Episode 7 Sunday Morning Live

Would you like your local bobby to look like this?

As more police with guns are brought onto the streets,

A company boss resigns after suggesting some women do not

want top jobs and prefer to be happy and do great work.

There's a call for more religion in schools.

But should God be kept out of the classroom?

And singer Gregory Porter tells Nikki Bedi

about the racism he suffered as a child.

We had a cross burned in our yard. Were you frightened? Yes, until my

mother got in my face, and said, you know, I am here, I will protect you.

You are below nobody. You are not above anybody but you are below

nobody. Tommy Sandhu is back

here so he can share You can contact us by

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[email protected] Let's meet some of our

guests this week. Dame Joan Bakewell is an author,

journalist and broadcaster. Kevin Hurley is a former

police officer and was the Surrey Police and

Crime Commissioner. James Delingpole is a writer

and columnist at Breitbart News. Leroy Logan is a former

superintendent in the Metropolitan Police and chair

of the Black Police 600 extra armed police are to be

deployed on the streets of London to counter terrorism

threats. Within 24 hours of members

of the new contingent being put on display,

officers with firearms were called to Russell Square in the heart

of the capital to tackle a man with a knife who killed one person

and stabbed five others. It wasn't an extremist incident

and the perpetrator But the Metropolitan Police

Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe says it's not a matter

of if but when a terrorist So as gun-carrying officers become

a familiar sight in the capital, should we go further and arm

more or even all police? Our first question this week,

do armed police make us safer? And we'll also be joined

from Belfast by Chris Ryder, a journalist who specialises

in security and policing in Northern Ireland where all police

officers carry guns. Welcome to you as well. Kevin, do

you agree with the decision to increase the number of armed

officers? Actually you are being misled because there are 1300 less

police officers now than there were in 2009. What we are looking at is a

slight feeling of the gap. What I don't like to see is the showing off

of all the equipment that we saw the other day. The police have always

had that kind of stuff. I thought it was a necessary scaremongering,

particularly in light of the fact that the biggest threat we are

likely to save here is the lone wolf attack, like we saw in Neath with

the lorry, the chap on the train with the axe, and yesterday in

Brussels where an individual attacks in an unknown place and they are

stopped because local police with handguns deal with the issue rather

than bringing out the full Ninja team. Key points, one, we actually

have less police armed than in 2009, and this will only go halfway to

filling that gap, and secondly what we need is better dispersal on

response shifts so that if something bad happens in Guildford town

centre, Maidstone, Southampton or up in Manchester in the suburbs, a

local officer can deal with it. You have brought up quite a few issues

there. Leroy, we are one of very few countries which do not routinely

have an armed police force. Are we behind the times or ahead of the

times? I think we are the envy of the world. I have travelled

extensively and my colleagues in different countries have said they

really admire as for being able to patrol without firearms. It is the

whole look and feel of policing that is really important. We don't want

to create barriers with communities. What has been said is really

important. What is reassuring to some people, seeing more guns, can

be fearful to some people, especially if they have received

heavy-handed policing. They think it is bad enough when there were sticks

and spray and even tasered, because there is disproportionality in how

Tasers are used. 75% of people who have been tasered in recent years

from black and ethnic minority communities. If they seek Ninja

style Darth Vader clad officers with serious arms, they will think there

is a good chance they will be shot. It is about security, liberty and

balance with trust and confidence. Would police feel safer being armed?

We are told the terrorism threat is already high. I think the fear

factor is really important. When I was a police officer, and I am sure

all of us will have that fear, but you have got to overcome that fear

and be professional. It is about being sophisticated about how you

deploy those officers at the right place and time, not just patrolling

with arms, because that can create barriers with the community. I am in

favour of more police and the funding of more policing but I don't

like seeing them armed. It was interesting that yesterday across

the country there were protests by Black Lives Matter on the

anniversary of the killing of Mark Duggan, which triggered riots, as we

know. Yesterday, it was so peaceful and the police handled it very well

indeed, so we have made progress. We are so reluctant to compliment

ourselves and I think we have a fantastic record. Clearly something

is going right because although there have been individual

incidents, there has not been a major catastrophe to equal 7/7 in

all the years since. So what is going on is on the quiet.

