27/01/2018 The Papers

following some of the heaviest rain

for a century.

Hello and welcome to our look ahead

at the papers with my guests. Good

evening to you both. We will be

looking at the front pages in a

moment with Nigel Nelson, the editor

of the Sunday Mirror and Sunday

people and the broadcaster Penny

Smith. Let's look at the front

pages. The Sunday Times says Meghan

Markle plans to make a speech at her

wedding. Meanwhile, Donald Trump has

criticised Theresa May according to

the Mail on Sunday who thinks the

PM's approach to Brexit has not been

tough enough. The Independent on

Sunday in Leeds with a dramatic

picture of the bomb in Kabul which

has killed at least 95 people and

injured many more. The Telegraph

says Cabinet source is warning of a

Brexit betrayal. The Express has a

story on rogue parking companies.

Lots of stories on the front pages.

The papers all have their own

investigation is taking place. Let's

start off with the Mail.

We were

having a discussion, Nigel and I,

about whether it is really a snub

when what he has said is he would

have played hardball with Europe. He

he said the EU is not all it is

cracked up to be, I would be tough.

It is not really a snub. He says he

has been invited, Theresa May has

invited him twice to Britain and

everybody is saying did we know

about this? Is it true?

Fake news!

Because as we know, there have been

suggestions that there would be

protests and various other things,

and also in this, this is an

interview he has done with Piers

Morgan, and in it he praises Macron

and says how he really likes them

and they went up the Eiffel Tower.

And the wife, he likes the wife is

specially.

He likes the wife, they

closed everything and it was

fantastic. I supposed it is the

contrast between saying Theresa May

should have done this, but the

Macrons, they are great! That is

what struck me.

It was a new special

relationship.

It is not as!

What do

you think?

It is quite special to

get an interview with Donald Trump

so full marks to Piers Morgan for

pulling it off. But the problem is

you get the feeling that he did not

say anything. When it comes to the

so-called snub about Brexit, what he

says is he would have taken a stand.

What does that mean? David Davis

might say he is taking a tough

stand, Theresa May might say she is,

so it goes on. I think the news that

he thinks he is coming to two visit

is the most interesting, as Penny

said. The fact that Buckingham

Palace does not know anything about

it and nor does Downing Street, does

make me feel that he is a bit

confused. We do know that he is due

to make a working visit at the end

of the year. That seems to be set in

stone.

But the idea of a state visit within

the year.

Maybe it is one of those

things when people say we must do

lunch and you get your diary out and

that you look horrified.

It is

reported that when it was brought up

Mr Trump said we will talk about it.

It has then moved on to two visits!

Who can tell?

Let's turn to the

Telegraph. A couple of stories that

we are looking at on the front page.

Again, it is Brexit. Brexit

betrayal, Nigel.

You could call it

Brexit common sense, it rather

depends on which side of the

argument you are on. What the

Telegraph is suggesting is that

Whitehall officials, Whitehall

mandarins as we like to call them,

they are trying to get the Prime

Minister to agree a soft Brexit.

Much of the lines that Philip

Hammond was talking about, that he

seemed to get hauled over the coals

over by the PM when he was in Davos.

This is the idea of the modest

Brexit, not too many differences and

so on. They are saying Jeremy Heggie

Cabinet Secretary is behind this,

along with Ollie Robbins, the PM's

chief Brexit advisor. They may well

be advising that. It may be the

sensible thing to do. But the

Telegraph being a Brexit paper, this

is a betrayal.

They do say that

obviously they have the big war

cabinet meeting on Monday, say

really keying it up.

Every time I

hear the word whenever I try, I see

people sliding under the table! The

thing is, we are in it for the long

haul. It seems to me that these are

the small things on the way to our

divorce. These other bits, I have

mentioned it before, it is like a

divorce. You have the house,

children, probably children and then

house. You have all these things to

unpick and then you are talking

about who is having the books.

What

aspect of Brexit concerns you?

Whenever they start talking about

things that I think are going to

really affect me, let's face it,

that is the only thing I really care

about, being able to get to Europe

quickly and getting through customs

without worrying, and also about

companies and companies that rely on

European interchange. Those are the

things. This to me, as I said...

People have got bored with it

because not a lot has happened. The

feeling that one gets all the way

through with the government doesn't

really know what it wants from

Brexit. That is what the Europeans

keep telling us. When we know what

we are aiming for, it might get more

in just in because we will then

begin to understand how it will

affect us individually. Until it

happens, it can be a bit dull.

That

is putting it mildly for some!

Something that will probably get a

lot of people's attention is council

tax bills to rise by £80.

This is

because as we know, councils are

strapped for cash, and the

government has lifted its cap on

increases, and it looks like quite a

few councils are going to say right,

lets makes it out. We need lots of

things doing and we particularly

need to pay attention to social

care. Social care has been the one

thing they have been banging on

about with the NHS, the reason why

the NHS is struggling is because of

social care, and that has this

knock-on effect.

It of all the bed

blocking.

