22/06/2014 Sunday Politics East

Welfare reform is one of the government's most popular policies.

So Labour says it would be even tougher than the Tories.

We'll be asking the Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary if she's got

Even Labour supporters worry that Ed Miliband hasn't got what it takes

Labour grandees are increasingly vocal about their concerns.

Over 50% of Labour voters think they'd do better with a new leader.

And in the east, a shortage apparently "toxic" on the doorstep.

And in the east, a shortage of GPs leaving thousands

promised an electric car revolution, why so little progress?

Nick Watt, Helen Lewis and Janan Ganesh, the toxic tweeters

First, the deepening crisis in Iraq, where Sunni Islamists are now

largely in control of the Syrian-Iraq border, which means

they can now re-supply their forces in Iraq from their Syrian bases.

Rather than moving on Baghdad, they are for the moment consolidating

their grip on the towns and cities they've already taken.

They also seem to be in effective control of Iraq's

biggest oil refinery, which supplies the capital.

And there are reports they might now have taken the power

Iraqi politicians are now admitting that ISIS,

the name of the Sunni insurgents, is better trained, better equipped and

far more battle-hardened than the US-trained Iraqi army fighting it.

Which leaves the fate of Baghdad increasingly in the hands

No good news coming out of there, Janan. No good news and no good

options either. The West's best strategy is to decide how much

support to give to the Iraqi government. The US is sending over

about 275 military personnel. Do they go further and contemplate

their support? General Petraeus argued against it as it might be

seen as the US serving as the force of Shia Iraqis -- continue their

support. Do we contemplate breaking up Iraq? It won't be easy. The Sunni

and Shia Muslim populations don t and Shia Muslim populations don't

live in clearly bordered areas, but in the longer term, do we deal with

it in the same way we dealt with the break-up of the Ottoman empire over

100 years ago? In the short-term and long-term, completely confounding.

Quite humiliating. If ISIS take Baghdad I can't think of a bigger

ignominy for foreign policy since Suez. If Iraq is partitioned, it

won't be up to us. It will be what is happening because of what is

happening on the ground. Everything does point to partition, and that

border, which ISIS control, between Syria and Iraq, that has been there

since it was drawn during the First World War. That is gone as well. An

astonishingly humbling situation the West, and you can see the Kurds in

the North think this is a charge -- chance for authority. They think

this is the chance to get the autonomy they felt they deserved a

long time. Janan is right. We can't do much in the long term, but we

have to decide on the engagement. And the other people wish you'd be

talking turkey, because if there is some blowback and the fighters come

back, they are likely to come back from Turkey. Where is Iran in all of

this? There were reports last week that the Revolutionary guard, the

head of it, he was already in Baghdad with 67 advisers and there

might have been some brigades that have gone there as well. Where are

they? What has happened? I'm pretty sure the Prime Minister of Iraq is

putting more faith in Iran than the White House and the British. I think

they are running the show, in technical terms. John Kerry is

flying into Cairo this morning, and what is his message? It is twofold.

One is to Arab countries, do more to encourage an inclusive government in

Iraq, mainly Sunni Muslims in the government, and the Arab Gulf states

should stop funding insurgents in Iraq. You think, Iraq, it's

potentially going to break up, so this sounds a bit late in the day

and a bit weak. It gets fundamentally to the problem, what

can we do? Niall Ferguson has a big piece in the Sunday Times asking if

this is place where we cannot doing anything. He doesn't want to do

anything. By the way, that is what most Americans think. That is what

opinion polls are showing. You have George Osborne Michael Gold who

would love to get involved but they cannot because of the vote in

parliament on Syria lasted -- George Osborne and Michael Gove. This

government does not have the stomach for military intervention. We will

see how events unfold on the ground. All parties are agreed that

Britain's 60-year old multi-billion The Tory side of the Coalition think

their reforms are necessary and popular, though they haven't

always gone to time or to plan. In the eight months she's had since

she became Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Rachel Reeves

has talked the talk about getting people off benefits, into work and

lowering the overall welfare bill. her first interview

in the job she threatened "We would But Labour has opposed just

about every change the Coalition has proposed to cut the cost

and change the culture of welfare. Child benefit, housing benefit,

the ?26,000 benefit cap - They've been lukewarm about

the government's flagship Universal Credit scheme - which rolls six

benefit payments into one - and And Labour has set out only

two modest welfare cuts. This week, Labour said young people

must have skills or be in training That will save ?65 million,

says Labour, though the cost And cutting winter fuel payments

for richer pensioners which will Not a lot in a total welfare bill

of around ?200 billion. And with welfare cuts popular among

even Labour voters, they will soon have to start spelling out exactly

what Labour welfare reform means. Welcome. Good morning. Why do you

want to be tougher than the Tories? We want to be tough in getting the

welfare bill down. Under this government, the bill will be ?13

million more than the government set out in 2010 and I don't think that

is acceptable. We should try to control the cost of Social Security.

But the welfare bill under the next Labour government will fall? It will

be smaller when you end the first parliament than when you started? We

signed up to the capping welfare but that doesn't see social security

costs ball, it sees them go up in line with with inflation or average

earnings -- costs fall. So where flair will rise? We have signed up

to the cap -- welfare will rise? We have signed up to the cap. We will

get the costs under control and they haven't managed to achieve it. The

government is spending ?13 billion more on Social Security and the

reason they are doing it is because the minimum wage has not kept pace

with the cost of living so people are reliant on tax credits. They are

not building houses and people are relying on housing benefit. We have

a record number of people on zero hours contracts. I'm still not clear

if you will cut welfare if you get in power. Nobody is saying that the

cost of welfare is going to fall. The welfare cap sees that happening

gradually. That is a Tory cap. And you've accepted it. You're being the

same as the Tories, not to. If they had a welfare cap, they would have

breached it in every year of the parliament. Social Security will be

higher than the government set out because they failed to control it.