Intelligence building, sharing of information, infiltrating where

there is risk, that is happening, and we are all the beneficiaries and

we don't know it. We don't need to see guns to reassure us. Are we

getting it right, James? I agree with some of that about the

intelligence service and what Leroy said about consent, but they are

both describing a golden era that no longer exists. When I was growing up

and we went to foreign countries like Italy and Spain and the police

were tooled up at the airport and having their guns, and my parents

said, yes, but in Britain our police don't carry guns and it is a sign of

how civilised we are, but things have totally changed. Yes, we have

had terrorism with the IRA and stuff, but not of this kind before.

We have not had lone wolves prepared to die in order to kill people and

that is what has changed. I also worry

about police safety. There was an example in France a few months ago

when a policeman was followed home by terrorists. They tortured him and

his wife in their home. Police need to be reassured that their safety is

considered. I think it is really important that we recognise in every

profession including policing there is a risk. You talk about a golden

age of policing. I think the golden age is still to come. We are very

good police service, internationally admired. I think people need to

understand that we can respond in an appropriate way, a proportionate

way, but we don't have to have firearms 24 last seven. In Northern

Ireland all police officers are armed. Chris can join us, a

specialist in policing and security there. What are your views on having

an armed police and the impact that has had? It has become essential in

Northern Ireland for the police to carry firearms at all times, because

not only were the police targets when they were on duty, they were

also targets of duty because as many police were targeted and attacked in

their homes and their families were put at risk, so every officer

carries a personal firearm and has done for many years. There are

strict controls about the use of firearms and the availability of the

firearms officers. They have got to pass regular tests to show they are

competent to use them. Because of a range of suicides with police

officers using their firearms to take their own lives, there were

very rigorous checks on the mental health of officers. If an officer is

unstable, they have the gun taken away from them. Northern Ireland is

not the ideal society, but the police have played a very key role

in ensuring the police here have brought about a more peaceful

society than Northern Ireland experience for many years. It would

be unthinkable here to try and disarm the police because of the

very high level of terrorism that still exists here from dissident

republicans. Do you think it would work across the UK and should be

extended? My own view is that it should be. If you take the Normandy

attack, which was at a quiet time and police were murdered, there is

no point waiting until someone goes on a rampage with a gun or a knife,

and then fly in armed officers from somewhere else, get them there by

road. You need greater availability of armed response officers able to

deal effectively with serious incidents in all localities. If the

incident is a major one, you have to bring in reinforcements to do that.

I think the principle of an unarmed police force in the current state

and age is probably obsolete. I know the idea would be to have a police

force who can maintain that, but I think it is necessary given the

serious threat to the country faces from global terrorists and mentally

unstable people and just the generally violent nature of much of

society today. Your reaction, Leroy? The thing is, you cannot cheat your

way out of this problem. We have to recognise it is not just about army

police officers. -- you cannot shoot your way out of this problem. The

police of the community and the community are the police. The police

have got to work in partnership with all sections of the community,

including those sections where you can have lone wolves. It is not

necessarily religion, it is urban deprivation and social exclusion. We

have got to get the intelligence for those people to work with us and we

cannot create barriers. There is a definite need for firearms but it

needs to be done in a very bespoke way, knowing that trust and

confidence can be eroded if we get it wrong. This Christmas all our

high streets will be full of people shopping and going out for the

Christmas lights. I would like everybody to visualise their local

town and imagine how crowded the streets. Then ask yourself, if

someone takes a heavy lorry like an Nice, and starts running people

down, how the local police will stop it. The way the lorry was stopped in

Nice was bicycle police with handguns on their hips, shooting the

guy and stopping him. The point about Nice was the lorry should have

been stopped by bards the road before its way out there. --

bollards. Yes, but we are not going to have bollards on every road so

when the lorry drives through the flower show, the local St George's

day parade, how will you stop it? I think the important thing is to move

the initiative further up the pathway, so people that are mentally

unstable have been identified earlier, and held onto their

medication, checked regularly. Of course prevention is better than

cure but when push comes to shove... It is located in London when there

are armed patrols going round everywhere, but in small market

towns lots of people would be dead before the armed police got there.

