24/07/2014 The Papers

Rennick sisters triumph. And the rest of the action on an eventful

evening in the pool. Hello and welcome to

our look ahead to what the papers With me are the broadcaster

David Davies and the political Two super heavyweights. Are you

happy with me referring to you in that way? I think David has more

weight than me on him. We will argue over classifications later.

The Telegraph's main headline is the news that Britain has

the fastest`growing economy of the main developed countries,

The Express has the Queen at the Commonwealth Games on their front

If you can see in the corner of that box, the Queen has snuck into a

selfie being taken by the Australian hockey team.

The Independent splits it's front page between a picture

of injured children in Gaza and claims that new Government

figures show that council tax rises are hitting Britain's poor hardest.

Gaza features on the front page of the Metro too, with an arresting

picture of a grief`stricken father who's son has died in the shelling.

And the Guardian continues their story about hygiene

The paper says the health secretary is demanding an investigation

Let's begin with news that will be very pleasing to the Chancellor. The

UK has the fastest`growing economy, growing faster than those of other

major developed nations according to the International Monetary Fund.

This will be interesting reading, because it was only last year that

the IMF was saying that his policies were not a sensible idea? No, they

will be delighted in the Treasury over the story. Nobody seems to be

denying it is true. It is good news. Even Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls, for

once, seems to be accepting that growth is racing ahead. You can look

it into microwaves. As you say, a year ago, the IMF were warning that

Mr Osborne, the Chancellor, was playing with fire and there should

be a and B. Now they are saying they are moving through faster. If they

got it wrong a year ago, they could be getting it wrong today! Why do we

take them so seriously? Well, we took them seriously when they were

not particularly complimentary? Well, I share Lance's cynicism about

some of the figures. Even though the IMF, I see, I love the language, and

upside surprise, it calls the news. The figures are new, but the fact

this has been happening and we have been outperforming countries like

America, like Brazil, like South Africa, that is not new. The

interesting thing for me is if the government is going to get the

credit for this next May. Now, Lance is better qualified than I am to say

that. My view is that they may well do. But events, dear boy, between

now and May, who knows what? The chief economist at PwC has said this

upgrade is a symbolic upgrade. But he says the recovery is not yet

sustainable. It's still a shaky recovery, the economy is still

fragile. It is not surging ahead. The question is how deep the growth

goes and how many sectors of the economy at effects. It does not

automatically translate into political support. In 1997, when my

old boss Tony Blair swept to power, any fair observer would say that the

economy had been growing strongly under the Conservatives in the year

or so, more than a year before the election. But it wasn't enough?

Interesting, I would be interested to hear how you play this in

opposition. If there is some good economic data, which everybody says

they want because they want everybody to benefit from it, how do

you judge the reaction to it? You don't want to be too effusive. There

is a real debate, and you can tell it has been going on in the Labour

leadership. Most of the time, Ed Balls is pretty curmudgeonly. He is

curmudgeonly about a lot of things. Of course, it is his job to oppose

the Chancellor and shoulder problems there are. He seems to be changing

tack. If anybody would listen to me, which they don't, I would advise,

you do say that things are getting better, they could have got better a

lot quicker and Britain could still be in a much stronger position. The

question is, do people out in the country, particularly outside London

and the south`east, do they feel this? Do they feel, hey, it matters

that we are doing better than the United States, than Brazil, than

South Africa? Or is this still a south`east, London and London thing?

Let's stay with The Telegraph. Gold Rush rescues the summer of sport. A

clutch of gold medals, of course, they have been won by Scotland and

England. There are pictures of some of those lucky winners. Alistair

Brownlee, at the top, he beat his brother in the triathlon. Jodie

Stimpson, lower left, the first gold of the games in the women's event.

Sophie Thornhill and her guide, Helen Scott, winning the women's

sprint tandem finals. Allow me to help. Here we are. We are doing this

more and more often, I rather like it. Who was this? Ashley Mckenzie

took gold in the judo. We also saw Ross Murdoch beat Michael Jamieson

in the men's 200 metres. So, the Scots have had some success. Perhaps

in Scotland they may notice that it is a lot of English success on the

front page of the Daily Telegraph. But, hey, before Lance says it, it

is not a vintage year for British sport. But things are on the up.

Rory McIlroy, supporters of his in golf, they will confirm that. There

is the Ryder Cup to come. Perhaps the BBC Sports Personality Of The

Year will be a serious short list, as opposed to an effective short

list of one. But this is a fantastic event. You know, it will be

interesting. One or two of the papers, and we might talk about it

later on, they are starting the undertones of what impact it will

have on the referendum debate. At the moment, there are some fantastic

sporting performances going on. Yes, they are coming from home nations at

the moment. The cartoonist on the Telegraph has already interwoven

sport and politics. It looks like the judo, is it judo? Anyway, in the

judo arena. Is this judo or a discussion about keeping the pound?

