:00:15. > :00:25.Tonight, with the Oscar nominations announced this week, takes you to
:00:25. > :00:30.
:00:30. > :00:35.A silent film The Artist piles up the nominations, presidential
:00:35. > :00:38.matinee idol Barack Obama puts tax and fairness at the heart of his
:00:38. > :00:41.re-election campaign. We can restore an economy where everyone
:00:41. > :00:51.gets a fair shot and everyone does their fair share and everyone plays
:00:51. > :00:54.
:00:54. > :00:59.Back at home, Bishop performing in the House of Lords turn up the
:00:59. > :01:05.volume to fight for fairness over welfare reforms. Czar of the small
:01:05. > :01:09.screen, writer and ideas man, Alain de Botton says we should all feel a
:01:09. > :01:13.bit more charitable about paying our taxes. The horrible process of
:01:13. > :01:19.paying tax could be given some of the heart-warming quality of giving
:01:19. > :01:25.money to charity. And what if the taxman learned to say a little
:01:25. > :01:29.please and thank you? There's not much to sing and dance
:01:29. > :01:34.about as the IMF publishes yet another gloomy growth review. So,
:01:34. > :01:39.with the celebs of the economic and political world gathering on the
:01:39. > :01:43.slopes of Davos, chief critic Mehdi Hasan gets his skis on. With the
:01:43. > :01:52.world chi slip sliding back into recession, do any of our political
:01:52. > :01:56.leaders have what it takes to bring us back from the brink? Tn Oscar
:01:56. > :02:01.nominations for The Artist, but who could have guessed a French silent
:02:01. > :02:08.film would be such a success? Can you really pick winners within it
:02:08. > :02:12.comes to the creative industries? Singer and actress Charlotte
:02:12. > :02:22.Gainsbourg talks art v commerce. don't believe you have to make
:02:22. > :02:27.
:02:27. > :02:33.Evening all. Welcome to This Week, a week when Gingrich beginning
:02:33. > :02:38.became the front runner in the primary race by attacking the made
:02:38. > :02:41.ya. It's an easy route to popularity which is why it's
:02:41. > :02:45.beneath the dignity of our MPs, though best not mention it to Ed
:02:45. > :02:49.Miliband, just in case. So sooner had Mr Gingrich taken the
:02:50. > :02:53.lead that he promptly promised to two to Mars. Transpired he meant a
:02:53. > :02:59.Gingrich presidency would set that as the target for a new US space
:02:59. > :03:04.programme. And he wouldn't actually go there himself. Mitt Romney was
:03:04. > :03:14.crest fallen, Barack Obama wore a huge grin. Back on terrafirma, it
:03:14. > :03:15.
:03:15. > :03:19.wasn't a good weak our over overworked and underpaid workers in
:03:19. > :03:26.Parliament. Our elected representatives were much more
:03:26. > :03:30.exorcised by complaints that a tax subsidised starter of beetroot and
:03:30. > :03:34.pumpkin salad consisted of only one piece of beetroot in a puddle of
:03:34. > :03:39.pumpkin puree and was tasteless. Worse than that, a boiled egg had
:03:39. > :03:45.been cut into quarters but only three served up on a plate. Petty
:03:45. > :03:53.and insulting way to save a buck, said one MP. Another said, a bucket
:03:53. > :03:57.of chips makes for soggy chips! The tower arrangement, he said, is
:03:58. > :04:02.better. The inhumanity of it all. Suffer
:04:02. > :04:06.the Parliamentary children with their soggy bucket of chips.
:04:06. > :04:13.Speaking of those who deserve no sympathy whatsoever, I'm joined on
:04:13. > :04:19.the sofa by two of Westminster's most pathetic wretches, the Oliver
:04:19. > :04:22.Twist and Artful Dodger of late flight political chat, Michael
:04:22. > :04:27.Portillo and Alan AJ Johnson. Welcome to your both. Michael, your
:04:27. > :04:31.moment of the week? Well, in a week in which the Bishop's led the
:04:31. > :04:35.assault on the welfare reforms of the Government in the House of
:04:35. > :04:38.Lords, it was interesting to read an article by Lord Carey, a former
:04:38. > :04:45.Archbishop of Canterbury, and he was writing I think in the Mail on
:04:45. > :04:50.Sunday. He talked about the immorality of the high level of
:04:51. > :04:54.borrowing. The Daily Mail actually. It's true that we are living life
:04:54. > :04:57.on the hog today at the expense of generations that will come
:04:57. > :05:02.afterwards because we are spending more than we produce in income so
:05:02. > :05:07.we are borrowing. That borrowing will have to be paid for by future
:05:07. > :05:11.general races. You referred to the trillion of national debt. Heading
:05:11. > :05:15.for 1.5 trillion? Not many Bishops focus on the immorality of saddling
:05:15. > :05:19.a future generation with the burden of living to the extremes that we
:05:19. > :05:24.do at the moment. I think that is a moral question and I'm pleased that
:05:24. > :05:29.Lord Carey mentioned it. Interesting? Mine's a light hearted
:05:30. > :05:34.moment. Andrew Stunell, a Local Government junior minister told the
:05:34. > :05:37.Commons they must vote against an opposition amendment. A vote was
:05:37. > :05:42.called. There is two lobbies you have to go through, the aye and the
:05:42. > :05:47.no lobby. Stunell was telling them to walk through the no lobby. He
:05:47. > :05:51.then decided to nip into the aye lobby to get a glass of water, but
:05:51. > :05:56.there's water in the no lobby as well. He went in there, got locked
:05:56. > :06:02.in and the only way to get out was to vote, so he hid and came out
:06:02. > :06:06.after the vote had finished. I think there's a new verb now to
:06:06. > :06:10.walk into the wrong lobby will be Stunell-ing!
