Maisie: Page 94, the Private Eye Podcast
Andy: Hello and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name is Andrew Hunter Murray, and I'm here in the private eye offices with
Helen Lewis, Adam McQueen and Ian Hislop.
We are here to discuss, the minor little obscure stories of the week's news.
Just, a few things you might have missed.
So we thought we'd start off with number one.
America the number of very aged men standing for the presidency has halved in
the last 24 hours at time of recording.
this is very exciting.
Helen: Yes.
When you say America, since we were last here, an enormous
amount has happened in America.
We, we are now recording this.
After the attempted assassination attempt on Donald Trump after the Republican
National Convention in Milwaukee, in which everybody in the Republican Party was
very, happy about the fact that they were running against extremely old Joe Biden.
And then the Sunday night pivot into update extremely old Joe
Biden has finally conceded.
He's too old.
And now the Republican Party is sad and say Donald Trump did an amazing
true social post where he said I should get all my money back, but
I spent campaigning against Biden 'cause it's not gonna be him now.
Essentially she's very hopeful, good luck to him.
Ian: I enjoyed the fact that it was the speaker, Nancy Pelosi,
who's even older than Biden, who apparently, eventually told him, you
are too old, even by old standards.
is that fair?
Helen: Yeah.
She's 84 and she had been ratcheting up the pressure behind
the scenes for quite a long time.
It was cons, it's generally considered it's been her and Barack Obama.
And she did a very, coded interview after Joe Biden said, no, actually I think
I'm gonna, I'm gonna stay in saying, whatever Joe Biden decides, we'll all
support him, whatever it might be.
and that kind of gave the coded signal.
And then, George Clooney wrote an op-ed in the New York Times, in
which he also said, I love him.
He is one of my best friends.
But sometimes you have to say to people.
Sold off oldie.
It was broadly, and that was con, that was seen as being directed by Obama, right?
So the two people who never need to run for elected office again in the
Democratic party, had taken over, the effort so that they wouldn't be seen
by anyone to be jocking for position or doing it in their own interest.
None of the potential contenders had come anywhere near saying
they thought he should go.
Ian: And can I just check?
'cause Biden, he sent out his resignation letter and then he added afterwards
that he supported, Kamala Harris.
Now, given that.
Not very long ago he confused her with Trump.
Did he mean to say he supported Trump?
Adam: You hope someone check that tweet, don't you?
Helen: I wondered about that.
I asked my American colleagues about that, why they were two separate
tweets and their theory was that he thought the resignation letter
would end up in history book.
So we just wondered it to only be about him.
Wow.
And I, oh yeah.
No, actually that does, I, that's appealing, isn't it?
Instantly make sense to me.
But you're right.
Was this odd thing and it was update regarding my previous announcement.
PS I'm releasing all my delegates to Kamala, which makes a huge amount of
sense because the fund, the campaign funding already has her name on it, right?
As she, 'cause she would've been on the vice presidential pilot.
They can just switch that all over to her.
So her, rather than anyone else being the Democratic nominee, has
got an enormous funding advantage.
So
Andy: the money just.
SLS straight across.
Helen: Yeah.
You can just take down the, peel down the Biden for president,
paste on Harris for president.
And whereas otherwise they would've had to do something complicated
about transferring it to a PAC, a political action committee.
And those aren't supposed to co coordinate with the candidate,
except we all know that they do.
Adam: that can still be a challenge for the Democratic nomination.
Can they?
Helen: Yeah, absolutely they will.
There'll be a vote at the Democratic Convention, in Chicago in August.
And still time for
Adam: Bernie Sanders to come in, even older.
Come
Helen: on, Bernie.
Still time, feel the burn.
Jimmy Carter's...
Adam: is still with us, isn't he?
Helen: you could still, he is.
I think in practice it would be very difficult, because everybody who you.
Everyone you heard of you thought it would be, has already rode in.
And there was a primary challenge, a very briefly, a guy called Dean
Phillips who primary challenged Biden, and he got absolutely nowhere.
And if you remember, there was a lot of grumpiness about Hillary in 2016.
The fact that she had that establishment of kind of form behind her and
no one else could get a look in.
So it is quite.
It'd be, I'd love it.
Obviously it'd be chaos and drama, but it would be very tricky at this point.
Ian: And what about her contemporaries?
Are they just biding their time?
A Biden terrible God?
no.
Sorry.
Are they saying, I'll just wait until another time and then, it might be me.
Helen: Yeah, I think they were before that.
I think that's definitely, Newsome's approach.
He's been very loyal to.
Biden all the way through.
But then the other, if you are, a white man from a swing state, now
is an incredibly good time to remind everybody that you're still alive
because the assumption is that's who her running mate will need to be.
And that could be a couple of people.
There's a guy called Andy Beshir, who is the Democratic governor of Kentucky, which
is about as improbable as that sounds.
Andy: Is that a swing?
Swing?
No.
Who knew?
Helen: Whereas, he's got a proven track record of, appealing to what
you would think of as traditionally very Republican elements.
How, earth did he become a, he won the first time by 5,000
votes, and then he massively increased his majority last time.
So he, seems just to be a very
Adam: parly speaking.
Is this the same sort of lib dem, tage wells?
Is that what we Yeah, he just Thank you for putting it in terms I.
God.
God, there's a very good sort
Ian: of Civil War history, long tail that is worth looking at in the South, but
sadly we haven't got time for it today.
You're not talking about Tage Wells now, are you
Helen: Harris Scar by the Civil War Kent versus
Ian: the Kenis man, isn't it?
She he works equally well here.
No, the one
Helen: I'm thinking of in terms of swing states would be someone like Josh
Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania.
Okay.
And Pennsylvania is probably the key swing state in this election.
Okay.
So he would be a brilliantly useful.
Addition to the ticket also, the democratically tenant, governor of the
state would , take over from him so they wouldn't lose that governorship.
Andy: Okay.
I see.
Helen: I won't, and I won't get to say the words gubernatorial
race, some of my favorite words In American politics, there are so
Andy: many terms in there is a bit of a collective.
British journalists go a bit gooey.
A lot of them rude about, I'm sorry, not present.
Company accepted.
