:00:09. > :00:14.A new report calls for the decriminalisation of cannabis,
:00:14. > :00:24.recognising that too many people are being criminalised, or a get
:00:24. > :00:37.
:00:37. > :00:43.way to harder drugs and frightening Good morning. Welcome to Sunday
:00:43. > :00:49.Morning Live. A major report by scientists and police calls for the
:00:49. > :00:54.decriminal idesation of cannabis. But with concern s of the strength
:00:54. > :01:01.of it is it right to make life easier for cannabis smoking. With
:01:01. > :01:08.an ageing population, is it triem toration - to ration treatment for
:01:08. > :01:14.the eld will and is comeenian Rowan Atkinson to say that religious
:01:14. > :01:21.groups are part of the outrage industry. Even if it hurts people,
:01:21. > :01:31.even fit offends people, speech must be free. Welcome to my guests,
:01:31. > :01:31.
:01:31. > :01:41.Germain Greer is a feminist author and Peter Hitchens is the author of
:01:41. > :01:42.
:01:42. > :01:51.the War We never Fought. And James O'Brien is a radio presenter on
:01:51. > :02:01.London talk station LBC. We want to know what you think. Call in to
:02:01. > :02:12.
:02:12. > :02:16.challenge our guests, you can get It is one of the most hotly
:02:16. > :02:21.contested issue, should cannabis be decriminalised. Some see it as
:02:21. > :02:28.harmless and others as a dangerous get way drug. But after a six year
:02:28. > :02:32.study the drugs policy commission has concluded decriminalisation is
:02:32. > :02:38.overdue. This isn't the first call from scientists for
:02:38. > :02:45.decriminalisation and a greater distinction to be made between
:02:45. > :02:55.drugs. Professor David Nutt lost his job as a government advisor on
:02:55. > :02:56.
:02:56. > :03:00.drugs after claiming ecstasy was no more dangerous than horse riding.
:03:00. > :03:06.They point out that legal cigarettes and alcohol cause more
:03:06. > :03:10.deaths and in the case of drink, violent crime. The Home Office said
:03:10. > :03:16.two million people in the UK use cannabis. 42,000 in England and
:03:16. > :03:22.Wales are sentenced each year for possession and 160,000 are given
:03:22. > :03:27.warnings. The commission argues that cannabis should be regarded as
:03:27. > :03:30.a personal choice. Some regular users include people with long-term
:03:30. > :03:34.illnesses, such as multiple sclerosis, taking it for pain
:03:34. > :03:39.releaf. They're unhappy that current law forces them to seek out
:03:39. > :03:44.drug dealers to buy what they regard as essential medication. But
:03:44. > :03:49.some doctors say it causes physical harm, including cancer, because of
:03:49. > :03:57.how cannabis is often smoke without a filter. Some sigh sky tourists
:03:57. > :04:01.point to studies linking the drug with mental illness. -- some
:04:01. > :04:08.psychiatrists. What about the claim that it is a gate way drug that can
:04:08. > :04:14.lead to harder substances? Opponents of liberalised drug laws
:04:14. > :04:19.say decriminalisation would normalise drug use. It is ludicrous
:04:19. > :04:23.that we arrest individual and jail them over private choiceser or
:04:23. > :04:30.would decriminalisation send out a dangerous message that cannabis is
:04:30. > :04:36.safe and socially acceptable? So should cannabis be decriminalised.
:04:36. > :04:40.Well that is the problem, it has been decriminalised, it should be
:04:41. > :04:50.recriminalised. That is a question for today's vote. Should cannabis
:04:51. > :05:05.
:05:05. > :05:10.I was wondering, James you're a parent now, do you think it would
:05:10. > :05:15.be a big deal if your teenage child was to start to smoke cannabis.
:05:15. > :05:19.Only because it is illegal and the trouble they may get into for the
:05:19. > :05:25.law. It strikes me that the argument shouldn't even be carrying
:05:25. > :05:30.on now. You refer to a six-year study by an independent commission
:05:30. > :05:35.and the government's own advisor on drugs. All the consensus, you will
:05:35. > :05:43.always finds some lone voice, suggests our position is ludicrous.
:05:43. > :05:47.You were expelled from school. flung out of school 20 year ago and
:05:47. > :05:51.that experience was a horrible experience that involved policemen
:05:51. > :05:57.and the most horrible was my parents' reaction. They belonged to
:05:57. > :06:03.a similar mind set. The idea that I may have revealed myself as a crack
:06:03. > :06:08.addict. It criminalised me and criminalised a couple of my school
:06:08. > :06:12.friends and it was ludicrous when you consider what goes on legally.
:06:12. > :06:18.I reminded of MMR when we decided to give them that the jab, we
:06:18. > :06:23.followed the scientific consensus. We didn't follow scaremongering
:06:23. > :06:26.journalists and we didn't hang upon the word of a lone scientist trying
:06:26. > :06:30.to draw attention to themselves for being at odds with the prevailing
:06:30. > :06:35.wisdom. I would say the attitude to cannabis for a parents is similar
:06:35. > :06:39.to MMR when it comes to who you decide you will trust. Is there a
:06:39. > :06:44.moral panic about it? There should be a panic, because of the dangers.
:06:44. > :06:48.The difficulty with cannabis there is no measure of mental illness. So
:06:48. > :06:58.it is difficult to say that cannabis leads to mental illness.
