Page 94: the Private Eye Podcast.
Hello, and welcome to another episode of page 94.
My name's Andrew Hunter Murray, and I'm here in the I Studio with Helen
Lewis, Adam McQueen, at Ian Hislop.
If you're watching this, you may have already voted in the local elections.
You might even know the results, But one really interesting thing about the whole
campaign is that so much of it has focused on what we would think of previously as
the edges of British politics, uh, on right and left, reform in the greens.
Uh, it seems increasingly quite hard for the conservatives in labor.
Traditionally quite big
missed out the Lib Dems again.
I'm sorry.
I'm
Poor Ed,
Which is the theme of
the campaign.
Yeah.
Literally, the Lib Dems are complaining.
Our
polls,
they were consistent.
No one even
mentioned
us.
Yeah.
It's very unfair.
I
so I just thought I'd mention them.
them.
is, is that a fair summary, Helen, or is it
I think that the Greens and Zach Pilanski have taken up a vast
majority of the oxygen in these campaigns for a very good reason.
A lot of the seats that are being defended are labor seats
that are kind of green facing.
Some of them are, are reform facing.
They expect to lose a huge number of seats.
So that's almost been kind of factored in at this point, right?
The story, if, if Labor even do slightly better than you think, everyone will kind
of fall about themselves with, with shock.
I'm bracing myself for a both reform and green saying the
mainstream media underrated us, but look how well we've done.
This will be a lie if they
say
this.
I would just say this.
Everyone expects them to do incredibly well.
And one of the things I found most interesting, I was reading, um,
Jim Warton's very good newsletter, London-centric, in which he referred
to the fact they'd got their hands on last year, reforms local elections
playbook, their canvassing handbook.
And one of the things they'd say to their candidates are, "Let Nigel
deal with the national issues.
You just focus on, on Ulas or whatever it might be on potholes, on the
housing estate that no one wants built, whatever it might be, that's one thing.
And the other thing is don't post anything on social media."
At all.
At
all.
don't think that this is now your time to air your thoughts about
the Middle East peace process.
And so, I think having been through that mega storm of lots and lots of reform
candidates being found out to have unpleasant views, they, there's something
the parties is very aware of as a problem.
The Greens are further back on that learning curve, I would say.
So we have two people who've been arrested on allegations of antisemitism,
one of them seen campaigning out for the Greens after that.
You have the Greens deputy lead in Mothinalid saying to people who've
been accused of antisemitism, you know, get, think about challenging the
party on this, you know, we shouldn't give into these smear campaigns.
So that fight that the Corbinir Labor Party went through in the years 2015
to 19 is now happening in very much the glare of publicity for, for the
Greens.
we should say, of course, this is in the wake of the Goldus green
stabbings and, you know, renewed focus on antisemitism in, in British
public life.
Well, it was prior to that as well.
I mean, it was very obvious even prior to the Stabbings and Gold's Green last week,
the, the, there was a, a conserted kind of campaign of, of, of, of violence and
intimidation against the Jewish community.
So there were firebomb attacks on, um, most notoriously the, the, the ambulances,
but also a couple of attempted arson attacks at synagogues in, in North London.
So it was quite clear that that sort of stuff was going on.
And even prior to the Gold's Green stabbing, Zach Polancy came out and
said one of the most idiotic things that, that, that we needed to be wary
of whether this was Jewish people feeling unsafe or whether it was just a
perception they had of unsafety, which, um, I mean, there's quite a lot of clear
evidence in there and fire bombs attacks.
I, I would feel quite unsafe.
Yeah, and the,
and the stabbing outside Heaton Park, uh, synagogue in Manchester as well.
I, I mean, if you look at the figures, the Jewish community in Britain is very small
and it is enormously disproportionately affected by hate crimes.
There isn't a synagogue or a Jewish school out there that doesn't have security
around it, that doesn't have walls, you know, and I think this is a community
that has felt that it has been living in fear for a, really quite a long time now.
Now, every party, I would say, has had its own problems with
antisemitism in, in its ranks.
I don't know about the Lib Dems actually.
They, they may have managed to dodge it, I'm not sure.
Uh, but certainly, uh, this was a problem in Labor under Jeremy Corbin There, there
seemed to be lots of credit, credible evidence that this is now a problem, in
the contemporary Green Party.
again, one shouldn't f- forget that the leader
of the Reform Party had,
had quite a well
publicized incident,
uh, during his school
days, um, which
24 people gave evidence about and which has now been dismissed and it's
considered bad taste to bring it up.
So I thought I would.
Um, but it's not entirely gone, has it?
Yeah.
And re- reform candidates
mostly now, are being discovered to
have,
Islamophobic or, uh, whatever you want
to call
it, uh, tendencies.
But there was a period where they were pretty anti-Semitic.
Yeah.
I
I think it's an interesting insight into the evolution of anti-Semitism in Britain
is that it was the casual prejudice of choice, well, one of them, on the right
in the, in the '60s and '70s, and since then it has been, yeah, there are still
neo-Nazis out there, but it has also now become associated with a particular left
wing form of anti-Semitism, which bleeds into some things that are legitimate.
I mean, this is always the problem with everybody draws their line in a
different place, but it, it bleeds into criticisms of Israel, particularly the
Gaza War, and also some of the tropes on the left about, uh, you know, a
global elite or a 1% or billionaires.
And some of those are perfectly legitimate.
And then some of those go into Rothschild's, uh, you know, Luminarty,
protocols of the elders of Zionist control government, and then it
gets closer, you know, and closer closer to overt, rank antisemitism.
So I think that that is, you know, there has been an evolution in where
you would imagine the prejudice would come and for the right, as you say,
and the, the, the people who are now to be afraid of are, are Muslims.
And you will hear all these tropes about a Muslim invasion of Europe,
you know, these idea of kind of armies of rapists overtaking us.