:06:10. > :06:14.Love it. Now, it's presidential election
:06:14. > :06:19.year in America, and President Obama was accused of class warfare
:06:19. > :06:26.this week when he used his last State of the Union address of this
:06:26. > :06:30.term to call on the rich to pay a bigger share of their income in tax.
:06:30. > :06:36.With potential republican opponent and multi-millionaire Mitt Romney
:06:36. > :06:39.forced to explain why he pays a lower tax rate than many middle
:06:39. > :06:43.class Americans, Mr Obama obviously thinks there are votes in it. Nick
:06:43. > :06:47.Clegg today called on his own coalition Government to do more to
:06:47. > :06:52.reduce tax for low earners and the squeezed middle, claiming the
:06:52. > :07:02.public had reached "boiling point" on the issue. So we turned to
:07:02. > :07:15.
:07:15. > :07:19.writer, thinker and dreamer, Alain The prospect of paying tax is
:07:19. > :07:22.pretty awful at any time. It's a bit like having a tooth pulled. But
:07:22. > :07:27.in these dire economic times, it's perhaps even worse. We tend to feel
:07:27. > :07:31.that life is already quite unfair and we don't want to have to add
:07:31. > :07:34.another tax burden to our situation. I think that's why the Bishops
:07:34. > :07:38.annoyed so many people when they argued that actually we had to keep
:07:38. > :07:42.paying for the most unfortunate in society. What are these people
:07:42. > :07:49.doing making this kind of argument in the Members of Parliament as
:07:49. > :07:53.well? Haven't they got pulpits for this sort of thing?
:07:53. > :07:58.I fully agree that the Bishops should stay well out of Parliament
:07:58. > :08:01.but I think here, as in so many other areas, the secular world
:08:01. > :08:06.could pick out some useful lessons from the religious one. When it
:08:06. > :08:10.comes to tax, what politicians might learn is that the word "tax"
:08:10. > :08:16.is a particularly colourless, odourless offensive word. What
:08:16. > :08:20.religions do is rebrand tax as charity. Now, charity is a much
:08:20. > :08:24.more appealing word and in Christianity, it's absolutely
:08:24. > :08:29.fundamental to being a spiritual person. The idea is that Jesus
:08:29. > :08:33.sacrificed himself for you but God gave up something very precious for
:08:33. > :08:38.you and you in turn should practice giving up things like money that
:08:38. > :08:42.are important to us in order to help others.
:08:42. > :08:47.On the surface, this is a completely cray zis argument, but
:08:47. > :08:51.it's also one that we can use, paying taxs is one of the most
:08:51. > :08:55.generous things any of us ever gets to do, it's giving a huge share of
:08:55. > :09:00.our income for other people, yet it feels so horrible. The challenge
:09:00. > :09:05.for politicians is, how can we give to the act of paying taxes some of
:09:05. > :09:10.the charm, spiritual depth and warm glow that naturally comes when you
:09:10. > :09:14.give to charity? Paying taxes is a horrible process.
:09:14. > :09:18.So I think this is what politicians should do. They should make us feel
:09:18. > :09:22.that the enormous amount of money we are contributing in taxs is
:09:22. > :09:26.actually going towards something that's pleasant, valuable and
:09:26. > :09:30.important. They should reconnect us emotionally to the fruits of our
:09:30. > :09:33.charity. They should show us that schools, the hip replacements, the
:09:33. > :09:38.hospitals, the nurseries that our money has gone to fund.
:09:38. > :09:43.They should stop making paying taxes feel like such a punishment.
:09:43. > :09:45.And, as our parents always told us, please and thank yous are very
:09:46. > :09:49.important and, after you've just given something really valuable,
:09:49. > :09:55.it's always nice to get a thank you. So isn't that something that the
:09:55. > :10:04.taxman could do for us, a little thank you slip after we've filed
:10:04. > :10:09.our return. Alain de Botton in his North London
:10:09. > :10:13.study. Welcome to This Week. Thank you very much. If you were on a
:10:13. > :10:17.tight income struggling to make ends meet in these tough economic
:10:17. > :10:20.conditions but you are paying your whack of tax, do you think a little
:10:20. > :10:25.thank you note from the taxman's going to make you feel any better?