:06:58. > :07:04.The correlation is extraordinary. And eminent sky Kye tourists --
:07:04. > :07:08.eminent psychiatrists say the correlation is strong enough to not
:07:08. > :07:13.be dismissed. What about the health risks, Germain Greer you're from
:07:13. > :07:16.the generation that promoted the use of drugs like cannabis. As
:07:16. > :07:26.being something positive and beneficial. What is your position
:07:26. > :07:32.now? We're still having this debate. Well unfortunately I'm consistent,
:07:32. > :07:39.I seldom change my minds about anything. In 1968 I wrote a piece
:07:39. > :07:43.for Oz magazine called flip top legal pot. Saying while the nower
:07:43. > :07:47.children were floating around dreaming when cannabis could be
:07:47. > :07:53.decriminalised, that actually they hadn't figured out what was going
:07:53. > :07:57.to happen was that corporations were going to copy right the names
:07:57. > :08:05.of drugs, the different kinds of drugs that they were going to give
:08:05. > :08:10.them back to us with additives and cripple us with huge taxes. And
:08:10. > :08:13.they will exploit us the way they did with tobacco. My worry if a
:08:13. > :08:17.child of mine was smoking cannabis would be as you would have seen in
:08:18. > :08:21.the clip, that most of the time there is more tobacco than cannabis
:08:21. > :08:28.in the cigarette. And there are other ways of taking your cannabis
:08:28. > :08:33.and I remember the old days when we eat cookies. I have a checkored
:08:33. > :08:39.career with cannabis, because it gives me a mass reflex. I hate it
:08:39. > :08:42.and can't use it. But people close to me are users. What I will say is
:08:42. > :08:52.that it doesn't seem to have done them any good. But you could say
:08:52. > :08:56.
:08:56. > :09:01.that about lots of other things. This six-year commission addressed
:09:01. > :09:05.that point. You are worried about the wrong people getting involved,
:09:05. > :09:08.one of the elements that has been ignored by the media is the
:09:08. > :09:12.criminalisation or the decriminalisation of growing a
:09:12. > :09:17.small amount yourself, which leads you to a cottage garden approach,
:09:17. > :09:22.which flies in the face of a lot of this. I don't seem to be getting
:09:22. > :09:28.much part in this discussion and I think I know more about it than
:09:29. > :09:34.James. First, the dangers of cannabis are considerable. And it
:09:34. > :09:42.would be very irresponsible of a parent to think tobacco was more
:09:42. > :09:45.dangerous. All you need to do is turn to experience of Patrick
:09:45. > :09:50.Coburn's son described in his book. He was exposed to cannabis at
:09:50. > :09:53.school 5 ended up in a mental hospital. It won't happen to
:09:53. > :09:57.everyone, but you don't know who it will happen tofplt but young people
:09:58. > :10:03.are vulnerable to it. Secondly, James said he was criminalised, he
:10:03. > :10:11.wasn't. He criminalised himself by obtaining and using a drug which he
:10:11. > :10:16.knew to be illegal. Wait a minute you have had a long say. I'm
:10:16. > :10:22.talking and pointing to this... Use of word criminalise. You will
:10:22. > :10:27.respond when your words comes. Use of the word criminalise is a tricky
:10:27. > :10:32.dodge to complain of some persecution. The drug is illegal.
:10:33. > :10:39.And this independent commission. Of whom is it independent. Nobody on
:10:39. > :10:44.that commission was conservative about morals of drugs. A former
:10:44. > :10:51.chief of the constabulary. police are one of the principle --
:10:51. > :10:57.principal lobbyist for decriminalised. Put on this matter,
:10:57. > :11:04.they dangerously wrong. Your scientific qualifications are?
:11:04. > :11:10.your qualifications are? I want to bring in a scientist. Peter. Just a
:11:10. > :11:13.moment. I want to bring in a profess, David Nutt, the Labour
:11:13. > :11:20.Government's drugs advisor, who fell out with them and was sacked.
:11:20. > :11:23.I want to mention, bring you in professor David Nutt. You spoke out
:11:23. > :11:28.about your views on the scientific evidence. I understand that have
:11:28. > :11:34.said you think alcohol consumption might go down if we were to
:11:34. > :11:40.decriminalise cannabis. Can you tell us what your view is now?
:11:40. > :11:46.Alcohol is the biggest problem we have in terms of harms from drugs
:11:47. > :11:53.in the UK at the moment. It is the leading cause of death. In between
:11:53. > :11:59.between 18 and 60. The deaths from alcohol have been rising in the
:11:59. > :12:07.last 40 years. As we have increased the availability and reduced the
:12:07. > :12:15.price. A lot of people would prefer to use cannabis rather than alcohol.
:12:16. > :12:21.And we now have evidence from the US today where increasing
:12:21. > :12:28.availability of medicinal cannabis has led to a reduction in alcohol
:12:28. > :12:31.intake and road traffic accident deaths from alcohol. I want to ask
:12:31. > :12:36.your opinion of what you have heard with the claim that scientist who
:12:36. > :12:46.is call for decriminalisation are biased. What is your view on what
:12:46. > :12:47.
:12:47. > :12:51.Peter has been saying? We are not biased. That he have written three
:12:51. > :12:59.major reports over ten years, which took place evidence from people
:12:59. > :13:05.like me and it's clear that the contribution of cannabis is at best
:13:05. > :13:10.a minor contribution. In fact many people, many schizophrenics use
:13:10. > :13:15.cannabis to help them deal with their illness in an unofficial way.
:13:15. > :13:19.We have problems with the quality of line. Well the professor said
:13:19. > :13:24.that the more alcohol was used the more damage it does. Of course.
:13:24. > :13:28.That would be the same with cannabis were legalise and went on
:13:28. > :13:32.commercial sale and were as prevalent as alcohol, we would have
:13:32. > :13:38.disastrous consequences. No one is arguing that alcohol is good. How
:13:38. > :13:43.anyone is could argue because alcohol does harm it would be sane
:13:43. > :13:48.or scientific to relax the laws against another dangerous drug.
