Latest / UK Column Radio / UK Column News — 4th November

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UK Column News — 4th November · UK Column Radio

0:16
Speaker 1: Good afternoon.
0:17
Speaker 2: It's just gone one o'clock on Wednesday, the 4th of November, 2026.
0:21
Speaker 2: Welcome to UK Column News. I'm your host, Charles Mallett,
0:25
Speaker 2: and I'm joined in the studio today by Basil Valentine.
0:28
Speaker 1: Welcome back. Good to have you here.
0:29
Speaker 3: Great to be with you, Charles.
0:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we've got lots to look forward to.
0:32
Speaker 2: We've also got Ben Timberley on Live Link, and we're
0:35
Speaker 2: going to be joined by a special guest later in
0:37
Speaker 2: the program. So there's going to be a lot to
0:39
Speaker 2: get through as usual, and we'll be looking at the
0:42
Speaker 2: repeated failings of the security service, and of course, the
0:45
Speaker 2: greater failure to take them to task. A further update
0:48
Speaker 2: on the complex situation unfolding in Poland. and the terrific
0:52
Speaker 2: vulnerability of the Internet of Things with a specific focus
0:56
Speaker 2: on the recent train crash in Spain, as well as
0:59
Speaker 2: an examination of the state broadcaster and its so-called approach
1:04
Speaker 2: to public health. We're going to start with Donald Trump
1:07
Speaker 2: taking a battering, but it wasn't really his fault. Was
1:11
Speaker 2: it or was it, Basil?
1:12
Speaker 3: Well, so he claims. Extraordinarily, he phoned into Fox News
1:18
Speaker 3: in the middle of the night. Republicans took an absolute shellacking,
1:23
Speaker 3: as they call it in America, at the polls. Everybody
1:26
Speaker 3: expected Democrats to do well, but not quite to the
1:31
Speaker 3: extent that they did. 54 seats now for the Democrats
1:37
Speaker 3: in the Senate. That gives them what's called a Fetterman-proof
1:42
Speaker 3: majority because John Fetterman, the senator of Pennsylvania, whose seat
1:47
Speaker 3: was not up for election last night, only 35 of
1:50
Speaker 3: the 100 seats in the Senate were up for grabs.
1:53
Speaker 3: He often votes with Republicans these days. So if you
1:57
Speaker 3: take one of him and add it to the Republican total,
2:00
Speaker 3: it still only makes 45. Two races still too close
2:03
Speaker 3: to call, including extraordinarily the great state of Mississippi, where
2:08
Speaker 3: there's been no Democrat senator since the early 1980s. Indeed,
2:14
Speaker 3: Democrats won Senate seats in Texas, Maine, Kansas, Ohio, Iowa,
2:20
Speaker 3: and both North and South Carolina, all of them flips.
2:24
Speaker 3: And of course, Abdullah al-Sayed became the first Muslim to
2:29
Speaker 3: be elected to the United States in the entire history
2:33
Speaker 3: of that great country. He won Michigan handily enough in
2:39
Speaker 3: the end, in spite of hundreds of millions of dollars
2:41
Speaker 3: being spent to try and prevent him making it to Washington.
2:47
Speaker 3: It was a similar story in the House of Representatives,
2:50
Speaker 3: the US Congress, a landslide, 258 to 177 Republicans had
2:58
Speaker 3: held the House with a very narrow majority, and Mike Johnson,
3:02
Speaker 3: as the leader of the House, the Speaker, That's all history.
3:06
Speaker 3: Hakeem Jeffries will be the new Speaker of the House.
3:11
Speaker 3: He is, of course, like the Democrats' leader in the Senate,
3:15
Speaker 3: Chuck Schumer, very much an establishment Democrat. And a lot
3:20
Speaker 3: of these results have been achieved in spite of the
3:22
Speaker 3: fact that there are deep fissures in the Democrat Party
3:26
Speaker 3: over all sorts of policies. Affordability, of course, has been
3:30
Speaker 3: right at the top of the list of everybody's problems because...
