:00:28. > :00:33.Good morning. Welcome to The Big Questions, live from Ashton Park
:00:33. > :00:36.School in Bristol. I'm Nicky Campbell. Anders Behring Breivik's
:00:36. > :00:41.testimony at his trial in Oslo, where he calmly set out his reasons
:00:41. > :00:45.for killing 77 people by bullet and bomber, has shocked the world. Our
:00:45. > :00:49.first big question: do some crimes deserve the death penalty? Peter
:00:49. > :00:53.Hitchens says anyone who takes a life with evil intent or violence
:00:53. > :00:55.should receive the same in return. "After the scandals of recent years,
:00:55. > :00:59.people have lost faith in politics and politicians. It is our duty to
:01:00. > :01:04.restore their trust." those are David Cameron's words from the
:01:04. > :01:10.foreword to the ministerial code. He goes on: "transparent about what
:01:10. > :01:14.we do and how we do it". But he is less keen to sanction ministers who
:01:14. > :01:17.seem to fall short of the sentence. Our next big question: is there
:01:17. > :01:21.something rotten at the heart of British politics? The Labour MP
:01:21. > :01:24.Paul Flynn says a culture has been created where backdoor Ritz and
:01:24. > :01:27.secret conversations have become the norm.
:01:27. > :01:32.And as President Sarkozy raises the labelling of halal meat as an
:01:32. > :01:35.election issue in France, our last big question: should halal and
:01:35. > :01:39.kosher meat be labelled? This campaigners as labelling is the
:01:39. > :01:49.only way of avoiding meat from animals that have received a non-
:01:49. > :01:49.
:01:49. > :01:51.Christian blessing. Welcome to The Big Questions.
:01:51. > :01:53.Anders Behring Breivik has said "There are only two just and fair
:01:54. > :02:02.outcomes of this trial - acquittal or capital punishment. I consider
:02:02. > :02:04.21 years of prison as a pathetic punishment. "and one of the
:02:04. > :02:09.original judges assigned to his trial agreed with him. Thomas
:02:09. > :02:11.Indrebo was dismissed on day one when it came to light that he had
:02:11. > :02:16.tweeted that "the death penalty is the only just sentence in this
:02:16. > :02:20.case". But 21 years of imprisonment is the maximum sentence available
:02:20. > :02:27.in Norway since the death penalty for war crimes and treason was
:02:27. > :02:33.abolished in 1979. Do some crimes deserve the death penalty? Michael,
:02:34. > :02:37.you work with the innocence network, those who are in prison and should
:02:37. > :02:41.not have been imprisoned according to you. Some crimes are so beyond
:02:41. > :02:49.the pale, whether it is a mass killer like Breivik or a child
:02:49. > :02:56.killer like Robert Black. Do those cases not test your liberal
:02:56. > :03:00.principles? No. They are clearly emotive cases. I am a parent myself.
:03:00. > :03:05.You often think that if someone harmed one of your children, you
:03:05. > :03:09.wonder what you might do to protect your loved one. Or to seek
:03:09. > :03:14.vengeance? That is the society we are brought up in, that is how we
:03:14. > :03:19.think we would write that wrong. But we have to decide what our
:03:19. > :03:22.values are as a people, our identity. We abolished capital
:03:22. > :03:26.punishment in this country in the 1960s because the British public
:03:26. > :03:32.could not stomach the reality that an innocent person had been
:03:32. > :03:35.executed wrongly. Once you start to go down a path of saying that we
:03:35. > :03:39.want to reintroduce capital punishment, even into conversations
:03:39. > :03:45.in this country, you will be inevitably executing innocent
:03:45. > :03:48.people. And one life lost is not worth it for the rest who are
:03:48. > :03:52.guilty? People on this side of the debate clearly think it is, because
:03:52. > :03:55.before we came on air, we were discussing over coffee. People
:03:55. > :04:01.think that we have a system which will make mistakes, some innocent
:04:01. > :04:06.people will be killed, and that is OK. But it is not their lives.
:04:07. > :04:11.Judicial error stone trouble people in the judiciary. So it is OK if an
:04:11. > :04:16.innocent life is lost? Of course not. Nobody says it is OK. Every
:04:16. > :04:21.step should be taken to ensure that no innocent life is lost. But only
:04:21. > :04:25.a total pacifist can honestly used that as an argument against a
:04:25. > :04:29.policy of the death penalty if you have other was accepted that it is
:04:29. > :04:35.a good thing. In many cases, there would be people in this room who
:04:35. > :04:38.supported the bombing of Serbia during the Kosovo episode. Almost
:04:38. > :04:44.anybody here would believe that our conduct in the Second World War was
:04:44. > :04:49.correct. In both cases, we pursued what we believed to be a good end.
:04:49. > :04:52.And we accepted that in the cause of that, innocent people would die.
:04:52. > :04:56.Therefore, if you are going to say that you cannot accept even the
:04:56. > :05:00.faintest possibility of an innocent death as a reason for not having
:05:00. > :05:07.the death penalty, you have to declare that you would not have
:05:07. > :05:11.fought the Second World War. That is not correct. You are mixing
:05:11. > :05:15.different things together and trying to come out with a
:05:15. > :05:21.conclusion. I do not agree that we should go to these wars, but that
:05:21. > :05:26.is separate. You have missed my point already. This argument is
:05:26. > :05:32.heard it so many times. People do not listen to what the other is
:05:33. > :05:40.saying. If you are going to argue that the death penalty is never
:05:40. > :05:44.justified, that is one thing. But if you are going to argue that the
:05:44. > :05:49.danger of innocent life being lost Israel the all-consuming veto over
:05:49. > :05:52.the death penalty, that is a different question. Many would say,
:05:52. > :05:56.I support the death penalty, but I am against it because of the
:05:56. > :05:59.problem of innocent life. I am saying that that as an argument
:05:59. > :06:05.says that you are also unable to adopt all kinds of other policies
:06:05. > :06:10.which most would see as desirable. If that is your argument, you have
:06:10. > :06:14.to abandon a lot of other things. You are a criminal barrister, but
:06:14. > :06:20.you are both Christians. Surely the death penalty is vetoed by the fact
:06:20. > :06:23.that you are holding out the possibility of redemption thigh and
:06:23. > :06:30.for a soul ultimately to be saved? That should argue against your
:06:30. > :06:37.position. It concentrates the mind. If you know you are going to face a
:06:37. > :06:43.higher court, the original basis for the death penalty came out of
:06:43. > :06:48.Noah's Ark. I know some people will not accept that. When I came out of
:06:48. > :06:54.the Arc, he was told that god said if any man sheds blood, then by man
:06:54. > :06:57.shall his blood be shed, because man is made in the image of God.
:06:57. > :07:06.There are 35 things in the Old Testament which you are not
:07:06. > :07:14.supposed to do, including to be rude to your parents. Thigh Christ
:07:15. > :07:19.died on the cross force. But if you believe that Jesus would have
:07:19. > :07:26.supported the death penalty, do you think Jesus Christ, who preached
:07:26. > :07:29.love and forgiveness, would have been capable of pulling the lever?