You read the polls, and the party does lots of its own polling, and

you're scared of being seen as the welfare party. You don't really

believe all of this anti-welfare stuff? We are the party of work, not

welfare. The Labour Party was set up in the first place because we

believe in the dignity of work and we believe that work should pay

wages can afford to live on. I make no apologies for being the party of

work. We are not the welfare party, we are the party of work. Even your

confidential strategy document admits that voters don't trust you

on immigration, the economy, this is your own people, and welfare. You

are not trusted on it. The most recent poll showed Labour slightly

ahead of the Conservative Party on Social Security, probably because

they have seen the incompetence and chaos at the Department for Work and

Pensions under Iain Duncan Smith. Your own internal document means

that the voters don't trust you on welfare reform. That is why we have

shown some of this tough things we will do like the announcement that

Ed Miliband made earlier this week, that young people without basic

qualifications won't be entitled to just sign on for benefits, they have

to sign up for training in order to receive support. That is the right

thing to do by that group of young people, because they need skills to

progress. We will, once that. -- we progress. We will, once that. - we

will, onto that. You say you criticise the government that it had

a cap and wouldn't have met it, but every money-saving welfare reform,

you voted against it. How is that being tougher? The most recent bout

was the cap on overall welfare expenditure, and we went through the

lobbies and voted for the Tories. You voted against the benefit cap,

welfare rating, you voted against, child benefit schemes, you voted

against. You can't say we voted against everything when we voted

with the Conservatives in the most recent bill with a cap on Social

Security. It's just not correct to say. The last time we voted, we

walked through the lobby with them. You voted on the principle of the

cap. You voted on every step that would allow the cap to be met. Every

single one. The most recent vote was not on the principle of the cap it

was on a cap of Social Security in the next Parliament and we signed up

for that. It was Ed Miliband who called her that earlier on. Which

welfare reform did you vote for We welfare reform did you vote for? We

voted for the cap. Other than that? We have supported universal credit.

You voted against it in the third reading. We voted against some of

the specifics. If you look at universal credit, they have had to

write off nearly ?900 million of spending. I'm not on the rights and

wrongs, I'm trying to work out what you voted for. Some of the things we

are going to go further than the government with. For example,

cutting benefits for young people who don't sign of the training. The

government had introduced that. For example, saying that the richest

pensioners should not get the winter fuel allowance, that is something

the government haven't signed up. You would get that under Labour and

this government haven't signed up for it. ?100 million on the winter

fuel allowance and ?65 million on youth training. ?165 million. How

big is the welfare budget? The cap would apply to ?120 billion. And

you've saved 125 -- 165 million Those are cuts that we said we would

do in government. If you look at the real prize from the changes Ed

Miliband announced in the youth allowance, it's not the short-term

savings, it's the fact that each of these young people, who are

currently on unemployment benefits without the skills we know they need

to succeed in life, they will cost the taxpayer ?2000 per year. I will

come onto that. You mentioned universal credit, which the

government regards as the flagship reform. It's had lots of troubles

with it and it merges six benefits into one. You voted against it in

the third reading and given lukewarm support in the past. We have not

said he would abandon it, but now you say you are for it. You are all

over the place. We set up the rescue committee in autumn of last year

because we have seen from the National Audit Office and the Public

Accounts Committee, report after report showing that the project is

massively overbudget and is not going to be delivered according to

the government timetable. We set up the committee because we believe in

the principle of universal credit and think it is the right thing to

do. Can you tell us now if you will keep it or not? Because there is no

transparency and we have no idea. We are awash with information. We are

not. The government, in the most recent National audit Forest --

National Audit Office statement said it was a reset project. This is

really important. This is a flagship government programme, and it's going

to cost ?12.8 billion to deliver, and we don't know what sort of state

it is in, so we have said that if we win at the next election, we will

pause that for three months and calling... Will you stop the pilots?

We don't know what status they will have. We would stop the build of the

system for three months, calling the National Audit Office to do awards

and all report. The government don't need to do this until the next

general election, they could do it today. Stop throwing good money

after bad and get a grip of this incredibly important programme. You

said you don't know enough to a view now. So when you were invited to a

job centre where universal credit is being rolled out to see how it was

working, you refused to go. Why We asked were a meeting with Iain

Duncan Smith and he cancelled the meeting is three times. I'm talking

about the visit when you were offered to go to a job centre and

you refused. We had an appointment to meet Iain Duncan Smith at the

Department for Work and Pensions and said he cancelled and was not

available, but he wanted us to go to the job centre. We wanted to talk to

him and his officials, which she did. Would it be more useful to go

to the job centre and find out how it was working. He's going to tell

you it's working fine. Advice Bureau in Hammersmith, they

are working to help the people trying to claim universal credit.

Iain Duncan Smith cancelled three meetings. That is another issue,

Iain Duncan Smith cancelled three meetings. That is another issue I

was asking about the job centre. It is not another issue because Iain

Duncan Smith fogged us off. This week you said that jobless

youngsters who won't take training will lose their welfare payments.