3:34
Speaker 3: The cost of living, if we think we've got a
3:36
Speaker 3: crisis here in the UK, it's absolutely out of control
3:40
Speaker 3: in the United States, $ 7 or $ 8 for half a
3:42
Speaker 3: dozen eggs. Price of petrol, of course, which they're all
3:44
Speaker 3: so heavily dependent upon. going through the roof, and all
3:48
Speaker 3: because Donald Trump has gone in precisely the opposite direction
3:52
Speaker 3: from the one he promised when elected, Charles. You know,
3:55
Speaker 3: no more wars. In fact, I'll end the ones going on.
3:59
Speaker 3: We will have a new golden age, he said. Well,
4:02
Speaker 3: it's turned out to be more like a new dark ages,
4:04
Speaker 3: hasn't it? Fortunately, he has pulled back from an immediate
4:08
Speaker 3: strike on Iran. Only a few days ago, Tucker Carlson
4:13
Speaker 3: and others, including Joe Kent, former national security advisor, was
4:17
Speaker 3: saying that Trump was possibly even, at the behest of
4:21
Speaker 3: the Israelis, dropping a nuclear bomb on Iran in order
4:27
Speaker 3: to destroy their so-called nuclear enrichment facilities. That now appears
4:34
Speaker 3: to be off the menu. No immediate plans to strike Iran,
4:39
Speaker 3: which is obviously good news. We'll take a win where
4:41
Speaker 3: we can find it these days, Charles, because that of
4:44
Speaker 3: course threatened to plunge the world into total chaos. He's
4:48
Speaker 3: pulled back from that. He is now the lamest of
4:52
Speaker 3: lame ducks. As presidents go, he will be unable to
4:56
Speaker 3: put through his own policies at all. He has congratulated
5:02
Speaker 3: Democrats on the midterms and admitted that the Iran war
5:08
Speaker 3: played a pivotal role. But I don't view this as
5:13
Speaker 3: a hit on me, he said when speaking to Fox
5:17
Speaker 3: News in the middle of the night. It's everybody else's fault.
5:20
Speaker 3: Of course it is, Donald. His delusion really is absolutely
5:24
Speaker 3: off the charts these days.
5:29
Speaker 1: What does this all mean?
5:31
Speaker 3: Well, apart from anything else, an issue high on the
5:35
Speaker 3: agenda was this mushrooming of AI data centers across the
5:41
Speaker 3: United States. Hundreds have been planned. And a lot of
5:45
Speaker 3: Democratic governors ran on a ticket to stop the data
5:49
Speaker 3: center building program in its tracks, including in Texas, just
5:57
Speaker 3: one of the flips. extraordinary there. Abbott was handily defeated
6:03
Speaker 3: by Gina Hinojosa, the first Latina to be elected governor
6:09
Speaker 3: of the great state of Texas. And she has promised
6:12
Speaker 3: a moratorium on data center building. So that's good news,
6:19
Speaker 3: I think, across the board. The more Trump is restrained
6:25
Speaker 3: in the last couple of years of his presidency, the better.
6:28
Speaker 3: I mean, he might now, of course, just go completely mad,
6:31
Speaker 3: disregard the wishes of the voters, try and start World
6:35
Speaker 3: War III, renew the bombing. But he isn't going to
6:39
Speaker 3: be able to get any of his proposed legislation through Congress.
6:43
Speaker 3: And in fact, Congress, both the Senate and the House
6:47
Speaker 3: now have the option to investigate him and his family
6:51
Speaker 3: for the billions they've been making during his presidency, perhaps
6:54
Speaker 3: even articles of impeachment. Now, there may be enough establishment
6:58
Speaker 3: Democrats in the Senate who don't want to upset the
7:02
Speaker 3: apple cart to that extent of having him actually impeached,
7:06
Speaker 3: that he would survive that. But nevertheless, his... His power
7:12
Speaker 3: is considerably diminished this morning.
7:15
Speaker 1: It does seem so.
7:16
Speaker 2: I mean, the process of guessing what's going to happen
7:19
Speaker 2: next doesn't seem to be over anytime soon. I think
7:22
Speaker 2: encouraging to see signs of pushback against data centers, even
7:24
Speaker 2: if we can't necessarily attribute that to a huge amount
7:28
Speaker 2: of what's happened, but none less significant.
