Latest / UK Column Radio / UK Column News — 17th July 2026

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UK Column News — 17th July 2026 · UK Column Radio

0:08
Speaker 1: Good afternoon, It's Friday, the seventeenth July twenty twenty six.
0:12
Speaker 1: Well ten minutes after one o'clock. Apologies for the late's start.
0:15
Speaker 1: We had a slight technical problem there, but i'm your host,
0:19
Speaker 1: Make Bruminson joining me in the studio, well by video link,
0:22
Speaker 1: sorry is Basil Valentine. Now later in the program, we're
0:25
Speaker 1: going to have news of Andy Burnham's coronation, the publication
0:29
Speaker 1: of the mhra's annual report, and will be following up
0:33
Speaker 1: on the report from Wednessey's program on Karros.
0:37
Speaker 2: Well.
0:37
Speaker 1: Actually, since we've changed the order here, we are actually
0:40
Speaker 1: going to start with Andy Burnham, so let's bring him
0:44
Speaker 1: on screen. The King of the North has been crowned
0:47
Speaker 1: this morning, this afternoon, rather the Special Labor Conference began
0:52
Speaker 1: at midday or so. Now Burnham has promised a new
0:55
Speaker 1: path for the UK now the decent leader, and of
0:58
Speaker 1: course he makes his promise with no mandate. He promised
1:02
Speaker 1: to lead the government with the courage to fix the
1:04
Speaker 1: big things that politics has neglected and the conviction to
1:08
Speaker 1: argue for Labour's plans. He says his government is going
1:13
Speaker 1: to be unashamedly labor and its priorities and in the
1:17
Speaker 1: decisions we take, putting people and places at the heart
1:19
Speaker 1: of everything we do. I think we've heard all this
1:22
Speaker 1: kind of rhetoric before change change, change, which of course
1:25
Speaker 1: equals the song remains the same. So if he's going
1:28
Speaker 1: to be unashamedly labor, that probably means he'll destroy the economy.
1:32
Speaker 1: But that's okay because that's what the Tories have done
1:35
Speaker 1: as well, and he will, without doubt simply in the
1:39
Speaker 1: meantime accelerate all the policy areas that we know and love,
1:42
Speaker 1: the war policy, the surveillance policy, the censorship policy, and
1:46
Speaker 1: so on and again, all policies that the Tories were
1:50
Speaker 1: pushing just as hard. So then the question is who
1:53
Speaker 1: is going to be helping them, helping him develop these policies. Well,
1:57
Speaker 1: the picture of who that would be is beginning to
1:59
Speaker 1: clar So here's Matthew mcgregorly and he has been was
2:04
Speaker 1: announced yesterday as Andy Burnham's new head of political strategy.
2:09
Speaker 1: This has caused quite a stir, with Greedow, Fox, the Spectator,
2:13
Speaker 1: and the National Pulse all getting very excited.
2:16
Speaker 2: Now.
2:16
Speaker 1: While the announcement focused on McGregor's involvement with the Obama
2:20
Speaker 1: that's a Labor announcement rather focused on his announcement with
2:24
Speaker 1: the Obama presidential campaign. Guido Fox coverage and the other
2:28
Speaker 1: coverage prefers to focus on his role as director of
2:31
Speaker 1: Campaigns and Communications for Hope Not Hit, which he held
2:36
Speaker 1: that role from January twenty eighteen till October twenty twenty one,
2:40
Speaker 1: after which he was appointed chief executive of thirty eight
2:43
Speaker 1: degrees Now. Greeedo Fox also notes that Burnham has also
2:47
Speaker 1: heard Justinda ur Durn's old campaign director, Hidden Monroe as
2:52
Speaker 1: political director. So this is Greeedo Fox Lee saying, is
2:58
Speaker 1: leading some labor sources to worry about how well connected
3:01
Speaker 1: these senior hers are to what they describe as the
3:05
Speaker 1: party family. Bazil, let me welcome you to the program
3:08
Speaker 1: because I'm sure you have some thoughts on this.
3:13
Speaker 2: Yes, it seems it's going to be Blair two point
3:16
Speaker 2: one from Andy Burnham. The usual platitudes about the biggest
3:20
Speaker 2: moment of change in forty years, But as you say,
3:23
Speaker 2: with the likes of Jacinda Arderne's former top personnel joining him,
3:28
Speaker 2: and he remains very cagey about who's going to be
3:30
Speaker 2: in the shadow cabinet, although he said this morning that
3:33
Speaker 2: he has a plan. We have absolutely no idea what
3:37
Speaker 2: that plan is. It's just the usual generalizations at the moment.
3:42
Speaker 2: So he once he says to sort of bring back
3:45
Speaker 2: the Labor voters from the mill towns and the shipyards
3:48
Speaker 2: of the northeast and from London, where of course it
3:53
Speaker 2: was only the vagaries of our electoral system that meant
3:57
Speaker 2: Keir Starmer managed two thirds of the seats in the
3:59
Speaker 2: House of Commons with one third of the vote, and
4:03
Speaker 2: it looked like Labor we're going to be undone by
4:06
Speaker 2: the same electoral system at the next general election with
4:09
Speaker 2: their vote craterings. So the whole idea is to try
4:12
Speaker 2: and hang on to as many Labor seats as possible
4:16
Speaker 2: in three years time. Commentators have said this morning, this
4:19
Speaker 2: is not the speech of a man who anticipates being
4:22
Speaker 2: yet another short term prime minister in Britain, but somebody
4:27
Speaker 2: who set it stall out for a much longer tenure
4:30
Speaker 2: in Downing Street.
4:32
Speaker 1: Bazzil just very quickly. This whole idea of a mandate,
4:34
Speaker 1: of course, theoretically is not the British way of doing things,
4:38
Speaker 1: because we elect a party based on its manifesto for
4:42
Speaker 1: the term of the parliament. And of course that's on
4:47
Speaker 1: the basis that he will stick to the manifesto that
4:49
Speaker 1: was advertised at the last general election.
4:53
Speaker 2: Well, Starmer didn't stick to the Labor manifesto of twenty
4:57
Speaker 2: twenty four at all. Ironically, Burnham may sticks lightly closer
5:00
Speaker 2: to it, but that isn't the point really, Really, Burnham
5:05
Speaker 2: should be going to the country with the manifesto of
5:07
Speaker 2: its own that the people can make their mind up about.
5:10
Speaker 2: It's as simple as that. All this sort of cloak
5:13
Speaker 2: and dagger behind the scenes, swapping leaders, I mean, let's
5:18
Speaker 2: not forget the tourists did it twice in their last administration.
5:23
Speaker 2: It's very Unbritish, it's very undemocratic, particularly when you have,
5:28
Speaker 2: to all intents and purposes, in the UK and elected dictatorship.
5:32
Speaker 2: Burnham has got the troops on his back benches to
5:35
Speaker 2: ram through whatever policies he wants, particularly with the sort
5:40
Speaker 2: of added gusto of somebody taking over from the hugely
5:45
Speaker 2: unpopulous Starmer. The Commons and the Lords will go along
5:49
Speaker 2: with pretty much anything King Andy decrees.
5:54
Speaker 1: Absolutely no, we had intended to begin today with facial recognition,
5:57
Speaker 1: but because our guest isn't able to join us, until
6:00
Speaker 1: later on. We've had to shift that in the focus
6:03
Speaker 1: in the running order, but we will be absolutely covering
6:07
Speaker 1: that a little bit later. But in the meantime, Patrick Henninson,
6:11
Speaker 1: as everybody will know, has been in Iran and he
6:14
Speaker 1: is now back in the UK having been there re
6:19
Speaker 1: least he's on his way back at the moment, but
6:21
Speaker 1: he sends us this report to summarize the events of
6:25
Speaker 1: the last week and a half.