:07:29. > :07:36.Jesus Christ would judge us all. Would you have been capable of
:07:36. > :07:41.pulling the lever? He came as our saviour. But you say he supported
:07:41. > :07:51.the death penalty. He suffered the death penalty for us. In the New
:07:51. > :08:04.
:08:04. > :08:12.Testament, he said, I have done The New Testament is love. Jesus
:08:12. > :08:17.said, do not judge, or you will be judged. Since they have made this
:08:17. > :08:22.intervention, you must here These people story. You lost your son 11
:08:22. > :08:30.years ago? Our son was murdered by a gang 11 years ago. When we went
:08:31. > :08:35.to court, we got a total lies from them. I was raging and angry and I
:08:35. > :08:40.wanted to kill 'em. A year after that, I decided to move on and
:08:40. > :08:45.forgive them because it was destroying me. After that, we
:08:45. > :08:50.decided we wanted to meet them and get the truth. We met one of the
:08:50. > :08:54.boys who killed our son last year. If he had had the death penalty, we
:08:54. > :09:00.would not have met him and I would not have heard him say, I was a
:09:00. > :09:04.coward and I killed your son. And I went on a restorative justice
:09:04. > :09:09.course, and suddenly I saw Christopher for the first time. I
:09:09. > :09:13.realised who my victim was and I admitted it. We would not have got
:09:13. > :09:18.all that if we had had the death penalty. If you bring the death
:09:18. > :09:24.penalty in, people like us will get forgotten. We are victims, and you
:09:24. > :09:28.are not putting us first. In court, the victims don't get a voice. For
:09:28. > :09:32.the past eight years, we have been going around prisons and schools,
:09:32. > :09:36.teaching restorative justice. We have seen a lot of people change.
:09:36. > :09:41.What did it mean to you, looking into the eyes of one of the boys
:09:41. > :09:51.who killed Christopher and for him to address you? It meant an end. We
:09:51. > :09:54.
:09:54. > :10:02.were able to move on. Peter, sorry to have interrupted you. I have a
:10:02. > :10:11.simple point here. You can't apologised to a dead person. You
:10:11. > :10:16.can apologise to the relatives. I am not speaking for you. Please
:10:16. > :10:22.don't interrupt me. I am not attempting to speak for you. I am
:10:22. > :10:27.attempting to speak for a society which the taking of life is the
:10:27. > :10:32.single most serious crime, and against which there must be some
:10:32. > :10:35.defence. If people can take another life and get away with it, as they
:10:35. > :10:39.do, and they are increasingly not charged with murder, but convicted
:10:39. > :10:46.of manslaughter and then out on the streets in a few years, if that
:10:46. > :10:53.happens, there will be more murder. So if you kill the boy who killed
:10:53. > :11:00.my son, what about his family? What about the boys who killed our son,
:11:00. > :11:10.do you want them and their families to suffer the way we did? I want
:11:10. > :11:11.
:11:11. > :11:15.there to be justice. Justice is served by the law. James is
:11:15. > :11:19.desperate to come in. Form an orderly queue. Peter is doing our
:11:19. > :11:22.workforce. Firstly, he says you can't apologise to a dead person,
:11:22. > :11:25.and then contends that incidences of killing their people by accident
:11:25. > :11:29.should not be a fly in the ointment of his support for state-sanctioned
:11:29. > :11:39.murder. You can't say sorry to someone who has been executed
:11:39. > :11:43.
:11:43. > :11:47.despite being innocent. I wish to prevent innocent death. You have a
:11:47. > :11:50.parallel with war. Any justice system am aware of recognises self-
:11:50. > :11:54.defence. For you to equate state- sanctioned murder of someone who
:11:54. > :12:00.has already been captured and convicted with a nation seeking to
:12:01. > :12:09.repel Nazism or combat the excesses of Slobodan Milosevic is an
:12:09. > :12:15.argument so fatuous that it is beneath you. Michael, you were in
:12:15. > :12:18.prison for a murder that you did not do for 11 years? I did 11 years
:12:18. > :12:23.and 43 days because dishonest people, including people in
:12:23. > :12:29.authority, decided to use me as a scapegoat for a crime I did not do.
:12:29. > :12:33.Mr Flynn knows about my case. I would have been executed if you had
:12:33. > :12:38.had your way. The Birmingham Six, the Guildford four, where does it
:12:38. > :12:48.stop? May I answer that? The abolition of the death penalty has
:12:48. > :12:51.cheapened the trial of murder in this country. How? Very simply. How
:12:51. > :12:58.much more seriously do you take a trial where your verdict could send
:12:58. > :13:01.someone to the galleon must -- the gallows if you are on a jury? The
:13:01. > :13:10.penalty for murder in this country is now a number of years in prison,
:13:10. > :13:15.often quite a brief number of years. That is not correct. I want to hear
:13:15. > :13:20.from Bruce Anderson. Firstly, I find the parents of the murdered
:13:20. > :13:23.boy profoundly moving, but you can't determine the criminal law.
:13:23. > :13:28.About 1000 years ago, it was decided in England that crime was
:13:28. > :13:32.not an offence against the victim, it was an offence against the
:13:32. > :13:35.king's piece. I don't think you should be entitled to demand a
:13:35. > :13:44.reprieve for your son's killers any more than you should be entitled to
:13:44. > :13:49.demand the death penalty. If we end a few of the worse murders every
:13:49. > :13:55.year, I am sure it would not have included that, the public demand
:13:55. > :13:59.for vengeance, which is not an unhealthy demand, would cease and
:13:59. > :14:09.it would be more merciful to the generality of murders. Ilott of
:14:09. > :14:09.