7:30
Speaker 1: And if you've got sort.
7:32
Speaker 2: Of a quick few remarks on what Basil's just been
7:36
Speaker 2: reporting on, I think it'd be great to hear from you.
7:40
Speaker 4: Good morning, gents.
7:40
Speaker 1: Yes, it's good to be back.
7:42
Speaker 4: I think the situation in America is concerning, not least
7:47
Speaker 4: from the perspective of Trump being restrained is a good thing.
7:51
Speaker 4: But the concern is that the Democrats, with this extra
7:55
Speaker 4: leeway that they'll have in terms of influencing policy, They're
7:58
Speaker 4: very unlikely to change what I see as being the
8:02
Speaker 4: preeminent concerns internationally. I think they're likely to double down
8:06
Speaker 4: on some of the most concerning aspects of it, specifically
8:09
Speaker 4: their approach to both Iran and Russia. The Democrats have
8:13
Speaker 4: a long history of being war hawks. It is the
8:17
Speaker 4: intelligence services which generally guide the Democrats policy in that regard.
8:21
Speaker 4: And it's the same intelligence services that are working with Trump.
8:25
Speaker 4: So my concern is that we're not going to see
8:27
Speaker 4: any real change in terms of the preeminent issues and
8:30
Speaker 4: the US policy towards them.
8:32
Speaker 3: Just quickly, Ben, all I would say is that.
8:36
Speaker 3: The will of the people has been clearly expressed as
8:39
Speaker 3: we don't want any more war. We don't want to
8:41
Speaker 3: inflate the national debt, now something around $ 35 trillion, any
8:45
Speaker 3: more than it already is. It depends on the extent
8:48
Speaker 3: to which the newly elected congressional Democrats, which include some
8:53
Speaker 3: of the most progressive ever elected to Washington, whether or
8:58
Speaker 3: not they do indeed represent the views of their constituents
9:01
Speaker 3: or allow the national security state to continue to dominate policy,
9:05
Speaker 3: particularly overseas.
9:07
Speaker 1: Super. Well, thanks both.
9:09
Speaker 2: And in fact, Ben's reference at the intelligence services brings
9:13
Speaker 2: us on to what we're going to look at next,
9:15
Speaker 2: which is, of course, the security service. And not for
9:17
Speaker 2: the first time, we must ask, is the security service
9:20
Speaker 2: MI5 above the law? Well, I think this headline from
9:23
Speaker 2: the Daily Mail encapsulates things rather neatly.
9:26
Speaker 1: So we'll just pop that on screen now.
9:28
Speaker 2: As they say, that the MI5 and its director general,
9:33
Speaker 2: Sir Ken McCallum, will not face contempt of court proceedings
9:36
Speaker 2: despite lying to courts about neo-Nazi agent who threatened girlfriend.
9:41
Speaker 1: Of course, it doesn't Look, good.
9:44
Speaker 2: In the article, they're saying that the senior high court
9:46
Speaker 2: judges said it would not be in the public interest
9:49
Speaker 2: to initiate contempt of court proceedings over the agency's dishonesty.
9:53
Speaker 2: Of course, there's widespread confusion as to what public interest
9:56
Speaker 2: actually means, and there's no fixed definition of it. which
10:00
Speaker 2: is interesting in itself, perhaps. generally accepted as providing societal
10:05
Speaker 2: value and ironically protecting the public's health and safety. Now,
10:11
Speaker 2: this is something that UK Column has been tracking for
10:13
Speaker 2: a number of years, and there's already an excellent article
10:16
Speaker 2: by David Miller on exactly this subject, but with a
10:19
Speaker 2: specific focus on the Director General himself and referring back
10:24
Speaker 2: to the trial earlier in the year. Judicial bodies concluded
10:28
Speaker 2: that NMIFI had repeatedly relied on sorry, I've just lost
10:33
Speaker 2: sight of that, had repeatedly... It's gone.
10:38
Speaker 1: I do apologise.