How many young people are not in work training or education? There

are 140,000 young people claiming benefits at the moment, but 850,000

young people who are not in work at the moment. This applies to around

100,000 young people. There are actually 975,000, 16-24 -year-olds,

not in work, training or education. Your proposal only applies to

100,000 of them, why? This is applying to young people who are

signing on for benefits rather than signing up for training. We want to

make sure that all young people .. Why only 100,000? They are the ones

currently getting job-seeker's allowance. We are saying you can not

just sign up to... Can I get you to respond to this, the number of

people not in work, training or education fell last year by more

than you are planning to help. Long turn -- long-term unemployment is an

entrenched problem... This issue about an entrenched group of young

people. Young people who haven't got skills and are not in training we

know are much less likely to get a job so there are 140,018-24

-year-olds signing onto benefits at the moment. This is about trying to

address that problem to make sure all young people have the skills

they need to get a job. Your policy is to take away part of the dole

unless young unemployed people agree to study for level three

qualifications, the equivalent of an AS-level or an NVQ but 40% of these

people have the literary skills of a nine-year-old. After all that failed

education, how are you going to train them to a level standard? We

are saying that anyone who doesn't have that a level or equivalent

qualification will be required to go back to college. We are not saying

that within a year they have to get up to that level but these are

exactly the sorts of people... These people have been failed by your

education system. These people are, for the last four years, have been

educated under a Conservative government. 18 - 21-year-olds, most

of them have their education under a Labour government during which

300,000 people left with no GCSEs whatsoever. I don't understand how

training for one year can do what 11 years in school did not. We are not

saying that within one year everybody will get up to a level

three qualifications, but if you are one of those people who enters the

Labour market age 18 with the reading skills of a nine-year-old,

they are the sorts of people that should not the left languishing I

should not the left languishing. I went to college in Hackney if you

you are -- a few weeks ago and there was a dyslexic boy studying painting

and decorating. In school they decided he was a troublemaker and

that he didn't want to learn. He went back to college because he

wanted to get the skills. He said that it wasn't until he went back to

college that he could pick up a newspaper and read it, it made a

huge difference but too many people are let down by the system. I am

wondering how the training will make up for an education system that

failed them but let's move on to your leader. Look at this graph of

Ed Miliband's popularity. This is the net satisfaction with him, it is

dreadful. The trend continues to climb since he became leader of the

Labour Party, why? What you have seen is another 2300 Labour

councillors since Ed Miliband became the leader of the Labour Party. You

saw in the elections a month ago that... Why is the satisfaction rate

falling? We can look at polls or actual election results and the fact

that we have got another 2000 Labour councillors, more people voting

Labour, the opinion polls today show that if there was a general election

today we would have a majority of more than 40, he must be doing

something right. Why do almost 0% of voters want to replace him as

leader? Why do 50% and more think that he is not up to the job? The

more people see Ed Miliband, the less impressed they are. The British

people seem to like him less. The election strategy I suggest that

follows from that is that you should keep Ed Miliband under wraps until

the election. Let's look at actually what happens when people get a

chance to vote, when they get that opportunity we have seen more Labour

councillors, more Labour members of the European Parliament...

Oppositions always get more. The opinion polls today, one of them

shows Labour four points ahead. You have not done that well in local

government elections or European elections. Why don't people like

him? I think we have done incredibly well in elections. People must like

a lot of the things Labour and Ed Miliband are doing because we are

winning back support across the country. We won local councils in

places like Hammersmith and Fulham, Crawley, Hastings, key places that

Labour need to win back at the general election next year. Even you

have said traditional Labour supporters are abandoning the party.

That is what Ed Miliband has said as well. We have got this real concern

about what has happened. If you look at the elections in May, 60% of

people didn't even bother going to vote. That is a profound issue not

just for Labour. You said traditional voters who perhaps at

times we took for granted are now being offered an alternative. Why

did you take them for granted? This is what Ed Miliband said. I am not

saying anything Ed Miliband himself has not said. When he ran for the

leadership he said that we took too many people for granted and we

needed to give people positive reasons to vote Labour, he has been

doing that. He has been there for four years and you are saying you

still take them for granted. Why? I am saying that for too long we have

taken them for granted. We are on track to win the general election

next year and that will defy all the odds. You are going to win... Ed

Miliband will win next year and make a great Prime Minister.

Now to the Liberal Democrats, at the risk of intruding into private

grief. The party is still smarting from dire results in the European

and Local Elections. The only poll Nick Clegg has won in recent times

is to be voted the most unpopular leader of a party in modern British

history. No surprise there have been calls for him to go, though that

still looks unlikely. Here's Eleanor.

Liberal Democrats celebrating, something we haven't seen for a

while. This victory back in 199 led while. This victory back in 1998 led

to a decade of power for the Lib Dems in Liverpool. What a contrast

to the city's political landscape today. At its height the party had

69 local councillors, now down to just three. The scale of the

challenge facing Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems is growing. The party is

rock bottom in the polls, consistently in single figures. It

was wiped out in the European elections losing all but one of its

12 MEPs and in the local elections it lost 42% of the seats that it was

defending. But on Merseyside, Nick Clegg was putting on a brave face.

We did badly in Liverpool, Manchester and London in particular,

we did well in other places. But you are right, we did badly in some of

those big cities and I have initiated a review, quite

naturally, to understand what went wrong, what went right. As Lib Dems

across the country get on with some serious soul-searching, there is an

admission that his is the leader of the party who is failing to hit the

right notes. Knocking on doors in Liverpool, I have to tell you that

Nick Clegg is not a popular person. Some might use the word toxic and I

find this very difficult because I know Nick very well and I see a

principal person who passionately believes in what he is doing and he

is a nice guy. As a result of his popularity, what has happened to the

core vote? In parts of the country, we are down to just three

councillors like Liverpool for example. You also lose the

deliverers and fundraisers and the organisers and the members of course

so all of that will have to be rebuilt. As they start fermenting

process, local parties across the country and here in Liverpool have

been voting on whether there should be a leadership contest. We had two

choices to flush out and have a go at Nick Clegg or to positively

decide we would sharpen up the campaign and get back on the

streets, and by four to one ratio we decided to get back on the streets.