6:28
Speaker 3: This is an update for UK column viewers regarding the
6:33
Speaker 3: situation in Iran. We're currently in transit, we've left the
6:37
Speaker 3: Islamic Republic and I want to give you an update
6:40
Speaker 3: because a lot has happened since our last reports that
6:44
Speaker 3: we filed. A lot has happened in terms of the
6:47
Speaker 3: geopolitics where we are with the ceasefire, the memorandum of
6:51
Speaker 3: understanding and all these other issues. I'm going to give
6:55
Speaker 3: you a quick synopsis of that right now. But we
6:58
Speaker 3: were there for a historic event, the state funeral, week
7:02
Speaker 3: long procession for the Supreme Leader, the Ayatola Sayid Ali
7:07
Speaker 3: Hamane in Iran. It's been their leader for thirty seven years,
7:12
Speaker 3: so this was massive in terms of the numbers. We
7:16
Speaker 3: reported on those before, but the estimates even Financial Times
7:19
Speaker 3: admitted fifteen million in Tehran, as we predicted half the population.
7:27
Speaker 3: Upwards of forty million people have taken part in some
7:31
Speaker 3: way or another in these ceremonies over the course of
7:33
Speaker 3: that week, So just on a scale that is pretty unbelievable.
7:39
Speaker 3: But while we were there, the US restarted airstrikes on Iran,
7:44
Speaker 3: and so that's one of the reasons why some journalists
7:48
Speaker 3: left during the last couple of days, because it's just
7:52
Speaker 3: very unpredictable what the situation was going to be going forward. Nonetheless,
7:58
Speaker 3: the situation is this the memorandum of understanding between the
8:02
Speaker 3: United States and Iran is I think it's pretty much
8:07
Speaker 3: hit the rocks, and for the reasons that we described earlier.
8:12
Speaker 3: I remember when the first incidents took place in the
8:15
Speaker 3: Strait of Horne Moose, specifically with the Singaporean tanker two
8:20
Speaker 3: weeks ago, and then the United States really ratcheted up
8:23
Speaker 3: the escalation and a lot of pundits were saying all
8:25
Speaker 3: these were just symbolic attacks by the trumpministration. We said
8:29
Speaker 3: at the time and continue to say that no, the
8:32
Speaker 3: target selection by the US throughout the last month were
8:36
Speaker 3: actually part of a broader strategy by the United States,
8:40
Speaker 3: and if you look at the record in terms of
8:43
Speaker 3: what they've been attacking, Syrik Island, radar stations in and
8:47
Speaker 3: around the Strait of Horn, Moose, Keshim Island, kish Abu Musa, Garuk,
8:53
Speaker 3: all these islands have various pieces of infrastructure that have
8:57
Speaker 3: to do with the physical management of the Strait of
9:00
Speaker 3: for Moose. So it's very clear that the United States
9:03
Speaker 3: entered into the MoU with no intention whatsoever of abiding
9:08
Speaker 3: by any of their obligations. It's now clear just based
9:12
Speaker 3: on the pattern of their attack, they've been using the
9:14
Speaker 3: MoU as a ruse to systematically dismantle by creating stage
9:20
Speaker 3: provocations in the straits by directing certain tankers into areas
9:25
Speaker 3: they know that they're going to clash with Iranian authorities
9:29
Speaker 3: Iranian management agency that was set up by this memorandum
9:34
Speaker 3: that allows Iran to manage the strait or form Moose,
9:38
Speaker 3: the United States has been undermining it, creating provocations, and
9:41
Speaker 3: then using any Iranian deterrens or attacks against unauthorized shipping
9:49
Speaker 3: as an excuse to escalate militarily against Iran, with the
9:53
Speaker 3: long term goal of degrading Iran's ability to physically manage
9:57
Speaker 3: the strait. Because of all of the different pieces of
9:59
Speaker 3: lever Iran has, the Strait of Hormouse is probably the
10:03
Speaker 3: most potent and the most important. So the United States
10:07
Speaker 3: has used the MoU to degrade gradually over time, death
10:12
Speaker 3: by a thousand cuts, if you will, Iran's ability to physically,
10:16
Speaker 3: logistically and physically manage the straight. So they're hitting Comm's infrastructure, ports,
10:21
Speaker 3: targets in the South, Bander Abbas, Chabahar, Conrak, all of
10:26
Speaker 3: these key port cities in the South, and then through
10:29
Speaker 3: the straits all the various islands. They've been doing this intentionally,
10:33
Speaker 3: and so I kind of realized that this was going
10:36
Speaker 3: to be the case because they're going to buy for
10:38
Speaker 3: time to rearm and reload. So the Trump administration had
10:43
Speaker 3: no intention really of any peace negotiations. They really were
10:48
Speaker 3: just buying time. And it looks like the US and
10:51
Speaker 3: Israel will select the ideal time as probably after the
10:55
Speaker 3: midterm elections, in order to really ramp up a major
10:59
Speaker 3: military attacks against Iran. So there's no intention by this
11:03
Speaker 3: president of not going and escalating this war against Iran.
11:07
Speaker 3: It's pretty clear. And the United States threw up a huge,
11:12
Speaker 3: massive protest that Iran was charging fees before on the
11:16
Speaker 3: straight and then this week Trump comes up and says, oh, no,
11:20
Speaker 3: the US is going to control all traffic and levy
11:22
Speaker 3: a twenty percent shipping tax, which is way more than
11:27
Speaker 3: anything Iran would ever dream of doing. And if the
11:31
Speaker 3: US did this, it would add an average of seventeen
11:33
Speaker 3: to eighteen dollars on top of per barrel of oil.
11:37
Speaker 3: So it's just it would create an inflationary spike by
11:41
Speaker 3: the US wanting to impose a global tax on all trade.
11:44
Speaker 3: I mean, it's just kind of crazy and outrageous, but
11:48
Speaker 3: this is what Washington's doing. So the US had to
11:51
Speaker 3: Here's the point, the US had to engage in fake
11:54
Speaker 3: diplomacy in order to use or try to extract some
11:58
Speaker 3: tactical advantage against Iran. If there were a true superpower,
12:03
Speaker 3: they wouldn't need to do to wage war by deception.
12:07
Speaker 3: They would just go and do it. But they're not.
12:10
Speaker 3: So the US had to use the negotiation process or
12:14
Speaker 3: the quote peace process in order to sort of do
12:18
Speaker 3: the sort of sneaky method of basically resuming the war
12:22
Speaker 3: without officially resuming the war. And why is this? Donald
12:26
Speaker 3: Trump just sent a letter to Congress asking for another
12:30
Speaker 3: sixty day extension for military action against Iran. So just
12:34
Speaker 3: right on schedule. So what Trump is doing is to
12:37
Speaker 3: avoid Congressional oversight of the War Powers Act. He's basically
12:42
Speaker 3: doing what there's a provision in there for a sixty
12:45
Speaker 3: day rollover. If the President just informs Congress, they can
12:48
Speaker 3: just continuously roll over sixty day cycles from the executive
12:52
Speaker 3: branch and not have to go through Congress to vote
12:54
Speaker 3: on the war. It's kind of a loophole that was
12:56
Speaker 3: put in to run alongside the War Powers Act, and
13:01
Speaker 3: that's what the White House is doing. So that's why
13:03
Speaker 3: you're seeing this current escalation, and they're going to keep
13:07
Speaker 3: doing this every sixty days. Do not be surprised if
13:10
Speaker 3: there's another ruse of some kind of a peace negotiation
13:14
Speaker 3: or peace process. Don't be surprised if that happens now.
13:17
Speaker 3: This happens just at the same time. This week, the Democrats,
13:20
Speaker 3: as if a miracle, practically actually pushed back and defeated
13:25
Speaker 3: the NDAA provision for one point one five trillion dollars
13:30
Speaker 3: for more war that was led to the resistance on
13:35
Speaker 3: this in the Senate was led by Bernie Sanders, an
13:38
Speaker 3: independent Senator and Chris van Holden Democrat. So they actually
13:42
Speaker 3: did it. The Democrats, unbelievable, plenty of warmongers among them,
13:47
Speaker 3: actually stepped up and basically sidelined this the NDAA bill,
13:55
Speaker 3: the Defense Bill as it were. So it's not the end.