10:39
Speaker 2: But the point, obviously, to be drawn is that the
10:44
Speaker 2: MI5 had absolutely lied, and not only that, but effectively
10:49
Speaker 2: doubled down on that. So this points back to McCullum himself,
10:56
Speaker 2: largely responsible for the intensive push on national security issues,
11:01
Speaker 2: And MI5, or at least he has put out a
11:04
Speaker 2: statement on this. And so we'll just look at what
11:06
Speaker 2: it is he had to say, but specifically what to
11:09
Speaker 2: make of it. He wrote in his statement, the High
11:11
Speaker 2: Court has not initiated contempt proceedings, and that is welcome. Meanwhile,
11:17
Speaker 2: our work inside MI5 to learn all lessons continues at pace. Well,
11:24
Speaker 2: what lesson is he learning? Seems to be one that if...
11:30
Speaker 2: They continue to behave like this. They will continue to
11:33
Speaker 2: get away with it. Basil, I don't know if you
11:35
Speaker 2: have a quick thought on sort of how this looks,
11:38
Speaker 2: the fact that there's clearly been a contempt of court,
11:41
Speaker 2: but no action taken.
11:43
Speaker 3: Well, one isn't surprised in the slightest.
11:45
Speaker 5: I mean.
11:47
Speaker 3: The security services do appear to be above the law.
11:50
Speaker 3: And more than that, they appear to be directing great
11:54
Speaker 3: swathes of government policy as well. You know, this chap
11:58
Speaker 3: has never been elected. He isn't even really accountable to parliament,
12:03
Speaker 3: let alone a wider electorate. And we do have a
12:07
Speaker 3: deep state, a permanent state, a shadow government, if you like,
12:12
Speaker 3: in the United Kingdom. which seems to do exactly as
12:15
Speaker 3: it wishes and which engages in nefarious alliances, shall we say.
12:20
Speaker 1: I think that's probably a fair comment.
12:22
Speaker 2: Well, I'm pleased to say that David Miller has written
12:24
Speaker 2: another article which has gone on the website just today.
12:27
Speaker 2: So please do take a look at that. And there
12:30
Speaker 2: will be a link to it in the show notes.
12:32
Speaker 2: Of course, highlighted is that the MI5 told the court
12:37
Speaker 2: that the Agent X's status had not been disclosed. But
12:41
Speaker 2: of course, turned out to be a lie, at least
12:43
Speaker 2: where the BBC was concerned. And if we're wondering how
12:46
Speaker 2: it is that this is enabled in the first place,
12:48
Speaker 2: we need look no further than the legislation, of course,
12:52
Speaker 2: the Covert Human Intelligence Services Act, which goes back to 2021,
12:59
Speaker 2: which authorises criminal conduct, apparently in pursuit of an investigation.
13:05
Speaker 2: And of course, this is power that's granted to very
13:08
Speaker 2: many bodies well outside of the security service as well.
13:11
Speaker 2: But it's extraordinary precedent to set.
13:13
Speaker 3: It puts one in mind of James Bond, 007. License
13:17
Speaker 3: to kill. Who gave him that license?
13:19
Speaker 2: Exactly so, indeed. And it's applicable not just to Bond,
13:23
Speaker 2: of course, but to... Dozens of other people.
13:25
Speaker 1: Many, many others.
13:26
Speaker 2: Now, we're going to change region geographically, at least. Mike
13:30
Speaker 2: spoke on Monday about the situation in Poland, the apparent
13:34
Speaker 2: power struggle.
13:35
Speaker 1: Going on there.
13:36
Speaker 2: And I'm pleased to say that Ben has further detail
13:39
Speaker 2: on that for us. So Ben, what have you got?