Absolutely.
No, it very much present company.
Very much included.
That's fine.
when people say, I'm here at the caucus.
Yeah.
They're releasing the delegates.
There's this frisk on that goes through British acts who've been happy to cover,
Ian: and people who can literally say, I think, if you remember
the 1956 runoff between Senator Dewey and Senator Louis, and it's
impossible, not to feel, ignorant.
Yeah.
Helen: But also I went to DeSantis rally a couple of years ago and he was
running for reelection in Florida and that was quite, he's a quite a boring
speaker, but it was a vintage car museum.
In a like lovely Florida parking lot.
He had like proper muscle cars behind him and big spotlights.
And that was for, just a governor candidate.
You don't understand how much more exciting this is than, I'm sorry to say.
This Lib de party conference
Andy: I was gonna say no, was where are the foam hammers?
Whereas the, was the Glee Club who's at Six Flags, going on the biggest and
scariest rise until their electrics.
Yeah, you're gonna have to update
Adam: this.
Helen: Did you have a favorite moment from the Republican National Convention?
Andy: I couldn't pick out one.
I suppose they were all my favorite moments, really much
Trump's favorite Bible passage.
he just likes all of them so darn much.
Helen: I think for me it was maybe Melania Trump having to watch Kid
Rock and trying not to laugh and like, why is my life turned out like this?
As he sang a song he'd written about Donald Trump.
Adam: Good lord.
But she did bizarrely in her statement after her husband was shot.
Say had his love of music was one of the things she brought up as, which is funny.
One of the great things about it, which is all of the stories
Helen: you get from Maa Largo is that he sits there, quotes DJing on his iPad.
So he basically, they let him control the music in the restaurant
and he puts on, this is a man whose favorite film is Sunset Boulevard.
So he puts on like Abba.
That's good.
that's good, one.
Know it's water wool bangers, but very much of a certain.
camp and generations.
He is the
Adam: campes man in the world, isn't he?
Essentially?
Yeah.
Helen: Yes.
He blew a kiss at Hulk Hogan that was like Hulk Hogan ripped off three shirts in a
row and Donald Trump was, it was genuinely the highlight of the convention for him
and he, just looked at Hulk Hogan and I thought, this is so unbelievably camp.
Adam: And he did use YMCA as one of his campaign tunes, didn't he?
And dance along to it.
Helen: You just think,
Adam: this is great.
It's a man who's securing his own sexuality and knows that he's appealing
to all of his core constituencies there.
he's going out to the American construction workers, the law enforcement
community, the cowboys, the Native Americans, and of course the leather
joy boys who must never be forgotten.
Ian: they won't be now.
Andy: And is that part of the appeal?
the Republican seeming.
I don't wanna say normal 'cause it's so deeply un British.
You think that British think shows
Adam: that, that they're going for all the different kind of catch.
It's normal for
Ian: America, isn't it?
Yeah.
I mean that, the actual Republican conference should not be about
politics, It should be basically a revivalist church, meeting in which
the Almighty has saved the preacher, followed by WrestleMania, And then there
was a boring bit where I think you, Helen pointed out everyone was quite
bored by the politics in the middle.
Helen: Trump made a 90 minute speech, which went through some of his greatest
hits, including his riff about Hannibal Lecter, which is Hannibal Lecter.
Great guy once had a friend for dinner, and you're like, why are we here?
What, what's happening?
What are we doing here?
But he went on and on, and it was really sad.
All the people who'd come for the kind of bald eagle being fired out
of a cannon were just like, oh, Yeah.
Give it a rest, mate.
Andy: So I suppose that's the main question that people have.
Have had in the last day or two is, how's, how is the news about Biden
gonna change things, if at all?
Helen: as I say there, those polling that came up before that
said, if you match up Trump and a quote unquote younger Democrat.
The numbers look pretty good.
So the question is Kamala Harris flamed out of the 2020 primary when she ran
against Biden, having been a tough on crime prosecutor try in California, then
trying to pivot to being very 2020 energy.
Very reformist, very kind of pronouns in the bio and that
really didn't go very well for her.
Is that a country in Western Song?
One of Dolly Parton's Best, I think.
But she, didn't, she did not prosper in that environment there, and
she's known as being quite awkward.
she gave a ter, she's made some terrible flubs in interviews beforehand.
So the question is now really?
Will the American people when they see a bit more of her, like her or not, right?
But from my point of view, I think the thing was that it was
an insult to the intelligence of voters to run a candidate in Biden.
That the whole party was lying about thinking that he was fit enough to run.
So any, anything is better than that.
Ian: The British press, I presume, aping, the, American Press has now
said, yes, Biden made lots of gaffes, but what about Kamala Harris's Gaffes?
You've replaced one gaffer with another.
Is that fair?
I've read a few of them.
they're not quite getting the wrong president in a major
world conflict, are they?
Helen: No, they're more just that she's quite awkward.
She does come and give off a kind of, slightly stoned
aunt kind of vibe sometimes.
That's true.
one of the most brutal things said about Joe Biden in 2020 primary,
he was picked up on his opposition to busing, the integration of
schools by moving kids around.
And she said, she attacked him on that.
And she said, because the little girl on that bus was me.
And it was an incredibly powerful moment.
And the thing that people have been close to us say that she's very reluctant
to do that kind of emotional politics.
Americans need.
So I think, I'm not say we do, but then we just elected Kier is
also very uncomfortable with it.
So the question becomes whether it's not a former prosecutor
It's all looking very good for big lawyers this year, isn't it?
But yeah, I think so.
I think that's the question is whether or not she can Open up.
And also the other thing I wonder, having seen some of the reaction on
X and Adam, I dunno what you've seen, but people just can't stop doing what
are unfunny, racist and sexist, gags about her, which I think actually are
probably quite repellent to normal voters.
Adam: That is the big unspoken question, isn't it?
Is how will her ethnicity and gender play with, swing voters?
they weren't keen on Hillary Clinton, not just for the fact that she was
Hillary Clinton, but the fact she was a woman I think, played into that.
But
Helen: she ran a campaign that was based around either the first
female president, I'm with her.
and no one cared.
and I think that would be, I think that will really inform
how Kamala Harris will run that.
