Browse content similar to 19/05/2013. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
to turn our backs on the EU? One politician claims leaving the | :01:26. | :01:36. | |
:01:36. | :01:36. | ||
Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2156 seconds | :01:36. | :37:32. | |
European Union could end up costing Politics in the South East. Coming | :37:32. | :37:37. | |
up later, similar towns with the same problems but why did Labour win | :37:37. | :37:41. | |
seven out of eight county council seats in Hastings but only one out | :37:41. | :37:47. | |
of eight in Thanet? Joining me in the studio today is Conservative MP | :37:47. | :37:49. | |
for Rochester and Strood Mark Reckless and Labour Peer Lord Bassam | :37:49. | :37:53. | |
of Brighton. Welcome to you both. A year ago this month, the government | :37:53. | :38:03. | |
backed Portis town scheme -- Portas Towns Scheme was launched. This | :38:03. | :38:06. | |
week, the television programme Mary Queen of the High Street highlighted | :38:06. | :38:12. | |
the efforts made so far in Margate. The programme, starring Mary Portas, | :38:12. | :38:17. | |
did not go down well with former members of the Town Team, who | :38:17. | :38:21. | |
complained about the way they were portrayed. Roger Gale called it a | :38:22. | :38:26. | |
vanity project for the presenter. Do you think this was a vanity project | :38:26. | :38:30. | |
or an actually deserving way of spending government money? It was | :38:30. | :38:34. | |
trying out a new idea to revitalise some of our town centres and there | :38:34. | :38:38. | |
are 12 of them and I guess it will have worked in some and Mary Portas | :38:38. | :38:41. | |
will have, without good ideas and the local authority will have been | :38:41. | :38:46. | |
able to implement them. In sorry that has not worked in all of them | :38:46. | :38:51. | |
but I hope people visit Margate. danger is that you have a high | :38:51. | :38:55. | |
profile celebrity who gets involved with a relatively small amount of | :38:55. | :39:03. | |
money and it becomes hijacked by her. She has a reputation in if | :39:03. | :39:06. | |
people are complaining it has not been followed up, I suggest Mary | :39:06. | :39:14. | |
Portas listens to what they are complaining about and sorted out. | :39:14. | :39:20. | |
is funny that Brighton should need it? What can you do with �100,000? | :39:20. | :39:25. | |
It is a bit of a gimmick. I don't begrudge her involvement. It is a | :39:25. | :39:29. | |
good thing because it focused on retailers and that is a good slice | :39:29. | :39:33. | |
of Brighton and Hove business. I don't get it has had the impact it | :39:33. | :39:37. | |
needs to and if we are serious about city centre regeneration we need to | :39:37. | :39:43. | |
have a long-term plan and invest properly. | :39:43. | :39:47. | |
Euroscepticism appears to be alive and well in Kent and Sussex. Nine of | :39:47. | :39:51. | |
our MPs, including Mark, voted in favour to an amendment on the | :39:51. | :39:54. | |
Queen's Speech on the EU referendum earlier this week was that we'd | :39:54. | :39:57. | |
leaving the European Union cost us more than we would gain? Joining us | :39:57. | :40:04. | |
from Oxford is the Lib Dem MEP Catherine Bearder. You obviously | :40:04. | :40:10. | |
have a vested interest with the EU. You claim you would lose half a | :40:10. | :40:14. | |
million jobs in the region if we lost the EU for the boy did you get | :40:15. | :40:19. | |
that figure? It is not my figure. It is the Department of business that | :40:19. | :40:24. | |
came up with this figure. It is very difficult to come up with a figure. | :40:24. | :40:30. | |
We have a lot of inward investment from outside Europe who come to the | :40:30. | :40:37. | |
UK, knowing that they understand English air and the rest. But it is | :40:37. | :40:41. | |
into the European market, which is a free market. If we were to read draw | :40:41. | :40:48. | |
from that, we would lose that inward investment. We would then not have | :40:48. | :40:51. | |
trade deals with all of the countries in the European Union, | :40:51. | :40:59. | |
that is not just trade deals, such as tropical timber or anti-dumping | :40:59. | :41:05. | |