:10:25. > :10:30.It's not going to solve everything but I think it helps. Charity is
:10:30. > :10:33.something that people at all levels of society enjoy, giving to
:10:33. > :10:40.somebody else is a fundamental sign of your freedom. That is a sign
:10:40. > :10:42.that you are a free person. I don't have freedom not to pay tax, I make
:10:42. > :10:47.charitable contributions, that's a freedom to make them or not to make
:10:47. > :10:52.them, there's no choice when it comes to paying tax? Nevertheless,
:10:52. > :10:58.I think that the act of giving tax should be in some ways acknowledged
:10:58. > :11:02.as something that you are doing for other people, that it's not merely
:11:02. > :11:08.a dry, bureaucratic procedure, it's an act of generosity, however
:11:08. > :11:13.forced. Alan, up for rebranding tax as charity? When there was the
:11:13. > :11:15.fracas over the 10p tax rate which Gordon, as Chancellor in the Blair
:11:15. > :11:22.Government introduced, he was surprised at the backlash because,
:11:22. > :11:26.at the same time he bought the basic rate of tax down to 20p, so
:11:26. > :11:30.what the public should have focused their mind on was, we have got the
:11:30. > :11:33.lowest basic rate tax ever. Instead of that, the public, which kind of
:11:33. > :11:37.I think suggests that the public do understand about the fairness
:11:37. > :11:42.argument, the public didn't say thuck for a 20p tax rate, the
:11:42. > :11:46.public actually were very concerned about the very poorest losing the
:11:46. > :11:49.10p tax rate -- didn't say thank you for the 20p tax rate. We
:11:49. > :11:52.misrepresent the public I think when we think they they don't
:11:52. > :11:58.understand this money going towards schools and hospitals. I don't
:11:58. > :12:01.think you need to rebrand it. It's an interesting idea, but... In the
:12:01. > :12:07.process of paying your tax, the forms you sent, the language that
:12:07. > :12:10.the revenue uses, there's absolutely no acknowledgement that
:12:10. > :12:14.this is a human process whereby one part of the population gives up
:12:14. > :12:18.their income for the sake of another. There's absolutely nothing.
:12:18. > :12:22.It could be just a few sentences, something to suggest that what you
:12:22. > :12:29.are doing is not merely an about tract bureaucratic procedure, but
:12:29. > :12:34.it's part of living in a society. Would that make tax for acceptable?
:12:34. > :12:38.We now never think about what tax does and it does lots of good
:12:38. > :12:42.things of which we'd be very happy about. It's about proportions, we
:12:42. > :12:47.also think part of what we give in tax is wasted. We can see lots of
:12:47. > :12:52.Boro cats living high on the hog or money being wasted in hospitals or
:12:52. > :12:56.Public Services. Or IT schemes? We know that the Government thinks
:12:56. > :13:01.that public spending is too high and it wants to bring its down. Ten
:13:01. > :13:07.years ago, under Gordon Brown, it was 38% of our national wealth, now
:13:07. > :13:10.it's 48%. So proportions come into it as well. Alain is right, that in
:13:10. > :13:14.our hatred of taxation, we have perhaps forgotten that we are doing
:13:14. > :13:20.good things with our money and it might be nice to be reminded of
:13:20. > :13:25.that. But didn't Labour go through a huge tax and spend period after
:13:25. > :13:28.about 2000 Stuck to Tory plans to begin with, then you really got
:13:28. > :13:33.going and the economy was growing fast. But a lot of people just
:13:33. > :13:37.thought that a lot of the money that was spent was wasted, that you
:13:37. > :13:43.had taken their hard-earned money and put it into building new
:13:43. > :13:50.schools and imbrofing hospitals and cutting waiting lists -- improving.
:13:50. > :13:55.Because there was a lot of it, a lot was wasted. The IT scheme was a
:13:55. > :13:59.huge problem. Most of what we did was because we were able, because
:13:59. > :14:03.the unemployment came down and the unemployment rate went up to the
:14:03. > :14:08.highest ever known, 75%. We weren't spending that money on ufpb
:14:08. > :14:10.employment benefits and you could spend it on schools and hospitals -
:14:10. > :14:16.- unemployment. It was a period when we were fortunate to be there
:14:16. > :14:20.at that time, but actually, that was a lot to do with the policies...
:14:20. > :14:25.The proportion of national wealth spent by the Government went up by
:14:25. > :14:35.10%. That is... Not in the period that Andrew is talking about. It
:14:35. > :14:38.
:14:38. > :14:42.was at 38% ten years ago. Yes, A lot of rich folk would rather
:14:42. > :14:48.give up in charity like Bill Gates, so they can choose how to spend the
:14:48. > :14:53.money. There is an embarrassment in Government and society about tax
:14:53. > :14:56.because there is a feeling it is being wasted. First, there is
:14:56. > :15:00.accountability, what tax is spent on. I would rather see a pie chart
:15:00. > :15:06.where it says hospitals, defence and wasted money for paperclips and
:15:06. > :15:10.bad lunch. At least I know where it is going. At the moment there is an
:15:10. > :15:14.embarrassment, shameless secrecy. So let's open it up and have a
:15:14. > :15:19.thank you slip along with the words like, sorry that we have wasted 32%
:15:19. > :15:23.of your tax income, we are struggling to bring you down.
:15:23. > :15:27.pie chart does not show that. If you say 35% has gone on health, you
:15:27. > :15:33.do not know how much was drugs that were thrown away at the end of the
:15:33. > :15:40.week because they over ordered. local council, when I get my local
:15:40. > :15:45.council tax bill, it sends me a pie chart. Do you like it? I do look at
:15:45. > :15:49.it. It does not make me feel better about paying the tax. The central
:15:49. > :15:54.point is that with the bishops we were not talking about a great deal
:15:54. > :16:02.of money. Welfare reform was 200 and some two 5 million of a budget,
:16:02. > :16:05.the biggest budget that I ever had of �192 billion. As Iain Duncan
:16:05. > :16:10.Smith says, this is not about saving money. His argument was that
:16:10. > :16:20.it is a fairness argument. If you are very rich, as I am told you are,
:16:20. > :16:22.
