02/02/2014 Sunday Politics South

Morning, folks. Welcome to the Sunday Politics. The unions helped

him beat his brother to the top. Now Ed Miliband wants to change Labour's

relationship with them. Who will come out on top? We will be asking

one union baron what he thinks. Cracks in the coalition after

Education Secretary Michael Gove sacks the chairwoman of Ofsted. His

Lib Dem deputy is said to be hopping mad. We will be talking to the new

deputy leader of the Lib Dems, Malcolm Bruce.

Caught a bout of the EU blues? David Cameron has been drowning his

sorrows with the President of France. Who better? We will be

asking if the EU referendum bill is dead in the water.

And bad weather getting you down? Getting from A to B a bit of a

nightmare? Fear not! The leader of the Greens will be here with her

traffic and travel report. Dutch 20 47 consultant care, this hospital

among only a handful reassurance people want?

Yes, all that and more in today s action-packed Sunday Politics. And

blowing more hot air than I have had hot dinners, Helen Lewis, Nick Watt

and Iain Martin. After the row about candidate

selection in Falkirk, Ed Miliband said he wanted to reshape the

relationship between Labour and the unions. The biggest changes involve

union membership of the party, which in turn will affect future Labour

leadership elections. Some claim this is Ed's Clause 4 moment. But

the unions will continue to be powerful at conference and on the

party's ruling committees, and they will still be able to bankroll the

election campaign. Here is Labour's deputy leader, Harriet Harman,

speaking earlier. What he is proposing for the March the 1st

conference is a huge change in financing, in the election of the

leader, in what goes on at local level. In due course, it might have

implications for the NEC elections and conference. But this is already

a big issue to take forward. Joining me now is Paul Kenny,

general secretary of the GMB union and chair of the Trade Union and

Labour Party Liaison Organisation. Is this Ed Miliband's Clause 4

moment? I don't know about that It is certainly a bold move,

particularly to have an electoral college, which as you said was the

system which elected him in the first place. Everybody admits that

has needed reforming for some time. Moving to a one member, one vote

situation seems to me to be sensible. I know some people are

upset, mostly MPs, who will lose their golden share. But it is

nonsense that one MP should have the same vote as 1000 party members So

the MPs have lost out. Have the unions lost out? Well, the system is

currently that union members get a ballot paper, but they have to

declare that they are a Labour supporter and they have to sign to

that effect in order to participate. Then their vote is counted. At the

last election, about 200,000 trade union members gave that indication,

and they participated in that way. That will not change. The way it is

organised will be different. The big change in the electoral college is

that the logical weight given to MPs will disappear. I wonder if you have

really lost anything. At the moment, there are about 3 million people

automatically affiliated from the unions to the Labour Party. If only

10% of them opt in, that will still mean twice as many union individual

members, 300,000, versus about 180,000 Labour Party members. So

union members and maybe even the unions will have as big an influence

on the leadership elections as you do now, maybe bigger? Well, they are

individual votes. Different unions support different candidates. It is

lost in the media myth of barons and block votes, but there is an

individual vote. Different unions recommend different candidates, and

union members vote accordingly. Ed Miliband won more individual votes

by a country mile than David, but it got messed up in the process of this

electoral college. As I have understood the proposals so far

they are not a done deal. There is a lot of discussion. But it seems

there are three hurdles. Firstly, union members themselves will have

to agree whether they want to affiliate to the Labour Party. If

they don't, the rest of it falls. If they decide they do my they will ask

union members to support that an individual basis the next five

years, which will have financial implications. Then there will be a

third position, which is that people who may want to agree with the

union's position and affiliate with the Labour Party may want to go

further and become active supporters of the Labour Party, participating

in leadership elections. They will have to give their sanction to that

at a third stage. So the implications in terms of

constituency parties and so on are a lot less than the idea that the 3

million who are currently affiliated will change. At the moment, the

unions, because of the automatic affiliation, hand over a affiliation

fees of about ?8 million a year to Labour. You will now get to keep

that money, because the individuals will have to put up the money

themselves. You can keep that money and determine if you give it to

Labour to fight the election campaign, correct? Incorrect.

Firstly, the affiliation fees are paid from what is called the

political fund, which most unions have to set up in order to

participate. The union will continue to pay the ?3 a affiliation fee for

those members who want the union to be affiliated. But you get to keep a

lot more money. In reality, we will see a transitional period of a few

years. Less people will probably say yes, depending on how popular Labour

are, about whether they want the union to give money to the Labour

Party. The GMB has already done this. By the way, don't call me

kneel. It is Andrew or Mr Neil. The unions will have a bigger chunk of

money because the unions will not be handing over all of the money at one

time. But you could still play a major part in funding the Labour

election campaign. We'll how much you give the dependent on what the

Labour Party puts in its manifesto? Of course it will. It will have to

justify our support to Labour for the members who provide money to the

political fund. If we did not argue for the cert is social justice

campaigns and laws we want to see, we would be failing in our job. I

don't intend to hide that from anybody. The unions are there to

fight for their members. That is our job. So you will still be a major

part of the bankroll of the Labour campaign. You will still have 5 % of

the votes at a Labour conference, and you will still have a major part

in the Labour National executive committee and the policy committee.