13:59
Speaker 3: They're going to keep pushing various versions of this bill.
14:02
Speaker 3: So this is just a small victory for piece by
14:06
Speaker 3: the Democrats. Still I'm in shock that they've even managed
14:09
Speaker 3: to do this, but anyway, they've done it, so it's
14:12
Speaker 3: a good start. But anyway, that's all happening at the
14:15
Speaker 3: same time, so there's a lot of games going on
14:18
Speaker 3: right now, and you can kind of see how this
14:20
Speaker 3: thing is playing out. And you know, the other thing
14:23
Speaker 3: you have to remember is the US begged for a ceasefire.
14:26
Speaker 3: We said this on this program back in April. The
14:28
Speaker 3: US begged on April sixth or April eighth for a ceasefire,
14:32
Speaker 3: and so did Israel. They just couldn't take it anymore.
14:35
Speaker 3: They wanted it to stop. They wanted the missiles to stop.
14:38
Speaker 3: So the US and Israel were behind the imploring the
14:41
Speaker 3: Iranians to stop, and they said, oh, we'll come to
14:43
Speaker 3: the table. Fourteen point plan led to the MoU which
14:47
Speaker 3: is now collapsed. Okay, so that's important to remember. Iran
14:53
Speaker 3: was not chasing the US for a ceasefire or negotiated settlement.
14:57
Speaker 3: It was the other way around. So that's an important thing.
15:01
Speaker 3: Carg Island that's still on the table. The US is
15:04
Speaker 3: currently planning for a ground invasion, their drawing up plans.
15:08
Speaker 3: Whether they press the button on that is another question,
15:11
Speaker 3: but that's already been confirmed and you can tell as
15:13
Speaker 3: well by all the pundits on Fox News. The General
15:16
Speaker 3: Keys of the World, the General Kellogg's of the world
15:18
Speaker 3: and others are basically telegraphing carg Island. Carg Island. They've
15:23
Speaker 3: been doing that for two months, so clearly there's a
15:25
Speaker 3: plan in place for that. It would probably be a
15:28
Speaker 3: symbolic ground deployment and a symbolic occupation, probably for a
15:34
Speaker 3: short period of time, and then they would leave, declare victory,
15:37
Speaker 3: and this would coincide with some other disruption the US
15:40
Speaker 3: would engineer for the strait and then claim that they've
15:43
Speaker 3: got control over it. Whatever the case is, there are
15:46
Speaker 3: various plans afoot. What actually takes shape and is initiated
15:50
Speaker 3: by the US remains to be seen, but there are
15:53
Speaker 3: multiple scenarios that are on the table that are just
15:57
Speaker 3: waiting for approval from the President and the so called
16:01
Speaker 3: Department of War. And on top of all that, oil
16:04
Speaker 3: prices are spiking again, and the sort of global but
16:09
Speaker 3: especially the US inflationary pressures are now kind of unstoppable.
16:14
Speaker 3: So as we were saying many many weeks before, all
16:16
Speaker 3: of these forces, all of these factors economically have already
16:20
Speaker 3: been baked in to the situation. And you know, even
16:23
Speaker 3: announcing another deal or they're playing the short game in
16:26
Speaker 3: terms of gaming the stock market or the oil market,
16:29
Speaker 3: up and down, put options, call options. All these games
16:34
Speaker 3: have been going on by Trump and his inner circle
16:36
Speaker 3: and Wall Street since the beginning of this crisis. None
16:40
Speaker 3: of these things are going to change the absolute final
16:44
Speaker 3: determination that the economic macroeconomic forces already basically careening out
16:50
Speaker 3: of control in terms of the global supply on fuel
16:54
Speaker 3: and petroleum, the drop of strategic patroleum reserves, inflationary pressures,
16:59
Speaker 3: and the US dollars absolutely taking a pounding, not least
17:03
Speaker 3: of all because the Japanese yen has hit the wall
17:06
Speaker 3: as well, and you know, Japan is one of the
17:08
Speaker 3: key countries and propping up the value of the US dollar,
17:12
Speaker 3: buying US treasuries as part of the you know, making
17:15
Speaker 3: it the global world reserve currency. That plus bond yields
17:19
Speaker 3: are basically going through the roof. These are all horrible
17:23
Speaker 3: signs for the US economy and the global economy. Trump's
17:26
Speaker 3: not going to be able to outrun any of these things.
17:29
Speaker 3: They're already baked into the to the equation in the
17:32
Speaker 3: run up to the US mid terms this November, only
17:35
Speaker 3: four months away. So just to give you that short update,
17:40
Speaker 3: So the MoU is finished. Clause one was destroyed when
17:44
Speaker 3: the US did that dodgy deal with Israel for Lebanon,
17:49
Speaker 3: which legalized occupation and slaughter in South Lebanon. That destroyed
17:54
Speaker 3: Clause one of the MoU. And then of course Clauses
17:57
Speaker 3: four and five the US has basically dismasted and made
18:01
Speaker 3: null and void through these various escalations that they've done,
18:05
Speaker 3: and then threats to take over the Strait and tax
18:07
Speaker 3: everybody as shipping texts insane, incredible, but that's where it's at.
18:12
Speaker 3: So just remember, folks. Bottom line, if we learned anything
18:15
Speaker 3: from this is that the United States is not a
18:18
Speaker 3: good faith actor when it comes to anything of a
18:21
Speaker 3: negotiated settlement on any front regarding Iran and hopefully, and
18:26
Speaker 3: I believe from my experience in Iran. And also in
18:31
Speaker 3: a press conference we had with Iberdahim Azizi, who is
18:35
Speaker 3: the head of the Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Policy and
18:41
Speaker 3: National Security, he said too the international press at that
18:45
Speaker 3: conference that I was attending that clearly, the Iranians have
18:50
Speaker 3: no expectation, no expectation of the US ever fulfilling any
18:55
Speaker 3: of its obligations in any of these negotiats. That's the
19:01
Speaker 3: realist position that the Iranian parliament, who are slightly moderate,
19:05
Speaker 3: but they've taken that position, and this is emboldened the
19:09
Speaker 3: hardliners in Iran. So like from a negotiations point of
19:13
Speaker 3: view or de escalation point of view, total failure by
19:16
Speaker 3: the US. But I wouldn't even call it failure. It
19:18
Speaker 3: was by design. The US intends and Israel intend to
19:22
Speaker 3: escalate against Iran. That's what all the signals show us.
19:26
Speaker 3: So that's what I wanted to convey to you today.
19:30
Speaker 3: So again, thank you very much, and I appreciate the
19:33
Speaker 3: great feedback we've got from our previous reports and interviews
19:38
Speaker 3: with the UK column from this visit to Iran during
19:42
Speaker 3: this very critical time in history. Appreciate your feedback, your
19:46
Speaker 3: comments as well from the audience at the UK column.
19:50
Speaker 3: So this is Patrick Henningson signing out. We will see
19:53
Speaker 3: you very soon.
19:55
Speaker 1: All the best, Thank you very much Patrick for that.
20:01
Speaker 1: Basil just very very briefly any comments on that.
20:07
Speaker 2: Well, As Patrick said, Iran has no expectations whatsoever of
20:12
Speaker 2: the United States abiding by any international agreement. I mean,
20:17
Speaker 2: let's not forget that Obama devoted his entire presidency foreign
20:23
Speaker 2: policy wise, to achieving the JCPOA, which was working fine
20:30
Speaker 2: until Donald Trump, of course, under pressure from the Israelis,
20:33
Speaker 2: threw it out in his first term. All this was
20:36
Speaker 2: completely avoidable. There's no support for it in the United States.