Times have changed and we need police to be routinely armed. But we

don't have terror in small towns across the country. There have been

one or two isolated incidents. If you want to avoid true recruitment

of jihadists, the major political threat of suicide bombers, you have

to reform the prison system, because that is where recruitment is going

on even as we speak all the time. I agree with that. We cannot allow the

terrorists to dictate to us what we do. What we are having a

conversation about is changing our lifestyle, the look and feel of our

police officers, just because terrorists are dictating to us. Are

you saying that even with criminals, not just terrorists, if we had armed

police that would change the attitude of criminals? Sometimes it

can at the anti. I know some hardened criminals that have come

from other countries who have stopped using their firearms. In

other countries they will shoot on sight, whatever, but over here they

adopt the culture. We do not have a strong gun culture, we have a

different type of culture. Officers do not have to think them every

time. You are smiling, James. There are no hard-core jihadist out there

who think they were going to launch an attack but they see the police

have a different approach and they decide not to do it. We are relying

on to intelligence to make sure the community can tell us about these

people. During the Olympics, people talked about armed officers but we

had a light touch police and we had good community resolve and a

partnership to give us the intelligence to stop these people

behind-the-scenes. There were lots of incidents but fortunately it was

a successful Games and you did not see security.

Leroy is wrong, no one has answered the question about stopping the

lorry once it has started. Another scenario, the German scenario,

someone ran down the train chopping people up and was eventually stopped

with a handgun. How do you stop that? Only a few years ago in

Cumbria a man ran a mark in Cumbria, shooting dead 12 people in public.

Unarmed police were unable to intervene. We need more subtlety in

how we respond. I share much of what Leroy is saying, actually because I

don't like to see these displays of people with big kit and big weapons.

We need them but I like to see a more subtle approach with a handgun

on the hip. What we have lost in policing is the brand image.

Heavyweight body armour, stuff all around them and because we won't

face the idea of let's have a view more handguns out locally, we've

gone the other way and they look over the top. The person who gunned

down the American tourist in Russell Square was stopped with a Taser.

Knife attack. Knife attack. But he was stopped with a Taser and he

survived so he can be interrogated and analysed, rather than shot dead.

Can I deal with the Taser thing? Kevin raised the point about

practical terms, how do police tackle someone who is on the

rampage, so to speak, if they are not armed?

Chris, I will bring you in, in a moment. Like everything, you will

always have incidences. It is not a question that we don't respond to

those things. It is very important we respond to those things.

Unfortunately, police numbers have been eroded through spending cuts

and the whole recession, they've got to build up those numbers. I do

respect that you need more armed officers to ensure that you can

respond to these incidences, especially in rural areas. I

understand. But you can't say every officer will be in the right place

at the right time because they have a gun? Chris, briefly, you want to

intervene? The whole thing about proportion, there may be

circumstances as in Russell Square where the Taser is effective. And

look at the incident in Cumbria that was referred to, there was an

incident I remember in Hungerford where another man went on the

rampage with a gun. Those are situations when you need readily

available effectively armed police who can deal with the situation and

who are not unarmed, waiting for armed colleagues to come in from God

knows how far away. You've been sending us your texts

and tweets on this. Let's hear some of your reactions

from Tommy. A lot of people say it is

unfortunate a lot more armed police exist but it is the sign of the

times and may be hoping that they will be more a deterrent to criminal

activity. Is this the way things are going to

be from now on? Terrorism is changing and the police

can't stop that. I've seen Kevin nodding and Leroy you are shaking

your head. I don't think you can totally anticipate someone who

leaves their house with a knife and decide they will stab someone. Or

someone gets into a vehicle, not necessarily a truck, any large

vehicle, a van... We have got to detect those sort of peoples who are

vulnerable. Whether it is in the communities, care in the community,

whether it is around rehabilitation. These things are not being done. I'm

doing anti-gang work in East London. The infrastructure to help people

vulnerable to extremist view, whether it is based on religion or

not is not being picked up. When they are supposed to be supported,

they are left to the streets, who tell them, yeah, do this, do that. I

don't disagree with anything Leroy says, absolutely right, as is Joan.

But when these incidences happen, we need to stop them. It is not good

enough having little clumps of heavily armed police in our big

cities when someone runs a mock and does terrible damage. Just to park

the Taser point, Joan. When we used the Taser at Leytonstone, you saw

police officers running away, leaving the public vulnerable and

they discharge the Taser several times before the darts stuck in

their chests. What happened and Russell Square, officers responded

with firearms and Taser. They had the luxury of using a Taser whilst

covered by someone with a proper gun, that is the problem. Your

reaction? People don't come out shooting and killing people from

nowhere. There is always a trace that you can trace back into their

lives, their contacts, their outlook. It needs to be captured

earlier. Why is their crime? There is always a source and a way of

identifying it, which we often acknowledge with the accounts coming

up in the papers and we say, some some carer should have spotted that.