She won't run us like, this is your chance to make history.
'cause it turns out no one massively cares about that.
Adam: And does, like Kia Dermot does competency camp for something,
does this looking like a safe pair of hands, particularly next to.
the, unsafe pair of hands that have just gone and the tiny pair of
hands that are potentially coming in
Helen: tiny hands grasping for the crowd.
I think that's the thing is that the Trump campaign had been built entirely
around the idea that they were gonna run on competency in Biden's age.
So in a way it completely wrong foots.
Then they have to know, scramble to find what all the things that they think will,
that will work against Kamala Harris.
And they've only got.
In November.
So they've only got four months to do
Ian: is it me, the, Hillary campaign, everyone says it was 'cause she was
a woman and she did various things, but it was also 'cause she'd been
married to Bill Clinton and just passing, the job over to your wife,
particularly when your wife had stood by you when you'd been telling rather
a lot of lies about your personal life.
I don't wanna be pathetic about this, but surely.
A woman who's got there on her own merits and got the job, that, that's
a different proposition, isn't it?
Helen: Yeah.
I think there was a lot of feeling that Hillary Clinton had been knocking
around Washington for quite a while.
she was a good senator for New York, and a good secretary of state, but
there was a feeling of oh, it's the Clintons and the sort of very
machine politics, very insidery.
Whereas Obama, although whatever it turned out to be, ran as.
proto drain the swamp.
we're not gonna have lobbyists coming in and all that sort of stuff.
So I think her message of change was deeply complicated by the fact
that change to the person who you remember from the nineties yes.
Is a, tough one to do, I think.
Andy: Just quickly, you mentioned some of the potential vice
presidential candidates earlier.
There's one who I, we haven't discussed yet, who potentially is the first ever
American president or vice president to have been in space even about him, even
Helen: cooler than that.
Andy: Yeah.
Helen: So this is Mark, Kelly, who's the senator for Arizona.
He's a twin.
His twin brother is also an astronaut.
Oh, didn't they
Andy: do an experiment where one of them got taller in space?
They did it.
Oh, they both got taller in space.
I'm
Ian: getting confused.
Andy: This
Ian: is the first time Andy's been excited in this entire conversation.
Andy: No, but you get taller in space, don't you?
Because you're I do.
Yeah.
Your, spine
Helen: isn't being compressed by gravity.
Awful.
So they did the twin study.
NASA did a twin study about, him and his brother, and they,
while he was in low earth orbit in the us in the space shuttle.
To measure all kinds of stuff about like his gene expression and all that
kind of stuff, to see what the effects of being in space for a long time were.
Adam: So the other twin was like the control twin?
Yeah.
Did he have to go underground or something?
The,
Helen: they made him go down to the earth core where he was very short.
They got really short, but very dense indeed.
Ian: Are they identical twins?
Andy: Yeah, that one's taller.
Ian: It's been spaced.
Yeah.
They've got exactly the
Helen: same genetics.
That's what makes it a good twin study.
Yeah.
So
Ian: this is a fabulous block for a, a presidential, caper, thriller
president, president's twin is missing.
See?
Yeah.
Yes, it's done.
Helen: But he's also got a very compelling story.
He's married to Gabby Giffords, who was the representative for Arizona,
who was shot at a public appearance.
and they had been in the middle of going undergoing.
IVF treatment.
and then they had to stop if she was recovering from, from all the
surgeries she needed from that.
And they've since spoken about the fact that some of the Republican
rollbacks of abortion in states like Arizona have also affected IVF.
And the IVF is under threat because the Republican pro-life.
Idea is the idea that you create all these embryos and not all of them
implanted, some of them are destroyed.
So some of the Evangelical wing has been going after IVF too, right?
Which is obviously even among many Christians, deeply unpopular.
Andy: So not only would you be forced to have the children you
might not want to have, you won't be able to have the children.
You do
Helen: exactly right.
And, already.
it's not a winning slogan.
no.
And already in this election, particularly for suburban women voters, the overturning
of Roe versus Wade has been a huge issue.
It, seems to have motivated turnout in the midterms.
so it's something on which they would be Yeah.
They, they could have an, inspiring astronaut with a really moving story
about one of the key election issues,
Ian: and to be cynical to someone who's been shot in a more horrid way.
Than the opposition.
Helen: that person did.
Yes.
That person did not miss.
That's not the ultimate
Adam: American politics, isn't it?
Is who got shot the worst being the thing that designed, I'm just saying
Ian: from my observation of American politics, that
will come up fairly quickly.
Yeah,
Helen: Lord.
yes.
Also, he'd have to debate JD Vance, who rather fancies himself
as a, as an eloquent speaker.
And I do think a bit like, oh, you went to Harvard.
I went to space.
Andy: just one final thing on this because, , the
British angle is always, yes.
Interesting.
It's been a magnet not only for British hacks, but also for British, politicians.
Can we
Adam: have the phrase former, mostly politicians?
yes.
Andy: No, Nigel Far knew, is newly elected.
We also had Liz Truss and Boris Johnson heading over to press the Flesh.
Adam: Sorry.
Andy: Must do press not
Adam: very much flesh in Boris Johnson's case.
That amazing photo of him addressing an almost empty room of people.
Andy: Yes.
Extraordinary.
I had, a look 'cause I'm really sad.
I think I counted that.
It was 35 out of 180 potential seats were filled.
So just
Adam: so you know, I counted the people.
I didn't count the seats.
This is why you're a better journalist than me.
Happy.
You need to have the sta I was thinking
Ian: that's worse than the Tory's election result.
Andy: Yes.
And he was speaking on a panel about, something or other.
It doesn't matter.
No one heard it.
But he, was flanked by flags of the Vapor Technology Association,
which is a, vape lobby.
one thing I found interesting, just a little phrase that got used.
So Boris met at Trump, right?
And he said that, he was on top form.
And when Stama met Joe Biden, or rather had a chat with Joe Biden at,
the, was it the NATO summit recently?
Yeah.
the phrase he used was good form, he is on very good form.
And that those are phrases that you use about elderly relatives.
Who spry are not reliably.
Yes.
