14/02/2016 Sunday Politics London

Morning folks and welcome to The Sunday Politics.

David Cameron says a manifesto shouldn't be a "wish list,

He says he's been ticking off the commitments his manifesto made,

Well, today we launch our own Manifesto Tracker and we'll be

talking to the minister responsible for implementing it.

The Government wants to crack down on the gender pay gap.

But is it really as bad as everyone seems to make out?

We'll be talking to TUC General Secretary Frances O'Grady.

And we'll be asking who's wooing who

in the putative Tory leadership contest?

In the capital, after eight years in office, the curtain

is coming down on Boris Johnson's mayoralty.

He'll be here, to talk about his legacy.

And with me, as always, a match made in heaven.

Nick Watt, Polly Toynbee and Tim Shipman,

who'll be tweeting throughout the programme.

First, this morning let's turn to the situation in Syria.

A nationwide "cessation of hostilities" is due

But, despite that agreement, the prospects for peace

The truce does not apply to the battle against what Russia

calls terrorist targets and means it will continue its heavy bombing

Meanwhile, Turkey has shelled Kurdish positions in Northern Syria

and the Turkish Foreign Minister has said his country is pondering

This morning, the Foreign Secretary said Russia had to begin complying

The situation in Aleppo is extremely worrying,

the Russians are using carpet-bombing

tactics, indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas

Yes, we demand that the Russians comply with their obligations under

international law and their obligations under the UN

Security Council resolutions that they have signed up to.

Nick, you get a feeling that given this deal was signed in Munich, it

it is living up to deal is signed in Munich reputations. When we hear the

Foreign Secretary saying we demand Russian do something when they are

creating facts on the ground and we are not, that will have a hollow

ring. Russia is now. President's Asad air force. They have ensured

that President Assad cannot lose this war but he cannot also win it.

They have the air force but no forces on the ground. Now that

President Assad cannot lose this war has changed the dynamics. We can

whistle in the wind as much as we like but Russia is the reality and

power. Sir Roderick Lyne, the former UK ambassador to Moscow was on radio

five this morning and he said we should not get too carried away with

quite how powerful Russia is, they don't have troops on the ground

they have a faltering economy and they are nervous about going into

far because of the disaster of Afghanistan 35 years ago. They do

have some troops on the ground, they have proxy forces on the ground from

Hezbollah and the uranium National Guard. Although they can't take back

the whole of Syria, they will take back enough of it -- Iranians

National Guard. Making success in the south, the border with Turkey,

controlling the Mediterranean coastline. When they have done that,

they might be serious about peace talks. Then they are stuck with it.

It is not clear if Vladimir Putin thinks beyond tomorrow. It is not

clear what the long-term strategy could do. It could be like the

Russian invasion of Afghanistan an absolute disaster. President Assad

is saying that they intend to take over the whole of the country,

entirely unrealistic. There will be some sort of partition. What is

happening is very frightening in the sense that everybody is fighting a

proxy war, the Iranians and Saudis. The one thing that people keep

saying is Barack Obama was so weak that it is quite unclear what he

could have done. Perhaps he could have given Syria's weapons to the

more moderate rebels. Hillary Clinton wanted him to do that in

July 2012. She put a plan together along with the general and he turned

it down. What would have happened is that they would be shooting down

Russian planes with American weapons. Or Russia might not have

gone to war. We don't know. Everything has a dynamic to it. This

dynamic is leaving the west pretty much as onlookers. It is clear that

at least in the short-term, Mr Putin will get back enough ground for

Assad to then say we have got rid of a lot of these "Terrorists" because

they are not Islamic state. It is now asked versus Islamic State.

Exactly, we sound like the mouse that squeaked this morning. I

disagree with Polly. One of the great powers in the world has now

got very involved in a situation and the other hasn't. President Obama

had options. He did not explore them to any sort of extent that it put

off the Russians. Britain is left on the sidelines, waiting for a new US

president, to get engaged in this issue and do something proactive.