And so the kind of polls of, of the kind of, the racism have
switched.
the far right are very keen
on Israel now.
Um, so, alongside the St. George flags, you had demonstrations where there
was St. Georgia, oh, and the state
of Israel.
that's a long way for British fascism to move, which has
been, you know, pretty solidly anti-Semitic right the way through.
Now it isn't.
Tommy Robinson was invited over to Israel, wasn't he?
by, I think the President's office, which is, is an extraordinary
kind of fusion, uh, uh, of people.
But there's another thing I've noticing that's really interesting is the sort
of
bandwagoning, uh, by the right onto this antisemitism and blame that all on Mus-
Muslim, um, communities as well, uh, which goes along with the, you know,
they are being made the scapegoat for absolutely everything by, by the right.
But the, the idea that anti-Semitism in this country has somehow been imported
in on the small boats and, uh, and, and it, it's another migrant, it's a migrant
community who are, who are, who are completely to blame, blame for that as
well, which is sort of equally inaccurate.
I mean,
Keir
I know is trying to make the point at the moment
that this is,
this is itself evidently a massive problem for society and it's something
that we should all be ashamed of.
Uh, and to, kind of move it on into just trying to scapegoat someone else seems to
be as useless a, a, a reaction to it as,
as, as
any other, really.
Right.
Now, I wasn't on the podcast last time, so can I just check, is this all
just an attempt by you three to have another go at poor old Zach Pilanski
who is doing his best under very trying circumstances to offer hope and
change-
Dammit.
he spotted us.
just facing this sort of sneering cynicism from the media, is that- Well, okay.
okay.
So, uh, just to give you a glimpse behind the scenes, while you were away,
um, probably doing actually something actively green rather than, uh the
stuff the green party's more into
these days.
Um, we got criticized by Zach Polanski for not understanding
the appeal of the greens.
Uh, and Ian stands indicted of the crime of saying, they don't seem to
talk about environmentalism very much.
They are more a lefttering populist party.
And I, I know.
And I remember this as the, as I live in Lewischm, which is a contest between
labor and the greens, as the green leaflet, big picture of Zach Polanski on
the front, dropped through my letterbox.
Can you guess how many times environmentalism was mentioned
in that leaflet, Andy?
I'm going to say double figures at least.
You're gonna say none because it was none.
It was about their populist economic proposals of 15 pound
minimum wage, for example.
and the way that Zach Polanski phrased this in his interview
with the times essentially, well, paraphrased by decorating them
for him, was everyone knows that they're in favor of green issues.
That's fi- that's sort of taken as a given.
Right.
So actually they're gonna talk about cost of living issues instead.
of the things I found quite unpleasant was the fact that, um, Rachel Millward, the
green, the other green deputy leader apart from Mothin Ali was on question time.
Um, she was asked about the gold as green stabbing in the rise
of 97ism, and she attributed it to the cost of living crisis.
And I think that is ... Yeah,
I know.
Another random scape artist.
But that wasn't yeah- How so?
But, but it's basically like asterities made a lot of people
feel, you know, very angry.
And what struck me about that is that is a mirror image of things you will hear
from reform supporters who say essentially it's very hard not to be racist these
days because, you know, all these people coming home and taking our jobs, right?
And that in both cases, there is this idea that economic insecurity
is kind of gives people a sign off essentially for finding a scapegoat.
And I was quite surprised to hear that the, the green, you know, party
deputy leaders signing off that something that they would attack
very heavily when the right use that
same, Yeah.
same language.
Can I just say at this
point, I would like
to be
unpopular on
all fronts.
Uh,
uh, and
say that, um,
there is classically a,
a, problem with Islamism and antisemitism.
I made a documentary about anti-
semitic,
precedents and
ended up,
you
know, witnessing the Cairo Book Fair, and this is a couple of years ago, where
they're actively selling Mind Camp.
and, uh, a lot of cartoonists in Arab newspapers
literally would not get published anywhere
else um, on the grounds of antisemitic tropes.
So,
we can't ignore it.
and I think it is,
it is worth,
saying that
the eye has tried, which is usually a, a failed policy, um,
of saying,
We
are
against, um, Israel's behavior in Gaza but we're not very keen on antisemitism."
after our Gaza cover, there was nothing but, um, letters saying, you know,
the eye is absolutely anti-Semitic.
Despite, um, the number of literally every issue we write about anti-Semitism
online, um, Elon Musk, uh, all of those things, but we do run pieces saying,
guess what's happening in the West Bank?
It's not great.
Dr. Grimm runs those pieces.
So attempting nuance,
is unacceptable
in
the new bipolar
world.
Um, and that makes this issue even worse because everyone deliberately,
you say,
you know, the, the borders between the two get confused.
I think they're deliberately confused by people who want
to play in that space.
and you've had experience of this a lot over the years because of the,
the acid test of the letters page.
Yes.
You know, and whoever's complaining most.
it, it's, and it's normally when someone, someone is popular,
someone is new, as Zach Polanski undoubtedly is at the moment.
Someone seems to be offering something different before
mass disillusionment has kicked
in,
as happens in every single political career, it's part of the process, uh,
you, you experience that in real time,
you know?
Yes.
And,
uh, people are furious
and they write letters
and, and, it
used to be, um, the
Scotts Nats.
They would, they were easily the
most prolific
and bad tempered letter writers
about any
mention of Nicholas Sturgeon at all.
Any suggestion that anything in Scotland had gone wrong in any way was just,
you
know.
Sassinat.
act whinging, Um, and,
you know, sort of, uh, what you
want Boris then.
Yeah.
Yukip originally,
you've never seen so many letters.
Um, Tori's briefly,
the Boris
Cult,
any mention of
him-
Wow.
... particularly
the overflowing
laviatory suggesting that was his
legacy, I think there
was a
staggering- number of
right?
