04/07/2013 Question Time

welcome to Question Time. Good evening to you at home. Welcome

to our audience and our panel, Liberal Democrat chief Secretary

and, Danny Alexander, Labour's chair of the Public accounts committee,

who has been grilling multinational companies on tax affairs, Margaret

Hodge, the doctor who became a Tory MP, Sarah Wollaston, contributing

editor of the Spectator, Douglas Murray, and actor and television

Maulkin. How can MPs justify a pay rise when the rest of us have run

out of notches on our belts to tighten?

This is the proposal to put salaries up from 66,000 up to over �70,000.

Tony Robinson. This is one of the questions where the question will

get more applause than any of the answers. We have to recognise that

as far as all of the Western democracies are concerned, our MPs

are among the lowest. There are only two below us in terms of pay.

Nevertheless, my response to that is, so what? I don't think that they

deserve to be paid any more. And the reason I don't think they deserve it

goes back to the expenses scandal a few years ago.

APPLAUSE I still do not think that the

majority of MPs, even those who were not directly involved, realise the

offence that that scandal caused within the country. It was as though

they thought that because they had not broken the law, it did not

matter whether what they had done was morally right or not. And

clearly, it was morally wrong. We know why they did it. They did it

because they felt they had not had a pay rise for a long time, so they

went round the back way and got higher expenses to justify the fact

that they had not got higher wages. Why does that make it wrong for them

to be granted, by an independent body, a wage rise? May I develop my

argument first? Yes, as long as you do not take too long because we have

others eager to get in. Now I understand. The fact is that they

were so hoity-toity about the whole thing, weren't they? I understand

that it was an independent committee which gave them money, and I can see

why they did it, because our MPs are paid somewhat less than other MPs.

Nevertheless, it is going to take them a long time before they are on

the right to come back to us and say that we should have a pay rise,

particularly when it is these MPs who, every day the decision that

they make are cutting our standard Danny Alexander, is this going to be

accepted or blocked, the proposed increase? My answer to the question

is that it is not justified. We are going through difficult economic

times as a country. Millions of people who work in the public sector

have had pay frozen for three years and will seek pay rises of only 1%

this year and two years after that. Millions in the private sector have

seen wages in many cases reduced, or have chosen to work fewer hours to

maintain employment in this country. Under those circumstances, it would

be totally wrong for MPs, who are also public sector workers, to see a

pay rise that is out of keeping with what everyone else in the country is

experiencing. Is it possible to block it, having set up an

independent body to recommend a salary? The independent body is not

accountable to Parliament, so MPs do not have the power to block it, but

it is going to be running a consultation. I would urge members

of the public and MPs who have strong views, as I do, to make them

known. The body was set up to be independent for the reasons that

Tony gave, because of what happened in the expenses scandal, so that MPs

would not have any power over their pay. What are you saying?Let me

develop my argument. If you all develop your arguments we will never

get to the end of the first question. We may get some

interesting answers. The audience will be the judge of that. It should

not ignore the reality, which is that millions of people are on a pay

restraint. We do not know what they will bring forward yet, but I think

the most important thing is that MPs are not seen to be having an

experience in terms of pay that is different. If the independent body

comes in with the recommendation that is being suggested, is there a

mechanism by which Parliament can say, it is very kind of you to

suggest that, but we do not want it? Not except for changing the law. MPs

could refuse the pay rise. Why macro the expenses scandal. It is

demoralising to have this accusation levelled at you. The public demanded

that the pay of MPs was set externally and I think that is

right. If MPs had been deciding on their salary for the next election,

we probably would not have voted for a rise. It is the outside body that

is doing that. Why? I feel passionately that we need more

people from all sorts of different backgrounds in Parliament.

Parliament needs to look much more like modern Britain. But there are

many people who would find it difficult, for example had teachers,

many doctors. I was not put off by the salary, but I know some that

are. To put this in context, a GP working the hours that I work would

be earning �40,000 more than I do as an MP. I am happy to have done that.

I knew what the salary was before I applied and I am privileged to be

there, so I am not asking for a rise. But I think we need to

recognise that the public also do not want MPs with outside jobs. They

do not want a parliament full of people who are independently

wealthy. M independent body set the job and then get on with it. I would

like to get rid of expenses altogether, set a rate for the job

and get on with it. APPLAUSE

And would you like to see the 70,000 figure that has been suggested?

think it should be set independently of MPs. That CNN is to MPs with

conflicting outside interest and other jobs. -- let us see an end to

MPs with conflicting other jobs. do not know why MPs are saying there

is some difficulty with saying no to this pay recommendation. When the

teachers pay review body came up with a recommendation for teachers

salaries, the MPs said, no, we are not going to increment that in full.