What could have been done that would have been any use at all? Either

useless or worse than useless, stuck us in there... He did say he had

chemical weapons and it was an important red Line. And he let them

cross the red line. He totally ignored it. What would you have done

that would have been useful? You could have set up a humanitarian

safe haven and protected it with force and armed the rebels to deter

the Russians and make it a situation where Assad could not continue. We

now have a situation where Assad is now a fact of life, he is not going

anywhere. There is not much you can do without you were serious

involvement. I am glad we touched on Syria, it is an important developing

story. Now, what's black and white

and not read all over? Even if you did read it,

would you be able to remember all the promises and whether

the Government had delivered them? Today, we're launching our very

own Manifesto Tracker, which charts the progress

of the pledges Sort of like a blue virtual

Edstone, or maybe not! Over the next four years,

we'll be monitoring the Government's progress on all of the commitments

the Conservatives made ahead of the 2015 general election

in their manifesto, and a few big promises they made

during the campaign. So, we've identified 161 pledges,

and loaded them into our Manifesto We've grouped them into categories

covering all the major areas of Government policy,

from the constitution And we've given each

of the promises a colour rating Red signalling little

or no progress so far. Amber when the Government

has made some progress. Let's start by looking

at the Conservative commitments As you can see they've made at least

some progress on all of them. Easily the party's biggest promise

here was to hold a referendum on Britain's membership

of the EU by December 2017. We've marked that amber,

to show that some progress The bill setting the vote has passed

through Parliament and it's looking likely the poll will

be held this year. The cornerstone of the Conservative

election campaign last May was how they would handle the economy,

and as you can see, that's where we've found the greatest

number of promises. Let's look at one of the policies

they identified as part of their plan to

eliminate the deficit. That was to reduce the welfare

bill by ?12 billion. Again, we've given

that an amber rating. The savings were outlined

in the Chancellor's Autumn Statement But it's too early to say

if they'll all be achieved. When it comes to the constitution,

the Government's made some progress But it promised to scrap

the Human Rights Act, and replace it That gets a red rating,

as although there have been reports something is in the pipeline,

as yet there is no sign of the legislation

required to introduce it. Some manifesto commitments have

already been delivered in full. Like the introduction of English

votes for English laws to give English MPs a veto over laws that

only affect England. Other changes promised in

the manifesto are less well known. Like the promise to recover

?500 million from migrants and overseas visitors who use

the NHS by the middle We will give that amber,

because some new charges have already been introduced,

and the Department of Health Let's add on the rest

of the promises in each of the policy areas and have a look

at how the government Taken together, of the 161

Conservative election commitments, we think ten are red,

111 are amber, and 40 are green We'll be returning to the manifesto

tracker every few months, but in the meantime you can find

the full data on the politics And with us now the Cabinet Office

Minister and Paymaster General, Matt Hancock, he oversees

the implementation Welcome to the programme, do you

regard this manifesto as a contract with the British people and do you

intend to intimate it all? It is certainly the commitments on which

we were elected. We take it incredibly seriously -- goals to

implement it. That is the goal. We have got about a quarter delivered,

we have had less than a year. In fact, I really welcome this scrutiny

and this project you have been on. We will implement and publish our

own plans and make sure that each individual manifesto commitment has

an individual minister responsible for delivering it. And publish that.

We will nationalise you and this process. You will nationalise us? We

can't afford you, probably, but we will do this as a government. Let's

see if you still want to do that at the end of this interview. Your

manifesto promised to scrap Labour's Human Rights Act and replace it with

a British Bill of Rights, and abolition Bill would be drafted

within the first hundred days after the election. It didn't happen. Why?

The work is in progress. Internally, we will publish it. Why have you not

kept to the timetable? The timetable of the whole manifesto is to deliver

within the parliament. You said this would be done, the draft bill within

the first 100 days. Clearly, we will deliver against the commitment. I

thought it was a bit harsh to call that read, I would call that Amber.

It is not delivered yet. We called it red because the justice minister,

Mr Bove, said the consultation had been delayed yet again. The question

is what we deliver over the five-year parliament. -- Mr Gove. We

are less than a year in and we have got one quarter delivered and that

is one where there is work in progress but we are committed to

doing it. The manifesto promised to make the UK's Supreme Court "The

ultimate arbiter of human rights in the UK". That will not happen. This

is all part of the same package which we have committed to

delivering. We are less than a year in and we have a few years to go.

Whatever the package, the Supreme Court will not be "The ultimate

arbiter" on human rights, will it? That is part of the proposed

package, as part of the replacement of the Human Rights Act. We will get

to that. There is a bigger picture, which is making sure that we deliver

on the overall set of commitments in the manifesto where we are making

good progress. But, you can enhance the role of the Cyprian Court on

human rights, I understand that Maybe the British Bill of Rights

will do their -- Supreme Court. But at the end of the day, the European

Court of Human Rights is the ultimate arbiter. That is the

factual legal situation. It all depends on the changes that you

make. We will bring forward a package of changes to be able to

deliver against these commitments in the Parliament. Mr Gove says we are

not planning to derogate from the European Court of Human Rights.

Let's see what happens when we published the proposals on this

particular package. Immigration probably your biggest fail, I would

suggest. The 2050 manifesto repeated the pledge in the 2010 manifesto to

get annual net migration down to tens of thousands -- 2015. After

five years, far from getting it down, net migration reached a record

336,000 last year, that is a spectacular failure. Clearly, this

is a commitment. To get immigration down to tens of thousands, that

remains the goal. But we haven't yet reached it. Presumably you did not

call that green. No. It is red. That the commitment remains because we

think it is reasonable to control immigration in this country, so that

while some immigration can be very good for the economy and more

broadly, actually it has got to be done at a reasonable level.

It's not just that you didn't get it down enough, it's actually risen

since you came to power. Why would you promise what you have failed

dismally to deliver again? I think it is a reasonable goal. Clearly we

put it in the manifesto for a reason, to get immigration down And

we are less than a year into the Parliament and we've got four years

to go. Is it a goal or a pledge Do you pledge to the British people

today that net migration will be down to the tens of thousands by

2020? Well I pledge to fulfil what was in the manifesto on which I and

every other Conservative MPs was elected. Well that pledge was to get

it down to the tens of thousands. It was meant to be in the tens of

thousands by 2015, it is 346,00 , is there a pledge that it will be down

to the tens of thousands by 202 ? There is a whole series of actions

that we are taking, not least the EU renegotiation to try to tackle

immigration and make sure that it's brought down to a reasonable level.