:14:09. > :14:14.boys of 20 now are being sentenced Either they commit more crimes or
:14:14. > :14:19.there's something wrong with the American system of justice. It is
:14:19. > :14:26.not an analogy here. The fact is that our system is a much more
:14:26. > :14:30.civilised on, I think. Is it more civilised? When you look at the
:14:30. > :14:34.victims of wrongful convictions, what you see is the same kind of
:14:34. > :14:38.demographic. Working-class people, ethnic minorities. I want to say
:14:38. > :14:42.one final thing to this, you talk about short prison sentences, but
:14:42. > :14:46.prisoners to maintain innocence in this country may never get out. We
:14:46. > :14:49.do not officially have a life without parole, but the cases that
:14:49. > :14:53.we work on our people who are given a ten-year tariff, they are still
:14:53. > :14:57.in prison after 40 years because they will not admit to a crime they
:14:57. > :15:02.said they did not do. You say that you care about innocent people in
:15:02. > :15:05.prison, but what do you do? You have to be alive to the reality of
:15:05. > :15:13.the numbers of innocent people in prison before you can do anything
:15:13. > :15:18.about it. You are heartless and you are immoral. I make no personal
:15:18. > :15:24.point of view, and I think he should do the same for me. You
:15:24. > :15:30.should accept that my views... do not accept that his motives are
:15:30. > :15:34.good? He is saying what he knows he has to save. He does not believe it,
:15:34. > :15:37.because he is not prepared to do anything about it. You cannot say
:15:38. > :15:42.you care about the innocent but then say you want the death penalty,
:15:42. > :15:46.the two things do not fit together. You have little idea what I think
:15:46. > :15:50.and have not read my book on the subject, so you are shooting off
:15:50. > :15:56.arose in the dark against what I think. Don't do it, I am addressing
:15:56. > :16:00.what you save. The simple point as this. Since the death penalty was
:16:00. > :16:03.abolished, the amount of violence capable of killing people in this
:16:03. > :16:07.country has increased enormously. The only reason our murder rate is
:16:07. > :16:11.not immensely high is because at the same time, the quality of
:16:11. > :16:15.medical treatment, particularly of trauma surgery, has increased
:16:15. > :16:19.immensely. The number of attempted murders and assaults with intent to
:16:19. > :16:22.kill his enormous each year. If we did not have superb trauma
:16:22. > :16:29.treatment, our murder rate would appear at the level of the United
:16:29. > :16:32.States. In the audience, you, sir, in the blazer. A surely the problem
:16:32. > :16:36.with the death penalty, we have talked about practical problems but
:16:36. > :16:41.not the moral question. Do we think that people who commit terrible
:16:41. > :16:44.crimes should be punished? If we do, don't we think that murder is a
:16:44. > :16:47.peculiarly terrible crime and should be punished in a particular
:16:47. > :16:51.way? It seems that the idea that people are responsible for what
:16:51. > :16:54.they do has disappeared and it has been replaced by the idea that
:16:54. > :16:58.criminals are victims themselves. That is why we do not have the
:16:58. > :17:03.death penalty and criminals are treated so soft in the first place.
:17:03. > :17:09.I confess to being a total as a first, in the De's words Parma but
:17:09. > :17:13.the death penalty is not justice but revenge. -- In Peter's words.
:17:13. > :17:20.We should not have to resort to something that a criminal would do
:17:20. > :17:26.in order to stop a criminal. don't we do more about why they do
:17:26. > :17:30.these things? Why don't we deal with that and talk more about that?
:17:30. > :17:37.Why they killed my son, rather than after. Did those boys say why they
:17:37. > :17:42.killed Chris. They were high on drink and drugs. Is it worth
:17:42. > :17:47.spending time to work out why Anders Breivik did it or not? Is it
:17:47. > :17:53.worth the time? He is a very sick man and needs help. He is a very
:17:53. > :17:59.sick man. He was playing games. He said that he played video games and
:17:59. > :18:04.taught himself how to do this. What does that say about our six society,
:18:04. > :18:09.about games? The boys that killed my son said that. They said that to
:18:09. > :18:14.the QC in court. We were playing games. Bruce Anderson. I find the
:18:14. > :18:18.smug expression on Breivik's face intolerable. I would like to
:18:18. > :18:22.adjusted with 100 lashes for a few goes on the waterboard. There is an
:18:22. > :18:29.argument for sentencing him to death and keeping him alive for the
:18:29. > :18:32.psychiatrists and people to examine and come to the conclusions. What
:18:32. > :18:36.if, Mark Mullins, somewhere down the line he turns around and says,
:18:36. > :18:42.do you know what, I have tried to talk your language, what if he says,
:18:42. > :18:47.I have got all this wrong, Christ is the answer? You are cutting off
:18:47. > :18:52.that possibility. No, well, first of all, I'm glad we recognise is
:18:52. > :18:57.not a Christian. Some people have said he is a fundamental. Do not
:18:57. > :19:01.hold out hope that he will find God? It is amazing how the debt and
:19:01. > :19:06.of the concentrates the mind. are not answering my question.
:19:06. > :19:10.is his time to repent. If you leave it, the sentence is prolonged and
:19:10. > :19:13.people harden their hearts against the consequences. Many people
:19:13. > :19:20.convert in prison. Somebody who knows they will face the death
:19:20. > :19:23.penalty has an opportunity to repent, and many take it. They
:19:23. > :19:28.deserve what they get, but they go to heaven at the end because they
:19:28. > :19:32.repent. They repent of their sins and trust in Christ, and that is
:19:32. > :19:38.far more important. He cannot have a view on the death penalty and
:19:38. > :19:42.less to have read Peter's book, astonishing! -- unless you have
:19:42. > :19:47.read. The Christian faith in which I am raising my children is
:19:47. > :19:52.represented by these people, not by you. From the Islamic Party of
:19:52. > :19:58.Britain, the support the death penalty? Yes, I do. For what?
:19:58. > :20:04.the right reasons. It should be down to the families to decide. As
:20:04. > :20:08.I mentioned earlier, the Ten Commandments have been overtaken by
:20:08. > :20:13.rules and regulations that have failed as. It should not be
:20:13. > :20:19.eliminated. It should be allowed. I remember the Moors murderers, and I
:20:19. > :20:23.met people who have lived with that. Likewise, year. Absolutely awful.
:20:23. > :20:27.But they would not have found out why the body was buried had she not
:20:27. > :20:32.been kept alive. There was information that came later, was it
:20:32. > :20:38.there? There was, but the fact that Myra Hindley, Lord Longford was
:20:38. > :20:42.wanting her released. Do you think Breivik should die? I think so, yes.
:20:42. > :20:51.If one of the 7/7 bombers had been caught, should he have been put to
:20:51. > :20:58.death? Yes, but we know that 9/11 and 7/7 were not done by... O, I
:20:59. > :21:04.see! We know that, do we? I cannot argue with the man with the crystal
:21:04. > :21:09.ball, I am terribly sorry. We go around the country, two schools and
:21:10. > :21:15.youth clubs, and we work with a lot of young people. We teach the Judd
:21:15. > :21:19.to put down their knife, put down the gun and stop revenge. One we
:21:19. > :21:26.are talking about his revenge. are we teaching our young children
:21:26. > :21:34.out there? We are talking about justice. No, sir, justice is about
:21:34. > :21:39.government... Should he be dead? This man should not be dead, no.
:21:39. > :21:44.would have been dead! If it was down to the victim's family, they
:21:44. > :21:49.wanted me dead! As soon as you are convicted... Address him on that.
:21:49. > :21:58.You can never justify the death penalty. We are supposed to live in
:21:58. > :22:03.a civilised society. I can justify it. You cannot justify it! What
:22:03. > :22:08.about the youngsters of today? What kind of message is that sending? It
:22:08. > :22:14.is OK to kill kill the Pope if you are in government? We are the
:22:15. > :22:19.government, you killed him, I am going to kill you. -- it is OK to
:22:19. > :22:26.kill him guilty folk. The one caricaturing me. You cannot justify
:22:26. > :22:30.the death penalty, innocent people have already been murdered.
