Browse content similar to 22/06/2014. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
Welfare reform is one of the government's most popular policies. | :00:37. | :00:43. | |
So Labour says it would be even tougher than the Tories. | :00:44. | :00:46. | |
We'll be asking the Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary if she's got | :00:47. | :00:50. | |
Even Labour supporters worry that Ed Miliband hasn't got what it takes | :00:51. | :00:56. | |
Labour grandees are increasingly vocal about their concerns. | :00:57. | :01:01. | |
Over 50% of Labour voters think they'd do better with a new leader. | :01:02. | :01:12. | |
Later in the programme: apparently "toxic" on the doorstep. | :01:13. | :01:21. | |
NATO?s chief on the Newport summit and future of the military alliance. | :01:22. | :01:24. | |
promised an electric car revolution, why so little progress? | :01:25. | :01:40. | |
Nick Watt, Helen Lewis and Janan Ganesh, the toxic tweeters | :01:41. | :01:47. | |
First, the deepening crisis in Iraq, where Sunni Islamists are now | :01:48. | :01:55. | |
largely in control of the Syrian-Iraq border, which means | :01:56. | :01:57. | |
they can now re-supply their forces in Iraq from their Syrian bases. | :01:58. | :02:04. | |
Rather than moving on Baghdad, they are for the moment consolidating | :02:05. | :02:06. | |
their grip on the towns and cities they've already taken. | :02:07. | :02:09. | |
They also seem to be in effective control of Iraq's | :02:10. | :02:11. | |
biggest oil refinery, which supplies the capital. | :02:12. | :02:15. | |
And there are reports they might now have taken the power | :02:16. | :02:17. | |
Iraqi politicians are now admitting that ISIS, | :02:18. | :02:24. | |
the name of the Sunni insurgents, is better trained, better equipped and | :02:25. | :02:27. | |
far more battle-hardened than the US-trained Iraqi army fighting it. | :02:28. | :02:32. | |
Which leaves the fate of Baghdad increasingly in the hands | :02:33. | :02:35. | |
No good news coming out of there, Janan. No good news and no good | :02:36. | :02:53. | |
options either. The West's best strategy is to decide how much | :02:54. | :02:57. | |
support to give to the Iraqi government. The US is sending over | :02:58. | :03:02. | |
about 275 military personnel. Do they go further and contemplate | :03:03. | :03:05. | |
their support? General Petraeus argued against it as it might be | :03:06. | :03:11. | |
seen as the US serving as the force of Shia Iraqis -- continue their | :03:12. | :03:17. | |
support. Do we contemplate breaking up Iraq? It won't be easy. The Sunni | :03:18. | :03:26. | |
and Shia Muslim populations don't live in clearly bordered areas, but | :03:27. | :03:29. | |
in the longer term, do we deal with it in the same way we dealt with the | :03:30. | :03:33. | |
break-up of the Ottoman empire over 100 years ago? In the short-term and | :03:34. | :03:38. | |
long-term, completely confounding. Quite humiliating. If ISIS take | :03:39. | :03:45. | |
Baghdad I can't think of a bigger ignominy for foreign policy since | :03:46. | :03:51. | |
Suez. If Iraq is partitioned, it won't be up to us. It will be what | :03:52. | :03:55. | |
is happening because of what is happening on the ground. Everything | :03:56. | :04:01. | |
does point to partition, and that border, which ISIS control, between | :04:02. | :04:07. | |
Syria and Iraq, that has been there since it was drawn during the First | :04:08. | :04:12. | |
World War. That is gone as well. An astonishingly humbling situation the | :04:13. | :04:15. | |
West, and you can see the Kurds in the North think this is a charge -- | :04:16. | :04:24. | |
chance for authority. They think this is the chance to get the | :04:25. | :04:27. | |
autonomy they felt they deserved a long time. Janan is right. We can't | :04:28. | :04:33. | |
do much in the long term, but we have to decide on the engagement. | :04:34. | :04:37. | |
And the other people wish you'd be talking turkey, because if there is | :04:38. | :04:40. | |
some blowback and the fighters come back, they are likely to come back | :04:41. | :04:45. | |
from Turkey. Where is Iran in all of this? There were reports last week | :04:46. | :04:50. | |
that the Revolutionary guard, the head of it, he was already in | :04:51. | :04:53. | |
Baghdad with 67 advisers and there might have been some brigades that | :04:54. | :04:58. | |
have gone there as well. Where are they? What has happened? I'm pretty | :04:59. | :05:03. | |
sure the Prime Minister of Iraq is putting more faith in Iran than the | :05:04. | :05:14. | |
White House and the British. I think they are running the show, in | :05:15. | :05:18. | |
technical terms. John Kerry is flying into Cairo this morning, and | :05:19. | :05:22. | |
what is his message? It is twofold. One is to Arab countries, do more to | :05:23. | :05:26. | |
encourage an inclusive government in Iraq, mainly Sunni Muslims in the | :05:27. | :05:31. | |
government, and the Arab Gulf states should stop funding insurgents in | :05:32. | :05:36. | |
Iraq. You think, Iraq, it's potentially going to break up, so | :05:37. | :05:42. | |
this sounds a bit late in the day and a bit weak. It gets | :05:43. | :05:45. | |
fundamentally to the problem, what can we do? Niall Ferguson has a big | :05:46. | :05:49. | |
piece in the Sunday Times asking if this is place where we cannot doing | :05:50. | :05:53. | |
anything. He doesn't want to do anything. By the way, that is what | :05:54. | :05:58. | |
most Americans think. That is what opinion polls are showing. You have | :05:59. | :06:03. | |
George Osborne Michael Gold who would love to get involved but they | :06:04. | :06:07. | |
cannot because of the vote in parliament on Syria lasted -- George | :06:08. | :06:10. | |
Osborne and Michael Gove. This government does not have the stomach | :06:11. | :06:15. | |
for military intervention. We will see how events unfold on the ground. | :06:16. | :06:18. | |
All parties are agreed that Britain's 60-year old multi-billion | :06:19. | :06:21. | |
The Tory side of the Coalition think their reforms are necessary | :06:22. | :06:26. | |
and popular, though they haven't always gone to time or to plan. | :06:27. | :06:29. | |
In the eight months she's had since she became Shadow Secretary of State | :06:30. | :06:33. | |
for Work and Pensions, Rachel Reeves has talked the talk about getting | :06:34. | :06:40. | |
people off benefits, into work and lowering the overall welfare bill. | :06:41. | :06:43. | |
her first interview in the job she threatened "We would | :06:44. | :06:45. | |
But Labour has opposed just about every change the Coalition | :06:46. | :06:49. | |
has proposed to cut the cost and change the culture of welfare. | :06:50. | :06:53. | |
Child benefit, housing benefit, the ?26,000 benefit cap - | :06:54. | :06:56. | |
They've been lukewarm about the government's flagship Universal | :06:57. | :07:02. | |
Credit scheme - which rolls six benefit payments into one - and | :07:03. | :07:05. | |
And Labour has set out only two modest welfare cuts. | :07:06. | :07:13. | |
This week, Labour said young people must have skills or be in training | :07:14. | :07:16. | |
That will save ?65 million, says Labour, though the cost | :07:17. | :07:21. | |
And cutting winter fuel payments for richer pensioners which will | :07:22. | :07:27. | |
Not a lot in a total welfare bill of around ?200 billion. | :07:28. | :07:35. | |
And with welfare cuts popular among even Labour voters, they will soon | :07:36. | :07:37. | |
have to start spelling out exactly what Labour welfare reform means. | :07:38. | :07:44. | |
Welcome. Good morning. Why do you want to be tougher than the Tories? | :07:45. | :07:57. | |
We want to be tough in getting the welfare bill down. Under this | :07:58. | :08:01. | |
government, the bill will be ?13 million more than the government set | :08:02. | :08:04. | |
out in 2010 and I don't think that is acceptable. We should try to | :08:05. | :08:09. | |
control the cost of Social Security. But the welfare bill under the next | :08:10. | :08:13. | |
Labour government will fall? It will be smaller when you end the first | :08:14. | :08:17. | |
parliament than when you started? We signed up to the capping welfare but | :08:18. | :08:21. | |
that doesn't see social security costs ball, it sees them go up in | :08:22. | :08:27. | |
line with with inflation or average earnings -- costs fall. So where | :08:28. | :08:32. | |
flair will rise? We have signed up to the cap -- welfare will rise? We | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
have signed up to the cap. We will get the costs under control and they | :08:38. | :08:41. | |
haven't managed to achieve it. The government is spending ?13 billion | :08:42. | :08:44. | |
more on Social Security and the reason they are doing it is because | :08:45. | :08:50. | |
the minimum wage has not kept pace with the cost of living so people | :08:51. | :08:53. | |
are reliant on tax credits. They are not building houses and people are | :08:54. | :08:57. | |
relying on housing benefit. We have a record number of people on zero | :08:58. | :09:03. | |
hours contracts. I'm still not clear if you will cut welfare if you get | :09:04. | :09:07. | |
in power. Nobody is saying that the cost of welfare is going to fall. | :09:08. | :09:13. | |
The welfare cap sees that happening gradually. That is a Tory cap. And | :09:14. | :09:18. | |
you've accepted it. You're being the same as the Tories, not to. If they | :09:19. | :09:25. | |
had a welfare cap, they would have breached it in every year of the | :09:26. | :09:29. | |
parliament. Social Security will be higher than the government set out | :09:30. | :09:34. | |
because they failed to control it. You read the polls, and the party | :09:35. | :09:37. | |