Again there is a broader point, of the 160 odd commitments that you are

measuring, delivering an accord of them, of course some are quicker

than others to deliver on, it's fair to say. But the whole point of

having the manifesto and tracking it as we are doing is to make sure we

know where we are up to. Lets come onto the European negotiations, that

was in the manifesto. The manifesto promised several key things in the

renegotiation, a four-year ban on EU migrants claiming in work benefits,

a new residency requirement for social housing, and no child benefit

for EU migrants if their children live abroad. The draft deal contains

none of these things. Well, firstly, as you say, the centrepiece of our

European policy was to have the referendum, and we will be having

the referendum. Although you call that Amber it is certainly going to

happen. I understand that but none of the things you said we would get

to vote on in this referendum have been delivered. We then sat out --

set out what we wanted to negotiate and that negotiation is not

complete. We have a lot of work to do this week to get the best

possible deal we can. I hope we will have a good deal and be able to vote

to stay in a reformed Europe. There is a version of the ban on EU

migrants benefits, there is not no child benefits, now there will be 28

different child benefits that Britain will pay but there is no

mention of residency requirement for social housing, no mention of that

in the deal, so that has gone? Look, we don't know the outcome of this

negotiation until the end of this week. There is a week of hard work

to get the deal. But there is a bigger picture here. Social housing

is not on the agenda? Let's see what we get in this deal over the next

week. But there's a bigger point here, which is that we said we'd

have the renegotiation, lots and lots of people said you are never

going to get these things on the table. A question of in work

benefits, child benefit, we were told you couldn't even put that on

the agenda. The discussion in Europe this week is exactly how far we go

on those. People said that we couldn't deliver anything in this

space and we've managed to deliver already the draft deal, and we will

see where we end up. But not what was in the manifesto. We will see

where we end up at the end of this week. We will indeed. Not

necessarily next week but in the weeks ahead we will be coming back

to go through this. Onto the economy, you put in place a charter

for budget responsibility which commits you to running a surplus, a

legal obligation as well as a policy. The in situ for fiscal

studies says that will require tax rises or spending cuts as yet

unannounced, do you agree? Not in the latest financial forecast put

out by the office for budget responsible to who independently

advise on these, and we have a budget in just over a month's time

so we will see what the figures say, then. Clearly in the latest forecast

from the government, yes, we have that surplus. You have not hit a

surplus. We have hit it in the forecast. And they change. They do,

as the economy changes. On that economic front there was an awful

lot in the manifesto on that, it is all about economic security,

generating jobs, in the same way that the national Security ones were

all about national security. And those were the two elements at the

heart of this manifesto that we were elected on. I would say that we are

delivering very strongly on both. In terms of the big picture of what you

are getting from the message that we said we were going to deliver. Let

me come down to the smaller but still very important picture. You

have a legal obligation to reach a surplus by 2020. If, to reach that

surplus, you had to raise taxes would you? Look, much as I'd love

to, I'm not going to set out tax policy on Sunday morning. To meet

the legal obligation, if it required tax increases, would there be tax

increases? We've set out the plans and the plans hit a surplus. We did

that in the Autumn Statement in November. Clearly the economy

changes all the time, internationally, people have seen

falls in the stock market in the last few months. But we will have a

budget in more than a month's time. But I voted to have that surplus and

that is clearly what we will set out to do. You promised a lower tax

society. Yes. Yet on the forecast, the overall tax burden is rising as

a percentage of GDP and on the forecast, not the buoyancy but extra

tax that you have introduced will be ?50 billion higher. So you have

previous on this, you could raise taxes again because you already

have? Clearly there are some areas where we have tightened things up,

especially on tax avoidance. We took an extra ?5 billion from tax

avoidance measures. And what about the billions in addition to that? We

have reduced the tax burden especially on people in lower wage

jobs, they are going to get the national minimum wage but we are

well on the way to the manifesto commitment of making sure you don't

have to pay any income taxed until you make ?12,500. We have made

progress but there is more to do. The manifesto talks about reducing

the tax relief on pension contributions for people earning

more than ?150,000, people on 4 %, the highest income tax band, you are

going to cut tax relief on their pension contributions. If you were

to also cut the tax relief of those on the 40% rate, that would be

breaching the manifesto? There we've done what we said we would do in the

manifesto. We've followed the manifesto clearly in terms of the

commitment that it made. Outside the manifesto there's always going to be

other things that you do. On pension tax review were explicit that it

would be those in the 45% wouldn't get it, you didn't mention any other

bracket, the imprecation is that it's only the 45%. If you took away

tax relief from the 40% taxpayers that would be broken manifesto

commitment? That's not how I see it, you can add things to the manifesto.

Look at the whole reform programme a massive reform programme which was

not in our manifesto because we ve built it up as a proposal since

then. Likewise the Prime Ministerspeech on social mobility

and an tackling an just inequalities -- an just inequalities. We've done

a huge amount of that on the autumn. Delivering on the manifesto

commitments is absolutely essential. But it is not the only thing you do

in government because you respond to events. But the purpose of this

interview is to hold your manifesto to account. Hunting, when will you

give Parliament the chance to repeal the hunting act. We are committed to

doing that. When? In this Parliament. We looked at doing it

early on. You dropped that. We decided not to do it then, but we

are committed to its. You set a target of ?1 trillion of exports by

2020, most forecasters including your own oh BR say you will be at

least ?350 billion short. Can we agree that you will not hit that

target? It's fair to say that it is stretching target, but it remains

our target, our aspiration. But you will miss it. There is an awful lot

of work going into achieving it Thank you for that, come back and we

will see the progress in the months ahead. Look forward to it.

And remember if you want to see how the government is doing

in detail our manifesto tracker is available for you to peruse

On Friday, new measures to tackle the pay gap between genders

From 2018, companies with more than 250 employees will have

to publish the differences in salary between men and women.

Businesses failing to address the problem will be named

Here's what Women and Equalities Minister Nicky Morgan had to say.

Transparency about the gender pay gap in companies and public sector

organisations is going to be very important in driving behaviour.

So we are going to require companies, under the regulations,

companies of over 250 employees to publish their gender pay gap

We, as a government, will then compile those league tables.

It will be two fold, one, companies will hopefully,

and we expect from the response we have,

to think a lot harder about where women are in their workforce.

How they are distributed, what they are being paid.

But it will also drive applications to work in certain

organisations because I think women will look and see what is the gender

pay gap in this organisation and is this somewhere

And with us now, General Secretary of the TUC, Frances O'Grady.