On that note I will have to finish this part of the conversation, thank

you so much, we could have gone on for much longer, I'm sure. Thank you

for your comments, keep them coming in.

Still to come: Gregory Porter, on the influence his

Two days before she passed, she said to me, "Don't forget your music,

it's the best thing you do, don't forget it".

The words of a boss as he resigned this week over a sexism row.

Kevin Roberts, the executive chairman of Saatchi Saatchi, one

the world's best known advertising firms, stirred up a storm

when he said he didn't think the lack of women in the industry

He said many women and men simply wanted to be happy and do

great work and some women had a circular rather than

Saatchi's parent company says promoting gender equality starts

at the top and the spirit there is vive la difference.

But are women less ambitious than men at work

or are they just held back by outdated attitudes?

Tommy went to Manchester to find out what people

We are here in Manchester in the business hub of the North and also

the birthplace of suffragette Emily Pankhurst. Is there still a battle

for equality to be fought in the workplace or is it just a case of

different adages between men and women? Who is more ambitious in the

workplace, men or women? Women. Because they want to get to the top.

Isn't it a man's world and men dominate in the workplace? No way,

it's a woman's world. Men can be more assertive but they have the

same ambitions but are shy. Things have changed, women are. They are

more likely dominant species, now. Should there be more female bosses?

Absolutely. In the workplace, you with men, women, that's just how it

goes. If you look at most businesses, they all run by men and

the majority are run by men. In my personal experience, yes, most of my

bosses have been male. It should be equal but it is just not, is it? It

is the way we are brought up, I suppose. A lot of guys have the

opportunity to stay at home, role reversal, it is more prevalent now.

In the past, I know I could have done just as good a job as a man.

But I couldn't because I had three children and I had to bring them up.

That's the way it goes. What do you see around you? Independent women

doing their own thing. It used to be focusing on men and women staying at

home but that has changed, that was years ago. 2016 is all about the

women. It's all about the women. Tommy with some views

from Manchester there. So our question is are women

less ambitious than men? Joining the panel now

are Catherine Mayer, the co-founder of the Women's Equality Party

in the UK, and the broadcaster Joining us from our newsroom studio

is Elena Shalneva a writer Julia, you showed some sympathy for

Kevin Roberts. Yes, absolutely, I think it reflects

what a lot of women and career women go through. It is not a question of,

we're not ambitious, we are not career women, that horrible phase

that started around the time that you were on the April, that the idea

you couldn't be anything other than a woman -- you on the apron.

Virtually all of my friends have taken a bit of a backtrack on our

careers for a few years while we have young children, not because our

husbands beat us and make us do it. Not because of the nasty sexist

bosses but we like our kids and we want to be mothers as well as have

careers. Zero on the salary, job title doesn't give us as good a

feeling about ourselves as being a mother. If a woman had made those

comments, would they have been more palatable? The funny thing about

what Kevin Roberts said is that he was right in one respect but right

for the wrong reason. When he talked about the debate being over, he was

right. But the debate is over only in the sense that there is such an

eye watering wealth of evidence in favour of gender equality, not just

for women but for men, and for business, for business to function

well for economic growth that he took us back into a debate that we

shouldn't even be having this debate today, really. Are women ambitious?

It's so obvious what the issues are, here. From the moment boys and girls

are born, they are given messaging about what appropriate behaviour is.

When people try to behave differently, we throw obstacles in

their path, does that mean some women what he called circular

ambition or what Julia just described? Of course. Does it mean

some people seek different career path? Different ambitions?