That was the cover with a literal toilet
I I wanted to complain about that cover just on the grounds.
it was so horrible.
Yes, it was horrible.
but the volume is, and the greens are out now.
Yeah.
Um, they are
very, very
offended, um, by any christism
of Zach and any
christism of themselves.
And I think it's when you get this rush of popularity,
it doesn't occur to you that the thing that comes next is accountability-
Yeah.
um,
because you might be in.
And by the time I say this, he might well be in charge of a party that's running
a lot of councils.
people
are gonna ask you things, and if they ask you things that you don't
like or you don't particularly
want to
answer, that doesn't mean they're mainstream media
smear merchants.
I
mean, you've
just got to get beyond that.
Otherwise, you know,
you end up
saying, "I don't want journalism."
I, I think about all the people we've had in politics in my lifetime.
There has been a real difference between what you might call the
populists and the, the mainstream.
The mainstream just moan a lot less about journalism, right?
And that's one of the things that is, uh, I think is very different
about them.
Well, there was a, there was a very fun piece, uh, last week, I
think in The Economist analyzing 35,000 likes by Zach Polanski on
Blue Sky,
which is his social media platform of choice.
I
mean, he's, he's
filming all the time, he's writing all the time, and he's on it all the time,
clearly, and he will like anything that mentions him positively, and he will
also like quite a lot of stuff that's incredibly rude about anyone who's,
who's been even slightly critical of him.
Right.
And it's just, I don't have time to like 35,000 things on blue sky.
I don't know how someone running a major political party does.
But that speaks to what he's very good at, which is content creation.
He's very, he, he's very visible.
He turns up, he, you know, he, he's pushing at his mesh- message.
These are the things I will give him credit for-
mm-hmm.
... is that that is part of the role of party leading out, something that Keir Starmer
is obviously failing at and terrible at.
What does Keir Starmer think we're going or how do you think we get there?
Very hard to tell you now, even.
Like he's just not communicating those things.
Zach Polanski is, I mean, I think it's all completely different to what
he believed 10 years ago and he's never really accounted for how he's
changed his mind, but we certainly
know he's apologized To Jeremy Corbin.
Hmm.
the one thing that he's apologized for is essentially,
yeah, the Labor Party being too
tough on And he was fooled By the propaganda.
What the Libdem
propaganda-
No, the Propaganda
around Corbinism.
Oh,
I see.
The idea that there was an anti- any antisemitism in the Labor Party.
Yeah, he's, that's the bit
he's apologized
for.
for suggesting that might have been
the case.
Yeah.
But
on,
Stick your fingers in the
socket, go on.
gonna stick my feet in the socket because, because one of the things
that has been really interesting with the Greens that they were very
good at, at expelling people for was expelling gender critical feminists.
So Shahar Ali, in fact, took the party to court, um, he felt that they had
discriminated against his lawful views.
So I would say, yes, I would take the fact that there has been a huge intake
of new candidates and their vetting has been, you know, delayed by that.
However, I would say, is it also reasonable to say you've had a very
bright line about what views on sex and gender, you were not perm- permitted
in this, in this party, and as a political party, that is your right.
There's not an imposition in free, of, of free speech.
People can hold those views, they just aren't compatible with
being in the Green Party, sure.
However, you are, I think, we're more reluctant to do this on views
about antisemitism, and I think the rest of us are allowed to
comment on that and disagree with
it, actually.
And when you talk
about
vetting, I mean, when Furage said, "I, I don't have time to vet these candidates,"
I thought, "Well, you could knock off
two hours in the
pub, um,
and
read the list." Um,
Um,
and
He's got spare time now, he's not doing his cameo videos anymore.
Yeah.
He he could get up at five o'clock in the morning and do a bit of vetting
that, yeah.
And the same with
Zach, rather
than dress up in
green clothes and pose for the Sunday time green, photo shoot, you could
have had a coffee and looked over the
list.
See, here's an idea.
Ollie Robbins is looking for a job at the moment, isn't he?
He's, he's got some experience of vetting that could
get
him
in.
Before
we move on from this bit, we should say just a, a little bit about
exactly why Nigel Farach has been able to afford to give up doing
videos on cameo for 75 quit a time.
Hmm.
Um- It's
because he's on
celebrity traitors.
It's
He's the
only
person who
isn't.
Which,
which is the, the last week we've learned that he received in 2024, uh, a gift of
five million pounds, uh, which was not taxed from Christopher Harbourne, who is
a, a Thai based crypto businessman- Yeah.
and I believe billionaire.
Uh, I did a little calculation, just in case you're interested,
uh, Keir Starmer could bought, uh, 2,000 pairs of nice glasses- ... Uh,
and still not come up to the level-
You Surely mean Wahidali
could've bought that many pairs of
glasses, for Kistarma.
Sorry.
He
fact- In
fact, that is the total in the whole glasses gate.
It was, it was, it was many, many more
pairs of glasses than that you could get.
This does not seem to have attracted the attention that I think it ought to.
Um, Faros got in very early with a, a defense.
Uh, you, you know exactly how that happened in the Ellen.
Well, so the, uh, the Guardian who had this story, credit to them,
um, went to them for comment on it.
Yeah.
Uh, and the, according to the guardian, the reform press office stalled
them and said we need more time.
Then they said, "Oh, you've directed it to the wrong press officer actually."
And in the meantime, a, uh, a very sympathetic piece, I think my Gordon
Rainer in the telegraph appeared with the headline, I was firebombed,
and this was lots and lots about- B-
by Farish.
By, about, by Nigel Faraj being firebombed.
And this was lots and lots about Nigel Farage's security issues with then very
long way down going, and in order to resolve these security issues, I accepted
this
gift.
One problem with that, I think you, you
spotted
the problem, didn't you, Andy?