Welcome back. We know there is a gender pay gap. In some age groups,

not all, but still in some age groups. Where is the evidence that

it is a result of dissemination of employers not paying properly, as

opposed to lifestyle and choices? We still do have this pretty crazy

situation where women have Giroud and 80p for everyone pound that men

do across the economy. -- where women earn 80p for every pound that

men do. This is a welcome step, this initiative, but it is a very small

step. It is about reporting, not about telling us why this is going

on, not coming up with actions to deal with it. When you dig down from

the headline figure, and you have just used one, you begin to see some

quite deep-seated cultural issues, not just a matter of economics. The

labour market study shows that men tend to work in occupations that pay

more, that's been a historic thing. And women in jobs that pay less For

example men in construction, women in retail. Men in computer

programming, women in nursing. That is one of the explanations for the

page gap. There is certainly still big job separation, but one of the

questions we must ask is, is it case of equal values? People paying for

the work of equal value. It is illegal to pay anybody less than a

man is getting or vice versa, equal pay for equal jobs. For example why

is looking after children considered to be less valuable than mending a

car? The problem is, in order for women to prove it, they've got to be

able to take employment tribunal claims, and of course we've seen

this government introduce very significant fees that have massively

reduced the number of women being able to take pay and six

dissemination claims. Is on the gender pay gap really a generational

matter, and it might be resolving itself? I'd like to show you this

chart, here, which looks at different age groups. For women aged

40 to 49, there is a gap, it's coming down but there is still a

substantial gap. For younger women in the 22 to 29, there is no pay

gap, indeed there is some evidence now that the gender pay gap is the

other way among younger people than it is amongst men. What I think it

shows you is that the real problem kicks in when women have babies

Yes. That's when women are much more likely to work part-time, much more

likely to need nurseries, and as we get older and we are looking after

elderly parents, too. Elder care as well. Some of those public service

cuts are hitting our sure start centres and care for the elderly. I

think you hit on something, there. You can begin to see the return of

the gender pay gap as women hit their late 20s or early 30s, because

the average age that women have their first child is 28 and a half.

So that suggests that the policy response will have to be quite

sophisticated to get rid of a later developing pay gap. Stopping cuts on

this is would help but also helping dads as well. A lot of men nowadays

want to be more involved with their children but they need more paid

paternity to be able to do that I want to show you another chart that

suggests there are developers. This shows you a figure that is not

widely known, there are now every year 100,000 more women applying for

university than men. 100,000 more. Women from poor backgrounds are 50%

more likely to go to university than men. Women now take most of the

first in medicine and law, two professions that are pretty well

paid. Again, isn't this sense that, even in the later years, now, the

gender pay gap could begin to resolve itself?

I really hope so the TUC analysis shows that at this rate of change it

would take another 45 years. No I looked at these figures. Frances

O'Grady, you took one year of the pay gap, which strode it came down

by 0.2%. Dodt which showed. If you had taken the last ten years it

still takes too long but it is not 47 years, that was a propaganda

figure. You can't do a trend on one year. Most people agree we need bold

action to change it. Given we have agreed that it is a complicated

picture and now becomes an issue primarily for women who have taken

time off and then go back into the workforce again, get me one thing

that the government could do that would stop this gender pay gap

re-emerging in their 30s and 40s? Stop cuts to nurseries. Provide a

proper system of care for old people, that allows women and men to

combine those caring responsibilities with a responsible

job. That is what would really make... I can see how it would help.

It is about progression and people feeling they can go for that

promotion or training course that would get them a better job. And

having the confidence to do it, that their life won't fall apart if they

tried. If the TUC wanted to be ahead of the curve, should you not now be

giving a lot more attention to the growing underperformance of young

males, particularly from poorer backgrounds in education and the

workforce? That is a looming problem. Believe you me, we do, we

do. We've been fighting very hard for not just more apprenticeships

but real quality apprenticeships. Equal opportunities for all. That

would help. There are a lot of young men who want to be as involved in

bringing up their children as their partners do. Why doesn't the TUC

practice what it preaches when it comes to gender equality? Only three

of the largest ten unions are led by women even though most unions have a

female majority membership. Being a national offices in the unions are

lower than the percentage of the night union members. Eight out of

ten. And seven out of ten unions have women where they are

significantly underrepresented on the national executive. Of the TUC

delegation is. Even though women are majority membership. As you know,

the picture has changed dramatically over the last few years. We do just

have three in ten union leaders elected on average. That is a big

change, it is a lot better than the board room and a hell of a lot

better than many sat around the Cabinet table. It is still not that

great. 74% female membership. Only 70% full time. 75% TUC delegation

and only 28 on the TUC. Led by a woman general secretary. You have a

way to go. For the first time in history it is 50-50. We are

committed. We want to work with businesses who want to make that

change. I am delighted to say. He loves unions. Thank you.

It's just gone 11:30am, you're watching the Sunday Politics.

We say goodbye to viewers in Scotland who leave us now

Coming up here in 20 minutes, The Week Ahead.

First though, the Sunday Politics where you are.

Few gave him much hope eight years ago but he won twice.

And as the curtain comes down, how does he think he did?

To help us mark his card, Tania Mathias, Conservative

MP for Twickenham, and Keir Starmer, Labour MP

I want to start with a quick word about the Met Commissioner,

He's got only a one-year extension to his contract.

At the same time he's just asked a judge to look at how the Met has

been dealing with historical sex abuse enquiries.

Are these things connected, do you think this has cast

I wouldn't say it's cast a shadow until that has been investigated.

For me the one-year makes a lot of sense because of the mayoral

It gives a new incoming mayor an ability to legitimise Bernard

Yeah, I think the relationship between the mayor and

the commissioner is a really important one,

and it makes sense for the incoming mayor to have the chance to look

But I worked with Bernard when I was Director of Public

I think on the big things in London he has done

Does it look to you, though, that he's had to bring in this judge

to look at the way they do things, and has also raised questions

about whether we regard victims or their accounts in the same way,

I think we should always look at any issue such as this.

Check the way things have been done, get somebody to look independently

With victims we veer from one side of the road to the other.

We've been doing this for years and we've got to be careful not

to steer and oversteer the whole time.

What's your observation been about how this has become

And this sense that he should be apologising to people?