It is right to say the unions are still at the heart of Labour, are

they not? Well, if you sick to break the affiliated link between trade

unions and the Labour Party, the whole thing collapses. That is what

anchors the Labour Party as far as we are concerned. Many of our

members think that when they want to look for ferrochrome and rights

social justice, housing and the health service, Labour are better it

quipped to deliver that for working people than the current parties

That is why we have traditionally supported them. But not at all of

our members support Labour, which is why we don't affiliate all of them

to Labour. There are over 30 million people in the British labour force

now. Union membership is only 6 5 million out of that 30. A 6.5% of

that do not vote Labour, they vote Tory or liberal or nationalist in

Scotland. So you are a relatively small pressure group. Why should

Labour be in thrall to you? We are the biggest voluntary organisation

in this country. Sorry about that, but that is the fact. People make

conscious choices. My own union the GMB, has been growing for eight

years. So this dying picture you are trying to paint... In terms of

accounting for the fact that some do not support Labour, that is why

unions do not affiliate all of their members to the Labour Party. We have

adjusted to that. If you don't like being called Neil, I don't like

being called a barren either. What about Mr Baron? I don't like that

either. We are representatives of working organisations. It may be

inconvenient for politicians to have to listen to working people, but we

will continue to press. Lord Baron, thank you very much.

So, is this a Clause 4 moment for Ed Miliband? Not really, but to his

credit, he is going ahead with this. There was a point at which it looked

as though Ed Miliband would back away from reform. To his credit he

is trying to create a mass membership party again. But when it

comes to the crucial business of funding a general election campaign,

these reforms will make Labour more reliant on large donations from

trade unions. They could have more power now, because they get to hold

back this money, whereas beforehand, they had to hand it over

automatically. As Mr Kenny just said, how much they handover will be

dependent on good behaviour. Yes, but these are pragmatic reforms The

fact that Ed Miliband has a lot of capital in not being seen as a

Blairite has helped him get these through . The response has been

muted, which suggests good party management on his behalf. That may

be because they will still have 50% of the votes at a party conference.

Mr Kenny was clear that that could be deal-breaker if they tried to

take that away. They have more places at the NEC than anyone else,

and party members, if only 10% of them signed up, they will outweigh

individual members in the constituencies. It was interesting,

how relaxed Paul Kenny was. He was taking thousands of pounds from the

Labour Party a few months ago because he was annoyed about these

reforms, and now he is relaxed because they still have 50% of the

vote at Labour Party conference and Labour Party Parliamentary

candidates are still selected in the same way. But there is a simple

point here. Yes, you can pick apart what Ed Miliband said and said the

unions have too much influence, but the only way he could have gone all

the way was to break the link with the trade unions, and he was not

going to do that. It was not the Labour Party that founded the

unions, it was the unions that founded the Labour Party. Even Tony

Blair did not break the link. In that context, Ed Miliband has gone

incredibly far. For the last 50 years, this opting into the union,

you have to turn to page 50 of your union terms and conditions to say,

do you want to opt out of the political levy 's that is going to

go, which will mean that when the next Labour leader is elected from

the union votes, they will get their ballot from the Labour Party and you

will append the fast where ballots went out from Unison macro and GMB

with a picture of Ed Miliband on the front of the ballot paper saying,

vote for aid. They were Stasi and Saddam Hussein ways of trade union

members electing the Labour leader, which will go. I am sorry his

Lordship is not still here to answer that question.

HMS Coalition is not a happy ship. The lovey-dovey days in the rose

garden are long gone. It is not a loveless marriage, perhaps even an

open one. The latest split is over the decision by Education Secretary

Michael Gove to replace Labour peer Sally Morgan as head of the schools

inspectorate, Ofsted. Mr Gove's deputy, Lib Dem David Laws, is said

to be spitting blood about her removal, although only through

surrogates. He has not said a word on the record. Here was the

Education Secretary a little earlier. If there is another

opportunity for Sally to serve in a different role at a different time,

then I would be delighted to support her in the role which she thinks it

is appropriate to do. There is nothing wrong with Sally but there

is a principle across government that there should be no automatic

reappointment, and that after three or four years, it is appropriate to

bring in a fresh pair of eyes. That is good corporate practice in order

to ensure that you refresh boards, bring a new perspective, and have

tough questions asked. We're joined now by the newly elected deputy

leader of the Liberal Democrats Malcolm Bruce. He's in Aberdeen

Welcome to the Sunday Politics. David Laws is said to be furious

with Michael Gove, is he? I think he is because Sally Morgan has been

doing a good job and that has been generally agreed across the whole

spectrum. I think Ofsted is an impartial body that inspects all

schools and it shouldn't be subject to some kind of political direction.

That is the concern, that she is being removed when she was doing a

good job and most people thought she should be reappointed. It is

strongly rumoured her successor will be a high-ranking Tory backer. Why

hasn't David Laws said this himself, have you spoken to him? I have, and

I know he is not very pleased about it but he will want to speak to

Michael Gove himself when he gets to see him on Monday. The question you

have to take on board is that David Laws is the schools minister,

effectively the one who has engagement with Ofsted, and he is

seeing it being undermined by the Secretary of State. There is a

question that if Michael Gove is so pleased with Sally Morgan why is he

replacing her, and who will he be replacing her with, and on what

basis? Maybe parliament should have a confirmation hearing so that we

can be assured that whoever is put in charge is there because they are

good at it. Why has he licensed his surrogates to save this rather than

saying it himself? He didn't, he knew I was on the programme this

morning so I am giving you the answers as best I can. David is

perfectly capable of speaking for himself. He hasn't so far. You asked

me to come on this programme and David was anxious for me to know he

wasn't happy about it, and I can certainly tell you that. I can also

give you my own opinion which is that Ofsted is not the Department

for Education, it is an independent body. The question you have to ask

is will Michael Gove but someone in charge of Ofsted who will have a

political agenda? If so, that is not what Ofsted should be used for.

