:00:18. > :00:23.Hello and welcome to our look ahead to what the papers will bring us
:00:24. > :00:26.tomorrow, with me, Robert Fox, defence editor of the London Evening
:00:27. > :00:29.Standard, journalist and broadcaster, and your poor are you.
:00:30. > :00:35.The front pages, let's overlook them. Starting stop the Christmas
:00:36. > :00:39.gift card ripped off, the headline in the Daily Mail, which warns that
:00:40. > :00:44.some store cards are expiring just six months after being pursued. The
:00:45. > :00:47.Times also has a personal finance lead, claiming that people are being
:00:48. > :00:52.unfairly charged hundreds of millions of pounds in credit card
:00:53. > :00:55.fees. The Telegraph has an investigation into top-flight
:00:56. > :01:01.British schools and it says are accepting 6-figure sums from
:01:02. > :01:05.overseas parents desperate to secure a place. The Independent leads with
:01:06. > :01:08.comments from the European Parliament chief Brexit negotiator,
:01:09. > :01:13.British people could be given the chance to remain EU citizens. Rupert
:01:14. > :01:18.Murdoch's tempted to take full control of sky television with a
:01:19. > :01:22.takeover by 21st-century foxes on the front page of the Financial
:01:23. > :01:26.Times. The scandal of our wasted foreign aid is the headline in the
:01:27. > :01:28.express which says that ministers are under pressure to reveal
:01:29. > :01:33.precisely how all foreign aid is being spent around the world. And
:01:34. > :01:37.finally the eye reports on the Duke of York has taken the unusual step
:01:38. > :01:41.of issuing a statement to deny claims of a rift between himself and
:01:42. > :01:46.the Prince of Wales Cup the role of his daughters.
:01:47. > :01:50.Let's begin, lots to talk about, shall we start of the seasonal
:01:51. > :01:54.stories? The front page of the Daily Mail, stop the Christmas gift card
:01:55. > :02:00.rip-off. This is specifically about gift cards, rather than about credit
:02:01. > :02:04.cards. The report is...? The rip-off is that you buy gift cards because,
:02:05. > :02:10.you know, some of us are quite lazy, and suddenly with only a few days
:02:11. > :02:15.before Christmas, you think, what are we going to buy? And it looks
:02:16. > :02:20.very handy. It is rip off, because, and we have all experienced that.
:02:21. > :02:23.You go with your card, and then it is actually expired, because you
:02:24. > :02:31.know, I mean, you know, the devil is in in the small print. But more than
:02:32. > :02:34.that, there's actually a windfall for those retailers because you
:02:35. > :02:41.never, if it has expired, you never actually buy things that are exactly
:02:42. > :02:45.fitting the amount you have been given, so there's always a few
:02:46. > :02:51.pounds for the retailer. More than a few pounds according to this. ?6
:02:52. > :02:58.million a week they make. Quite extraordinary. So the Times has a
:02:59. > :03:03.similar story, about credit cards. Yes, with PPI and so on, and
:03:04. > :03:08.mis-selling, the credit card world were supposed to have cleaned up its
:03:09. > :03:15.act, this is not much about credit cards themselves, it is retailers,
:03:16. > :03:18.who charge you a premium. Whether it is online, particularly stores,
:03:19. > :03:24.services, where, if you pay by credit card rather than debit card
:03:25. > :03:30.or cash, it is 2%, 5%, and the Times has got occasions when it is 12%,
:03:31. > :03:34.going up to 15%. Come on. Christmas would not be Christmas in tabloid
:03:35. > :03:44.went if you could not write a headline about a rip-off. So, it is
:03:45. > :03:51.Christmas. In Fleet Street. Or, what used to be Fleet Street. Let's move
:03:52. > :03:56.on to a story on the front page of the Telegraph, cash for places a
:03:57. > :04:02.scandal at top schools, and the Telegraph has done its own
:04:03. > :04:08.investigation into a school which it says is charging... Well, it is not
:04:09. > :04:12.charging, it is allowing parents to get places at this school if they
:04:13. > :04:18.make a very substantial donation. And what is interesting is that the
:04:19. > :04:24.story, sort of, the line, halfway down the piece, it suggests that
:04:25. > :04:30.educational consultants, so, middling people, are facilitating
:04:31. > :04:35.payments of up to ?5 million, to certain high-profile schools. ?5