does lots of its own polling, and you're scared of being seen as the | :09:38. | :09:41. | |
welfare party. You don't really believe all of this anti-welfare | :09:42. | :09:47. | |
stuff? We are the party of work, not welfare. The Labour Party was set up | :09:48. | :09:50. | |
in the first place because we believe in the dignity of work and | :09:51. | :09:52. | |
we believe that work should pay wages can afford to live on. I make | :09:53. | :09:56. | |
no apologies for being the party of work. We are not the welfare party, | :09:57. | :10:01. | |
we are the party of work. Even your confidential strategy document | :10:02. | :10:06. | |
admits that voters don't trust you on immigration, the economy, this is | :10:07. | :10:09. | |
your own people, and welfare. You are not trusted on it. The most | :10:10. | :10:14. | |
recent poll showed Labour slightly ahead of the Conservative Party on | :10:15. | :10:17. | |
Social Security, probably because they have seen the incompetence and | :10:18. | :10:22. | |
chaos at the Department for Work and Pensions under Iain Duncan Smith. | :10:23. | :10:26. | |
Your own internal document means that the voters don't trust you on | :10:27. | :10:32. | |
welfare reform. That is why we have shown some of this tough things we | :10:33. | :10:35. | |
will do like the announcement that Ed Miliband made earlier this week, | :10:36. | :10:40. | |
that young people without basic qualifications won't be entitled to | :10:41. | :10:44. | |
just sign on for benefits, they have to sign up for training in order to | :10:45. | :10:47. | |
receive support. That is the right thing to do by that group of young | :10:48. | :10:50. | |
people, because they need skills to progress. We will, once that. -- we | :10:51. | :11:00. | |
will, onto that. You say you criticise the government that it had | :11:01. | :11:05. | |
a cap and wouldn't have met it, but every money-saving welfare reform, | :11:06. | :11:09. | |
you voted against it. How is that being tougher? The most recent bout | :11:10. | :11:16. | |
was the cap on overall welfare expenditure, and we went through the | :11:17. | :11:20. | |
lobbies and voted for the Tories. You voted against the benefit cap, | :11:21. | :11:25. | |
welfare rating, you voted against, child benefit schemes, you voted | :11:26. | :11:30. | |
against. You can't say we voted against everything when we voted | :11:31. | :11:32. | |
with the Conservatives in the most recent bill with a cap on Social | :11:33. | :11:36. | |
Security. It's just not correct to say. The last time we voted, we | :11:37. | :11:44. | |
walked through the lobby with them. You voted on the principle of the | :11:45. | :11:50. | |
cap. You voted on every step that would allow the cap to be met. Every | :11:51. | :11:55. | |
single one. The most recent vote was not on the principle of the cap, it | :11:56. | :11:59. | |
was on a cap of Social Security in the next Parliament and we signed up | :12:00. | :12:02. | |
for that. It was Ed Miliband who called her that earlier on. Which | :12:03. | :12:06. | |
welfare reform did you vote for? We voted for the cap. Other than that? | :12:07. | :12:13. | |
We have supported universal credit. You voted against it in the third | :12:14. | :12:18. | |
reading. We voted against some of the specifics. If you look at | :12:19. | :12:23. | |
universal credit, they have had to write off nearly ?900 million of | :12:24. | :12:28. | |
spending. I'm not on the rights and wrongs, I'm trying to work out what | :12:29. | :12:32. | |
you voted for. Some of the things we are going to go further than the | :12:33. | :12:35. | |
government with. For example, cutting benefits for young people | :12:36. | :12:41. | |
who don't sign of the training. The government had introduced that. For | :12:42. | :12:44. | |
example, saying that the richest pensioners should not get the winter | :12:45. | :12:46. | |
fuel allowance, that is something the government haven't signed up. | :12:47. | :12:50. | |
You would get that under Labour and this government haven't signed up | :12:51. | :12:54. | |
for it. ?100 million on the winter fuel allowance and ?65 million on | :12:55. | :13:00. | |
youth training. ?165 million. How big is the welfare budget? The cap | :13:01. | :13:06. | |
would apply to ?120 billion. And you've saved 125 -- 165 million? | :13:07. | :13:13. | |
Those are cuts that we said we would do in government. If you look at the | :13:14. | :13:18. | |
real prize from the changes Ed Miliband announced in the youth | :13:19. | :13:21. | |
allowance, it's not the short-term savings, it's the fact that each of | :13:22. | :13:25. | |
these young people, who are currently on unemployment benefits | :13:26. | :13:28. | |
without the skills we know they need to succeed in life, they will cost | :13:29. | :13:34. | |
the taxpayer ?2000 per year. I will come onto that. You mentioned | :13:35. | :13:38. | |
universal credit, which the government regards as the flagship | :13:39. | :13:42. | |
reform. It's had lots of troubles with it and it merges six benefits | :13:43. | :13:48. | |
into one. You voted against it in the third reading and given lukewarm | :13:49. | :13:51. | |
support in the past. We have not said he would abandon it, but now | :13:52. | :13:57. | |
you say you are for it. You are all over the place. We set up the rescue | :13:58. | :14:02. | |
committee in autumn of last year because we have seen from the | :14:03. | :14:04. | |
National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee, report after | :14:05. | :14:09. | |
report showing that the project is massively overbudget and is not | :14:10. | :14:14. | |
going to be delivered according to the government timetable. We set up | :14:15. | :14:18. | |
the committee because we believe in the principle of universal credit | :14:19. | :14:20. | |
and think it is the right thing to do. Can you tell us now if you will | :14:21. | :14:25. | |
keep it or not? Because there is no transparency and we have no idea. We | :14:26. | :14:31. | |
are awash with information. We are not. The government, in the most | :14:32. | :14:37. | |
recent National audit Forest -- National Audit Office statement said | :14:38. | :14:42. | |
it was a reset project. This is really important. This is a flagship | :14:43. | :14:47. | |
government programme, and it's going to cost ?12.8 billion to deliver, | :14:48. | :14:52. | |
and we don't know what sort of state it is in, so we have said that if we | :14:53. | :14:56. | |
win at the next election, we will pause that for three months and | :14:57. | :15:03. | |
calling... Will you stop the pilots? We don't know what status they will | :15:04. | :15:08. | |
have. We would stop the build of the system for three months, calling the | :15:09. | :15:12. | |
National Audit Office to do awards and all report. The government don't | :15:13. | :15:18. | |
need to do this until the next general election, they could do it | :15:19. | :15:21. | |
today. Stop throwing good money after bad and get a grip of this | :15:22. | :15:26. | |
incredibly important programme. You said you don't know enough to a view | :15:27. | :15:31. | |
now. So when you were invited to a job centre where universal credit is | :15:32. | :15:34. | |
being rolled out to see how it was working, you refused to go. Why? We | :15:35. | :15:40. | |
asked were a meeting with Iain Duncan Smith and he cancelled the | :15:41. | :15:43. | |
meeting is three times. I'm talking about the visit when you were | :15:44. | :15:46. | |
offered to go to a job centre and you refused. We had an appointment | :15:47. | :15:51. | |
to meet Iain Duncan Smith at the Department for Work and Pensions and | :15:52. | :15:53. | |
said he cancelled and was not available, but he wanted us to go to | :15:54. | :15:58. | |
the job centre. We wanted to talk to him and his officials, which she | :15:59. | :16:03. | |
did. Would it be more useful to go to the job centre and find out how | :16:04. | :16:06. | |
it was working. He's going to tell you it's working fine. | :16:07. | :16:20. | |
Advice Bureau in Hammersmith, they are working to help the people | :16:21. | :16:27. | |
trying to claim universal credit. Iain Duncan Smith cancelled three | :16:28. | :16:33. | |
meetings. That is another issue, I was asking about the job centre. It | :16:34. | :16:38. | |
is not another issue because Iain Duncan Smith fogged us off. This | :16:39. | :16:44. | |
week you said that jobless youngsters who won't take training | :16:45. | :16:48. | |
will lose their welfare payments. How many young people are not in | :16:49. | :16:57. | |
work training or education? There are 140,000 young people claiming | :16:58. | :17:02. | |
benefits at the moment, but 850,000 young people who are not in work at | :17:03. | :17:08. | |
the moment. This applies to around 100,000 young people. There are | :17:09. | :17:16. | |
actually 975,000, 16-24 -year-olds, not in work, training or education. | :17:17. | :17:23. | |
Your proposal only applies to 100,000 of them, why? This is | :17:24. | :17:30. | |
applying to young people who are signing on for benefits rather than | :17:31. | :17:36. | |
signing up for training. We want to make sure that all young people... | :17:37. | :17:43. | |
Why only 100,000? They are the ones currently getting job-seeker's | :17:44. | :17:47. | |
allowance. We are saying you can not just sign up to... Can I get you to | :17:48. | :18:00. | |
respond to this, the number of people not in work, training or | :18:01. | :18:06. | |
education fell last year by more than you are planning to help. Long | :18:07. | :18:16. | |
turn -- long-term unemployment is an entrenched problem... This issue | :18:17. | :18:24. | |
about an entrenched group of young people. Young people who haven't got | :18:25. | :18:30. | |
