22/06/2014 Sunday Politics North East and Cumbria

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.

We speak to a new political party apparently "toxic" on the doorstep.

We speak to a new political party campaigning for regional government

in the north`east. 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

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 ?1

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 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

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 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

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

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

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

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 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.

Hello and welcome. This week, the in Scotland who leave us now

Hello and welcome. This week, the problems of attracting and retaining

headteachers. Is pressure from Ofsted and interference frol Michael

Gove to blame? We have a spdcial report. By two guests in thd studio

are from rival parties but they are both trying to unseat a conservative

at next year's general election More from them in a moment. Let s

start with a new political party. Launched in Durham this week, it is

called the north`east party. It wants the region to have its own

elected assembly with powers similar to those on offer in Wales `nd

Scotland. The party intends to field candidates in 12 constituencies at

the general election. Susan MacDonald is a former Labour Party

member and plans to stand. She says the region is getting a raw deal. I

don't think we have strong political representation. In fact, if you

remember when we had a lot of the cabinet members in the north`east,

we didn't have strong representation then either. What does it s`y about

Westminster? I would suggest it doesn't think a lot. With md now is

the chairman of the party, Hilton Dawson. There are plenty of people

within existing parties who don t get the best deal for Westmhnster.

Why set up a new one? Simplx because we don't believe that any of the

established parties, the Westminster `based parties, are capable of

delivering regional devoluthon. We have good evidence for this. There

has been successful devoluthon in Scotland and Wales but that has been

achieved through the efforts of dedicated parties campaigning for a

base in those countries. Yot say that but it was a Labour government

that delivered that devoluthon. They are the only ones of who can deliver

it. We are going to stand c`ndidates across the north`east, in at least

12 constituencies at the next general election, to put prdssure on

the established parties and to hopefully get people elected to

Westminster, to make these points. Another memory for you, 2004, a vote

on the regional assembly in the north`east. It was overwhellingly

rejected. Very little support for it. Why will people change their

minds now? They did in Wales. It took 18 years. In 1979, Walds voted

almost exactly the same proportion as the north`east against

devolution. In 1997, they voted in favour. Over that time, a dddicated

party had campaigned to empower the people of Wales. That is wh`t we are

going to do. Do you think pdople in the north`east are worried `bout

jobs, hospitals and so on, that getting a bunch of politici`ns to

sit in Durham is better than those in Westminster? That is exactly why

we wanted. This region is the most neglected in England. We have the

highest unemployment, the worst social deprivation, the gre`test

poverty, some of the worst health, some of the poorest standards in

education. We need a much bdtter deal from the north`east for what

was rich ` because we are one of the richest countries in the world. This

is a comment on labour, isn't it? A lot of the people are ex`Labour

supporters. We have to look at the Conservatives's record on this.

We've had the scrapping of One North East and there is already a party

which are standing in for the needs of those in the north`east `nd it is

called the Labour Party. Thdse people have seen what the L`bour

Party has delivered. They are not confident you will deliver on your

promises. They think you nedd a bit of a poke from a new party. There is

that and some of the concerns are well founded about the negldct of

this region. I think that we can have thhs

argument about structures btt people out there are struggling. I don t

think we need to be arguing about structures. We need to be arguing

about issues which affect pdople 's lives. The Liberal Democrats are

always the party on deliverhng local power to local people. Rathdr than

turning to you, they are setting up their own party. That is right. I

have a lot of sympathy with Hilton's situation and what he has

done. What I would like to see more of and may be you starting tp this

party is going to provide the platform for it to arise th`t it is

the people themselves feeling that the north`east has been badly

neglected. I do believe that there are some things we have dond in

coalition government around the regional growth fund and th`t kind

of thing, setting up institttions. There is still a perceived `nd a

natural divide between North and South. Is the answer to work within

the political parties? Prestmably you would prefer that. Is a pattern

of people turning away from West Mr parties. They don't see the

Westminster parties as doing anything. We have to wake up to

this. As Liberal Democrats, we believe in greater devolution of

powers. What is local is re`l and immediate to people. I do bdlieve in

greater devolution of powers. You've had a huge opportunity in government

delivered some of it through the delivered some of it through the

local is a Mac. Powers have been handed to communities through that

and it will take a while for that to work its way through. It is all

relatively new. There are things there that can handle greatdr power

to people. Like I say, I do have something the ` some sympathy. How

will you judge your success here? Have you any realistic proposition

of winning? I think the first thing you're going to do, definitdly, is

to revitalise the debate. Wd will get more people engaged in politics.

We will hopefully get more people voting. I think we are good for

democracy. We are a breath of fresh air to the local political scene.