:16:22. > :16:26.very rich... All writers are rich. You would not notice paying a bit
:16:26. > :16:30.more tax. But if you are run a little above average income at the
:16:30. > :16:34.moment when your fuel bill has gone through the roof and food prices
:16:34. > :16:40.have risen as well, and the tax band that you are in, you have
:16:40. > :16:45.suddenly slipped into the next one, any more tax and you are really
:16:45. > :16:49.struggling. Absolutely. And your pay is not keeping pace with
:16:49. > :16:52.inflation. All that I am saying is that there should be more of an
:16:52. > :16:56.acknowledgement on the part of governments that demand tax that
:16:56. > :17:01.they are asking for people to do something for others, and that that
:17:01. > :17:04.has to be remembered as part of the mix. It may go wrong and the money
:17:04. > :17:09.may be wasted but that is fundamentally what the aspiration
:17:09. > :17:13.of tax is, and we often forget it. It is worth bearing in mind.
:17:13. > :17:18.Something remarkable is already beginning to happen in America,
:17:18. > :17:22.America is going to have an election based on class. It has
:17:22. > :17:28.never happened in recent times. Because Mr Obama, rightly or
:17:28. > :17:33.wrongly, does think there are votes in getting the rich, or at least
:17:33. > :17:36.the well-off, to pay more tax. think you could also say it is an
:17:36. > :17:40.election about the size of government. They are having the
:17:40. > :17:42.debate we ought to be having in Europe, how big a government can we
:17:42. > :17:50.afford, what is the role of government when the going gets
:17:50. > :17:56.tough? Obama's point is, why should a secretary pay more tax than the
:17:56. > :18:02.millionaire she is secretary to. But the money mitt Romney is
:18:02. > :18:07.getting on 15% has already paid 35% corporation tax. It is bound to be
:18:07. > :18:11.a political issue. You will not get away with that in a presidential
:18:11. > :18:17.debate. Mr Clegg claimed -- claims we have reached boiling point on
:18:17. > :18:22.tax, and that is why he wants more tax cuts. Do you buy that? I do not
:18:22. > :18:26.buy it in the sense that he means it. Because he is talking about
:18:26. > :18:31.reducing taxes on the lowest paid an increasing them on the highest
:18:31. > :18:34.paid. And I am not sure I do agree with him. Not just the lowest paid.
:18:34. > :18:40.If you take people out of the threshold, people in the middle
:18:40. > :18:44.benefit, too. But it does nothing for the 3 million households who do
:18:44. > :18:49.not pay any tax. Do you think you will ever convince anybody with
:18:49. > :18:53.this line? It is one part of what you have to do as a Government,
:18:53. > :18:57.make tax accountable, reduce tax as much as possible, use it
:18:57. > :19:01.efficiently, and as part of that makes you have to reconnect the
:19:01. > :19:04.electorate to why they are paying tax. You are asking them for
:19:05. > :19:08.something and it is a democracy so you need civic involvement in the
:19:08. > :19:15.act of paying tax. It cannot simply be an authoritarian demand for
:19:15. > :19:18.money, which it too often is. it may be late and we may be
:19:18. > :19:21.shedding viewers faster than you can say Newsnight Special from
:19:21. > :19:24.Davos, but we refuse to compromise our artistic vision here on This
:19:24. > :19:27.Week. So coming up, actress, singer, scion of French bohemia Charlotte
:19:27. > :19:31.Gainsbourg, who'll be talking about the tension between art and
:19:31. > :19:35.commerce. And for those without an ounce of poetry in your bones,
:19:35. > :19:40.remember you can post your prose on our interweb site, tweet us on your
:19:40. > :19:44.Twitter thingumabob, or follow us on The Facebook.
:19:44. > :19:47.Now, the PM and the Chancellor have been unusually chipper this week,
:19:47. > :19:52.despite the grim state of the economy. Who cares about jobs or
:19:52. > :19:55.prices when there's the prospect of a fresh dump in the Swiss Alps? And
:19:55. > :19:58.I'm not talking about Val D'Isere. Oh, no. Call-me-Dave and Gidders
:19:58. > :20:02.have been excitedly packing their salopettes and skis for this
:20:02. > :20:05.weekend's international snooze-fest in Davos. So we asked The New
:20:05. > :20:15.Statesman's in-house ski champion, Mehdi Hasan, to join them on the
:20:15. > :20:31.
:20:31. > :20:34.black run for his round up of the Here we are in Davos, with the
:20:34. > :20:43.great and the good of the financial world. I would be -- I thought I
:20:43. > :20:46.would take an hour off to squeeze in some skiing, as you do. It maybe
:20:46. > :20:52.blue skies in Davos, but there has been an avalanche of bad economic
:20:52. > :20:58.news this week. Our GDP fell by 0.2% at the end of last year. The
:20:58. > :21:03.IMF has revised down its UK growth forecast for 2012. And for the
:21:03. > :21:09.first time ever, our national debt topped one trillion pounds. Can it
:21:09. > :21:13.get any worse? Hold on, George, wait for me. Britain has
:21:13. > :21:16.substantial economic problems and debts built up over the last 10
:21:16. > :21:22.years. We are dealing with those, but dealing with those problems is
:21:22. > :21:25.made more difficult by the situation in the eurozone. It suits
:21:25. > :21:29.George Osborne to blame our economic problems on the eurozone.