Let's move on to your own position. You are 69, white male,

middle-class, what is your answer to the party with diversity problems? I

don't think that is what they voted on. They felt I had a wealth of

experience that would be vulnerable to the party from the period now

until the election, not least because the central issues that will

concern voters are the economy, and I have a track record of promoting

the party's economic policy over many years. But you are not even

standing at the next election. No, but we need to get to the next

election and my colleagues have confidence that I can do a useful

job for the party in that situation. We have developed and delivered

policies that I have helped to shape and I want to persuade people to

understand the Liberal Democrats have made a fundamental difference

to the economic recovery. But you know what has been happening with

the Liberal Democrats and their problems with women. Wasn't this a

chance to select a woman in a major part? You only have seven female MPs

out of 57, not a single Lib Dem woman in the Parliament. Again, why

you rather than making a break and bringing someone in onto major

positions? My colleagues have concluded that the role I am best

qualified to do it, that is why they voted for me. We do only have seven

women and that is an issue we need to address. Two of those women are

ministers, one is a government whip. We seem to have lost our line to

Aberdeen, just as Malcolm Bruce was in full flight defending his

position. I'm not sure if we can get the line back, just bear with me for

a few seconds to see if we can get it. It looks as if we have lost

Malcolm Bruce, I do apologise to Malcolm Bruce and the viewers that

we were not able to continue that interview.

Fierce winds, torrential rain and a tidal surge have brought more misery

to thousands. Official records show that southern England has seen the

wettest January since records began in 1767. I remember it well. The

Somerset Levels have been hit by weeks of flooding, with little

respite from relentless rain. And, the residents of one village on the

Levels, Muchelney, has been cut off for almost a month. We sent our Adam

out with his wellies and a properly filled out risk assessment form The

very wet road to Muchelney. This village of about 100 residents has

been cut off for about four weeks, and like the weather vane, it feels

a little bit spooky. It came up to here and your front door was there.

Anita is just relieved the water stopped here, practically on her

doorstep. Now it is the practicalities that are the problem.

Driving around for food is quite a hassle. You are foraging. It's not

as bad as that but we do have a few bits in the vegetable garden still,

and we had some nice apples until the rats ate them but we are not

doing too badly on that score. It sounds like the medieval! That's

what it feels like. Talking of retro, who knew Somerset still had a

Coleman, this is Brian's first delivery since Christmas. Everything

has gone old-fashioned. We are now talking to neighbours we might never

have seen before or spoken to so we are getting to know more people in

the village. She's right, there has been an outbreak of Dunkirk spirit,

quite literally. The council and the Fire Brigade have put on this boat

service to get people to work and school. The church has become an

unofficial flood HQ. This is where people pick up their mail, and this

is where the people who run the boat stopped for their tea breaks. It all

seems quite jolly, if a bit boring, but it is no fun for the homes and

businesses that have been inundated, or for the farmers whose land is

underwater, an area the size of Bristol, or for the villages which

are less isolated but where the flooding is worse. People like the

parish chairman are starting to get angry with how the Government has

responded. It was all a bit late. We knew what was going to happen with

the amount of rain on the fields and the Government was so slow to

react. The county council got the boat going quickly but it was

another four weeks nearly before the button was pressed for the major

incident. Right on cue, the cavalry arrived in the shape of emergency

crews from other parts of the UK. The rumour is that they will bring

in a hovercraft but the bad news is that the weather is becoming more

grim this weekend. There has been a surge in bookings at the campsite

where people have seen the Somerset Levels on holiday and would like to

come on holiday, if it ever stops raining. I'm delighted to say we

have got the line back to Aberdeen, somebody has put a shilling in the

meter. We can go back to Malcolm Bruce. We were talking about the Lib

Dem women and your election, I suppose the point some people are

making is that your party has as many knights in Parliament as it has

women and you are one of them. The good news is that for the five MPs

who are standing down, who have had candidates elected in their

constituencies so far, all five candidates that have been selected

are women. We need to fight hard to get behind those women and get them

elected so that we have a much better balanced parliament in the

future, but given that we have few women, you really have to pick

people appropriate for the job and we have appointed the women as I

have said but we need our image to be balanced. How many women

candidates will there be come the next election? At the moment, 1 ,

five more than we have now, and we haven't finished selection. Where

there are men sitting and standing again, that is not likely to change,

but where they are standing down we are overwhelmingly choosing women,

and in my view good and very able women. What I would want to say to

people is that if you want to see the Lib Dems have more women, go to

those seats and help us hold them. We are told that only 20% of the 57

seats have female candidates and in the unlikely event that you were

able to hold onto them all, it still wouldn't be a sea change to have

20%. The point is you have to build them up. We are supporting female

candidates. These are really good candidates who will make first-class

MPs and I certainly believe you will gradually see the Liberal Democrats

taking them on. We don't have 3 0 seats that we currently hold like

other parties, but what I can tell you is that increasing --

increasingly we will have female candidates. One newspaper has said

that you will deal with the Chris Rennard fallout quickly and

privately, what does that mean? It means I will not be telling you

because these things are not helped by comments on the airwaves. I hope

it will be possible to have a resolution without people going to

court but I don't think it helps anybody for me to comment on any

aspect of how this will be done and I'm not prepared to do so. If you

are not in full possession of the facts, why did you say you will deal

with this privately? I have come into this halfway through, I don't

have full possession of the facts, I doubt you do, and we have a process

that needs to be followed through. Any comments in public do not help.