Yes, it's a timeline thing, which is that the, the fire, the firebombing,
the, um, attempted arson attack on, on Furose's home, which we we don't need to
say, probably should say is deplorable, shouldn't happen in- a- in any way.
Yeah, we're all against it.
That happened, uh, one year after Farah accepted a, a five million
pound donation, which is apparently something to do with his security.
So either Christopher Harbourn is a psychic- or crypto really is so good
that it can predict something that's gonna happen in a year's time, or
that actually doesn't really stack up.
And it was also a gift made when Ferrari was not an MP.
So they are saying, look, this is completely irrelevant
to Mr. Ferrata's political
career,
But I love this, this is always the argument with donations that aren't
declared, isn't it, is that technically it didn't have to be declared.
And in this case, the excuse is- it was the point where he said he was
never coming back as reform leader and he was done now and Richard
Tyson was gonna take over.
Uh, and it's just so clearly, I mean, to, to use a parliamentary
term, complete bollocks, isn't it?
Because if, if you're in hock to someone for five million pounds, if someone is
giving you farming, clearly, on principle, that is something you need, if there is a
register of interest, that is an interest.
I mean, this is the same argument that, that our old friend Peter Manilson
made, first resignation time around, when he said he didn't think it was
relevant that, that, that, that he owed 373,000 pounds to another cabinet
minister at that point- because he'd been, he'd been lent it by Jeffrey
Robinson to buy a house in Notting Hill.
Clearly- Yeah.
... it's a relevant interest.
You don't have to, you don't need to kind of pass it and go into accountancy terms
of
exact technicality.
And if it comes a few months before you announce not only that you're, you're
going back into frontline politics and also that you think this crypto
stuff is fantastic and there should be
much lower taxes
on crypto transactions.
And later on, Farough has said that he's invested nearly 300
grand in a company that buy
and hold Bitcoin.
Yes.
You're suggesting that two and
two
equal four.
Yeah, I am.
Which I'm sure in crypto world
is not true due to something clever,
but
they
do.
Yeah.
And I love Nigel Frozer's phrase that he's never a- Cristo Harborne has never asked
me or anything.
He gave you five million pounds personally and 17 million pounds to the party.
He doesn't need to ask you.
You know
You
what you're doing then,
You know what
you do in that
in that way.
And also they is the, obviously the amusing irony that the
leader of a party that complains
about foreign people
having influence over British
politics
is now,
you know, the largest recipient
of
the largest amount
of money ever,
um- Yeah.
by someone who's resident in Thailand.
He probably loves Thailand,
um, but he's
also there
in order to run a
business there without all the encumbrance
of British
tax and British
regulation,
which again, doesn't
seem hugely
patriotic.
Yeah, I think Nigel Farage is recreating the worst bits of MAGA.
the involvement in crypto, which is just a deeply scammy industry.
I, I would say any serious politician really should stay away from it.
And they should stay away from prediction markets.
They should say, you know, just that, they should stay away from gambling.
Like it's all of
And organized crime.
And those sort of things, I, I would say.
a sex ring, all of these things I would, I would recommend that they
often turn to shade into dodgy business and I'm against them.
But, um-
You're so
radical.
I know, right?
I'm so right wing.
Um, but the thing, the other thing is that Zia Yousef announced, um,
on Bank Holiday Monday, this, he, he essentially this sort of like weird
prisoners dilemma where he said, "We're going to do mass deportations.
We're going to build migrant hotels and we're going to put them in places
that vote green to punish them.
So if you don't want one in your place, vote
reform."
This literally comes with a website as well where you can put in your,
um, postcode and it will tell you where your, it looks like you're
going to vote reform, so you won't be getting one or it looks like people
are going to get green in your area.
You will be getting it on your doorstep.
I mean, it's, it's the ... I can't think of another situation in an
election where there's been a sort of outright threat with menaces like that.
Yeah.
Can you?
I mean, there's the usual sort of bribery
and kind
of we will cut your taxes and that kind of thing.
But an absolute, if your area goes the wrong way, then you're
trouble, Yeah.
If you vote green, you're going to get more potholes and we're
going to cause them, you know.
But they think it's very clever, right?
They think it's a trap that the left has walked into, which is like, oh,
I see, you don't like migrant hotels.
I thought you thought refugees were welcome.
Now that is very true of a, a tiny subset of the Green Party who do believe in
completely open borders, but actually there's a lot of people voting green for
a lot of other reasons, including cost of living and economic reasons, but who,
who, you know, who don't feel like that.
But this again, I think is the MAGA trap.
Donald Trump, no squish on immigration, has pulled back from pulling crying
children out of the streets, right?
Like just bundling people into cars, bundling them off to El
Salvador or wherever it might be because actually it looked cruel and
unpleasant and people didn't like it.
Even his supporters were not, you know, Steven Miller gung ho about
it as effective chief of staff, um, or his effective prime minister.
But, but mostly this was not a
popular place- And he sacked the person in charge.
And Greg Bevino, who was swaggering around in a very richy coat, I would say,
uh, got, yeah, got his marching orders.
So, you know, this just
... I,
I, I, I think this is,
this is a ... I think that was a really unpleasant announcement.
Obviously there's a million ways in which it didn't work.
You know, the places that Greens are gonna win will be inner cities.
If you think you can build anything in most places that elect greens.
Also, if there's one thing that unites every part of the political spectrum in
Britain,
it's
NIMBYism.
Right.
people just hate anything being built in Britain.
Like, good luck with that.
But it was also, it was just, it was just an odd, punitive,
guess
say, like a sort of punishment beating
for not
voting for us.
And in a way that I think you're right, crossed a line that I
hadn't seen cross before in
British policy.
And there is a long tradition
in, in British politics of,
of telling the voters you're going to give them
free money.
Um, Hogarth Onwards, you know, our,
our satirical tradition
is rich
with just politicians saying,
"Would you like
something,
um,
I'll give it to
you.