20:41
Speaker 2: Only places where anybody wants to see any more war
20:45
Speaker 2: are Tel Aviv and some parts of Washington. It's absolutely disgraceful. Unfortunately,
20:52
Speaker 2: rather like the conflict in Ukraine, or for that matter,
20:56
Speaker 2: the Middle East, the Guards of Palestine situation, there's no
21:01
Speaker 2: reason why it should end anytime soon. These attritional tit
21:05
Speaker 2: for attacks and counter attacks could carry on for years,
21:09
Speaker 2: Let's hope not, but only huge increases in the price
21:15
Speaker 2: of oil may force the American's hand and actually say
21:20
Speaker 2: enough is enough. We need to protect the world economy
21:23
Speaker 2: because that's the only thing it seems that will make
21:26
Speaker 2: them stop.
21:27
Speaker 1: Thank you for that, Basil. Okay, Now, if you like
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22:15
Speaker 1: ever left Africa. That's at seven pm, and at nine
22:19
Speaker 1: pm Karl is discussing the US did not see China's
22:23
Speaker 1: next move coming Join him at nine for that and
22:26
Speaker 1: then on Sunday at seven pm for members only is
22:29
Speaker 1: part three of a thousand Words podcasts with Chris Coverdale
22:33
Speaker 1: who joined us for that as well. Basil. Back to
22:36
Speaker 1: you then and well. On Wednesday's program we were discussing Caros,
22:41
Speaker 1: which is all about Christians in Palestine and so on.
22:46
Speaker 1: Charles was covering that story. You have more on that
22:49
Speaker 1: for us today.
22:51
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm doing to say. I'll be joined in a
22:53
Speaker 2: couple of moments by Charlotte Marshall, director of Chiros. Further
22:59
Speaker 2: to Charles's earlier in the week, the Church of England's
23:02
Speaker 2: General Synard overwhelmingly voted to stand in solidarity with Palestinian Christians,
23:08
Speaker 2: voting to hear the Cairos Palestine documents. It's a resolution
23:13
Speaker 2: that urges Anglican congregations to engage with Palestinian Christian testimonies,
23:20
Speaker 2: to reject religious prejudice, and indeed review church investments in
23:26
Speaker 2: the life of international law. The Archbitraal of Canterbury, Sarah
23:29
Speaker 2: Molalley herself said we must hear the voices of Palestinian
23:33
Speaker 2: Christians calling for prayer and active solidarity and a just
23:38
Speaker 2: piece for every person in Israel and Palestine. Now joining
23:44
Speaker 2: me to talk about what happens next is Charlotte Marshall,
23:48
Speaker 2: director of Sabil Cairos, who sponsored promoted the motion. Charlotte,
23:54
Speaker 2: welcome to the program.
23:56
Speaker 4: Thank you very much. It's lovely to be with you.
24:00
Speaker 2: It's great that the Carlisle Diocese motion passed with such
24:04
Speaker 2: a huge majority. But what does the Church of England's
24:07
Speaker 2: decision to stand in solidarity with Palestinian Christians actually mean
24:13
Speaker 2: in practical terms and what actions should follow this vote?
24:18
Speaker 5: Yeah, this is a really important part of it. I
24:20
Speaker 5: mean we have worked on this motion for five years
24:23
Speaker 5: with the Carlisle Diocese. It's been a very long time
24:27
Speaker 5: getting to the point where it was debated at General Synod,
24:30
Speaker 5: and there was a bit of a sort of storm
24:32
Speaker 5: beforehand in terms of the pressure not to actually even
24:35
Speaker 5: debate it, coming from Jewish institutions, from the Chief Rabbi,
24:40
Speaker 5: from the Board of.
24:40
Speaker 4: Deputies of British Jews.
24:42
Speaker 5: So it was a great relief just to hear it
24:44
Speaker 5: debated and to be spoken about in a public forums
24:47
Speaker 5: such as General Synod.
24:49
Speaker 4: In terms of what this means for the Church of England,
24:52
Speaker 4: you know, there is a very core, clear call.
24:54
Speaker 5: In this yes, we are asking churches to listen to
24:57
Speaker 5: the testimony of Palaestinian Christians, but we are also asking
25:01
Speaker 5: them to engage with that and to respond. And if
25:04
Speaker 5: you read the Churis documents, not least the last one
25:07
Speaker 5: which was issued in November twenty twenty five, there is
25:10
Speaker 5: a very clear call to what we call costly solidarity.
25:14
Speaker 5: And this involves not just words, no more statements and words,
25:19
Speaker 5: but actual action that puts pressure on firstly the UK
25:23
Speaker 5: government to take a much better stance on Palestine, to
25:27
Speaker 5: abide by international law and its responsibility under that, and
25:32
Speaker 5: if but for example, to impost sanctions on the state
25:35
Speaker 5: of Israel because it has now violated international law for
25:39
Speaker 5: nearly seven decades. So there is a call for Christians
25:42
Speaker 5: to get involved politically, but there's also a call for
25:45
Speaker 5: them to get involved as the church theologically.
25:48
Speaker 4: And we know that many of the theologies that circulate.
25:52
Speaker 5: In our churches today are actually responsible for contributing to
25:57
Speaker 5: the oppression of the Palestinian people. This Kiros call asks
26:01
Speaker 5: those churches to explicitly reject that theology. You know, theology
26:05
Speaker 5: like Christian Zionism, which puts the rights of the Jewish
26:08
Speaker 5: people in Israel above the rights of all other indigenous groups.
26:13
Speaker 5: And so there is a sort of joint call here
26:15
Speaker 5: both theologically and in terms of the church. In terms
26:19
Speaker 5: of Church is taking action and also politically and involving
26:22
Speaker 5: themselves in political action that supports justice and peace.
26:27
Speaker 2: I mean the whole Christian Zionism thing. For me, Beggars
26:31
Speaker 2: belief central to the New Covenant is the revision of
26:35
Speaker 2: God's covenant with the Jewish people to the followers of Christ.
26:40
Speaker 2: That's what Christianity is all about. So to sort of
26:44
Speaker 2: reject that central message, as Christian Zionist to do means
26:48
Speaker 2: that really their adherents of an Old Testament faith and
26:51
Speaker 2: not of Christianity, quite apart from the fact, of course
26:53
Speaker 2: that Christ taught love, compassion, and forgiveness, all things that
26:57
Speaker 2: Zionism seems to explicit the reject in favor in vengeance.
27:02
Speaker 2: But anyway, can the vote possibly be leveraged to ensure
27:05
Speaker 2: that we in Britain and across the Anglican world are
27:08
Speaker 2: able to hear Palestinian voices and testimony more clearly and
27:13
Speaker 2: authentically because one of the things that the Israel lobby
27:18
Speaker 2: in collusion often with the UK government and legacy media
27:22
Speaker 2: is that we simply do not hear from Palestinians and
27:26
Speaker 2: their lived experience, even where they're under the threat of Eurasia.
27:31
Speaker 4: Well, this is our hope and dream with this resolution.
27:33
Speaker 5: You know, this should span and go beyond just the
27:36
Speaker 5: Church of England for a start, the Church of England
27:39
Speaker 5: still holds a highly influential role in the Anglican Communion worldwide.
27:44
Speaker 5: The Archbishop of Canterbury herself has a role with unity
27:47
Speaker 5: across Anglican churches around the world, and you know there
27:50
Speaker 5: are many other Anglican churches and situations of persecution and injustice.
27:54
Speaker 5: You know, I really hope this motion gives them hope
27:57
Speaker 5: that the Anglican Communion has an interest in stand in
28:00
Speaker 5: solidarity with their brothers and sisters in Christ as.
28:03
Speaker 4: Part of the Body of Christ, and they are called
28:05
Speaker 4: to do that biblically.
28:06
Speaker 5: There's that beautiful verse about if one part of the
28:09
Speaker 5: Body suffers, all suffer, and that is a call to
28:12
Speaker 5: this costly solidarity. So we hope that this is not
28:15
Speaker 5: just a voice for Palestine, but a voice for justice,
28:18
Speaker 5: a voice for the marginalized, a voice for the oppressed.