:22:30. > :22:35.should try... Or Ray Gilbert has done 30 years, and is still trying
:22:35. > :22:42.to clear his name. He has had his latest appeal turned down. There
:22:42. > :22:47.are people in prison who have done these crimes. Oh, of course. I know
:22:47. > :22:51.a few of them. Michael! There are guilty people in society who
:22:51. > :22:58.escaped justice because innocent people are serving their sentences.
:22:58. > :23:03.Last word! We do not live in a perfect society. You cannot make an
:23:03. > :23:07.emotional case, citing again and again the horrible things which
:23:07. > :23:11.happen to people who are murdered. I could do that, but I'm not,
:23:12. > :23:17.because I think there is a rational case for the death are the which
:23:17. > :23:23.you need to consider. No, there is not. The last word. Is this
:23:23. > :23:28.emotional? It is not emotional. I needed answers. We both needed
:23:28. > :23:32.answers. Do you respect people who do not take your course, who say,
:23:32. > :23:37.actually, I would like the person who killed my little Bill... I feel
:23:37. > :23:43.terribly sad for them. I understand where they are coming from, I have
:23:43. > :23:47.been there, but I have chosen to move on, and there are many like as
:23:47. > :23:53.though know that now and are moving on. We want to help other people.
:23:53. > :23:58.This takes time. Meeting the boys who killed our son was part of that.
:23:58. > :24:02.It was part of getting the answers. The process goes on. It is one more
:24:03. > :24:06.thing, everyone keeps quoting the Old Testament. Gandhi said, if we
:24:06. > :24:11.start looking for an eye for eye, three-quarters of the world would
:24:11. > :24:18.be blind. Thank you very much for your contributions. If you would
:24:18. > :24:22.like to have your say about that debate, go to the website. We are
:24:22. > :24:26.also debating live from the Ashton Park School in Bristol, is there
:24:26. > :24:30.something rotten at the heart of British politics? And should have
:24:30. > :24:33.and kosher meat be labelled? Tell us what to think about those topics,
:24:33. > :24:42.send us your ideas for future debates for any general comments
:24:42. > :24:48.Toulouse one Cabinet minister, Mr Cameron, may be regarded as a
:24:48. > :24:53.misfortune. To lose two may be regarded as carelessness. What
:24:53. > :24:57.would Oscar Wilde have made of the relationship between Jeremy Hunt
:24:57. > :25:01.and Adam Smith? Who said what to whom has all the makings of a long-
:25:01. > :25:06.running Whitehall farce. Is there something rotten at the heart of
:25:06. > :25:10.British politics? James O'Brien, where did it all go wrong? What is
:25:10. > :25:14.at fault? It is sanction, the idea that when you are caught out with
:25:14. > :25:18.your fingers in the till or wherever else it may be, in bed
:25:18. > :25:22.with Rupert Murdoch, metaphorically speaking, you can wriggle your way
:25:22. > :25:26.out, get out of trouble. It is not confined to the Conservative Party.
:25:26. > :25:30.Peter Mandelson could give Jeremy Hunt a master class in evading
:25:30. > :25:34.responsibility. I'm afraid, if you behave like schoolchildren, you
:25:34. > :25:38.need to be treated like schoolchildren, and you need a
:25:38. > :25:41.strict set of guidelines which is enforced independently from above,
:25:41. > :25:45.not in the Prime Minister's gift, because he is passing the buck out
:25:45. > :25:48.of sheer terror that he will be next in the firing line, and not
:25:48. > :25:53.out of a politically appointed person. It needs to be an
:25:53. > :25:55.independent Inquirer who can impose what is already there, a fairly
:25:55. > :26:00.robust ministerial code which is apparently treated with contempt by
:26:00. > :26:07.any politician even close to power. First of all, the government wanted
:26:07. > :26:11.Jeremy Hunt to be cross-examined as quickly as possible by Robert Jay...
:26:11. > :26:16.You are not supposed to choose who does it! He is a formidable cross
:26:16. > :26:20.examiner. Can I take you out of the particular and taking to the
:26:20. > :26:24.general a little bit before we focus in, Bruce? Never has the
:26:24. > :26:27.public been so disillusioned with the political process. I have a
:26:27. > :26:31.quote here, in our political system, too much power is concentrated in
:26:31. > :26:35.the hands of the elite and denied to the man and woman on the street.
:26:35. > :26:40.We have been seen the symptoms of that for years, decisions made
:26:40. > :26:45.behind closed doors. Our politics is broken. First of all, who said
:26:45. > :26:51.that? It is obviously a trick question, probably David Cameron.
:26:51. > :26:57.Absolutely right! Is he right? I think he was not right. We have a
:26:57. > :27:00.very robust democracy in this country, a democratic temperament,
:27:00. > :27:06.we have newspapers who neither fear nor favour, who scrutinise
:27:06. > :27:13.inexhaustibly. I think we also have... We have newspapers who
:27:13. > :27:15.neither fear nor favour? Newspapers who do not favour them? We have
:27:15. > :27:19.newspapers who actually are prepared to scrutinise any
:27:19. > :27:24.government of any party. No government has had an easy ride
:27:24. > :27:29.from the press for years. Secondly, most MPs are decent people, and
:27:29. > :27:32.that is true of all parties. They work hard, they came to public
:27:32. > :27:38.service with high motives. Certainly, mistakes have been made,
:27:38. > :27:42.but if David Cameron had a devil's bargain with Rupert Murdoch, why on
:27:42. > :27:45.earth was Vince Cable initially in charge of this? It was only an
:27:45. > :27:49.accident that threw it on Jeremy Hunt. Now, Jeremy Hunt told me at
:27:49. > :27:53.the time, I asked him what was going on, I was not expecting an
:27:53. > :28:01.answer and I did not get one. Be said, he is taking the role very
:28:01. > :28:06.seriously. Did he say, this is a trick question! I imagine he will
:28:06. > :28:10.emerge with his reputation unsullied. If things are so
:28:10. > :28:16.wonderful, why is it in the Bradford by-election a fringe
:28:16. > :28:21.candidate got 56% of the vote? Why is it that we hear that it is
:28:21. > :28:24.possible to buy access to the Prime Minister? Access to the Prime
:28:25. > :28:28.Minister, we know through Mrs Thatcher and John Major and Tony
:28:28. > :28:34.Blair and Gordon Brown at David Cameron, they dropped everything to
:28:34. > :28:44.see Rupert Murdoch at his best. Why can't that be the case for the
:28:44. > :28:48.
:28:48. > :28:55.We know why Rupert Murdoch can see the Prime Minister, because he
:28:55. > :29:02.owned several newspapers. The Sun in particular does what he tells
:29:02. > :29:07.them. By the way, Rupert Murdoch at one stage also seemed to be above
:29:07. > :29:12.the law. He now knows different. I do not think there will be another
:29:12. > :29:19.newspaper proprietor like Rupert Murdoch in the next century. He has
:29:19. > :29:22.paid the price for his behaviour. So David Cameron opens his door to
:29:22. > :29:26.the newspaper proprietors who are in charge of the newspapers that
:29:26. > :29:30.neither fear nor favour any politician? That is ridiculous.