:13:48. > :13:54.Stop heckling. How it would be... How you can argue and I will say
:13:54. > :13:59.this again, because I'm sick of being heckedled -- being heckled by
:13:59. > :14:07.this person because the danger o's of alcohol are the reason to
:14:07. > :14:14.unleash another drug. The fact he is qualified does not make him a
:14:14. > :14:20.guru on cannabis. Can we have another response. This a all right
:14:20. > :14:24.Peter. May I speak now? Professor David Nutt was not arguing for the
:14:24. > :14:28.alcohol is somehow a comparison that you drew. He was arguing that
:14:28. > :14:32.cannabis is less harmful and your position leads to legislating for
:14:32. > :14:36.alcohol by looking at people sleeping under bridges existing on
:14:36. > :14:42.a diet of electric soup. The examples you point to are not
:14:42. > :14:46.representative or indication kiv of the use of something that is almost
:14:46. > :14:51.always harmless. The smoking element can be dealt with by a
:14:51. > :14:56.frank and open conversation. That is extraordinary. It is responsible
:14:56. > :15:02.to refer... Because you stopped. It is extraordinarily for any person
:15:02. > :15:07.to claim that cannabis is harmless. We do have objective evidence from
:15:07. > :15:14.the study that among the young cannabis can reduce intelligence.
:15:14. > :15:24.That is -- has been established. What is it also doing to you. Would
:15:24. > :15:37.
:15:37. > :15:47.it be likely that a mind bending It encourages people to look for
:15:47. > :15:54.ways out it difficult take That are drug-related. -- always out of
:15:54. > :16:02.difficulty that curb drug-related. Speaking it -- speaking from
:16:02. > :16:07.experience, in my family, the use of Mepham threatening has caused
:16:07. > :16:11.devastation. You have heard the discussion. There are scientists
:16:11. > :16:17.who say that taking cannabis is just like gambling or eating junk
:16:17. > :16:25.food. Would decriminalisation make your job easier, you would not have
:16:25. > :16:30.to run a project like this? I am not an advocate of the
:16:30. > :16:35.decriminalisation of drugs. Whether it would make my job easier is
:16:35. > :16:42.another matter. I am a frontline worker in the drug and alcohol
:16:42. > :16:46.field in Liverpool. My experience is that this drug destroys
:16:46. > :16:54.individuals who habitually use. The difference between today and 30
:16:54. > :16:57.years ago is that the strains are a lot more powerful. It not only
:16:57. > :17:05.destroys the individual who is walking the cannabis, it destroys
:17:05. > :17:11.the families. How young are these people using it? I have worked with
:17:11. > :17:19.children from the age of nine, up to 26. I have worked with families
:17:19. > :17:25.whose sons have committed suicide. They have experience psychosis,
:17:25. > :17:32.paranoia. You think there is a direct link between heavy cannabis
:17:32. > :17:37.use of Porton strains? Yes. Thank you for what you have told us.
:17:37. > :17:46.Clark French is someone who has used cannabis for medical reasons,
:17:46. > :17:53.is that correct? Yes, I have multiple sclerosis. I have used it
:17:53. > :17:56.to treat my symptoms. It gives me a much better quality of life.
:17:56. > :18:03.Cannabis has been known to have medicinal properties for thousands
:18:03. > :18:10.of years. The Chinese and the Romans have used it. It is part of
:18:10. > :18:14.our history and our culture. It is ridiculous that I am denied a
:18:14. > :18:19.medication that has been scientifically proven to work.
:18:19. > :18:26.is your experience of getting it, given that it is illegal, is that
:18:26. > :18:34.the issue? That is part of the issue. I am forced to deal with the
:18:34. > :18:39.black market, with criminal gangs. The different strains are a product
:18:40. > :18:48.of prohibition. They only exist because of probation. It is easier
:18:48. > :18:52.to sell stronger stuff for more money for profit. Thank you so much.
:18:52. > :18:57.Peter, if it was medically controlled in the way that eight
:18:57. > :19:03.days in some states in the USA, would you have a problem with that
:19:03. > :19:08.form of legalisation? Lots of drugs have beneficial effects, but they
:19:08. > :19:12.also have side effects which are damaging. Thalidomide was good at
:19:12. > :19:19.treating morning sickness, but unfortunately it had the side-
:19:20. > :19:23.effect so devastating that it could not be used. If a drug has a
:19:23. > :19:29.serious danger of making you mentally ill you will be careful
:19:30. > :19:33.about using it for anything. The medical cannabis argument was
:19:33. > :19:40.described by the chief campaigner for cannabis legalisation in the
:19:40. > :19:48.United States as a red herring. There are actually prescription
:19:48. > :19:52.drugs available on the NHS. Prohibition, by definition, breeds
:19:52. > :19:58.ignorance and enhanced corruption, ignorance about what is available
:19:58. > :20:04.and side-effects. It is the worst sort of exploitation that we have
:20:04. > :20:12.heard of. In a medical sense, Queen Victoria used it for period pains,
:20:12. > :20:20.and that is an era that you clearly approve of, Peter! My mother grew
:20:20. > :20:26.cannabis because it made her popular with her lodgers. Australia
:20:26. > :20:33.runs in its rather dopey way it on cannabis. You can smoke cannabis
:20:33. > :20:39.and the Tate and survive. viewer says that alcohol is more of
:20:39. > :20:44.a gateway drug than cannabis. Another says the his the about
:20:44. > :20:52.cannabis is crazy. I know people who have smoked it for decades and
:20:52. > :20:57.all have good jobs and there are no ill-effects. What we see now are
:20:57. > :21:02.the effects of decriminalisation, people should realise that.
:21:02. > :21:09.opinion poll question is should cannabis be decriminalised? You can
:21:09. > :21:13.get in touch with the details on the screen. Text messages will be
:21:13. > :21:21.charged at your standard rate. You can vote online by going to our
:21:21. > :21:25.website. You have 20 minutes before the opinion poll closes.
:21:25. > :21:29.Stories of elderly patients apparently being denied treatment
:21:30. > :21:35.regularly make the headlines. This week a study by the Royal College
:21:35. > :21:41.of Surgeons warned that decisions on patients' surgery must not be
:21:41. > :21:44.made on outdated assumptions of patient fitness. But the difficult
:21:44. > :21:48.choices need to be made in the face of an ageing population, should
:21:48. > :21:53.doctors ration treatment for the elderly?