Ian: Always there.
Yes, both.
And it can be relative, isn't it?
It's not absolute top form for himself.
Yeah.
Great form.
Yeah.
Which was low.
He was up and
Andy: about as awake.
That I think he recognized me.
Yeah.
Is that kind of thing.
Helen: And there was a very odd list.
Truss, speech that she subsequently made in Pennsylvania about how she had
a showerhead in the shape of the Liberty Bell exactly as Ronald Reagan did,
Adam: which was odd even for Liz Truss, wasn't it?
It was great.
It was up
Helen: there with port markets in one of the great pantheon of weird
Liz Truss anecdotes immediately.
Ian: But they're like, you, they, find America more exciting than Clarkton.
Helen: I mean I think lots of people in Claton would probably, if they
could listen, I dunno, maybe I'm being, maybe please write in if you're
from Clarkton and let us know, would you rather go to Milwaukee and watch
Eagles being fired out of a cannon?
Or would you rather watch Nigel Frige in your local Leisurer center, answer the
problem about the drop curbs or find out,
Andy: Okay.
Now, honeymoons, how long should they last and how long do they last in practice?
sometimes someone has to fly home early, that kind of thing.
And we are in the middle of a honeymoon, a national honeymoon.
At the moment, everyone's feeling very relaxed and tanned and happy,
but how long is it going to last?
Then the labor honeymoon, Adam.
Adam: I, everyone's feeling relaxed in town and happy might
be a bit of an exaggeration, at least with the summer we've had.
But, no, I was struck by, there was an observer, in the observer last weekend.
it was a poll by public first, which just said that 45% of people are now
feeling optimistic about the future of the country following the election, which
is a straight turnaround because poll, just before the election, 43% of people
said they were feeling very pessimistic.
Wow.
it's very un British.
It is extraordinary, isn't it?
5%.
We touched on this last time, didn't we?
And the kind of.
The private eye coverage after Blair got in 1997 again, that there is
suddenly this moment that people go, oh, no, everything's gonna be
lovely again, before remembering what life is actually like usually.
'cause we remind them, but Stan's personal ratings gone up as well.
I saw yesterday, up 20%.
They're actually positive.
They've gone from minus 1% to 19% of people thinking stama is a good thing.
there is undoubtedly a, honeymoon period, but how long it will
last is, quite hard to say.
Those figures
Ian: are extraordinary in our recent memory.
But a 19% approval rating in real life by minister, God, it's terrifying
Andy: to think we've all got approval ratings in our own lives.
It's just no one's bothered doing the numbers 'cause we're not Prime Minister.
Adam: But I think there is a sort of natural human reaction,
particularly to people who aren't as.
Deeply embedded and nerdy about politics as we are, to think,
just take election as being right.
That's done, that's all sorted now.
And I remember talking to Lab mps who were, canvassing for the 2017 election,
so a year after the Brexit vote.
and supposedly that was one of the big issues of that election, wasn't it?
and it was Teresa Ma trying to solidify her position, didn't
quite work out in order to be able to push through her, Brexit deal.
But, MPS then were saying on the doorstep, it just didn't come up.
if, you mentioned Brexit, people just said, no, I've done that.
We sorted that.
it was so far from sort, it was still two years off being sorted and
still not entirely sorted, is it?
But there is this sort of reaction.
Yeah.
We vote for it.
It's, happened.
It's okay.
we are happy now.
Just get on with it.
Come back to us in five years.
I think there is an element of that.
Helen: yeah.
Like the NHS is fixed now.
Oh, good.
I'm glad we all voted to fix the NHS.
Just check out.
I think that, as we are recording this, laborer running into
their first, real sticky patch.
Shaban, Mahmud having to early release the prisoners was, was
great tabloid front page fodder, but that was foreseeable, right?
Whoever.
Had been in, would've had to do something about overcrowding in jails.
Whereas what's now happening is discussions over the two child cap on
universal credit and, child tax credit.
And that was a really controversial policy when it came in, under
the, in, in the austerity era.
And it's, always been a kind of nagging, unpleasant one.
But there is a, big mood against it on the labor backed benches.
Now obviously they have a majority of 50 million, so it's not a,
it's not an issue at the moment.
But I think you'll see in the King's speech debate that people,
lots of people will be airing their views and not necessarily
all the people you would expect.
John McDonald and the other kind of progressive parts of the
party has spoken out against it.
But Rosie Duffield, for example, had a, said it was a thing that got
her into politics at the weekend.
And then I think Ela Braman, pre braman has
Adam: spoken out.
It's one of those things that unites all right round in the horseshoe, doesn't it?
ELAs.
Very much against it and says it should be got heard of.
And Lord Freud, who was the welfare minister who was responsible for bringing
it in under camera, and Osborne has also said he now thinks it should go.
Helen: and I think there's an issue which, a kind of persistent emerging criticism
of Team Starer is that they have got addicted to what in American politics
they call punching the hippie, which is basically always just making sure
you're really rude to the left and like ostensibly, disrespect them in order to
prove your kind of centris credentials.
True.
And your kind of macho ability to face people down.
You're not.
Soft bleeding heart type, and I wonder if this has fallen into that, that the
kind of labor is soft on welfare, they know is such a strong attack line.
And so they're actually ended up supporting something that lots of
their, back benches are uneasy about.
Lots of the labor supporting think tanks are uneasy about
because it has undoubtedly put more children into poverty.
It costs about 3 billion as well to fix it.
So it's quite a big ticket item to deal with, but I think it's the first thing
I've seen where Actually, I've already begun to see bits of a, Bridget Phillipson
said, oh, we're gonna look at it.
Ki has endorsed that there is a bit of kind of soft peddling
backwards, or maybe we might call this one slightly wronging because
Andy: they've done a bit of punching the hippie on what I mean, quite a bit
of it on net zero stuff, particularly in reference to just stop oil.
It's, it is incredibly useful for labor to say, just stop oil or idiots.
We're not gonna do what they say, we're not gonna end, you know it all,
but tomorrow's just not possible.
It's a very useful point of differentiation between, yourself and the
imagined labor where people are saying, they're just net zero zealots and they're
going to, they're going to, turn all the
Ian: lights off immediately.