28:22
Speaker 5: But also you know, within the UK, we have twenty
28:25
Speaker 5: six diocesan bishops sitting in the House of Lords.
28:28
Speaker 4: We want this to empower them.
28:31
Speaker 5: You know, they have an influential political role to play
28:34
Speaker 5: here in helping bring about justice and peace, and even
28:37
Speaker 5: outside of that, there are members of the Church of
28:40
Speaker 5: England at all levels who have political influence and we
28:44
Speaker 5: want them to be actually standing up and speaking about
28:47
Speaker 5: these speaking about the violations of international law, speaking about
28:51
Speaker 5: this beleagued, besieged Christian community which.
28:54
Speaker 4: Is at the very edge of extinction. Now you know
28:56
Speaker 4: they are less than.
28:58
Speaker 5: One percent of the population, but they also provide forty
29:02
Speaker 5: percent of services to Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the West
29:06
Speaker 5: Bank and Gaza.
29:07
Speaker 4: So what does that mean for all Palestinians If.
29:10
Speaker 5: The church disappears, schools disappear, hospitals disappear, society programs disappear.
29:16
Speaker 5: So we want the House of Lords, we want the
29:19
Speaker 5: churches to be speaking out about the devastating effect this will.
29:22
Speaker 4: Have if this church community disappears. And we've already actually heard.
29:27
Speaker 5: I mean interestingly, I had an email just today from
29:29
Speaker 5: a colleague in America saying, we want to use this
29:32
Speaker 5: vote to put pressure on the Anglican Church in America.
29:35
Speaker 5: We can see that what has been done here has
29:38
Speaker 5: the potential to leverage.
29:39
Speaker 4: Other churches to action.
29:41
Speaker 5: And in fact, just last week, you know, even before
29:44
Speaker 5: the General Synod, the Methodist Church voted to not only
29:48
Speaker 5: receive the Chirost documents, but to respond to study and
29:52
Speaker 5: to see what they can do in more solidarity and
29:55
Speaker 5: action with Palestinian Christians. So absolutely, we are hoping that
29:59
Speaker 5: this is a spring board for many more churches to
30:02
Speaker 5: feel empowered to take concrete action in support.
30:06
Speaker 2: And do you think that'll be reflected in the Church
30:08
Speaker 2: of England's own investment policies and political advocacy, because cowardice,
30:14
Speaker 2: some would say, characterize the church's immediate response to the
30:18
Speaker 2: genocide in Gaza.
30:20
Speaker 5: Absolutely, and I mean this is where it is our
30:23
Speaker 5: job as organizations and also job at the job of
30:27
Speaker 5: the people in the Church.
30:28
Speaker 4: Of England who pushed this notion forward, who were.
30:31
Speaker 5: Involved very heavily in a campaign to get it up
30:35
Speaker 5: the establishment, to get it debated in their national forum,
30:38
Speaker 5: to hold their feet to the fire. So we specifically
30:41
Speaker 5: in this motion asked for a review of the Church's
30:44
Speaker 5: investment policy in light of the International Court of Justice
30:48
Speaker 5: Advisory opinion in twenty twenty four which has deemed the
30:52
Speaker 5: Israeli occupation illegal.
30:54
Speaker 4: Now, if they are.
30:55
Speaker 5: Still applying the same investment policy that they apply to
30:58
Speaker 5: any other conflict affected region or situation of occupation, that
31:02
Speaker 5: is wrong.
31:03
Speaker 4: There is a difference here. We have an international ruling
31:06
Speaker 4: that says this is illegal.
31:07
Speaker 5: So we would expect a very bare minimum that they
31:11
Speaker 5: would be, for example, not investing in any companies on
31:14
Speaker 5: the UN list of companies involved in the settlement enterprise.
31:18
Speaker 4: But really it should be going further than that.
31:20
Speaker 5: You know, settlements are one aspect of the occupation, but
31:23
Speaker 5: they're not the whole thing. There's the pillage of natural resources.
31:27
Speaker 5: There's you know, the control of water. There's the restrictions
31:30
Speaker 5: on movement, there's the wall, the checkpoints. All of these
31:33
Speaker 5: are embedded in an occupation which relies on and is
31:38
Speaker 5: sustained by companies who endorse it and profit from it.
31:43
Speaker 5: And does the Church of England want its money going
31:45
Speaker 5: to support organizations or to businesses like that?
31:49
Speaker 4: You know, let it prides itself and I understand why
31:53
Speaker 4: on being a leading ethical investor.
31:55
Speaker 5: It relies on and uses guidance by the UN and
31:59
Speaker 5: by a host of ethical investment policies, and this is
32:03
Speaker 5: one area where we would love to see it take
32:05
Speaker 5: that lead.
32:05
Speaker 4: When it comes to Palestine.
32:08
Speaker 2: It's really it's just announced over four hundred million dollars
32:11
Speaker 2: funding for establishing no fewer than thirty four new settlements
32:16
Speaker 2: in the occupied West Bank in a further breach of
32:19
Speaker 2: international law. But if the British government and indeed the
32:23
Speaker 2: international community are serious about a two states solution as
32:27
Speaker 2: they claim, then surely they need to act in terms
32:30
Speaker 2: of proper sanctions immediately. A time for talk is.
32:34
Speaker 4: Over, absolutely.
32:36
Speaker 5: I mean, I cannot stress the urgency of this situation
32:40
Speaker 5: enough and actually they you know, there is a sense
32:43
Speaker 5: amongst Palastinian communities that it is already too late. You know,
32:47
Speaker 5: so many people have been raised from this land, so
32:50
Speaker 5: much aggressive settlement building, so many home demolitions, and so
32:54
Speaker 5: many people have been forced to leave because this situation
32:57
Speaker 5: is intolerable.
32:58
Speaker 1: You know.
32:58
Speaker 5: Since October twenty twenty, we know that eighty families criticis
33:02
Speaker 5: Christian families have left the Bethlehem area, well Bethleyhem out
33:06
Speaker 5: of those thirty four new settlements is about to be
33:09
Speaker 5: encircled by another six.
33:12
Speaker 4: This is one of the last remaining.
33:15
Speaker 5: Christian populations in the West Bank, and they are already
33:19
Speaker 5: feeling cut off. They are cut off from Jerusalem, they
33:21
Speaker 5: are cut off from Hebron, They're cut off from the
33:24
Speaker 5: rest of the West Bank, and they're about to be
33:26
Speaker 5: encircled by a further six settlements which will take even
33:30
Speaker 5: more of their land, of their natural resources, of their
33:32
Speaker 5: beautiful historic places that are actually a lot of them
33:36
Speaker 5: owned by Christians and church institutions. So I mean, honestly,
33:41
Speaker 5: the need to act was yesterday, but in terms of
33:43
Speaker 5: right now, this is an urgent core which cannot go unanswered.
33:49
Speaker 5: And our reason for highlighting this to the church is
33:51
Speaker 5: to say, you have the ability to influence here.
33:54
Speaker 4: You can be the moral voice of clarity in civil society.
33:58
Speaker 5: And we know from looking at pre areas, whether it's
34:01
Speaker 5: South African apartheid or whether it's you know, other conflicts
34:04
Speaker 5: around the world, that yes, we need political pressure and
34:07
Speaker 5: we need our politicians to act with urgency, but we
34:10
Speaker 5: need a grassroots civil society movement that puts that pressure on,
34:15
Speaker 5: that decides on actions it can take not only amongst
34:20
Speaker 5: communities but politically which will force the government to act
34:23
Speaker 5: because this will become an issue by which people vote on,
34:26
Speaker 5: it will become an issue by which they support a
34:28
Speaker 5: political party on. And the church is an institution that
34:31
Speaker 5: has a spread across the whole of the UK in
34:34
Speaker 5: communities every week, people going and sitting in a church
34:38
Speaker 5: and listening. They have a great ability to be a
34:41
Speaker 5: moral clarity and a moral voice on this question. So
34:45
Speaker 5: that's why we're encouraging them and saying you have to
34:47
Speaker 5: take action now before it's too late, before the church
34:50
Speaker 5: in historical Palestine has gone.