:21:30. > :21:35.Last year, he was blaming the snow and the royal wedding. Next, it
:21:35. > :21:40.will be the dog that eight out GDP. So surely a blizzard of easier tax
:21:40. > :21:45.lines for the Labour Party. Go on, go get him. Growth has been flat
:21:45. > :21:51.lining in our economies since well before the eurozone crisis. In fact,
:21:51. > :21:55.since his Spending Review in autumn 2010. And what has characterised
:21:55. > :22:01.the Government's approach throughout this period? Total
:22:01. > :22:04.arrogance. Well done, head, that's more like it. If only the previous
:22:04. > :22:09.week the Labour Party had not announced it planned to keep these
:22:09. > :22:12.cuts. Talk about mixed messages. The Government's Welfare Reform
:22:12. > :22:16.Bill snow ploughed his way through the House of Lords with the bishops
:22:16. > :22:21.launching an attack on the Government's �26,000 benefit cut.
:22:21. > :22:25.It left David Cameron able to present himself as the champion of
:22:25. > :22:29.working families, as he did on a visit to as staff. Are you happy
:22:29. > :22:36.that your taxes are going towards families where no one is working
:22:36. > :22:40.and they are earning over �26,000 in benefits? Is that fair? No.
:22:40. > :22:42.again, the Labour Party is all over the place. Its message of
:22:42. > :22:47.supporting the cap in principle but opposing it in practice has meant
:22:47. > :22:51.that it has lacked attack climbs on the coalition. Here, for example,
:22:51. > :22:55.is a case study in how not to do opposition. If you get your
:22:55. > :23:00.amendment, you will tell you Lords to vote against the other amendment,
:23:00. > :23:04.the child benefit one? I am not able to say what will happen in the
:23:04. > :23:14.debate later. It would help if you had a policy. We would know what is
:23:14. > :23:24.going to happen. All right, you have got me, I am a jobbing hack. I
:23:24. > :23:28.am not in Davos, I am in Hemel Hempstead, and I cannot ski.
:23:28. > :23:31.Opposition can be an uphill struggle, which is why it is often
:23:31. > :23:35.left to outside parties to pick up the baton. This week, the Health
:23:35. > :23:39.Select Committee joined doctors, nurses and midwives to denounce the
:23:39. > :23:47.Government's health reforms. David Cameron had a ready-made answer.
:23:47. > :23:50.think they will want to hear from this GP who hails from Doncaster.
:23:50. > :23:55.He said this when he was the acting chairman of the Doncaster GP
:23:55. > :24:01.commissioning group. He said, becoming one of the first national
:24:01. > :24:04.pathfinder areas is a real boost for Doncaster. A single doctor in
:24:04. > :24:10.Ed Miliband's constituency of Doncaster. That's all right then.
:24:10. > :24:20.Forget that 90% of GPs want the bill dropped. Talking of drops, I
:24:20. > :24:22.
:24:22. > :24:27.Even with the health service on its back, it still will not be enough
:24:27. > :24:30.to save Ed Miliband on its own. He has to up his game. He has to look
:24:30. > :24:38.-- perhaps he can look across the pond and look at the only centre-
:24:38. > :24:48.left leader in the Western world who seems about to win an election.
:24:48. > :24:51.
:24:51. > :24:54.Barack Obama serenading Al Green is one thing. I am not saying Ed
:24:54. > :24:58.Miliband should start singing but he could borrow some of the
:24:58. > :25:02.President's other lyrics. Right now, because of loopholes and shelters
:25:02. > :25:06.in the tax code, a quarter of all millionaires pay lower tax rates
:25:06. > :25:10.than millions of middle class households. Do we want to keep
:25:10. > :25:14.these tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans? That is what I am
:25:14. > :25:20.talking about, but it has taken Barack Obama three years to get his
:25:20. > :25:29.act together. I am not sure Ed Miliband has that kind of time.
:25:30. > :25:35.If you believe that Davos is going to save the euro, let alone the
:25:35. > :25:41.world. -- few believe. What next? The civil war is good for the
:25:41. > :25:44.economy, but with who? All options remain on the table, but I stress
:25:44. > :25:48.that the importance of this policy and the reason we are pursuing it
:25:48. > :25:53.is because we do not want to see a nuclear weapons armed Iran and
:25:53. > :25:57.nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, but we also do not want to
:25:57. > :26:00.see Michal -- military conflict in that region. The problem with
:26:00. > :26:04.attacking Iran, apart from the bloodshed and the Boback, is that
:26:04. > :26:08.oil prices could hit a record high, plunging the world economy into a
:26:08. > :26:17.new Great Depression. -- the blow back. But it could give George
:26:17. > :26:22.Osborne a new excuse next time the growth figures go downhill.
:26:22. > :26:24.Mehdi Hasan at the snow centre in Hemel Hempstead. You can tear up
:26:24. > :26:32.the letters that you were writing to complain that we had paid for
:26:33. > :26:37.him to go to Davos! Michael, the NHS reforms. It seems to be a
:26:37. > :26:41.loser-lose situation for the Government. Why do they persist?