:29:30. > :29:34.Either they do favour politicians, which is why Rupert Murdoch sees
:29:34. > :29:39.them, or they don't. It is a journalist's job to push the
:29:39. > :29:44.envelope, we can't blame them. It is a politician's job to say no, I
:29:44. > :29:50.don't want to come to your party or have a ride on the horse that you
:29:50. > :29:57.borrowed. If you don't want to holiday on their yacht, does that
:29:57. > :30:01.mean there is no such thing as a free launch?! I am wary of the idea
:30:01. > :30:06.that we live in the best possible world with all these nice
:30:06. > :30:10.politicians who only ever make mistakes. Forgive me for being
:30:10. > :30:15.cynical, but haven't we got to the point where it is clear that the
:30:15. > :30:19.vested interests, be they lobby groups or the established parties,
:30:19. > :30:26.have been so long in this little dance with each other that we need
:30:26. > :30:32.something new and fit for purpose? We need to get beyond the point
:30:32. > :30:37.where these guys deign to say, I would consider resigning. This
:30:37. > :30:45.might amuse you. We asked a lot of lobbyists to come on, and none were
:30:45. > :30:50.particularly keen. One of them said, get real. Lobbyists were denounced
:30:50. > :31:00.by David Cameron two years ago. He said, this is the next major
:31:00. > :31:01.
:31:01. > :31:06.scandal. And he is right. This to until then had not finished. David
:31:06. > :31:10.Cameron has refused to use the ministerial code. It was used only
:31:10. > :31:14.once under the last government against Shahid Malik, and he was
:31:14. > :31:23.found not guilty. It should have been used in the Adam Werritty and
:31:23. > :31:29.Liam Fox case, and should also have been used against Eric Pickles.
:31:29. > :31:34.finish your point. We must surely deserve as a society a system that
:31:34. > :31:43.enshrined in law that these deals are not going on behind closed
:31:43. > :31:48.doors. I will reveal my sources is not enough. I might resign is not
:31:48. > :31:58.enough. It should be a criminal offence to have that level of venal
:31:58. > :32:05.complicity. There is no venal complicity. But we are talking
:32:05. > :32:09.about the entire culture. Peter, is it rotten? Yes, it is rotten at the
:32:09. > :32:14.heart for his simple reason. Political parties have long ago
:32:14. > :32:19.departed from having anything to do with what most people think. It
:32:19. > :32:23.happened mainly during the 1960s. We have developed in this country a
:32:23. > :32:30.political elite which is almost entirely disconnected from the
:32:30. > :32:33.concerns, fears and worries of most people. And that a leak is only
:32:33. > :32:37.sustained because the political parties are twin corpses with
:32:37. > :32:42.vigour mortis propping each other up. If one fell, the other would
:32:42. > :32:45.fall. But they probably each other up in this farce of five-year
:32:45. > :32:55.elections in which millions don't participate and others vote because
:32:55. > :32:57.
:32:57. > :33:01.they can't think of anything better to do. And they can't vote for one
:33:01. > :33:04.of the others because of many of the rules and a huge preponderance
:33:04. > :33:07.of millionaires contributing prevent any outsiders coming into
:33:07. > :33:11.our political system. You have to be immensely rich to run a
:33:11. > :33:15.political campaign, and you would then have to go to the BBC and say,
:33:15. > :33:19.when the election comes up, even though I did not exist at the last
:33:19. > :33:22.election, you have to give me coverage. Under broadcasting rules,
:33:22. > :33:26.they will not. You have to change the rules and exclude the dodgy
:33:26. > :33:30.millionaires. Under those circumstances, we might develop
:33:30. > :33:34.political parties which actually represent my point of view and your
:33:34. > :33:44.point of view, both of which at the moment are not represented. People
:33:44. > :33:49.
:33:49. > :33:53.should stop voting the parties which despise them. At the moment,
:33:53. > :34:00.the main issue for the people of Bradford West was to bring our
:34:01. > :34:04.troops home from Afghanistan. People are dying in a war which
:34:04. > :34:07.virtually nobody believes in any more. We can't even debate it in
:34:07. > :34:12.the House of Commons. I have been trying for eight weeks to vote on
:34:12. > :34:20.this subject. There is a dislocation. We have great strength
:34:21. > :34:24.in our democracy, though, and we should not throw it out. You have
:34:24. > :34:28.looked at democracies all over the world. What do we have to
:34:28. > :34:34.celebrate? We need a bit of perspective. The British system is
:34:34. > :34:37.one of the healthiest democracies in the world. Things like the
:34:37. > :34:42.Leveson inquiry proved that, the fact that every day, you can switch
:34:42. > :34:45.on your TV and see people being questioned. Unlike Russia? They
:34:45. > :34:52.would never have the Leveson inquiry in Russia. How about
:34:52. > :34:55.France? It is debatable. They did not have it in Greece. It is
:34:55. > :34:59.unthinkable here that we could get to a situation where we would find
:34:59. > :35:03.that corruption is endemic, the country was bankrupt and the social
:35:03. > :35:07.order would then break down. Are we a beacon of excellence? We are in a
:35:07. > :35:12.worse position than two years ago. Other countries are learning from
:35:12. > :35:19.us. Of course, it is not perfect. Politics is a messy business. There
:35:19. > :35:22.are many demands on politicians. Two years ago, we had a nightmare
:35:22. > :35:32.over the expenses scandal. Most people thought this was rock bottom.
:35:32. > :35:42.
:35:42. > :35:46.But we are now subterranean. Peter is getting frustrated. A load of
:35:46. > :35:53.sycophancy is the last thing we need. You are constantly telling us
:35:53. > :35:57.what a wonderful man this ghastly creature is, Cameron. It is a dirty
:35:57. > :36:03.job, someone has to do it, but in this country almost everything is
:36:03. > :36:06.broken. The schools don't educate, the police don't tackle crime, the
:36:06. > :36:11.streets are disorderly, the transport system doesn't work. We
:36:11. > :36:15.don't make or export anything substantial. We are increasingly
:36:15. > :36:19.declining in national status and in our economy. Almost nothing which
:36:19. > :36:24.any of us actually has to use, apart from very rich people in
:36:24. > :36:28.London, almost nothing works. me tell you one thing which is
:36:28. > :36:31.fantastic. To sit there smugly and say we are one of the best
:36:31. > :36:35.democracies in the world can only be said by a member of an out-of-
:36:35. > :36:39.touch elite. There is one fantastic thing in this country. We are
:36:39. > :36:43.having this debate. It is being had at the Leveson inquiry and in
:36:43. > :36:49.Parliament. This is not the case in other countries. When we had the
:36:49. > :36:53.expenses scandal, it revealed that a lot of individuals had been
:36:53. > :36:58.crossing the line and have brought the reputation of Parliament into
:36:58. > :37:03.disrepute. But at the same time, with an address that. We introduced
:37:03. > :37:11.new institutions and a new cohort of MPs came in. There will always
:37:11. > :37:15.be problems with politics, but we need to learn. Some of the things
:37:15. > :37:21.that have been most wrong in Britain have been education and
:37:21. > :37:25.welfare. Our school system was failing. Our welfare system
:37:25. > :37:28.encouraged illness. This Government has brought about the biggest
:37:28. > :37:34.education reform since 1944 and the biggest welfare reform since
:37:34. > :37:43.Beveridge. Two massive bills that will influence this country for the
:37:43. > :37:46.years to come. Let me come to the audience. Good morning. Firstly,
:37:46. > :37:56.you can win a political campaign without loads of money, because we
:37:56. > :37:56.
