:28:44. > :28:48.huge amount. We were borrowing �160, it's now �110. It's still incredibly
:28:48. > :28:51.high by Britain's historical standards. It's incredibly high
:28:52. > :28:58.compared to how Governments used to operate. Compared with what we
:28:58. > :29:01.inherited, we are heading in the right direction. Can you clarify
:29:02. > :29:06.clarify about what he's arguing against and what Jill is saying, are
:29:06. > :29:10.you afraid of taking the radical action needed, Jill has been
:29:10. > :29:15.suggesting what you could do and you are saying you can't? We are judging
:29:15. > :29:19.what it is we can do that enables us to maintain standards in schools and
:29:19. > :29:24.to protect the Health Service. We are a nationwide insurance bowl. We
:29:24. > :29:29.put in so we can enjoy health care without paying for it when we go to
:29:29. > :29:34.hospital. That principle unites most people in Britain and I believe in
:29:34. > :29:38.it and we are trying to bring down the deficit without jeopardising
:29:38. > :29:40.principles and services like that which holds this country together.
:29:40. > :29:44.APPLAUSE You, there, please, Sir? I don't
:29:44. > :29:49.want to appear rude or anything, but I expect what I'm hearing from
:29:49. > :29:53.certain members of the panel, I know their agendas on, but Simon Hughes,
:29:53. > :29:57.I can guarantee, in two or three years' time, when the Tories and the
:29:57. > :30:01.Liberals have been thrown out, will be back on your programme saying how
:30:01. > :30:08.he disagreed with that, that and that, I would rather him sayinglet
:30:08. > :30:11.tonight in front of us now, because he's to the left of the party now.
:30:11. > :30:16.APPLAUSE In the coalition you negotiate. One
:30:16. > :30:20.example. If you win your seat, which you won't... Let's have less of
:30:21. > :30:27.that. Policy example. The first budget George Osborne announced, he
:30:27. > :30:31.said, after year one of people being unemployed, they would lose 10% of
:30:31. > :30:34.their jobseeker's allowance as an incent 'til. I said immediately
:30:34. > :30:37.unacceptable, my colleagues said that and when the bill appeared, it
:30:37. > :30:41.wasn't in the bill because some things for me are red lines and my
:30:41. > :30:49.job in the party and my job as a Liberal Democrat, and as a liberal
:30:49. > :30:52.of 30, 40 years, to make sure we have the society that Beverage
:30:52. > :30:56.fought for. It wasn't delivered by Thatcher or Blair, I want it to be
:30:56. > :30:59.delivered and we are in the circumstances not doing too badly
:31:00. > :31:04.and the alternative would have been a Tory only Government and you would
:31:04. > :31:10.have been much less happy with that. Do you agree with everything now?
:31:10. > :31:15.No, of course not, because we are in a coalition. What do you not agree
:31:15. > :31:19.with? You will come back in three years' time and say you don't agree
:31:19. > :31:25.with everything. I'm not persuaded that we should defer the period for
:31:25. > :31:30.which people get their benefits, as was said this week. I think that
:31:30. > :31:37.probably we ought to make... If it was a universal credit, it could be
:31:37. > :31:43.paid monthly. You could be wait ing waiting for five weeks. This is why
:31:43. > :31:52.the red line wasn't to go into an election promising to abolish fees,
:31:52. > :31:56.and then treble them. You, Sir? you look at the problem
:31:57. > :32:01.realistically, now because of what happened after the financial crash,
:32:01. > :32:04.my children and my children's children will have to live with a
:32:04. > :32:12.catastrophic amount of debt. Personally I blame that on Labour.
:32:12. > :32:16.No offence to you. I want to hear solutions to the problems. I don't
:32:16. > :32:19.think the solution is more brothering because it doesn't make
:32:19. > :32:24.logic sense. I don't believe stealing people's money through the
:32:24. > :32:28.art of taxation works either. What I see is the problem that we have had
:32:28. > :32:32.for the past 20 years, is that the state thinks that it can do
:32:32. > :32:38.everything, spends pretty much about half of everything spent in Britain
:32:39. > :32:48.today. I want the state to be reduced, private sectors to be taken
:32:49. > :32:55.