They
don't usually
say, "Vote
for
me or else." Yeah.
That, that's different.
right.
Now, uh, we come on to the state of the media and there's been a report about
the, uh, the Press Freedom Index, which is a global, uh, report about how free
the press is in all sorts of countries.
Normally, you're used to seeing it if you do see it in the context of a lot
more people banged up in Uzbekistan
this year,
uh, journalist, I mean, but obviously, Adam, it also features the UK.
Yes.
Because the UK is part
of
the
global community.
It is.
It is one of the 180 countries, uh, that were recorded in this report,
uh, the World Press Freedom Index, uh, which is issued by reporters Son
Frontier, which older reasons will remember is the international version of,
um,
It's a knockout,
uh, one for the kids there.
Um, and obviously there was an awful lot.
I mean, generally it was, it, it was a bad view.
Um, it was, the lowest average score they've ever recorded across the
globe in terms of press freedom.
Um, a lot of that was down to, um, journalists being killed in
various, uh, uh, conflict zones and other places around the world.
220 journalists more than that now, I think killed in Gaza by Israeli
forces, um, a lot in Sudan and South Sudan as well, they noted.
Um, but I thought, um, because we're very, very parochial, uh, we
are UK based, we could have a look at what they said about the UK.
Now the UK fell two places.
Uh, it's still recorded as satisfactory rather than good.
It's the 18th most free press in the world, according to reporters on Frontier,
which not
bad.
That doesn't be, sorry, coming in 18th and it's still not good.
Satisfactory.
Do
you want to know who's good?
I can tell you.
Norway, Sweden, Finland, Scandinavia doing fantastically.
Uh, Ireland, very good, uh, Estonia and, uh, and the Netherlands were the
one, the ones who were graded as good,
but
we
came in
just as satisfactory.
Is there
anywhere graded
outstanding?
There is not.
It's not like Ofsted.
No.
I just want to, I'm just testing the
ratings Good
is as good
as
it
can
get.
Okay.
So satisfactory
is, is-
is
is pretty good.
It's satisfactory.
good.
pretty good.
So
why, so we flipped, did you say we
slipped a couple of runs?
Slipped a couple of rungs, yep, yep, yep.
Uh, not as, not doing as badly as the US which has full fallen seven places, uh,
specifically because of Donald Trump and his, uh, his kind of, uh, maga movements,
uh, constant attacks on the media.
But the specific reasons they gave for the, uh, the, the UK deteriorating
slightly all the problems with the,
uh,
with the UK.
One of them very specific, um, attacks on exiled Iranian journalists who are
broadcasting from over here and threats to their family- uh, back families back
in Iran to try and stop them, um, putting out what the, uh, anti-regime, news.
Um, uh, but they also noted, uh, a few other things, uh, the rise in online
abuse of journalists, um, and, uh, the government's failure to act as promised
on slaps, which of course are strategic lawsuits against public participation,
which, uh, any Eye reader will know.
We've, we've covered in great detail along the way.
So we, we've we've gone in specifically on, um, Muhammada Mersi's, uh,
extraordinary range of, uh, legal threats against, um, Charlotte Leslie, uh, the
formatory MP, uh, uh, who he pursued through the courts, as I say, in, in, in
several different ways over several years, uh, for having Tamarity to put a memo out
to 11 people containing some information
about him.
Right.
Uh- So those
are generally rich people shutting down
journalists
through the courts.
In a lot of cases, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Another one was Tom Burgess, who was actually the journalist doing the
Guardian last week, uh, exposed the Christoph Harbourne uh, donation to
Nigel Faraj, you mentioned earlier.
Uh, but he put a b- a book called Kleptopia.
Uh, this case was thrown out as wholly flawed by the judge in
the end, but it was brought by a Kazakhstan based mining company.
Uh, so, you know, these are the sort of, you know, it's people with a
lot of money behind them who really don't want any of their activities
written about.
So- Okay.
There have been lots and lots of those.
Now, the government did promise, um, ahead of the election that this was
gonna be one of their priorities, that they were gonna bring in
legislation to stop this kind of thing.
Uh, there was a kind of phalanx of media lawyers, the society of media law, lawyers
was created, which is lots of people from, uh, firms that uh, I readers will know and
love like Shillings and uh, Carter Ruck.
Yep, I'll get it right.
Uh, and various others who said this is absolute nonsense and this
would be terrible, um, a terrible, terrible thing to, uh, restrict our,
our, our client's right to, uh, legal
representation.
and their right to shut down journalism.
Yes.
Which, um, uh, if you are a very, very rich person, it never seems
to occur to you that, that, that
isn't one of
your fundamental human rights- ... That any criticism of yourself should stop.
Um, and there's always lawyers who, who are prepared to do that.
Um, but it did look as though this battle was being won and there were
brilliant books about, you know, um, Russian autocrats that managed to
survive, um, you know, really good work, really good journalism, and suddenly
we seem to be rowing backwards again.
Right.
Um, and the Labor government, which I know, I shouldn't take seriously
what they wrote in the manifesto.
It's silly of me, but I think I believe they might do
this.
Yes.
And they still say that they will do at some point, but unfortunately
what's happened is that they've, uh, put in a working party which involves
a lot of these same media lawyers who are lobbying very, very hard, uh,
against it and, um, it's sort of got kicked into the long grass as being
something that's a bit difficult.
I would say it was one of the most popular things they could
possibly do if they want, wanna curry favor with newspaper editors.
Um, it's, it's, it's a slam dunk, this one,
isn't it?
And boo foreigners, you know, it goes down pretty well.
I mean, why, why not extend it to rich
foreigners?
Yes.
Who is pro-
Kasak billionaire?
What is the
for that in Britain?
Quite small.
The other thing, Adam, I wonder if it came up.