Isn't it hypocrisy of a high order to hear from a party that is

constantly calling for transparency in other institutions but when it

comes to your own, you say, I am not going to talk about it. There are

all sorts of disputes that happen in the world and often people don't

talk about them because talking about them aggravates the

situation. I believe you have to deal with them privately and I don't

think trial by media in this context is helpful and I don't believe that

those who choose to make those comments are making it easier to

solve them. There are problems in other walks of life and the Liberal

Democrats are not the only ones with these problems. We are trying to

change that culture and I think we will do it effectively in our own

way. We have a pastoral care officer now and I think that is the right

way to do it. Thank you for that. Let's now go back to the story of

the flooding in Somerset. We are joined by the leader of the Green

party, Natalie Bennett in Millbank. Natalie Bennett, don't the Green

party bears some responsibility for these floods? You have sided with

the Environment Agency in the decision not to dredge rivers and

that is one of the reason why these places have been flooded. Firstly I

want to give my sympathy to everyone dealing with these floods. The

homeowners, the farmers seeing sodden fields for weeks and weeks.

We get that, we all have huge sympathy, particularly because so

little seems to be done to help them. What is the answer to my

question? I think there is strong evidence that dredging is not the

answer. If you think about the flow of the river, where the pinch points

are is things like bridges, weirs and towns. If you dredge the river

in between those barriers, you just make the water faster to those

points. The experts are saying that dredging is not the answer, it may

be in particular cases, but you have to look at each river system on its

own merits and very often the best way of dealing with this is working

out ways to slow the watered down and make sure that people don't

suffer unduly while you are doing that. The west of England

agricultural Society, which I would venture knows more about the

Somerset Levels than either of us, has said that without dredging, this

was a disaster waiting to happen. The local drainage boards have been

calling for years for dredging to be resumed. The National Farmers' Union

has called for it, and the chairman of the West Sussex flood defences

has called for more drainage, and he is a drainage engineer by

profession. So I don't know where your experts are, but the experts on

the ground am not the urban ones in London, seem to think this has not

been caused, but made worse by the failure of the Environment Agency to

continue to dredge. If you look at the example of the planning and

climate change coalition, which is led by the town and country planning

Association, who you would not describe as a group of radical

greens, these people have said we have to look at how we deal with

flooding in the future. But not in Somerset. These are the people

currently being flooded, not somebody sitting in a quango office

in London. They have asked for this to happen and it hasn't, and they

are now flooded in definitely. We have to look at what is happening on

a case-by-case basis. If you look at Germany, there are many cases there

were, to deal with flooding, many farmers are paid to hold water on

their land. Maybe we need to introduce those systems, because we

have to protect farmland, but we also have to protect urban areas for

safety. We saw a horrible flood in Wales were lines were endangered --

where lives were endangered. That is the priority, to protect lives,

property and farmland. Lives are endangered at the moment,

particularly as this stagnant water turns toxic. And yet we are in a

situation, again encouraged by the Greens and the lobbying Environment

Agency, it says it does not want to dredge because dredging is

expensive, yet it spends millions on a bird sanctuary. That is getting

everything totally wrong. The government is getting everything one

by cutting on flood defences. It has not cut on a bird sanctuaries. I

don't know the details of that. But looking at the broader issue, we

have to prepare for climate change. The government has slashed funding

to the Environment Agency and has cut back on the number of staff

available to deal with it and has removed the requirement on local

councils to plan for climate change. These are all gambling the future of

our lives and property and the future of our environment. Hasn t

the high watermark of greenery now gone well past? You don't come out

of the Somerset Levels with any great reputation. The UK government

is now going to start fracking as quickly as it can. Brussels is

loosening the CO2 obligations for 2030. The President of America is

about to give the go-ahead to the keystone pipeline, a totemic issue

for American greens, and your party is in a state of civil war in

Brighton. It is over, isn't it? Absolutely not. We are seeing large

amounts of extreme weather around the world. Any one event is whether,

but we are seeing a lot of it and people are recognising that climate

change is happening. If we are going to quote international experts, I

can quote to you Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary-General, not known as a

radical green, and he said after the IPCC report came out that the heat

is on and we must act. If you go to Christine Lagarde, head of the

International Monetary Fund, again not a radical green, she was asked

what kept her awake at night, and she said, we are not doing enough

about climate change. So actually, people around the world are looking

at what is happening around them are both people on the ground and people

in high positions are saying we have to act on climate change. And in the

case of Britain, that should absolutely not mean fracking. Sorry

to interrupt, but I have evidence that you are planning a little

career change. Don't go away. This is what happens when you let Nigel

Farage present the weather. One thing leads to another and low and

behold, the Sunday Politics now has a new traffic and travel reporter.