skills and are not in training we know are much less likely to get a | :18:31. | :18:34. | |
job so there are 140,018-24 -year-olds signing onto benefits at | :18:35. | :18:41. | |
the moment. This is about trying to address that problem to make sure | :18:42. | :18:45. | |
all young people have the skills they need to get a job. Your policy | :18:46. | :18:50. | |
is to take away part of the dole unless young unemployed people agree | :18:51. | :18:55. | |
to study for level three qualifications, the equivalent of an | :18:56. | :19:01. | |
AS-level or an NVQ but 40% of these people have the literary skills of a | :19:02. | :19:09. | |
nine-year-old. After all that failed education, how are you going to | :19:10. | :19:14. | |
train them to a level standard? We are saying that anyone who doesn't | :19:15. | :19:19. | |
have that a level or equivalent qualification will be required to go | :19:20. | :19:24. | |
back to college. We are not saying that within a year they have to get | :19:25. | :19:29. | |
up to that level but these are exactly the sorts of people... These | :19:30. | :19:34. | |
people have been failed by your education system. These people are, | :19:35. | :19:38. | |
for the last four years, have been educated under a Conservative | :19:39. | :19:43. | |
government. 18 - 21-year-olds, most of them have their education under a | :19:44. | :19:48. | |
Labour government during which 300,000 people left with no GCSEs | :19:49. | :19:54. | |
whatsoever. I don't understand how training for one year can do what 11 | :19:55. | :20:00. | |
years in school did not. We are not saying that within one year | :20:01. | :20:03. | |
everybody will get up to a level three qualifications, but if you are | :20:04. | :20:07. | |
one of those people who enters the Labour market age 18 with the | :20:08. | :20:11. | |
reading skills of a nine-year-old, they are the sorts of people that | :20:12. | :20:19. | |
should not the left languishing. I went to college in Hackney if you | :20:20. | :20:25. | |
you are -- a few weeks ago and there was a dyslexic boy studying painting | :20:26. | :20:30. | |
and decorating. In school they decided he was a troublemaker and | :20:31. | :20:35. | |
that he didn't want to learn. He went back to college because he | :20:36. | :20:40. | |
wanted to get the skills. He said that it wasn't until he went back to | :20:41. | :20:45. | |
college that he could pick up a newspaper and read it, it made a | :20:46. | :20:49. | |
huge difference but too many people are let down by the system. I am | :20:50. | :20:55. | |
wondering how the training will make up for an education system that | :20:56. | :21:00. | |
failed them but let's move on to your leader. Look at this graph of | :21:01. | :21:04. | |
Ed Miliband's popularity. This is the net satisfaction with him, it is | :21:05. | :21:10. | |
dreadful. The trend continues to climb since he became leader of the | :21:11. | :21:16. | |
Labour Party, why? What you have seen is another 2300 Labour | :21:17. | :21:20. | |
councillors since Ed Miliband became the leader of the Labour Party. You | :21:21. | :21:25. | |
saw in the elections a month ago that... Why is the satisfaction rate | :21:26. | :21:33. | |
falling? We can look at polls or actual election results and the fact | :21:34. | :21:38. | |
that we have got another 2000 Labour councillors, more people voting | :21:39. | :21:42. | |
Labour, the opinion polls today show that if there was a general election | :21:43. | :21:47. | |
today we would have a majority of more than 40, he must be doing | :21:48. | :21:54. | |
something right. Why do almost 50% of voters want to replace him as | :21:55. | :22:00. | |
leader? Why do 50% and more think that he is not up to the job? The | :22:01. | :22:07. | |
more people see Ed Miliband, the less impressed they are. The British | :22:08. | :22:13. | |
people seem to like him less. The election strategy I suggest that | :22:14. | :22:18. | |
follows from that is that you should keep Ed Miliband under wraps until | :22:19. | :22:22. | |
the election. Let's look at actually what happens when people get a | :22:23. | :22:27. | |
chance to vote, when they get that opportunity we have seen more Labour | :22:28. | :22:31. | |
councillors, more Labour members of the European Parliament... | :22:32. | :22:38. | |
Oppositions always get more. The opinion polls today, one of them | :22:39. | :22:45. | |
shows Labour four points ahead. You have not done that well in local | :22:46. | :22:50. | |
government elections or European elections. Why don't people like | :22:51. | :22:55. | |
him? I think we have done incredibly well in elections. People must like | :22:56. | :23:01. | |
a lot of the things Labour and Ed Miliband are doing because we are | :23:02. | :23:05. | |
winning back support across the country. We won local councils in | :23:06. | :23:09. | |
places like Hammersmith and Fulham, Crawley, Hastings, key places that | :23:10. | :23:15. | |
Labour need to win back at the general election next year. Even you | :23:16. | :23:19. | |
have said traditional Labour supporters are abandoning the party. | :23:20. | :23:26. | |
That is what Ed Miliband has said as well. We have got this real concern | :23:27. | :23:31. | |
about what has happened. If you look at the elections in May, 60% of | :23:32. | :23:36. | |
people didn't even bother going to vote. That is a profound issue not | :23:37. | :23:41. | |
just for Labour. You said traditional voters who perhaps at | :23:42. | :23:46. | |
times we took for granted are now being offered an alternative. Why | :23:47. | :23:51. | |
did you take them for granted? This is what Ed Miliband said. I am not | :23:52. | :23:56. | |
saying anything Ed Miliband himself has not said. When he ran for the | :23:57. | :24:03. | |
leadership he said that we took too many people for granted and we | :24:04. | :24:07. | |
needed to give people positive reasons to vote Labour, he has been | :24:08. | :24:11. | |
doing that. He has been there for four years and you are saying you | :24:12. | :24:15. | |
still take them for granted. Why? I am saying that for too long we have | :24:16. | :24:20. | |
taken them for granted. We are on track to win the general election | :24:21. | :24:24. | |
next year and that will defy all the odds. You are going to win... Ed | :24:25. | :24:34. | |
Miliband will win next year and make a great Prime Minister. | :24:35. | :24:39. | |
Now to the Liberal Democrats, at the risk of intruding into private | :24:40. | :24:44. | |
grief. The party is still smarting from dire results in the European | :24:45. | :24:47. | |
and Local Elections. The only poll Nick Clegg has won in recent times | :24:48. | :24:51. | |
is to be voted the most unpopular leader of a party in modern British | :24:52. | :24:55. | |
history. No surprise there have been calls for him to go, though that | :24:56. | :24:59. | |
still looks unlikely. Here's Eleanor. | :25:00. | :25:00. | |
Liberal Democrats celebrating, something we haven't seen for a | :25:01. | :25:05. | |
while. This victory back in 1998 led to a decade of power for the Lib | :25:06. | :25:11. | |
Dems in Liverpool. What a contrast to the city's political landscape | :25:12. | :25:16. | |
today. At its height the party had 69 local councillors, now down to | :25:17. | :25:22. | |
just three. The scale of the challenge facing Nick Clegg and the | :25:23. | :25:26. | |
Lib Dems is growing. The party is rock bottom in the polls, | :25:27. | :25:31. | |
consistently in single figures. It was wiped out in the European | :25:32. | :25:36. | |
elections losing all but one of its 12 MEPs and in the local elections | :25:37. | :25:42. | |
it lost 42% of the seats that it was defending. But on Merseyside, Nick | :25:43. | :25:49. | |
Clegg was putting on a brave face. We did badly in Liverpool, | :25:50. | :25:53. | |
Manchester and London in particular, we did well in other places. But you | :25:54. | :25:59. | |
are right, we did badly in some of those big cities and I have | :26:00. | :26:03. | |
initiated a review, quite naturally, to understand what went | :26:04. | :26:10. | |
wrong, what went right. As Lib Dems across the country get on with some | :26:11. | :26:14. | |
serious soul-searching, there is an admission that his is the leader of | :26:15. | :26:18. | |
the party who is failing to hit the right notes. Knocking on doors in | :26:19. | :26:24. | |
Liverpool, I have to tell you that Nick Clegg is not a popular person. | :26:25. | :26:29. | |
Some might use the word toxic and I find this very difficult because I | :26:30. | :26:34. | |
know Nick very well and I see a principal person who passionately | :26:35. | :26:38. | |
believes in what he is doing and he is a nice guy. As a result of his | :26:39. | :26:45. | |
popularity, what has happened to the core vote? In parts of the country, | :26:46. | :26:54. | |
we are down to just three councillors like Liverpool for | :26:55. | :26:58. | |
example. You also lose the deliverers and fundraisers and the | :26:59. | :27:02. | |
organisers and the members of course so all of that will have to be | :27:03. | :27:08. | |
rebuilt. As they start fermenting process, local parties across the | :27:09. | :27:12. | |
country and here in Liverpool have been voting on whether there should | :27:13. | :27:18. | |
be a leadership contest. We had two choices to flush out and have a go | :27:19. | :27:23. | |
at Nick Clegg or to positively decide we would sharpen up the | :27:24. | :27:26. | |
campaign and get back on the streets, and by four to one ratio we | :27:27. | :27:32. | |
decided to get back on the streets. We are bruised and battered but we | :27:33. | :27:38. | |
are still here, the orange flag is still flying and one day it will fly | :27:39. | :27:42. | |
over this building again, Liverpool town hall. But do people want the | :27:43. | :27:48. | |