:32:55. > :32:59.third row. I am interested because you keep talking about growth of
:32:59. > :33:02.jobs and the economy but I want to know when we will see that in the
:33:02. > :33:11.north-east, because it seems London is benefiting from that, but not
:33:11. > :33:16.us. What do you think the position is in the north-east? It is quite
:33:16. > :33:22.hopeless, really. You mentioned the swimming pool, and that is part of
:33:22. > :33:26.our heritage and it has just been closed down. My place of work this
:33:26. > :33:30.morning announced redundancies via e-mail. I wonder when the
:33:30. > :33:35.north-east, or anywhere outside of London will see the effects of this
:33:35. > :33:42.so-called growth. Are you employed in the private sector, or the public
:33:42. > :33:46.sector? By a college. The projection is for 30,000 extra jobs in the
:33:46. > :33:49.north-east, and talking to my colleagues in the city council,
:33:49. > :33:53.there is no reason why Labour have to close the summing pool in the
:33:53. > :34:00.middle of the city. If they diverted some of the health money, summing
:34:00. > :34:07.bull could have stayed open, and if they had reduced the hours, the
:34:07. > :34:13.libraries could have stayed open. -- the swimming pool. This morning I
:34:13. > :34:16.was at the old brewery site in the centre of Newcastle where there is a
:34:16. > :34:21.massive development underway with schoolkids celebrating the start of
:34:21. > :34:23.that development. I went to the university to say we are putting �6
:34:23. > :34:26.million of investment into medical research here because we have the
:34:26. > :34:30.funding for a close there are illnesses which medics in Newcastle
:34:30. > :34:35.will be more able to tackle than anywhere else in the world. We are
:34:35. > :34:45.going to invest in the industries and prospects in Newcastle. You can
:34:45. > :35:03.
:35:03. > :35:11.join in tonight, as I am sure you a bit slow at the moment. Another
:35:11. > :35:15.question from Chris Smith. Edward Snowden, hero or villain?
:35:15. > :35:20.whistleblower, now in Moscow airport, apparently, having told the
:35:20. > :35:30.whole world how surveillance of the internet operated. Is he a hero or a
:35:30. > :35:33.
:35:33. > :35:37.villain? Mark Steel. Well, if it is a one word answer, then hero. I
:35:37. > :35:44.think some of the most fascinating people in history are those who go
:35:44. > :35:50.through the system, they are part of the system, they feel that the
:35:50. > :35:54.system is working, they go along with the. He was in the Army, wasn't
:35:54. > :35:58.he, Snowden, and was going to be in the Iraq war and did not see
:35:58. > :36:02.anything wrong with it. And then something happens and they realise
:36:02. > :36:04.that all is not as they were brought up to believe it would be. That
:36:04. > :36:10.happened to him and he realised there was this enormous surveillance
:36:11. > :36:16.going on, far beyond what the government was letting on about. And
:36:16. > :36:21.so he became a rebel about it. It has hardly benefited him. The poor
:36:21. > :36:27.bloke has had to leave his house, his family and he is somewhere in
:36:27. > :36:33.Moscow. Where the argument gets diverted here, is if it is along the
:36:33. > :36:38.lines of, well, we need this surveillance because we need to have
:36:38. > :36:43.national-security. That may be the case to a certain extent. However,
:36:43. > :36:48.what he seems to have picked up on is that the amount of surveillance
:36:48. > :36:52.was way, way beyond that. It was not just that they were trawling through
:36:52. > :36:57.people so they could keep us safe by looking at e-mail and text and so
:36:57. > :37:03.on. It was way beyond that. And vast amounts of the surveillance,
:37:03. > :37:08.certainly in America, over the last few years, has been looking at all
:37:08. > :37:11.sorts of people who are campaigners and so on. I am not a fan of
:37:11. > :37:14.conspiracy theories and I would never have believed it if it was not
:37:14. > :37:22.for this week but some of the stuff about people who have been under
:37:22. > :37:30.some way in. Doreen Lawrence. How absurd can that be? Doreen Lawrence
:37:30. > :37:33.was under surveillance. The police actually put someone in the campaign
:37:33. > :37:37.for justice for Stephen Lawrence so they could find dirt on Doreen
:37:37. > :37:41.Lawrence, one of the most admired people in this country. Throughout
:37:41. > :37:45.that time, the police were criticised, rightly, for not doing
:37:45. > :37:49.enough work around finding the murderer. It seems they did have
:37:49. > :37:54.time to go and smear her. Even more ridiculous stories about the people
:37:54. > :37:57.who wrote leaflets condemning McDonald's. It turns out that the
:37:57. > :38:06.police had people working with the group that broke the leaflet that
:38:06. > :38:09.caused the problem. I find myself, having to think, is this true, this
:38:09. > :38:12.story? But it is true that there were even people having
:38:12. > :38:17.relationships with women in the environmental groups to the extent
:38:17. > :38:22.that they fathered a child and then went off, having been doing all this
:38:22. > :38:32.undercover work. It is absurd. So that is a lot of words to say one
:38:32. > :38:38.