Let's go back to Green Party leader, Natalie Bennett. Thanks, Andrew It

is easy out that, so let's start with our airports. I am pleased to

say that Heathrow's third runway, Boris Island and all short-haul

flights are, just like our arguments, well grounded. We suggest

making or alternative arrangements, like a re-nationalised rail

network, although it would be a glaring omission if we did not admit

that that plan is currently being delayed by Labour Party foot

dragging. Speaking of trains, we are hearing that high-speed two may well

be derailing, or at least getting bogged down in political fog. One

viewer, Ed Balls, has texted in to say he is completely lost. Thanks

for the update, Ed. You are not alone among political commuters

Meanwhile, dumped UKIP manifestoes are causing major tailbacks across

the South, apparently stretching all the way to Brussels. This does make

driving road tricky, but UKIP's MEPs can, of course, just hop on their

gravy train. The tree had a roundabout is blocked after reports

of a political earthquake. It seems that a green unwound his beard to

block a dodgy gas extractor. A motorist who turned out to be the

environment minister object into the delay and was told to frack off as

furious badgers demanded that he stopped moving the goalposts.

Unregulated traffic in the city of London continues unchecked.

Pedestrians should try to block bankers with sacks of loot rushing

for the payments. But do beware the Lib Dem Exodus that is clogging up

the motorways. Although they are in a jam, or is it a fudge, we are

happy to make way for them, as, like all refugees, we say they are

welcome here in muesli green. That is the travel. Back to you, Andrew.

Natalie, I think you make my point. You are now preparing a new career

in traffic and travel. Well, I do believe in lifelong education and

that was an example of it. We know you have had a tough time today to

get to our studio. Thank you for the effort.

You are watching the Sunday Politics. Coming up in just over 20

minutes, we will have more Welcome. Onto the's show the Crown

estate plans to develop Poole Harbour by possibly having a car

park island has prompted complaints from locals who say they have not

been consulted on the impact on an area of natural beauty. I am joined

by the Labour Party in the European elections and the Conservative MP

for word thing and East Shoreham. The police gave you a warning in a

long`running dispute with one of your constituents this week, someone

you say is abusive. Colleagues suggested that you were owed an

apology. Is this whole thing with the police part of trying to assert

the rights of Parliament or you trying to sort this whole issue out?

It was a select committee and because of the beach of

Parliamentary privilege that I reported to the house the Chief

Constable and Assistant Chief Constable were hauled before the

privileges committee and they were found rather lacking in the

evidence. It is important to point out that my case is as it may be and

will be reported in due course but the police issued me with a pen

notice on the basis that I said the constituent of mine who had been

problematic a copy of Hansard and that was deemed to be harassed. If

that is seen as harassment it impacts on the way we go around our

job as politician. Do you think the MPs should be asserting themselves

with the pleas in this week? I do. It has all been deemed pled Gate

to, I await the report. `` Plebgate Two. People have said to me they

have constituents like this and they could fall foul of the same laws.

The police have said they mocked up but they think it is the right thing

to do. We will see what the report says and the implications on that.

You are still hoping for an apology? The committee asked the

Chief Constable to apologise and he refused to. We will see what

happens. Bike macro should retake the European Parliament more

seriously? One of the wider concerns I have is not just about how

parliamentarians relate to their constituency but how

parliamentarians relate to each other and sometimes we would cut

politicians shouting at each other in parliament and that is not a

great example. In the European Parliament it is a different animal.

It is incredibly boring and bureaucratic, isn't it? I am macro

it may be boring but you do not have people shouting at each other like

it is the school yard, engaging in innuendo, we attend our sessions,

Labour MEPs, the is a lesson we need to learn because a lot of people put

the television on and see Prime Minister's Questions and think they

are behaving like schoolchildren, not series people trying to put the

right policies in place to help us. It was very noisy this weekend I saw

you with your feet on the bench in front. I was crossing my legs at the

time! There was a lot of noise from politicians corner. We have these

constant complaints that it is too noisy, abusive or whatever but what

goes on for the 30 minutes of PMQ 's every week is not the main business

of Parliament. However, it is the most sought after ticket in

parliament. The public areas are absolutely full, people are loving

it, smiling and joking along with it, it is entertaining. The Speaker

always gets up and says he has complaints about the behaviour they

have been 32, do not take PMQ 's as typical of the deal work that goes

on often behind the cameras in parliament but it has become a bit

of a pantomime. It is good exercise. For some, sure! Oxfordshire has new

funding for the county. The Chancellor was the man in the white

coat on Tuesday announcing an investment in signs in Oxfordshire.

It comes from the government and the private sector. On Wednesday another

7 million was on the table as part of the enterprise scheme for Milton

Park near Didcot. It is expected to create more jobs. On Thursday the

Deputy Prime Minister was that Harwell for the signing of the city

deal, ?55 million from the government with Oxford University

and the local council is adding another ?40 million to the pot. The

say it will be worth more than ?1 billion once everyone chips in.

