03/12/2017 The Papers

A wicket in Adelaide, England are

29-1.

That's all the sport for now.

Hello and welcome to our look ahead

to what the the papers

will be bringing us today.

With me is the political commentator

James Millar and Sian Griffiths,

Education Editor of the Sunday

Times.

The Observer leads with news that

Theresa May's social mobility Tsar,

Alan Milburn, has resigned

in protest against the

government's policies.

The Sunday Times goes

with the same story,

reporting that Mr Milburn accused

ministers of betraying the people

who voted for Brexit.

The Mail on Sunday says

a Labour peer has been

wrongly claiming expenses -

the peer says he will pay

some of the money back.

The Sunday Telegraph

reports on dissent within

the Conservative Party over the role

EU courts will play

in the UK after Brexit.

And the Sunday Express claims

the upcoming royal wedding will lift

the economy by half a billion pounds

and boost the UK's diplomatic

relationship with the United States.

Let's start off, Alan Milburn

quitting along with the rest of the

social mobility team. Is it a

surprise?

I don't think it is

completely a surprise. It is

embarrassing for Theresa May because

she has made this a personal mission

of hers. She said the famous quote,

we will make Britain a country that

works, not for the privileged few

but for everyone of us.

When she

first arrived at Downing Street.

It

was her pledge. So Alan Milburn has

quit today as her social mobility

tsar, taking with him three other

members of the commission, including

Julian Sheppard, a former Tory

Education Secretary. It is

embarrassing. Not completely

unexpected because there is a back

story to this, which is of course,

Alan Milburn, who has been the

social mobility tsar for quite a

long time, his position came to an

end this summer and the post is

being readvertised. So he's making

political capital from this, because

I think his position was going to be

readvertised. It was open for other

applications and he has come out and

said I am quitting and this

government is not doing enough to

mend the divisions of our society

and make it easier for poorer people

to access wealth, jobs and

opportunities.

James, it is time for

the Sunday papers to report on their

front pages, could he be accused of

gesture politics by the Prime

Minister?

Yes, he has jumped before

he was pushed. He is a former Tony

Blair Minister and has done an

excellent piece of media management

in a classic Blairite fashion.

Do

you think Alastair Campbell might

have been involved?

I don't know,

but it is a good bit of media

management because he would have

been out of the post probably

anyway. But the stuff he has put in

his resignation letter is quite

explosive. He said the government

doesn't have the bandwidth to look

into this because of the Brexit

stories going on. He said the worst

position in politics is to set out a

policy to heal social divisions,

then do nothing about it. It is

hard-hitting and for a Prime

Minister who is already fairly weak,

the Prime Minister 's -- the papers

will lap that.

The government does

have two focus on Brexit, and it is

hard to focus on anything else at

the moment?

Obviously, they have to

focus on Brexit, but you cannot

forget the fact that people who

voted for Brexit voted because they

were feeling hopeless about their

prospects and the prospects about

their children. Focusing on Brexit

ignores the problem is why we got to

the position we are now in. Alan

Milburn is right to be highlighting

this issue. If you don't tackle it,

what you risk is extremism,

populism, these part of the country

feeling left behind, really getting

very, very angry and where does it

lead to? Civil Unrest. It is

worrying.

Brexit and social

mobility, Brexit will have a massive

impact, it will happen and will have

a huge impact. Part of that will be

economic and that will impact on

social mobility. Whether that it is

being worse off all better off,

depending on what you think will

happen, conditions at work and the

benefits guaranteed by the EU at the

moment, it is all connected and you

cannot ignore social mobility to do

a trade deal with New Zealand, you

cannot ignore it.

Coming at the end

of a difficult week for the Prime

Minister, the Damian Green saga and

other things, and this resignation.

That is why it is on the front pages

of two papers. It is not that big a

deal. The government was having a

decent time post-budget, getting

their act together. It looks like

they will get some stuff going on

with Brexit coming to an agreed

position. It could be a lot worse in

terms of front pages.

There was a

time when Theresa May, people

thought, she only had a few days but

she is still hanging on.

She is, but

who is a possible contender for the

job? Who wants the job? These

pictures on the front of the

Observer very revealing.

Florists in

Berkshire.