:38:38. > :38:43.but I think what Snowden has done is probably very wrong indeed. Mark is
:38:43. > :38:45.confusing two different things. I agreed with what he said about
:38:45. > :38:49.Doreen Lawrence and I agree that the accusations on that were deeply
:38:49. > :38:54.shocking, which is why we have to get to the bottom of what went wrong
:38:54. > :38:58.with the investigation into the murder of her son. But the
:38:58. > :39:02.completely different case is what we have two do to protect our
:39:02. > :39:07.national-security. And when Mark says national-security with a hint
:39:07. > :39:13.of a sneer, it means that we can enjoy the Olympics and the Royal
:39:13. > :39:17.Jubilee without being subject to terrorist attack. That is what
:39:17. > :39:21.national security means and we are in debt to the agencies, the police
:39:21. > :39:27.and the Armed Forces, the security agencies who ensured we could enjoy
:39:27. > :39:30.those events with great safety. What is crucial is that those activities
:39:30. > :39:33.should be carried out within the framework of law. The framework of
:39:33. > :39:38.law that governs the activities of those agencies is strong and
:39:39. > :39:42.effective. There is a clear set of laws going back to the John Major
:39:42. > :39:48.and Tony Blair governments. There are independent legal experts who
:39:48. > :39:52.can check on every operation. There is a parliamentary committee of MPs
:39:52. > :39:58.from all three parties that can assess and investigate anything they
:39:58. > :40:03.wish to assess. And the scale of American surveillance? Is that
:40:03. > :40:10.legitimate and legal and proper? I cannot comment on what goes on in
:40:10. > :40:13.the US, but in Britain we have too comply with the law. Our security
:40:13. > :40:19.agencies have too comply with the law, the law has to be enforced and
:40:19. > :40:24.it is enforced. I tend to think whistleblower is, generally, our
:40:24. > :40:31.heroes rather than villains in society, and that you need people
:40:31. > :40:35.sometimes to say, look, government is going over the top. I am with
:40:35. > :40:39.Mark and David on some examples we have, close to me, people like to
:40:39. > :40:49.Wayne Brooks, I have come to know that Lawrence family as a South
:40:49. > :40:53.London MP. It was almost unbelievable. What we have to do, we
:40:53. > :40:57.have had a debate, a difference between coalition partners. We have
:40:57. > :41:01.said, as Liberal Democrats, that we are suspicious of more powers being
:41:01. > :41:06.given to the security services to track correspondence and e-mails and
:41:06. > :41:11.so on. We fought off the Labour Party doing it with the plan for ID
:41:11. > :41:14.cards and the rest, rightly in my view. I think we have to give extra
:41:14. > :41:19.powers very carefully and occasionally. Of course, David
:41:19. > :41:23.Willetts is right, we need security services. I agree with him that I
:41:23. > :41:26.think there is no evidence that our services are not properly
:41:26. > :41:30.accountable and have acted outside the law. I have no evidence for
:41:30. > :41:35.that. I am not so sure about the States, and I think we need to be
:41:35. > :41:41.attentive when people tell us that benighted States may be abusing
:41:41. > :41:47.their powers in ways which have not been authorised there or elsewhere.