Why are they having difficulty in curbing their own pay rise? Margaret

Hodge. This timing is absurd. It is completely wrong at this time to

think that MPs could have a 10% pay increase, if that is what it is. I

agree, why should we be treated differently from teachers, public

sector workers, or people on zero hours contract, who used to have a

full-time job, or people in the private sector who have had to go

part-time. I agree with that. We used to set our own pay and we got

into trouble when we did that. With the expenses scandal. So we then set

up this body, completely independent of us, drives lots of us mad lots of

the time when we have to deal with them, completely independent of us,

to set it. That is not working. My question goes back to you. What is

the best way of settling this issue? How can we have a really grown-up

conversation about what we are prepared to pay for politics? It is

partly about the pay for MPs, partly about funding political parties,

where talks broke down today, partly about what you expect your MPs to

do, whether full-time or part-time, and about how MPs are selected. It

is that whole bunch of things. I think politics matters. The fact

that you have all come out on an evening shows that you think so too.

But we always get stuck on this debate about how we are going to

decide how we pay for our politicians. Let's hear from the

audience. Sarah made the most important point. The salary of the

MPs is not as critical as this other issue that we have, which is the

secondary jobs that a number of MPs have. In my view, that is a corrupt

system in itself. APPLAUSE

What should happen is that MPs should, in my view, get a rise

according to the independent party, but they should be banned from

having secondary jobs, because that is corrupting the way that MPs

operate. MPs should be 100% behind their constituents, no other

parties. APPLAUSE

I am not really sure why this issue is being raised right now. It seems

like it is wasting valuable time when their arm or important issues

we could be sorting out. Whether MPs should have a pay rise is the least

of my problems at the moment. Everyone has said the timing could

not be worse. It is obvious that the system is a mess. The two things

that keep coming up, the expenses matter and that of MPs pay. Public

sector workers are having pay frozen, increased by 1%, and MPs get

a 10% rise. Obviously, it looks terrible. However, there is an

argument to be made, as Sarah has a ready mention, an argument for

increasing the pay. In my opinion, that should only happen if, among

other things, something comes back to the general public for that. I

think, for instance, if you increase the paver MPs at this point, either

that means we should sort out, scrap the expenses system, or it could

mean there are fewer MPs. I would love to have seen the boundary

review that was proposed, where we could save the money of the increase

they could get from having fewer MPs.

APPLAUSE My own view is that people should

not be able to get pay rises unless the opposite is possible as well. If

you only ever reward people and there is no disincentive. Dot. I

discovered today that in Singapore, admittedly not a thriving democracy,

but bear with me, in Singapore, politicians have performance related

pay. I would not mind seeing that. I am not sure how you would arrange

it. How do they do it?I am not sure. Isn't our performance assessed

by the electorate at an election? Barely. You would find unnecessary

papers being written to meet the performance targets. Margaret Hodge

says you should let the electorate decide, but if you are in opposition

you would get paid less and in office you would get more, right?

Isn't it extraordinary that you can have some MPs who only turn up twice

to make two speeches in Parliament this year, for example, Gordon

Brown, and he gets the same pay as an MP who speaks regularly. That is

what is wrong. There is no performance management. More Gordon

Brown. I'Anson pathetic to the argument that MPs should spend

full-time on the job. It is a lot to do. -- I am sympathetic to that

argument. Sarah made a good point about attracting people into

politics. Aside from the other interests that many MPs have, they

are already independently wealthy and it does not really matter to

them. Sarah makes a very good point, although I agree that it is perhaps

not, talking about whether they get a pay rise right now is not top of

my priority list. Would you rather see a bigger salary to attract

people who did not have private means? Yes.

I was going to add a word of caution in terms of performance related

pay. I work in the NHS and we know how successful Pullman --

performance and targets are in the NHS, so we should be cautious.