:21:53. > :21:58.This month, new anti age discrimination laws came into force
:21:58. > :22:03.in the NHS, but when it comes to treating older patients, is it
:22:04. > :22:09.being ignored? New research by the Royal College of Surgeons has shown
:22:09. > :22:12.that treatment for prostate cancer dropped sharply in the over 70s,
:22:12. > :22:18.even though they make-up the majority of the people with these
:22:18. > :22:24.conditions. They fear that an NHS efficiency drive is dangerous to
:22:24. > :22:32.older people. The report says it is often wrongly perceived that it is
:22:32. > :22:35.less cost-effective to treat elderly patients. They say that a
:22:35. > :22:40.fit 80-year-old may benefit more from treatment than an unhealthy
:22:40. > :22:46.person half that age. But some argue that it makes sense to focus
:22:46. > :22:51.resources and treatment on the young. There has been massive
:22:51. > :22:55.controversy over GPs being asked to identify the 1% of their patience
:22:55. > :23:00.expected to die each year and discuss end of life plans. Speaking
:23:00. > :23:04.about death is something we do not do well in this country.
:23:04. > :23:09.Campaigners say that the elderly have paid into the system all their
:23:09. > :23:16.lives. Should they not have right to treatment no matter the
:23:16. > :23:20.financial cost? There are worries that rash -- there are worries that
:23:20. > :23:26.rationing treatment devalues senior citizens. Could it be a slippery
:23:26. > :23:30.slope to euthanasia? Or would allowing doctors to determine who
:23:30. > :23:35.gets treated allow it the elderly more choice and control over how
:23:35. > :23:43.they died? If you have a webcam, you can join
:23:43. > :23:47.in the conversation. We are joined by Richard the North, the author of
:23:47. > :23:53.several books and a Fellow of the Social Affairs Unit think-tank.
:23:53. > :24:00.Should doctors be rationing treatment? Yes, rationing is
:24:00. > :24:07.inevitable in a world where resources are limited. If you have
:24:07. > :24:13.got to choose between extending an old life, or improving a young one,
:24:13. > :24:20.I guess it is pretty obvious that the young and make a good claim on
:24:20. > :24:24.the treatment. But it is more interesting than that. We have
:24:24. > :24:29.drifted into a situation where torturing old people unnecessarily
:24:29. > :24:38.has become pretty normal. You are speaking about aggressive medical
:24:38. > :24:45.intervention? Yes, that has become normal and not compassionate.
:24:45. > :24:49.think the missing term in the discussion is the patient. In many
:24:49. > :24:53.cases that I know of, elderly patients have refused treatment but
:24:53. > :24:59.it was not known what they were doing because they are protesting
:24:59. > :25:03.the clinical situation was not understood. I watched as someone
:25:03. > :25:12.refused every drink she was given, but she was trying to say that she
:25:12. > :25:16.was fed up. That was one way to do it. I understand the question about
:25:16. > :25:20.investing in expensive treatments that will keep someone in relative
:25:20. > :25:25.comfort for five years when the same amount of money spent on a
:25:25. > :25:28.younger person might give you 40 years. When you are speaking about
:25:28. > :25:33.a national health service that is what you have to deal with, but
:25:33. > :25:42.there should be another option, which is that the family of that
:25:42. > :25:46.person can say, can we pay for this operation? I thought the word
:25:46. > :25:52.missing it from the question was poor. We are speaking about
:25:52. > :25:58.rationing health care for people who cannot afford to go privately.
:25:58. > :26:03.There will have to be privatisation. I think it should be taken by
:26:03. > :26:08.doctors on a case-by-case basis. hear about cases where patients
:26:08. > :26:13.have found do not resuscitate on their notes. You are relatively
:26:13. > :26:18.young, you may say that it is a rational decision? It may well be
:26:18. > :26:28.rational but it needs to be transparent. You can certainly
:26:28. > :26:30.
:26:31. > :26:35.introduce choice. This all has to be transparent. If I was older and
:26:35. > :26:40.I was watching this debate, listening to these proposals and
:26:40. > :26:46.hearing this grim sense of inevitability, I would be terrified.
:26:46. > :26:52.It is a time of my life when I am probably not at my most robust. The
:26:52. > :27:01.idea that I am going to you -- that I am going to lose my right to life,
:27:01. > :27:04.it is terrible. People are being advised that they are approaching
:27:04. > :27:14.the end of life and are being advised to think about planning
:27:14. > :27:17.
:27:17. > :27:21.their end. This is saying, let there be a fuller, richer
:27:21. > :27:26.conversation between more people about the end of life. I think bald
:27:26. > :27:30.people ought to be thinking about it more carefully. I think that
:27:30. > :27:33.their children, who often fight aggressively for more treatment
:27:33. > :27:40.without thinking through what it really means, ought to be thinking
:27:40. > :27:46.about it. It is a pity that there is not a kind of priest element
:27:46. > :27:51.around now. But we are speaking about this and I am glad it is
:27:51. > :27:56.happening. I want to bring in a professor of cancer medicine at
:27:56. > :28:00.Hammersmith Hospital. People worry that all people are clearly
:28:00. > :28:04.reaching the end of life, and then there are people who are older and
:28:05. > :28:11.they are getting second-class treatment for things like cancer.
:28:11. > :28:17.What is your view about how doctors are treating older patients?
:28:18. > :28:23.think Richard is spot-on. We cannot do everything. For it is every
:28:23. > :28:29.health care system in the world, not just the NHS. I think the
:28:30. > :28:35.difficulty is the scale of things. I have a drug for a type of cancer
:28:35. > :28:45.that cost �28,000 a shot. Dr I give it to 93-year-old lady who has
:28:45. > :28:49.profound dementia? Are you really having to make choices like that?