Um, I was judging the poor foot awards this year and really great entries as
ever, um, and we'll see you who wins.
But one of the things that struck me again was that particularly with the, the
local papers, the regional press, there's been some brilliant diversification onto
Substack, um, and the, you know, these sort of small startups, but it is still,
people are on shoestring resources.
That absolutely was one of the other things that came up in this,
in this report, uh, in, in, in, in, in the press freedom interest.
Uh, they said the budgetary pressures have left many outlets forced to close their
newsrooms or drastically reduce staff.
Um, and at the same time, you're absolutely right.
There are these sort of independent, um, uh, uh, outlets which are coming out
and still doing fantastic journalism, a lot which is, is recognized every year
in, in the foot awards, as you say.
I Um, so Mill Media, who is one of these, uh, independent outlets who are doing
a lot of very, very good journalism, faced down all sorts of legal threats.
Most recently in the last week, uh, they, uh, had a threat from, um, uh, a spad
to Shabana Mamood, the home secretary over a story they were doing about
her, which were very definitely in the public interest, threatening them with
an injunction on the grounds of libel, which, um, if you know anything about law,
that's, that's, that's not how it works.
Libel, the very principle is absolutely there published and be damned.
So uh, story went ahead
anyway
It stops people following up the story, right?
That's, that's the reason I always think for those legal threats.
If it's someone small, does a story, they get this heavy handed legal
response and everyone else who might follow it up then like backs
off a little Well, there is an absolutely classic method which we've
seen millions and millions of times with stories that we run in the Rotten
Burris column, which then local papers try to follow up, uh, and are told
by, you know, the press office or for the council concerned or, or wherever.
"Oh yes, no, that was very inaccurate and we're taking
legal action against private eye.
And "Occasionally they will phone up, phone us
up and say," Are they?
And I said," No, we haven't heard a dicky bird from them at all.
"But that, that threat is- enough.
Um, can
I just ask, Adam, the press freedom, uh, people, do they have anything to say
about
who owns the telegraph?
I just, I've
been
so
worried
about
it.
They
did.
Did they?
They ... Well, no, what they did point out was that one of the problems
with the UK media, as far as they're concerned, is that there are just
three companies who dominate the market who are of course News UK, Reach,
and the Daily Mellon General Trust.
Now, actually, that would have been even more of an issue because it looked for
awhile like the D, uh, DMGT were gonna take over the, uh, telegraph as well.
But in fact, we have now pl- more plurality in the UK media, so we're gonna
go up the 2027 index, presumably, because Axel Springer have come in from Germany
and, uh, and taken over the telegraph.
So yes,
it
was in there.
So
this
is a
win
for Press
Freedom.
Pr-
Pr- press
diversity.
Mm.
Ah,
Ah, yes,
okay.
Yeah,
yeah, Slightly different thing.
every time you said Axel Spring, my brain has supplied Axel Foley,
of course, the
protagonist
of
Beverly Hills.
who I'm choosing to believe that Eddie
Murphy has taken
over
the
telegraph.
That would
be- Much more
entertaining.
wouldn't
it,
Yeah.
Oh, that's interesting because another thing we haven't mentioned is the
BBC have just announced this huge cut
of their own headcount, I mean,
2,000 people losing their jobs about a 10th of the overall workforce
there, that's, that's going to have a substantial effect as well.
Yeah.
You know, there, there are going to be a
lot of,
lot of journalists on the jobs market,
basically.
And there's no
clear rationale for, for why these journalists have been
suddenly culled- Um, during an
interim between director generals, and
it may just
be convenience,
but,
uh, there was no warning,
there was no build up, there was no narrative,
it was just,
yeah, we need the money now.
we're not
going to salami slice, which
is the traditional BBC,
uh,
range, we're just going to cut.
only thing offered
was,
well,
with,
uh, the license fee,
we're, you know, no one's
paying it, we're not collecting
it, right?
I mean,
there is a remedy for
that.
I mean, I get it.
Um, attempting to
lock up
very, very poor people for not
paying their
license fee doesn't
look good,
but arguing
um, as the government, uh, that, um,
you have put
this license
fee in place
because you believe it is worth it.
Might be worth
trying.
Right.
Do you know what?
I've never felt more pro- BC than
I don't know if I've mentioned any, but I've just been to the Galapagos.
Um,
sorry.
once again, I think that, yeah, the BBC did loads of stuff I don't
agree with, but actually no one is doing work of that quality
...and
so
much of it.
And on, on, on the international, uh, spectrum as well, you know,
there are now Starlink terminals being smuggled into Iran so that
people can get the BBC World Service
and the BBC Persian service
because they are reaching a huge number of the adult population.
And I think it's something that all of the BBC's trials and tribulations
here don't really reflect is, is what the BBC is still managing to do around
the
world.
So
I went
to
an event organized by
Hostage
International, which, um, uh, offers support to the
families of those
who've been kidnapped
and, and tries to sort of, um, make their life better
in whatever they can
do and offer help and advice.
And, this event was about the kidnapping
of John
McCarthy, who was very
famously, um, kidnapped by
an Iran backed
group, um, in the Middle East,
and he
spent five years as
a hostage, but he was
talking.
And
the number of references
to the world
service,
um, involved in his
account and the other's account, should have made everyone in the
audience ashamed, um, both for the hostages, you know, um, they denied
them radios when the,
the Americans got a radio,
John heard his friend talking about him the
first time in two years he had proof that
anyone cared that he
was still alive, but the effect on,
uh, the warders,
the jailers,
uh,
the other people
in the region
listening,
the
idea that, the BBC World
Service is some,
um,
embarrassment.
I mean,
we've got aircraft carriers
that don't
work.
Um, we've got, uh, a
soft
power radio
station that works
unbelievably well.
We're gonna cut that.
I mean,
it's
extraordinary.
And
very noticeably, that has been noticed elsewhere.