But the, cap is supposed to be a deterrent, isn't it?
has anyone done any figures on whether people in certain income
brackets are having less children because you don't get benefit for it?
is there any, fact, oh, I
Andy: don't know.
There are so many causes aren't there?
I mean there are so many causes of things like housing will be a
huge factor in terms of whether people have all the children they
want to or whether they can't quite that, think they have the room.
Adam: I
just,
wanna just take a moment there to acknowledge all of the listeners who
are just about to write in and say.
Fewer children, not less, right?
Because I know private I reads.
Can I just take a Biden moment and
Ian: say, I deeply regret
Adam: that
Ian: misstep.
Adam: I think there's two things to this though, I think, and there are two kind
of key labor messages, aren't there?
'cause there's punching the hippie one that you mentioned, and there's also,
there's Rachel Reeves being very tight with the purse strings and very sensible.
And it's a bit like, I know I bring everything back to, 1997, but
that, that commitment that Gordon Brown made to stick within the toy
spending limits for that first.
Term and that a kind of like headline thing that, I'm sure both Ki Stama
and Rachel Ru and everyone in the Labor Party would like to get
rid of the two child, limit cap.
but being able to say, we'll do it when it's fiscally appropriate to do so and
we've got the cash to do it, does play to a certain point, but also it's,
it be a good one for them to be able to make a concession on, wouldn't it?
Helen: Yeah, and they have a similar problem about the, the pay awards.
So nurses and teachers and other NHS staff, the independent bodies said,
give them a 5.5% pay rise, and that would cost them billions as well.
But they're also looking slightly, slightly soft on that.
I suppose the ideal thing if you're Rachel Reeves is what you
hope is that the economy's done a bit better than you thought.
You've suddenly got a bit of fiscal headroom to play with, and
suddenly this, large s can be.
Counted out in the autumn statement out of, nowhere
Adam: and you make it in the autumn so that it's, you can make it very clear
that it's the economy doing better under your government rather than just the
tail end of the last government, because that's the incredibly clever bit of spin
I think labor are doing on everything, and they're doing it very, effectively.
So with the prisoner release thing and with the pay awards, which was a case
of, the independent advice on pay awards at 5.5% went in to the Tory government
before the election and they sat on it and didn't do anything with it.
And this line, that labor have now got of the.
It plays incredibly well with the, still remaining mystery
of why Rashish one Earth.
Rashish Sunna decided to call an election in July rather than in
October when everyone was expecting.
It was just, is just to spin it as well.
Obviously he saw all these problems coming down the line, didn't wanna take
any responsibility for them, and just handed them all over to us, which does
work incredibly well and brilliantly.
it's something they learned from George Osborne that, isn't it,
that you just, you can keep coming back and specifically blaming.
The government before you, he, how many times did he harp back to that Li
Burn note about there's no money left?
And use that as the excuse for absolutely everything.
Andy: Well, a lot of decisions were left on desks, weren't they?
And some of that was to do with the election being called, but a
lot of it was just things which were slightly convenient to
Ian: pass.
Alex, when he was just a secretary, did actually say, I'm going to have to let.
People out.
the prisons are full.
So the brilliant thing about this spin is some of it's true.
Yeah.
Which I find works incredibly well.
Helen: Yeah.
And I think that's why the early releasing has fizzled out for now.
The way it will come back, if you remember the, new labor government
is if one of the people who's released early goes on to do a crime.
And that was, I think that was John Reed got into terrible trouble
'cause some people he'd let out went on the run dressed in hijabs.
Do you remember this?
Terrorists sneaked across the border.
Yeah.
So that's the, if you are now the Daily Mail news desk, what you are
an absolute watch for is the minute that someone who's released 40% into
their sentence rather than 50% in.
Commits an offense
Andy: within that 10%.
Yeah.
Of the sentence they were, I'm sure that will happen.
I'd
Adam: imagine they're s out every front gate of every prison in the
country and just following people.
Going can do crime.
You can do crime.
But I would imagine Ki
Ian: Star having been in charge of DPP, is also looking very, carefully at the
Adam: people who come out.
Now, Helen, I know there is only one thing you like more than me funding
a parallel from 1997 And that is me funding a parallel from 1974.
Oh gosh.
So on the, pay awards front, you'll remember of course that, Edward Heath
went into the election in 1974 after the minor strike, on the grounds he could
not, could not agree a pay deal with them.
And he went to, went, to the country on, on, on the platform
of, who governs this country.
And, the answer came back as a resounding, ain't you.
Harold Wilson immediately comes in, within 48 hours, has settled
the minor strike with a pay award.
5.5% is what's being recommended for public sector workers
for, Rachel Ster Award.
I.
What do you think the pay rise that was given to the miners in 74 was, oh,
Helen: please say it was 5.5%
Adam: higher.
I was
Helen: gonna say in 1979, I think the teachers were asking
for 30% or something like that.
So some of these pay demands were, huge.
Adam: Higher, no higher, 40.
40, 35%.
Not bad.
Not bad going, is it?
That's not there with the junior doctors.
But again, I think it was taking advantage of, again, that honeymoon period that
people think, oh, we've elected you and, you were given a bit of leeway at
that point to just be able to write, sign things off, sort 'em out, and you
could make big decisions like that.
This is the moment where you can do it.
Helen: There's an odd parallel with that.
So West treating went and immediately had talks with the doctors' unions, and
it came out, sounded quite positive.
They were basically we are not going to use this as a kind of wedge issue.
Know and say how terrible these people are holding us all to ransom.
We're gonna try and work constructively with you.
There's a parallel with the way that Starmer has approached
foreign policy, right?
Where he's gone to Europe and gone.
Don't worry lads.
we're not gonna be constantly briefing that you're a load of
cheese, eating, surrender monkeys, foisting your, small boats on us.
We are here to work with you and it'll be really interesting to see whether or not.
That approach works versus the much more kind of what they just need is
a really good talking to, and then they'll see the British point of view.
Ian: Starmer is, we all agree, has always been very lucky.
So to go to Europe at the point where most of the people you are talking to
have got the far right hammering at their door and you are the only left.