deals that we have with other countries. Just getting back to that | :41:05. | :41:07. | |
statistics because that is the headline that was bandied around | :41:07. | :41:11. | |
this week. You said yourself it was difficult to pin it down. That is | :41:11. | :41:16. | |
one of the problems you have. Departments of skills, business and | :41:16. | :41:21. | |
innovation except later from a 2006 report. It is hard to say. The BBC | :41:21. | :41:28. | |
have also tried to get the figure. It is more than just jobs. It is the | :41:28. | :41:35. | |
cultural funding, the cultural mixing, the right fork Brits to go | :41:35. | :41:40. | |
and live on the mainland in Europe, as it is for Europeans to comment | :41:40. | :41:43. | |
working. In Kent, or that any grass in the South East region, there are | :41:43. | :41:48. | |
people from all over Europe who like to live in Kent and commute to work | :41:48. | :41:55. | |
in Paris or Brussels or wherever. So it is's leaving would cut us off. We | :41:55. | :42:05. | |
:42:05. | :42:06. | ||
get a lot of funding, committee funding and cohesion funding. | :42:06. | :42:09. | |
your constituency, Mark, in Rochester, one and a half million | :42:09. | :42:13. | |
pounds of European funding has come in in the last four years. Do you | :42:13. | :42:18. | |
want to throw that away? We have paid far more into Europe than we | :42:18. | :42:25. | |
get back. �19 billion more last... Kent does not pay �19 billion was up | :42:25. | :42:35. | |
:42:35. | :42:37. | ||
I think they pay more than of a disproportionate amount. Vince Cable | :42:37. | :42:40. | |
cited the study. When people have looked into this study and gone and | :42:40. | :42:45. | |
spoken to the author of it, he said that is quite wrong, we won't lose 3 | :42:45. | :42:47. | |
million jobs or half a million. It might be quite positive and I have | :42:47. | :42:54. | |
been misquoted! You cannot use it for those purposes. The risk is, are | :42:54. | :42:58. | |
you going to risk it, even if it is half that number? Is that what you | :42:58. | :43:02. | |
really want for this country or are you actually going to see we are | :43:02. | :43:08. | |
part of a bigger unit and jobs for this country are as vital for this | :43:08. | :43:12. | |
country as they are for the rest of Europe. Are we going to see... What | :43:12. | :43:16. | |
are you going to say on day two when you're outside the European Union? | :43:16. | :43:25. | |
Can I finish? Can I make that point? I will let you answer. I would like | :43:26. | :43:34. | |
to trade freely with the whole world. Rather than being tied to one | :43:34. | :43:38. | |
dying economy, I would like to trade with the emerging countries of China | :43:38. | :43:43. | |
and India. I would like to negotiate our own free-trade agreements with | :43:43. | :43:53. | |
:43:53. | :43:54. | ||
them, which put British interests first. We would like access to their | :43:54. | :43:59. | |
trade and service industries. are also big fan of staying in, | :43:59. | :44:05. | |
aren't you? I think it is important that we have a trading nation ship | :44:05. | :44:09. | |
with Europe. It is on our doorstep. This assertion that the Tories have | :44:09. | :44:13. | |
with Europe is bizarre in the extreme. We should because of | :44:13. | :44:16. | |
treading on jobs and growth. The notion that we are somehow going to | :44:16. | :44:21. | |
create a referendum in four years time, we don't know when the issues | :44:21. | :44:24. | |
with you by going to be. It is a bizarre thing to raise as an issue | :44:24. | :44:32. | |
now. I've read in the Guardian this week, the CBI director-general, he | :44:32. | :44:34. | |
is incredibly critical of this government's approach to Europe. He | :44:34. | :44:37. | |
says they are obsessed, they should concentrate on the real things that | :44:37. | :44:42. | |
real economy. Those are the right things for us to concentrate on. | :44:42. | :44:51. | |
What about voters? What about your voters? You guv put it on number 11 | :44:51. | :44:54. | |
as the list of priorities. Is it something you genuinely concerned | :44:54. | :45:00. | |
about? Number two is immigration and it is because of the relationship | :45:00. | :45:04. | |