So what floods interfill the gap is, as you, you know, it is Russia today,
it's Sputnik, it's those things that come to directly Kremlin front funded
propaganda outlets and, you know, China has sim- similar operations of
kind of news going around worldwide.
So with the World Service
being cut back
here, Trump cutting funding for, for NPR and the Voice of America and all those
kind of things, you know, this stuff
does
matter.
Yeah, tough times for all the people who've been funded
by Victor Orban in Hungary.
Like the, the people on the, on the, on the right very well aware
that it is a good idea to fund friendly media organizations.
Yeah.
And then maybe, yeah, Britain should say, "Well, we've got some values of
our own actually, and one of them is obj- this idea of objectivity, which
we aim for, maybe we should fund that.
" Anyway, here concludes
the
party political broadcast in favor of the BBC.
Is, is there any particularly, uh, uh, good journalism that, that, that could be
highlighted at the moment, for instance, by looking at the, uh, at a long list on
the,
uh,
private eye website?
Will we be redoing our,
our
very
successful series of little
interviews with people?
Yes, Yes.
once the shortlist is out, I'm going to be, uh, interviewing the shortlist and
you'll
hear it
on
this
podcast
channel.
Great.
I'm hearing a lot of pro- journalist propaganda
here.
Yeah.
I
love
it.
I know.
Read Street of
shame
next
issue
to find
out how
awful
they
all are.
as well.
now, having been so nice about journalists- We're
going to be nice about you.
No, no.
Oh,
no.
We're going to be nice
about
parliamentarians, aren't we?
We've,
yeah, I just thought it would be worth
doing a little, section about, one of the bits of the
British political system that works
Which bit is that, Andy?
It's-
The
canteen.
team.
Is
it
cross
charging
pavement solutions?
Don't even get me started.
I go away on holiday for one week and the government makes a big announcement
saying, "We're going to make this a permitted thing and look out for
legislation coming later in the year. I'm gutted." I hear they call
law.
Andy's law.
It is a
win
though, Andy, isn't it?
It's ... Well, let's ... I'm not going to get too excited.
I'm keeping, I'm keeping the, um, the carver on
ice,
but- Yeah, because if this
government promises it's going
to happen,
boom,
Yeah.
it
happens.
Exactly.
And
then
there's a quick
U-turn
at the end of the cul-de-sac and they come right back the other way,
look, it looks like it might happen.
That's not what I wanted
to talk about,
but the bit that has been working and I think is worth highlighting is
something I've been, um, trying to go along and, and look at, which is the,
um, the transport select committee.
So for those listening who don't know, there are all sorts of
select committees on, on major issues in British public life.
They're made up of MPs whose job is to run investigations, look at the
issues that are, is their particular patch and eventually come up with
a report and, and recommendations.
So I've been going to the transport select committee, they have, uh, one of
their running investigations is called supercharging the electric vehicle
transition about is it working, is it not?
So they, they take evidence and it just, for anyone whose normal
experience of politics is seeing the occasional snippet of Prime Minister's
questions,
it, it it is a completely different side of the experience and, and so much more,
uh, interesting and constructive, you
know?
Oh, I love
a select
committee.
Yeah.
I mean, do you remember some of the great select committees
around the time of, um, the
phone hacking,
for example?
Yeah.
They were behigrama.
Um, Margaret Hodge used to do, I think the public accounts committee- Yes.
... one of the, one of the ones that scrutinizes finance and it was- That's a
big, yeah, it was incendiary sometimes.
Yeah.
And what you tend to do is, yeah, okay, so there are some idiots who
just sign up to them for whatever reason because they want to grandstand.
And there is a bit of, this isn't so much a common, a question as a comment,
which is the plague of public life.
Yeah.
But normally you get MPs who are genuinely enthused and interested and knowledgeable
about a topic and they're getting in front of them people who are also
enthused and
interested and knowledgeable about the topic.
This is it.
And the, the thing I found really interesting is the difference between
the bit where it's the committee of MPs interviewing just sort of subject
experts.You might get someone from a big charging company or you might
get someone from a local council and
say, like, "What,
what are you concerned about or what's going well?"
And then the political bit, because on the, in the last session, you
had, uh, the minister responsible who's, uh, Kia Mather and Pete who
that, you might recognize that name.
He's wild, Yes.
He's 28.
I mean, it's amazing like- He's not 12.
He's,
he's very young.
Um, he was
very impressive, you know-
but he chang his name to
Andy
soon, because he
obviously-
obviously,
it's gonna
be quite, you know- Yeah.
Um, but that, that slightly changed the, the nature of Of it, but even then, I
mean, this committee is mostly labor MPs because most MPs are labor MPs,
Well, select committees are, um,
the,
the
membership
is reflective of the- Yeah.
Yeah, it's- ...States the parties in the house, isn't it?
It's reasonably proportional, you know.
There, there is a Tori, there, there were a couple of Lib Dems on this committee,
But
the, the interesting thing was they, they were not noticeably, kinder to him
because he was a minister in their party.
I mean, they, like some of the toughest
questions
about whether this thing is working or not came from the other labor MPs
on the committee.
there wasn't
too much grandstanding or party dicks, There were one or two, but
mostly it was very collaborative,
I
mean,
there are fun things about it, like the first session I
went to,
10 minutes of it was completely inaudible because, uh, Angela
Rippen was running a dance
class outside-
With
the speaker of the
house.
Oh yeah, I
saw
the pictures of
of that.
Yes,
pictures of that.
That was in PortColor's face.
Yeah.
It was in Port Colors house.
What you didn't see was all the committee rooms around the center of Port Colors
house where people were just saying,
" Well,
we don't know what's being said here and
maybe,
maybe it's
rather than not
that we're not
getting
we're not getting it.
So
would you say
the
transport committees were better than the select committees that
looked into the
Mandelson
Gate saga?