Support for small and medium`size enterprises, without which, the

signs base will not be sustainable in decades ahead. I am joined by

Adrian Lockwood from the Oxfordshire local enterprise partnership, none

of it was new money, was it? It was not, all we were doing was

identifying existing government funds and directing it waiting could

be usefully deployed. I am incredibly impressed by the people

we have got around the table. They might not have thought each other

before? There were people who would not have spoken to each other before

sitting in the middle is business and we are focused on delivering. We

engaged with local business leaders and we are charged with bringing

these things forward. There is no prize for coming second order

losing, we do not have much room for politics with what we do, we get on

with it with what we do. We looked at business models and all of these

cases to ensure they are going to deliver and you will get the maximum

return for your investment. You were hoping for this to be signed off a

lot earlier? We had hoped last summer but we were hoping for

engagement with central government which is another aspect. Now we have

been local body engaging with central government across the area

's ministries explaining that while the policy may be existing

nationwide it has to be unique in one specific environmental area. Are

you worried this would have to change again if there was a new

government coming in? I do not think we are really worried. The whole

ethos of what has been created here seems to be potentially very

successful, a very good new mix and we forward, I am sure there will be

changes somewhere in terms of the delivery but my understanding when

talking with various parties involved here is that there is a

general acceptance that this is a good move. Do you think it is

working well? Better than the old development agency? I would not

necessarily say that but I think he hit the nail on the head when he

said the issue is around delivery. A lot of this looks good on paper but

it is really aspirational. Some of the elements, particularly around

housing, there is really not an enforcement mechanism. In terms of

what was being said about relationships with central

government, politicians and Whitehall cooed say you want to have

the right to borrow and build more houses, to ultimately save the

public purse so you are not putting people into private housing, but we

will let you do that if you fulfil particular conditions. That is the

example saying you cannot have social housing, it would have to be

affordable housing, you cannot put housing in one place, only another

place. My concern is that they are not getting localities power over

this process. It is a great vision and I do not mean to diminish what

you and your colleagues have done but I am worried about the delivery.

It used to have an infrastructure before which was a regional

structure, it was not perfect but now we have the whole patchwork

across the South East without that clear delivery mechanism being their

any more. You are all in competition with each other, do you think it is

working with business involvement? What about the national insistence

on different things? It is early days for the Letts. We are waiting

for confirmation. Before they were far too big, it covered Oxford

through to Dover, far too big and unwieldy, too expensive to run. What

we have got no is the business involvement which is key. The way it

is working is to get the leveraged effect, the gearing of extra

business is coming in. Talking together with other partners in a

joined up Way. There is no point in having public money thrown at the

regeneration scheme if it is not working, it has got to be joined up

with neighbouring towns and villages and with the businesses and

innovation zones and all the things like that. Within this framework I

think that can happen and is more likely to happen whereas it was not

happening certainly economically with the great large areas that

there were before. And what do you think? I do not see how that can be

the case when it is unclear what the delivery mechanism is going to be.

700,000 extra homes is great but we are still having people arguing with

each other about where they will go. At least with the previous situation

they had to deliver. The regional development agencies were... They

were elected, now we have the patchwork, some are great and some

not so great. We need joined up thinking. They were run by people

who were not... Who were paid by watering salaries, we have to see

them working with businesses and local infrastructure. The potential

is much more workable than it was. You are positive that you could

improve things. I think we were very lucky, Oxfordshire has a very small

map and it is well defined. We only have one County Council. In terms of

the delivery of the housing, all of the district councils are signed up

to this, it was not done in isolation. They all understand they

have to deliver that housing, in terms of what we have one locked

with infrastructure, you know the area, look at the main road, I know

what my journey to work is like and I am not trying to get into the

enterprise zone but around it. We are trying to unlock schemes that

have always did before because of budget reasons. They want to grow

new spin out businesses that will benefit locally from the technology

that is done and the research establishments, the University, we

are putting in incubators to grow local businesses, spin offs out of

that, rather than it going somewhere else. Thank you. Plans for the

development of pool B has been criticised by environmental

campaigners. Part of the property may be least to the highest bidder

but that is where the scheme runs into choppy waters. `` leased. One

of the largest natural harbours in the world with this National trust

owned island sitting in the middle. This most picturesque of views could

be about to change. The owners of the shoreline, the Crown estate,

want to develop the marina with berths for 600 yachts and space for

200 vehicles to park in a man`made island out in the bay. What has

upset local residents, environmental campaigners and others is a complete

lack of consultation locally and no consideration of the environmental

impact of the scheme. We were staggered, fancy the concept of

building in pool B and Ireland to part 200 cars, not just that but the

access bridge will be high level so that the fisher men can go

underneath it to access the harbour. It is amazing. The Crown estate are

the landlords who own these shoreline and are considering to

rival schemes. One plan is for the 900 berth marina for which there has

been a great deal of consultation. We have done an environmental

assessment and have spoken to a whole range of state holders, local

residents, local councillors, fisher men. Our concern is that the rival

scheme has not been through that same due diligence. The preferred

bit by the Crown estate will include a public viewing gallery and the

bridge connecting the island with the shore but with no drawings yet

released many say they have no idea what the scheme will actually look

like saw how can the Crown estate have made that its preferred option?

They have abdicated their responsibility to consult with

people here about this scheme, they have been allowed to just get on

with what they want without any proper oversight. It is fantastic

that people have written into the Crown estates in such large numbers.