Lib Dems back in charge in this city? I certainly wouldn't vote for | :27:49. | :27:52. | |
them. Their performance in Government and the way they have | :27:53. | :27:57. | |
left their promises down, I could not vote for them again. I voted Lib | :27:58. | :28:04. | |
Dem in the last election because of the university tuition fees and I | :28:05. | :28:10. | |
would never vote for them again because they broke their promise. | :28:11. | :28:14. | |
The Lib Dems are awful, broken promises and what have you. I | :28:15. | :28:18. | |
wouldn't vote for them. This is the declaration of the results for the | :28:19. | :28:21. | |
Northwest... Last month, as other party celebrated in the north-west, | :28:22. | :28:26. | |
the Lib Dems here lost their only MEP, Chris Davies. Now there is | :28:27. | :28:32. | |
concern the party doesn't know how to turn its fortunes around. We | :28:33. | :28:38. | |
don't have an answer to that, if we did we would be grasping it with | :28:39. | :28:45. | |
both hands. We will do our best to hold onto the places where we still | :28:46. | :28:50. | |
have seats but as for the rest of the country where we have been | :28:51. | :28:55. | |
hollowed out, we don't know how to start again until the next general | :28:56. | :28:59. | |
election is out of the way. After their disastrous performance in the | :29:00. | :29:02. | |
European elections, pressure is growing for the party to shift its | :29:03. | :29:13. | |
stance. I think there has to be a lancing of the wound, there should | :29:14. | :29:18. | |
in a referendum and the Liberal Democrats should be calling it. The | :29:19. | :29:24. | |
rest of Europe once this because they are fed up with Britain being | :29:25. | :29:30. | |
unable to make up its mind. The Lib Dems are now suffering the effects | :29:31. | :29:35. | |
of being in Government. The party's problem, choosing the right course | :29:36. | :29:40. | |
to regain political credibility. We can now speak to form a Lib Dems | :29:41. | :29:46. | |
leader Ming Campbell. Welcome back to the Sunday Politics. Even your | :29:47. | :29:51. | |
own activists say that Nick Clegg is toxic. How will that change between | :29:52. | :29:58. | |
now and the election? When you have had disappointing results, but you | :29:59. | :30:02. | |
have to do is to rebuild. You pick yourself up and start all over | :30:03. | :30:07. | |
again, and the reason why the Liberal Democrats got 57, 56 seats | :30:08. | :30:12. | |
in the House of Commons now is because we picked ourselves up, we | :30:13. | :30:16. | |
took every opportunity and we have rebuilt from the bottom up. | :30:17. | :30:27. | |
least popular leader in modern history and more unpopular than your | :30:28. | :30:30. | |
mate Gordon Brown. You are running out of time. No one believes that | :30:31. | :30:35. | |
being the leader of a modern political party in the UK is an easy | :30:36. | :30:39. | |
job. Both Ed Miliband and David Cameron must have had cause to | :30:40. | :30:42. | |
think, over breakfast this morning, when they saw the headlines in some | :30:43. | :30:47. | |
of the Sunday papers. Of course it is a difficult job but it was | :30:48. | :30:51. | |
pointed out a moment or two ago that Nick Clegg is a man of principle and | :30:52. | :30:55. | |
enormous resilience if you consider what he had to put up with, and in | :30:56. | :30:59. | |
my view, he is quite clearly the person best qualified to lead the | :31:00. | :31:02. | |
party between now and the general election and through the election | :31:03. | :31:06. | |
campaign, and beyond. So why don't people like him? We have had to take | :31:07. | :31:11. | |
some pretty difficult decisions, and, of course, people didn't expect | :31:12. | :31:15. | |
that. If you look back to the rather heady days of the rose garden behind | :31:16. | :31:21. | |
ten Downing St, people thought it was all going to be sweetness and | :31:22. | :31:25. | |
light, but the fact is, we didn't know then what we know now, about | :31:26. | :31:29. | |
the extent of the economic crisis we win, and a lot of difficult | :31:30. | :31:33. | |
decisions have had to be taken in order to restore economic stability. | :31:34. | :31:37. | |
Look around you. You will see we are not there yet but we are a long way | :31:38. | :31:43. | |
better off than in 2010. You are not getting the credit for it, the | :31:44. | :31:49. | |
Tories are. We will be a little more assertive about taking the credit. | :31:50. | :31:55. | |
For example, the fact that 23 million people have had a tax cut of | :31:56. | :31:58. | |
?800 per year and we have taken 2 million people out of paying tax | :31:59. | :32:02. | |
altogether. Ming Campbell, your people say that on every programme | :32:03. | :32:07. | |
like this. Because it is true. That might be the case, but you are at | :32:08. | :32:12. | |
seven or 8% in the polls, and nobody is listening, or they don't believe | :32:13. | :32:14. | |
it. Once is listening, or they don't believe | :32:15. | :32:22. | |
doubt that what we have achieved will be much more easily | :32:23. | :32:25. | |
recognised, and there is no doubt, for example, in some of the recent | :32:26. | :32:29. | |
polls, like the Ashcroft Pole, something like 30% of those polled | :32:30. | :32:31. | |
said that as a result at the next something like 30% of those polled | :32:32. | :32:39. | |
general election, they would prepare their to be a coalition involving | :32:40. | :32:42. | |
the Liberal Democrats. So there is no question that the whole notion of | :32:43. | :32:47. | |
coalition is still very much a live one, and one which we have made work | :32:48. | :32:53. | |
in the public interest. The problem is people don't think that. People | :32:54. | :32:56. | |
see you trying to have your cake and eat it. On the one hand you want to | :32:57. | :33:00. | |
get your share of the credit for the turnaround in the economy, on the | :33:01. | :33:03. | |
other hand you can't stop yourself from distancing yourself from the | :33:04. | :33:07. | |
Tories and things that you did not like happening. You are trying to | :33:08. | :33:15. | |
face both ways at once. If you remember our fellow Scotsman | :33:16. | :33:15. | |
famously said you cannot ride both remember our fellow Scotsman | :33:16. | :33:28. | |
to the terms -- terms of the remember our fellow Scotsman | :33:29. | :33:28. | |
coalition agreement, which is what we signed up to in 2010. In | :33:29. | :33:32. | |
addition, in furtherance of that agreement, we have created things | :33:33. | :33:36. | |
like the pupil premium and the others I mentioned and you were | :33:37. | :33:40. | |
rather dismissive. I'm not dismissive, I'm just saying they | :33:41. | :33:43. | |
don't make a difference to what people think of you. We will do | :33:44. | :33:47. | |
everything in our power to change that between now and May 2015. The | :33:48. | :33:52. | |
interesting thing is, going back to the Ashcroft result, it demonstrated | :33:53. | :33:58. | |
clearly that in constituencies where we have MPs and we are well dug in, | :33:59. | :34:03. | |
we are doing everything that the public expects of us, and we are | :34:04. | :34:09. | |
doing very well indeed. You aren't sure fellow Lib Dems have been | :34:10. | :34:14. | |
saying this for you -- you and your fellow Liberal Dems have been saying | :34:15. | :34:17. | |
this for a year or 18 months, and since then you have lost all of your | :34:18. | :34:21. | |
MEPs apart from one, you lost your deposit in a by-election, you lost | :34:22. | :34:25. | |
310 councillor, including everyone in Manchester or Islington. Mr Clegg | :34:26. | :34:30. | |
leading you into the next general election will be the equivalent of | :34:31. | :34:37. | |
the charge of the light Brigade. I doubt that very much. The | :34:38. | :34:42. | |
implication behind that lit you rehearsed is that we should pack our | :34:43. | :34:46. | |
tents in the night and steal away. -- that litany. And if you heard in | :34:47. | :34:51. | |
that piece that preceded the discussion, people were saying, look | :34:52. | :34:54. | |
we have to start from the bottom and have to rebuild. That is exactly | :34:55. | :35:09. | |
what we will do. Nine months is a period of gestation. As you well | :35:10. | :35:13. | |
know. I wouldn't dismiss it quite so easily as that. I'm not here to say | :35:14. | :35:17. | |
we had a wonderful result or anything like it, but what I do say | :35:18. | :35:22. | |
is that the party is determined to turn it round, and that Nick Clegg | :35:23. | :35:26. | |
is the person best qualified to do it. Should your party adopt a | :35:27. | :35:31. | |
referendum about in or out on Europe? No, we should stick to the | :35:32. | :35:36. | |
coalition agreement. If there is any transfer of power from Westminster | :35:37. | :35:40. | |
to Brussels, that will be subject to a referendum. No change. And | :35:41. | :35:46. | |
finally, as a Lib Dem, you must be glad you are not fighting the next | :35:47. | :35:52. | |
election yourself? I've fought every election since 1974, so I've had a | :35:53. | :35:57. | |
few experiences, some good, some bad, but the one thing I have done | :35:58. | :36:01. | |
and the one thing a lot of other people have done is that they have | :36:02. | :36:05. | |
stuck to the task, and that is what will happen in May 2015. Ming | :36:06. | :36:07. | |
Campbell, thank you for joining us. It's just gone 11.35am, you're | :36:08. | :36:11. | |
watching the Sunday Politics. We say goodbye to viewers | :36:12. | :36:13. | |
in Scotland who leave us now Hello and on the | :36:14. | :36:16. | |
Sunday Politics Wales: We hear | :36:17. | :36:25. | |
from the military alliance?s chief. Meanwhile, Welsh military veterans | :36:26. | :36:31. | |