:04:36. > :04:41.million, extraordinary. It sounds mad to me. It is the going rate,
:04:42. > :04:45.from what I understand. It has been going on for some time. Particularly
:04:46. > :04:50.Southeast Asia, China, as part of a whole game of which there have been
:04:51. > :04:55.many scandals, actually, I cannot name the protagonist, one was
:04:56. > :05:00.murdered, for fear of libelling somebody. I don't want to get myself
:05:01. > :05:07.as well of the BBC... I would like you not to name them. It is very
:05:08. > :05:16.delicate, this, but it is a stock in trade. At my children to school
:05:17. > :05:19.there have been donations, in the good old days there would be
:05:20. > :05:24.donations and the donor was a benefactor and was not expecting a
:05:25. > :05:28.return in kind necessarily, but this goes on at Oxford, Cambridge,
:05:29. > :05:38.limiting damage, and so on, but now it is a business. And I think the
:05:39. > :05:41.Telegraph is on to say -- onto something, there are agents, and
:05:42. > :05:45.particularly from China, Southeast Asia, there are various countries
:05:46. > :05:50.where these things, English private schools, the most noble of all time,
:05:51. > :05:54.education is such a prize, that they put this money into it, what the
:05:55. > :05:59.reaction is from the schools, I cannot go into. That is where we are
:06:00. > :06:02.in trouble with the law. I suppose many people would not be that
:06:03. > :06:06.surprised that you described a private school as a business, that
:06:07. > :06:11.is what it is, but it is the scale of this, if the Telegraph is
:06:12. > :06:15.correct, talking about ?5 million. It is funny that you are surprised,
:06:16. > :06:23.it is not a matter for polite conversation, but I am not surprised
:06:24. > :06:29.at all. And there is snobbery. Oh yes, status, get ahead time also. I
:06:30. > :06:32.think they should be fined. The best schools are state-owned. You could
:06:33. > :06:39.not get a place with money if you are the best... But you might have
:06:40. > :06:43.to work harder. Of course. In France, there is a suspicion that if
:06:44. > :06:48.you have to pay for the education, then you must be very bad at school,
:06:49. > :06:54.but your parents have outside money. So, no, this traffic, this currency
:06:55. > :07:02.of snobbery, it will get a lot of people, very rich people, in what
:07:03. > :07:07.they think... Investing in their children's future. What they are
:07:08. > :07:12.investing in is what the future social life... But probably not
:07:13. > :07:18.there, you know, success in life. I suppose it does say something about
:07:19. > :07:20.the reputation of British education, certain top private schools, that
:07:21. > :07:25.people are willing to pay that sort of money, because I'm sure you can
:07:26. > :07:29.get as good an education in France, but people are not sending their
:07:30. > :07:37.children to your schools. It is about the mythology and the legend.
:07:38. > :07:43.Buying into a club. Exactly. It is about education, but not only
:07:44. > :07:46.that... Status. The Telegraph says this is an investigation. It will be
:07:47. > :07:53.interesting to see how they pursue it. But how much we are interested
:07:54. > :07:57.in it. Personally, I despise it, because I think it does point of
:07:58. > :07:59.much bigger picture we have talked about, the discussion running this
:08:00. > :08:09.week about whether you should have more free places at... That was
:08:10. > :08:18.today. Our education is bedevilled by... The public/ private division,
:08:19. > :08:20.and then you add this into a... The attraction for foreigners is the
:08:21. > :08:24.English language. That is the strength of the English language. It
:08:25. > :08:34.is the international lingua franca, to use Latin. This is what it is
:08:35. > :08:39.pointing to. Shall we discuss Brexit? Cannot let an evening go by
:08:40. > :08:44.without it. A day without it, cannot have that. The Times, the British
:08:45. > :08:52.will be offered the chance to keep the EU citizenship. Not in the way
:08:53. > :08:57.that you might expect. The detail is of course, individually, keeping the
:08:58. > :09:00.EU... It will be quite difficult to the men. But it is an idea that
:09:01. > :09:08.comes not from the British Parliament but from the former Prime
:09:09. > :09:17.Minister of Belgium, who is Mr Brexit for the European Parliament.