with the European Union that these people from Poland and other Eastern | :45:04. | :45:09. | |
European countries are able to come here and next year we have | :45:09. | :45:11. | |
barbarians and Romanians coming here. We should control our borders, | :45:11. | :45:17. | |
we should decide. You are sounding like Nigel Farage at this point! | :45:17. | :45:22. | |
People should be allowed to vote on that. Who would staff our hospitals, | :45:22. | :45:26. | |
pick our fruit. It is a huge part of the economy in Kent. If we don't | :45:26. | :45:31. | |
have that... We should train people locally. The people who are | :45:31. | :45:34. | |
unemployed, we should be training them. We should not be going | :45:34. | :45:37. | |
straight to the easy option of thing in people from abroad. We should | :45:37. | :45:42. | |
invest in our own people. Of course we should train local British | :45:42. | :45:48. | |
workers but we benefit enormously from our mothership of the EU. The | :45:48. | :45:54. | |
change, culturally, of our country over the last 30 years has been | :45:54. | :46:02. | |
beneficial. If we throw away those trading links with Europe, and we | :46:02. | :46:09. | |
cannot overnight build trade legs with China and India, , it will be | :46:09. | :46:13. | |
seriously damaged. Opinion is beginning to shift. It might be the | :46:13. | :46:17. | |
11th of 10th concern at the minute. People are beginning to worry that | :46:17. | :46:24. | |
we are sleepwalking out of the union. There are a few things I need | :46:24. | :46:27. | |
to put across was up the migrants that come from the rest of Europe | :46:27. | :46:31. | |
are net taxpayers. They are a benefit to this community. They pay | :46:31. | :46:36. | |
in, they do not take out and there is a surplus. There is a report out | :46:36. | :46:40. | |
this week that demonstrates that. The other point I want to come back | :46:40. | :46:44. | |
on once we can negotiate trade deals with China and the rest of the | :46:44. | :46:48. | |
world. We are a country of six T 5 million people. What sort of clout | :46:48. | :46:56. | |
do you have when you're with China? Do you want to be a trading partner | :46:56. | :47:00. | |
with half a billion people and have that sort of clout? That is what the | :47:00. | :47:03. | |
European Union does put up it is the world's biggest market. We'll be | :47:03. | :47:10. | |
crazy to cut ourselves off from that and to invite something from the | :47:10. | :47:13. | |
rest of the word question my crew spent 20 years negotiating with the | :47:13. | :47:16. | |
rest of the world. We have to leave it there but thank you for joining | :47:16. | :47:22. | |
The Labour Party celebrated in Hastings two weeks ago when they won | :47:22. | :47:25. | |
seven out of eight seats on the East Sussex County Council. Across the | :47:25. | :47:30. | |
county border, in than it, where the district council is Labour run, the | :47:30. | :47:33. | |
party was inspected to take seats from the Conservatives. It ended up | :47:33. | :47:36. | |
with only one. UKIP took the other seven. Hastings and Thanet are | :47:36. | :47:41. | |
similar areas, relatively impoverished seaside towns with a | :47:41. | :47:44. | |
strong working class presence. Why did the Labour Party do well in one | :47:44. | :47:52. | |
and badly in the other? Lucinda Adam went to find out. | :47:52. | :47:59. | |
Hastings and Thanet. To seaside resorts and two of the most deprived | :47:59. | :48:02. | |
parts of the South East of the Southeast will stop both had label | :48:02. | :48:05. | |
led councils and both were key targets for Labour to win back | :48:06. | :48:08. | |
county council seats at this month's elections will stop in | :48:08. | :48:13. | |
Hastings, Labour has elevated a landmark victory, taking 42% of the | :48:13. | :48:18. | |
vote and seven out of eight county council seats. But in Thanet they | :48:18. | :48:22. | |
failed to make any gains. Holding just one seat while the other seven | :48:22. | :48:29. | |
gave UKIP its strongest victory. In local by-elections, held last week, | :48:29. | :48:34. | |
UKIP gained a second seat on Thanet are strict council and one on | :48:34. | :48:41. | |
