27/06/2013 Question Time

welcome to Question Time. Good evening to you at home, to our

audience and our panel, the Universities and Science Minister,

David Willetts, Labour's shadow health minister, Liz Kendall, Deputy

Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Simon Hughes, former of the Centre

for Policy Studies, co-founded why Margaret Thatcher, Jill Kirby, and

comedian and columnist for the our first question. Do you agree

with George Osborne's comment that the British economy is out of

intensive care? Is the British economy out of intensive care. Liz

Kendall, do you think so? You will not be surprised to hear me say no,

I do not agree with that. We have failed to get the growth this

country and this region desperately need to create the jobs, to get

hanks lending to businesses again. We have had growth of 1% when the

government thought it would be 6%. You have 10% of the population in

the north-east unemployed, families facing a struggle to pay the bills

at the end of the week. What I thought about this week's Spending

Review was not only was it a sign of the past failure of this government,

but it is really not building the country we need for the future. It

is not, whatever the government said today, providing the infrastructure

we need, the proper jobs programmes to help people get into work. It is

not giving real power to the regions with the regional banks to get

lending going here. And so I feel it is not only problem of the past, but

people really want hope that things can be better in future and that was

what sadly lacking. David Willetts, what did George Osborne mean by out

of intensive care? It meant there is still a hell of a lot to do but we

are making progress. We have eliminated about a third of the

massive deficit we inherited, the biggest of any advanced country. We

have succeeded in getting jobs growing, over 1 million extra jobs,

but we want to do more. We have got the economy growing, but it is

modest growth because there is this massive overhang of debt of the

government and individuals. We are moving in the right direction but

there is an enormous amount to do, and what George was talking about

was the extra things we are doing. Out of intensive care, June 2013. In

November 2010, George Osborne said Britain is out of the financial

danger zone. March 2011, we can set off from rescue to reform. December

2012, the British economy is healing. He can go on until he is

blue in the face, but where is the evidence is Jamaat the danger zone,

back in 2010 we have the same interest rates as Greece and Spain.

And we had a larger deficit. The danger zone was going the way those

countries have since gone, and we avoided that I having a plan and

sticking to it. Yes, we were in a danger zone in 2010 and we are out

of it echoes we have a credible plan. But there is still a lot to do

to develop and deliver that plan, and that is why what we have done

this week is to say, we are going to invest more in schools, in science,

in roads and rail. So absolutely, we can raise the growth rate and keep

on growing and create even more jobs. You talk as if it was extra

spending but you are making cuts, aren't you? There seems some dispute

about whether you are or not. continuing to bring down the

deficit, and that takes time, but we are making progress, about a third

of the way through. We are increasing the jobs. We are trying

to get more investment coming into Britain and we are succeeding in

that. We have to do better in the export markets that are growing,

Brazil, China, Russia, and we are doing that, growing trade fair. But

we were so far behind with such a massive amount of debt, that the job

is not yet over. We will hear from the audience, but another member of

the panel, Jill Kirby, do you think the government is on the right track

rest Jamaat the debt is still getting bigger in real terms and as

a proportion of GDP. George Osborne has not tackle the debt. The deficit

has been peeled back in the last couple of years but since then it

has drifted up again. He has not got anywhere with the biggest bubble he

has to tackle. He made some of the right noises yesterday and is

talking positively about the importance of growth and private

sector jobs replacing lost public sector jobs. That makes sense in

terms of getting the economy back on its feet, but he still has a

hazardous path ahead. I think he is very well aware that the reason he

is able to go on borrowing so much money is because interest rates are

so low and he can get hold of that money partly because the government

has fixed the market by endlessly printing money, and partly because

it is forcing pension funds to invest more in government bonds.

What would you have him do that he did not do? I would have Tim -- have

him talk about cutting the amount of government expenditure. He is just

managing the enormous expenditure. Where would you have him cut?

would have him restructure the health service and consider to what

extent there should be copayments. I would have him restructure the

health care system to consider how we should payments on

contributions, to a greater extent. Would he win an election on that

Odyssey? I would have him cut some departments that the government

cannot afford to fund. The Department of media and sport would

be a good candidate. It is simply not realistic to go on borrowing so

much money. The time will come when he will not be able to get hold of

this cheap money. And then he will be forced, whoever is in charge by

then, probably somebody else, will have to make emergency cuts.

question I want to put to you is, what about the political dynamic of

this? Can a chancellor do the things that you say, even if, in economic

theory, you think you are right? In practical politics, would it be

sensible? George Osborne came to power from the scene to look

radically at the state of the deficit, to get the economy back to

health by changing the way the government does things, doing a lot

less through debt and is taxpayer money. He has not done that. And he

missed the opportunity, which he had at the beginning. He knows now he is

up against electoral terms so he has to create a sense of well-being for

the next election. We reduced the deficit to �110 billion. I think we

are following a prudent middle way between you, and we have to stick to

that. Mark Steel, and then members of the audience because you have

experience of what is being talked about. If it is out of intensive

care, David, why are you making so many cuts to very often the poorest

people in society? Why are you doing it? If it is out of intensive care?