13:44
Speaker 4: So I think the situation in Poland is deteriorating and
13:49
Speaker 4: it's intentionally deteriorating. What we're seeing here is a battle,
13:54
Speaker 4: an existential civilizational battle between the EU and anyone that's
14:00
Speaker 4: not essentially pro-NATO and working towards the EU's goal. So
14:06
Speaker 4: in terms of the direction of this, if we transition
14:09
Speaker 4: the slide, I'll provide some context about this. So before
14:13
Speaker 4: we get too deep into it, it's important we understand
14:15
Speaker 4: the legacy of Donald Tusk, who is the new premier
14:20
Speaker 4: in Poland, but also the old premier. And here we
14:23
Speaker 4: can see that in landmark 2014 rulings, Poland was essentially
14:28
Speaker 4: found guilty by the European Court of Human Rights for
14:32
Speaker 4: enabling illegal CIA detentions and torture on its territory. So
14:36
Speaker 4: this is the extraordinary rendition that happened around the war
14:38
Speaker 4: on terror. And they operated a secret black site called
14:42
Speaker 4: Quartz in Northern Poland. And essentially they were caught doing it,
14:47
Speaker 4: which was obviously very bad for them. So if we
14:50
Speaker 4: move on, there's a couple of other points of context here,
14:52
Speaker 4: which are critical. Currently, the PIS party in Poland is
14:58
Speaker 4: in opposition and Tusk's party are in power. The Polish
15:02
Speaker 4: Justice Minister and Prosecutor General Adam Bodnar of Ukrainian anti-Soviet
15:07
Speaker 4: heritage his family were essentially moved in a Soviet operation
15:14
Speaker 4: to cleanse the area of what they saw as dissidents,
15:18
Speaker 4: has led efforts to investigate the previous Law and Justice
15:20
Speaker 4: PIS party government's use of the Israeli Pegasus spyware. So
15:25
Speaker 4: it was this scandal that kicked off a huge investigation
15:28
Speaker 4: across Europe into Pegasus spyware and its usage against political opponents,
15:34
Speaker 4: journalists and various other people. but not all is as
15:37
Speaker 4: it appears. So as you can see on the screen,
15:42
Speaker 4: the Amidjar network illuminates, which is essentially the funding arm
15:45
Speaker 4: of the Amidjar network. And George Soros' Open Society Foundations
15:49
Speaker 4: fund cyber forensic investigations by Citizen Lab and Amnesty International
15:55
Speaker 4: Security Lab into the use of Pegasus spyware. So it's
15:58
Speaker 4: very clear that there is an NGO link here in
16:00
Speaker 4: terms of exposing and amplifying the use of Pegasus software
16:05
Speaker 4: by the PIS party. And this application happens through platforms
16:11
Speaker 4: like Politico and also Axel Springer's Onet.pl in Poland. Now,
16:17
Speaker 4: recently in the UK, Axel Springer recently purchased, I believe
16:20
Speaker 4: it was the Telegraph. So we've got some serious issues
16:23
Speaker 4: here in terms of the reach of these applications. So
16:29
Speaker 4: if we go with all of that context in play,
16:32
Speaker 4: if we go back to what's actually happening in Poland,
16:34
Speaker 4: we have this civilizational battle in place. We've got macro
16:39
Speaker 4: financial leverage, which is basically where funds that were earmarked
16:44
Speaker 4: for Polish use were frozen out. of use by the
16:48
Speaker 4: Polish government until the Polish government's policy alignment was in play. Essentially,
16:54
Speaker 4: the European Union was blackmailing the Polish government under PIS
16:58
Speaker 4: to stop them from being able to use that funds
17:01
Speaker 4: until they gave way on policy. What we're also seeing
17:04
Speaker 4: is European justice functions. So I believe it's the European
17:09
Speaker 4: Court on Human Rights, and also the Court of Justice
17:12
Speaker 4: of the EU overriding domestic policy using European jurisprudence to
17:18
Speaker 4: actually achieve that. We're also seeing the state of Poland
17:22
Speaker 4: in terms of its government and its actual judicial processes, again,
17:28
Speaker 4: being overridden by EU systems and the EU court system
17:33
Speaker 4: to restructure Polish society. And of course, we're also seeing
17:38
Speaker 4: US intelligence networks actually directed by US politicians themselves, not
17:44
Speaker 4: the agencies, which is unusual, actually being put in place.