:41:47. > :41:50.You said you were inclined to think he was a hero, is that right? It was
:41:50. > :41:55.a simple question. I think whistleblower is, generally, if they
:41:55. > :42:00.are brave enough to make that step, normally have something to say. If
:42:00. > :42:02.they are proved to be frauds, they are frauds. The NHS has benefited
:42:02. > :42:09.from whistleblowers and we need other people to be able to be free
:42:09. > :42:13.to be whistleblowers. If I had to opt, I would say villain rather than
:42:13. > :42:23.hero. I think he has been foolish, betrayed the trust of his employer.
:42:23. > :42:26.
:42:26. > :42:28.We should not take that lightly. Also, we are somewhat confused, Mark
:42:28. > :42:31.particularly, about the distinctions between using computer codes to rake
:42:31. > :42:34.through data, which no one ever gets to look at until it throws up
:42:34. > :42:38.something significant. On the whole, I think I am reassured that security
:42:38. > :42:44.services in the states and over here are using those systems to keep an
:42:45. > :42:47.eye on what is going on in terms of internet traffic. I am not
:42:47. > :42:52.particularly relaxed about the snooper's charter. I am with Simon
:42:52. > :42:57.on that. As far as our security is concerned, we should be thankful
:42:57. > :43:01.that we actually have a pretty efficient, so far, security service,
:43:01. > :43:05.and we have been spared a lot of risks that could otherwise have been
:43:05. > :43:10.greater threats. I think someone like Snowden regards himself as a
:43:10. > :43:16.hero, clearly. He is also very muddled. He rushed to Hong Kong
:43:16. > :43:21.first, then Russia and now wants to get to Ecuador. I think he thinks he
:43:22. > :43:26.is Julian Assange and he wants to strut on the world stage. You think
:43:26. > :43:30.he is a villain because he should keep calm when the whole of the
:43:31. > :43:36.United States is chasing him around the world. He should be more calm
:43:36. > :43:39.and measured about which country he hides in. He resigned his job
:43:39. > :43:44.because he was unhappy about the work he was doing. He should have
:43:44. > :43:47.done, and maybe talk more freely about things afterwards. But I do
:43:48. > :43:53.not think you Sibley ham things to the Guardian newspaper, or whoever
:43:53. > :43:59.will believe you. The Guardian has had doubts since about some of the
:43:59. > :44:03.stories he has given. He has risked national-security, which he should
:44:03. > :44:11.not do lightly. It is very different from a whistleblower in the NHS, or
:44:11. > :44:17.police undercover getting carried away. Barack Obama said you cannot
:44:17. > :44:22.have 100 and seven security and also 100% liberty. If I wanted 100%
:44:22. > :44:27.security, I would go to jail. The reason I do not want to go to jail
:44:27. > :44:31.is because liberty and freedom is more valuable than security. And
:44:31. > :44:35.William Hague said that only wrongdoers should be worried. How
:44:35. > :44:40.would he feel if I went to the foreign office and went to his desk
:44:41. > :44:50.and into his computer, and he came in and said, what are you doing, and
:44:51. > :44:53.
:44:53. > :44:57.I said, only wrongdoers should be worried? How would he feel then?
:44:57. > :45:00.I happen to disagree with the majority. I think he is a villain.
:45:00. > :45:04.He is a villain because when he took up the job to work in the Secret
:45:04. > :45:09.Service, he knew what was in the job description and he should have taken
:45:09. > :45:16.that on board before he began to blow his whistle, as you would put
:45:16. > :45:23.it. I am much more worried about the potential for threats to people
:45:23. > :45:30.caused by terrorism, by this network of new groups. It is not the old
:45:30. > :45:34.Cold War. We do not know where these new groups are. I was on the Chew in
:45:35. > :45:40.London and I had friends in Boston when the bombing happened, and I
:45:40. > :45:43.think it is essential that our security services can monitor and
:45:43. > :45:49.intercept e-mails, online data and phone calls if they believe it to be
:45:49. > :45:53.a threat. But just as our police need to have the trust of people
:45:53. > :45:56.that they are doing their job properly Asch and the issue about
:45:56. > :46:03.what has happened to the Lawrences is a separate point Asch our
:46:03. > :46:07.security services need to act within the framework of the law. The
:46:07. > :46:11.problem is, being open about such sensitive information, how do we
:46:11. > :46:14.know they are following the law if we cannot see that in public? That
:46:14. > :46:20.is why the MPs on the intelligence and Security committee is looking at
:46:20. > :46:27.the issue. My comment about Edward Snowden is that I think it is ironic
:46:27. > :46:35.that, as a man who champions free speech, he is trying to seek asylum
:46:35. > :46:39.in a country that denies its citizens free speech. I fail to
:46:39. > :46:42.understand how we can have freedom of speech at everything we say is
:46:42. > :46:46.being recorded, everything we say privately, everything we write,
:46:46. > :46:50.every question we ask Google is available to the security services.