We are bruised and battered but we are still here, the orange flag is

still flying and one day it will fly over this building again, Liverpool

town hall. But do people want the Lib Dems back in charge in this

city? I certainly wouldn't vote for them. Their performance in

Government and the way they have left their promises down, I could

not vote for them again. I voted Lib Dem in the last election because of

the university tuition fees and I would never vote for them again

because they broke their promise. The Lib Dems are awful, broken

promises and what have you. I wouldn't vote for them. This is the

declaration of the results for the Northwest... Last month, as other

party celebrated in the north-west, the Lib Dems here lost their only

MEP, Chris Davies. Now there is concern the party doesn't know how

to turn its fortunes around. We don't have an answer to that, if we

did we would be grasping it with both hands. We will do our best to

hold onto the places where we still have seats but as for the rest of

the country where we have been hollowed out, we don't know how to

start again until the next general election is out of the way. After

their disastrous performance in the European elections, pressure is

growing for the party to shift its stance. I think there has to be a

lancing of the wound, there should in a referendum and the Liberal

Democrats should be calling it. The rest of Europe once this because

they are fed up with Britain being unable to make up its mind. The Lib

Dems are now suffering the effects of being in Government. The party's

problem, choosing the right course to regain political credibility.

to regain political credibility We can now speak to form a Lib Dems

leader Ming Campbell. Welcome back to the Sunday Politics. Even your

own activists say that Nick Clegg is toxic. How will that change between

now and the election? When you have had disappointing results, but you

have to do is to rebuild. You pick yourself up and start all over

again, and the reason why the Liberal Democrats got 57, 56 seats

in the House of Commons now is because we picked ourselves up, we

took every opportunity and we have rebuilt from the bottom up.

least popular leader in modern history and more unpopular than your

mate Gordon Brown. You are running out of time. No one believes that

being the leader of a modern political party in the UK is an easy

job. Both Ed Miliband and David Cameron must have had cause to

think, over breakfast this morning, when they saw the headlines in some

of the Sunday papers. Of course it is a difficult job but it was

pointed out a moment or two ago that Nick Clegg is a man of principle and

enormous resilience if you consider what he had to put up with, and in

my view, he is quite clearly the person best qualified to lead the

party between now and the general election and through the election

campaign, and beyond. So why don't people like him? We have had to take

some pretty difficult decisions, and, of course, people didn't expect

that. If you look back to the rather heady days of the rose garden behind

ten Downing St, people thought it was all going to be sweetness and

light, but the fact is, we didn't light, but the fact is, we didn t

know then what we know now, about the extent of the economic crisis we

win, and a lot of difficult decisions have had to be taken in

order to restore economic stability. Look around you. You will see we are

not there yet but we are a long way better off than in 2010. You are not

getting the credit for it, the Tories are. We will be a little more

assertive about taking the credit. For example, the fact that 23

million people have had a tax cut of ?800 per year and we have taken 2

million people out of paying tax altogether. Ming Campbell, your

people say that on every programme like this. Because it is true. That

might be the case, but you are at seven or 8% in the polls, and nobody

is listening, or they don't believe it. Once

is listening, or they don't believe doubt that what we have achieved

will be much more easily recognised, and there is no doubt,

for example, in some of the recent polls, like the Ashcroft Pole,

something like 30% of those polled said that as a result at the next

something like 30% of those polled general election, they would prepare

their to be a coalition involving the Liberal Democrats. So there is

no question that the whole notion of coalition is still very much a live

one, and one which we have made work in the public interest. The problem

is people don't think that. People see you trying to have your cake and

eat it. On the one hand you want to get your share of the credit for the

turnaround in the economy, on the other hand you can't stop yourself

from distancing yourself from the Tories and things that you did not

like happening. You are trying to face both ways at once. If you

remember our fellow Scotsman famously said you cannot ride both

remember our fellow Scotsman to the terms -- terms of the

remember our fellow Scotsman coalition agreement, which is what

we signed up to in 2010. In addition, in furtherance of that

agreement, we have created things like the pupil premium and the

others I mentioned and you were rather dismissive. I'm not

dismissive, I'm just saying they don't make a difference to what

people think of you. We will do everything in our power to change

that between now and May 2015. The interesting thing is, going back to

the Ashcroft result, it demonstrated clearly that in constituencies where

we have MPs and we are well dug in, we are doing everything that the

public expects of us, and we are doing very well indeed. You aren't

sure fellow Lib Dems have been saying this for you -- you and your

fellow Liberal Dems have been saying this for a year or 18 months, and

since then you have lost all of your MEPs apart from one, you lost your

deposit in a by-election, you lost 310 councillor, including everyone

in Manchester or Islington. Mr Clegg leading you into the next general

election will be the equivalent of the charge of the light Brigade.