Absolutely. That that does mean that there are great structural barriers

to equality in the workplace to the equal participation? Absolutely. Is

that bad for everybody, men and women, absolutely. This is really

the debate we need to be having. James, when you look at the top

roles in the workplace and there is still a gender gap, what do we put

that down to? Sexism or a lack of ambition? It is good we are having

this debate on the BBC and the line that Catherine would be taking,

presumably, that there is terrible inequality still in business and

there is a glass ceiling. And then there is Kevin's view, that no, this

reflects the differences between men and women. Why is it fine to have

this debate on TV but not within Saatchi Saatchi? Why is it the

boat? Isn't it rather ironic that the company which owns Saatchi, the

motto of France, but they won't take anyone other than one corporate

view. -- vive la difference. Corporations have this monolithic

view, people aren't allowed to speak their mind. I know it is a terrible

crime these days, being a man. What is a crime, being a man? I am amazed

I am allowed on this TV to talk about this. You have to check your

white male straight privilege. Straight white men are pretty much

not allowed to talk about anything controversial now, they will lose

their jobs. This is a discussion that is very important for men,

precisely because economic and social well-being is something that

all of us need to be involved in. The problem with Kevin Roberts was

that he was the boss of the company that was supposed to be fostering a

culture in which women have equal chances to get ahead. Advertising

has huge problems. 85% of purchasing decisions are made by women but only

11% of creatives are women. Who cares? Who cares? Who cares? Joan, I

care about your view because Julia referred to the longevity you had in

your career in broadcasting. And as a woman in business. Have we got to

the point where someone like James feels he can't make a point, here,

or he can't make a comment... Yes! That is to do with his

sensibilities. I have lived through decades when women have struggled

for the search for opportunities and they have fallen short in their

opportunities for many, many decades. It's getting better. It's

just getting better. But of course, women remain ambitions for the jobs

that those in power hold and don't want to yield. It is a male culture,

still. Men, largely, rule the top jobs and they don't want to yield

them, of course, he doesn't want to. As an advertising agent, he could

have phrased his language better as someone who is in advertising, but

he wants to explain the system, in his terms. But he can't see that the

system has not yielded the world that women ideally want, including

women who also want to stay at home and love their children. Many men

also want to live a more moderate in life. We are now seeing the

generation of stay at home fathers, who... A tiny percent. I am not

talking about stay at home parents, just people who want a worklife

balance. Men are ambitious for different things.

I want to talk now to Elena Shalneva who worked in the City for 20 years

Why did you leave the City, a top job? I left the City because I don't

think working in a office for 35 years is the most natural way to

spend your life. But in terms of what Kevin Roberts said, I

absolutely agree. Look at what companies normally do now, a lot of

companies, in trying to solve the gender issues. They tried to push as

many women and other minorities as possible into the position of senior

management or the board, regardless of whether these people are

interested in these positions and have the temperament or inclination

to do the work. But companies do that because it will look good on

their diversity report. And on their quotas. What Kevin Roberts said is,

guys, let's look at this differently. Not all men or women,

and by the way he always spoke about both men and women, which is

something his critics failed to acknowledge, both want to be chief

executive officers. Instead of pushing them into these positions to

meet our quotas, let's help young people early in their careers

identify the positions their role and industry, that they will do for

30 or 40 years, and let's train them to do it as well as they can, and

then create an environment where we promote people to the positions that

they themselves want to be in, rather than the ones we have in mind

for them. Is it tokenism? Pushing women forward? The reason that I

founded the Women's Equality Party is because legislative change can

create cultural change. One of the things this sofa confuses is that

there is huge unanimity in business and in politics that enhancing

gender equality actually brings benefits for everyone. The things

that hold women back, childcare, affordable childcare, it is one of

our core policies... Don't men have children as well? Precisely. Why on

earth do we think that childcare is about women? Julia, thank you. You

are agreeing with me, if you listen to me. It doesn't hold women back.

It holds women back because of the gender pay gap. Very often men are

the ones who say they cannot afford to stay at home because of the

gender pay back. You need to do what Nordic countries did and make it

absolutely normal for equal parenting, for there to be shared

parental leave, for that parental leave to actually be accessible to

everybody. It created a huge cultural change in the Nordic

countries, and this is something that we could so easily do here. The

gender pay gap only opens up at the age where women begin to start

having children. James? Unanimity in business, there clearly is because

this guy disagreed and he got pushed out of his job for it. -- there

clearly isn't. I thought Elena was fantastic and told it like it is. I

really respect women who speak out on these issues because there is so

much pressure to take the stand that women are oppressed and we are women

and it is our job to be oppressed and angry. I think most women

watching the show will agree with Julia. We did not say we are

oppressed. We said we are ambitious. You said he is an advertising man

and he could have expressed himself better. I read the text of the

interview and he bent over backwards. He was sounding like a

feminist actually. He said men are dinosaurs, he said men have a wrong

view of the world. He was praising women and not criticising them. He

was trying to protect himself very badly. He is in the industry and he

has a view. It is a nice technique to praise women while promoting

them. It is a style that expresses the sense of superiority that

people, men, who have reached the top of their professions,

professions that indeed many men and women don't want to aspire to, used

to explain the fact that he is there and others are not. I wish we could

stop talking about men and women? Can we talk about people, their

ambitions for jobs and careers and formative life? When we start doing

that, we have got somewhere. What is everybody saying at home? Women tend

to prioritise family overwork but the majority of people think it

depends on the individual and what we want out of life.