It seems to me that this Spending Review is a continuation of the

strategy the government has had since it came in, which has been to

say that the country is in debt, so we need to get money back. And who

are we going to get the money back from, the poor, that is who. It

seems the belief of this government that the people with all the money

in society are the poor. Mainstream economics in this country thinks

that the poor are richer than the rich and so we have to get the money

back from them. I wonder what world you are in when you say it is out of

intensive care. The cuts that are happening, even more as a result of

this review, talking about people like firefighters everywhere, fire

stations shutting down. Were these the people that caused the debt?

Firemen, running up bills of billions and gambling the economy on

the stock exchange between fighting fires? There is a slimming pool in

Newcastle that has been shot. Why should it be a summing pool in

Newcastle that gets shot when it is the bankers that caused this. -- a

swimming in the pool who were destabilising the currency by

gambling half a billion on the stock exchange. The reason this is

pertinent now is because the amount of money that is going to be saved

by the government on this spending announcement this week is not that

much. But it is important. It is important because it is about a

culture that your government is managing to uphold which is a

culture to say that it is the poor who are to blame, and we will make

all the different sections of the people who are not the rich, who did

not cause the crisis, blame each other. We will say, you are on

benefits, so you are to blame. The people who have pensions, we will

say they are to blame. Meanwhile, in the real world, where you cannot

just say it is out of intensive care, there is a small minority of

people who are richer than ever, and somehow you leave them alone.

Hughes, do you have sympathy with what Mark Steel is saying? I have

some sympathy, but he is wrong on the facts. It is good rhetoric and

he is a good south London rhetoric and I stand by him. But let me take

you on on some of the facts. My constituency, like many parts of the

north-east, struggles economically. Lots of April on low income in south

London in the old docks, working-class constituency. The

reality is that pensioners have been specifically looked after by the

government. The state pension has gone up more since the general

election than since it was first created. They have been exempt from

all the other difficulties in this Parliament. Secondly, of course

people on the bottom struggle most. That is why we lifted the tax

threshold so that nobody pays any income tax on any thing up to ten

grand. Like you, I want to clobber the rich. Why don't you?The fact is

position on the rich. I thought a mansion tax was your policy. Your

party, when in government, dropped capital gains tax from 40p in the

pound down to 18p in the pound. Your party had a lower high tax rate, top

tax rate, 40p in the pound. Why are you cutting the 50p tax rate?

the pound was the top tax rate for the whole period of the Labour

government. It is currently higher than that and rich people pay more

tax than in any year under Labour. The answer to both Mark and Liz, who

come from different positions, under the Blair government we had the

biggest bonuses, ridiculous success in the city, which was unacceptable.

We were left with a less equal society in the north-east and

everywhere else after a Labour government than even after the

Tories. Come on! Newcastle has seen its central government grant funding

for local councils cut by �218 per person, compared to a national

average of 130, and �27 cut doctor my point is that inequalities are

widening because of what is happening. Let's hear from the

people from Newcastle and what they say. In your experience. I think the

purpose of tax in some ways is to try to get as much as possible for

the health service and education and so forth. The problem is that if you

tax the rich, which sounds good in principle, they will leave. They

have the ability to go abroad. They have the ability to avoid tax in

certain ways. So it can be very difficult to say, tax the rich and

get money. Do you think the economy is out of intensive care? Are you

optimistic? Traditionally, when people come out of intensive care

they are not flat-lining. Usually, that means they are dead, so I do

not think we can really say it is out of intensive care if it is not

growing as much as we would like. The woman with spectacles. I would

like to know what the Conservatives are going to do from mothers and

fathers that have children they need to look after. The job creation that

they have created our temporary jobs. All we get is temporary jobs,

and the jobs that we have two have are the most inappropriate jobs. My

son has to go to an after-school centre for me to go to work. And I

have to pay for that myself because I get nothing from the government

whatsoever. The cars apparently I earn too much money. -- because

apparently I earn too much money. What is your idea of a good job for

a mother? The job I have to do, I have to work in the afternoon and my

son has to go to an after-school centre which I have to pay for, so

basically I'm going to work for nothing. I do not know what your

income is and what your personal circumstances are, but we still have

tax credits. We have increased the element of the child tax credit that

is of most value for lowering come families. But we are having to take

tough decisions to save overall on tax credits and welfare, and I would

like to respond to what Mark said, because you cannot carry on

indefinitely borrowing �120 billion a year, because you are spending

more than you are receiving in tax. You cannot do that indefinitely. Any

mature government has to confront the reality that that is no way to

run an economy. We inherited 160, it is down to 110 and it is still going

down. Mark raised a fair challenge, that the cuts are falling

disproportionately on low income people. The independent analysis of

the decisions announced this week shows the opposite. It shows that it

is the richest 90% of the population who will lose the most as a result

of these decisions. And we are endlessly trying to make these

incredibly tough decisions in a way that does least damage to the social

fabric of the country. We inherited a mess, as we often do after labour.