:28:49. > :28:55.Not between two patients, but you have a budget, and that means that
:28:55. > :29:00.you have to make choices. It is not just age that matters, it is
:29:00. > :29:05.everything that goes with it. there cases of some doctors who
:29:05. > :29:11.have perhaps made an error. Do you think there are cases where doctors
:29:11. > :29:16.have been too arrogant and sweeping? The whole business of do
:29:16. > :29:21.not resuscitate, it is a poor communication, it is nothing to do
:29:21. > :29:30.with judging life and death. Most resuscitation is completely fail,
:29:30. > :29:34.however all the patient is. I think it is more than that. Doctors take
:29:34. > :29:39.too much upon themselves, they want to make decisions that they do not
:29:39. > :29:45.have to live with. You have to consult with the people who have to
:29:45. > :29:50.live with the decisions, and the first one is the patient. People
:29:50. > :29:56.think that patients cannot understand risk, but they can. It
:29:56. > :30:02.is hard for them in a clinical situation, they get flustered. They
:30:02. > :30:05.need information and time to think. We know that they are going on the
:30:05. > :30:15.Internet and getting bad information. They need good
:30:15. > :30:26.
:30:26. > :30:31.Hall hall your father had bladder cancer and one consultant was keen
:30:31. > :30:35.he shouldn't have surgery. What has been the outcome. He was diagnosed
:30:35. > :30:39.in September 2008, over a period of weeks he had tests and
:30:39. > :30:44.investigations which resulted in us being told he had a large
:30:44. > :30:49.aggressive bladder cancer. From the word go, my first reaction was, are
:30:49. > :30:52.we going to take his bladder out. To which he said, he is 78, it is
:30:52. > :30:57.not appropriate surpblrifplt as time went on and with each
:30:57. > :31:02.consultation, I continued to ask this consultant are you going to
:31:02. > :31:07.take his bladder out. He became increasingly irritated with me and
:31:07. > :31:14.told me there was a high mortality, it was major surgery. My father had
:31:14. > :31:18.no other disease process I, - o' process apart from this. You got a
:31:18. > :31:22.second opinion? Yes we went a hundred miles away and the
:31:22. > :31:27.consultant gave him chemotherapy and had his bladder removed and
:31:27. > :31:34.that was four years ago. Now he is fantastic he was rowing in a
:31:34. > :31:38.veteran eight, he is in the gym, he has holidays abroad. When they tack
:31:38. > :31:42.about denying patients surgery or chemotherapy, if he had noted that
:31:42. > :31:49.that surge tricost implications for the NHS would have been five times
:31:49. > :31:56.as great. He would had a palliative care team and pain killers. So you
:31:56. > :32:05.have to be careful when you talk about denying surgery. Karol Sikora
:32:05. > :32:09.what do you say? I know, the doctor was wrong clearly. Time has proven
:32:09. > :32:13.it. I think communication is the key. And making a balanced decision.
:32:13. > :32:18.Doctors are not the enemy. They're not trying to do older people down.
:32:19. > :32:23.But it is the sense of balance. That is the trick. I don't think
:32:23. > :32:28.the doctor was necessarily wrong, but that is a tough conversation
:32:28. > :32:32.and apples and pears are complicated, I could cite a case of
:32:32. > :32:37.an old man who was told can I get you through this next thing with an
:32:37. > :32:42.operation and the old boy said, yes I will go through it, he wanted to
:32:42. > :32:48.say yes to doctors and it was all charming. Except the old boy
:32:48. > :32:53.actually rather regretted being alive for the next five years.
:32:53. > :32:58.is proof of the case by case position. What you have when the
:32:58. > :33:02.word ration appears is the imposition of a threshold. Cross
:33:02. > :33:07.that and you no longer qualify for this treatment. This a cruel and
:33:07. > :33:11.unusual. You have to look at the specific circumstances. There is
:33:11. > :33:15.one thing I would say, the patient himself in this case, he would be
:33:15. > :33:23.the same age as I am now, knew it was going to be a painful operation
:33:23. > :33:27.and risky and hard to live with the results, knew the toxics would make
:33:27. > :33:31.him feel awful and there was a risk of dying and he went for it. That
:33:31. > :33:35.is the issue. Not all the rest. It is nobody else's decision but the
:33:35. > :33:41.patient's. If the patient is demented that is a different
:33:41. > :33:44.problem. Now Nick Bosanquet from Imperial College, co-do you see the
:33:44. > :33:49.concern that people have and do you think there is a difference between
:33:49. > :33:54.end of life planning and turning down over 75s for surgery because
:33:54. > :33:59.you want the save your Budget. I would dress what the position is,
:33:59. > :34:04.which is that 20 years ago there was a lot of denial of treatment.
:34:04. > :34:09.There is now more treatment for people in their 80s on dialysis and
:34:09. > :34:14.all kinds of other things. What we're not doing is offering privacy,
:34:14. > :34:18.dignity and control in the last phase of life. We are at a stage
:34:18. > :34:23.where there is a lot of overtreatment and overadmission to
:34:23. > :34:28.hospitals, which damages the well being quality of life for a lot of
:34:28. > :34:34.elderly people. We have got to face up to the need of better palliative
:34:34. > :34:41.care, end of life care and a recent study from Boston has shown that
:34:41. > :34:46.you can prolong life for longer than you can for using chemotherapy
:34:46. > :34:53.in many cases, with people with lung cancer. Thank you. Richard,
:34:53. > :34:57.have you rethought your view, given that individual stories are what it
:34:57. > :35:02.boils down to. I don't think it I just individual stories. I think
:35:02. > :35:06.there is a matter of, none of us get out of this alive. Doctors will
:35:06. > :35:13.make mistakes. Individual cases will go sour. Some will come right
:35:13. > :35:18.for the wor possible reasons. It is a mess. End of life is going to be
:35:18. > :35:23.a mess. But I think we're going to get, we are getting better. Our
:35:23. > :35:28.conversation about this is better. I hope when, it comes to me, I hope
:35:28. > :35:32.I will be in a better surrounded by good help and better able to
:35:32. > :35:39.appreciate it. We have to leave it there. But some comments, Martin
:35:39. > :35:46.what kind of society have we become, putting money before people. Thank
:35:46. > :35:55.you all very much. Coming up, Issa tire and public protest being -- is
:35:55. > :36:05.satire being curbed by the worry of causing insult. Remember keep
:36:05. > :36:12.