:26:41. > :26:45.suppose because they think they are the right thing to do. They think
:26:45. > :26:50.the National Health Service has repeatedly underperformed. They
:26:50. > :26:53.want to see it perform better. They want to see the Decisions passed
:26:53. > :26:58.down to doctors. They want better management of budgets. They think
:26:58. > :27:02.it is worth it. If you are making a major reform on welfare, the
:27:02. > :27:06.biggest since the welfare state came in, major reforms on the
:27:06. > :27:11.education front, struggling with a deficit that is not going away
:27:11. > :27:15.easily and tough economic times, do you also want to be doing the
:27:15. > :27:21.biggest reform of the health service since it came in? This is a
:27:21. > :27:26.very interesting point. He said with a wry smile. I absolutely did
:27:26. > :27:30.not predict this. Half the Tory party did not. When I was writing
:27:30. > :27:34.about what the Tory party might do two years ago, said they would
:27:34. > :27:37.tackle the deficit, tackles secondary education but leave
:27:37. > :27:41.health a side because it is too controversial. To my surprise, they
:27:41. > :27:46.have tackled it as well. I suppose they feel that there are so many
:27:46. > :27:55.things they want to... They are going to be quite unpopular, so
:27:55. > :28:01.they might as well prepared -- Health is a good issue for Labour
:28:01. > :28:06.and a tough one for the Government. It is the other way on welfare.
:28:06. > :28:11.Labour is struggling to get the clear message on welfare reform.
:28:11. > :28:18.don't think so. A lot of what Iain Duncan Smith is doing our the
:28:18. > :28:23.reforms that we would introduce as well. On this issue, I think there
:28:23. > :28:27.is a very strong feeling that �26,000, the average wage of
:28:27. > :28:31.�35,000, should be the most that someone on benefits can earn. The
:28:31. > :28:35.problem is in the detail. Iain Duncan Smith says there will be a
:28:35. > :28:40.transition period. The peers were pointing out, Labour peers as well,
:28:40. > :28:42.it is that if you are not careful in the Government's own impact
:28:42. > :28:46.assessment you will find lots of people presenting themselves as
:28:47. > :28:50.homeless as a result. Local authorities have to pay tax payers
:28:50. > :28:54.money and it ends up being more expensive. The Government could not
:28:54. > :28:58.give assurances about what those transition arrangements could be.
:28:58. > :29:01.On the other issue, child benefit, they were pointing out that someone
:29:01. > :29:07.on 80,000 a year would have child benefit but someone on 26,000 a
:29:07. > :29:11.year would not. You would get 26,000 a year if you had no kids
:29:11. > :29:16.and 26,000 a year if you had four kids. And so the effect on child
:29:16. > :29:20.poverty. Important points to debate. But what you have said on the cap
:29:20. > :29:23.is a perfectly realistic position. It is not what I have been able to
:29:23. > :29:28.get any official Labour spokesperson to say. You say that
:29:28. > :29:32.you accept the cap and think 26,000 is about right for the cap, but you
:29:32. > :29:39.are going to be very careful to make sure the transition
:29:39. > :29:45.arrangements are right. Yes. Your party has not said that. That is
:29:45. > :29:55.the position of Liam Byrne. I have interviewed people this week and
:29:55. > :30:01.
:30:01. > :30:06.I didn't see your interviews, but we were reforming welfare, it's a
:30:06. > :30:09.long hard slog, but we were doing it. Well, the fact is though that
:30:09. > :30:13.Labour could have gone much further, they didn't, and this Government
:30:13. > :30:18.is? Yes, I mean Alan said a moment ago you have got to be careful not
:30:18. > :30:25.to do this, that and the other. One thing you have got to be kaifl of
:30:25. > :30:30.is that people will propose all sorts of transitional arrangements,
:30:30. > :30:33.you have to make sure you don't lose all the reform. One Government
:30:33. > :30:36.after another has tried to control the size of the welfare budget, has
:30:37. > :30:40.tried to control for instance the numbers of people claiming benefits
:30:40. > :30:43.that are intended for disabled people. One Government after
:30:43. > :30:47.another's made no impact in the welfare budget. Do you think we
:30:47. > :30:52.will see, because we have got the universal credit coming down in
:30:52. > :30:55.2013, these changes on the cap coming in in 2013 as well, there's
:30:55. > :31:02.also other changes involving various disability allowances and
:31:02. > :31:06.so on. Will we see, by 2015, will a very different welfare system have
:31:06. > :31:11.started to take route? I think this is the most comprehensive effort by
:31:11. > :31:17.a Government that I can recall but I expect the results to be
:31:17. > :31:22.disappointing. I don't think so. Look, the numbers of people on
:31:22. > :31:27.Incapacity Benefit went up from 700,000 up to 2.6 million from the
:31:27. > :31:31.70s to the 90s. To get that down, not just stopping the flow but also
:31:31. > :31:36.looking at the stock in those terms, many of whom wanted to go back to
:31:36. > :31:40.work, they need ed help and counselling. That's a long, hard
:31:40. > :31:45.process, we started it. We stopped the flow, it would have been four
:31:45. > :31:49.million if that ratio carried on much longer. We stopped the flow
:31:49. > :31:54.and then you need to get to work with the many individual families.