election will be the equivalent of the charge of the light Brigade I

the charge of the light Brigade. I doubt that very much. The

implication behind that lit you rehearsed is that we should pack our

tents in the night and steal away. -- that litany. And if you heard in

that piece that preceded the discussion, people were saying, look

we have to start from the bottom and have to rebuild. That is exactly

what we will do. Nine months is a period of gestation. As you well

know. I wouldn't dismiss it quite so easily as that. I'm not here to say

we had a wonderful result or anything like it, but what I do say

is that the party is determined to turn it round, and that Nick Clegg

is the person best qualified to do it. Should your party adopt a

referendum about in or out on Europe? No, we should stick to the

coalition agreement. If there is any transfer of power from Westminster

to Brussels, that will be subject to a referendum. No change. And

finally, as a Lib Dem, you must be glad you are not fighting the next

election yourself? I've fought every election since 1974, so I've had a

few experiences, some good, some bad, but the one thing I have done

and the one thing a lot of other people have done is that they have

stuck to the task, and that is what will happen in May 2015. Ming

Campbell, thank you for joining us. It's just gone 11.35am, you're

watching the Sunday Politics. We say goodbye to viewers

in Scotland who leave us now East. Surgeons but no doctors,

patients who cannot get appointments and half empty training courses.

and half empty training courses This is probably the worst workforce

crisis in my years as a qualified doctor. The parliamentarians trying

to get their message across. I think politics really matters and can make

a real difference to people's lives and unless they are engaged they do

not worry to vote. Let's meet not worry to vote. Let's medt our

guests, former Minister of Labour's candidate for Northampton North. And

newly re`elected conservative MVP. I wanted to start with the environment

committee report into flooding which criticised the lack of routine

flight maintenance seeing it as our TB in a month. The tidal surge left

1400 homes flooded and many acres of land underwater. 130 defencd

projects needed repair. The main finding is that you must not cut

down on maintenance because you create extra capital costs further

down the line. This report says that not enough money is

prevent flooding and that is a false economy? If you look back at what

happened, the worst in 50 years, the Environment Agency did an

amazing job compared to 50 years ago, but absolutely

are changing and we need to make sure we are prepared and look at how

flood defences are performed, whether they need to be better

maintained. I am concerned about areas in the North claims and in

Somerset making sure that experience would not happen here. Let's look at

places where the defences h`ve held up well such as in

Northamptonshire. That is because there was very good investmdnt at

the time. ?7 million saved in any much more than that. The cost of the

last round was around about ?1 billion, so we need to see flood

defences and protection and essential infrastructure and

increase funding which has been cut. Jobs going at the Environment

Agency? Money has been put into environmental protection. If you

look at what has happened in some places, there are flood defences and

it is now time to be complacent when patterns changing and there is a

commitment money will go into this. We want to learn from what happened

in the West Country and that the needs to be more dredging we have to

look at that. We will have to leave it.

Staff shortages in doctors' surgeries. A struggle to recruit

enough doctors to cope with demand and one surgery is expected to close

later this year leaving 16,000 no family doctor and some GPs

the crisis could force the privatisation of the NHS. The

pressure is rising and the statistics tell a stark story.

Demand for medical services are going up and they are not enough GPs

to go around. This is probably the worst workforce crisis I have seen

in 30 years as a private doctor. David is something going wrong and

we need to change that. If xou have we need to change that. If you have

been to the doctor lately you will have seen a few changes. Surgeries

are high`tech places these days with a lot of Kier previously given by

hospitals taking place. People are living longer and people have

multiple diseases that are continuing to lead reasonably

healthy lives. The increased workload has made many established

doctors retired early and there is a significant shortage of GPs. I have

a great practice with 16,000 patients about to be short of six

doctors, and we will be down to two GPs within a few months. Thdy do not

think they can provide a safe service any more.

longer collect statistics btt we have learned the problem is not just

in Essex. In Suffolk, 14 of 66 are currently advertising

doctors and the Norfolk arotnd half have vacancies. This surgery in

have vacancies. This surgerx in mid`Norfolk has had to transfer 1500

to a nearby practice. It wouldn't be to a nearby practice. It wotldn t be

a natural thing to do. Changes to funding mean local subsidies are

also under financial pressure. GP surgeries like this account for 90%

of patient contact time but attract only 8% of the budget, and fill

every patient matters about 20p per day. Health education in England as

the body responsible for tr`ining doctors and aims to get 50% of all

graduates into general practice by 2016. It says the take`up in our

region is around 93%, a fall of 7% since 2010. The take`up is still

relatively high but we have been told by local medical committees

that GP training courses attached to hospitals in our region are only

half full. In Suffolk, the GP Federation aims to attract more

doctors to the county. One of the things we really want to do is

support general practices to make them a more attractive placd for

young doctors to come to. It is a great place and when people come

here they really `` do not often want to leave. I think Suffolk is a

great place to work and I h`ve really enjoyed it. There's a great

range of things work and been those great

diversity. Do you think you might come back? I would not say no. A

failure to solve the GP crisis could have far`reaching consequences. I

worry that we are seeing thd privatisation of primary care. We

would lose that personal care that the population has grown to

appreciate. Joining me from Ipswich, a practising doctor. What are you

going to do about this shortage You are right in saying that general

practice and community carers the engine room of the NHS. We need to

see more investment in the years ahead as they look after

with increasingly complex Kier needs. That is why the government is

increasing the funding available and that is happening across all the

Legion but we are also making sure we're increasing the number of GPs,

1000 than in 2010. `` 1000 lore The problem as it takes many years to

train a general practitioner, five years from leading medical school,

and that planning has to be in place many years in advance. Some of the

issues we are tackling are due to decisions made in 2007, 2008. It is

all very well blaming the previous incumbents but we heard from

patients and about one surgery in Essex which will close leaving

16,000 without any GPs. What will you do in the meantime? We've also

got to recognise that many general practices are small businesses in

their own right. That is the funding model for decades now. Therd's an

opportunity for general practice is to offer additional salary for new

GPs coming in and packages to attract people to the area, and as

you have hard in England, we are relatively well`off

people applying. Whilst it lay be people applying. Whilst it may be

that you have indicated 93% is the fill rate, because the number of

places has increased we are seeing more people choosing general

practice as the carrier and what we will be seen by 2016 is 50% of

doctors going into general practice, meaning a lot more effort and

attention going into it. If these are run on some sort of business

model, what happens if they effectively go bust? The model is

run `` has run very effectively for many years and the average GP is

paid a salary of ?110,000. Why aren't more people coming forward

for these vacancies we talkdd about? Half of surgeries in Norfolk

have vacancies with no applicants. have vacancies with no applhcants.