:46:50. > :46:59.I do not trust them with my bank details, let alone that information.
:46:59. > :47:03.How are we supposed to have involved discussions? You say no-one is above
:47:03. > :47:07.the law and that Security Services have nothing to hide, why do we need
:47:07. > :47:12.secret courts that the public don't have access to and the press can't
:47:12. > :47:16.comment on? How, as a public, are we supposed to trust them when there is
:47:16. > :47:22.no public insight into what they do? APPLAUSE
:47:22. > :47:26.Time for another question. It's an interesting one, a similar theme.
:47:26. > :47:31.Andrew Hills, who is a doctor, I think. Andrew Hills? What should be
:47:31. > :47:38.done to those involved in the covering up of in incompetency in
:47:38. > :47:41.some areas of the NHS and how can it be prevented in the future? These
:47:41. > :47:45.are the allegations that reports, particularly in Morecambe and the
:47:45. > :47:50.children who died there, that they were deliberately obscured or
:47:50. > :48:00.covered up which the people involved in deny happen. Jill Kirby? There is
:48:00. > :48:01.
:48:01. > :48:08.some problem with who looks after those who're looking after those who
:48:08. > :48:12.in the CQC. Yes, there's questions that people might be losing their
:48:12. > :48:17.faith if they really knew. If you preserve your pension and pay off,
:48:17. > :48:21.that's what you are in the job for, that is what is being said. There
:48:22. > :48:25.are a number of people at the CQC who were involved in deleting
:48:25. > :48:28.reports, making sure the public didn't know what was happening and
:48:28. > :48:33.by virtue of them not making the information public were probably
:48:33. > :48:37.risking further deaths which they seemed more concerned to cover up
:48:37. > :48:41.than actually allow to become known. I think that actually looking after
:48:41. > :48:46.your own back seems to have been the culture of this particular quango
:48:46. > :48:50.and that some of the people involved should not be able to retire with
:48:50. > :48:55.the huge public sector pensions which we are all paying for in order
:48:55. > :49:02.to enjoy the benefits of having a lifetime in a job which has not
:49:02. > :49:04.actually been of any service to anybody.
:49:04. > :49:08.APPLAUSE Do you think it's a one-off or do
:49:08. > :49:13.you think this is symptomatic of the way quangos can go? Well, it doesn't
:49:13. > :49:17.seem to have been a one-off in the Health Service. We seem to have
:49:17. > :49:20.streams of whistleblowers now e-Americaning, some of whom we have
:49:20. > :49:25.read about before, some of whom are coming to the fore, yet at the same
:49:25. > :49:29.time we have been reassured be I the man in charge of the Health Service,
:49:29. > :49:32.Dave Nicholson, and he told the Select Committee that there was only
:49:33. > :49:37.one whistleblower he'd ever come across and there now seems to be
:49:37. > :49:43.umpteen of them. I'm sure he will be aware and reports will have reached
:49:43. > :49:46.him of concerns being expressed by practitioners and consultants of
:49:46. > :49:51.different sorts. We need to know what is happening in this huge
:49:51. > :49:55.organisation. The CQC was clearly not set up on the basis of it could
:49:55. > :50:01.find out what is happening, its remit seemed to be about assurance,
:50:01. > :50:05.it seemed to get away with hospitals not reporting on themselves.
:50:05. > :50:11.Self-assessment carried to ridiculous extremes - "we think we
:50:11. > :50:16.are a hospital doing a good job", "fine, go off and have another nice
:50:16. > :50:19.lunch". The public has been bad badly served. The NHS is a
:50:19. > :50:23.monolithic organisation, it's difficult to supervise every detail
:50:23. > :50:26.of it unless we get it into a manageable size of accountable units
:50:26. > :50:31.and so people will then know what is going on.