34:54
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, I mean it's an opportunity for the church
34:57
Speaker 2: to sow some moral leadership. This time is fast disappearing.
35:02
Speaker 2: As the archbishop herself said, Charlotte Marshall of sabiel Kars,
35:06
Speaker 2: thank you so much for joining us today on UK
35:09
Speaker 2: column News.
35:10
Speaker 4: Thank you so much for having me.
35:12
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you very much, Charlotte, thank you, Basil. Okay,
35:17
Speaker 1: let's move on there to the MHRA, because they have
35:20
Speaker 1: delivered what they describe as their record performance, so they
35:26
Speaker 1: say that they further strengthened their international standing during the year.
35:30
Speaker 1: It was designated a World Health Organization Listed authority. It
35:35
Speaker 1: recognizes the quality and robustness of the UK regulatory system,
35:39
Speaker 1: while continuing to play a leading role in the international
35:42
Speaker 1: regulatory collaboration through initiatives such as the Access Consortium. I
35:47
Speaker 1: just a couple of highlights of this, just to bring
35:51
Speaker 1: it into perspective. What they're saying is that in the
35:55
Speaker 1: lap the past year, they have approved nine hundred and
35:57
Speaker 1: twenty one medicinal products for use, including thirty nine new medicines.
36:03
Speaker 1: They have said that they're removing a record twenty eight
36:06
Speaker 1: point five million doses of illegally traded medicines from circulation,
36:12
Speaker 1: that they played a leading role in shaping the future
36:15
Speaker 1: regulation of AI and healthcare, and that they are proposing
36:19
Speaker 1: a new rare disease Therapy therapy is regulatory framework to
36:23
Speaker 1: support earlier, more frequent and iterative engagement with developers. They
36:29
Speaker 1: then went on to say that they're secured they have
36:30
Speaker 1: secured seven point five million pounds in new research brand
36:34
Speaker 1: funding to advance regulatory science, because regulating medicines now is
36:39
Speaker 1: a science in and of itself. They're supporting public health
36:43
Speaker 1: research and regulatory decision making through the Clinical Practice Research
36:47
Speaker 1: Data Link using anonymized UK primary care data. Of course,
36:52
Speaker 1: we absolutely know that in fact there is no such
36:57
Speaker 1: thing as anonymized primary care or any anonymized data at all.
37:02
Speaker 1: They can pseudonymize it, but it's usually reversible. Supplying more
37:08
Speaker 1: than one hundred and fifty four thousand biological reference materials
37:10
Speaker 1: globally supporting the quality, safety, and effectiveness of medicines and
37:15
Speaker 1: vaccines worldwide is what they're saying. So that's the position
37:20
Speaker 1: of the MHRA Basil. I don't know if you've got
37:23
Speaker 1: any thoughts on this, but one of the things that
37:25
Speaker 1: we have been saying for years, in fact since twenty
37:29
Speaker 1: twenty at the very littist, is that what the MR
37:33
Speaker 1: is aiming to do here is to become a global regulator,
37:37
Speaker 1: to become really the first voice of regulation of pharmaceutical industry.
37:45
Speaker 1: And when I say regulation, what I mean is enabling,
37:49
Speaker 1: of course, because they're not really doing anything to limit
37:52
Speaker 1: what the pharmaceutical industry, what big Pharma does, but they
37:56
Speaker 1: are certainly doing or they can to limit any alternative
38:00
Speaker 1: for any any what's the word disruptive medicines or healthcare solutions.
38:10
Speaker 2: Goes all the way back to the Flexner Report, doesn't it, Mike.
38:14
Speaker 2: When Rockefellers decided to do away with all natural medicines,
38:20
Speaker 2: and cures. The entire wealth of human knowledge I built
38:27
Speaker 2: up over centuries of how to cure various ailments with
38:32
Speaker 2: herbs and things like that was swept away and replaced
38:36
Speaker 2: with pharmaceuticals made from various types of refined crude oil.
38:41
Speaker 2: That was one hundred years ago, believe it or not,
38:44
Speaker 2: and prior to that doctors learned about how to cure
38:48
Speaker 2: with natural products. Now on top of this, of course,
38:51
Speaker 2: we've also got the edict to buy the branded American
38:56
Speaker 2: medicines at hugely inflated prices, meaning that something like forty
39:01
Speaker 2: odd billion pounds extra it's going to be spent on
39:05
Speaker 2: on pharmaceuticals at the cost it was estimated in a
39:08
Speaker 2: study in the Lancet of Sorry, the British Medical Journal
39:12
Speaker 2: of the two hundred and forty thousand lives. So you
39:15
Speaker 2: put it all together and we're in a very strange place.
39:19
Speaker 2: My advice would be to always find an alternative. The
39:24
Speaker 2: fewer pharmaceuticals, the fewer interventions, the better.
39:28
Speaker 1: Absolutely no basil. Let's move back across atlantic to the
39:32
Speaker 1: United States. What has Marco Ruvel been up to?
39:36
Speaker 2: Well, this is a really sort of bizarre dark stuff.
39:40
Speaker 2: Mike yesterday Rubio and Stephen Miller painted a very dark
39:46
Speaker 2: picture of what they described as far left terror to
39:51
Speaker 2: over sixty diplomats at a ministerial in Washington, urging them
39:56
Speaker 2: to defend civilizations against this scourge. Miller spoke of the
40:03
Speaker 2: need to fight what he called this fatal cancer of civilization,
40:09
Speaker 2: claiming that left wing terrorism, when left to run its course,
40:13
Speaker 2: always becomes a gulag. They argue that the United States political, legal,
40:18
Speaker 2: and judicial systems don't work if the threat of violence
40:22
Speaker 2: and terror goes on unchecked. He denounced, amongst others, Antifa
40:27
Speaker 2: protesters as deformed, saying their outer appearance becomes a manifestation
40:32
Speaker 2: of their inner hatred. Now this is, you know, perhaps unsurprising,
40:40
Speaker 2: this demonization of political opponents. But the language that was
40:46
Speaker 2: used yesterday was particularly strong. If your civilization is your home,
40:52
Speaker 2: you must defend it with the same passion and force
40:55
Speaker 2: as if an enemy intruder is inside your own house
41:00
Speaker 2: where your family lives. The idea is that there is
41:06
Speaker 2: left wing terror waiting to burst onto the streets of
41:12
Speaker 2: the United States, Europe everywhere for that matter, unleashing or
41:18
Speaker 2: you know, waves of bombings and assassinations. Good knows what
41:23
Speaker 2: I mean, there's no evidence for this. Ribio announced a
41:25
Speaker 2: new visa restriction policy designed to target members of far
41:30
Speaker 2: left terrorist and interestingly enough, other aligned groups. Now what
41:35
Speaker 2: those other aligned groups have no idea? Perhaps they include
41:39
Speaker 2: things like the Workers Party of Great Britain or your party.