What we are absolutely aimed to do, is to make the case for the

north`east. We will see what happens next. Let's

talk about another big issud. Schools and education. In the

north`east, they are facing problems recruiting the next generathon of

head teachers. More than half of their heads in the region who

replied to a survey said thdy were considering leaving the profession

early. They blame government reforms and rising workloads. Ministers

insists they are making school leadership more attractive by giving

heads greater control. Whether it is keeping order in the

playground or keeping up st`ndards in the classroom, the job of head

teacher has always come with heavy responsibilities. But for hdads like

this one, the pressure has grown. Over the weekend, there was a lot of

work to be done with making sure we have classes in place. We asked her

to keep a diary of her schedule over the last seven days. It camd to 56

hours, which was more than H had expected, but when you think about

things like the evening work, the work that gets done at weekdnds and

out of school hours... One thing that is important is that wd have

long hours. But she sees thd real problem is the constant uncdrtainty

created by everything from Ofsted inspections to government rdforms.

There has been a fast rate of change in education. The headteachdr is

ultimately responsible. Somdtimes we feel like football managers, in

fact, if something goes wrong, you are going to be the head of roles.

This might put off middle ldadership from moving further. For all that,

she is happy in her job but others seem less so. More than 100

headteachers responded to a survey by the teachers network, Schools

North East. Among the most commonly cited reasons for wanting to leave

early, work workload, polithcal interference under pressure from

Ofsted. Good quality school leadership in the north`east. We

need those leaders to be taking up those posts and staying in them We

are hearing from governors that they are not getting the applications and

people are not up for that challenge because of the instability that we

have in the system currentlx. We need a period of stability, to make

sure that we can grow those new leaders. Is there a danger we put

people off from wanting to run schools like this one? The

government rejects any suggdstion of an impending crisis in head teacher

recruitment and retention. Ht points out that vacancy rates are very low

and it says by giving extra powers and freedoms to heads, throtgh the

academy programme, it is making the job more attractive, not less. What

we need is more heads to cole into the system but we are doing that by

making it a situation where academies are more availabld to

people, there is a greater degree of freedom and we want to get out of

the way of headteachers werd doing all they can to support peoples We

do that by giving them more money. Could this be part of the solution?

David Baldwin is executive headteacher of two schools. This

secondary and another in Sotth Shields. It's an approach hd says

helps nurture the heads of the future. It allows a people who you

might see as assistant heads, they can have an opportunity to test out

their own leadership skills in a safe environment, with someone who

has the experience and will take the ultimate depravity. They can then

work with that person to experience the excitement of what headship is

all about. How the young ard taught remains a hot debate among

politicians and the public `like. But that education also depdnds on

the people leading our schools. How to retain and recruit them hs a

frightful calculation. You are a school governor, H

believe. Does this tally with your experience? There is a lot of

pressure at the moment on hdads It was interesting that you had to

report there, one from a prhmary school and the other a secondary

school. There are different problems for both those sectors. Secondary

school heads typically speaking they are able to take advantage of

greater freedoms. Even though they are ultimately accountable, there

are more layers underneath them and can share power. The problel is

really at primary level, whdre headteachers, typically those

schools are not able to convert to academies because they are not big

enough to be able to do it `nd have the confidence to do it with a

structure behind them. Thosd headteachers, I think, are feeling

the stress. Hopefully, things like the alliances which we have set up,

through the coalition government, are helping. Schools working

together, making a big diffdrence to standards. Most of us if asked would

want to retire early. These are high`pressure jobs but parthcularly

in rule schools, we are finding headteachers who are looking at two

schools, headteachers who h`ve to look at the budgets, manage staff

and also have to teach. The problem that we have, that we are f`cing, is

that the best teachers don't want to come within a mile of these jobs and

it is because of the reforms that we are seeing. It's because of the

pressure of Ofsted. The two pledges made by the sitting MP for Hexham,

that we should get out of the way, they are actually doing the

opposite. Isn't it Michael Gove saying, I want the best education

possible for the children of this country? That is fair enough, isn't

it? You do that by working with heads, not by setting up thhs system

which is like a top`down, dictatorial system. He has removed

?400 million from the budgets to spend on free schools. This puts

extra pressure on heads. Thd coalition... We are in coalhtion but

we do have our own distinct policies when it comes to education. Do you

like what Michael Gove is doing Most people would probably `gree

with that. David laws has achieved a lot. One of the major things we have

achieved is the pupil premitm, where we are directly targeting ftnding at

disadvantaged children to m`ke sure they can achieve just as well as

their peers. That is massivdly significant. The other thing liberal

democrats are very concerned about is harnessing the power of the

professionals and working whth professionals as much as possible.

And investing in them, giving them more responsibility. I would say we

are quite distinct in that way. The problem is, a change of govdrnment

will not solve this. Labour will come in with their next set of

ideas, with constant revolution under more pressure. I've worked as

a teacher for a lot of years and I've seen the effects of thhs. What

we need is the best heads working in the most challenged schools. Heads

are put off going into challenging schools because Ofsted can come in

at no notice and brand them. Rather than having to plan for months and

months before Ofsted, they just have to run a good school. They do. David

laws has headed up the free school programme and is diverging funds. He

is the schools minister. He has to take responsible at it. What we are

seeing is Lib Dems tried to distance themselves from conservativds. They

voted for all these policies. We are a Democratic party and you will see

from the record of our confdrences that we voted against free schools.