Bradgate town council in a war -- in a ward that had been a Labour | :48:41. | :48:46. | |
majority. That left Labour in deepwater. Why are the party's | :48:46. | :48:51. | |
fortunes so mixed? Like Thanet, unemployment in Hastings is three | :48:51. | :48:58. | |
times the national average. Both areas suffer from a seasonal jobs | :48:58. | :49:05. | |
market, older people and other cancers will stop success in | :49:05. | :49:12. | |
Hastings is put down to a strong majority on the council, achieving | :49:12. | :49:15. | |
goals to regenerate the town. have a council that is proactive in | :49:15. | :49:20. | |
tackling the jobs and we have here. They started out an apprenticeship | :49:20. | :49:23. | |
programme. They were looking to do 101 hundred days. They exceeded | :49:23. | :49:29. | |
that. They got 160 apprenticeships in 100 days. We are looking to do up | :49:29. | :49:35. | |
the town 2 billion best in the town. They have ordered over 600 | :49:35. | :49:40. | |
properties to do up the front edge. In Thanet, UKIP said that progress | :49:40. | :49:43. | |
on regeneration project has been sluggish. Labour councillors have | :49:43. | :49:51. | |
not supported expansion at the airport. The airport is a major | :49:51. | :49:55. | |
regeneration opportunity. You don't need the brains of Lloyd George to | :49:55. | :50:01. | |
know that. They are against it. They are doing everything they can to | :50:01. | :50:08. | |
restrict the operation there. Since KLM went in, 42 new jobs have been | :50:08. | :50:12. | |
created. We have a world-class airline operating there. The | :50:12. | :50:16. | |
majority of the people in Thanet really want the airport to be a | :50:16. | :50:22. | |
success. When the former Conservative leader of Thanet | :50:23. | :50:29. | |
council was jailed before polling day, Labour should have capitalised | :50:29. | :50:32. | |
was stop a series of defections and infighting has caused trouble and | :50:32. | :50:37. | |
destruction fall leaders. infighting in Thanet has been a | :50:37. | :50:41. | |
problem. It has been a consequence of having a minority administration | :50:41. | :50:44. | |
which has been virtually controlled by the interests of only a handful | :50:44. | :50:49. | |
of councillors in key positions. That has caused a great deal of | :50:49. | :50:53. | |
squabbling. We had a lot of time in council meetings arguing about | :50:53. | :50:57. | |
issues that have nothing to do with the business of local council. | :50:57. | :51:02. | |
win confidence and their votes, campaigning was widespread in | :51:02. | :51:07. | |
Hastings. In Thanet, Labour focused its efforts on Margate and it was | :51:07. | :51:10. | |
UKIP who knocked on doors elsewhere. There will not be a | :51:10. | :51:14. | |
street in Thanet that has not been visited by one of our now elected | :51:14. | :51:22. | |
members. I certainly did not see any Labour. Labour did not even put out | :51:22. | :51:27. | |
a leaflet in my ward. There was no targeting at all. Nobody knew who | :51:27. | :51:31. | |
the Labour candidate was. The only Labour councillor who won in Thanet | :51:31. | :51:39. | |
admits the party was complacent in targeting traditional Labour areas. | :51:39. | :51:42. | |
You are not putting the same effort into some of your strongholds. When | :51:42. | :51:46. | |
a party like UKIP has come along with a message that chimes with a | :51:46. | :51:51. | |
certain set of voters, it causes problems with all sort of parties, | :51:51. | :51:54. | |
which is what happened here. It is a wake-up call that we need to be | :51:54. | :52:00. | |
talking to the voters in all seats, not just certain seats will stop to | :52:00. | :52:04. | |
similar areas but to print stories for Labour. What does the party have | :52:04. | :52:12. | |
to do to win back voters in Thanet? Its popularity here might be washed | :52:12. | :52:19. | |
away for good. Joining us now is the Labour group | :52:19. | :52:23. | |
leader Gordon Cowan. You have had a few weeks to think about this. What | :52:23. | :52:26. | |
has happened there? Was it a missed opportunity or did you just take | :52:26. | :52:33. | |