Inevitably, it will have an impact on the way that we see the games,

because of this referendum not very far away. Because we are only weeks

away from the referendum and the games are taking place in Glasgow.

That is the link, that is all you need to say. We were talking about

the impact of the economy, the impact of sport on how people vote

is much harder to read. Is it a great occasion for Scotland, so it

shows how well Scotland could do culturally, sporting, by themselves?

Or does it show what Scotland is able to do while in the United

Kingdom anyway, so why bother with independence? Let's move on to the

independent, council tax rises hit Britain's poor hardest. More than 2

million of the poorest people in England are facing rising tax

demands because the government is cutting further into the benefit

system. Some of these people would have been protected from having to

pay the whole council tax bill. The full consequences of this

government's welfare reforms, Iain Duncan Smith's welfare reforms, they

are still emerging several years after they were introduced. You

know, this story, in its own way, millions of families on blowing

firms have received council tax demands for the first time. The

impact that remains to be seen. Are they people... Again, we get back to

the earlier subject, are they people that are going to vote come next

May? Are they people who are not going to support the government

anyway? All of those questions come into it. It's interesting that the

impact of the welfare reforms, some of which people across the board

have supported, some of which, certainly, the bedroom tax being the

best example, they most certainly haven't. What the impact will be

will be interesting. If they can't pay they will be taken to court? In

London, 16,000 people had been referred to bailiffs for nonpayment.

If you aren't the impact of the changes to council tax on housing

benefit, the number of people affected is enormous. Some of those

people, if they are in work, will have benefited from the raising tax

allowances. But people never voted to say thank you for something that

they have been given. They certainly remember what has been taken away

from them. Let's stay with the independent and we will look at this

and The Metro together. Understandably, what is happening in

Gaza is on the front page of many papers. Not even a UN school is

safe, and human appalled by the attack, that is how the Independent

is reporting it. A picture of a grief stricken father of a boy

killed in the shelling. An investigation was being carried out

by Israel into how this. `` how this happened. It does now appear that

Israel is preparing to admit it probably was one of its missiles?

Yes, they seem to be changing their story as the day went on. One of the

other papers, the Guardian, they have been detailing the tweets that

the IDF was putting out. Latterly, they did seem to be accepting it was

their responsibility. We have been here before. The last time there was

a major assault on Gaza, almost copycat, there was a missile strike

on a school. It was where the United Nations had a school and they were

trying to get the civilians out. I think the Israelis factor in

international outrage into their decisions on this. They know what

the response is going to be. They know that the front pages of

newspapers all over the world are going to be screaming out what they

are screaming now. But they still think they have to do what they have

to do. I don't know what you think about this, but there are very

impressive spokespeople on their behalf who come across a very often,

as very reasonable and, on the one hand, on the other, and yet,

tonight, it was a very difficult case for their spokesperson to make.

He was, right, as you say, edging towards, well, perhaps it was us.

The warning had gone out, there was supposed to be an opportunity to get

people out, and then that was never actually given? I never know how

that works. How do you know how long it is going to take for people to

get out? And where do they shelter anyway, if half of the Gaza Strip is

a no`go area by Israel's own admission? It was the United Nations

themselves trying to negotiate with the Israelis about when a strike

might start. The Israelis issued a warning that civilians should be

moved away from the area. The UN also have very good spokespeople and

make a very good case for trying to defend civilians in war zones. You

know, clearly, they are outraged by the way that the Israelis had been

behaving. There will come a point when they think that they have taken

it far enough and international outrage is too great, we have to

stop? I haven't planned a campaign like this and I hope I never have to

get involved in that sort of thing. They will calculate how far they

need to go to achieve their military objectives, they will calculate the

response of the international media, because they have been there before,

they have seen it before and they know this sort of tragic incident is

going to happen. They will have in the back of their minds, even if it

is not on paper, what the tolerance level, at which point they have to

say, we have achieved all we have been able to achieve.

Your interview with the Hamas leader. He is edging towards at

least a temporary ceasefire. These events, however awful they are, tend

not... They tend not to last endlessly. You know, you sense

they're moving in a direction towards some sort of a temporary

ceasefire. Let's hope you are right. That is it for The Papers this hour.

David and Lance will be with us again at 11.30pm for a look at the

stories making the front pages. Coming up next. It's time for

Sportsday. Hello, and welcome to Commonwealth

Games Sportsday, I'm Katie Gornall. Scotland rule the pool as

Ross Murdoch snatches Gold from the It's a sister act in the Judo

as Kimberly and Louise Renicks