Well, apologies are always difficult for any investigation.

If we were to apologise every time someone was investigated and not

charged, there would have had to have been an apology

to Jimmy Savile, because of course he was investigated and not charged.

I don't think many people would be comfortable with the idea that,

as a general rule, when somebody is investigated and not charged

they should be entitled to an apology.

If of course it transpires that something went wrong

with a particular investigation then of course there should

But I don't think it should follow as a rule that

if there is an investigation that does not lead to a charge,

I'm sure Bernard, if the review says in this case something went wrong,

You said it was important for the mayoralty, but do you think

this has cast a shadow over his tenure?

No, I think people will judge him on crime generally for London,

and the good results that London has had.

But also what I was wondering on the apology was, can you not then

acknowledge people's experience their hurt, without legally saying

He has actually expressed regret, I think.

It is a huge strain on anybody investigating circumstances

like that, and you can and we should acknowledge it.

If someone is in charge they are entitled to be treated

But I just think the general rule or feeling should be that an apology

is trouble some, because do we really think Jimmy Savile should

We would be talking about whether it was appropriate.

We must move on because we have a lot to get through.

Soon there will be a new narrative taking hold at City Hall,

and we'll be saying farewell to Boris Johnson.

If he was seriously underestimated at the beginning, is used his two

victories and time at City Hall to turn round his own political

fortunes, and who knows what comes next.

As an enthusiast of the ancient world, Boris Johnson will be well

acquainted with the British Museum, home to many of antiquity's finest

treasures, including this, the statue thought to have inspired

which reflects on how great men are seen through history.

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings.

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.

Now Boris Johnson has just 12 weeks left as Mayor of London.

So the question now really is this, when people look back

through history at his eight years running London,

will they judge him as a man of monumental achievements,

or just another bloke forgotten in the sands of time?

There's no question that in office he's made many Londoners laugh.

Others feel a little better about living in what he likes

The skyline has been transformed, the Olympics hosted,

and the city left with cable cars, bikes, buses and cycle lanes.

But according to Sarah Sands, editor of the Boris-supporting

Evening Standard, a vital part was neglected in this flurry

He was the one who said this was going to be this great city

this magnet, the population was going to grow to ten million

And actually he's been very good at planning for it in transport

terms, he's been a great champion of Crossrail and getting

On housing I think in principle he's been for it, but Boris isn't that

And I think housing is so much about process.

So when taking in the good and the bad, what might his

We asked political cartoonist Martin Rowson for his impression.

I portrayed him in this classical pose as a mixture between Pericles

and Achilles, crowning himself with a crown of laurel leaves,

And behind him you can see these two people saying,

"Don't know, and will never get through the cycle lane

Think that more or less sums up Boris's legacy.

This week the mayor announced three new cycle superhighways,

but interestingly the Conservative candidate for mayor this year,

Zac Goldsmith, said that he'd consider ripping them all up.

Certainly the last few weeks in office will be ones

in which he can help secure a legacy, but also of course put

down some interesting challenges for his successor.

So by announcing things now, it makes it slightly more difficult

than if they hadn't been announced, for his successor now to pull back

from them if they choose not to do something.

The introduction of the night tube is also uncertain.

There has been resistance from trade unions, and while once it was due

to start in September it may now be the legacy of some future mayor

The Garden Bridge, though, may not even have that luxury.

Mired in controversy over the procurement process,

this week the Royal Institute of British Architects said that

And according to Kevin Craig, a local Labour councillor

in Lambeth, it's 50/50 whether the project will go

There is every chance that the Garden Bridge will not be

The project is in doubt, the funding is not secured,

and with every day that passes as we approach the end of Boris s

reign, more voices come out and say the process the bridge was procured

by is flawed, and needs to be done again.

So while there may not be much time left, there is still plenty

Boris Johnson could do to determine how his legacy is set in stone.

And Boris Johnson is here, and welcome to you.

Not mentioned there, but one really big legacy question,

can you tell the city Corporation, all the London business

organisations, that you are ready to recommend staying in the EU,

Whatever happens, I think what you could say is that under

this mayoralty, London is by far and away the economic powerhouse

It's the commercial, financial, cultural,

Last year London had 18.8 million visitors, we knocked Paris

off number one spot, New York.

As you saw in the bit about housing, it's the only city in Europe

where the population has been growing so fast,

the demand to live in London is so high, that that's really

You remember back when I started out, they are having

mayoral hustings now, when I did hustings back in 200 ,

We had to respond to the demand for housing in London.

Contrary to what Sarah said in that otherwise excellent film,

Housing in one moment, but one last thing, commentators

are saying you haven't got the courage to put

Can you just clarify what your position will be?

I can tell you that I'm going to wait until the Prime Minister

does his deal and I will then come off the fence.

Whatever happens you will hear a lot from me.

The salient point is this, that London is now

People thinking about Britain in Europe, Britain out of Europe,

should recognise that a lot of the investment we attract now

is from places outside the EU, export increasingly outside the EU.

I think a lot of good reasons to be positive about Europe

Does it not cast a really big shadow?

Do you not feel pangs, do you not feel bad that this

housing crisis has got worse, and it has got worse on your watch?

Well, I mean, I think, as I said earlier on,

the struggle to find housing in London is obviously something

that is very important for huge numbers of people.

What I would say in defence of what we've tried to do,

we have built a record number of affordable homes.

I can see that Keir is bubbling with a question.

It's all right, he will come in in a minute.

Let me give you an example, which is the First Steps scheme

where we've built 52,000 homes and got Londoners into family

properties very often where the average household income

of people who have bought those homes is ?37,000 a year.

That, for two people, does not seem to me to be bad.

If you are saying that the challenge is huge, and we should be

doing more, then yes I perfectly accept that.

But what we are doing is putting in the transport infrastructure that

will liberate those brownfield sites.