the past, politicians did have second jobs and still did a super

job. Take Churchill, right up until the Second World War, he had to make

his money by writing articles for newspapers. I thinks -- I think this

idea that politicians get �70,000 or �80,000 a year when they don't even

work 52 weeks of the year has got to be at the key end of the debate. I

think Margaret was right as well when she said it was to do with

selection. If you want ordinary people do come into politics, you

have got to select ordinary people. It's no good just looking at Falkirk

at the moment and maybe we'll Dom that later, they've already

preselected the person who's going to win, or so they think. But that

doesn't mean that that's necessarily representative of the people who're

going to vote. Let's go to Falkirk, since you raise it. Emily Rivers has

a question on it. How much control over the Labour

Party do the unions really have? This is Falkirk, of course, where

Len McCluskey is alleged to have been manipulating his own person in

as the Labour Party candidate. Tony Robinson? First thing we need to do

is recognise the fact that at the beginning of the 20th century,

working people didn't have any representation at all and the trade

unions decided that if they were going to be able to do something

about that, they needed to form their own Parliamentary party in

order to ensure there was legislation for working people. That

worked very well. So Trade Union worked very well. So Trade Union

culture's always been central to The Labour Party and indeed Trade Union

money has. Although I know some people raise an eye at that, the

fact that shed loads of money goes to the Conservative party from

private capital means that unless actually you did have that kind of

funding from the Trade Unions, we would. Able to run a two-party

democracy. So I'm just saying that because I think it's important to

understand why it's important to have theyed unions. As far as this

issue is concerned, every party now and then has a problem about

somebody trying to muscle in to get the nomination because people are

attracted by power, absurdly thinking that MPs have power, so

they want to become MPs. This particular one happens to, or

appears to have happened to involve Trade Unionists. What is really

important and what I think will answer your question is how well or

badly that's been dealt with. It seems to me that by and large, it's

been dealt with pretty well. The party itself has been frozen. The

nomination has been frozen. Tom Watson, the minister in charge,

resigned today and I think it was absolutely appropriate that he did

because one of the people in his office was the successful candidate

in the original Falkirk elections. So I think it's been conducted

pretty well. That would seem to imply that inappropriate Trade Union

intervention into the Labour Party is by and large a thing of the past.

I think you can see that by the macho bullish outrage of Ken

McCluskey who clearly feels absolutely thwarted. Alexander

election. Do you think this thing has been properly handled? I called

you Danny I called you Douglas then. I might have given you you a

different answer! You have a state of affairs where Ed Miliband was

elected not by the members who voted for his brother, but by the unions

whose block vote overturned the views of the members of the party.

You now have a situation where it appears - and none of us have seen

this famous report kept so secret - that the union's been trying to

manipulate the selection to get its own MP elected. I think I would be

frustrated that this union was trying to thwart my choice and try

to force its own person on me. As Chief Secretary, I've spent time

negotiating with the TUC and Trade Unions on public sector pay and on

public service pension reform and so on. I think Trade Unions play a very

important role in industrial relations, speaking up for members

in the work place, doing so effectively and making

representations. They do themselves a disservice by getting mixed up in

one political party. Much better for the Trade Unions if they were much

less entangled in the Labour Party and focussed more on their day job

and speaking up for their members would be better.

Margaret Hodge, do you agree with that? Well, the question was, do the

Trade Unions control the Labour Party - that was actually the

question that Emily asked and I think the answer to you, Emily, is

no, they don't. But let's look at the argument. The Genesis, the

traditions, the routes of the Labour Party are that we came about because

we are there to protect and promote the interests of working people and

policies in that direction, and those are very similar routes to the

ones from the Trade Union. In fact, we sprung out of the Trade Union

movement. Of course, there's a close partnership link in the idealogy and

the values that underpin the Trade Union movement today, which I think

does play an important role and that underpins the Labour Party. But, it

is completely and utterly and totally unacceptable that any

secondtional interest, any Trade Union, ought to intervene or

interfere in the selection of a candidate for a particular seat.

That is just plain wrong. What Ed Ed Miliband did was immediately stop

that, immediately suspend the selection. He's called it in, he's

suspended a number of people in the party, including the person who was

hoping to be the candidate, and we'll now have an open, transparent

system. But there is an agenda here. You describe it as being slightly

improper, but there is an agenda. think it's really wrong. There is an

agenda on the part of Unite and Tom Watson who talks about Tony Blair

having marched Labour into the desert of pragmatism. This is a

deliberate attempt to move to party to the left, that's how it seems?

Let me just say this. If it were that - we would haven't Unite week

after week after week getting up on the airwaves and complaining about

the policies that the Labour Party's putting forward. Let's just think -

they've complained about public sector pay, they've complained about

our attitude to the spending cuts, they've complained about the benefit

cap. These are three... That's what I'm trying to say, they are trying

to move the party to the left? they controlled the Labour Party,

you wouldn't see this independent side. It's a partnership, it's not

control. Just last year, notes were found from one of your Shadow

ministers' meetings, Ministry of Justice, saying we should raise this

issue, but we need to double check with the Trade Union concerned

before we do so we make sure it doesn't upset them. There's a deeper

more problematic thing going on here than you describe. I've got to come

back on this because it's not true. If you work in partnership with

organisations - you do, Sarah does and you will always consult your

stakeholders on anything you do and the trade Trade Unions are

important. To say they control either the policy, they control the

selections, they control the direction, is plain wrong. It really

offends me, I've got a lot of people in my Labour Party who're individual

Trade Unionists. They would be as offended by what Unite did here in

Falkirk as actual actually everybody sheer in the audience and we are

here on the panel. Margaret Hodge, with the amount Trade Union bosses

and Labour Party MPs, when was the last time you had a working class

wage because you earn so much money and union bosses earn so much money,

when was the last time? You say you represent the working class. When

was the last time you had a working class wage of say �20,000 odd. You

are talking crap. APPLAUSE.