:09:18. > :09:22.A great man, actually. He has had this idea for, you know, 40% of the
:09:23. > :09:27.British population, who did not vote for Brexit, and to feel European,
:09:28. > :09:31.and perhaps that is a solution, for them, I mean, I have a look to
:09:32. > :09:36.British friends, with some ancestry in Europe, and they are asking for,
:09:37. > :09:42.you know, the Germans, for some passport, or the Irish, so that
:09:43. > :09:50.might be a solution, except, individually, I mean, how will it
:09:51. > :09:55.work? This has actually been brought forward, according to the Times,
:09:56. > :10:03.partly because of the vote in the Commons this week. Yes, I think the
:10:04. > :10:09.various parties are having to reveal their positions and I think the
:10:10. > :10:14.former Belgian prime ministers really onto something here. It is
:10:15. > :10:18.interesting that it has come from Europe and Polmont. Because there is
:10:19. > :10:23.such a thing of solidarity, people with a common experience, called
:10:24. > :10:27.work experience. Myself, half my family is Dutch. My children can
:10:28. > :10:32.carry on as EU citizens, I cannot. And yet I have worked half my life
:10:33. > :10:37.there. For the last 51 years, every year I have done some work in
:10:38. > :10:43.Europe, I have a second language, and the idea that Brexit means
:10:44. > :10:47.prevail over 48.5%, that kind of prevail over 48.5%, that kind of
:10:48. > :10:54.light and dark, Manichaean division, it is complete nonsense. What is so
:10:55. > :10:59.notable is that the Brexit supporters, or their flag-bearers,
:11:00. > :11:03.their standard-bearers, soon-to-be getting more shrill by the minute,
:11:04. > :11:07.because the whole question looks so complex, and cannot be done in the
:11:08. > :11:13.timetable laid out, as we will hear with the next story. It will not be
:11:14. > :11:18.able to be done in two years. Let's move on to that, actually. This is,
:11:19. > :11:24.you talk about the flag-bearers, well the official flag bearer, David
:11:25. > :11:31.Davis, Minister for Brexit, talking about a transitional deal, a sort of
:11:32. > :11:35.buffer period. He is saying that he has no interest in that. Well, you
:11:36. > :11:39.may not have any interest in this by British companies and actually the
:11:40. > :11:43.British people have a stake in it, of course, there must be a
:11:44. > :11:50.transition period. What is very funny is that he said, oh, I don't
:11:51. > :11:54.mind being kind to the EU. I would rather the EU was asking for a
:11:55. > :12:01.transition period, but he's never going to ask for it. It is British
:12:02. > :12:08.companies, the Bank of England, the major British banks, they need it.
:12:09. > :12:12.So I agree with that EU representative quoted by the
:12:13. > :12:17.Financial Times, saying that, David Davis is completely diluted. Under
:12:18. > :12:23.British politicians have not got a clue. What is curious about this is
:12:24. > :12:26.that David Davis does not, in a sense, seem to be against a
:12:27. > :12:31.transitional period, he just seems to be against asking for it. He is
:12:32. > :12:38.against begging for it. It is very hard to see what he, Fox, Johnson,
:12:39. > :12:42.and Theresa May, to an extent, are really for. They are going to have
:12:43. > :12:46.to reveal the plan, particularly when we have the Supreme Court
:12:47. > :12:50.decision, they will need to talk about what the legislation will have
:12:51. > :12:56.to be if legislation there has to be. They have to reveal a plan, that
:12:57. > :13:03.was the point, that came out... The word around Whitehall is, would you
:13:04. > :13:08.believe it, it is either Norway minus, an associate of deal with
:13:09. > :13:16.Norway, or Canada plus. Work out what that means. But how long does
:13:17. > :13:20.it take to do a trade deal? That is the kind of period we are talking
:13:21. > :13:25.about. That is what the city is so worried about, with people like
:13:26. > :13:29.Davis, Fox, Johnson, they think they are lightweight. They don't think
:13:30. > :13:34.that the people in the civil service are lightweight, but supposing you
:13:35. > :13:40.and do, at a stroke, this has been in the heavy papers for the past two