:50:31. > :50:34.The woman in the second row from the back? I wondered what your thoughts
:50:34. > :50:38.are about the market changes that you are trying to enforce into the
:50:38. > :50:43.NHS, whether that will lead to bigger incentives to people to cover
:50:43. > :50:48.up issues like this rather than being open and honest. If it were
:50:48. > :50:54.market driven? Yes, I think it's heading that way and I don't think
:50:54. > :50:58.that incentivises NHS managers to be open and honest. Introducing more of
:50:58. > :51:02.a competition element will incentivise them to be more open.
:51:02. > :51:07.they were told where to go and not to go, recommend it to friends or
:51:07. > :51:11.not, or indeed in a hospital knows that if it loses patients or kills
:51:11. > :51:14.patients, it might not get any more. Those market responses, you don't go
:51:14. > :51:19.to a supermarket that sells rotten food because it's not a good place
:51:19. > :51:25.to buy things, you wouldn't go to a hospital if you could help it.
:51:25. > :51:35.about the Hamburgers with horsemeat in them? They didn't kill anyone.
:51:35. > :51:40.All right. The woman there on the gangway? You encourage people to
:51:40. > :51:43.whistleblow, but most people won't whistleblow because, for the simple
:51:43. > :51:50.fact, they lose their job, they've got everything to lose if they do
:51:50. > :51:53.that, so why encourage it? Simon Hughes? Well, I think our
:51:53. > :51:57.discussion's relevant. Two answers to that. One of the interesting
:51:57. > :52:01.things is the lengths in this Government is to get the best system
:52:01. > :52:04.for an accountable NHS we have ever had. I have dealt with far too many
:52:04. > :52:07.complaints by individuals that they've not had the service that I
:52:07. > :52:10.always believe the NHS should deliver. The NHS have given my
:52:10. > :52:14.family the most fantastic service and I'm their biggest fan, but they
:52:14. > :52:21.don't always do it properly. Two things should happen. Firstly, the
:52:21. > :52:23.moment you are sent from your GP to a hospital, as an in-patient or
:52:23. > :52:27.out-patient, somebody should be responsible for your care in that
:52:27. > :52:31.hospital and accountable, a named person, and they should make sure
:52:31. > :52:36.everything is delivered. Secondly, we have had far too many Chief
:52:36. > :52:39.Executives who bluntly don't take responsibility and when it's
:52:39. > :52:45.discovered that something terrible like Staffordshire happens, they've
:52:45. > :52:48.moved somewhere else. What should happen to them? The answer is, they
:52:48. > :52:51.shouldn't be re-employed in the NHS. APPLAUSE
:52:51. > :52:55.If you are found not to have done your job properly, not on a medical
:52:55. > :52:58.judgment, but in terms of managing the patient care as a consultant or
:52:58. > :53:02.as a Chief Executive, or as a clinical director, bluntly, usualed
:53:02. > :53:09.not continue to serve the public on a high salary in the public's name,
:53:09. > :53:15.we've got to change that. The man on the right? The CQC has
:53:15. > :53:22.showed to be completely inept or corrupt. If you want a quango to
:53:22. > :53:26.cut, cut the CQG. Mark Steel? Obviously what they did was
:53:26. > :53:32.absolutely disgraceful. There was a tragedy of the most appalling nature
:53:32. > :53:37.for the families of the people that suffered. But then when I listen to
:53:37. > :53:41.Jill's response to that, I thought that was awful because what you were
:53:41. > :53:47.doing was not dealing with that tragedy, you were using it as a way
:53:47. > :53:52.of trying to argue that the NHS shouldn't be... I wasn't using it. I
:53:52. > :53:57.was pointing out that a woman who pro sided over an organisation which
:53:57. > :54:04.deleted You started going on about the pensions and so on that you
:54:04. > :54:08.wouldn't have. Lives were at risk, that's a clear lesson. Of course
:54:08. > :54:13.someone who's behaved in that way shouldn't just go off and retire on
:54:13. > :54:16.a pension. The point the lady made over here, she felt more market
:54:17. > :54:22.forces would be a bad thing, I was dealing with, and it's an important
:54:22. > :54:27.point to answer, that actually some market forces might have prevented
:54:27. > :54:31.these things happening. A simple quell is to look at two cases where
:54:31. > :54:36.market forces do or did prevail. First of all, in America, where
:54:36. > :54:40.people who come over from America simply can't believe how marvellous
:54:40. > :54:44.the Health Service is. Perhaps you could give me a specific example.