:31:54. > :31:57.65,000 are affected by this �26,000 budget. Iain Duncan Smith says, and
:31:57. > :32:00.I think it's right, that if you concentrate on each one on their
:32:01. > :32:06.circumstances, you can use the year leading up to this taking effect to
:32:06. > :32:09.actually find what the problem is, you can work with Louise Casey and
:32:09. > :32:16.her family intervention project to try to solve the problems. What you
:32:16. > :32:20.don't do in doing all this is to hit familys that are in real
:32:20. > :32:23.difficultty, the guy who's 59, four kids, worked all his life, had a
:32:23. > :32:31.stroke, can't work, a quarter of these people affected by the cap
:32:32. > :32:35.cannot work by the Government's definition. The public want the
:32:35. > :32:39.shameless sorting out, the Shameless TV series, they want
:32:39. > :32:43.those people sorting out, they don't want to hit people genuinely
:32:43. > :32:47.in need of the benefits and that's the difficulty of how you have to
:32:47. > :32:51.get this right. There have been huge changes over the years and I
:32:51. > :32:54.think Iain Duncan Smith has carried on many of those and has to be
:32:54. > :32:58.careful he doesn't defeat his own objective. The economy, more bad
:32:58. > :33:02.news, the fourth quarter of last year. The economy declined, the
:33:02. > :33:07.eurozone crisis back in the head luens again this week. The Greek
:33:08. > :33:14.situation still unresolved -- headlines. The IMF Chief Economist
:33:14. > :33:18.downgrading Britain's growth rate for this year. It was said that the
:33:18. > :33:22.UK should consider slowing the speed of the cuts to avoid
:33:22. > :33:25.strangling the recovery? What did you make of that? Well, it's
:33:25. > :33:29.perfectly plausible an argument but I don't think it's the argument
:33:29. > :33:34.that the markets accept. I mean, the pace of the austerity programme
:33:34. > :33:38.which was agreed by the coalition in the 72 hours following the last
:33:38. > :33:43.general election is dictated by their view of what the markets will
:33:43. > :33:47.put up with. They believe that only the acceleration of the austerity
:33:47. > :33:50.package by comparison with what Gordon Brown was pursuing has
:33:50. > :33:55.entkwrabled us to continue to finance our debt at very low rates
:33:55. > :33:58.of interest -- enabled us, and to be able to print money without
:33:59. > :34:02.affecting that. I think we are all on tenterhooks as to whether the
:34:02. > :34:07.markets might one day turn against Britain and say no, you are not
:34:07. > :34:12.going to pay 2%, but 5 or 6%. The difference for us between able to
:34:12. > :34:16.finance 2% or 5 and 6% is huge, it's the difference between a
:34:17. > :34:20.controllable situation and a calamity. It's all very well
:34:20. > :34:25.someone from the IMF saying you ought to change your austerity
:34:25. > :34:29.programme, I don't think any politician will take that risk in
:34:29. > :34:33.the markets. I was interviewed Liam Byrne, your friend, and it seems to
:34:33. > :34:37.be an endorsement of Labour's position in a way, but within a few
:34:37. > :34:40.hours, Christine Lagarde said the opposite. You can't win? Christine
:34:40. > :34:45.Lagarde's looking for the UK Government to pony up a lot of
:34:45. > :34:47.money to the IMF. She is indeed. North-east not about to upset them.
:34:47. > :34:52.Michael and I represent a real difference in this. I was in
:34:52. > :34:59.Government at the time of the 2010 election when things were going
:34:59. > :35:02.pear-shaped, when it looked like we wouldn't get what the outcome was a
:35:02. > :35:07.hung Parliament. The markets weren't panicking, they weren't
:35:07. > :35:13.panicking about what was a G20 policy. They put us on negative
:35:13. > :35:16.credit watch and we were paying yield similar to Italy? Look, at
:35:17. > :35:21.the time, halfing the deficit within four years was a plan that
:35:22. > :35:25.didn't send the markets into panic. You look at the non-where are EU
:35:25. > :35:29.countries, you'll see that their growth, all of it, was better than
:35:29. > :35:33.the UK this year and all bar Hungary is going to be next year.
:35:33. > :35:39.If you look at countries that control their own economies, the US,
:35:39. > :35:43.Switzerland, the non-EU countries. Sweden? Yes. You look at those
:35:43. > :35:48.countries, you will see that their yields are lower than the UK's.
:35:49. > :35:53.going to have to stop you there. I'm check my gild yields now. Nick
:35:53. > :35:56.Clegg appointed as Deputy Prime Minister, Ed Miliband in charge of
:35:56. > :36:00.the Labour Party, Diane Abbott leading the fight against fried
:36:01. > :36:04.chicken. Yes, it's a funny old world, isn't it. A hat trick of the
:36:05. > :36:11.unlikely and the unwise and the unpredictable. But predicting the
:36:11. > :36:17.future is notoriously tricky. So no sooner had Dave Titanic Cameron
:36:17. > :36:22.called on filmmakers to make more commercially successful movies than
:36:22. > :36:29.a black-and-white French film with hardly any dialogue received ten
:36:29. > :36:37.Oscar nominations. Is it really wise to ask for that. We decided to
:36:37. > :36:44.put art v commerce in this week's spotlight.
:36:44. > :36:50.This morning, we'll share the news we've all been waiting for. Hugo.
:36:50. > :36:54.Hugo. The Descendants The Artist. It's that time again when Holyrood
:36:55. > :37:01.prepares to polish the statues. Surprisingly, with a silent French
:37:01. > :37:05.film proving to be a cut above the rest. The Prime Minister toured
:37:05. > :37:09.Pinewood Studios recently and urged British film producers to focus on
:37:09. > :37:14.making films that made a profit, rather than an artistic statement
:37:14. > :37:18.and was backed by one of the toasts of Tinsel Town. I have been
:37:18. > :37:22.critical of the idea that all public money should go into
:37:22. > :37:26.minority rather obscure films. I think that it's in the interests of
:37:26. > :37:29.the industry and indeed the public that we start building up and
:37:29. > :37:33.making more films that people want to see.