We are trying to sort it out in a way that preserves the social fabric

and strengthens the economy. woman in pink to the second row to

the back? I would like to know what you guys thought with regard to the

Chancellor's previous comment about being out of the dangers zone? How

do you feel about whether society is going to be in the danger zone with

policing, courts and prisons, having budgets cut yet again?

Well, just on that... Let Simon Hughes answer that one because you

are both in the coalition, so to speak, up to a point. Simon?

joined the coalition, there wasn't a majority of any, Labour lost the

election because... We know that. Because we wanted to deal with the

crisis which was enormous. The answer to the lady eats question is,

thank goodness crime figures have come down in the last four years

than ever in my lifetime. Mercifully, we may not need as many

people in frontline as we did and I hope it goes on in that direction.

We have got to keep paying for the key drops, the firefighters in

London should be kept and it's Boris's plan to reduce the spending

for them which is wrong. The economy - I think it's very gently easing

out of intensive care. I'm not overoptimistic or naive, I know the

unemployment situation in the north-east but in the north-east

unemployment has fallen, but in the north-east we are the only region

which net exports more than it imports and Hitachi and Nissan and

other companies are investing. I understand the lady saying about

proper jobs, but they are going to have to be private sector jobs,

that's why we try to encourage the sector... Sorry, but... Thank you.

I'm not accusing you of making a speech, don't think that for a

moment, but all the Pammists, if you could speak more briefly we'd hear

more from the City of Newcastle. Either party can't decide whether

it's going to spend more or last. Last Saturday little Ed said we

agree now finally for the need for expenditure cuts. It was ironically

called disciplining the party, because within 24 hour, big Ed

decide yes we will spend more, yes we will borrow more and how you get

out of debt by borrowing more is beyond me.

APPLAUSE These people should never be allowed

to go to the gates of Downing Street again. Liz Kendall, what is the

answer? We have been very clear we are not going to borrow more on

day-to-day spending in 2015-16. Sorry, can I give you the quote.

Would Balls borrow more and he said "of course". On day-to-day spending.

I think that people can see the I think that people can see the

difference between investing In our roads, rail, infrastructure, school

building, all of those sorts of things which are about building for

the future. People are see the difference between investing.

investing... The Government is already borrowing more. The IMF

says... Are you going to borrow more, let me understand this?

for the day-to-day spending. But you are still borrowing the money

billion. Are you going to borrow more? �245 billion more than they

said. What the IMF has said is, we should be bringing forward �10

billion of investment in this year and next to get the economy going

again. My worry about what the Government's done on infrastructure

is, these are projects for five, six, seven years' time. All the

announcements today, many of them they made two or three years ago.

They said in this region 31 schools were supposed to be built as part of

the priority schools programme, not a single one's started.

It doesn't make sense. What do you make of borrowing more to invest,

does that sound economic economics in your view? I'm sceptical as you

about the infrastructure announcements we had today, a lot

were recycled. In the end, the debt is continuing to grow. As I said,

George Osborne has debt on easy terms at the moment which won't

last. The situation will get very difficult. What is going to happen?

We can't keep borrowing money to pay welfare bills, for example. Whilst

the lady rightly points out it's hardly worth her while going to work

in order to pay for childcare, the situation is that where is the money

going to come from, should the Government borrow money more to pay

for your childcare so it's worth you going out to work? I don't know,

it's a difficult test because when you look at the amount of money

that's being used now to service the debt interest, it's more than we

spend on education every year. A hell of a lot of money just going to

service debt and that will only grow unless we start looking differently

at it. You said that the spending on the NHS, which the Conservatives or

the coalition have ringfenced, was something which should be looked at.