There is a duty to those GPs as they run the small business to make sure

they put together attractivd packages for new GPs coming into

work and those practices in the future. It is incorrect

there's a lack of people choosing general practice because we now have

1000 more GPs than the work in 010. It is an attractive career and we

need to see more people choosing but it is not just about delivering

GPs and right technology and enabling

practices to work health problems to cope and look

after themselves. investing in important work for

district nurses as well and making sure we have enough to support

people with long`term conditions. Thank you for the moment. Do you

think people have to expect less from GPs in the future? No, but I

think you have to have experienced and properly trained GPs and Daz was

just pointed out, you cannot train AGP overnight.

the last few years of the L`bour government when they

medical careers and I remember warning

brightest would leave the country as a result.

heard more money is going into GP training and

GP practices is excellent. We also need to remember that the job is

also changing, we are living longer and care of the elderly is

important, so we want well`trained proper GPs. Do you think people are

on the other hand expecting too much? They should not expect 24

hours a day service. I do not think people are expecting too much and

they would dispute some of figures because many of the people

would have started under the Labour Government. My

understanding is that while you have 93% take`up of training in the East

Midlands, it is 62%, which is very serious. There's a 3% reduction in

the number of GPs and people are waiting and you hear people talking

about it. What needs to happen? There needs to be more investment

GP training and attracting people into the profession. The government

took their eye off the ball with their top`down

wasted time and money and goodwill, and I think they need to look again

at exactly how the services are configured, so that GPs can

offer... I want to come back to Doctor Poulter. Are you resting on

your laurels are busy work still to be done? Not at all. The 3% decrease

in GP numbers is fully qualhfied GP and that is a direct legacy of the

lack of investment towards the end of the Labour Government. The

increase has mostly come from GP registers coming towards the end of

their training who are about to become fully qualified GPs which

shows we are investing in more GPs sure we have the workforce to look

after people. There has been a lot of talk in

recent weeks about the publhc feeling

and in particular with the main parties. It probably explains why

turnout in local elections is often so long. He recent survey found only

49% were likely to vote and 67% believe politicians don't understand

their daily lives. The Housds of Parliament recently launched an

outreach service to explain how politics works. I think polhtics

really matters and can make a difference to people's lives and

unless people are engaged, I actually worry they do not have

rights to complain. You are facing an uphill struggle? UKIP is a signal

because a lot of the support seems to come from people who do not

normally bought slaughters `n angry voice. One area of concern hs young

walkers with less than one third under 24 saying they are interested.

`` young voters. She has called on her party to do more to engage

her party to do more to eng`ge with young voters. They may be voting

less than older people, that is extremely clear, and they are voting

less than previous generations. That is also an important point

does not mean they are not doing politics.

projects and getting results. That is politics, but there is perhaps a

different language around it. I was speaking to another MP from our

region who said we live in a world of instant

particularly young voters expect things to be solved instantly. Is

that one of the problems? I am sure it is in there but I do not see us

as a problem, just the way the world doubts. It is an opportunity for

politicians to do things differently and to serve the people we are there

to serve. This is just the way my generation and those behind us will

be like. How do you win thel back? You want to get the message out in

the right way. should have been doing this for

years? Of course and good ones have. It has not worked! Things kdep

moving on and a particularly obvious changes the coming of the intranet.

That affects all generations because we lived through, but my generation

and those even younger have grown with the intranet and that changes

politics and radically. Politicians need to change the game? Politicians

need to respond to the Newm`rket. What business Woods failed to sell

to new customers? Do you thhnk this is an opportunity to reject any

newly to young people? `` in a new way? The big crisis coming is

individual voter registration which will result in a lots young people

disappearing off the electoral roll and it'll be a huge challenge

make sure they are able to vote and actually use it.

question of changing the message, we have to

traditional and conventional politics as a way to change their

lives. Do you agree, do they do it better elsewhere in Europe? Not

necessarily because in the Duropean elections about one in the UK

elections about one in the TK voted, about the same as five years ago,

and the Conservative vote in the East of England held up

you predicted. It is important that we engage, but if you look

elsewhere, Slovakia was the worst at 13%. We are not the worst in terms

of water turnout. In terms of using the Internet it is important we look

at what people are saying and it is not just young people who are

contacting us through the Internet, you have to use new media. TKIP

brought in new voters, what are they doing right? And quite a lot of

older voters. I had more active young campaigners knocking on doors

campaigning with me than at any point in the last ten years. Your

party is losing votes to UKHP, what are they doing you are not? We lost

some and we probably lost fdwer than others. Why isn't labour and

engaging as much? It was voting like a free kick at the traditional

parties. We need to change the way we do politics and speak to people

and over the coming year we will have to make sure that young people

are on the register to vote. We must move on. Now to our politic`l

round`up of the week and it seems the only way is Essex even hf the

trends do not run. `` trains.