:36:12. > :36:22.You have about five minutes before the poll closes. Or you can vote
:36:22. > :36:22.
:36:22. > :36:28.online. Now time for our moral moment of week. Each has chose an
:36:28. > :36:34.story. Germain Greer you chose the revelation that the England
:36:34. > :36:39.football team take sleeping pills to take them down from the caffeine
:36:39. > :36:47.pills. How shocking is that? They are athlete s who make sure they
:36:47. > :36:54.pray to -- play to the top of their ant, -- ability, we make them take
:36:55. > :37:01.caffeine. So they can legally take their caffeine and in order to get
:37:01. > :37:05.them come down from that, we give them I imagine some sleeping
:37:05. > :37:11.tablets. They were taking sleeping pills, when the match got post
:37:11. > :37:15.poned, none of them could sleep. They are all wired on caffeine
:37:15. > :37:20.tablets, that is why they played so badly. I thought they had given
:37:20. > :37:27.them the sleeping tablet and they were too sleepy. Your concern this
:37:27. > :37:32.a athletes expect to take these? Look, I have a prejudice against
:37:32. > :37:39.medication. And drugs generally. I think there is usually as much in
:37:39. > :37:43.the way of undesirable effect as is there is in desirable. And we're
:37:43. > :37:49.getting more and more into the way of thinking that all you need to do
:37:49. > :37:57.to deal with life is to change your body chemistry by eating something,
:37:57. > :38:03.or sticking in your body or smoking something. I think it's... That is
:38:03. > :38:07.your slippery slope. And now George Osborne interesting ticket
:38:07. > :38:14.situation. The first class ticket that he had to buy and I don't know
:38:14. > :38:19.what we can call it. It has been a weird week for the Government. And
:38:19. > :38:25.then Andrew Mitchell and what he said to that police officer. It is
:38:25. > :38:29.odd that we have got a millionaire Tory Chancellor, of one of the
:38:29. > :38:35.richest countries on earth. It seems as long as there is a first
:38:35. > :38:42.class carriage left, he is the prime candidate to live in it, be
:38:42. > :38:47.in it. Was it just about the way he handled it. Eno nothing of how he
:38:47. > :38:52.handled that. I know we are in an absurd moment where the knobs are
:38:52. > :38:57.calling the plebs plebs, the plebs are calling everyone posh and out
:38:57. > :39:01.of touch. The Andrew Mitchell thing, I rather sympathise with people who
:39:01. > :39:07.reach into old fashioned language from their class background when
:39:07. > :39:12.they're angry. We all do it. Do you you? Everyone does. If you lose
:39:12. > :39:17.your rag, awful stuff comes out. That is just life. We should all
:39:17. > :39:24.grow up about it. What about the broader picture. Are we in a class
:39:24. > :39:29.war, or is it whipped up by the media. The narrative of austerity
:39:29. > :39:32.is either one adegrees with the notion that people bear no
:39:32. > :39:37.responsibility for this. The whole pleb issues plays into the notion
:39:37. > :39:42.that this Government, whether you agree with the position or not,
:39:42. > :39:47.this Government holds ordinary work people who pay their tax and expect
:39:47. > :39:52.some protection in the work place and know their place to pick up the
:39:52. > :40:00.bill for the excesses of bankers. And you have chosen the story of
:40:00. > :40:05.the scout who is an atheist who has been told he can't be still a scout.
:40:05. > :40:10.Because he won't take the allegiance to God. He is eleven and
:40:10. > :40:13.there are two elements. First, his first contribution was not about
:40:13. > :40:19.the question or faith or religious discrimination, he the lad said I
:40:20. > :40:24.have never been caving and they are all going caving. Girls can be
:40:24. > :40:31.scouts and you can different religions. But he refused to do the
:40:31. > :40:38.oath. I don't know if this will consign me to seventh circle he
:40:38. > :40:44.could have just crossed his fingers. We never thought to worry. Maybe
:40:44. > :40:50.Scot HQ will override it. Should he just have taken it. I'm so proud of
:40:50. > :40:55.him! And if he wants to start his own scout troop, I may scrape about
:40:55. > :41:00.and find a few quid to send his way. A brave little boy. How
:41:00. > :41:05.extraordinary. And the other thing is that eight yism is a moral
:41:05. > :41:09.position. And he should be allowed to hold it. One of things that is
:41:09. > :41:14.irritated about our society is if you call yourself a religion, its
:41:14. > :41:19.doesn't matter how ridiculous you get special consideration, you're
:41:19. > :41:25.tax-free and if your an Airth yist, you're on your own. - o' atheist
:41:25. > :41:31.you're on your own. Good little buy boy. You may have been voting in
:41:31. > :41:41.our poll, should cannabis be decriminalised. The polis closing
:41:41. > :41:41.
:41:42. > :41:46.now, so don't vote. -- the poll is closing now, so don't vote. Rowan
:41:46. > :41:56.Atkinson is backing a campaign to drop section five of the public
:41:56. > :41:57.
:41:57. > :42:02.order Act, which he says is being used to stop artists. Protester
:42:02. > :42:07.have said a fundamentalist group were anti-gay and also a 16-year-
:42:07. > :42:12.old protester who placard described Scientology as a dangerous cult.
:42:12. > :42:22.Germain Greer this it is important to stand up for the right to offend.
:42:22. > :42:22.
:42:22. > :42:30.Whether it hurts people or offends people, speech must be free. The
:42:30. > :42:36.common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous liable were
:42:36. > :42:43.abolished in 2008. It so is curious that under section five of the
:42:43. > :42:47.Public Order Act words or actions likely to cause offence are illegal.
:42:47. > :42:53.If the police see you giving someone two fingers they could
:42:53. > :43:00.arrest you. You can't say or do anything that might upset people,
:43:00. > :43:06.even if nobody is actually upset. It is illegal to take the Micky.