David Willetts, is this guaranteed to ringfence protect the NHS and

education and overseas aid, is that something that will last beyond the

next election? Is this a permanent can commitment or just for the

moment? Well, every Government sets out their plans for life. I know

that, that is I'm asking the question. I would be very surprised

if we did not repeat our commitment on the NHS because it's incredibly

important to this country. When we go to the election, we'll set out

our expenditure. You will be surprised that it's not yet decided

if it's Tory policy? Conservative Party is committed to

the NHS, we have set out plans. not the same is it? We have set out

our plans for 2015-16, after that we believe in the NHS of course and I

would be very surprised if when we produce our plans, they don't

involve maintaining the process. We have a clear view that you can't set

out the plans until after the next... What about... I think that

we could get much better value for money if we join together the �105

billion on the NHS and the �15 billion in social care. If you had a

system where instead of further and further cuts to the help disable and

elderly people need for help at home and if that's cut, they end up in

hospital. That is terrible for them and their families and ends up

costing more. What you've done is, you've taken �3 billion, which you

have already wasted on a top down reorganisation in the NHS and said

we'll join it up with social care, but that's a tiny amount compared to

the �120 billion, we could get better care and value for money if

we got the services working together.

APPLAUSE Mark Steel? There must be a lot of

people who're going to be hit by some of the announcements this week

who'll wonder what on earth this conversation is about. One

announcement was that, unemployment benefit will now be paid a bit later

than it was, it will go up another three days, is that right? Now, it

was presented as if this means now it will be three days after you

become unemployed before you receive the murntion although it's already

three weeks so it's three days beyond that, so it's

three-and-a-half weeks now before you receive anything. That might not

be much to the people opt panel. To the people suffering, that is

absolutely disastrous and the only people who're going to win out of

that will be the payday loans people, the Wonga people.

APPLAUSE Two things about that. First of all,

Ed Balls has been on the television on the radio as well all day saying,

of course we won't change that and being very equivocal about it. He's

supposed to be the opposition. Someone should slap him and say,

remember, you are the opposition, you are allowed to oppose, you are

allowed to do that. APPLAUSE

The other thing, coming back to the gentleman over here who said this, I

mean, this is the comment that we get quite often. We can't tax the

rich and so on because they'll go away. We are talking about people,

for example, and that's why the culture of this is so important,

Phillip Green, for example, who paid himself �1. 2 billion in one pay

cheque and paid it through an account in his wife's name in

Monaco, which meant that he saved �300 million many tax in one go. Why

aren't the Government having a go at him about that? Of course, the

answer comes back... APPLAUSE

The answer comes back every time, well we can't do that because we

have to be prepared to... Mark, it's complete nonsense. One of the other

measures the Chancellor's announced is absolutely more steps to tackle

the problem that people aren't paying due taxes and we are

expecting to collect more because we are being more energetic. More

people in HMRC doing the means testing of child benefit than you

have on cracking down on tax havens, the it doesn't make sense. What we

are doing is going after all the tax avoiders and people and all the

people... Why haven't people taken a single Internet company to court?

That's not the culture. ALL SPEAK AT ONCE

One at a time. One at a time. Listen, if you all speak at once,

nobody can hear any of you. I believe you probably go home every

night and think think, what on earth am I doing. The man second row from

the back. Silence on the panel first. I wonder if more austerity

cuts are needed to accelerate the payments of deficitlet back to the

people who they're lending it off. You think there should be more cuts?

I think slightly more extreme cuts so it will accelerate the payment of

the loan back to the actual... would be interesting to know what

the audience thought. Do you think that expenditure is being savagely

cut, as most of the press and media tell us? Do you think these are

savage cuts? Would it surprise you to learn that the total public

expenditure cuts over four years represent about 2% and back in the

1970s, Dennis Healey cut public expenditure by 4% in one year.

Currently, public expenditure is more than double what it was in real

terms. We are talking of 2% over four years. That is not savage

cutting. It's true that we'll have spent more as a total expenditure on

public expenditure on this Government percentage than Labour

did under Tony Blair. I don't think anybody here would support what you

are arguing for, which is we start dismantling the welfare state. You

have to get a balance and basic things you have to support.

Therefore, the answer to our friend over there is, you can't tart paying

back the deficit overnight even though we were borrowing a pound for

every �30 or �4 we were spending. you want to come back on the point?

Why can't we semi privatise the NHS like, make the people who can afford

it pay for it and the lowest, like put a cap on it? Let him make the

point. It's not working is it?David Willetts, answer his question?

is a clear middle way here. Liz thinks we should borrow more, Jill

and you think we should borrow less. We have a plan for bringing

borrowing down and we have got to bring it down steadily so interest

rates we main low. Do it faster, as Jill is suggesting? We have a track

which has enabled us to keep interest rates low. It's not

working? In other words we can borrow this amount and the markets

believe we have a plan we are sticking to to get a grip on the

public finances. You are borrowing a huge amount more, �245 billion. A

huge amount. We were borrowing �160, it's now �110. It's still incredibly

high by Britain's historical standards. It's incredibly high

compared to how Governments used to operate. Compared with what we

inherited, we are heading in the right direction. Can you clarify

clarify about what he's arguing against and what Jill is saying, are

you afraid of taking the radical action needed, Jill has been

suggesting what you could do and you are saying you can't? We are judging

what it is we can do that enables us to maintain standards in schools and

to protect the Health Service. We are a nationwide insurance bowl. We

put in so we can enjoy health care without paying for it when we go to

hospital. That principle unites most people in Britain and I believe in

it and we are trying to bring down the deficit without jeopardising

principles and services like that which holds this country together.