Well, I think the point has been well made that we need a more

representative body. What I really think is that the way Sarah

Wollaston was selected is a really good model and we have in her

somebody who's got a lot of experience because she was a doctor

who's pretty independent. She probably offends her whips every now

and then. She really contributes to Parliament. So let's open up the

selections and, you know, I'm the first to be with you and I think one

of the problems with politics is there are too many people coming

into it who've never done anything else before and who live in the

Westminster bubble and don't really understand what's going on. Sarah

Wollaston? There is a wider problem here. Falkirk is a constituency. It

hasn't changed hands since 1935. That's why this is so important,

because the selection effectively will decide who is going to be the

MP for Falkirk, maybe for decades, and that's why this is so offensive.

There are safe seats like this all around the country, both

Conservative and for Labour and it's Elle equally important this issue

for both. Why is it that just a handful of people get to decide that

MP? The thing about open primaries, and I was the beneficiary of an open

primary, is that everybody, whatever their party political afilliation,

gets to have a stake in what type of MP you have within a safe seat. So,

for example, in my case, they were able to choose a centre right

Conservative MP. In Falkirk, perhaps the people would like the

opportunity to have a centre-left MP, but they won't get the

opportunity to do that if the votes are rigged by Unite. That's why it's

so offensive. I'm delighted to hear what Margaret said and I think it

would be fantastic if the Labour Party would also pilot an open

primary. They don't have to be expensive. The criticism in my case

was that it was too expensive. There are lots of ways you could pilot

making open primaries much cheaper so I would really like to see the

Labour Party take that forward and maybe Unite could fund it. That

would be great, wouldn't it? T?! APPLAUSE

You, Sir? I agree with David. I think the unions are finding it very

difficult to reconcile and support them under New Labour. They would

like to go more to the left and they are finding it difficult to do that

under New Labour because there's little difference, in my opinion,

between policies with the Tories, Liberal Democrats and New Labour.

I think McCluskey wants to get involved with that and pull them to

the left. You, Sir, on the gangway? This goes back to the black adder

episode episode where Balderick becomes the MP for Rotten Town and

he's voted MP 16 times. I'd support the two last speakers on the panel.

I think the best way to clean what appears to be the Aegean stable here

would be to have an open election. A lot of people in Falkirk think the

same thing. I welcome that last point that you made, that there's no

point any political party being high minded about this and saying, it's

just happening in the Labour Party. This kind of thing happens in all

parties and what's important is that it's always stamped on quickly.

Douglas Murray? This is the problem isn't it? Every party has this

problem. It's the unions in the case of the Labour Party, major

businessmen, fund-raisers in the case of the Conservative Party and

the Liberal Democrats and the Labour Party to an extent as well. It's the

circular firing squad that we keep seeing in politics. The question of

how it's to be funded is not an easy question. Very few would want state

funding of political parties like other countries have. There are two

problems to cite about this quickly. One is the fact that this plays once

again, this story, into the perception which I think is correct

that, across the party, effectively politics is a type of closed club.

If you join at an early age and dedicate yourself to the machine and

you are part of it, butter up the right people and so on, politics is

for you. That is a perception which I think rightly occurs across all

political parties. So few people are engaged in political parties now.

That, I would say, is one of the reasons for it. Another point and

I'll finish with this, it's very striking to me tonight, and this

isn't a criticism of David or the producer, but it's striking that we

have had two questions and they are both about procedural issues of

politics. This is about how the thing is done, how Parliament works

and so on, but this is a world away from what most of us care about.

APPLAUSE Most of us who're slightly

interested in politics, we care about all sorts of things, how our

children are going to be educated, how the NHS is or isn't going to

work, a whole set of things, where Britain is in the world, how we fund

things and instead in this country, we have got into this situation

where, you know, we end up talking about how much George Osborne spent

on a Hamburger. It's such a pitiful situation for a state like Britain

to be in. APPLAUSE

agenda of the audience. The reason we chose those questions was because

we had more questions on that than on any other topic. So put that in

your pipe and smoke it. You can join into my's debate at home by text or

Johnson. Will a �200 a year NHS levy on non-EU migrants crackdown on

health tourism. In view of my rebuke to you, I will let you start on

that. That is very kind. It is not going to sort out the issue,

obviously, but I think it addresses a legitimate concern of the public.