are being offered more support, And a new map | :36:32. | :36:33. | |
for local government is coming. But are the councils and the | :36:34. | :36:38. | |
Welsh Government heading Measures to support veterans will be | :36:39. | :36:41. | |
announced by the Welsh Government It?s already announced there?ll | :36:42. | :36:48. | |
be more money for treating post But there is a concern about big | :36:49. | :36:51. | |
variations in waiting times. It was during the First World War | :36:52. | :37:08. | |
that cases of post-traumatic stress disorder were first documented. | :37:09. | :37:14. | |
Soldiers develop shell shock as a result of their experiences in the | :37:15. | :37:20. | |
trenches. The firing line museum at Cardiff Castle tells the story of | :37:21. | :37:24. | |
the Welsh soldier over the decades and for many ex-service men and | :37:25. | :37:29. | |
women, dealing with the after-effects of combat is part of | :37:30. | :37:35. | |
that story. This man's spell at 18 years in the Army and served in | :37:36. | :37:40. | |
Northern Ireland and the Falklands. He did not seek treatment | :37:41. | :37:43. | |
straightaway but he started recognising he had problems while he | :37:44. | :37:48. | |
was still in the Army. Self diagnosed and I dealt with it. There | :37:49. | :37:53. | |
were occasions, sleepless nights, nightmares, bouts of heavy drinking. | :37:54. | :38:00. | |
But I just put that down to service life anyway because we work hard and | :38:01. | :38:05. | |
we play hard. I had tended not to talk about my experiences and the | :38:06. | :38:08. | |
first time I'd spoke about my experiences were 16 years after the | :38:09. | :38:13. | |
event. It was a long-time bottled up. It was like a pressure cooker | :38:14. | :38:17. | |
for release. You have to admit you are suffering. You are in denial for | :38:18. | :38:22. | |
a long time because people say it is a sign of weakness. The way I looked | :38:23. | :38:33. | |
at it, the job that I chose, that became part of it, in a way. I kind | :38:34. | :38:41. | |
of accepted this. Since 2010, there has been a specialist mental health | :38:42. | :38:44. | |
service for ex-service personnel within the Welsh NHS. Later this | :38:45. | :38:51. | |
year, it launches under a new name. The head of the service says that | :38:52. | :38:55. | |
treating sufferers of conditions like this promptly improve the | :38:56. | :39:03. | |
effectiveness of treatments. Like any disease, the quicker you catch | :39:04. | :39:06. | |
an illness the better. If someone does not present within service, | :39:07. | :39:16. | |
several years down the road, they present with symptoms and problems | :39:17. | :39:19. | |
that could have been dealt with sooner. That makes it more | :39:20. | :39:32. | |
difficult. And there have been concerns about variations in the | :39:33. | :39:35. | |
time veterans have to wait for treat went across Wales. We asked all the | :39:36. | :39:40. | |
local health boards for their current waiting times from first | :39:41. | :39:45. | |
assessment to the start of treatment. Of those who responded, | :39:46. | :39:55. | |
the weight varied from two or three weeks to six months currently in the | :39:56. | :39:58. | |
Cardiff and Vale health board area. The variations are mainly due to a | :39:59. | :40:06. | |
limited number of therapists dealing with fluctuating demand, according | :40:07. | :40:11. | |
to those working in the service. This week the Welsh Government | :40:12. | :40:14. | |
announced there will be more money available to treat post-traumatic | :40:15. | :40:19. | |
stress disorder among that terms. It is promising more details later in | :40:20. | :40:25. | |
the week. The chair of the cross-party group on the Armed | :40:26. | :40:28. | |
Forces welcomes any extra resources but is urging the Welsh Government | :40:29. | :40:37. | |
to do more. There is variation in the ability of health boards to meet | :40:38. | :40:40. | |
the needs of veterans in their areas. We need to make sure that | :40:41. | :40:44. | |
there is adequate investment and to make sure that when clinicians come | :40:45. | :40:50. | |
across a veteran with problems, they are able to strike while the iron is | :40:51. | :40:59. | |
hot. If we do not have that, we will see more family breakdown and | :41:00. | :41:05. | |
unfortunately, more veterans taking their own lives. Over 30 years, | :41:06. | :41:17. | |
since he started showing signs, he has learned to live with his | :41:18. | :41:23. | |
symptoms. It does not affect me in day-to-day life. I have coping | :41:24. | :41:28. | |
strategies. I have good days and bad days. I just cope with it now | :41:29. | :41:35. | |
through hard-working, I work seven days a week and I do not have time | :41:36. | :41:38. | |
to stop and think about things. It does affect me when I see it on the | :41:39. | :41:46. | |
news, I find it very upsetting to this day. You feel for the families. | :41:47. | :42:03. | |
We are all part of the same military community. | :42:04. | :42:06. | |
Army veteran Maldwyn Jones ending that report by Bethan Lewis. | :42:07. | :42:11. | |
Staying with the military, preparations for the NATO summit | :42:12. | :42:13. | |
at the Celtic Manor in Newport are underway. | :42:14. | :42:21. | |
In September, Wales will host the biggest summit in NATO 's history. | :42:22. | :42:31. | |
In London this week, it was revealed that Russian forces were continuing | :42:32. | :42:36. | |
to amass near you crave. That threat will top the agenda in Newport. We | :42:37. | :42:43. | |
will discuss the future and that will be influenced by the current | :42:44. | :42:48. | |
events in Ukraine. Russia's illegal military action in Ukraine has | :42:49. | :42:54. | |
dramatically changed the security situation in Europe and we will have | :42:55. | :42:58. | |
to adapt to that and that will be one of the important topics to be | :42:59. | :43:02. | |
discussed in Wales. You have said that troops are massing on the | :43:03. | :43:07. | |
border. You have also said that NATO will not hesitate in the situation. | :43:08. | :43:10. | |
What exactly are you committing us to by saying that? To defend and | :43:11. | :43:16. | |
protect our allies. That is the core task of NATO. We have two adapt to | :43:17. | :43:22. | |
the new security situation and we have taken immediate steps to | :43:23. | :43:27. | |
enhance policing over the Baltic states. We have deployed naval | :43:28. | :43:35. | |
vessels. We have conducted exercises on the ground. We will not hesitate | :43:36. | :43:43. | |
to take further steps if necessary. Should people in the UK consider | :43:44. | :43:49. | |
Russia and enemy? I would put it this way, we have tried to develop a | :43:50. | :43:54. | |
partnership with Russia but apparently, Russia considers us not | :43:55. | :44:01. | |
a partner but an adversarial. And of course we have two adapt to that. | :44:02. | :44:06. | |
You are also of course discussing the situation in Afghanistan and | :44:07. | :44:13. | |
NATO 's withdrawal as a fighting force there. Can you understand why | :44:14. | :44:17. | |
people in Wales, people who have lost loved ones, may wonder why we | :44:18. | :44:26. | |
got involved in Afghanistan? Let me remind you why we went to | :44:27. | :44:31. | |
Afghanistan in the first place. It was in the wake of the September | :44:32. | :44:41. | |
2001 attacks on the United States. And we wanted to prevent Afghanistan | :44:42. | :44:44. | |
from once again becoming a safe haven for terrorists who could use | :44:45. | :44:49. | |
Afghanistan as a launching pad for terrorist attacks against Europe or | :44:50. | :44:55. | |
North America. And in that respect, we have achieved what we came for | :44:56. | :44:59. | |
because since we launched the military operation we have not seen | :45:00. | :45:04. | |
Afghanistan as a haven for terrorists. Isn't that because NATO | :45:05. | :45:09. | |
has a big military presence there and once we have pulled away, we | :45:10. | :45:12. | |
will leave it in a fragile state again? It is a very important point | :45:13. | :45:22. | |
that we do not believe that. We have spent a lot of time and efforts to | :45:23. | :45:27. | |
build a very strong Afghan security force of 350,000 soldiers and | :45:28. | :45:32. | |
police, that is a lot. And we have seen them handle security incidents | :45:33. | :45:37. | |
quite professionally. Recently they have also secured the presidential | :45:38. | :45:43. | |
elections and done so very professionally. I am confident that | :45:44. | :45:49. | |
they will be able to take full responsibility for the security by | :45:50. | :45:54. | |
the end of this year, as planned. But for people in Wales whose | :45:55. | :45:58. | |
relatives were in the Armed Forces and they have paid the ultimate | :45:59. | :46:01. | |
sacrifice, what would you say to them? First of all, I pay tribute to | :46:02. | :46:10. | |
the service and sacrifice of many British servicemen and women, | :46:11. | :46:14. | |
including a lot from Wales. And they have really made a difference in | :46:15. | :46:19. | |
Afghanistan and their sacrifice has not in in vain. On the contrary, as | :46:20. | :46:25. | |
I said, we have a better security situation but also if we look at the | :46:26. | :46:33. | |
broader development, you see a better Afghan society today than ten | :46:34. | :46:38. | |
or 15 years ago, economic growth, better educational system, 8 million | :46:39. | :46:43. | |
children go to school, alt of which more than one third are girls. Life | :46:44. | :46:48. | |
expectancy has gone up, in particularly for women. And you see | :46:49. | :46:56. | |
a vibrant media environment in Afghanistan. It is a much better | :46:57. | :47:01. | |
society than it was. The summit will be taking place shortly before a | :47:02. | :47:06. | |