Labour supporters for granted? Thanet, if you look at the results, | :52:33. | :52:43. | |
:52:43. | :52:45. | ||
the UKIP was 8% in 2009 and 39% in 2013. In actual fact, the Labour | :52:45. | :52:51. | |
vote held up. In fact, it increased by 2%. Well we had with that? Don't | :52:51. | :52:58. | |
of course not. We wanted to win. We wanted to get 20 plus on Kent County | :52:58. | :53:05. | |
Council. We did marvellously well. We got 13. I don't beg anyone would | :53:05. | :53:08. | |
say that was doing marvellously well. Those votes in Thanet have | :53:08. | :53:11. | |
cost you the opposition on Kent County Council. If Labour are going | :53:11. | :53:14. | |
to get back into power in two years time, Thanet is the kind of place | :53:14. | :53:19. | |
for the need to win seats. It is, absolutely. This particular time, if | :53:19. | :53:25. | |
you go back to 2009, it was the Conservatives that had control of | :53:25. | :53:31. | |
Thanet. They had control of the Thanet District Council. Labour was | :53:31. | :53:37. | |
one of the heartlands that they want to win. Labour only got one seat out | :53:37. | :53:41. | |
of the aid on offer. If you look at the results and you look at the | :53:41. | :53:48. | |
percentages, Labour's vote held up. But we did not quite get as many | :53:48. | :53:52. | |
votes as we would like to to get more councillors on Kent County | :53:52. | :53:57. | |
Council. Where do you go from here? All eyes are on the general election | :53:57. | :54:00. | |
in two years. What do you do locally as a party? It sounds like you are | :54:00. | :54:05. | |
not doing well enough to get the seats, to get that springboard to a | :54:05. | :54:10. | |
general election victory. We have to listen to the electorate and the | :54:10. | :54:13. | |
electorate have a clear message out this time. They have given a clear | :54:13. | :54:18. | |
message out. That message is more of a message to the central government | :54:18. | :54:22. | |
that, quite frankly, whether it is immigration, whether it is the | :54:22. | :54:26. | |
Europe in and out situation, people want answers. They want real | :54:26. | :54:33. | |
answers. We have got to try and get that message out. We will be | :54:33. | :54:35. | |
relaying that message to Ed Miliband. We have to get a clear | :54:35. | :54:39. | |
understanding about Europe and the direction we are going. You seem to | :54:39. | :54:43. | |
be blaming the Conservatives for you not winning enough seats in Thanet! | :54:43. | :54:53. | |
:54:53. | :54:53. | ||
Is it that you would not talking to people and showing that they would | :54:53. | :54:59. | |
do well by voting for you? We sent out at least two leaflets to every | :54:59. | :55:02. | |
single door within the Thanet area. It was not about not knocking on | :55:02. | :55:07. | |
doors. The overall picture, throughout the country, was one of a | :55:07. | :55:14. | |
protest vote from UKIP, not just in Thanet but everywhere. You work | :55:14. | :55:24. | |
:55:24. | :55:31. | ||
campaigning in Hastings, will you take the credit? Politics in Thanet | :55:31. | :55:34. | |
seems a bit scrabbled up. The Tories don't do enquiry well. There are two | :55:34. | :55:37. | |
Tory groups on the district council. Clearly there | :55:37. | :55:40. | |
organisational issues to be addressed. Results for Labour were | :55:40. | :55:43. | |
patchy in some parts of the country. We made tremendous progress in | :55:43. | :55:53. | |
:55:53. | :55:55. | ||
Hastings. Gordon makes a good point that we did hold the vote in Thanet. | :55:55. | :55:58. | |
It is a minority led thing on Kent County Council. Labour has that | :55:58. | :56:06. | |
patchy results. We have two years to go, what does Ed Miliband learned | :56:06. | :56:09. | |
from the Thanet, Hastings comparison? What does he do? If | :56:10. | :56:14. | |
those votes go the same way, you will not get into Number Ten. | :56:14. | :56:19. | |
have to get our message is absolutely right for politics | :56:19. | :56:24. | |
nationally and, not dilute them, but make sure they work locally. We have | :56:24. | :56:26. | |
district than our local organisation. We need to make sure | :56:26. | :56:33. | |
that people get onto the doorsteps and we need to make sure that | :56:33. | :56:36. | |