Somebody said the other day that it is a National Health Service, not an

international health service. There is a major problem when people are

able to take out of the system that they have not put into. And I think

it is the least that can be expected of people, if they have not paid

into the NHS at any point and then they find themselves in Britain and

need to use the NHS, that people who have paid for it all their lives do

not pay for those people. APPLAUSE

And I must say, I am rather sad to notice that in the last few days,

since this has been mooted, the extent to which people have

basically avoided that fundamental and rather obvious issue, and have

instead tried to deflect part of the debate by pretending this is somehow

bigoted, xenophobic or something like this. Is it we think it would

be common sense, even if we were not in recession. Labour's shadow

public-health Mr, Diane Abbott said, what price xenophobia, stigmatising

foreigners accessing NHS help create a public risk. Do you agree? This

was one of the most depressing stories of the week. I will tell you

why. My committee looks at the finances of the NHS and they are in

dire straits. We probably have up to a half of NHS trusts which are

basically bust, in deficit, bankrupt. At the same time we have

all of the pressure on accident and emergency. I know about it down the

road in Romford. And we have things like the 111 dozen work. These are

the big issues in the NHS. -- the 111 does not work. I want an NHS

free at the point of use for everybody in Britain. To divert us,

not that I disagree with the policy particularly, but to divert us onto

this issue rather than tackling that, to always slag off the NHS,

which is what he does all the time, he divides it and is critical of it,

I think it is just a terrible way forward. I want my Secretary of

State to tell me how are the hospitals and GPs going to cope with

declining finances. How is the quality going to improve? How are we

going to get this 111 service working? When he has done that, this

is a tiny amount of money in the totality of everything that is

spent. 110 billion, something like that. 12,000,100 and 9 billion, get

the big picture. Focus on the big Victor and give us the NHS we

deserve. -- the big picture. clarify, you are against the �200.

Let me just say some. Just that.I am an MP from down the road in

Barking, where we have had a total transformation of our community

through migration. For years and years, I have been saying things

that have been considered very radical. I think if new migrants

come in, they have to spend a bit of time. They have to earn their time

here, spend time here before they can access services. The services I

am talking about are actually services which are rationed by us.

For example, social housing, council housing. There is not a council

house for everybody and you ought to have time spent in your community

before you get it. Come to the end because we have to stick to the

question. Benefits is the same. I do not know why Polish workers are

sending child benefit to families in Poland. But on the NHS and

education, think about it, if you have a newly arrived migrant with

children, it puts pressure on school places, but should we not give a

child a place? When it goes to the NHS, there are pretty good rules. We

get most of the money end. There is 12 million we do not get in. Let's

tighten it up a bit, but this is not the big picture. It is not the big

picture. Do not let him get you on this and think, if we get a little

bit more out of migrants we will solve the real difficult issues

facing us, to give us the NHS we want. I think this proposal is

sensible, just doing what many countries around the world already

do, as you will know if you have applied for a Visa to go to

Australia, New Zealand, or if you have looked at Finland and other

European countries. When someone applies for a Visa to come to the

UK, we say they should make a small financial contribution to disarray

the costs of using our National Health Service when they are here.

It will not mean that if someone turns up at accident and emergency

needing emergency treatment, they will be denied it. It is about

ensuring that people who come here to use the NHS make a financial

contribution towards doing so. Margaret is right that the amounts

of money involved are small, compared to the budget of the

National Health Service. We are making major changes. Last week we

announced one of the most radical reforms in the health system,

linking health and social care with a shared pot of money to be jointly

commissioned by health bodies and local councils, to end the scandal

of elderly vulnerable people falling down the cracks between the health

service and the social care service. By joining those up, we can get

better services for elderly people with less money to go around.

Genuinely radical change, we spent a lot of time talking about last week.

But it is important that people who come to our country should make a

financial contribution for using the health service. I agree with your

point that you get out what you put in. But I think we are missing a

crucial point, which is the fact that the decision-makers in the NHS

are at fault as well. I have a close family member who is in the coal

face at the NHS. And she is seeing it disintegrate in front of her

eyes. Money is being put in the completely wrong places. And people

are definitely seeing a shift towards much more privatisation in

the NHS. It might not be happening completely now, but that is

definitely where it is going, and I do not want to see that happen. And

I know that my close family member who is in the coalface of the NHS

does not want to see it either. you think this �200 fee is a step

towards asking other people to pay for the services of the NHS? It is

perhaps. But I also think we need to take an inward look at where this

�10 million budget for NHS spending is being spent already, and reject

that and examine where money is being spent.

I was a GP before I retired some years ago, and I remember the first

time a patient came from overseas and I did not know the procedures.

This was an American who was insured up to the years with a reasonably

minor problem. I phoned the organisation we were answerable to

come the family practitioner committee, and I said, what do I do

about this guy? Do I charge him? He said, you can see him as a private

patient yourself, or if you cannot be bothered to do that, sign him on

as a temporary resident, which means we will pay you to see him. He was

willing to pay everything. He was insured. But the NHS could not be

bothered to take the money. What is your view about the �200 flat fee?