Bosses sitting around and not doing anything? Does that happen!

If it all goes after day, James, I have your back! Some support for

you, James! What do you think of the comments? It is just expressing

something that we all know. I have a whole raft of friends, professional,

university educated, ambitious career women, and when they have had

children, they have said they really enjoy being a mum, like I do, and

they want to spend more time with the kids. To pretend there isn't a

biological difference between the way that most mothers mother and

most fathers father, I think it is a nonsense and an insult to

intelligent women. Most women watching this don't feel like

victims of sexism. If you told my nine-year-old he can't do or be

anything she wants to be, she would think you were insane. This isn't

about free choice. Choices come from cultures. We're not talking about

being victims. We are talking about something that is good for everybody

but you are intent on a threadbare notion. You have given me the last

word! Brief last word! The point about making these changes is it

would lead to better business. The point about people saying there are

not women with experience to be on board. If you don't promote women,

you don't get the women with experience to be on board. You have

to find ways of breaking the logjam is to the benefit of all of us and

it is very easy to do that, which is why the Women's Equality Party

exists! The last word and a plug! Thank you for your comments and keep

them coming in. Gregory Porter is an American jazz

vocalist, songwriter and actor. But he also doesn't mind

being known as a mama's boy. He counts his mother,

a preacher, as a huge influence Nikki Bedi went to meet him to talk

about his childhood, his inspirations

and his trademark hat. Gregory Porter, you are a huge star

in America, a Grammy award-winning musician, but we love you in the UK.

How much do you love us and what do you love about us? There are so many

things that I love about the UK. We don't have any royalty. In the US.

That is a pretty magical thing. You played at Buckingham Palace, didn't

you? Yes. They also had me for a day of remembrance celebration at Royal

Albert Hall. After singing, I bowed to the Queen

and I waved. I am just an American boy from Bakersfield, what am I

doing here? It was a grand experience. You are quite late

coming to a recording career. How old were you when you made your

first record? 38 and 39 when it was first released. By the time I got

over to you, I was 40. Your mother had some sort of influence on you

actually pursuing your musical career, didn't she? Yes, two days

before she passed, she said to me, don't forget your music. It is the

best thing you do and don't forget it. Her teachings to me find their

way into the music. Whether I am conscious of it or not at the time

of writing, after I listened to it, I am like that is mom. Tell me about

her. She was a storefront preacher. She's set up in the worst places.

She set up on Lakeview Avenue, a street with prostitutes and homeless

people, they were there. We had a little PA system and I learned how

to sing there. Not in a posh church. I learned how to sing to the

afflicted ones, the lonely ones, the hungry ones, the people who lost

their way. # Take me to the avenue.

# Take me to the afflicted ones. So your mother would literally set up a

church in a storefront. What was she breaching? She was definitely on the

extreme side of life. Redeemed. She would get a calling to do these

things and she would do them. Do you have a similar calling? I have a

similar calling for messages of love and mutual respect. I think those

things, irrepressible love, those things keep finding their way into

my music. # There are people down the way

thirsty... When you are performing, are you channelling some sort of

spirit, God, energy? I always have. I grew up singing in the church so

this energy, in a way, this gift, this performance, for God, has

happened absolutely on stage. It is interesting because as smooth and

mellifluous your voices, your lyrics sometimes have a hard-hitting, edgy

message. Is that important to you? Is it deliberate? Yes, it is

deliberate. Every day there is a new one. We have to talk about these

things. # There was a man.