:54:44. > :54:48.are running out of time. Secondly, if you hear anybody, luckily now
:54:48. > :54:53.it's been going so long that you have to go back a long way for this,
:54:53. > :54:57.but if you hear anybody talk about the way the health was delivered
:54:57. > :55:02.before the Health Service, and how extraordinary an innovation it was
:55:02. > :55:07.and how people people simply couldn't believe... A Health Service
:55:07. > :55:11.from old folk and babies. Of course it doesn't excuse them from doing
:55:11. > :55:17.terrible things, but the answer to it is not to think, I can use this
:55:17. > :55:24.as a way of thinking we can argue for privatising it.
:55:24. > :55:29.APPLAUSE All right. Pf
:55:30. > :55:32.I know as a constituency MP that sometimes sometimes when people have
:55:32. > :55:36.had something terrible happen to them, they want to make a complaint
:55:36. > :55:40.and the NHS feels like it's pulling down the shutters and ignoring what
:55:40. > :55:44.they've said and what those people desperately want is for someone to
:55:44. > :55:49.acknowledge what's happened, be held responsible for it, but also to
:55:49. > :55:53.learn the lessons. Why does that matter? If you have got a culture
:55:53. > :55:57.where the bosses of an organisation aren't say, if there's a problem,
:55:57. > :56:00.come forward, tell us about it, let's learn from our mistakes, in
:56:01. > :56:04.all of our jobs, if you've got a boss who is like that who says come
:56:04. > :56:08.forward with a problem, we'll deal with it and sort it for the
:56:08. > :56:15.future... Why don't they do that? You need a leadership. Why don't
:56:15. > :56:18.they do that? Because I think that people to end up, people end up too
:56:18. > :56:23.often defending the system. The NHS is all about patients but we have
:56:23. > :56:26.got to start at the bedside. It's from the bedside to the board room
:56:26. > :56:31.and regulation's the final bit of the jigsaw. You you need to have
:56:31. > :56:35.enough staff who're properly trained always thinking about am I treating
:56:35. > :56:40.this person how I would want to be treated or how I would want my mum
:56:40. > :56:43.treated? So I think if we start, we need an effective regulation system
:56:44. > :56:49.because people need to know that their hospitals and care homes are
:56:49. > :56:52.safe, but you have got to start with patients at the bedside and I think
:56:52. > :56:56.transform the amount of information there is available to patients in
:56:56. > :56:59.the public. We started on that with stroke and heart disease, but we
:56:59. > :57:03.need to get the information out there so patients can see it and
:57:03. > :57:07.hear their voice. OK. David Willetts, we only have a
:57:07. > :57:11.few moments left I would be grateful if you keep it brief. There is a
:57:11. > :57:16.serious problem with the culture of the Care Quality Commission that. 's
:57:16. > :57:21.why we have swung the doors open to have an independent inquiry. The CQC
:57:21. > :57:24.now, unlike in the past, should have experts who understand medical care
:57:24. > :57:28.inspecting hospitals. We shouldn't have dental technicians doing
:57:28. > :57:32.inspections of hospitals, we should let people doing a hospital one week
:57:32. > :57:37.and a beauty parlour the next week, we should have independence and we
:57:37. > :57:41.are doing that and the culture goes back to the previous Government. We
:57:41. > :57:45.have always got a boost the NHS, we should not confront the challenges,
:57:45. > :57:52.we can confront the challenges while protecting the principles of the
:57:52. > :57:56.NHS. Absolutely not true. I'm afraid time's up. We are going to be in
:57:56. > :57:59.Basildon next week. Danny Alexander will be there for the Liberal
:57:59. > :58:03.Democrats, Nadine Dorries for the Tories, Margaret Hodge for Labour
:58:03. > :58:07.and Tony Robinson, the television presenter also on the panel. If you
:58:07. > :58:17.want to come to Basildon, go to the want to come to Basildon, go to the
:58:17. > :58:19.
:58:19. > :58:23.website. The address is On the Live, remember you can continue the