And frankly, no one likes

tax rises, but my view on this one

is, bring it on. Until we start

talking about this whole social care

issue and until we integrate the

health side and the social care side

and the billions it will cost, we

will have constant problems. Yes,

somebody will have to pay for it

somewhere along the way, let's start

with council tax.

But a lot of

people are not getting pay rises,

how will they pay for this?

Because

of inflation, they are Angela

getting paid equally as is. The cost

of life is getting more and more. We

are in 's territory. No matter which

way you dress it up, whether you put

those on it and put glitter on, it

is still austerity.

The other side

is we have ambulances queueing up in

car parks. However you cut it, more

money is necessary and it means a

lot more money. Obviously, if the

Labour government was in the moment,

what we would have is the highest

paid would be making the biggest

contribution. That to me is the way

forward. However you look at it, we

are all going to have to pay some

more.

Talking about pay, let's move

on to our third story on the Sunday

Telegraph. What grabbed you about

this story? The BBC are accused of

paperboy.

The argument is because

you have the gender report coming

out next week, the BBC decided what

a perfect time to deflect from this

and we will announce that some of

the top paid presenters like John

Humphreys and Huw Edwards have

agreed to take a pay cut. It does

seem that this is a bit more

fundamental. The BBC needs to think

about what it needs to and what it

do wants to be. You might argue John

Humphrys should not get £600,000 of

public money and Hugh Edwards, I

hope he is not around at the moment

to hear after! You can argue about

things like that you can argue about

pay parity, but at the end of the

date is public money and it is how

you spend it. I would have thought

this was a perfect time for the BBC

to look at itself and say, do we

need to do everything? Do we need to

have so many expensive light

entertainment programmes on? Isn't

it part of the BBC to be producing

television that would not be

available elsewhere?

How does this

compare to the commercial side?

I do

think with the BBC, and particularly

with radio presenters, like you were

talking that John Humphrys, the BBC

in the past has talked about other

commercial pressures and part of me

thinks, you are not supposed to be

competing in that way so therefore,

don't offer huge salaries because

somebody will do it because they

want to do it. You don't need to

offer these massive amounts and you

cannot get that in the commercial

sector. You really can't. These

wages are far more than anybody

else's offering.

OK. Let's move on

to the Independent. And, yes, 95

people killed in Kabul. There are

stories of women and children also

killed in this. The Taliban really

picking up the pace on attacks in

Afghanistan.

I think for me, there

is also that added hideousness that

it was all packed into an ambulance.

It is that horrible juxtaposition.

Just like when you find out doctors

have joined Isis, for example. You

think there is something quite weird

about that combination of something

which is supposed to be helping

people who are ill and then blowing

people to bits. You can only imagine

the hideousness of living in a place

like this, and the same in Syria, to

be fair.

I will look it up for the

next programme, I think the

international Red Cross have said it

is regarded as a crime, that they

have used an ambulance, something

which should help people, to commit

an atrocity. I will find that for

the next hour. Nigel, could you take

us to the Express please?

Indeed.

The Express have gone completely off

piste when it comes to politics. A

story which will affect a lot of

people because 6 million people get

private parking tickets in this

country. No more. The government is

doing something about this. This is

Sajid Javid the Communities

Secretary. The idea is a new code of

practice for the private parking

companies. They handle private bits

of land and hospital car parks. If

they issue tickets when they should

not and if they have an appeals

procedure which does not work or if

anything is confusing about the way

they operate, what they can do is

remove the right to go to the DVLA

to get our addresses and that will

put them out of business because if

they have not got the addresses from

the DVLA and our names, they cannot

finance, they get no money and that

will be the end of them. That is the

idea.

You were telling us early on

about how you stopped off somewhere.

I was at party conference. I parked

on a hotel for court to put in in

Manchester. I drove off, put my car

in a multi-story. The next morning I

found a ticket on it from one of

these private companies. Somebody

had seen me in the hotel and worked

his way all round the car park to

put the ticket on. Tickets are not

actually tickets, they are invoices.

I refused to pay the invoice and

told the company I would happily

expose them in the newspaper if they

pursued it and that was the sad

thing is not everyone can say that

threat. How would you know it was a

cowboy? First of all the tickets

should not look like tickets. It is

one of the things that would be

banned under this system. They will

not be local authority. It will be

written on it that it is a private

firm. And then what you do is you

take them on. You should be able to

get rid of them.

I think a lot of

people would be scared.

Very

quickly, irony want to get to this

story, the bride will be speaking at

her wedding. What do you think about

this?

The amount of weddings I have

been to in the past two years where

the bride have spoken.

Really?

Yes,

it is relent. Andy McDowell did it

in the film For Weddings and a cat

macro funeral.

We have not mentioned

which wedding it is. It is Meghan

Markle and Prince Harry. Why do like

it?

I just think it sounds like it

will be really good fun. There is a

line where it says she is even

thinking of putting in some jokes.

Excellent!

We will leave it there.

Penny and Nigel, thank you. We have

more coming up in the next hour. You

can see all the front pages online

and on the BBC News website.

It's all there for you -

7 days a week at bbc.co.uk/papers -

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