Or Leftish, depending on how our readers perceive Mr.
Stama, the secure, you are the only, surviving, centrist politician.
they're incredibly keen, to be nice to him and to accommodate
him and to listen to what he said.
And so he, his timing and his luck is extraordinary, which I
think will extend the honeymoon.
And actually most of you have not even listening to this bit.
You've listened to the election, in America bit 'cause it's more interesting.
So he's lucky again.
'cause this is item number two.
Andy: Now, we come to Phil Hammond.
So Phil is Private Eye's medical correspondent, also known
in the pages of the mags MD.
and for some time now Phil
has been writing about the Lucy.
Let be case for any international listeners or those who haven't
been following the story.
Lucy.
Deby was a, nurse at the
Countess of Chester Hospital.
Luby was convicted of, seven murders of young babies at the
hospital where she worked, and seven attempted murders as well as that
across various different trials.
Her trial lasted for eight months.
She was given a whole life term in prison for the offenses.
I.
And she has recently been appealing the charges That appeal has just failed.
now Phil has been writing about this case for a long time, although not
everything he's written has been in the pages of the magazine for reasons that he
will, doubtless be explaining in a bit.
But Phil, can you tell me your initial.
Opinion and what that was of this trial, because this has
been a very long running story.
these deaths all took place, in 2015 and 2016 at the can of Chester Hospital.
MD: So when the initial verdict
came out, I guess like the jury, I think I sided with
the seven consultant pediatricians who'd worked on the
unit alongside lucy Letby with a hundred years of experience
between them, all of whom
having observed sudden deteriorations of
children they weren't expecting, had reached the
conclusion that it must be deliberate harm, and looking at the shifts.
She was nearly always.
On duty or there, or thereabouts as they
caused it, which later gave me slight pause for thought.
But my slight Blind spot over the years is I've relied very
heavily in 32 years writing for private eye on senior medical
whistleblower sources.
The first big story.
I broke the Bristol heart scandal, almost exclusively relied on a senior
medical whistleblower, Steve Bolson, who blew, the whistle on far too
many babies dying in Bristol.
And because I nearly always senior medical whistleblowers in
my experience have been right.
I assumed that the Chester, consultants were right.
the jury had reached the right conclusion.
And so my initial piece in private eye was to say we should have
listened to these whistleblowers
earlier.
They were raising concerns
about Lucy Lepe, long before she was stopped.
perhaps the manager should have listened more.
So that was my first take on it immediately.
I started to get letters and contacts into private eye.
the first one came from a chap called Dr.
Bernard Freal, who wrote an exhaustive letter saying that basically
this was largely supposition.
There was no firm evidence, no definitive evidence that babies had died from
insulin injection or air embolism.
and he absolutely felt that the case wasn't, proven beyond reasonable doubt.
And then of course, as an investigative journalist, you have to investigate.
and I'm very lucky now because I have lots of really good contacts,
and one of the first contacts I went back to was one of the Chester
consultants who'd worked on that unit.
and said, look, people are writing into private eye.
Several people had contacted me saying, this isn't right.
It's not proven beyond junior, reasonable doubt.
And they were saying things like random fluctuations in death so
that Lucy Levy was accused of.
I found guilty of, seven murders and seven attempted murders, but
there were maybe 35 incidents over that period, and a number of deaths.
One of the slightly alarming things is that people can't even agree on
the number of deaths if you can't even get the body count, right?
what on earth are you, what else are you getting wrong?
But there were perhaps there were between six and 10 other deaths that she wasn't
implicated in, and those deaths alone.
Represented a significant increase on previous years.
So perhaps there was something to do with the unit.
Perhaps they didn't have sufficient senior staff.
and we know from, reading the notes and, what came out in the inquiry
that they did have staffing problems.
They didn't have enough junior or senior staff or nurses.
It was a cramped unit.
The cults were too close together.
there are a number of reasons that could have contributed to substandard care.
And interestingly, if you ask any sta statistician, random
fluctuations in deaths can occur year on, year by chance alone.
so there's a lovely, account on X, formerly known as Twitter, tried by, stats
and he puts up for 2014 to 15, he puts up.
10 hospitals with significantly excess deaths and ask you to
spot the count of Chester.
and it's a trick 'cause counts of Chester that year was number 12.
So lots of units of having excess death rising across the country, perhaps because
of, austerity or cuts in care or, we hear of all these maternity scandals where
maternity units aren't able to cope.
So perhaps there was an influx of really sick babies onto this unit.
So the question really was, How was this case proven beyond reasonable
doubt?
Andy: I think that's an important thing to raise because as you said
in your last column in the magazine.
you're not saying anything about the guilt or innocence of Lucy
lepe in this particular trial.
what would you define as what you have been trying to ascertain
MD: What I've been trying to say is that having looked into the case,
it appears to me that the science and statistics weren't fairly and
completely explained to the jury.
And so they were making a decision based on partial interpretation or of partial
picture of the science and statistics.
Had they seen the fuller picture?
They may have reached the same conclusions.
They may have reached different conclusions on some of the cases, or
they may have decided all of it was not proven beyond reasonable doubt.
Of course, that doesn't mean that she didn't do it.
There are cases where people have got away with murder, and the reason
they have is because proving medical murder is extremely difficult.
Particularly in a cohort of babies who are already very sick, they're at
increased rates of death and anything from an infectious disease outbreak
or not having sufficient staff.
So when they do suddenly go off and suddenly the, they have breathing
difficulties or their pulse goes down, people don't pick it up in time.
a bit like people not
picking up a sepsis in time or whatever, and, babies can die for a
combination of.
Being very ill And a unit not quite
having the expertise to cope with babies of that complexity.
And statistically that's a far more likely explanation because it
happens in the NHS all the time.
every, we'd reckon there are about 11,000 avoidable deaths every year in the NHS
because people don't get the expert care they need.
So when you are trying to ascertain what's most likely,
you start with the likely thing.
When I was taught statistics, I was told, if you hear.
who's on the bridge?
Think first of the horse.
Before you think of the zebra.
Before you think of the unicorn.
The medical murder is like the unicorn option.