There has been sustained lobbying, that effect might make them change

their mind but we will have to wait and see. The leader of the borough

council says they have been kept in the dark. The Crown Estate does not

see it as their responsibility to discuss with the council ordered the

harbour commissioners. They are the custodians of pool harbour and these

special issues should be considered for any bid that goes in. We did

invite the Crown Estate to be interviewed but they declined. They

were not able to provide details of what it would look like, we ask for

details of the tender but we were told that was commercially sensitive

and would not be made public. In 2010 the Treasury Select Committee

criticised the Crown Estate. The said they used their monopoly over

the media environment to focus on generating revenue rather than to

act in the long`term public interest. Some locals say that under

no circumstances will they accept a man`made parking island and

connecting bridge on one of the most environmentally sensitive parts of

the South West. We want to fight this potential desecration of pool

harbour and ensure the environment is protected. It is a lack of

transparency and the Crown Estates have increased their surplus revenue

every year for the last ten years. Should they be doing more? As I

understand it they have been profit for the last 25 years, this relates

to our discussion before. It is important that people can see

democratic input into these kinds of decisions, they have to have some

sort of commercial point of view but they have to balance that in terms

of taking people's opinions into account. I have been involved in

cases around The National Trust's properties we are commercial

imperatives deemed to be driving some decisions. We need to have a

balance, some transparency around how these decisions are being made

so people do not feel shut out of these decisions. Did you find

dealing with them was the same as dealing with any other commercial

organisation? They are a strange beast. They certainly need to be

more transparent, I agree. It was formed in 1760 but it has changed in

the last few years such that the Queen now gets 50% of their

revenues. I do not think anybody understands how it is really run. It

is all the more reason given that they are one of the largest

landowners in the country, responsible for the shoreline, in my

case we have the largest offshore wind farm being planned off the

coast of Sussex and the lot of people have a big interest in that.

Crown estate have not been forthcoming with information about

that. Crown estate is absolutely should be accountable and they are

not as accountable and transparent as they need to be, that would allay

some of the fears, I think. Now, our regular round`up of the political

week in the South in 60 seconds. The new minister for pot smoker paid his

first visit to the city by the historic dockyard and Nelson's

flagship EEPROM is the government will not turn a blind eye to

Pompey's problems. Lessons were cancelled at Oxford University as

lecturers walked out over a 1% pay offer. It looks like best will be

the first equal time to be finished but the 5000 houses first planned

under Labour are still controversial. Sussex residents who

rejected an eco`town here say they are out of the frying pan and into

the fire, an incinerator now heading their way. The chimneys will be seen

everywhere in the South Downs. Finally, the French flew into

Oxfordshire and the PM to the President down the pub. `` took the

President. I think we will keep the continental music going! Do you mind

if we do not stand up? You want to get to Europe, do you want to change

things over there or do you think the Wii France as Lalonde operates

is all right? I do not want to operate in the same way as he has

done recently! Seriously, Labour wants to have a number of reforms to

Europe, not least the agricultural policy. Can I quickly say children

in the back of cars and smoking being allowed, you are starting a

consultation on this? Yes, on my website I have asked people what

they think about it. I am against the nanny state and I want to hear

what people say. Safety for children. It

Not a complete denial! Hopefully a Conservative mayor again.

Not a good week for David Cameron on the tricky European front last week.

President Hollande said he was not interested in major treaty reform

for 2017. That is when Mr Cameron hopes to hold his in-out referendum.

And the private member's bill to put that referendum on the statute bill

was killed by Labour and Lib Dem peers in the Lords. James Wharton

was the Tory MP behind the bill and he joins me now. What happens now?

It is out of my hands what happens now, because Labour and the Liberal

Democrats conspired in the Lords to kill off my bill. One of the options

is for another private member to bring a bill forward when they have

the next private member's bill at, and we can try again. The prime

minister has indicated that he will support that. But whatever happens,

it will be in the Conservative manifesto at the next election. Do

you accept that cost this is Tory policy and not government policy

that the government policy elite macro cannot bring forward a bill?

That is the problem. The Liberal Democrats, despite having promised a

referendum in their manifesto at the last election, now will not allow

government time for a bill to enshrine that in law. That was why I

brought it forward as a private member's bill. David Cameron and the

Conservative Party through everything behind that. To many

people's surprise, we got it through all the House of Commons stages

Sadly, to their discredit, Labour and Liberal Democrat peers, doing

the bidding of their masters in the Commons, is conspired to kill it. Do

you accept that it is Conservative policy, but not government policy,

that you could not use the Parliament act to get this through

the Lords? That is not the case The Parliament act is clear that if a

public bill passes through the House of Commons twice in one

Parliamentary period, there is a certain amount of time that has to

be between both bills being presented. There are some procedural

steps to be overcome, but there is no legal reason why the Parliament

act could not come into effect. I was talking about you not having a

majority in this case. That remains to be seen. We saw previously that

Labour and the Liberal Democrats sent enough people to frustrate its

progress to make it as difficult as possible, but not huge numbers to

vote against it. On a Friday, huge numbers of MPs do not attend

normally. Getting that number might prove difficult. The Parliament act,

which is a bit of an atomic bomb in constitutional terms, if that was

used, they would turn up to vote against you. Is it not the case that

after the countryside Alliance tried to involve the courts in the hunting

ban that it was made clear that the Parliament act was not to be used

for constitutional issues? I don't think we know how many would turn up

and we don't know how they would vote. One of the things that has

been revealed as I have gone through the process of getting this bill to

get a referendum through the Commons is that there are big splits in the

Labour Party. One of the reasons we did not see them turning up in large

numbers to stop this bill from happening was that Ed Miliband knew

that if he tried to lead his own MPs through the lobbies to block a

bill, the only purpose of which is to let Britain decides to give

people a say on membership of the union, a lot of his MPs may not have

followed him. It is all fantasy politics anyway. The French

president has made clear that he has no interest in treaty change this

side of 2017. He would need a referendum as well . And he needs

that like a hole and had. Merkel is not keen, as she is in coalition

with the social Democrats. Without the French or the Germans, it will

not happen, end of story. The policy is that we will try to negotiate on

getting a better deal. I hear what you are saying, but I don't

recognise it as reality. We have a strong bargaining position. But

whatever the result of that negotiation, it will be put in an

in-out vote to the Britain people. It is time people were allowed to

decide. It has been over a generation since we last had a say.