41:43
Speaker 2: The fight against the alleged rise of violent left wing extremists,
41:46
Speaker 2: including anarchists and anti fascists, he said, is a key
41:51
Speaker 2: priority of the Trump administration, so that you're no longer
41:54
Speaker 2: allowed to be an anti fascist apparently. Of course, multiple
42:00
Speaker 2: former officials said that this issue has of course been
42:03
Speaker 2: politicized by this administration, and the threat from the far
42:07
Speaker 2: lefties to nothing like the level posed by groups like
42:11
Speaker 2: ISIS or far right extremists. Worth pointing out, of course,
42:15
Speaker 2: that ISIS and our friends in government in Syria, and
42:19
Speaker 2: indeed they may indeed be an entirely phantom creation of
42:23
Speaker 2: the CIA in the first place. But let's remember it
42:26
Speaker 2: was only a couple of years ago that Joe Biden
42:30
Speaker 2: was saying exactly the same thing. He was having the
42:32
Speaker 2: same sort of fever dreams about right wing extremists back
42:38
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty two. As we can say that seether
42:41
Speaker 2: Biden vows the convent the venom and violence of white supremacy,
42:45
Speaker 2: urging Congress to do more to force social media companies
42:50
Speaker 2: to address the spread of hate through their platforms. Now, well,
42:55
Speaker 2: what this all speaks to, of course, is the fact
42:57
Speaker 2: that both Publican and Democrat administrations seem to want to
43:05
Speaker 2: outlaw the opinions of their opponents, squeezing the acceptable opinion
43:11
Speaker 2: corridor into an ever more narrow space, and indeed introducing
43:17
Speaker 2: what primary legislation to outlaw. I mean, in the United States,
43:23
Speaker 2: they have, of course the First Amendment, which theoretically protects
43:28
Speaker 2: freedom of speech, but the visa restrictions, etc. Could mean
43:34
Speaker 2: that perfectly legitimate political actors from Europe are denied entry
43:40
Speaker 2: to the United States. It really does represent a completely
43:45
Speaker 2: unnecessary and unwarranted escalation, and let's hope that it disappears
43:52
Speaker 2: as fast as Rubio does when he takes off his
43:56
Speaker 2: Cuban heels and shrinks in size.
44:00
Speaker 1: Yes, indeed, Basil, thank you for that. No, unfortunately, we
44:04
Speaker 1: did rea instincts to give our guest a chance to
44:07
Speaker 1: join us. It doesn't look like that's going to be possible.
44:10
Speaker 1: But let's Basil, let's come on to the issue official
44:13
Speaker 1: recognition and you're kicking off here with Bedfordshire Police.
44:19
Speaker 2: Yes this is I mean, I just did a quick
44:23
Speaker 2: search for facial recognition and discovered there are dozens of
44:32
Speaker 2: such things being rolled out across the country at the moment,
44:35
Speaker 2: starting as we can see there with Bedfordshire surveilling the
44:40
Speaker 2: River Festival, Bedfordshire Police deployment fasure recognition for a quarter
44:44
Speaker 2: a million Bedford River Festival visitors. But that's not the
44:48
Speaker 2: only place. We have to go to Hampshire Winchester, which
44:54
Speaker 2: is hardly a sort of hot bed of cry and
44:56
Speaker 2: we're talking really about the heart of the Home County,
45:00
Speaker 2: aren't they aren't we very affluent town Winchester, And now
45:05
Speaker 2: we've got to have facial recognition with these dirty great
45:09
Speaker 2: vans as you can see being deployed in the city
45:13
Speaker 2: center there. Now if we go to Oxfordshire, the heart
45:18
Speaker 2: of the Cotswolds, and indeed up in Yorkshire Wakefield as
45:24
Speaker 2: well Arow in Whitney. Unsurprisingly, you know, David Cameron country
45:30
Speaker 2: that they're not keen on having this rolled out. Likewise
45:35
Speaker 2: Wakefield up in Yorkshire, and it seems Cheshire Police they're
45:39
Speaker 2: crowing about the fact that they're introducing facial recognition software
45:43
Speaker 2: as well. This is all happening at absolutely breakneck speed,
45:48
Speaker 2: very little public consultation, although where there has been some
45:52
Speaker 2: public consultation, as in Dorset, bizarrely enough, seventy four percent
45:58
Speaker 2: of people ay by Dorset Police and they were in
46:03
Speaker 2: favor of introducing facial recognition and twenty three percent against.
46:10
Speaker 2: So a lot of people seem very acquiescent to this
46:13
Speaker 2: major sea change really because apart from anything else, there
46:20
Speaker 2: is a pre crime element to it. If we can
46:23
Speaker 2: see that now, this includes identifying people that maybe a
46:31
Speaker 2: threat to themselves or others, and well that could be
46:38
Speaker 2: just about anybody, Mike, for just about any reason.
46:42
Speaker 1: Well, that's absolutely right basil. Of course, in the last
46:46
Speaker 1: couple of weeks we've been talking on this program about
46:48
Speaker 1: the role out of cameras the sainsbury supermarkets and so on.
46:52
Speaker 1: But actually what we maybe don't know is who is
46:56
Speaker 1: behind that, and it's this organization Watch and as you
47:01
Speaker 1: can see on screen there, it's not just Sainsbury's, but
47:04
Speaker 1: I mean Facewatch has published new figures and announced a
47:08
Speaker 1: UK first capability as they describe it, which is going
47:12
Speaker 1: to launch an autumn. As part of the face Watch
47:14
Speaker 1: crime management platform. It's going to notify police automatically in
47:18
Speaker 1: an average of four seconds. They say when a quote
47:21
Speaker 1: serious offender triggers a live facial recognition match in a
47:25
Speaker 1: subscribing store. Now Facewatch is justifying this because of what's
47:30
Speaker 1: described as a massive rise in retail crime. They say
47:34
Speaker 1: that they had alerted retailers roughly three hundred thousand times,
47:38
Speaker 1: So we just bring this back on screen here. Three
47:40
Speaker 1: hundred thousand times in the first half of twenty twenty
47:43
Speaker 1: six that a non repeat offender had entered a store
47:47
Speaker 1: and had sent is currently sending fifty thousand plus positive
47:52
Speaker 1: alerts a month. It also did a control a responsibility
47:57
Speaker 1: across the retailer network, which it's as a strength. As
48:01
Speaker 1: we've already mentioned, Sainsbury's is expanding from fifty five to
48:05
Speaker 1: two hundred stores by the end of the year, but
48:08
Speaker 1: Facebook's press release is saying more than one hundred and
48:12
Speaker 1: twenty five retailers naming budgets, Sainsbury's, Home Bargains, Fraser's Group,
48:17
Speaker 1: Flannels and Sports Direct, amongst others. They're claiming seventy percent
48:21
Speaker 1: reduction in repeated fending and ninety nine point ninety eight
48:25
Speaker 1: percent operational accuracy, and they're saying that that's based on
48:29
Speaker 1: the use of two separate algorithms plus a human check.
48:34
Speaker 1: And this, as I say, generated five hundred and sixteen
48:38
Speaker 1: thousand alerts in twenty twenty five two hundred and fifty
48:41
Speaker 1: two twenty twenty four. So they seem to be claiming
48:44
Speaker 1: that this is on the basis of a huge increase
48:47
Speaker 1: in the amount of retail crime that's going on now
48:51
Speaker 1: that those numbers might believe lead people to believe, sorry
48:55
Speaker 1: that the problem is getting worse. Well is it, though,
48:57
Speaker 1: because actually shoplifting, for example, fell one percent in the
49:02
Speaker 1: year to December to twenty twenty five, so it's certainly
49:04
Speaker 1: not rising, and that was a fall from six point
49:08
Speaker 1: two million to five point eight million incidents. And there
49:12
Speaker 1: are two reasons Facebook numbers are apparently rising then. First
49:16
Speaker 1: of all, one is a broader roll out, of course,
49:17
Speaker 1: but also the fact that the Crime and Policing Act
49:20
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six has repealed the two hundred pounds summary
49:23
Speaker 1: only threshold, which is expected to of course push the
49:27
Speaker 1: numbers of alerts even higher. Again, so what we have
49:31
Speaker 1: going on here is bigger watch lists means more alerts,
49:35
Speaker 1: and they're therefore more justification for the facial recognition and
49:40
Speaker 1: live ficial recognition camera rollout at retail locations. So, Basil,
49:46
Speaker 1: I don't know what your thoughts are on this.