Frankly I have just cycled here from City Hall,

I looked around at the cranes, there has never been a period

of building like this in London in my memory.

When people look back at your mayoralty do you think

people will think that you have grappled really hard

with these housing issues, and you have come up with anything

I do, and I think you will see that the plans we put in place

with the housing zones, with the First Steps schemes,

with continuing to drive forward new affordable housing,

low-cost homes, on sites that nobody thought could be got away.

Look at Battersea, Vauxhall, Battersea, everybody complains

and says it all for rich foreigners, that's not true, there is plenty

None of that would have been possible.

The only affordable housing approved there is for people on ?45,000,

Look at what's happening in Greenwich.

You almost introduced him a second ago, let's bring him in.

I have family after family who are in council accommodation,

housing association accommodation, where there is massive

overcrowding, usually mum, dad, two or three kids,

with one bedroom, and that crisis of housing has not got better.

I can totally understand that, but what has happened in London

since I have been mayor is the population has actually

And it's going to keep rising, and that is because of

Why didn't we prepare, you are asking?

Actually we did prepare but what you can't count

for is the fantastic success of the city.

We are now seeing building at scale and pace.

People are telling you in Twickenham that generations of young people's

hopes have been dashed, and it's happened under this mayor.

We don't have that in Twickenham actually.

It is interesting what you are saying about people

Because in my area, the council realised people want to live

and stay in the area, so it's actually the local planning

made it family homes, so we are trying to minimise

They are certainly not affordable in that neck of the woods.

Exactly what you said, Boris, when you first were in hustings

It is now the main issue of all the hustings

It is the main issue as a new MP with your party parliamentary group.

And I think there will be, and this is the good thing,

a cross-party way of addressing London's needs.

For me the main thing is key workers, keeping people

You will be seen, won't you, as a cycling mayor?

A mayor who has done so much to promote cycling.

Don't think you would have said that a few years ago.

We've watched it stuttering, haven't we?

You've arrived very late to what people seem to be saying

in terms of cycling is working well, do you regret that you clearly

didn't think this through to begin with or you didn't have

Cycling has more or less doubled since I've been mayor and I do think

it's a wonderful thing about living in London.

It makes it a much better place to live in, move around in.

We are seeing huge numbers of people cycle who never thought

People who are vulnerable cyclists who maybe had been scared before.

Now I think what you are saying is, could the initial cycle superhighway

Could you have succeeded in achieving your 12 superhighways?

Could it have protected a lot more cyclists who got hurt?

I think we've learnt an awful lot along the way.

London is a very old city with very constricted road space.

As Martin Rowson was saying in his cartoon bit, people

are complaining about the delays caused by the cycle superhighway.

I assure you all my friends in Parliament are so cross with me,

There will come an end to these roadworks.

And then you will have fantastic segregated cycle superhighways.

What I really hope is that the future mayor,

whoever he or she may be, continues that programme

of investment in cycle safety and improving London's roads.

It would be a disaster if we were to have a mayor

who were to take ?2 billion out of London's transport budgets that

could otherwise be spent on great projects for the infrastructure

What do you say looking ahead about how you have left future

transport investment, given that you have not been able

to persuade the Chancellor, George Osborne, to reverse

the decision to cut ?3 billion over the next four or five years

in investment, what happened there and why did you fail on that?

I had TFL in yesterday afternoon going through the whole thing,

every single one of our major infrastructure projects we can

But how did you fail on that so fundamentally, on that money

Don't forget, when I came in as mayor we had the worst

financial crunch the city has seen for 50 years,

Crossrail itself was on the block, they were going to chop Crossrail.

We've got it now coming in on time and on budget.

This Chancellor, this Conservative government is actually now

about to go ahead with Crossrail Two, which will be

You raise the issue about a future Labour mayor, some kind of black

hole which you and other Conservative colleagues are talking

about, it brings us nicely to look at the rest of the news in 60

seconds which begins with a relevant item.

The controversy continues over Labour mayoral candidate

Sadiq Khan's promise to freeze transport fares for four years.

He says it will cost just ?452 million, a claim that had been

publicly contradicted by Transport for London,

who circulated a figure of ?1.9 billion.

This week however transport for London Commissioner Mike Brown

publicly confirmed that the cost would be less, as their figure

was based on a five-year period not the four-year length

Staying with transport, and the transport union the RMT this

week suspended two Tube strikes over the safety of maintenance

staff and shift changes to track patrol workers.

However there remain six further 24-hour strikes planned over

Drivers using Tower Bridge will be encouraged to stop idling

and switch their engines off when the bridge is opening to help

lower emissions and boost air quality.

The scheme is jointly funded by Southwark,

Tower Hamlets and the Mayor of London.

Keir Starmer, are Sadiq Khan's plans feasible?

Will they deny TFL much-needed income?

I think most Londoners would say that their fares have gone up

It is becoming a significant part of their take-home pay to get

So he is absolutely right to introduce a freeze.

Obviously there is an argument about the numbers but he is right

I think what you had yesterday from Mike Brown at TFL was a clear

confirmation that it is a ?1.9 billion cost over the business plan.

You made the decision not to raise fares, so by not raising fares,

You didn't raise them 1% above inflation, which is what TFL

wanted, so you yourself have denied them income and you are accusing him

On the contrary, we had a very steady fares system.

What we haven't done is gone in promising cuts and then lurching

If you haven't given TFL 1% above inflation

which they thought they were going to get for three

years, you have denied them that money as well.

If you go ahead with what the Labour candidate is promising in classic

Livingstonian form, and by the way he has yet to rule out

that he is going to bring back Ken...

He is offering a fares cut that will be unaffordable for London

and will lead to us having to cut staff.

People commuting from Twickenham will not want to be paying huge 1%

What people in Twickenham need and I very much hope TFL take

over our services, what we need is more regular services.