Thanet, I know they have a good track record, we need to make sure | :56:36. | :56:40. | |
that they are not far behind them. This is not covered tool for you as | :56:40. | :56:44. | |
a party either. There is a wide expectation that Nigel Farage mate | :56:44. | :56:49. | |
juice to stand for election in Thanet because he did so well. Who | :56:49. | :56:53. | |
are you more scared of? UKIP or Labour? If Labour are pleased that | :56:53. | :56:59. | |
their vote held up in Thanet, that is all right. That is good news for | :56:59. | :57:03. | |
the two Conservative MPs there. The message I take is that you have to | :57:03. | :57:07. | |
be out there on the doorstep and I am campaigning this weekend and the | :57:07. | :57:10. | |
message in picking up such on the doorstep is that people are | :57:10. | :57:13. | |
concerned about immigration, particularly the remaining and | :57:13. | :57:17. | |
barbarian immigration next. On Monday, I'm going to Romania, I have | :57:17. | :57:21. | |
a meeting with the Romanian Prime Minister and I will see what I can | :57:21. | :57:24. | |
do to limit that. Coming back to Thanet, it sounds as though the | :57:24. | :57:30. | |
calibre of local councillors, most of whom were conservative, have got | :57:30. | :57:39. | |
into quite a lot of trouble, they are going to UKIP. Labour have | :57:39. | :57:42. | |
pretty much given up as a campaigning force there. At a | :57:42. | :57:47. | |
parliamentary level, I think the strong Conservative representation | :57:47. | :57:50. | |
with Roger and Laura and I think they will be brooding on our results | :57:50. | :57:55. | |
and we will have a strong position. Two people disagree with you there | :57:55. | :57:58. | |
but I will have to move on. It is now time for a round-up of the | :57:58. | :58:08. | |
:58:08. | :58:10. | ||
week's other political events with Brighton's binmen are back at work | :58:10. | :58:12. | |
but their unofficial strike action over pay has two wars disputes | :58:12. | :58:16. | |
between the city's Green councillors, with calls for some for | :58:16. | :58:22. | |
people to resign. The Deputy Prime Minister told Stephen Lloyd that the | :58:22. | :58:25. | |
governor to look into decision to downgrade local maternity services. | :58:25. | :58:29. | |
I will ask the secondary estate for help to discuss this matter | :58:29. | :58:34. | |
further. Parliament has been called to clamp down on live animal exports | :58:34. | :58:39. | |
that we started at the Cannes's port. It is bad for an all welfare | :58:39. | :58:43. | |
and bad for the local economy. Sussex Police have it started a | :58:43. | :58:48. | |
drive to recruit more Eastern European line which bidders to | :58:48. | :58:54. | |
become committee support officers. It builds a very good link with us | :58:54. | :59:00. | |
as a law enforcement institution. And it is the most littered | :59:00. | :59:02. | |
shoreline in the county, but Shakespeare Beach does not have many | :59:02. | :59:07. | |
visitors will stop environmentalists say it is rubbish from abroad that | :59:07. | :59:14. | |
is being washed up on the tide. What do you think about the idea of | :59:14. | :59:18. | |
these funded police community liaison officers to deal with | :59:18. | :59:24. | |
migrants question Mark there are particular issues, we have to insure | :59:24. | :59:26. | |
that all committees are policed properly. I would like to see is | :59:26. | :59:30. | |
investing more in our young people here and particular ensuring that | :59:30. | :59:33. | |
next to me that see the sort of numbers of people coming from bog | :59:33. | :59:38. | |
area and Romania that we have seen from Poland and others. We heard | :59:38. | :59:42. | |
about chicks babies but Brighton out as six four letter in the country. | :59:42. | :59:49. | |
-- Shakespeare Beach. One of the MPs would like the government to do more | :59:49. | :59:54. | |
to promote antilitter campaigning. What we think? That is a gimmick. | :59:54. | :59:57. | |
I'll prefer to see the local council do its job and clear up the plastic | :59:57. | :00:03. | |
and glass on the beach and increase its recycling rate, which is | :00:03. | :00:07. |