Well,
I, Well, That was the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, wasn't it?
Which is chaired by Emily Thornbury, who really not very happy at
not, not, not being put into the cabinet at the last election and,
and, and made that quite apparent.
didn't She
she was giving diva,
I
think is
the way to describe that.
There was very little diva given on the transport select committee.
Maybe what-
when these things are a bit further from scrutiny, you know,
they, they're allowed to just
get on
with the job.
No,
because I, I
felt, you know, the
Foreign Affair Select Committee had identified some
of the big problems such as Peter Manson shouldn't have been
appointed,
you know, which
I
wouldn't have had
a
clue about
unless they'd had at least 12
sessions.
Are those helpful
those, that,
that
kind
of- that
comment, not very.
I, I, I think we need to get
back to
travel.
No, those, those, select committees where it's, it's a big public thing
or the, or the,
phone
hacking ones, are they
doing
a
different
thing?
There is quite a lot of grandson.
I mean, famously Keith has, when he was in charge of the home affairs committee,
was very into a celebrity guest.
So you would tend to get sort of, um, Russell brand turning
up, uh, back in the day.
uh, and, and pontificating for, for several hours while, while
Keith tried to get himself in
the, in in
the camera
frame as
well.
Uh, so- there is, There are a lot of criticisms we made
in this process as well.
But there are in fact so many of these select committees that a lot of them
still are doing a lot of good business.
I would say just say, well, we're on this congratulatory thing,
just slightly self congratulatory.
I think Gavilbasher, uh, uh, one of our parliamentary chorismologists
is an absolutely brilliant job of, of not focusing on the chamber and
the, and, and, and prime minister's questions and that kind of thing and
getting along to a lot of these select committees and along to the House of
Lords Chamber as well, which is another of the areas that's sort of overlooked
and ignored by the general daily
coverage.
So-
Right, because the laws, as far as I see it, they were the
ones who really, um, ended the
the assisted
dying Absolutely.
Yeah.
ran into the sand in, into, in, in the laws
consistently.
Yeah.
But I think it is actually quite useful occasion to
restore your faith in democracy.
In the same way that every year I find that judging the poor foot towards
restores my faith in journalism, because yes, there are a lot of show
ponies who are very irritating and in everything and doing much better
in their careers than me, which is wrong and shouldn't be allowed.
But also, there are people who are doing, like, just
unglamorous, heavy lifting work,
and
that's what you see at the select committees too.
Yes.
And it does not get less glamorous, I can tell you than maybe half
an hour of questions about the electric vehicle excise duty
which
you
you know,
that you've got to be interested to be-
Presumably absolutely vital in the sense that we could be having a flood
of cheap Chinese electric vehicles here and they are sort of essentially barred
from coming
over, right?
Like- they're not barred at all.
They're not barred at all?
No.
no no.
So tell us what's
Yeah.
Oh,
well, it's
the, one of the most revealing comments made was, does the government
have one foot on the accelerator and one foot on the brake when it
comes to this, you
know.
They've decreed that by 2030, all new cars have to be
electric
in some element, whether that's full electric or with a bit of hybrid,
that's coming up quite soon, you know, it's coming up within a few years.
Is the country ready for it?
Are we ready for petrol taxes
to drop
off as people
make the switch, there is a range of opinion on display in the
committee, you know, experts are saying slightly different things
depending on what they want.
You know, someone who runs a big charge point company obviously
wants more big charge points.
Someone who's trying to represent electric vehicle drivers is saying,
"Well, we just want to make it convenient so maybe we just need, you
know, to make home charging easier even
if
you don't
have a
driveway,
all of this stuff."
Yeah.
That there is one MP on the committee who quite clearly has a big coach business
because she only asks questions about electric coaches and whether- Yeah.
you know, coach tours are going to be able to electrify, which I would say is not
the main
element of the committee, but that's not, that's not for me to say,
you know.
And the thing of whether it's paid for is a potential stumbling block by this
event, which is you're gonna be charged three P a mile to drive an electric
car, that's gonna be done, it seems like in quite a laborious way with
having to take it in for an MOT, declare
your
mileage, get that checked.
It, it
sounds like FAF,
the
way it's
currently
being pitched.
The
government's response is, "Well,
we, we think
we have to replace
petrol
duty with something, which is true.
We're giving lots of notice so people can get ready for it, and there are
various projections about whether it will stop people going electric or not.
of these committee sessions were happening before the evidence
has come in from
the war in Iran, petrol suddenly becoming very unaffordable.
So,
it's quite hard to tell what, what is
gonna
happen next- Yeah.
... without
that.
your feeling was that MPs were making themselves better informed-
Yeah.
and increasing the amount of information about this
issue they had on
hand, which does
sound good.
It's really good.
Like 100%, you know, even, even when there were opinions being given
that I you know, I disagreed with, that the MPs are asking and drilling
down into the details of all of it
and, you know,
trying to get to the bottom of it before they issue their
report.
government- We've gotta get away
from this drilling
down
metaphor.
Oh yeah.
It's,
it's not
helping.
Charging up, I'm
not
sure.
Yeah.
They
were really plugged in.
They were plugged in.
There we go.
yeah, can't wait to read the report.
I'll be staying up late,
you know,
on
the night before And I can't
wait to read your report Of that report in private
eye.
and
so much more, if I can stress that, uh, including
the
Poor Foot Awards Shortlist and, and, and so much else in the
next issue of the magazine.
Uh, that will be out on Newsstand soon.
You can just buy it in your local shop or you can go to private-i.co.uk and get
a very reasonably priced subscription.
That's it for this episode though.
We'll be back again in a fortnight with another one.
Until then, it's thanks to Helen, Adam, and Ian.
Thanks to you for listening and thanks to Matt Hill of Rethink Audio
for producing.
Bye for
now.