49:49
Speaker 2: Well, there's been very little about it in the corporate
49:53
Speaker 2: media and even less spoken about it in the House
49:56
Speaker 2: of Commons. You know, it's a long way away from
50:00
Speaker 2: the sort of Dixon of Dot Green policing that I
50:02
Speaker 2: grew up with. I mean, a lot of people feel
50:05
Speaker 2: that the police ought to have a little bit more presence,
50:08
Speaker 2: but it doesn't necessarily mean these dirty, great vans calling
50:11
Speaker 2: people in because you know, quite simply don't like the
50:14
Speaker 2: shape of your face. But we don't even know whether
50:17
Speaker 2: it works properly. There are claims that if you're not
50:21
Speaker 2: identified as a suspect for any reason, it's deleted. But
50:24
Speaker 2: the simple fact is it ramps up the whole police
50:27
Speaker 2: state apparatus, doesn't it. I mean, we have to ask
50:31
Speaker 2: ourselves what kind of world, what kind of country do
50:34
Speaker 2: we want to live in? Do we want to live
50:36
Speaker 2: in one where there are huge police vans, you know,
50:40
Speaker 2: running facial recognition software. When you go out for your
50:43
Speaker 2: Saturday afternoon shopping I mean, it's a very ugly world
50:47
Speaker 2: that's being created, isn't it right?
50:49
Speaker 1: It absolutely is. Well, look let's finish them with some
50:53
Speaker 1: more in case you mistard Basil.
50:56
Speaker 2: Yes, everybody's favorite section, it seems these days. And we
51:00
Speaker 2: kick off with an well we go Keir Starmer claiming
51:06
Speaker 2: that he only quit to stop a massive fight. I
51:10
Speaker 2: don't know whether that was going to be in the
51:12
Speaker 2: cabinet room or where this fight was going to take place.
51:16
Speaker 2: Giving his final interview as Prime Minister, he said that
51:19
Speaker 2: he disagrees with his former talpaid that his team did
51:23
Speaker 2: not prepare enough for coming into government. Well, they prepared enough,
51:28
Speaker 2: It's just that they did all the wrong things. Next up,
51:32
Speaker 2: this is the first of our ones from across the Pond.
51:37
Speaker 2: Defense Secretary Peter Hegsit has announced the military person at
51:40
Speaker 2: age thirty year older, we'll undergo testing for testosterone deficiency
51:45
Speaker 2: as an annual part of their health screening. I don't
51:48
Speaker 2: know whether this means they're going to be given additional
51:50
Speaker 2: testosterone if they fail, or whether or not of this
51:54
Speaker 2: supplies also to female members of staff, but it does
51:59
Speaker 2: seem a rather bizarre test. I mean, testosterone levels are
52:04
Speaker 2: supposed to be waning across the population as a result
52:07
Speaker 2: of microplastics in our food and all sorts of other nasters.
52:12
Speaker 2: So PG Sith has taken it upon himself to make
52:15
Speaker 2: sure that everybody in the US forces is sufficiently beefed up.
52:20
Speaker 2: Now next to another one from across the pond, this
52:25
Speaker 2: chap running the White House teleprompter. He's been placed on leave,
52:30
Speaker 2: unsurprisingly having won more than one hundred thousand dollars betting
52:35
Speaker 2: on Trump's speeches on the poly markets. No doubt you
52:39
Speaker 2: won't find Labrouks or William Hill offerings on anything like that.
52:43
Speaker 2: But of course he knew what the President was going
52:46
Speaker 2: to say and how the markets would react. He might
52:50
Speaker 2: even have been betting on the exact words that the
52:53
Speaker 2: President was going to use, because on those poly markets
52:56
Speaker 2: you can pretty much bet on two flies crawling up
52:59
Speaker 2: a wall. So I don't know whether he'll get away
53:02
Speaker 2: with it. One hundred thousand dollars doesn't seem very much.
53:05
Speaker 2: I mean, given that he was betting on absolute certainties,
53:07
Speaker 2: he should have made.
53:08
Speaker 1: A lot more.
53:09
Speaker 2: Now, next up, we've got Oh, yes, well, this is
53:16
Speaker 2: particularly dark story, declassified, but I'm pleased to say also
53:20
Speaker 2: some aspects of the corporate media, also highlighting that the sas,
53:26
Speaker 2: amongst other things, drove prisoners off forklifts for fun. According
53:31
Speaker 2: to the Afghanistan Inquiry, special forces thwarted the normal rules
53:36
Speaker 2: and were disconnected from the rest of the British Army.
53:40
Speaker 2: According to witnesses, the term feral has been used to
53:44
Speaker 2: describe these troops because, of course there's no oversight. Elite forces,
53:50
Speaker 2: just like the elites who run the world, think they
53:53
Speaker 2: can do whatever they like at anybody's expense. And civilians
53:58
Speaker 2: in Afghanistan, of whom had anything to do whatsoever with
54:01
Speaker 2: nine to eleven or anything else, found themselves in the
54:04
Speaker 2: way of special forces who should never have been there
54:08
Speaker 2: in the first place. Next up, we have a story
54:12
Speaker 2: which we will be giving more attention to next week
54:17
Speaker 2: on the website. I believe Mike m I five reprimanded
54:21
Speaker 2: for lying about ties with Neo Nazi in foreman who
54:24
Speaker 2: attacked the girlfriend with the machete. Apparently the MFI m
54:28
Speaker 2: I five lied in three separate courts.
54:32
Speaker 1: Mike, Yes, indeed, Basil. And the thing about this, of
54:36
Speaker 1: course is this was one one use of the Chez Act,
54:40
Speaker 1: which is the Covit Human Intelligence Sources Act. We absolutely
54:43
Speaker 1: highlighted at the time effectively gives carte blanche for a
54:48
Speaker 1: covert human intelligence. At least the legislation gives cart blanche
54:52
Speaker 1: for covert human intelligence to break the laws as with impunity.
54:56
Speaker 1: So it's interesting that this has come out in this way.
55:00
Speaker 1: But are there going to be any consequences for it?
55:02
Speaker 1: But as you say, we're going to have a big
55:04
Speaker 1: article from David Miller on this in the early part
55:07
Speaker 1: of next week.
55:09
Speaker 2: Great. I look forward to seeing that, and I think
55:12
Speaker 2: it's time for And finally, isn't it go ahead? Yep? Yeah, Well,
55:18
Speaker 2: and finally this week this was a post on Instagram.
55:22
Speaker 2: The farm is already built, the fence is already up.
55:26
Speaker 2: The only question that remains, and it is the most
55:29
Speaker 2: urgent question of our time, is whether enough people will
55:33
Speaker 2: recognize what they are before the last tools of resistance
55:38
Speaker 2: are taken from them too. And that's really been the
55:42
Speaker 2: theme of today's program, hasn't it, Mike. Enough people need
55:46
Speaker 2: to wake up to what's going on in the world
55:49
Speaker 2: and resist the authoritarianism that with things like the National
55:55
Speaker 2: Security State Threats Bill, which may yet see our colleague
55:59
Speaker 2: back Henningson detained on his return to the UK, we've
56:05
Speaker 2: gone from creeping fascism to galloping towards fascism, facial recognition
56:12
Speaker 2: being another part of this machinery.
56:14
Speaker 1: Mike absolutely one hundred percent, Basil, thank you very much
56:18
Speaker 1: for that night. We've got to leave it there for today.
56:20
Speaker 1: Sorry we had the technical problems at the beginning of
56:22
Speaker 1: the program, but anyway we'll finish there for today. Thanks
56:24
Speaker 1: to everybody that's watched and to all our contributors today.
56:28
Speaker 1: Have a great weekend. Don't forget interviews tonight if your
56:31
Speaker 1: UK call members, stay on the live stream for some
56:33
Speaker 1: news extra in a couple of minutes time. Have a
56:36
Speaker 1: great weekend, as I say, and we'll see it on
56:37
Speaker 1: Monday and weep one pm as usually see then Bye bye,