referendum in Scotland on independence. Do you have a view on | :47:07. | :47:11. | |
Scottish independence? No, I am definitely not going to interfere | :47:12. | :47:18. | |
with domestic British politics. It could have serious indications for | :47:19. | :47:24. | |
NATO, couldn't it? We have not discussed it. If the Scottish people | :47:25. | :47:35. | |
were to decide on independence, and if an independent Scotland were to | :47:36. | :47:42. | |
apply for membership of NATO, that would be addressed exactly like | :47:43. | :47:50. | |
applications from other nations. Do you think it would be difficult for | :47:51. | :47:53. | |
an independent Scotland to join NATO, given that the SNP is opposed | :47:54. | :47:58. | |
to any nuclear arms being held on Scottish soil or in Scottish waters? | :47:59. | :48:05. | |
Well, it is difficult to make any assessment of that because it is a | :48:06. | :48:09. | |
hypothetical question and we have not discussed it in NATO. Will it be | :48:10. | :48:15. | |
discussed at the summit? No, it will not be discussed. It is a | :48:16. | :48:25. | |
hypothetical question. It is for the Scottish people to decide. Let's | :48:26. | :48:30. | |
await the outcome of the referendum. What will this summit mean for | :48:31. | :48:34. | |
Wales? Will Wales benefit in any way from hosting the summit? There is no | :48:35. | :48:40. | |
doubt that Wales as a whole will benefit from this big event. It is | :48:41. | :48:48. | |
the biggest NATO summit ever. On the first day, we will have delegations | :48:49. | :48:54. | |
from 15 nations plus international organisations. -- 15 nations. It is | :48:55. | :49:03. | |
an excellent opportunity to showcase Wales. We know Wales as rich of | :49:04. | :49:12. | |
culture and history, so it is a very attractive event for Wales. It gives | :49:13. | :49:19. | |
a lot of exposure. Some people may feel the event takes place in a | :49:20. | :49:24. | |
bubble behind a ring of steel and that really the rest of Wales will | :49:25. | :49:29. | |
not benefit. It is almost incidental where the event takes place. There | :49:30. | :49:35. | |
is a lot of economic positive spin off from such an event. All of the | :49:36. | :49:42. | |
nations bring bigger or smaller delegations. You will see thousands | :49:43. | :49:46. | |
and thousands of people going to Wales and of course there is a very | :49:47. | :49:50. | |
positive economic spin off but you should not underestimate the public | :49:51. | :49:57. | |
relations effect of this event, the biggest event ever in NATO 's | :49:58. | :50:04. | |
history will be broadcasted all over the world and let me also mention | :50:05. | :50:08. | |
that this will be an historic summit, we will take very important | :50:09. | :50:13. | |
decisions regarding NATO 's future. For many years to come, this will be | :50:14. | :50:20. | |
remembered as the Wales summit that gives a lot of positive public | :50:21. | :50:23. | |
It?s been talked about for years, studied in detail by a | :50:24. | :50:26. | |
Welsh Government commission and the First Minister has been negotiating | :50:27. | :50:29. | |
But the Labour Party says it?s going to spend another three months | :50:30. | :50:33. | |
consulting about a cut in the number of councils. | :50:34. | :50:35. | |
The Local Government Minister says she?ll postpone elections | :50:36. | :50:37. | |
for councillors who agree to merge with their neighbours. | :50:38. | :50:47. | |
It is not reorganisation. It is about merging local authorities. You | :50:48. | :50:52. | |
will have heard the announcement I made that the elections now have | :50:53. | :50:57. | |
been moved to 2017. I will legislate for that as soon as possible and it | :50:58. | :51:00. | |
will be done on existing authorities and one of the incentives we are | :51:01. | :51:05. | |
offering for voluntary mergers is those elections would move to 2018. | :51:06. | :51:09. | |
Let?s see if we can work out what all this means, | :51:10. | :51:12. | |
with Russell Goodway, a Cardiff councillor and former Labour leader | :51:13. | :51:14. | |
of the authority, and in Swansea with the Liberal Democrat local | :51:15. | :51:17. | |
Peter Black, I will ask you first, to respond to that. She says she | :51:18. | :51:26. | |
wants to legislate as soon as possible. Does she have the | :51:27. | :51:33. | |
authority to legislate as soon as possible? She has the authority to | :51:34. | :51:37. | |
bring a bill before the assembly but what that contains will have to be | :51:38. | :51:41. | |
open to discussion. As I understand it, they want to bring in some | :51:42. | :51:44. | |
legislation before the assembly elections to enable local councils | :51:45. | :51:49. | |
to merge involuntarily and I think also to stop all the local councils | :51:50. | :51:53. | |
spending all the money before any mergers go ahead. That may well have | :51:54. | :51:57. | |
some support. Once those semi-elections are out of the way | :51:58. | :52:00. | |
and they start looking seriously at bringing this merger of local | :52:01. | :52:06. | |
authorities, it is not a reorganisation, it does look like a | :52:07. | :52:09. | |
reorganisation to me, but once those elections are out of the way, I | :52:10. | :52:12. | |
think that is when we start really getting down to business as to what | :52:13. | :52:17. | |
is acceptable and what is not. If she wants to clear the way for | :52:18. | :52:21. | |
councils to merge before then, you will help her? I do not know yet. I | :52:22. | :52:26. | |
would have to see the details. I would not like to see that happening | :52:27. | :52:29. | |
with just ministers making the decision. It would have to be a | :52:30. | :52:36. | |
decision for the whole assembly. It is taking everyone a very long time | :52:37. | :52:40. | |
to make up their own mind how this will proceed. Another delay, how | :52:41. | :52:45. | |
much of an incentive is that to local government? Probably not a | :52:46. | :52:50. | |
huge amount. We have known for 20 years that we made a mistake in 1995 | :52:51. | :52:55. | |
in creating 22 authorities. We knew that it would have an adverse impact | :52:56. | :53:01. | |
upon people in Wales. We have to put it right. I have not heard a | :53:02. | :53:05. | |
compelling argument yet against reducing the number of authorities. | :53:06. | :53:10. | |
I think we need to get on with it. I think this needs to be driven by | :53:11. | :53:18. | |
local government. We need local -- we should know what pattern of local | :53:19. | :53:21. | |
governor and we want, we should know what shape of local authorities that | :53:22. | :53:25. | |
we need in order to discharge our important functions. If we have | :53:26. | :53:31. | |
known for 20 years the current setup is a mistake wide as the Welsh | :53:32. | :53:34. | |
Government need to offer further incentives? I have not heard a | :53:35. | :53:43. | |
compelling argument. I have heard an argument about the cost but local | :53:44. | :53:46. | |
government is running out of money to deliver the range of services | :53:47. | :53:51. | |
that we currently deliver. We know that if things do not change, whole | :53:52. | :53:56. | |
areas of service delivery like leisure, culture, are going to | :53:57. | :53:59. | |
disappear from the local government agenda altogether. That is not | :54:00. | :54:04. | |
acceptable. We know we are making redundancies by the many hundreds at | :54:05. | :54:10. | |
the moment. Because we are having to sustain 22 infrastructures, | :54:11. | :54:15. | |
overheads, office staff, senior personnel, it is the front line | :54:16. | :54:21. | |
service people that are being made redundant. I cannot be sustained. | :54:22. | :54:28. | |
Will that work? Are there councils looking at merge involuntarily? I am | :54:29. | :54:33. | |
not aware of any councils looking at merge involuntarily. I am not sure | :54:34. | :54:38. | |
that an extra year is an incentive. It most probably complicates things | :54:39. | :54:48. | |
even more. I think in terms of where we are going, there is an agreement | :54:49. | :54:52. | |
that 22 authorities is too many. The question has to be, what is the | :54:53. | :54:55. | |
right number of authorities and how you go about doing it? I am not | :54:56. | :55:00. | |
convinced by the map that the Williams commission has produced. I | :55:01. | :55:07. | |
think it does not reflect local communities and I think the cost is | :55:08. | :55:09. | |
actually a very important consideration. This is money on top | :55:10. | :55:20. | |
of the cuts facing them already. But what about the money being wasted | :55:21. | :55:24. | |
now by inefficient services question mark I am not sure that it is. There | :55:25. | :55:28. | |
are problems in the sustainability of some services but in terms of | :55:29. | :55:32. | |
wasting money on inefficient services, that is another question | :55:33. | :55:37. | |
that has to be examined. This money has to be found up front and we do | :55:38. | :55:41. | |
not know the payback period yet. I am not convinced this is the right | :55:42. | :55:47. | |
time to do it. There is a lot of work that needs to be done before we | :55:48. | :55:52. | |
get any form -- anyone moving forward. Electoral reform is very | :55:53. | :56:01. | |
important. The assembly does not have the power at the moment to do | :56:02. | :56:04. | |
that. But electoral reform is very important. If you have bigger | :56:05. | :56:08. | |
councils, the elections have to reflect the outcome that how people | :56:09. | :56:18. | |
voted. All we would create -- I'm not in favour of that. Another three | :56:19. | :56:26. | |
months' consultation. Carwyn Jones wanted to present a map by the | :56:27. | :56:30. | |