# Voice of the people. # Standing on the balcony... We have

to talk about our differences and the foundations of acceptance and

the idea that other is not always negative and bad. I think sometimes

when this rise of negative energy towards the different, the other,

the underneath, there is also a counter energy and I feel like I

want to be part of that counter energy. Do you ever experience

racism and have you ever? I have had enormous difficulties in my life and

we as a family were attacked quite a bit. We had a cross burned in our

yard and they would urinate in bottles and throw them through our

windows every other weekend. That happened multiple times. Where you

frightened? Yes, until my mother got in my face and said, I am here, I

will protect you. You are below no one. You are not above anyone but

you are below nobody. It did have an effect on us for a little while. It

was scary, but I think, and I hope, that I am part of the energy of the

pushback to negativity and hate and intolerance and misunderstanding

between people. # Won't somebody help me? Well, we

come to the hat. Like so many jazz stars before who have had a

particular piece of headgear, it is a thing. Could you perform without

it? I think my voice would be different!

Peace and love! God bless you. The marvellous Gregory Porter. I doff my

cap to him. How important is it to know

more about religion? Very, according to the all-party

parliamentary group They've recommended that not only

should RE in schools be more strongly supported,

but that teaching in religious literacy should be

widely encouraged in universities, prisons, government departments,

councils and the general workplace. Stephen Evans,

the campaigns director of the National Secular Society,

says that we shouldn't blindly accept that religious literacy

is a necessary pre-condition is it important

to learn about religion? Joining the panel is Naved Siddiqi,

from the Islamic Society of Britain. Dr Matthew Francis, co-author

of a report on religious literacy of the National Secular Society,

the executive director and joining us from our newsroom

balcony is Paul Barber, director of the Catholic

Education Service. Matthew, when we talk about

religious literacy, what do we mean? We are talking about giving people

the knowledge and confidence to have a better quality of conversation

upon religious and nonreligious identities. That's something that

particularly important after a time of half a century or so when we've

not talked about religion in the public sphere. People don't have the

knowledge, vocabulary, to be able to engage with these issues and that is

important for people's relationship in the workplace and understanding

some of the new stories we see so frequently now. Keith, your concerns

when we talk about religious literacy being needed? We mustn't

forget that the vast majority of the population are actually

nonreligious, particularly young people.

They seem to be, kind of, left behind in all of this.

We should be concentrating much more on what binds us and our common

humanity, rather than obsessing about religion in every aspect of

life. I would much prefer to see... Much

more emphasis in religious education on philosophy.

And ethics, partly from a nonreligious perspective. And logic.

And civics. And human rights. Those kinds of things which we are

woefully underrepresented in the school curriculum. -- which are. The

people pushing this agenda are very often people who are determined to

get more religion forced into schools where kids are almost

captive. That's just wrong. What about the impact religion is having

on life and society in terms of how do we need to understand and do we

need to have a deeper understanding of religion? First of all, I don't

see the secular and religious as two separate boxes. I see much common

space, there. When we are talking about a level playing field and

about the land space that we all share, we need to get much more

comfortable with the terms secular and religious. At a broad level, I

think that the values and the teachings that all phones in part

and the lessons you find in assemblies, these are very much

morals -- all homes in part. They can be religious and can be secular.

When you are talking about the land space that we all share, we are

talking about the secular environment. In order to create a

level playing field, we need to get more comfortable about these things.

I don't think it should be so much about what the agenda and who's in

control. I think it needs to be much more about understanding the place

of religion in society. In a secular environment, is there a

misunderstanding of certain religions, particularly Islam for

example is to mark whether it is Islam or religion in general, there

can be a fear of religion wanting to exert too much control. -- Islam for

example? The question is about getting the right balance and how we

build a society on morals, with moral teachings. Where everybody has

an equal stake. And where people can understand things better. But I

think what is striking, for me, is the level of religious illiteracy.

Even if it comes to basics about perspective all about numbers were

about how religions feature -- or about. The historical significance

of religion. It will be striking how little

people know. Joan, how important is it that the next generation is

taught about religion and has religious literacy? I think it is

very important. Religion is very important in all societies. It is

important that people know how that has come about and about 3000 years

ago, humanity began to develop different aspects and philosophies

of religion. The great religions of the world were born about 2000, 1000

years before Christ. Those emerged. They did create moral codes by which

their communities should live. But they attached those moral codes to

supernatural explanations, so you get miracles and holy people and the

concept of God someone else beyond life. The variety is extremely

important, what ever your particular faith. -- the morality. But the

belief in supernatural requires faith but not evidence, because

there is no evidence for supernatural elements.