:43:06. > :43:16.You can't call a spade a spade. Because the spade's feelings might
:43:16. > :43:16.
:43:16. > :43:21.be hurt. Obviously, sexion five of the Public Order Act 1986 is
:43:21. > :43:27.asinine. The great and the good who, are the people most likely to be
:43:27. > :43:31.lampooned have joined forces to get it repeeled. -- repealed. Just
:43:31. > :43:36.because some people are touchy doesn't mean that the rest of us
:43:36. > :43:42.should be walk on eggshells. The grander the dignitary, the more he
:43:42. > :43:50.needs to be reduced to size. If we are to remind him of who is really
:43:50. > :43:54.boss. So we show Prime Ministers with condoms drawn over their heads
:43:54. > :43:58.or wearing their jupd pantss outside their trousers. Everyone
:43:58. > :44:04.can do a par diof the Prince of Wales. I'm sure it hurts his
:44:04. > :44:13.feelings, but he has to get used to it. Satire and caricature and
:44:13. > :44:19.decision are all essential for our political health. And while we are
:44:19. > :44:23.about it, we should repeal the civil law of liable. That prevents
:44:23. > :44:32.from telling the truth about child abusers until they're dead. Speech
:44:32. > :44:37.has got to be free. We have a moral duty to bear true witness. You can
:44:37. > :44:43.join in by webcam or make your point online or on phone. Peter
:44:43. > :44:49.Hitchens is back and joining us is Tim Stanley a historian who is a
:44:49. > :44:57.big fan of Doctor Who, who he said is a classic example of Tory an
:44:57. > :45:03.arkist. Tim you a fan of American hisry, the first amendment is held
:45:03. > :45:08.up as the idea of free speech. we don't live in America. What I
:45:08. > :45:13.would say when it comes to freedom of speech and criticising people f
:45:13. > :45:20.your dealing with civil society, not only is it OK to pill Ore the
:45:20. > :45:26.police, and doct ors, politician politicianings - politicians, they
:45:26. > :45:33.have probably got it coming. When it comes to God, I would make a
:45:33. > :45:39.plea for self sensorship. First, in the age o' of a war on terror F you
:45:39. > :45:43.Scotlander the prophet mopltd, you don't just put yourself at -- if
:45:43. > :45:46.you slan Der the profit mod Mohammed, you don't just put
:45:46. > :45:49.yourself at risk. If you're dealing with religion, your dealing with an
:45:49. > :45:55.issue that goes to heart of why people are what they are and how
:45:55. > :46:03.they live their lives. We discussed in the last debate old people at
:46:03. > :46:08.their most vulnerable when they're dying F you slan Der God, you take
:46:08. > :46:18.away their hope of a future life and undermine. Assuming they
:46:18. > :46:26.
:46:26. > :46:31.Obviously you do not like it or enjoy it, but it is something you
:46:31. > :46:37.have to expect. Our religious opinion is the same as a political
:46:37. > :46:42.opinion, you choose to have it. If people do not disagree they are
:46:42. > :46:49.entitled to say so. Blasphemy laws are used in countries like Pakistan
:46:49. > :46:56.as a pretext for maintaining laws against blasphemy against
:46:56. > :47:03.Christians, which operate in a savage fashion. In general, if you
:47:03. > :47:09.hold an opinion, you must expect other people to disagree with you.
:47:09. > :47:13.What about the argument of thinking about the safety of other people?
:47:13. > :47:23.In America, people do not make jokes about Christianity because
:47:23. > :47:24.
:47:24. > :47:34.they know people are religious? is much better for us to discover
:47:34. > :47:35.
:47:35. > :47:44.good manners than to make brand new laws. For God is not vulnerable.
:47:44. > :47:49.God is omnipotent. He is not vulnerable. Yes, God may be
:47:49. > :47:55.offended, but he is not going to be reduced by around Atkinson making a
:47:55. > :47:59.joke about him, but the face of people might be. Not at all. The
:48:00. > :48:09.Jesus Christ was derided but that did not reduce the date people had
:48:10. > :48:19.
:48:19. > :48:24.in him. -- the faith. I am remembering beyond the Fringe. One
:48:24. > :48:28.of the funniest items in it was a typical church if England sermon
:48:28. > :48:34.which was drivel from beginning to end. It was absolutely convincing
:48:34. > :48:41.and hysterical. It would have done the religious people watching it
:48:41. > :48:46.nothing but good. It did not do them any good. That is satire.
:48:46. > :48:53.do you think it does no good? Because the church is not stronger
:48:53. > :48:59.for having gone through the process of being critiques. People do not
:48:59. > :49:04.take it on the change. They are not more strength and having heard that.
:49:04. > :49:08.That is not what the marks sermon dead. You can tell people that
:49:08. > :49:15.their beliefs are rubbish till you are blue in the face, it will not
:49:15. > :49:19.make them give up their beliefs. Christians have been told in the
:49:19. > :49:25.Gospel of already that they will be reviled for their beliefs. It is
:49:25. > :49:30.something they should expect. about the life of Brian? There was
:49:30. > :49:36.a massive outcry about it at the time. Would you stand up for the
:49:36. > :49:42.right for it to be made? I would not stand up for it. I think it is
:49:42. > :49:48.a horrible film, but it is futile calling for it to be banned. I
:49:48. > :49:53.dislike the people who made it and the message that it carries. There
:49:53. > :49:59.is another thing about that film, you cannot understand it if you
:50:00. > :50:03.have not read the Bible. It is not directly attacking Jesus Christ,
:50:03. > :50:10.when as something like Jerry Springer at the opera at is
:50:10. > :50:15.directly attacking him. There is a lot of dispute about that. The BBC
:50:15. > :50:19.chose to broadcast it because they did not believe that it did. Peter
:50:19. > :50:24.Tatchell is well known for protesting on human rights issues.