David Cameron has committed to delivering that referendum. The

Conservative Party will have it in our next manifesto for the election.

Whatever happens to my bill or any other of the bill that comes

forward. If people want a referendum, the only party that can

deliver that in British politics is the Conservatives. Let me bring the

panel in. Nick, where is this going? It is clear to me and anyone who

follows European politics that there is no appetite for major treaty

change in the short run, particularly for the kind of major

changes that Vista Cameron says he is going to get, and yet the Tories

are talking about Europe again when they should be talking about the

economy. And Francois Hollande is looking at 2017, the year we are

meant to have this referendum. There will be a French presidential

election going on, and Nicolas Sarkozy will be back in play by

then. But James has an interesting point, which is that it is down to

Angela Merkel. She would be more receptive to David Cameron's ideas

of reform than people assume. She has looked over the edge at a Europe

without the UK and said, that is not acceptable, and I am willing to pay

a price, not any price, but a price to keep the UK in the European

Union. And the French, because the UK and France are the only serious

military powers in Europe, will eventually come to that position. So

there is more support for David Cameron than people assume. The

French are also not a strong position in terms of the euro and

French economy. The Foreign Office seem a bit more optimistic about

it. Of course they are. Douglas Hurd once told me, we are winning the

arguments on the single currency. Of course anything from the Foreign

Office comes with a health warning, but if David Cameron had won a

majority and was determined to renegotiate, he is in a strong

position with Merkel. There is a possibility that the French could

eventually be talked around. So it is not entirely bleak on that front

for Cameron. When do the Tory party managers say, look, stop banging on

about Europe again? The economy is going away. We still have an

electoral mountain to climb. Let's just talk about that and not be

divided. They should have done that some time ago. It is already too

late. The Tories need a seven point lead in the polls to get image are

tea. The way things are, that would require a huge change from where we

are now . It is very unlikely to happen. So all this is happening in

some bizarre imaginary space with wonderful rainbows and sunshine But

we can detect the beginnings of a shift in the last couple of weeks.

If you talk to Tory backbenchers, Douglas Carswell is now saying in

public that it is time to stop the fighting. If they are to get even

close to winning the election, they can't do it if they are all against

each other. I don't think it is an imaginary space. It is likely that

David Cameron will have the largest party in the election. If it is a

hung parliament and it is the Liberal Democrats and the

Conservative Party, David Cameron will save to Nick Clegg we gave you

an AV referendum, I am having this referendum. And it will be difficult

for Nick to say no. Let me go back to Mr Wharton. You are going to get

a referendum in the manifesto. Other than Ken Clarke, everybody wants it.

So why don't you just banked that and get behind the leadership

Institute causing endless problems and coming across as a Europe

accessed, divided party? I am absolutely behind the leadership.

David Cameron announced the policy I am trying to bring forward in this

bill. It is in line with the speech he gave this time last year. But

getting that commitment into law will help to kick-start the

negotiation process and mean everyone will know where we stand.

But whatever happens, the Conservatives are committed to

delivering a referendum. And to address the point that we talk about

Europe too much, that is not the case. We have a good message on the

economy, on tackling immigration and reforming welfare. There is more to

do, but this is also an important part of policy. But at a time when

the economic news seems to be turning in your direction, you are

talking about the European referendum. Your backbench

colleagues are trying to change the Immigration Bill every which way.

Dominic Rather is putting in an amendment is and Mr Nigel Mills has

been on this programme, putting in amendments that are clearly illegal.

How is that helpful? The fact is that we are in a coalition, so there

are areas of policy where Conservatives might want to go

further and we are not able to do that. In other areas, we are

delivering good reforms. But this is not a matter of going further. The

mill 's amendment was clearly a contravention of the Treaty of Rome.

That is where you get the headlines from. Some of your colleagues have a

death wish? Would they rather have a Miliband government if the choice is

an impure Cameron one instead? I don't think anyone in their right

mind would rather have a Miliband government. Then why are they

behaving that way? We have had some disagreements into the leak and

debate within the party, but it was talked about on the panel just now.

The Conservative Party is behind David Cameron and focused on winning

the next election. Europe is one part of that. We have policies in a

range of areas, but we are getting back on the right track. Thank you

for being patient with us. Is this ghost story going to go

somewhere? Mr Laws is talking through surrogates at the moment,

but there is a strategy by the Lib Dems make these differential points

now. I think it is fantastic coalition sports and entertaining,

but in terms of out there, it has almost no traction whatsoever. I

don't think any voters know who Baroness Morgan is and it sounds

like one but politicians shouting at another bunch of politicians about

their ability to give each other jobs. There is a larger point about

the way Michael Gove runs his government. He is notoriously a very

polite man surrounded by Rottweiler is, his advisers. He has made

enemies of a lot of people in the media, and some of that will come

back on him in the next 18 months. We shall see if Mr Laws himself

sticks his head above the parapet. That is it for this week. The Daily

Politics is on throughout the week at midday on BBC Two, except on

Wednesdays, when we are on at 11:30am. I will be back next week at

the same time. Remember, if it is Sunday, it's the Sunday Politics.