APPLAUSE You, there, please, Sir? I don't

want to appear rude or anything, but I expect what I'm hearing from

certain members of the panel, I know their agendas on, but Simon Hughes,

I can guarantee, in two or three years' time, when the Tories and the

Liberals have been thrown out, will be back on your programme saying how

he disagreed with that, that and that, I would rather him sayinglet

tonight in front of us now, because he's to the left of the party now.

APPLAUSE In the coalition you negotiate. One

example. If you win your seat, which you won't... Let's have less of

that. Policy example. The first budget George Osborne announced, he

said, after year one of people being unemployed, they would lose 10% of

their jobseeker's allowance as an incent 'til. I said immediately

unacceptable, my colleagues said that and when the bill appeared, it

wasn't in the bill because some things for me are red lines and my

job in the party and my job as a Liberal Democrat, and as a liberal

of 30, 40 years, to make sure we have the society that Beverage

fought for. It wasn't delivered by Thatcher or Blair, I want it to be

delivered and we are in the circumstances not doing too badly

and the alternative would have been a Tory only Government and you would

have been much less happy with that. Do you agree with everything now?

No, of course not, because we are in a coalition. What do you not agree

with? You will come back in three years' time and say you don't agree

with everything. I'm not persuaded that we should defer the period for

which people get their benefits, as was said this week. I think that

probably we ought to make... If it was a universal credit, it could be

paid monthly. You could be wait ing waiting for five weeks. This is why

the red line wasn't to go into an election promising to abolish fees,

and then treble them. You, Sir? you look at the problem

realistically, now because of what happened after the financial crash,

my children and my children's children will have to live with a

catastrophic amount of debt. Personally I blame that on Labour.

No offence to you. I want to hear solutions to the problems. I don't

think the solution is more brothering because it doesn't make

logic sense. I don't believe stealing people's money through the

art of taxation works either. What I see is the problem that we have had

for the past 20 years, is that the state thinks that it can do

everything, spends pretty much about half of everything spent in Britain

today. I want the state to be reduced, private sectors to be taken

third row. I am interested because you keep talking about growth of

jobs and the economy but I want to know when we will see that in the

north-east, because it seems London is benefiting from that, but not

us. What do you think the position is in the north-east? It is quite

hopeless, really. You mentioned the swimming pool, and that is part of

our heritage and it has just been closed down. My place of work this

morning announced redundancies via e-mail. I wonder when the

north-east, or anywhere outside of London will see the effects of this

so-called growth. Are you employed in the private sector, or the public

sector? By a college. The projection is for 30,000 extra jobs in the

north-east, and talking to my colleagues in the city council,

there is no reason why Labour have to close the summing pool in the

middle of the city. If they diverted some of the health money, summing

bull could have stayed open, and if they had reduced the hours, the

libraries could have stayed open. -- the swimming pool. This morning I

was at the old brewery site in the centre of Newcastle where there is a

massive development underway with schoolkids celebrating the start of

that development. I went to the university to say we are putting �6

million of investment into medical research here because we have the

funding for a close there are illnesses which medics in Newcastle

will be more able to tackle than anywhere else in the world. We are

going to invest in the industries and prospects in Newcastle. You can

join in tonight, as I am sure you a bit slow at the moment. Another

question from Chris Smith. Edward Snowden, hero or villain?