:50:24. > :50:31.Can you tell us the circumstances under which you came to be arrested
:50:31. > :50:36.under section 5 of the Public Order Act? I was part of a protest
:50:36. > :50:42.against an Islamist fundamental good. It had expressed extreme
:50:42. > :50:51.prejudice against Jews and Hindus. Some of its members had advocated
:50:51. > :50:54.the killing of gay people. Six of us went to a mass rally held by
:50:54. > :51:00.6,000 of their members and supporters and simply held up
:51:00. > :51:05.placards stating what they had said and criticising it, and for that,
:51:06. > :51:15.we were arrested. I find it shocking that the police... That
:51:16. > :51:16.
:51:16. > :51:26.what we were saying, that the other at group's horrendous incitements
:51:26. > :51:27.
:51:27. > :51:35.to murder, that in the face of that, we were criminals. What do you
:51:35. > :51:38.think about that? I am not making a case for legal censorship.
:51:38. > :51:46.Peter Tatchell not have turned up with those placards because some
:51:46. > :51:56.people got offended? No. In that case, that is actually rather brave.
:51:56. > :51:56.
:51:56. > :52:05.I have a great deal of respect for people Tatchell. -- Peter. Rowan
:52:05. > :52:11.Atkinson is a vaudeville act. There is a great deal of difference. I am
:52:11. > :52:17.saying that we need to be more polite and well mannered. I want to
:52:17. > :52:22.bring in Simon Woolley from Operation Black Vote. You think
:52:22. > :52:26.there might need to be some restrictions on what can be said?
:52:26. > :52:31.do not think this should be overly complicated. We can pretty much say
:52:31. > :52:41.what we like, but there are consequences. If you inside
:52:41. > :52:42.
:52:42. > :52:46.violence, then you may go to prison. As comedians, if you seek to offend
:52:46. > :52:52.by telling racist or homophobic jokes, then do not be offended a
:52:52. > :52:58.few are described as a racist or homophobic comedian. It is not
:52:58. > :53:03.overly complicated. The N-word, the racial word, is that something that
:53:03. > :53:08.is taboo and it is right that people are arrested if they are
:53:08. > :53:13.using that in the public arena? What we have to understand is that
:53:13. > :53:18.often when that term is used, it is often followed by a Punshon the
:53:18. > :53:22.nose. Josh Howie is a comedian and a practising Jew. You have told
:53:22. > :53:26.jokes about the Holocaust, but do you think there is a difference
:53:26. > :53:33.about being able to tell jokes about your own community, and
:53:33. > :53:39.telling jokes about other people, black people are Muslims? When I
:53:39. > :53:43.spoke about the Holocaust it was about my experiences as a third
:53:43. > :53:48.generation due. Sorry, I am being very Jewish with my hands at the
:53:48. > :53:53.moment, but it was not about denigrating the experience of the
:53:53. > :53:59.Holocaust, in the same way that I speak about black culture and
:53:59. > :54:04.Muslims. There is a difference, but I think I would be a hypocrite if I
:54:05. > :54:14.did not speak about those subjects. I have used the end word on stage,
:54:15. > :54:15.
:54:15. > :54:22.but it is all about context. 80s the point you're trying to make.
:54:22. > :54:28.Germaine was saying in her film,, the Serbs a role in our culture.
:54:28. > :54:33.What about responsibility, the idea that it goes too far? I have a
:54:33. > :54:37.responsibility as a comic to make people laugh. I have a
:54:37. > :54:43.responsibility to provoke an challenge and find where the line
:54:43. > :54:51.is. I think I know where the line is. Some people may disagree and
:54:51. > :54:58.they are offended, but I never set out to offend anybody. Comedy can
:54:58. > :55:03.also be cruel, it can also be a weapon. We should be able to
:55:03. > :55:08.critique what comedians say. I am a fairly conservative person, but I
:55:08. > :55:15.am a massive fan of political correctness, because for me, it is
:55:15. > :55:21.a way of codifying good manners. It is right that we ate are removing
:55:21. > :55:27.sexist and racist basis -- it is right that we are removing sexist
:55:27. > :55:31.and racist language from our society. But I would like the same
:55:31. > :55:38.standards of political correctness applied to religion. I am a Roman
:55:38. > :55:44.Catholic. You have heard comedians saying that it is their job to
:55:44. > :55:48.satirise, why do you think there should be a need to limit that?
:55:48. > :55:55.one is without limits in terms of speech because speeches always at
:55:55. > :56:01.two Way process. You have a speaker and listener. We cannot champion
:56:01. > :56:05.comedians as having a sort of golden right to offend. What about
:56:05. > :56:13.your concerns about marketing, that you think that there is a kind of
:56:13. > :56:20.cynical ploy it behind a lot of this outrage? By creating
:56:21. > :56:24.controversy, it does a lot of advertising for you. We have got to
:56:24. > :56:30.have a community response to that, not necessarily allow legal
:56:30. > :56:36.response. Is that enough, the public react, and the fate has gone
:56:36. > :56:41.too far, it corrects itself? I hold opinions which are not consensus
:56:41. > :56:49.opinions, and quite often I get letters written to me by people
:56:49. > :56:53.saying, you have insulted me by expressing your opinion. People
:56:53. > :57:00.often viewed non-mainstream opinions as insulting. That is very
:57:00. > :57:08.dangerous. Thank you very much. We will have a quick look at your
:57:08. > :57:16.online opinion poll votes. Here is what you told us. 69 % said that
:57:16. > :57:22.cannabis should be decriminalised. What can I say? It has already been
:57:22. > :57:26.decriminalised, it has been disastrous. The only place I would
:57:26. > :57:34.allow it legalise cannabis is in airport departure lounges, where I
:57:34. > :57:43.really need it! The people have spoken. I do not share that verdict,
:57:43. > :57:53.but it should mean something to somebody about their. -- somebody
:57:53. > :57:53.
:57:53. > :57:59.out there. Thank you very much. Thank you to everyone who has taken
:57:59. > :58:09.part, Germaine Greer, Peter Hitchens, Tim Stanley, and Khieu
:58:09. > :58:11.