If you are going to do it, it is not enough. How is �200 going to help?

Sarah Wollaston, you were a GP. do not know how much health tourism

costs us, because there is a positive incentive for hospitals not

to find out if somebody is chargeable. The extent is probably

greater than 12 million, but we can't be sure. The incentive is that

if you declare that somebody is not entitled to NHS treatment, you then

have to chase them for the money. If they default on the debt and

disappear, you do not get paid at all. It is much better for hospitals

to keep quiet, not to detect people, because then they will be paid

anyway. We do not know the extent of it. Like the gentleman there, I have

come across people desperate to pay for treatment in hospitals, who have

been trying to pay, and hospitals will not accept it because it is too

bureaucratic for them to handle. That is totally unacceptable and

that is partly why we need to review, to say what systems can we

put in place to collect the money due to the NHS. We do not want to

see doctors having to collect money at the surgery and I do not think

that is going to happen. What we want from doctors is for them to be

compassionate and focused on the patient in front of them, but there

is no doubt that there are problems within the system and great

uncertainty. To give you an example, I have a constituent who

was injured in an industrial accident, had paid into our tax

system for many years, went abroad, and as an ex-patria, came home and

was honest and said he was living abroad. Because of that, he was not

entitled to any treatment. The student coming from exactly the same

country would have been entitled to have free treatment the minute they

stepped off the plane. That is clearly not a fair system. I think

this is about fairness to all of you in the audience, because NHS

resources are tight. We want a compassionate NHS that will respond

to people with no questions asked in an emergency situation. And

absolutely right that we have a review to make sure there are not

any unforeseen consequences on public health, and perhaps people

who are homeless. We do not want widening health inequalities because

of this measure, but it is fundamentally about fairness and the

fact that NHS resources are limited. The man at the back. Is it not true

that the reason the current government and the government before

are leaving the NHS to go to ruin is because they have got outside

business interests which will profit from privatisation of the NHS?

I just wanted to come back to a couple of the panel. I am a doctor

as well. I think we have a room full of doctors tonight. And I agree with

a couple of you that it is a principle, and we probably should be

charging to make it fairer. But I also tend to agree with Margaret

Hodge, that the danger is that it is not only about principle but about a

limited attention that we have, and this is a very small issue.

Everything is falling apart around us and we are focusing on, you

know, my new shirt. Minutiae. �200 is minimal and I doubt it would

be possible to cover the cost of supervising and enforcing that rule

and leave any money for the Treasury. Are you a doctor to, by

any chance? No, I am not. I am glad the debate has swung in the way that

it has because when it started it was as if there was this one line

proposal which keyed into our anxieties, that it should be people

who contribute to the NHS who get proper service from the NHS, which

is something most people would agree with. But I felt as though we were

not going to scrutinise what the proposal itself actually meant. I

think the point the gentleman made up their earlier is terribly good,

which is that it is going to be so difficult to get that money back,

that you are going to have to set up this cumbersome admin is fitted

system. And as it is only going to save �12 million, it is going to be

a bit more of a gesture than something which is going to

transform the NHS in any profound way. The other thing that concerns

me is a public health issue. I do not want us ever to be in a

situation where people come to our country, have a little cough, it

gets a bit bigger, you and I would go to the doctor but they don't, and

it turns out to be some terrible disease. They have spots, they just

scratch them and rub on some cream and do not go to the doctor and we

have a huge break-out of something awful. That is what I fear from this

kind of attitude. The proposal precisely is not that this should be

something paid over-the-counter when someone turns up at a hospital. It

is to avoid those problems that what is being suggested is that when

someone applies for a Visa in their home country, in addition to paying

for the Visa, they pay �200, or whatever the number turns out to be,

to use the National Health Service. This is not about distracting from

the issues in the NHS. This is the 65th anniversary of our national

health service and there are big issues. There are issues about care

for the elderly, about the culture of secrecy that built up over many

years, particularly when the Labour Party was in government, which made

it harder than it should be for people to blow the whistle when

there are problems. We should have an open debate about those things,

but that does not mean it is wrong to ask people from overseas who are

coming to the country to make a small financial contribution for

using the National Health Service. The woman in the fourth row. It is

the principle of the thing, actually, that we are trying to give

this impression that you cannot come here and get everything for free. So

it does not matter how many people, or how much it is going to cost, it

is actually giving that impression to people that, you know what, we

are going to put a block on it now. You cannot scaremonger people by

turning round and saying, we will get diseases. One minute you are

saying there are not many people and the next minute you are saying we

are going to get a disease. And as Danny said, they will not stop you

going to accident and emergency. happy to assert principles but I

want to see principles that work. My point is that I don't want to start

shifting into a culture where public health is at risk and I want to make

sure that the things we do actually make the National Health Service

better. My fear is... We need to start somewhere. Yes, but the

question really is whether this is the appropriate place to start.