:37:33. > :37:38.Can you really predict a box office hit? Should politician bs in the
:37:38. > :37:45.business of telling artists to pick winners? Perhaps we should leave it
:37:45. > :37:55.up to the audience to decide whether art is commerce -- art
:37:55. > :37:58.
:37:58. > :38:01.beats commerce. We are joined by artist, actor, singer, Charlotte
:38:01. > :38:09.Gainsbourg. Welcome to This Week. Would you ever compromise artistic
:38:09. > :38:16.values to make a bit more money? course. No, I was lucky enough not
:38:16. > :38:20.to have to make compromises in my choices and so, but I feel very
:38:20. > :38:25.lucky that way. But if what you did was listened to by a lot more
:38:25. > :38:29.people because it was more commercial or watched by a lot more
:38:29. > :38:37.people in the movies, wouldn't a little compromise be worth it if
:38:37. > :38:45.you could reach out further? No, I think what I'm hoping to do is to
:38:45. > :38:53.be able to go from one maybe obscure film to another one that'll
:38:53. > :39:00.meet Australian add Jens and then go back to something more obscure -
:39:00. > :39:05.- meet audience and then go back to something more. So a bit of both?
:39:05. > :39:11.Yes. It's very hard to know whether a film will be a success or not, so
:39:11. > :39:15.so you never know, even with very commercial films sometimes they're
:39:15. > :39:19.very big flops. And millions spent on them as well, whereas sometimes
:39:19. > :39:24.movies with a pittance spent on them can be very successful?
:39:24. > :39:29.Exactly. As politicians, rather than artists, your life is
:39:29. > :39:32.compromised, isn't it? I dare say it is, but can I come to the point
:39:32. > :39:37.what the Prime Minister said. I think he's absolutely wrong. I'm so
:39:37. > :39:42.upset with British cinema which trades on nostalgia and makes safe
:39:43. > :39:49.cosy little films which make money, Love Actually, the King's Speech.
:39:49. > :39:59.You didn't like The King's Speech? It's cosy, safe and unambitious. I
:39:59. > :40:04.look at my other homeland, Spain and it's so risky, it's so edgy,
:40:04. > :40:07.it's so original and I think that British cinema just looks very pale
:40:07. > :40:12.by comparison. For the Prime Minister to commit us to continue
:40:12. > :40:15.to make this sort of cosy, British archetypal stuff is very, very sad.
:40:15. > :40:19.He was only giving an opinion, he can't tell us what movies to make.
:40:19. > :40:25.Would you like to join this attack or come to the defence of the
:40:25. > :40:30.British movie industry? I would join the attack. Really? The French
:40:30. > :40:40.make a lot more art house movies? Yes, and if we didn't have any help
:40:40. > :40:41.
:40:41. > :40:45.from the Government, I think the industry would have ended like, I
:40:45. > :40:49.don't know if it's the same, but as the Italian cinema. The Italian
:40:49. > :40:54.industry. I think we are very lucky to have that Government help.
:40:54. > :40:59.But you could say that if the taxpayer needs to subsidise the
:40:59. > :41:04.making of these films, it's only because so few people want to watch
:41:04. > :41:07.them, they need Government money? Well, I share the incredulity about
:41:07. > :41:12.David Cameron, you know, getting involved. There's an issue about
:41:12. > :41:16.the film industry. Lord Smith's just done a very good report.
:41:16. > :41:21.former Cabinet league? Chris Smith, about the practical help you can
:41:21. > :41:26.give to the film industry. You say that he was only offering an
:41:26. > :41:33.opinion, but it's the opinion of the Prime Minister of this country
:41:34. > :41:36.suggesting that somehow our taste is just Downton Abbey. There's been
:41:37. > :41:40.taxpayers' money thrown into the industry to make movies that not
:41:40. > :41:47.only they didn't even make it as flops on the screen, they didn't
:41:47. > :41:51.make it straight to video? That's because they're bad, it's not
:41:51. > :41:56.because they're risque or original or avant-garde. We want good movies
:41:56. > :42:00.which also take risks. A French film actress once said to me she
:42:00. > :42:06.was fed up with the French house plots because they are the same as
:42:06. > :42:10.Christine sleeps with Paul, Paul then sleeps with Marie, they all
:42:10. > :42:16.sleep together then all go out to dinner, that's the normal plot in a
:42:16. > :42:21.French movey? Of course, but it's great to have... Sounds like a
:42:21. > :42:26.Carry On film. It's great to have the boring films maybe but also
:42:26. > :42:32.commercial films at the same time. We do achieve that in France, we've
:42:32. > :42:37.had great successes of non-big budget films that were big
:42:37. > :42:41.successes. Across the world? Yes. suppose as a singer you have more
:42:41. > :42:49.artistic control compared to a movie, you can choose what you
:42:49. > :42:59.really want to do? Well, yes, I'm sort of in command. I can go
:42:59. > :42:59.
:42:59. > :43:04.wherever I want, well, I've liked to collaborate with other people so
:43:04. > :43:09.mainly they did the work, but with a film I love to be under the
:43:09. > :43:13.command of a director, it's completely different. You can go
:43:13. > :43:21.wherever you want but glad you time to This Week tonight. Thank you.
:43:21. > :43:28.That is your lot but not for us. It's Beach VolleyBall at Annabel's
:43:28. > :43:32.sponsored by Blue Nun and Alan and Michael have volunteered to be
:43:32. > :43:36.ballboys. We await news from Whitehall's infamous honours for
:43:36. > :43:39.feature committee, a previously sloth-like beast that's been