summer. Three months takes us beyond that. Has he got what he wanted? I | :56:31. | :56:36. | |
think so. He is in control of the agenda. What we do Black has just | :56:37. | :56:43. | |
said is precisely the wrong reason for bringing forward these | :56:44. | :56:45. | |
proposals. It is not about voting systems. It is about people in | :56:46. | :56:50. | |
receipt of services. If we congregate it by making it about | :56:51. | :56:55. | |
voting systems and councillors, then all of a sudden you realise that | :56:56. | :57:00. | |
this is not about improving services for people -- complicate it. This is | :57:01. | :57:03. | |
about petitions talking about themselves again. -- politicians. If | :57:04. | :57:14. | |
you have a proportional voting system in which the result reflects | :57:15. | :57:18. | |
the way that people voted, you have more comfortable councils, more | :57:19. | :57:20. | |
transparent councils and better services. That is key. Voting | :57:21. | :57:35. | |
systems are very important. They had a referendum and they lost. I am | :57:36. | :57:41. | |
sure that the conversation will go on. If I can just ask you about | :57:42. | :57:45. | |
another story while you are here. We have seen reports of young men from | :57:46. | :57:51. | |
Cardiff going out to Syria to join Islamist extremist movements. Is | :57:52. | :57:56. | |
there an issue for schools, education authorities in Wales, that | :57:57. | :58:01. | |
they need to counter extremism among younger people? It is an issue for | :58:02. | :58:07. | |
all of us. I am sure that most people would be surprised and | :58:08. | :58:10. | |
shocked to have cured the news over the past two days, although it is | :58:11. | :58:13. | |
not the first occasion when people who have had a link with Cardiff | :58:14. | :58:17. | |
have been associated with terrorism activities. I think that what is | :58:18. | :58:23. | |
needed is the faith communities, the police, local authorities, they need | :58:24. | :58:27. | |
to get together. I am not sure whether these things are being | :58:28. | :58:29. | |
identified, if they are on the radar. How they respond to it and | :58:30. | :58:41. | |
what arrangements are being put in place, I do not know. Cardiff, I | :58:42. | :58:45. | |
have to say, in terms of the religion ships with the Muslim | :58:46. | :58:48. | |
community leaders has always been very good. They have always been | :58:49. | :58:51. | |
reasonable and supportive. We need to draw on those Russian ships again | :58:52. | :58:58. | |
to see we can put in place something to identify this early on. -- | :58:59. | :59:06. | |
You can see what Carwyn Jones has to say for himself in | :59:07. | :59:14. | |
First Minister?s Questions on AMPM on Tuesday afternoon. | :59:15. | :59:20. | |
and they will be obliged to tell you. Thanks for joining us. Andrew, | :59:21. | :59:24. | |
back to you. think you'd want to. Labour grandees | :59:25. | :59:43. | |
are not queueing up to sing his praises. Look at this. In my view, | :59:44. | :59:50. | |
he is the leader we have and he is the leader I support and he is | :59:51. | :59:53. | |
somebody capable of leading the party to victory. Ed Miliband will | :59:54. | :59:58. | |
leave this to victory, and I believe he can. If he doesn't, what would | :59:59. | :00:06. | |
happen to the Labour Party? We could be in the wilderness for 15 years. | :00:07. | :00:09. | |
At the moment he has to convince people he has the capacity to lead | :00:10. | :00:13. | |
the country. That's not my view, but people don't believe that. We had a | :00:14. | :00:19. | |
leader of the Labour Party was publicly embarrassed, because | :00:20. | :00:25. | |
whoever was in charge of press letting go through a process where | :00:26. | :00:28. | |
we have councillors in Merseyside resigning. It was a schoolboy error. | :00:29. | :00:37. | |
Having policies without them being drawn together into a convincing and | :00:38. | :00:46. | |
vivid narrative and with what you do the people in the country. You have | :00:47. | :00:51. | |
to draw together, connect the policies, link them back to the | :00:52. | :00:57. | |
leader and give people a real sense of where you are going. Somehow he | :00:58. | :01:07. | |
has never quite managed to be himself and create that identity | :01:08. | :01:12. | |
with the public. And we are joined by the president of you girls, Peter | :01:13. | :01:15. | |
Kellner. Welcome to the Sunday politics. -- YouGov. The Labour | :01:16. | :01:26. | |
Party is six points ahead in your poll this morning. So what is the | :01:27. | :01:30. | |
problem? On this basis he will win the next election. If the election | :01:31. | :01:35. | |
were today and the figures held up, you would have a Labour government | :01:36. | :01:39. | |
with a narrow overall majority. One should not forget that. Let me make | :01:40. | :01:44. | |
three points. The first is, in past parliaments, opposition normally | :01:45. | :01:49. | |
lose ground and governments gain ground in the final few months. The | :01:50. | :01:55. | |
opposition should be further ahead than this. I don't think six is | :01:56. | :02:01. | |
enough. Secondly, Ed Miliband is behind David Cameron when people are | :02:02. | :02:04. | |
asked who they want as Prime Minister and Labour is behind the | :02:05. | :02:08. | |
Conservatives went people are asked who they trust on the economy. There | :02:09. | :02:11. | |
have been elections when the party has won by being behind on | :02:12. | :02:14. | |
leadership and other elections where they have won by being behind on the | :02:15. | :02:18. | |
economy. No party has ever won an election when it has been clearly | :02:19. | :02:22. | |
behind on both leadership and the economy. Let me have another go. The | :02:23. | :02:27. | |
Labour Party brand is a strong brand. The Tory Bramleys week. The | :02:28. | :02:32. | |
Labour brand is stronger. That is a blast -- the Labour -- the Tory | :02:33. | :02:42. | |
Bramleys week. A lot of the Tories -- the Tory brand is weak. Cant you | :02:43. | :02:49. | |
win on policies and a strong party brand? If you have those too, you | :02:50. | :02:56. | |
need the third factor which isn't there. People believing that you | :02:57. | :03:02. | |
have what it takes, competent skills, determination, | :03:03. | :03:04. | |
determination, whatever makes to carry through. -- whatever mix. A | :03:05. | :03:14. | |
lot of Ed Miliband policies, on the banks, energy prices, Brent | :03:15. | :03:18. | |
controls, people like them. But in government, would they carry them | :03:19. | :03:22. | |
through? They think they are not up to it. -- rent controls. If people | :03:23. | :03:26. | |
think you won't deliver what you say, even if they like it, they were | :03:27. | :03:30. | |
necessarily vote for you. That is the missing third element. There is | :03:31. | :03:36. | |
a strong Labour brand, but it's not strong enough to overcome the | :03:37. | :03:40. | |
feeling that the Labour leadership is not up to it. Nick, you had some | :03:41. | :03:47. | |
senior Labour figure telling you that if Mr Miliband losing the next | :03:48. | :03:50. | |
election he will have to resign immediately and cannot fight another | :03:51. | :03:53. | |
election the way Neil Kinnock did after 1987. What was remarkable to | :03:54. | :03:58. | |
me was that people were even thinking along these lines, and even | :03:59. | :04:02. | |
more remarkable that they would tell you they were thinking along these | :04:03. | :04:08. | |
lines? What is the problem? The problem is, is that Ed Miliband says | :04:09. | :04:14. | |
it would be unprecedented to win the general election after the second | :04:15. | :04:18. | |
worst result since 1918. They are concerned about is the start of a | :04:19. | :04:21. | |
script that he would say on the day after losing the general election. | :04:22. | :04:24. | |
Essentially what the people are trying to do is get their argument | :04:25. | :04:28. | |
in first and to say, you cannot do what Neil Kinnock did in 1987. Don't | :04:29. | :04:33. | |
forget that Neil Kinnock in 1987 was in the middle of a very brave | :04:34. | :04:36. | |
process of modernisation and had one and fought a very campaign that was | :04:37. | :04:41. | |
professional but he lost again in 1992, and they wanted to get their | :04:42. | :04:47. | |
line in first. What some people are saying is that this is an election | :04:48. | :04:52. | |
that the Labour Party should be winning because the coalition is so | :04:53. | :04:55. | |
unpopular. If you don't win, I'm afraid to say, there is something | :04:56. | :04:59. | |
wrong with you. Don't you find it remarkable that people are prepared | :05:00. | :05:02. | |
to think along these lines at this stage, when Labour are ahead in the | :05:03. | :05:05. | |
polls, still the bookies favourite to win, and you start to speak | :05:06. | :05:10. | |
publicly, or in private to the public print, but we might have to | :05:11. | :05:15. | |
get rid of him if he doesn't win. Everything you say about labour in | :05:16. | :05:18. | |
this situation has been said about the Tories. We wondered whether | :05:19. | :05:22. | |
Boris Johnson would tie himself to the mask and he is the next leader | :05:23. | :05:26. | |
in waiting if Cameron goes. It's a mirror image of that. We talk about | :05:27. | :05:30. | |
things being unprecedented. It's unprecedented for a government to | :05:31. | :05:33. | |
gain seats. All the things you say about labour, you could say it the | :05:34. | :05:37. | |
Conservatives. That's what makes the next election so interesting. But in | :05:38. | :05:41. | |
the aftermath of the European elections and the local government | :05:42. | :05:44. | |
elections, in which the Conservatives did not do that well, | :05:45. | :05:48. | |