That has been one of the legacies, and we need that in our area,

They are much more likely to get that, if I may say so,

with a Conservative mayor, working with the government

in a cooperative way to deliver better train services.

Keir Starmer, try and encapsulate if you can, how do you think he has

I think Boris is Boris, he is a one-off.

We touched on the major issue which is housing,

and housing for people in mine and many constituencies simply don't

have houses they can actually afford.

It is very difficult to pin Boris down.

I want to give you this chance to end on this note,

A rocky start to your mayoralty but then you got your head round it

all, and you had a successful Olympics, do you feel it

Asking about me, yes, it's the most absorbing

and demanding job anybody could possibly imagine,

I cannot believe that Labour created the mayoralty in the knowledge

that it could be conceivably won by a Conservative politician.

But it is the most wonderful job in British politics.

It's been an absolute privilege to do.

If you ask me other things we could have got right

at the beginning, of course there are.

But I think that overall I have a fantastic team

at City Hall, some amazingly gifted people who helped me do it.

Broadly speaking the results have been very good so far.

On that note, thank you very much indeed.

Presumably, next time we see you may be as a humble member

or you could be doing something else.

Very proud to represent Uxbridge and South Ruislip.

MPs are on their half term holiday at the moment, so you might be

forgiven for thinking we'll be in for a quiet time next week.

On Thursday, David Cameron heads to Brussels where he hopes

to finalise his deal on Britain s membership of the EU at what's been

dubbed the "crunch" European summit.

We will see how crunchy it is. Tim, Mr Hammond, the Foreign Secretary

this morning, Matthew Hancock on this programme, they both said,

let's see what the final deal is because there could be more in it

than the draft settlement, more for the British government. I would

suggest that the draft settlement for Mr Cameron is as good as it

gets. That may well be the case journalists have been seeking

rabbits from hats for many weeks, taking them out, and Eurosceptics

have been shooting them long before David Cameron got anywhere near it.

One thing I understand David Cameron will do before next weekend, he can

explain what he means by this sovereignty lock, the sovereign

Parliament will be... That is all smoke and mirrors. It is but it is

the one thing he has got left. It is something they can do in domestic

law and explain how the Supreme Court here will hold the European

Court to the letter of the European treaty. It is effectively getting a

British court to say that the European Court is not adhering to

its own treaties. If the summit finishes on Friday I suspect he will

unveil that either at a press conference or we will see him doing

Andrew Marr next Sunday and telling the world all about it. He is going

to do Andrew Marr next Sunday. Politically the Prime Minister would

be in trouble with his own party if this deal was further watered down,

wouldn't he? He needed to be strengthened. I'm hearing stories

coming out of Brussels saying there is a rabbit or two, but whether they

are tiny little rabbits or great big ones I don't know. I think this is a

campaign that will be won by fear, not by terrific bribes and isn't the

deal wonderful? What Philip Hammond said this morning was very

important, that if we vote to leave, Europe will make sure our conditions

are as bad as possible for fear of the whole thing falling apart, other

countries peeling off. That's the serious threat. The idea that we

will get a wonderful deal out of Europe or that France will go on

being our border guards and look after our camp in Calais, I think

it's those sorts of fears that will win it. If Mr Sarkozy wins in

France, it could change the camp whether we are in or outcome he is

campaigning on that. He could, that's true. Next year is next year.

The problem with all these things, like the out campaign saying if in,

Europe will react like this, none of that is provable until it happens.

We had a close colleague of Angela Merkel today warning that it would

be bloody, our terms, if we leave. And why shouldn't they say that

There's no point in issuing the threat afterwards. If they want to

threaten, now is the time. Doesn't mean he's not a good man just

because we haven't heard from him, but we haven't. It seems, I was

suggesting, that Michael Gove, in terms of which Cabinet ministers are

going to go with remain and which ones are going to go without, it

seems that Michael Gove is becoming the pivotal figure, here.

Suggestions that if he decides to go out, and apparently he is incredibly

anguished about this, Boris Johnson could well follow. If he doesn't,

they might not. Michael Gove is genuinely torn. Downing Street were

very confident at the beginning of this year that Michael Gove would be

with the Prime Minister. But anybody that has no Michael Gove, and are

used to be his colleague, he will know that in his heart of hearts he

would like to get Britain out of the European Union, it is as simple as

that. At he knows that if he campaigns to take Britain out of

Europe, what he is essentially doing is joining a campaign which, if

successful, will destroy David Cameron's Korea, and George

Osborne's and hand the Tory leadership to the two people in the

Conservative Party he loathes more than anybody else, Theresa May and

Boris Johnson. So he is torn. The thing about Boris Johnson, in his

heart of hearts, believes Britain should be in the European Union But

there is one thing Boris Johnson believes more than that, which is

that Boris Johnson should be Prime Minister. Therefore he needs to do

what is best for that, which is why he needs this sort of thing.

Grateful for that blinding revelation that Boris Johnson wants

to be Prime Minister. If Cameron can keep Michael Gove on board, there

will be fewer defections other than the usual suspects? I think that's

right. Somebody described him to me as the big Domino and if he falls,

others could. Cameron is trying quite hard. He had Gove in last week

trying to persuade him. What they think they've got is an enlargement

from Gove that if he does opt to follow his conscience and vote out

he will not do much campaigning I suspect he would do one interview

and sit the thing out, and they think if he is not out there leading

it, that will not do quite as much damage. We know Alan Johnson is

heading up the labour effort to stay in, but is Jeremy Corbyn really

going to campaign hard to stay in? Is the Labour Party going to spend

money on this campaign? I very much doubt it. It's not in his heart His

instincts are to pick up the wrong issue, today there he is saying that

he thinks Cameron is wrong on immigration, we should have much

easier immigration, he shouldn't be trying to cut back the number of EU

migrants coming into the country. That is no way to win it, I presume

he knows it. It's very important that Labour voters are brought on

board. Mr Cameron needs them, too. Cameron really needs Labour voters.