whistleblower, now in Moscow airport, apparently, having told the

whole world how surveillance of the internet operated. Is he a hero or a

villain? Mark Steel. Well, if it is a one word answer, then hero. I

think some of the most fascinating people in history are those who go

through the system, they are part of the system, they feel that the

system is working, they go along with the. He was in the Army, wasn't

he, Snowden, and was going to be in the Iraq war and did not see

anything wrong with it. And then something happens and they realise

that all is not as they were brought up to believe it would be. That

happened to him and he realised there was this enormous surveillance

going on, far beyond what the government was letting on about. And

so he became a rebel about it. It has hardly benefited him. The poor

bloke has had to leave his house, his family and he is somewhere in

Moscow. Where the argument gets diverted here, is if it is along the

lines of, well, we need this surveillance because we need to have

national-security. That may be the case to a certain extent. However,

what he seems to have picked up on is that the amount of surveillance

was way, way beyond that. It was not just that they were trawling through

people so they could keep us safe by looking at e-mail and text and so

on. It was way beyond that. And vast amounts of the surveillance,

certainly in America, over the last few years, has been looking at all

sorts of people who are campaigners and so on. I am not a fan of

conspiracy theories and I would never have believed it if it was not

for this week but some of the stuff about people who have been under

some way in. Doreen Lawrence. How absurd can that be? Doreen Lawrence

was under surveillance. The police actually put someone in the campaign

for justice for Stephen Lawrence so they could find dirt on Doreen

Lawrence, one of the most admired people in this country. Throughout

that time, the police were criticised, rightly, for not doing

enough work around finding the murderer. It seems they did have

time to go and smear her. Even more ridiculous stories about the people

who wrote leaflets condemning McDonald's. It turns out that the

police had people working with the group that broke the leaflet that

caused the problem. I find myself, having to think, is this true, this

story? But it is true that there were even people having

relationships with women in the environmental groups to the extent

that they fathered a child and then went off, having been doing all this

undercover work. It is absurd. So that is a lot of words to say one

but I think what Snowden has done is probably very wrong indeed. Mark is

confusing two different things. I agreed with what he said about

Doreen Lawrence and I agree that the accusations on that were deeply

shocking, which is why we have to get to the bottom of what went wrong

with the investigation into the murder of her son. But the

completely different case is what we have two do to protect our

national-security. And when Mark says national-security with a hint

of a sneer, it means that we can enjoy the Olympics and the Royal

Jubilee without being subject to terrorist attack. That is what

national security means and we are in debt to the agencies, the police

and the Armed Forces, the security agencies who ensured we could enjoy

those events with great safety. What is crucial is that those activities

should be carried out within the framework of law. The framework of

law that governs the activities of those agencies is strong and

effective. There is a clear set of laws going back to the John Major

and Tony Blair governments. There are independent legal experts who

can check on every operation. There is a parliamentary committee of MPs

from all three parties that can assess and investigate anything they

wish to assess. And the scale of American surveillance? Is that

legitimate and legal and proper? I cannot comment on what goes on in

the US, but in Britain we have too comply with the law. Our security

agencies have too comply with the law, the law has to be enforced and

it is enforced. I tend to think whistleblower is, generally, our

heroes rather than villains in society, and that you need people

sometimes to say, look, government is going over the top. I am with

Mark and David on some examples we have, close to me, people like to

Wayne Brooks, I have come to know that Lawrence family as a South

London MP. It was almost unbelievable. What we have to do, we

have had a debate, a difference between coalition partners. We have

said, as Liberal Democrats, that we are suspicious of more powers being

given to the security services to track correspondence and e-mails and

so on. We fought off the Labour Party doing it with the plan for ID

cards and the rest, rightly in my view. I think we have to give extra

powers very carefully and occasionally. Of course, David

Willetts is right, we need security services. I agree with him that I

think there is no evidence that our services are not properly

accountable and have acted outside the law. I have no evidence for

that. I am not so sure about the States, and I think we need to be

attentive when people tell us that benighted States may be abusing

their powers in ways which have not been authorised there or elsewhere.

You said you were inclined to think he was a hero, is that right? It was

a simple question. I think whistleblower is, generally, if they

are brave enough to make that step, normally have something to say. If

they are proved to be frauds, they are frauds. The NHS has benefited

from whistleblowers and we need other people to be able to be free

to be whistleblowers. If I had to opt, I would say villain rather than

hero. I think he has been foolish, betrayed the trust of his employer.

We should not take that lightly. Also, we are somewhat confused, Mark

particularly, about the distinctions between using computer codes to rake

through data, which no one ever gets to look at until it throws up

something significant. On the whole, I think I am reassured that security

services in the states and over here are using those systems to keep an

eye on what is going on in terms of internet traffic. I am not

particularly relaxed about the snooper's charter. I am with Simon

on that. As far as our security is concerned, we should be thankful

that we actually have a pretty efficient, so far, security service,

and we have been spared a lot of risks that could otherwise have been

greater threats. I think someone like Snowden regards himself as a

hero, clearly. He is also very muddled. He rushed to Hong Kong

first, then Russia and now wants to get to Ecuador. I think he thinks he

is Julian Assange and he wants to strut on the world stage. You think

he is a villain because he should keep calm when the whole of the

United States is chasing him around the world. He should be more calm

and measured about which country he hides in. He resigned his job

because he was unhappy about the work he was doing. He should have

done, and maybe talk more freely about things afterwards. But I do

not think you Sibley ham things to the Guardian newspaper, or whoever

will believe you. The Guardian has had doubts since about some of the

stories he has given. He has risked national-security, which he should

not do lightly. It is very different from a whistleblower in the NHS, or

police undercover getting carried away. Barack Obama said you cannot

have 100 and seven security and also 100% liberty. If I wanted 100%

security, I would go to jail. The reason I do not want to go to jail

is because liberty and freedom is more valuable than security. And

William Hague said that only wrongdoers should be worried. How

would he feel if I went to the foreign office and went to his desk

and into his computer, and he came in and said, what are you doing, and

I said, only wrongdoers should be worried? How would he feel then?