the issue was not Mr Cameron or the Tories doing well, the issue was the | :05:49. | :05:51. | |
Labour Party and how they had not done as well as they should have | :05:52. | :05:54. | |
done, and that conversation was fuelled by the kind of people who | :05:55. | :05:57. | |
have been speaking to nick from the Labour Party. Rachel Reeves cited | :05:58. | :06:03. | |
their real-life performance in elections as a reason for optimism. | :06:04. | :06:07. | |
When in fact their performance in the Europeans and locals was | :06:08. | :06:11. | |
disappointing for an opposition one year away from a general election. | :06:12. | :06:15. | |
What alarms me about labour is the way they react to criticisms about | :06:16. | :06:20. | |
Ed Miliband. Two years ago when he was attacked, they said they were 15 | :06:21. | :06:23. | |
points ahead, and then a year ago there were saying they were nine or | :06:24. | :06:26. | |
ten ahead, and now they are saying we are still five or six ahead. The | :06:27. | :06:31. | |
trend is alarming. It points to a smaller Labour lead. Am I right in | :06:32. | :06:37. | |
detecting a bit of a class war going on in the Labour Party? There are a | :06:38. | :06:42. | |
lot of northern Labour MPs who think that Ed Miliband is to north London, | :06:43. | :06:46. | |
and there are too many metropolitan cronies around him must I think that | :06:47. | :06:54. | |
is right, Andrew. What I think is, being a pessimist in terms of their | :06:55. | :06:57. | |
prospects, I do think the Labour Party could win the next election. I | :06:58. | :07:02. | |
just don't think they can as they are going at the moment. But the | :07:03. | :07:06. | |
positioning for a possible defeat, what they should be talking about is | :07:07. | :07:12. | |
what do we need to change in the party and the way Ed Miliband | :07:13. | :07:15. | |
performs in order to secure victory. That is a debate they could have, | :07:16. | :07:20. | |
and they could make the changes. I find it odd that they are being so | :07:21. | :07:26. | |
defeatist. Don't go away. Peter is a boffin when it comes to polls. That | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
is why we have a mod for the election prediction swings and | :07:31. | :07:35. | |
roundabouts. He is looking for what he calls the incumbency effect. | :07:36. | :07:41. | |
Don't know what is a back-up -- what that's about question don't worry, | :07:42. | :07:45. | |
here is an. Being in office is bad for your health. Political folk | :07:46. | :07:54. | |
wisdom has it that incumbency favours one party in particular, the | :07:55. | :07:59. | |
Liberal Democrats. That is because their MPs have a reputation as | :08:00. | :08:03. | |
ferociously good local campaigners who do really well at holding on to | :08:04. | :08:07. | |
their seats. However, this time round, several big-name long serving | :08:08. | :08:10. | |
Liberal Democrats like Ming Campbell, David Heath and Don Foster | :08:11. | :08:17. | |
are standing down. Does that mean the incumbency effect disappears | :08:18. | :08:21. | |
like a puff of smoke? Then there is another theory, called the sophomore | :08:22. | :08:27. | |
surge. It might sound like a movie about US college kids, but it goes | :08:28. | :08:31. | |
like this. New MPs tend to do better in their second election than they | :08:32. | :08:35. | |
did in their first. That could favour the Tories because they have | :08:36. | :08:39. | |
lots of first-time MPs. The big question is, what does this mean for | :08:40. | :08:44. | |
the 7th of May 2015, the date of the next general election? The answer | :08:45. | :08:51. | |
is, who knows? I know a man who knows. Peter. What does it all mean? | :08:52. | :08:59. | |
You can go onto your PC now and draw down programmes which say that these | :09:00. | :09:02. | |
are the voting figures from a national poll, so what will the | :09:03. | :09:07. | |
seats look like? This is based on uniform swing. Every seat moving up | :09:08. | :09:10. | |
and down across the country in the same way. Historically, that's been | :09:11. | :09:16. | |
a pretty good guide. I think that's going to completely break down next | :09:17. | :09:20. | |
year, because the Lib Dems will probably hold on to more seats than | :09:21. | :09:23. | |
we predict from the national figures and I think fewer Tory seats will go | :09:24. | :09:29. | |
to the Labour Party than you would predict from the national figures. | :09:30. | :09:33. | |
The precise numbers, I'm not going to be too precise, but I would be | :09:34. | :09:38. | |
surprised, sorry, I would not be surprised if Labour fell 20 or 25 | :09:39. | :09:44. | |
seats short on what we would expect on the uniform swing prediction. | :09:45. | :09:51. | |
Next year's election will be tight. Falling 20 seats short could well | :09:52. | :09:53. | |
mean the difference between victory and defeat. What you make of that, | :09:54. | :09:59. | |
Helen? I think you're right, especially taking into account the | :10:00. | :10:03. | |
UKIP effect. We have no idea about that. The conventional wisdom is | :10:04. | :10:07. | |
that will drain away back to the Conservatives, but nobody knows, and | :10:08. | :10:12. | |
it makes the next election almost impossible to call. It means it is a | :10:13. | :10:16. | |
great target the people like Lord Ashcroft with marginal polling, | :10:17. | :10:19. | |
because people have never been so interested. It is for party politics | :10:20. | :10:24. | |
and we all assume that UKIP should be well next year, but their vote | :10:25. | :10:31. | |
went up from 17 up to 27%. Then that 17% went down to 3%, so they might | :10:32. | :10:36. | |
only be five or 6% in the general election, so they might not have the | :10:37. | :10:39. | |
threat of depriving Conservatives of their seats. Where the incumbency | :10:40. | :10:44. | |
thing has an effect is the Liberal Democrats. They have fortress seats | :10:45. | :10:50. | |
where between 1992 and 1997 Liberal Democrats seats fell, but their | :10:51. | :10:53. | |
percentage went up. They are losing the local government base though. | :10:54. | :10:58. | |
True, but having people like Ming Campbell standing down means they | :10:59. | :11:02. | |
will struggle. We are used to incumbency being an important factor | :11:03. | :11:05. | |
in American politics. It's hard to get rid of an incumbent unless it is | :11:06. | :11:10. | |
a primary election, like we saw in Virginia, but is it now becoming an | :11:11. | :11:14. | |
important factor in British politics, that if you own the seat | :11:15. | :11:17. | |
you're more likely to hold on to it than not? If it is, that's a | :11:18. | :11:23. | |
remarkable thing. It's hard to be a carpetbagger in America, but it is | :11:24. | :11:26. | |
normal in British Parliamentary constituencies to be represented by | :11:27. | :11:30. | |
someone who did not grow up locally. It is a special kind of achievement | :11:31. | :11:33. | |
to have an incumbency effect where you don't have deep roots in the | :11:34. | :11:37. | |
constituency. I was going to ask about the Lib Dems. If we are wrong, | :11:38. | :11:41. | |
and they collapse in Parliamentary representation as much as the share | :11:42. | :11:44. | |
in vote collapses, is that not good news is that the Conservatives? They | :11:45. | :11:48. | |
would be in second place in the majority of existing Lib Dems seats. | :11:49. | :11:53. | |
For every seat where Labour are second to the Lib Dems, there are | :11:54. | :11:56. | |
two where the Conservatives are second. If the Lib Dem | :11:57. | :12:00. | |
representation collapses, that helps the Conservatives. I'm assuming the | :12:01. | :12:08. | |
Tories will gain about ten seats. If they gain 20, if they'd had 20 more | :12:09. | :12:13. | |
seats last time, they would have had a majority government, just about. | :12:14. | :12:17. | |
So 20 seats off the Lib Dem, do the maths, as they say in America, and | :12:18. | :12:22. | |
they could lose a handful to labour and still be able to run a one | :12:23. | :12:26. | |
party, minority government. The fate of the Lib Dems could be crucial to | :12:27. | :12:29. | |
the outcome to the politics of light. On the 8th of May, it will be | :12:30. | :12:36. | |
VE Day and victory in election day as well as Europe. The Lib Dems will | :12:37. | :12:41. | |
be apoplectic if they lose all of the seats to their coalition | :12:42. | :12:46. | |
partners. The great quote by Angela Merkel, the little party always gets | :12:47. | :12:51. | |
crushed. It's a well-established idea that coalition politics. They | :12:52. | :12:54. | |
can't take credit for the things people like you may get lumbered | :12:55. | :12:57. | |
with the ones they don't. They have contributed most of this terrible | :12:58. | :13:01. | |
idea that seized politics where you say it, but you don't deliver it. | :13:02. | :13:04. | |
Tuition fees is the classic example of this Parliament. Why should you | :13:05. | :13:10. | |
believe any promise you make? And Ed Miliband is feeling that as well. | :13:11. | :13:14. | |
But in 1974 the liberal Democrats barely had any MPs but there were | :13:15. | :13:19. | |
reporters outside Jeremy Thorpe's home because they potentially held | :13:20. | :13:22. | |
not the balance of power, but were significantly in fourth. Bringing | :13:23. | :13:26. | |
back memories Jeremy Thorpe, and we will leave it there. Thanks to the | :13:27. | :13:30. | |
panel. We are tomorrow on BBC Two. At the earlier time of 11am because | :13:31. | :13:34. | |
of Wimbledon. Yes, it's that time of year again already. I will be back | :13:35. | :13:39. | |
here at 11 o'clock next week. Remember, if it is Sunday, it is the | :13:40. | :13:42. | |
Sunday Politics. | :13:43. | :13:46. |