It ought to be the great, strong, uniting message for Labour.

Virtually all Labour MPs are strongly in favour part from a

maverick hand. Quite the clear majority of the Parliamentary party.

It should have been a big contrast, Labour pro-European, Tories all over

the place. I'm afraid Jeremy Corbyn will muddy that.

final debate when he laid into the European Union. He hates the new

free trade area. He said he would support our membership but push four

reform from within. A few days before the big summit which is meant

to clinch it one way or the other are we heading for a June 23

referendum? Almost certainly and thank God. So we can plan our summer

holidays and ministers and advisers feel the same. Never mind about the

needs of the nation. It looks like there will be some kind of deal and

they may give him a bit more in some areas. Cameron is determined to

press on with this, he does not want this hanging over his government.

Every Monday he Will have backed out of the

referendum, that is a factor in several politicians cut relations

right now. As I discovered, the front runners have been very coy

about it all. What is this about? A programme about the Tory leadership.

What on earth is the relevance of that to your

many millions of viewers when you consider that there is no,

thankfully, thankfully, and there is no vacancy

Nor is there going to be one for a very long time.

Oh well, maybe I'll get lucky with some of the other

Apparently, Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, might

Speculation surrounds the Welsh Secretary,

Stephen Crabb, Education Secretary Nicky Morgan

once a female candidate, preferably her.

Defra Secretary, Liz Truss is repeated to be ambitious.

There are mutterings about Business Secretary,

Sajid Javid, but is he really angling to be the next

And is a leadership bid while Michael Gove is swinging over

which side to back in the referendum.

Energy Minister, Andrea Leadsom is holding surgeries in the Commons

tearoom and a mystery member of the 2015 intake is rumoured

to have big plans and Employment Minister and arch

Eurosceptic Priti Patel is expected to have a profile-boosting

role in the Out Campaign and then there is Liam Fox.

This week, a poll on the website run by

Paul Goodman found that the former Defence Secretary was favourite

If you speculate that the hard right of Conservative Party membership,

is about a fifth of it, that sounds fair enough.

What was remarkable about his score was in fact how low it was,

it was the joint-lowest score for a leading

A lot of this is total nonsense, but it presages

potentially three years of Tory leadership gossip for the people

The Tory party would be in a leadership crisis but the country

would be in a huge political crisis. It would go on for years. It would

take at least smack years of very painful negotiations, maybe longer,

to get us out of these treaties Nobody has done it before, nobody

knows what it would look like. Cameron would have to go. The

humiliation would be appalling. Osborne's chances would be shot to

pieces. By then, the country might have changed its mind and be upset

by having narrowly voted against for getting out. They might regret it.

Where does that leave whoever the future leader is? Do you agree? This

whole contest will boil down to several binary choices, in and out

of Europe, George Osborne and not George Osborne. Boris Johnson Atmos

Boris Johnson. Woman and man. - or not Boris Johnson. Depending on the

circumstances we will find a leader. The young and old. 2015 intake are

getting bored about George Osborne is nearly inevitable and if not him,

Boris Johnson. They are thinking about running one of their own.

There are names that we haven't even considered that may enter the fray.

David Cameron might not go immediately but if he has to go he

would be the walking wounded through the summer and into the autumn. Mr

George Osborne probably the same. He kind of throws everything open. It

stars. There is a lot of chat amongst ministers about what happens

if we vote to leave -- it does. The Prime Minister says we trigger at

ago 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, two years negotiation and I should do

that -- at Article 50. One school of thought is that the prime and will

bring in David Davies as the Deputy Prime Minister and lead the exit

negotiations but I can't see that. I think that will be a leadership

contest and the defining feature is who is the best person to lead those

exit negotiations. And you would assume that a minister who has said

we should leave would be best placed. Maybe it will be possible to

have administered through said we should be in but maybe not wholly

involved in the remaining campaign. A good Eurosceptic track record

Boris Johnson? Theresa May Possibly. Do you want Boris Johnson

negotiating the future of the treaty over two years? I think Boris

Johnson's position will be weaker than anyone things because of the

dithering. It is so transparent and nakedly ambitious. Whether he is

fought in or out. Anybody who is interested in politics feels

passionately in or out and he can't pretend to be waiting for these

minor negotiations on this fundamental issue that he has

tackled all his life. Even if we wrote to remain, what is your view

on what is sometimes called even if we vote to remain, the

Conservatives, whose heart would not have been in remaining, will want

someone to lead them after Mr Cameron, much later, who was Brexit?

There is a strong case for that Most of the polls suggest that 0%

of the conservative grassroot is a Brexitier. There are polls which

show, to speak up for Boris, that he is wildly more popular than any

other conservative. There are conservative MPs who will look at

those polls, the one in the Independent this morning he is the

only main stream politician who has a positive rating. This is a 2-stage

process, the MPs put you on the ballot paper, the grassroots people

select you. Only two names go forward. You need to get past the

MPs and then make your case to the wider. If Boris gets through, to

being one of the final two, given his popularity with the Tory

grassroots, could change, it could be skin deep, I don't know, but

wouldn't he be an unstoppable? He doesn't have a huge backing at

Westminster, a lot of MPs don't know him. Will he survive the rigours of

a campaign? The interview on the Andrew Marr show, he faced awkward

questions about one of his friends. You assume he will get through that

process. We are talking about a contest after we have voted to stay

in. Important lesson from 1975, Harold Wilson was a massively

strengthened after that win. He moved Tony Benn at the crucial post

of industry because he was very strong. The Prime Minister will

pretty strong on that. Remember, if it's Sunday,

it's the Sunday Politics.