Labour are always afraid to start somewhere. There are far more

serious issues which some of the other people in the audience have

picked up that we should be addressing first and when we get

those sorted out, then we'll have the debate bait on the NHS. You said

something about what Margaret Hodge said? Well, at least this - I mean I

don't support this particular Government now, they are dog lots

and lots of welfare cuts that are really affecting a lot of people -

but on this particular issue, they are not scared to say, actually, I

think we should start charging people that come from abroad.

Labour never did that. OK. A couple more points. The woman second row

from the back? Considering we don't know how many illegal immigrants are

over here, how are you going to charge them? Danny Alexander?

look, one of the issues here is that our immigration system's been

allowed to go to rack and ruin over very many years and when Labour were

in office, they stopped counting the amount of people leaving the

country. We have an idea of who is coming in, no idea of who is coming

out, we are reintroducing those as a coalition Government. We are making

it harder for certain groups ofp people to come into the country.

stopped ID cards, Danny? We did, Marg resmt I think that was a huge

invasion of the civil liberties of every single person in this country.

It was wrong and we were right to stop it -- Margaret. What is your

answer to the lady's point, what are you going to do about people

illegally here now, because you won't be able to identify them?

Well, this policy is about people who're coming into this country,

applying for a visa, paying a charge upfront. It won't address that

point. It's a point we are looking at and can we put resources into

removing people who're here illegally because that's what should

happen. You, Sir? Danny mentioned about visas and Tony mentioned about

spots, would it not be sensible to have a health screen before they

leave their home country? OK. The woman up there at the very back in

the middle? I would like to say that after what seems to be a very

depressing conversation, if the NHS is disintegrating at the rate that

everybody seems to think it is, as a frequent user of it recently and

having many family members who've used it, I would like to say they

are dog an exceptional job. APPLAUSE

We'll move on. Another question from Jan Kemal, please? Can the military

coup and the overthrow of a democratically elected President

ever be justified? Ever be justified? Of course, thinking of

Egypt and the removal of President Morsi. Douglas Murray? I think there

are situations where it can be, whether it's the most desirable

thing I certainly question. I think I was on this programme a couple of

years ago when President Mubarak had been overthrown and I said then that

the likely snarl Joe was that the Muslim Brotherhood would come to

power and that would be a catastrophe for Egypt. That's come

to pass and the country is facing a much less easy to foresee future

now. My own view on it is that the Muslim Brotherhood, which is an

idealogy of which is, I mean the easiest way I think of it is, it's

basically a fascist political party, albeit a Muslim fascist political

party. It's a terrible and corrosive ininfluence across the region and it

cannot answer the basic needs and desires of the peoples of the

countries it is now trying to govern. I think we have seen that.

The Egyptian people have seen that and they have felt that for the last

year. The minorities in Egypt - I haven't been there since the

revolution, but one of my colleagues just got back and the treatment of

religious minorities, women, is absolutely terrible in Egypt - the

Egyptian people are suffering this. The Army have stepped in for those

and many other reasons, most obvious of which is the fact that the Muslim

Brotherhood cannot answer the Egyptian people's economic needs.

The question is whether it can be justified. The gist of what you are

saying is... My own view is that the Army's gone in too early. I think

the Muslim Brotherhood, like the fascists, it has to be seen as

defunct, incapable of ruling and a vicious thing that must be got out

of the system of it. The Army's probably stepped in too early.

Another few months even of Morsi would have clarified that. As it is,

I fear very much that the brotherhood is going to continue and

the embers are still obviously very hot and that they are going to hold

on to the idea that although they didn't get it right necessarily this

last year, that there is the possibility in the near future that

the brotherhood could govern and govern well. I think that that

idealogy of the Muslim Brotherhood what toss be obliterated like

fascism was in 1945. -- has to be obliterated. Danny

Alexander, the Foreign Secretary is saying he doesn't approve of the

Governments being overthrown there. Do you awe I approve? I don't

support military intervention to overthrow the democratically elected

Government. It's not the right way to resolve disputes. We have to work

with whoever is the Government of the day, we have British nationals

living there and British people doing business there. We have to

appeal to the Egyptian state to resolve this in a democratic way as

quickly as possible. You also need to have in a democracy political

parties and people from different perspectives working together to

make the constitution work. It's clear from the protests on the

streets of Egypt that there are a lot of Egyptians who feel that

wasn't happening. It's a difficult situation but I certainly don't

think that military intervention of the sort we have seen is the right

way to resolve these sorts of disputes.