:37:56. > :37:59.did it in Brighton last year. When I was canvassing, I came across
:37:59. > :38:03.young people being incredibly turned off politics. They said, I
:38:03. > :38:08.don't think I will bother voting. Clearly, there is something wrong
:38:08. > :38:13.with the way it is being done at the moment, if young people do not
:38:13. > :38:16.want to engage. We all accept that people are getting disengaged from
:38:16. > :38:21.politics and have been for a long time, especially the younger
:38:21. > :38:27.generation. Everyone is looking for who is responsible. We have got
:38:27. > :38:30.media inquiries and politicians blaming the media. What about the
:38:30. > :38:34.electorate? We have a responsibility ourselves. In this
:38:34. > :38:38.country, we get the press we deserve, the leaders we deserve. If
:38:38. > :38:48.we don't like it, it is time this country stood up and started doing
:38:48. > :38:53.more about it. Last year, as a mama four who knows little about
:38:53. > :38:57.politics and had little interest, I decide to stand in my local council.
:38:57. > :39:01.I did not get in, but got quite a number of votes, which I was
:39:01. > :39:06.pleased about. It was such an experience. But I agree that we
:39:06. > :39:14.have to educate our children about how important it is to voice their
:39:14. > :39:18.needs. Don't grumble about anything. Politics is about them. It should
:39:18. > :39:23.be, and it would be great if the people in government reflected
:39:23. > :39:27.society as a whole, not white middle-class men and very few women
:39:27. > :39:32.and ethnic minorities. White middle-class men are part of
:39:32. > :39:35.society, aren't you? I have grown a beard to defy the stereotype. But
:39:35. > :39:40.there is some common ground which will accommodate almost everybody
:39:40. > :39:45.except Bruce. And the common ground is that the institutions are indeed
:39:45. > :39:48.sound. The mechanisms we have in place in this country are the envy
:39:48. > :39:53.of the free world. But the people populating those institutions are
:39:53. > :39:58.now increasingly pygmies. Paul has mentioned his age today. Forgive me,
:39:58. > :40:01.but you mark the end of an era. The people of my generation, I am 40,
:40:01. > :40:05.are doing so because they could not get a job in a more glamourous
:40:05. > :40:09.career. George Osborne fell to get her on the Times as a trainee.
:40:09. > :40:13.Boris Johnson got the elbow from another graduate training scheme on
:40:13. > :40:21.newspapers. They went into politics because it was the only avenue left
:40:21. > :40:25.open to them that fits their image of themselves. Bruce, you think
:40:25. > :40:32.that MPs don't get paid enough? think they should be paid �100,000
:40:32. > :40:41.a year. So that you get better candidates? I agree. Some MPs are
:40:41. > :40:47.no doubt paid too much. But the hard-working ones are paid far too
:40:47. > :40:52.little. Politics is not a career. people need to make a living.
:40:52. > :40:59.People should not be allowed to go into politics until they have done
:40:59. > :41:06.something and had some experience. People have been special advisers
:41:06. > :41:15.and not been sacked by their ministers. We will have to conclude
:41:15. > :41:18.this, but Paul Flynn, I give you the last word. If all the MPs have
:41:18. > :41:22.prayed and meant it at the beginning of each day, that might
:41:22. > :41:26.improve things. Are you allowed to pray? We do pray at the start of
:41:26. > :41:30.each day. The most trenchant comment was made by an octogenarian
:41:31. > :41:34.last week, he talked about the posh boy sacking his servant. But the
:41:34. > :41:39.prayer we say, which would be a great model if everyone believed it
:41:39. > :41:43.in the House of Commons, may we never lead the nation wrongly
:41:43. > :41:46.through love of power, desire to please awkwardly ideals, but laying
:41:46. > :41:56.aside or private interests or prejudices, keep in mind the
:41:56. > :41:59.
:41:59. > :42:03.responsibility to seek, to improve the condition of all humankind.
:42:03. > :42:12.Empty benches at prayer time, unfortunately, but will Jeremy Hunt
:42:12. > :42:17.last the week? No. Thank you all very much. You can continue that
:42:17. > :42:22.discussion online. Send us your views about the last big question:
:42:22. > :42:26.should halal and kosher meat be labelled? Silence on the front
:42:26. > :42:32.benches, please. If you would like to be in the audience at a future
:42:32. > :42:35.show, you can e-mail us. Next week, a pre-recorded special from Bristol
:42:35. > :42:41.will be on, debating just one big question: is religion good for
:42:41. > :42:44.children? We will be back live from Northolt in west London on May 30th
:42:44. > :42:51.and recording a special edition on cults over there in the afternoon.
:42:51. > :42:54.And the last show of the series will come from Glasgow on June 3rd.
:42:54. > :42:57.This week, the House of Commons narrowly voted against the
:42:57. > :43:00.compulsory labelling of ritually slaughtered meat, but the campaign
:43:00. > :43:04.to get halal and kosher meat clearly labelled and supermarkets
:43:04. > :43:08.and restaurants continues both here and on the other side of the
:43:08. > :43:12.Channel. It was a big issue in the French election, thanks to
:43:12. > :43:15.President Sarkozy. Is this a concern for animal welfare or
:43:15. > :43:21.reform of anti-Islamic or anti- Semitic prejudice? Should halal and
:43:21. > :43:25.kosher meat be labelled? You have a real problem with this, Alistair
:43:25. > :43:29.Kirk from the Barnabas fund. You think a lot of Christians would
:43:29. > :43:38.have a problem eating a bit of chicken or whatever which has had a
:43:38. > :43:42.We are not opposed to religious groups having access to food which
:43:43. > :43:49.has been prepared in accordance with their requirements. Tell me
:43:49. > :43:56.about the blessing point. There are many reasons why people might be
:43:56. > :44:02.concerned about religiously slaughtered meat, but particularly
:44:02. > :44:08.halal, the cars over the past few years there is an instruction --
:44:08. > :44:11.because over the past three years there has been an introduction of
:44:11. > :44:16.halal and many Christians are concerned about the Islamic
:44:16. > :44:20.blessing as the meat is prepared, facing Mecca, which is in fact
:44:20. > :44:26.Sharia compliance. The compliance is always through the entire
:44:26. > :44:31.process. If you say grace, does that not kind of...? Well,
:44:31. > :44:35.absolutely, but many Christians are concerned about that. The blessing?