I happen to disagree with the majority. I think he is a villain.

He is a villain because when he took up the job to work in the Secret

Service, he knew what was in the job description and he should have taken

that on board before he began to blow his whistle, as you would put

it. I am much more worried about the potential for threats to people

caused by terrorism, by this network of new groups. It is not the old

Cold War. We do not know where these new groups are. I was on the Chew in

London and I had friends in Boston when the bombing happened, and I

think it is essential that our security services can monitor and

intercept e-mails, online data and phone calls if they believe it to be

a threat. But just as our police need to have the trust of people

that they are doing their job properly Asch and the issue about

what has happened to the Lawrences is a separate point Asch our

security services need to act within the framework of the law. The

problem is, being open about such sensitive information, how do we

know they are following the law if we cannot see that in public? That

is why the MPs on the intelligence and Security committee is looking at

the issue. My comment about Edward Snowden is that I think it is ironic

that, as a man who champions free speech, he is trying to seek asylum

in a country that denies its citizens free speech. I fail to

understand how we can have freedom of speech at everything we say is

being recorded, everything we say privately, everything we write,

every question we ask Google is available to the security services.

I do not trust them with my bank details, let alone that information.

How are we supposed to have involved discussions? You say no-one is above

the law and that Security Services have nothing to hide, why do we need

secret courts that the public don't have access to and the press can't

comment on? How, as a public, are we supposed to trust them when there is

no public insight into what they do? APPLAUSE

Time for another question. It's an interesting one, a similar theme.

Andrew Hills, who is a doctor, I think. Andrew Hills? What should be

done to those involved in the covering up of in incompetency in

some areas of the NHS and how can it be prevented in the future? These

are the allegations that reports, particularly in Morecambe and the

children who died there, that they were deliberately obscured or

covered up which the people involved in deny happen. Jill Kirby? There is

some problem with who looks after those who're looking after those who

in the CQC. Yes, there's questions that people might be losing their

faith if they really knew. If you preserve your pension and pay off,

that's what you are in the job for, that is what is being said. There

are a number of people at the CQC who were involved in deleting

reports, making sure the public didn't know what was happening and

by virtue of them not making the information public were probably

risking further deaths which they seemed more concerned to cover up

than actually allow to become known. I think that actually looking after

your own back seems to have been the culture of this particular quango

and that some of the people involved should not be able to retire with

the huge public sector pensions which we are all paying for in order

to enjoy the benefits of having a lifetime in a job which has not

actually been of any service to anybody.

APPLAUSE Do you think it's a one-off or do

you think this is symptomatic of the way quangos can go? Well, it doesn't

seem to have been a one-off in the Health Service. We seem to have

streams of whistleblowers now e-Americaning, some of whom we have

read about before, some of whom are coming to the fore, yet at the same

time we have been reassured be I the man in charge of the Health Service,

Dave Nicholson, and he told the Select Committee that there was only

one whistleblower he'd ever come across and there now seems to be

umpteen of them. I'm sure he will be aware and reports will have reached

him of concerns being expressed by practitioners and consultants of

different sorts. We need to know what is happening in this huge

organisation. The CQC was clearly not set up on the basis of it could

find out what is happening, its remit seemed to be about assurance,

it seemed to get away with hospitals not reporting on themselves.

Self-assessment carried to ridiculous extremes - "we think we

are a hospital doing a good job", "fine, go off and have another nice

lunch". The public has been bad badly served. The NHS is a

monolithic organisation, it's difficult to supervise every detail

of it unless we get it into a manageable size of accountable units

and so people will then know what is going on.

The woman in the second row from the back? I wondered what your thoughts

are about the market changes that you are trying to enforce into the

NHS, whether that will lead to bigger incentives to people to cover

up issues like this rather than being open and honest. If it were

market driven? Yes, I think it's heading that way and I don't think

that incentivises NHS managers to be open and honest. Introducing more of

a competition element will incentivise them to be more open.

they were told where to go and not to go, recommend it to friends or

not, or indeed in a hospital knows that if it loses patients or kills

patients, it might not get any more. Those market responses, you don't go

to a supermarket that sells rotten food because it's not a good place

to buy things, you wouldn't go to a hospital if you could help it.

about the Hamburgers with horsemeat in them? They didn't kill anyone.