A plea from Essex MP. Will he commend Essex businesses and support

their efforts to export mord by looking favourably upon our plans to

upgrade our infrastructure? As I have said before, where Essex leads

the rest of the country follows. But nobody followed anybody into Essex

as right on cue services and to call Chesterfield. And the need for a new

road junction was argued in Westminster. But it was the plans

for Rushden late's leisure complex that prompted an argument bdtween

two Northamptonshire MPs. He should be getting the splinters out of his

backside for sitting on the fence so long over this matter. A cl`im that

was strongly refuted. What about the new a 14 junction? It

is really important, infrastructure and investing in skills. And train

chaos, is it time some of these franchises were handed back? We need

more investment in infrastructure and we have started

that. We have been campaignhng that. We have been campaigning for

better railway infrastructure and have some improvements. We need a

vibrant economy in order to deliver the cash and I agree we need that on

broadband as well. Franchisds handed back to the government? If xou fail

to deliver you should not bd doing it. Thank

information, you can apply to them and they will be obliged to tell

you. Thanks for joining us. Andrew, back to you.

think you'd want to. Labour grandees are not queueing up to sing his

praises. Look at this. In my view, he is the leader we have and he is

the leader I support and he is somebody capable of leading the

party to victory. Ed Miliband will leave this to victory, and I believe

he can. If he doesn't, what would happen to the Labour Party? We could

be in the wilderness for 15 years. At the moment he has to convince

people he has the capacity to lead the country. That's not my view,

people he has the capacity to lead the country. That's not my view but

people don't believe that. We had a leader of the Labour Party was

publicly embarrassed, because whoever was in charge of press

letting go through a process where we have councillors in Merseyside

resigning. It was a schoolboy error. Having policies without them being

drawn together into a convincing and vivid narrative and with what you do

the people in the country. You have to draw together, connect the

policies, link them back to the leader and give people a real sense

of where you are going. Somehow he has never quite managed to be

himself and create that identity with the public. And we are joined

by the president of you girls, Peter Kellner. Welcome to the Sunday

politics. -- YouGov. The Labour Party is six points ahead in your

poll this morning. So what is the problem? On this basis he will win

the next election. If the election were today and the figures held up,

you would have a Labour government with a narrow overall majority. One

should not forget that. Let me make three points. The first is, in past

parliaments, opposition normally lose ground and governments gain

ground in the final few months. The opposition should be further ahead

than this. I don't think six is enough. Secondly, Ed Miliband is

behind David Cameron when people are asked who they want as Prime

Minister and Labour is behind the Conservatives went people are asked

who they trust on the economy. There have been elections when the party

has won by being behind on leadership and other elections where

they have won by being behind on the economy. No party has ever won an

election when it has been clearly behind on both leadership and the

economy. Let me have another go. The economy. Let me have another go The

Labour Party brand is a strong brand. The Tory Bramleys week. The

Labour brand is stronger. That is a blast -- the Labour -- the Tory

Bramleys week. A lot of the Tories -- the Tory brand is weak. Cant you

win on policies and a strong party brand? If you have those too, you

need the third factor which isn t there. People believing that you

have what it takes, competent skills, determination,

determination, whatever makes to carry through. -- whatever mix. A

lot of Ed Miliband policies, on the banks, energy prices, Brent

controls, people like them. But in government, would they carry them

through? They think they are not up to it. -- rent controls. If people

think you won't deliver what you say, even if they like it, they were

necessarily vote for you. That is the missing third element. There is

a strong Labour brand, but it's not strong enough to overcome the

feeling that the Labour leadership is not up to it. Nick, you had some

senior Labour figure telling you that if Mr Miliband losing the next

election he will have to resign immediately and cannot fight another

election the way Neil Kinnock did after 1987. What was remarkable to

me was that people were even thinking along these lines, and even

more remarkable that they would tell you they were thinking along these

lines? What is the problem? The problem is, is that Ed Miliband says

it would be unprecedented to win the general election after the second

worst result since 1918. They are concerned about is the start of a

script that he would say on the day after losing the general election.

Essentially what the people are trying to do is get their argument

in first and to say, you cannot do what Neil Kinnock did in 1987. Don't

forget that Neil Kinnock in 1987 what Neil Kinnock did in 1987. Don't

forget that Neil Kinnock in 198 was forget that Neil Kinnock in 1987 was

in the middle of a very brave process of modernisation and had one

and fought a very campaign that was professional but he lost again in

1992, and they wanted to get their line in first. What some people are

saying is that this is an election that the Labour Party should be

winning because the coalition is so unpopular. If you don't win, I'm

afraid to say, there is something wrong with you. Don't you find it

remarkable that people are prepared to think along these lines at this

stage, when Labour are ahead in the polls, still the bookies favourite

to win, and you start to speak publicly, or in private to the

public print, but we might have to get rid of him if he doesn't win.

Everything you say about labour in this situation has been said about

the Tories. We wondered whether Boris Johnson would tie himself to

the mask and he is the next leader in waiting if Cameron goes. It's a

mirror image of that. We talk about things being unprecedented. It's

unprecedented for a government to gain seats. All the things you say

about labour, you could say it the Conservatives. That's what makes the

next election so interesting. But in the aftermath of the European

elections and the local government elections, in which the

Conservatives did not do that well, the issue was not Mr Cameron or the

Tories doing well, the issue was the Labour Party and how they had not

done as well as they should have done, and that conversation was

fuelled by the kind of people who have been speaking to nick from the

Labour Party. Rachel Reeves cited their real-life performance in

elections as a reason for optimism. When in fact their performance in

the Europeans and locals was disappointing for an opposition one

year away from a general election. What alarms me about labour is the

way they react to criticisms about Ed Miliband. Two years ago when he

was attacked, they said they were 15 points ahead, and then a year ago

there were saying they were nine or ten ahead, and now they are saying

we are still five or six ahead. The trend is alarming. It points to a

smaller Labour lead. Am I right in detecting a bit of a class war going

on in the Labour Party? There are a lot of northern Labour MPs who think

that Ed Miliband is to north London, and there are too many metropolitan

cronies around him must I think that is right, Andrew. What I think is,

being a pessimist in terms of their prospects, I do think the Labour

Party could win the next election. I just don't think they can as they

are going at the moment. But the positioning for a possible defeat,

what they should be talking about is what do we need to change in the

party and the way Ed Miliband performs in order to secure victory.