It's incredibly rare it has happened, but you are gonna need pretty rock solid
proof to show beyond reasonable doubt.
So either you catch someone in the act, either they confess, either
there's some evidence perhaps on their internet history that they've
researched specific methods of murder.
Or the pathologist picks it up and says, this is clear act of deliberate
harm and we need to do something.
None of that happened in the Lucy Luby case.
It was fitted together long after the event.
To me it just doesn't seem, that the case was proven beyond reasonable doubt.
And there is several other aspects I found really distasteful.
So they.
They retrospectively came up with a spreadsheet to show Lucy let me,
was always on duty when the things we're worried about happened.
They ignored the other deaths and the other serious things that
happened when she wasn't on duty or wasn't there, or thereabout.
So she focused in on this and they paraded it around the courtroom as if
it was some killer piece of evidence.
and statistician say to me, if you did that in your undergraduate
statistics, viva, you would fail.
It was such an embarrassing portrayal of, over rigging the certainty on this.
It clearly, it shows that Lucy Levy was on duty.
When Lucy let me was on duty.
That's all it basically shows.
So it, I think they attached overdue importance to that.
And if you've watched expert wi witnesses over the years, the ones that
are slightly overconfident and they use a bit of razzle dazzle and they're
perhaps over certain of their evidence tend to have more impact than the,
ones that say, on the one hand, on the other hand, we can't be sure of this.
There is still an era of uncertainty.
So I think that particular evidence
was, over egged,
Andy: the, Second World War planes.
There's a famous image showing where planes were hit on bombing missions
in the Second World War, and they were largely hit in the wings.
And the argument was, we should we reinforce the wings?
No, you shouldn't.
The place you should reinforce is the.
place where the endings were hit when they then didn't return from the
mission, and so couldn't be studied.
MD: It's very hard distinction often between cause and coincidence.
And I think the other thing that was woefully lacking in this case
was proper statistical input.
So the Royal Statistical Society and the Basis looked at many previous miscarriages
of justice, often involving babies.
'cause the baby stuff is really complex science.
And they said it should be mandatory in trials of this complexity to have
full statistical input you need.
Proper statistical data to make sure people aren't milking the statistics
and making these outrageous claims and, waving their spreadsheets around
and attaching more significance to it when other possible causes
or varieties of causes and plausibility hadn't, been examined.
So that was pretty worrying.
And the thing that was most worrying at all when I looked at
it is that in addition to the seven consultant pediatricians who
all
felt she was guilty, The prosecution, brought on six expert
witnesses.
The defense didn't call a single expert witness.
so if you are sitting there in the jury, there's this really
complex stuff going on about air
embolism, which nobody really understands.
And could this be a course of death?
And then somebody's been accused of, sometimes they're injecting air into
the stomach and sometimes it's into the brain and they've got insulin,
but they weren't actually on duty when one of the insulin tests came on.
So they must have hidden in a bag somewhere and.
It's really confusing and complex.
What you're gonna do as a jury, you're gonna say, okay, there are 13 on that
side, seven consultants and six consultant experts, and there's none on the
other, just by sheer weight of numbers.
I think those guys with the 13 on their side are
probably right.
Andy: It sounds compelling.
It does sound
MD: The next thing that really confused me is that I discovered that the defense
actually did have a really good, expert witness who I was able to contact.
He for the life of him, can't understand why he wasn't called to give evidence.
he's since been interviewed initially by, the New Yorker who did the first big
piece about this because we weren't able to, because of the reporting restrictions.
And he makes some very interesting points.
But the interesting points he made were that he thinks the babies.
Were actually far sicker than the prosecution portrayed.
So the prosecution said these were babies who were previously
particularly very well.
They suddenly fell off their perch for no apparent reason.
We excluded every possibility and decided it must be deliberate harm.
Whereas he's saying, actually, I think they were sicker than they portrayed.
One of them had an existing chest infection.
Three of them were premature.
Quite a few of them, weighed less than three pounds, and they just
could have gone off for natural reasons as these babies do.
The second thing he pointed out, which made me worry, is that six of
these seven babies had a post-mortem examination at the Regional Center of
Excellence, which is Alder Hay Hospital by a specialist, pediatric or perinatal
pathologist, and not one of these babies
was any sign of deliberate harm picked up.
These were signed off by
the coroner, so they've all had ex quite extensive coroners postmortems.
. So the deliberate harm bit was fitted on later.
At the time, none of this was picked up.
Now I've been struggling to get a pediatric pathologist to speak to,
because actually I needed to understand a forensic pathologist to understand.
How it could be that this wasn't picked up.
And I finally managed to speak to one for this issue, a forensic
pathologist who works for the home office but didn't want to be named.
And she made some really interesting points.
And the first was, if you don't suspect murder at the time and tell
the pathologist and they don't pick it up, they will get a coroner's
postmortem, which is very thorough.
It's even more thorough in babies than it is in adults, but
it won't do emergency testing.
To look for deliberate harm.
So it won't do emergency testing for insulin, or it won't do
emergency testing for air embolism.
And unless those things are done pretty quickly, you can't
prove beyond reasonable doubt.
So they've come up with these theories of how the baby's died.
But they're not able to prove them beyond reasonable doubt.
And she said, people always look at pathologists and they say, oh, you must
come up with the answer at postmortem.
And she said, pathologists are actually quite cautious.
And the reason that they're cautious is partly because of
previous miscarriages of justice.
They say, oh, we've had some big issues.
And so they will say, this gives a lightly indication of, they won't definitively
say this is one thing or this is another.
So actually the statistics.
It doesn't say anything other than Lucy let me, was on duty when she was on duty.
and the pathology isn't definitive.
It doesn't provide evidence beyond reasonable doubt.
yeah.
So all you have at the end of the day is the opinions of the
consultants
Andy: Can you describe the process of Hot Tubbing?
MD: Yes, this is a new idea, relatively new idea, which says that.
juries nearly always get very confused when two professors of
equal status take diametrically opposed views of the evidence.
Who are you supposed to believe?
You're sitting there as a lay person and two highly eminent professors.
So the idea of hot tubbing is that you put the defense and the
prosecution experts on the stand, they take the oath at the same time.