:13:41. > :13:47.weeks, the European Community is act of 1972, then you go... You push it
:13:48. > :13:49.over the cliff, with a whole raft of human rights legislation, and human
:13:50. > :13:55.rights that are invoked, and this does not seem to be considered. As I
:13:56. > :13:58.said, this black and white... You get people demonstrating because
:13:59. > :14:03.they think it is primarily about immigration and how to stop it. The
:14:04. > :14:09.minute you say, we are no longer members, of the EU. Apparently
:14:10. > :14:18.there's a third option, Norway minus, Canada can plus, and Turkey
:14:19. > :14:26.meets Switzerland, another option that about, also quite deluded as
:14:27. > :14:30.well. The Times, a story about severely traumatised young people
:14:31. > :14:36.who have escaped from Mosul in Iraq. And the sort of things that they saw
:14:37. > :14:41.well under the Islamic State regime. We need to talk a little bit about
:14:42. > :14:45.that. Some background, this was written by a wonderful reporter, a
:14:46. > :14:51.great friend of mine, and I have been nasty places with him, Anthony
:14:52. > :14:55.Loyd. And he has an extraordinary, insightful story, because he went to
:14:56. > :15:01.the refugee camp, one of the biggest ones outside Mosul, receiving
:15:02. > :15:08.refugees, 81,000 have fled from this place of battle, and what they are
:15:09. > :15:12.finding, the Unicef people, is that they number in the thousands of
:15:13. > :15:15.young children who are just addicted to violence, rage, because it is all
:15:16. > :15:20.that they know, because of the traumatic scenes that they have
:15:21. > :15:24.witnessed inside Islamic State controlled Mosul. People being
:15:25. > :15:29.beheaded, tortured, and the particular case of a young boy, a
:15:30. > :15:34.four-year-old, who just hits his sister all the time, his mother does
:15:35. > :15:37.not dare let him go out to play, and the psychiatric damage, the
:15:38. > :15:41.psychological damage, is absolutely enormous. So if you think that is
:15:42. > :15:47.happening emotional, just imagining what is happening in Aleppo. It is
:15:48. > :15:54.unbearable to read. But it is one thing that is really key, and so
:15:55. > :16:00.poignant, not only this terrible atrocity, but also people and the
:16:01. > :16:06.Islamic State are obliged to watch. And you have got big screens,
:16:07. > :16:13.erected at marketplaces, and that combination between the lack of
:16:14. > :16:21.humanity, basic humanity, and also the entertainment, it is an
:16:22. > :16:25.unbearable article. Very chilling. Let's move on to our final story, on
:16:26. > :16:29.the front page of the Telegraph, along with a big photograph, the
:16:30. > :16:34.Duke of York, denying a rift with his older brother, unusual, for a
:16:35. > :16:39.member of the Royal family to come out with something like this. It
:16:40. > :16:45.seems to be... I mean, there is a recurrent theme. Prince Harry, taken
:16:46. > :16:50.to Twitter. They have taken to Twitter to do it. We have got to
:16:51. > :16:53.have our Christmas pantomime and the Royals are saying, move over
:16:54. > :16:57.Simpsons, we are it. I don't think they see it that way, but anyway, I
:16:58. > :17:01.suppose what is interesting is if you want the papers to lay off his
:17:02. > :17:05.family it has had the opposite effect, because what do we see? It
:17:06. > :17:10.is on the front page. He did not have a cool PR man saying, look,
:17:11. > :17:14.this is not right way to go about it. It will be interesting to see if
:17:15. > :17:22.tactics change. Thank you both much indeed. You can see all of the pages
:17:23. > :17:26.online on our website, where you can read a detailed review of the
:17:27. > :17:32.headlines. It is all there for you seven days per week, BBC .co .uk/
:17:33. > :17:35.papers. And you can see us there also each night in addition been
:17:36. > :17:39.posted on the page shortly after we have finished. Thank you both very
:17:40. > :17:55.much. Goodbye. Good evening, once again it has been
:17:56. > :17:59.another mild day for the time of year across the country, but also a
:18:00. > :18:03.day of contrast, we had quite a lot of cloud around, and some rain, in
:18:04. > :18:05.North Wales today, pretty dismal, not