That is a debate they could have, and they could make the changes. I

find it odd that they are being so defeatist. Don't go away. Peter is a

boffin when it comes to polls. That is why we have a mod for the

election prediction swings and roundabouts. He is looking for what

he calls the incumbency effect. Don't know what is a back-up -- what

that's about question don't worry, here is an. Being in office is bad

for your health. Political folk wisdom has it that incumbency

favours one party in particular, the Liberal Democrats. That is because

their MPs have a reputation as ferociously good local campaigners

who do really well at holding on to their seats. However, this time

round, several big-name long serving Liberal Democrats like Ming

Campbell, David Heath and Don Foster are standing down. Does that mean

the incumbency effect disappears like a puff of smoke? Then there is

another theory, called the sophomore surge. It might sound like a movie

about US college kids, but it goes like this. New MPs tend to do better

in their second election than they did in their first. That could

favour the Tories because they have lots of first-time MPs. The big

question is, what does this mean for the 7th of May 2015, the date of the

next general election? The answer is, who knows? I know a man who

knows. Peter. What does it all mean? You can go onto your PC now and draw

down programmes which say that these are the voting figures from a

national poll, so what will the seats look like? This is based on

uniform swing. Every seat moving up and down across the country in the

same way. Historically, that's been a pretty good guide. I think that's

going to completely break down next year, because the Lib Dems will

probably hold on to more seats than we predict from the national figures

and I think fewer Tory seats will go to the Labour Party than you would

predict from the national figures. The precise numbers, I'm not going

to be too precise, but I would be surprised, sorry, I would not be

surprised if Labour fell 20 or 5 seats short on what we would expect

on the uniform swing prediction Next year's election will be tight.

Falling 20 seats short could well mean the difference between victory

and defeat. What you make of that, Helen? I think you're right,

especially taking into account the UKIP effect. We have no idea about

that. The conventional wisdom is that will drain away back to the

Conservatives, but nobody knows, that will drain away back to the

Conservatives, but nobody knows and Conservatives, but nobody knows, and

it makes the next election almost impossible to call. It means it is a

great target the people like Lord Ashcroft with marginal polling,

because people have never been so interested. It is for party politics

and we all assume that UKIP should be well next year, but their vote

went up from 17 up to 27%. Then that 17% went down to 3%, so they might

only be five or 6% in the general election, so they might not have the

threat of depriving Conservatives of their seats. Where the incumbency

thing has an effect is the Liberal Democrats. They have fortress seats

where between 1992 and 1997 Liberal Democrats seats fell, but their

percentage went up. They are losing the local government base though.

True, but having people like Ming Campbell standing down means they

will struggle. We are used to incumbency being an important factor

in American politics. It's hard to get rid of an incumbent unless it is

a primary election, like we saw in Virginia, but is it now becoming an

important factor in British politics, that if you own the seat

you're more likely to hold on to it than not? If it is, that's a

remarkable thing. It's hard to be a carpetbagger in America, but it is

normal in British Parliamentary constituencies to be represented by

someone who did not grow up locally. It is a special kind of achievement

to have an incumbency effect where you don't have deep roots in the

constituency. I was going to ask about the Lib Dems. If we are wrong,

and they collapse in Parliamentary representation as much as the share

in vote collapses, is that not good news is that the Conservatives? They

would be in second place in the majority of existing Lib Dems seats.

For every seat where Labour are second to the Lib Dems, there are

two where the Conservatives are second. If the Lib Dem

representation collapses, that helps the Conservatives. I'm assuming the

Tories will gain about ten seats. If they gain 20, if they'd had 20 more

seats last time, they would have had a majority government, just about.

So 20 seats off the Lib Dem, do the maths, as they say in America, and

they could lose a handful to labour and still be able to run a one

party, minority government. The fate of the Lib Dems could be crucial to

the outcome to the politics of light. On the 8th of May, it will be

VE Day and victory in election day as well as Europe. The Lib Dems will

be apoplectic if they lose all of the seats to their coalition

partners. The great quote by Angela Merkel, the little party always gets

crushed. It's a well-established idea that coalition politics. They

can't take credit for the things people like you may get lumbered

with the ones they don't. They have contributed most of this terrible

idea that seized politics where you say it, but you don't deliver it.

Tuition fees is the classic example of this Parliament. Why should you

believe any promise you make? And Ed Miliband is feeling that as well.

But in 1974 the liberal Democrats barely had any MPs but there were

reporters outside Jeremy Thorpe's home because they potentially held

not the balance of power, but were significantly in fourth. Bringing

back memories Jeremy Thorpe, and we will leave it there. Thanks to the

panel. We are tomorrow on BBC Two. At the earlier time of 11am because

of Wimbledon. Yes, it's that time of year again already. I will be back

here at 11 o'clock next week. Remember, if it is Sunday, it is the

Sunday Politics.