It sets a dangerous precedent that when things go wrong, the Army can

just go back in to solve it. We have seen the Arab Spring leave countries

and it's a difficult process for many of the countries after if he

coulded towards having proper democracies where governments change

through elections. That must be the outcome that we are looking for and

it's a shame this has happened to Egypt at this stage. The Americans

fund the Egyptian Army to over $1 billion a year. Do you think the

American administration has knowledge of this and gave it a

nudge and wink approval? No idea whether the administration had

knowledge of this. Some of the Western media appeared to report on

it in advance of the military in Egypt considering intervention.

Clearly as the government in the country was doing this before, that

was always a risk. It's highly preferable, that in those

circumstances, democratic politicians should work to resolve

differences and government should be changed where the democratic will of

the people is to that effect. Robinson? It shows, more than

anything else, how hard democracy is, particularly if you come from a

country which has had a dictator for 30 or 40 years. Probably the only

reason that dictate got in was because different religions and

factions were kicking lumps out of each other, so a strong man was

unvitaled in. When the strong man is overthrown, do people suddenly go,

we love democracy, no, they kick lumps out of each other again.

That's what we are seeing here. So in a way, is it right for the Army

to intervene doesn't seem to be the right question, it's a struggle for

the Egyptian people to find their democracy and I don't think that we

can just sit on the sidelines and tut tut. We have been through all

this, we have had our Civil War, we have had our Peter Lou anded blood

on the streets and we have this luxury that it wasn't our blood that

was sacrificed, it was our forefathers and foremothers. When I

see something like this, I think we tend to be cavalier about our own

democracy in. The last two weeks, we've seen revelations about

terrible incursions into our privacy by security, by the government

security and private security. I think we have just been a bit lazy

about this. When we see something like that happening in Egypt, I

think that it's beholden on us to be absolutely rigorous to protect our

own democracy because it's so valuable.

on this, please do, but you, first? On the subject of whether they

intervened too early, let's bear in mind that the Muslim Brotherhood was

volunteering its members to start suicide bombing in the name of the

cause. Well, it's not the best way to do this, but I'm not hearing any

better way to have done it, wouldn't it have been nice if they sat at the

table and talked, but it wasn't going to happen. So let's hope we

get a decent secularing guy going and do our best to induce a

democracy that's respectable. -zblf you, up there, please, on the right?

The tourism trade - I was over there in January on holiday - it was said

there needs to be six coaches going to the pyramids and there's only one

now. The tourism trade's gone down the pan. One reason for that.

President Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood leader until yesterday,

very recently appointed among others as regional governors, one of the

people engaged in the terrorist assault on tourists in 1997 in

Luxor. This was when dozens of Swiss and other tourists were beheaded at

the archaeological sites. For Morsi to make a man involved in that the

governor, that is the ultimate insult, not only to Egypt, but to

anyone who'd want to visit the country.

APPLAUSE The same thing in Northern Ireland.

Terrorists were elected in Stormont. That's an embarrassment. People died

on the streets in Northern Ireland. I can assure you, I'm not wild about

that either. I was born in Egypt and left at the age of 4-4, so I don't

have an inside knowledge of the Egyptian politics or memory of it.

We are asking too much. It's do years since the Arab Spring was

sprung upon us. I think moving from, it wasn't 30 years, it's 50, 60

years of military-led awe tockry sill into a mature democracy

overnight is too big an asked, so we should try and hang on to the whole

feel of the Arab Spring and feel some strength by that. I want to

come back on Douglas on one thing because I hate to think this is

about redown. I don't think it is. I think where Morsi failed, he was

incompetent on the economy and on his politics. You gave an example of

that. But remember also that the Muslim brotherhood had 80 years, am

I right, when they were tortured and imprisoned by the previous despots

who ruled Egypt. I think this is a danger in turning this into a proand

antireligious thing. It's bad politics. One final thing. Sorry;

Sarah Wollaston, because we have reached the end of the programme.

This coup is worrying, we are trying to persuade extremists to turn to

the ballot box and I think the message that sends to them is why

bother. That's why it's worrying and I don't think it will end well and

we should be concerned about that. The point is, this is for the

Egyptian people, not for us and we should not be intervening.

APPLAUSE OK. Sorry to those who had your

hands up and the panelists who want hands up and the panelists who want

to come back, but time is up. If you have been listening on Radio 5 Live,

you can continue the debate. This is the last Question Time of the run.

We are going to be back early autumn, Thursday 12th September, to

be precise, in London. On the 19th September, in Rochdale.

If you want to come or know anyone who'd like to come to take part in

the programme, you can call us or apply on the website. I hope you've

all enjoyed this run. Thanks for your Tweets and texts that have been