All right. The woman there on the gangway? You encourage people to

whistleblow, but most people won't whistleblow because, for the simple

fact, they lose their job, they've got everything to lose if they do

that, so why encourage it? Simon Hughes? Well, I think our

discussion's relevant. Two answers to that. One of the interesting

things is the lengths in this Government is to get the best system

for an accountable NHS we have ever had. I have dealt with far too many

complaints by individuals that they've not had the service that I

always believe the NHS should deliver. The NHS have given my

family the most fantastic service and I'm their biggest fan, but they

don't always do it properly. Two things should happen. Firstly, the

moment you are sent from your GP to a hospital, as an in-patient or

out-patient, somebody should be responsible for your care in that

hospital and accountable, a named person, and they should make sure

everything is delivered. Secondly, we have had far too many Chief

Executives who bluntly don't take responsibility and when it's

discovered that something terrible like Staffordshire happens, they've

moved somewhere else. What should happen to them? The answer is, they

shouldn't be re-employed in the NHS. APPLAUSE

If you are found not to have done your job properly, not on a medical

judgment, but in terms of managing the patient care as a consultant or

as a Chief Executive, or as a clinical director, bluntly, usualed

not continue to serve the public on a high salary in the public's name,

we've got to change that. The man on the right? The CQC has

showed to be completely inept or corrupt. If you want a quango to

cut, cut the CQG. Mark Steel? Obviously what they did was

absolutely disgraceful. There was a tragedy of the most appalling nature

for the families of the people that suffered. But then when I listen to

Jill's response to that, I thought that was awful because what you were

doing was not dealing with that tragedy, you were using it as a way

of trying to argue that the NHS shouldn't be... I wasn't using it. I

was pointing out that a woman who pro sided over an organisation which

deleted You started going on about the pensions and so on that you

wouldn't have. Lives were at risk, that's a clear lesson. Of course

someone who's behaved in that way shouldn't just go off and retire on

a pension. The point the lady made over here, she felt more market

forces would be a bad thing, I was dealing with, and it's an important

point to answer, that actually some market forces might have prevented

these things happening. A simple quell is to look at two cases where

market forces do or did prevail. First of all, in America, where

people who come over from America simply can't believe how marvellous

the Health Service is. Perhaps you could give me a specific example.

are running out of time. Secondly, if you hear anybody, luckily now

it's been going so long that you have to go back a long way for this,

but if you hear anybody talk about the way the health was delivered

before the Health Service, and how extraordinary an innovation it was

and how people people simply couldn't believe... A Health Service

from old folk and babies. Of course it doesn't excuse them from doing

terrible things, but the answer to it is not to think, I can use this

as a way of thinking we can argue for privatising it.

APPLAUSE All right. Pf

I know as a constituency MP that sometimes sometimes when people have

had something terrible happen to them, they want to make a complaint

and the NHS feels like it's pulling down the shutters and ignoring what

they've said and what those people desperately want is for someone to

acknowledge what's happened, be held responsible for it, but also to

learn the lessons. Why does that matter? If you have got a culture

where the bosses of an organisation aren't say, if there's a problem,

come forward, tell us about it, let's learn from our mistakes, in

all of our jobs, if you've got a boss who is like that who says come

forward with a problem, we'll deal with it and sort it for the

future... Why don't they do that? You need a leadership. Why don't

they do that? Because I think that people to end up, people end up too

often defending the system. The NHS is all about patients but we have

got to start at the bedside. It's from the bedside to the board room

and regulation's the final bit of the jigsaw. You you need to have

enough staff who're properly trained always thinking about am I treating

this person how I would want to be treated or how I would want my mum

treated? So I think if we start, we need an effective regulation system

because people need to know that their hospitals and care homes are

safe, but you have got to start with patients at the bedside and I think

transform the amount of information there is available to patients in

the public. We started on that with stroke and heart disease, but we

need to get the information out there so patients can see it and

hear their voice. OK. David Willetts, we only have a

few moments left I would be grateful if you keep it brief. There is a

serious problem with the culture of the Care Quality Commission that. 's

why we have swung the doors open to have an independent inquiry. The CQC

now, unlike in the past, should have experts who understand medical care

inspecting hospitals. We shouldn't have dental technicians doing

inspections of hospitals, we should let people doing a hospital one week

and a beauty parlour the next week, we should have independence and we

are doing that and the culture goes back to the previous Government. We

have always got a boost the NHS, we should not confront the challenges,

we can confront the challenges while protecting the principles of the

NHS. Absolutely not true. I'm afraid time's up. We are going to be in

Basildon next week. Danny Alexander will be there for the Liberal

Democrats, Nadine Dorries for the Tories, Margaret Hodge for Labour

and Tony Robinson, the television presenter also on the panel. If you

want to come to Basildon, go to the want to come to Basildon, go to the

website. The address is On the Live, remember you can continue the