Biting her lip, looking

great, tired and anxious. He would

want to be in her position.

There is

a narrative that she is, suggested

partly because she was a woman and

these papers are produced by men,

suggesting she is a bit weak,

surrounded by flowers because she is

a lady. I am always concerned about

that narrative on what is driving

it.

And you can always find a

picture of a politician looking

tired. Onto the Telegraph, children

being offered counselling in the

classroom because of the mental

health crisis. We hear so much about

young people facing this mental

health crisis and it is a step that

is sensible to send experts into the

classroom?

It is a step in the right

direction, I am glad this is a Green

paper coming out tomorrow. It is a

joint Green paper between the health

Department and the education

Department and is trying to address

this problem. It is an epidemic of

mental health disorders among our

young people in schools, children as

young as five.

What is the reason

for that? Is it social media, an

increase in reporting on mental

health problems, why do we have this

epidemic?

There isn't one single

reason. If you talk to headteachers,

they are very worried. They come up

with a range of factors they think

may have caused it. That comes from

living your life and social media to

testing exams, GCSEs and A-levels

being made harder, SATs in primary

schools. There is an acceptance of

young people but there aren't enough

jobs for many of them when they come

out of university. I do agree, there

is more being talked about in terms

of mental health and the Sunday

Times has the same story today. They

have targeted all sorts of things,

Prince Harry talking about his

mental health problems, which has

been helpful in breaking the stigma,

opening up the conversation. One in

four of us, probably more will

suffer from a mental health

disorder, that can go on to

self-harming, depression,

self-harming, anorexia and sadly,

some people kill themselves. But

talking about it, having an outlet

for your feelings, hopefully this

will be able to identify the

children at risk and stop the

conversation.

One of the problems is

the NHS has been criticised for not

being very good at mental health

treatment, particularly amongst the

young?

Don't get too excited because

this will not happen until 2021 so a

lot of kids struggling at the

moment, it will not help them. My

concern with this, it is coming at

it from the wrong end of the

telescope. If you ask me what is to

blame, it is Michael Gove.

That is a

little bit harsh?

His education

reforms have made exams much harder.

I have been looking at secondary

schools for my daughter and the

teachers are saying they have had to

set up meditation rooms because the

students are buckling under the

weight of expectation from exams.

That is what is causing a lot of

this. Not all of it, but correlation

is not necessarily causation.

Michael Gove is in here to answer

that criticism but he will say he's

trying to improve standards in

education.

But at what cost? That is

the question. I defer to your

expertise, but standards have gone

up, but what cost are we doing that?

Exams cannot be the only reason

behind a mental health crisis?

Not

the only one, but if you looked at

the education system you might be

able to do with it that way, rather

than send in therapies.

Sian, ease

up on exams, can be tackled it that

way?

At the end of the day, our kids

have to compete with kids from

across the world for job snobs

standards need to go. Also two

families, working, that has had a

big effect on mental health in

children. But it is good something

has been done to address it. I'm

about to see the health department

doing something about it.

Speaking

of jobs and opportunities for young

people, what about the SAS? It looks

like they might be recruiting women.

I love this story. It is on the

front of the Sunday Times. They say

it is the last frontier for women

serving in the Armed Forces in

Britain. It is a proposal to modify

the gruelling selection tests that

they hold to give female recruits a

better chance. Reading it, I gather

women wouldn't have to wear such

heavy packs when they do the

selection tests. It would be great

to see more women in the SAS but

there is a bit of me that worries,

if you cannot wear that heavy pack,

he can manage it, what happens if

you have to carry an injured male

soldier in battle? Will you be able

to carry them?

With that apply to

any soldier, not necessarily just in

the SAS if they have to carry a

fallen comrades from the battlefield

as Jamaat odessey warfare is

changing and I am sure there are

many other abilities and skills in

modern warfare that perhaps women

have and could be very useful in the

SAS apart from this physical

strength.

Nobody is saying women

should not be physically fit, but

the idea of how much they can

physically carry.

Apparently it is

causing much discussion in the Armed

Forces about whether the rules

should be changed. I don't think

there is any argument about whether

women should be allowed in, all

roles will be open to women, it is

the question of whether they change

the bar they need to get over

because they are not as physically

strong as the strongest men. That

sounds fantastic. I would love to

hear what they are having to say

about this in an office's mess. How

politically correct it might be. I

have no idea.