They'll often have had a pre-meeting to say, these are the areas we agree on,
these are the areas that we disagree on.
and then you put them on the stand together and they're
cross-examined on the stand, and it's a slightly more discursive.
Collaborative thing where you are more likely to get to the truth of the science
rather than this fiercely adversarial system where prosecution may absolutely
try to destroy the expert witnesses on the other side and vice versa.
and generally the expert witness who can take the pressure best, tends to be
the one who's believed, not necessarily the one who's telling the best science.
So I think that's a collaborative thing.
Or my other idea was to take it out of.
The
prosecution and defense altogether and say it should be a duty of, say, the
Royal College and the Royal Statistics Society to provide a group of the
best currently available ev experts
to give evidence on behalf of the court,
rather than one side or the other.
And that would get away with, the financial incentive to make your evidence
more relevant because you're obviously being paid by one side or the other.
And I think, and, these experts would be currently practicing experts, not
people who had retired 15, 20 years ago.
So you knew they
were absolutely on the money.
Andy: is the hot tubbing thing being used anywhere at the
moment?
MD: Yes, my pathologist friend said it has been used and it is up to the,
either side to degree, agree to it.
It's a process that can be used and if the court agrees and the judge
agrees it can be used, but I think this particular trial was very fiercely.
Adversarial.
It was trying to rip shreds into each other, and I don't know why
let, be's barrister didn't call an expert witness, but it may have
been having meted out quite a severe beating to the opposition's experts.
He was worried that, his own expert might be ripped to shreds.
But having spoken to his expert, he gives very eloquent explanations about
why he thinks the babies were sicker and that the cases aren't all true.
And he, put doubt in my mind.
If he put doubt in my mind, I'm pretty certain he would've put doubt
in the minds of some members of the
jury.
Andy: And the final thing I wanted to ask you is about the publication
in Private Eye and the sort of tricky road that you've had to publication.
Can you tell us a bit more about that?
MD: the judge, judge Goss decided he
Andy: the initial trial.
MD: Yeah.
At the initial trial.
shortly after the trial, in fact, the Chester consultant I was in touch
with said that he was very confident
that this was just the
tip of the iceberg.
There were plenty other deaths that Lucy Lepe was implicated in, and the CPS
were likely to bring many more charges.
and I think because there was gonna be a retrial and the possibility of the
appeal, and there were already people.
Statisticians, particularly out on the internet, not necessarily resident in
the uk querying the process of the trial.
He decided to put a, really strict order preventing any reporting,
of the case other than the outcome at the original trial.
it was a slightly bizarre order that came out because, as well as protecting
Lucy, Lepe, fairness of any trial or retrial, it was supposed to protect
the babies, and yet he named one of the babies in his court order.
Now that sloppiness suggests to me they were under huge pressure and they'd rushed
it through, but it also meant that a
whole well of.
Experts built up this sort of frus, frustrated mass, and so
suddenly, I, talked earlier about the New Yorker, Rachel, as is writing a
really brilliant and very detailed piece, and she paid a lot of money to get the
entire court transcript that would've cost a lot of money,
And she went through it.
And wrote an extremely detailed 13,000 word, essay that's
actually quite compelling and really did a very thorough job.
And then of course, as soon as the reporting restrictions were, lifted after
she'd been, she'd lost her appeal and it'd been reconvicted, on another count.
Publications across the spectrum started publishing.
So it started with a very good piece in The Guardian, with Felicity Lawrence.
And then the Telegraph did a fairly long piece.
It's now been in the Daily Mail, it's been in the mirror.
It's been in the independent, fortunate, unfortunately for us.
'cause we were a two weekly, cycle.
The bit that I wanted to publish in September, I publish later,
but I've never been particularly.
I'm not somebody who cares about breaking a story.
What I want to do is to get justice right, and I ju it just, I've always had a thing
about expert witnesses and it just, it doesn't, there's something about this that
just doesn't seem right and I don't see what would be lost in offering an appeal.
I think the trouble now is that, let me barrish to pick
up on the importance he'd Mr.
Trick with experts and he put experts forward for his appeal.
It was a detailed letter from Expert saying the insulin testing wasn't
proven beyond reasonable doubt.
and then another expert who'd actually done a paper, done the paper that was
quoted by the prosecution, talking about skin changes that happen if you
deliberately inject air into the vessels calling an embolism that mayall's death.
he said, actually the changes weren't the same ones that I'm describing.
And anyway, in a coroner's postmortem, you tend not to take photos, and so you are
relying on people's memory of what a rash looked like and what happened at the time.
So that was another weakness in the case.
Anyway.
Very compelling bits of evidence, but the appeal court said, this isn't new.
You not new evidence.
This is interpretations of existing evidence,
which you should have produced in the first trial.
Andy: not allowed
MD: that's not allowed.
So we're not granting a retrial.
Whereas my argument is, I.
Had there been a fuller picture of the statistics and the science behind the
available evidence first time round, the jury may or may not have reached
different conclusions, but justice would've been seen to have been done.
which I think is just as important that it's seen that people give
evidence on both sides, in give the fullest scientific picture and
acknowledge areas of uncertainty.
We simply don't know why x, y, or z happened, that's what science is.
The final point I, will make, which I think is important, is that I,
spoke to my pathologist about, do people get away with murder?
And she said, yes, they do.
She spoke of a case where somebody was smothered, towards the end of life, and it
left no trace at all, and it wasn't picked up at post-mortem, and it only became
apparent when the person later confessed to it, but there was no postmortem traces.
So it is possible that people can get away with murder, but proving
murder beyond reasonable doubt in this case is extremely difficult.
I'm not convinced it was done, and I think on that basis, she deserves an
appeal, preferably before 10 years have passed, which is normally the
standard time it takes for someone to linger in jail while they're waiting
to see whether she's guilty or not
Andy: phil Hammond there.
That's it for this episode of Page 94.
Thank you so much to Ian, Helen, Adam, and to Phil.
Thank you so much to you for listening.
And thank you...
if you haven't already for going out and buying the magazine, or even better
subscribing to it at private-eye.co.uk.
Final thanks go to Matt Hill who as always produced this episode.
Goodbye.