:44:35. > :44:42.Yes, about the actual blessing. is just a bit of chicken at the end
:44:42. > :44:46.of the day, isn't it? Well, I love chicken, but I do not needed to be
:44:46. > :44:52.in compliance with Sharia. We just want it to be labelled. We want
:44:52. > :44:56.there to be a choice so that people know, so that the Christian and, in
:44:56. > :45:00.fact, many other groups as well, including six, who are
:45:00. > :45:06.discriminated against in his area, can make an informed decision and
:45:06. > :45:10.that there is also a choice, that it should be labelled. In halal,
:45:10. > :45:15.they say the animal is made sure it has a good life and also a good
:45:15. > :45:20.death. Also, should you not be more concerned perhaps with intensive
:45:20. > :45:24.farming and factory farming issues than you are with the prayer that
:45:24. > :45:28.is said at the time of death? there are many reasons, and the
:45:28. > :45:33.prayer is just one. I know that there will be represented views
:45:33. > :45:38.here of the animal welfare. I should also point out that the
:45:38. > :45:42.issue is not quite the same with kosher, which is already adequately
:45:42. > :45:48.labelled, and there is not quite the pressure for it to go into the
:45:48. > :45:53.mainstream. Let's move it on. concern is that people need to know
:45:53. > :45:59.where their money is going, and not many people may realise that a
:45:59. > :46:03.proportion of the cost of the food does contribute towards halal
:46:03. > :46:07.certification, and there are examples of those organisations
:46:08. > :46:12.also been involved in other Islamic activities. People deserve the
:46:13. > :46:17.right to know. Let's get his going, does this matter? In the great
:46:17. > :46:22.scheme of things, I'm not sure I understand your argument. I respect
:46:22. > :46:28.your sensitivities, but if I am a Christian poet halal chicken, are
:46:28. > :46:37.my religious bits being trumped? Am I injuring my spiritual welfare?
:46:37. > :46:42.That is a personal decision. What is yours? Am I? Look, with...
:46:42. > :46:45.you believe all other religions are wrong... It is a conscience issue.
:46:45. > :46:51.It is the right to know. This is about transparency. What should I
:46:51. > :46:57.be worried about? We have labelling for absolutely everything else.
:46:57. > :47:01.What are my risking by eating halal food? Can I answer that? In first
:47:01. > :47:05.Corinthians, the reason we are advised not to eat labelled food is
:47:05. > :47:14.that it might give the appearance to some, although I would say
:47:14. > :47:18.Christians, some might think that I am in some way giving some credit
:47:18. > :47:24.to the Muslim God, who has originally blessed this food.
:47:24. > :47:29.not the same God? The God of the Bible and the Muslim God has no son.
:47:30. > :47:33.Jesus Christ is the son of God. Actually, James, I agree with you.
:47:33. > :47:39.For that reason, we do not have to, but welfare concerns may dictate
:47:39. > :47:44.that we should, because some people may have objections. You are not
:47:44. > :47:50.really answering my question. question is, will it endanger my
:47:50. > :47:54.soul? What you are risking, if, in your heart, you have no issue about
:47:54. > :47:59.it, you do not risk anything, but you may cause somebody else, a
:47:59. > :48:03.weaker brother, to think that by you eating halal food, you are in
:48:03. > :48:08.some way endorsing the Islamic God in his name it was killed? That is
:48:08. > :48:14.the reason. David, what about the Islamic position? Should this be
:48:14. > :48:18.labelled? Yes, it should, for the very good reason that if you see
:48:18. > :48:22.the technical superiority of what happens when you slaughter an
:48:22. > :48:28.animal according to either Jewish law or Islamic law, as compared
:48:28. > :48:33.with stunning, and this was done in Germany, then you can see the
:48:33. > :48:37.superiority. Let's Labour-led to show which animals suffered pain. -
:48:37. > :48:43.- the label it. The culture and Islamic way shows that the animal
:48:43. > :48:49.suffers no pain. Stunning happens in 80% of Islamic meat. Then it
:48:49. > :48:53.cannot be halal. There has been a compromise, just before death, 80%
:48:53. > :49:02.of halal has been stunned. You have endured the animal and inflicted
:49:02. > :49:07.pain. So 80% of halal meat is not halal? So you are a purist. No, I
:49:07. > :49:11.am correct. I have been a butcher, and it is a compromise. So it is
:49:12. > :49:20.sold under false pretences? Absolutely. Is it cruel, cutting
:49:20. > :49:24.the track here like that? The vet Mary profession's concern, we are
:49:24. > :49:28.very focused on animal welfare. -- veterinary. Legislation requires
:49:29. > :49:32.that animals be stunned before slaughter, which renders them
:49:33. > :49:36.immediately unconscious, and then the unpleasant things that happen
:49:36. > :49:42.afterwards happens to an animal that is insensible and incapable of
:49:42. > :49:45.feeling that. What we support, other than stunning, is for food to
:49:45. > :49:51.be labelled not necessarily according to whether it is halal or
:49:51. > :49:54.kosher... We wanted to be labelled as to whether it is done or not,
:49:54. > :49:59.because that is important because of the welfare risk that people are
:50:00. > :50:04.increasingly concerned about. More and more people are concerned with
:50:04. > :50:10.the welfare of animals, and, yes, if we look at the science, there
:50:10. > :50:14.are at least three welfare risks. One is the delay to unconsciousness,
:50:14. > :50:19.with the ritual slaughter. Because of that delay, it allows pain to be
:50:19. > :50:24.felt, and there is scientific evidence to support that. He is a
:50:24. > :50:28.vet. We have already done the trials, and we know from EEG and
:50:28. > :50:32.ECG that animals do not feel the pain. Aside from the pain, which
:50:32. > :50:36.was going to be my third point, animals slaughtered in this way
:50:36. > :50:41.also as break some of their own blood, and that happens to a high
:50:41. > :50:44.percentage. -- aspirate. If you can imagine water going down the wrong
:50:44. > :50:52.way, there are two parts of the respiratory tract which are very
:50:52. > :50:55.sensitive to that. That is associated with some of the pain
:50:55. > :51:00.that you get in certain respiratory infections. Stunning is the best
:51:00. > :51:04.way? I do not know who has witnessed it, but it is remarkable.