It would be symbolic

because the SAS is this elite

regiment and to have women SAS

soldiers would be symbolic for the

Ministry of Defence, the Armed

Forces?

It would be symbolic and

there have been these professions,

traditionally have been hard to

break into four women and this is

one of the last bastions where it

has been difficult. I think some of

these tests, the police used to have

to have a test, being a certain

height and I did consider it at one

point and realising I was too small.

I think things have to be modified

as society changes.

We have a female

doctor, whether we have a female

James Bond down the line. We can

have James Bond.

Good idea. Let's go

on to the Mail on Sunday. Jeremy

Corbyn in expenses scandal.

This is

a senior Jeremy Corbyn in the Lords.

He is not a senior aide to Jeremy

Corbyn.

Is he a friend to Jeremy

Corbyn?

Not really. Most of them got

their job under Tony Blair so they

are not massive fans Jeremy Corbyn.

He has been claiming money for a

second home in London. He is

entitled to claim about £36,000 a

year allowance. Because that would

be OK if he didn't live in Brighton

and commute every day from Brighton

and he has also been claiming

expenses for his train ticket from

Brighton. If you claim one of the

other you will be all right, but

claiming both has not been looking

great. He has said he will pay some

of it back, he said he will pay the

train fare. When we had the expenses

scandal, not many broke the rules,

it just looked bad.

The focus seems

to has gone on expenses from MPs to

the Lords. More focus on collecting

the daily allowance but not

speaking. Various peers accused of

not taking part in debates for

months on end.

Of course, he is said

he will pay back the £41,000 for

rail and taxi fares but said he will

not play the money back for the home

allowance. He is choosing to pay

back the smaller of the amounts.

There is, it seems rules in the

Lords that can be bent. There needs

a massive review of these rules and

put in place something simple,

transparent and straightforward that

cannot be bent got around easily

because they are old-fashioned

rules.

And they call him Lord

swampy. He used to be a squatter

Sobey are any he has been caught out

on the issue of housing expenses is

too good for the papers to leave.

That was a long time ago.

We talked

about women in the SAS and the

female James Bond and now it is the

unisex scouts at the transgender

guides, Scout leaders are told,

don't call them boys and girls.

Scout leaders have been told to

refrain from calling children boys

and girls to make sure transgender

children are not offended. I think

it is part of a general thing across

organisations dealing with young

people, to try to get them to

consider these gender stereotypes, I

am not sure boys and girls are

gender stereotypes, but there is a

movement at the moment in getting

children to think. Should I be

wearing pink if I am a girl, should

I be wearing blue if I am a boy,

should I be playing football as a

boy, or playing with dolls as a

girl. It goes, in my view into

political correctness and lunacy. So

it can go too far and I think there

are boys and there are girls, it is

fine to call them boys and girls we

don't need gender neutral pronouns

for everything.

James?

As part of

that movement, this is a good thing.

There is no need to call the kids

boys and girls, you can call them

children. If you do call them boys

and girls, you trigger what that

means. There is so much about gender

stereotypes where boys are told,

this is what it is to be a boy.

Girls are told this is what it is to

be a girl. There was a programme in

the summer called there are no more

boys than girls. They stop calling

them boys and girls in the classroom

and the girls' confidence went up

and the boys, in terms of the

Calgary, improve. Simplifying it

somewhat, but it helped.

So you can

never say boys and girls?

Don't hang

your body out to dry who calls

anybody boys and girls, but there is

nothing wrong in thinking about it

and tackling those stereotypes. Then

there is another issue where the

stereotypes are so ingrained we

start confusing or conflating gender

and sex. Then we get into Sian's

story in the Sunday Times about

books on transgender being

distributed in schools. Which is

very much in the same sort of

ballpark. That is a related but

different issue. I think it is a

good thing not to call kids boys and

girls. If you can avoid it.

Sian is

laughing.

I don't have a problem

with this.

We will have two end it

there.

We do take a look at the front pages

of the next day's papers every

evening here on BBC News at 10:40

p:m., but thanks again to my guests.

Goodbye for now.