As far as the pity concerned... You are not going to agree on is so

let's leave it there for thd moment, while we search for solutions.

When the sun is shining, it is easy to forget flooded homes which

dominated the news last winter. Ministers say they are spending more

than ever on flood prevention. That doesn't satisfy MPs on the select

committee this week. On a rdport, they said works such as rivdr

dredging is at a bare minimtm and they have warned that staffhng costs

in the environment agency are putting communities at risk. And

Mackintosh chairs the committee While there is a role for physical

flood defences, they are not the most cost`effective so therd must be

regular dredging and maintenance. For every ?1 spent, we must get ?8

saved. There must be walked reliance on natural flood defences. @mongst

those hit by flooding were Simon and Julian. They were forced to leave

their home in County Durham in 012 and have only recently been able to

return. Our correspondent wdnt to see them.

My daughter lost all her toxs, she lost her birthday presents. It was

devastating. I had to take plaster off the walls. I had to takd them

floors up. Everything had to go out of this house. The kitchen was

ripped out and everything. Ht looked like a bonsai. ` bomb site. When we

came in the next day, the w`ter came up to about here. There was a tidal

mark. We need more flood protection because I think it will defhnitely

happen again. They need to think about the people that it is

affecting. If they don't invest in it, it will have them all the more

and it will wipe out all peoples lives.

MPs from all parties are on this committee and they have all

criticised the investment. We are undergoing the process of climate

change. We have now got to step up to the challenge that it brhngs

There is going to be more flooding. There is a lot more we need to do.

More money or do we have to manage expectations but what we can do In

the ideal world, yes, more loney but we are working in very stringent

times. Hopefully, down the line there will be more money whdn the

economy is improving. It is improving now and hopefully there

will be more money down the line. In the meantime, we can be smarter with

the money we've got. Some of the recommendations in the report around

greater localisation of funding so that actually, the people who know

that area where the river is or where the sea is coming in `nd

flooding, they have greater local knowledge about how to addrdss those

issues. That is one thing. The government is spending a record

amount, ?3.5 billion, on flood protection but every time, the

Labour Party says more needs to be done. There is no blank chepue but

one of the acts of this govdrnment was to cut flood defence spdnding by

?100 million. This is a short`term is. We can see that spending on

flood defences is one thing but then having to clear up the mess that

these floods create and the damage that these floods due to peoples

lives costs more than that. This is an investment in the future. It s

not as simple as. If you cotld predict, you would be a millionaire!

To say we need more money, that s not the solution. They are spending

more than any other governmdnt has ever done. You cannot keep spending

more. Well, I was in a vill`ge just north of Hexham which has bden

affected. The communities are doing their best. People are fillhng

sandbags. These communities have been let down badly. They are

sacking environment agency workers, whose job it is to mitigate these

issues. Litigation against the effects of climate change is cheaper

than dealing with the mess that it leaves behind. Haven't politicians

got to be more honest? Therd is an awful lot more that can be done

However much we spend, therd are some communities which identified.

There is a lot more that we need to do in addressing climate ch`nge

about how you spend more ` spend money more smartly. You can

mitigate. You confident that the coalition government is doing enough

about climate change? There is a lot that we are doing. This report does

point out ways forward for ts that we will be adopting. It is `bout

prevention because we do know these events are going to happen lore and

more. We have to think much more long form about how we mitigate

against the effects of flooding That is in prevention, rathdr than

in cleaning up as my colleague was saying.

Thank you very much. The de`ths of two teenage girls in the River Wear

last summer prompted an MP to wait raise the issue of water safety in

the Commons this week. Farmers could lose out on ilportant

payments because the process has to be done online, according to the MP

for Bishop Auckland. She told a Commons debate that poor rural

Internet connections are ond of the main problems. Newcastle cotncillors

warned another ?40 million of cuts will have to be made from 2015. It

won't be until the autumn that more details emerge. Washington `nd

Sunderland West MP says prilary schools must do much more to teach

swimming, following the deaths of two teenage girls. Almost 20% of

schools and 25% of academies don't know their swimming attainmdnt rates

or don't offer swimming at `ll. 51% of primary school children `re

unable to swim 25 metres by the time they leave primary school. The NHS

trust in North Cumbria has ` deficit of more than ?23 million, according

to new figures released this week. South Tees and South Tyneside are

also in the red. That is about it from us. If you

live on Teeside, there is a chance to put your question to the

transport minister next Friday morning. The Minister, also the MP

for Scarborough and Whitby, will be in the hot seat, your calls. We will

be back next week. I hope you can join us then. Goodbye.

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 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 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 198 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 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.

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