I think we ought to know how religions are constructed, we should

know about all their different sets and beliefs and we should find that

many of them have in common the Ten Commandments have much in common

with the teaching of Islam. The welcoming of strangers and arms for

the needy. It is important we know it is stories. That is one of the

great sources of enjoyment. It is found that young people don't know

the story... Who the 12 disciples were, they don't know about the old

Testament. They know fairy stories about no and stories are very good.

-- about Noah. Stories are the burden of morality that morality

exists and the stories which are man's narrative to itself. Let's

talk about someone who is very involved in education on religious

subjects. Let's bring in Paul Barber, director

of the Catholic Education Service. You've been listening to this

conversation, what should schools be doing? What should they be teaching

our children? Good morning, the first thing to say is very much

welcoming the analysis and recommendations of the all-party

group, the report. I think it has done a very good job of capturing

what religious literacy is and some very good challenges that are faced

by schools in creating good religious literacy. And some

excellent recommendations. Briefly, time is short.

The key thing here links to what Joan was saying, religious literacy

is giving people the tools to have a dialogue.

It's knowing each other's stories is important but it is deeper than

that, it's an ability to look critically and engage critically

with one's own beliefs and with others in an open and respectful

way. To have a dialogue about the religious questions in a more than

merely superficial way. Matthew, how detrimental could it be to other

subjects if there is too much of a focus on religion in schools? The

important thing about focusing religion in schools is separating

the confessional from educational. I am not saying we need more religious

education to teach people to be a particular religion but I'm

interested in in teaching people about religion from what we know

about scientific study of religion. There is a lot of serious stuff that

we can learn from. Things like these hard binaries of religious and

secular optically unhelpful at times. A lot of people who say they

are not religious but they didn't belong to a religious institution,

they might be spiritual, they might be interested in certain aspects but

they don't belong to a particular institution. That level of detail is

important. For too long, we have had these lessons which say, we must

believe in X and all Christians believe in why. That does not

reflect the landscape of this country. Tommy, what are people

saying? A lot of people say that religion is

important in education but it shouldn't be prioritised over other

subjects. More about morals. Keith, you wanted

to respond? I do agree with Matthew that it

shouldn't be confessional. The all-party group that was given such

a glowing report just now, it's extraordinary that the founder of it

has just denounced it as resembling a religious cult, under the current

people who've written the very report that is just been pushed. I

think we need to be very conscious. The government has just ignored a

judicial review saying they are not giving enough emphasis to the

nonreligious perspective. We really do need to make sure that the

majority of people's religious perspectives and philosophical

perspectives are respected in our schools. In many ways this is a

generational issue, isn't it? Anybody that is under 25 today, that

includes my children, that includes half of Britain's Muslims, they've

never known a world before the 9/11 terror attacks. They have been

shrouded by this conversation that religion is a problem.

We need to help a generation through that. A better understanding of

religious teachings and religious history has got to be an important

component of that. I think that is an extremely important point because

very often religion is a problem. And the political dimension of

religion can be very damaging, I refer you to Northern Ireland.

Conflict perpetuated by a division between two Christian sects if you

like. The political possibilities of a religion, which bases its

obedience in supernatural faith is very problematic. It needs to be

spun out for people, so they can make a judgment. Thank you all.

Let me thank our guests and you at home for your contributions.

This weekend in London sees Ot Azoy, a celebration of Yiddish language,

Among those taking part will be Shura Lipovsky,

And we can now hear them performing for us the song Abi Gezunt,

From me, and everyone here, goodbye.

# A bisl zun a bisl regn # A ruik ort dem kop tsu leygn

# Abi gezunt, ken men gliklekh zayn # A shukh, A zok, a kleyd on lates

# In keshene dray fir Zlotes # Di zun zi sheynt far yedn

eynem orem oder raykh # A bisl freyd, a bisl lakhn

amol mit fraynt a shnepzl makhn # Eyner sukht ashires

eyner sukht gvires # Eyner meynt dos gantse Glik

hengt nor op in gelt # Zoln ale zikhn, zoln ale krikhn

nor ikh trakht bay zikh # Ikh darf dos oyf kaporez vayl Dos

glik shteyt bay mayn tir # # A bisl freyd, a bisl lakhn

amol mit fraynt a shnepzl makhn # Di zun zi sheynt far yedn

eynem orem oder raykh # A bisl freyd, a bisl lakhn

amol mit fraynt a shnepzl makhn # A bisl freyd, a bisl lakhn

amol mit fraynt a shnepzl makhn