:51:04. > :51:09.It is a technology that is now available to us where a very large
:51:09. > :51:13.beast, a cow, if you like, is touched on the forehead, in the
:51:13. > :51:18.case of Captain Bold stunning, and it is like blown a candle out. It
:51:18. > :51:22.is like switching off a light. They drop to the ground, instantly
:51:22. > :51:29.insensible, and any argument about future pain, it is a humane death,
:51:29. > :51:33.it is wrong. Rabbi. There have been two points discussed here. On the
:51:33. > :51:40.cruelty point. On the cruelty point, one of the things we know about the
:51:40. > :51:45.meat industry is that it is an industry, there is a lot of
:51:45. > :51:49.pressure to make sure that it is run efficiently. The efficient
:51:49. > :51:52.running of a slaughter house... kosher slaughter crawl?
:51:52. > :51:55.efficient running of a slaughterhouse is not necessarily
:51:55. > :51:59.in the best welfare of the animal. If you're trying to process many
:51:59. > :52:05.animals under pressure of time, you are trying to get as many through
:52:05. > :52:10.as possible, so inevitably there are problems. About 9% of animals
:52:11. > :52:15.are badly stunned, so they have to be shot twice. The gassing of
:52:15. > :52:20.animals, pigs are cast, 16% of them are not being gassed properly, and
:52:20. > :52:26.they are suffering pain. So that a man's in total to approximately 3
:52:26. > :52:31.million animals every year. -- amounts. The total amount of
:52:31. > :52:36.animals which have kosher slaughter every year is 90,000. I think Shaun
:52:36. > :52:43.should be more concerned about 3 million animals being badly stunned
:52:43. > :52:47.or shot twice than 90,000 being slaughtered in kosher. There are
:52:47. > :52:53.two ones that I'm keen to make. The religious texts which prescribe how
:52:53. > :52:57.meat should be made available for the halal and kosher market, my
:52:57. > :53:02.colleagues were correct me if I am wrong, but originally they are to
:53:02. > :53:06.convey a sense of moral respect for animals. They were public health
:53:06. > :53:09.and public safety benefits as well, but originally making a prayer or
:53:09. > :53:12.saying a prayer at the time of death conveyed a sense of moral
:53:12. > :53:17.respect. What has happened since those texts were written is that
:53:17. > :53:20.science has advanced and technology has advanced, which allows us to
:53:20. > :53:29.interpret those texts, hopefully that matter of they did not have
:53:29. > :53:35.stunning back then. I would like to address that as well. Sorry, but
:53:35. > :53:39.the in the issue, the issue is that the main lobby is the cartridge
:53:39. > :53:43.manufacturers. This is a massive industry. Always look for the
:53:43. > :53:47.earner, that is where you have to be looking. You think some of the
:53:47. > :53:52.opposition is Islamophobia? course, it always has been. The
:53:52. > :53:58.point is... The British Veterinary Association are not Islamophobic.
:53:58. > :54:02.They should not be, but I have written for many years, and my
:54:02. > :54:06.cousin was an inspector with the RSPCA, and they will not listen.
:54:06. > :54:14.There is a very powerful lobby. would go to the audience. Everyone
:54:14. > :54:19.should have a right to know what they are eating. People should have
:54:19. > :54:25.the right to know, but if it causes allergies and things like that, but
:54:25. > :54:29.it is just going to cause more racism and alienate the Muslim and
:54:29. > :54:33.Christian relationship. You wanted to come in, didn't you? I think we
:54:34. > :54:38.are missing the point. A lot of people right now in South Africa
:54:38. > :54:43.are starving. Do you really think they care whether it is labelled or
:54:44. > :54:47.not? You know? There are bigger issues here. This is a trivial
:54:47. > :54:53.debate on this particular issue! People are dying in South Africa,
:54:53. > :54:58.right? Why? Because they have got no prude! If you tell them they
:54:58. > :55:03.cannot eat chicken because it has not been labelled or blessed or in
:55:03. > :55:08.a certain weight, the first thing they will do is eat it. That is
:55:08. > :55:15.more important than labelling. There is another point here that
:55:15. > :55:20.people who are cruel to animals often go on to be cruel to people.
:55:20. > :55:24.I take that point. A society that is not concerned about cruelty to
:55:24. > :55:32.animals is a society that the cruel to animals, so that is why it is
:55:33. > :55:37.worth discussing. Bruce. It does occur to me that it is not about
:55:37. > :55:39.cruelty, halal and kosher, it is about religious tradition, and if
:55:39. > :55:45.people want to keep up their tradition, I think they should be
:55:45. > :55:54.allowed to. I see no harm in labelling, I do not see what the
:55:54. > :55:57.problem is. We are very sensitive to Islamophobia. People may
:55:57. > :56:04.complain about the matter of halal killing, but that does not mean
:56:04. > :56:07.they are Islamophobic. President Sarkozy's motivations are extremely
:56:07. > :56:12.questionable with one week to go before the election. There is a
:56:12. > :56:15.disproportionate focus on labelling a certain kind of meat, so an
:56:15. > :56:19.assumption that if it is being slaughtered in a kosher way, but
:56:19. > :56:23.that is cruel to animals. There is no evidence to demonstrate that,
:56:23. > :56:28.and leading scientists say that the experiments they have done show
:56:28. > :56:34.that the animal when the throat has been cut does not react at all.
:56:35. > :56:38.What is the scientific consensus? We could debate this... We are
:56:38. > :56:43.doing the same tests under his jurisdiction. What is the
:56:43. > :56:50.consensus? We are relying heavily on the behavioural and prey
:56:50. > :56:54.measures. We have made very good use of BG, which give us a measure
:56:54. > :56:57.of brain activity linked to pain, and we can look at the pathology of
:56:57. > :57:01.the respiratory tract. But if we talk about it from the point of
:57:01. > :57:05.view of consensus, this is a view shared by not only the British
:57:05. > :57:10.Veterinary Association, the Federation of veterinarians of
:57:10. > :57:16.Europe, representing 38 countries, the project which looked at 200
:57:16. > :57:19.scientific references. A lot of people. The EU scientific panel on
:57:19. > :57:24.animal welfare, the Farm Animal all welfare committee, which advises
:57:24. > :57:29.the British government. We have all reached the same consensus. We have
:57:29. > :57:34.overlooked the drive that Bruce mentioned, the Sarkozy business,
:57:34. > :57:37.there is Islamophobia intrinsic to that. The Islamophobia is born of
:57:37. > :57:40.the English Defence League and the far right rhetoric which says that
:57:40. > :57:44.Muslims are trying to take over the world, creeping Sharia is the
:57:44. > :57:48.phrase that they use. They are forcing us to eat their food, that
:57:48. > :57:52.is part of the language and vocabulary of hate, and to bring us
:57:52. > :57:56.back to where we began this morning, back to Anders Breivik in a
:57:56. > :58:00.Norwegian courtroom, Voltaire said that those who can convince us of
:58:00. > :58:05.absurdities will also convinces to commit atrocities. That is why the
:58:05. > :58:09.Islamophobia angle is important. Last word, 20 seconds. The halal
:58:09. > :58:15.Food Authority, the certifying body, a Muslim organisation, also