17:47
Speaker 4: So the key people here are Radoslaw Sikorski. Now, Radoslaw
17:52
Speaker 4: Sikorski is the foreign minister of the current Tusk government
17:57
Speaker 4: in Poland. He's been in the situation for a very
18:00
Speaker 4: long time. He's Western educated. He's essentially a Western intelligence
18:05
Speaker 4: community scion, if you like. His partner is Anne Applebaum,
18:10
Speaker 4: who is a well-known journalist, a historian. Both of them
18:14
Speaker 4: are absolutely full on Zionists. And they're both very much
18:18
Speaker 4: pro-NATO individuals. And Roleslav Sikorsky was one of the key people,
18:23
Speaker 4: along with others, who founded the European Endowment for Democracy. Now,
18:27
Speaker 4: this is essentially the European version of the National Endowment
18:31
Speaker 4: for Democracy, which was the recently closed under Trump government
18:35
Speaker 4: slush fund, which was essentially a CIA regime change slush
18:40
Speaker 4: fund that was issued globally rather than just in Europe.
18:44
Speaker 4: This is the European version that is still essentially going,
18:47
Speaker 4: and it's still being used for the same purpose that
18:49
Speaker 4: the NED was. The Slotkin and Security Network. So as
18:54
Speaker 4: we can see, Alyssa Slotkin, Tom Malinowski, and Jason Crow,
18:58
Speaker 4: these are high-profile US Democrat politicians, I believe, who are
19:04
Speaker 4: associated with the Center for European Policy Analysis, which is
19:07
Speaker 4: essentially a CIA think tank. have been heavily involved in
19:12
Speaker 4: terms of this process. They have been directing much of
19:15
Speaker 4: the attack lines using the Pegasus scandal and using also
19:20
Speaker 4: the jurisprudence scandal in Poland, which is where the right-wing
19:26
Speaker 4: government of PIS, when it came into power, was essentially
19:31
Speaker 4: refusing to allow the previous judicial incumbents that had been
19:36
Speaker 4: selected by the Tusk government to actually be sworn in
19:40
Speaker 4: as judges. So it caused a major problem and a scandal,
19:44
Speaker 4: and that scandal is ongoing to this day. Now, what
19:46
Speaker 4: they've done is they've used the Court of Justice view to,
19:51
Speaker 4: as I mentioned earlier, to override domestic statutes and domestic policy.
19:55
Speaker 4: And their plan was to use these judges that they
19:57
Speaker 4: had put in place. So as you can see, all
19:59
Speaker 4: the standoff that's happening outside the main court in Poland
20:04
Speaker 4: at the moment, in Warsaw and elsewhere, That is about
20:08
Speaker 4: these policies that the EU are trying to force through,
20:11
Speaker 4: and they're trying to use their pet judges within Poland
20:14
Speaker 4: to enforce these mandates on behalf of the EU and
20:17
Speaker 4: specifically NATO. which tells you exactly what's going on. So
20:22
Speaker 4: also what we're seeing is the human rights process is
20:25
Speaker 4: being used to invalidate previous statutes and previous judgments that
20:29
Speaker 4: have been put in place in Poland to essentially make
20:31
Speaker 4: out that they never actually happened. So they can retroactively
20:35
Speaker 4: undo those policies and what's gone into place. And finally,
20:39
Speaker 4: the Pegasus disclosures by Citizens Lab They allowed the journalistic environment,
20:46
Speaker 4: the judicial environment and the government environment in Poland to
20:50
Speaker 4: be used to paint the PIS party as a pro-Russian,
20:56
Speaker 4: almost Israeli stooge, if you like, when in fact that
20:58
Speaker 4: is far away from the truth. Yes, they're a nationalist party,
21:01
Speaker 4: but I would hardly call them distinctly pro-Russian or pro-Israeli.
21:05
Speaker 4: In fact, they're the opposite in many cases. So there's
21:09
Speaker 4: absolute shenanigans going on in Poland with this. So if
21:12
Speaker 4: we nip onto the next slide, we'll be able to
21:14
Speaker 4: see where this goes. So the media has also been
21:17
Speaker 4: restructured with the Tusk government in play and also their
21:20
Speaker 4: intelligence services. All have been purged. The national TV stations,
21:25
Speaker 4: national radio stations, their intelligence services have all been purged.
21:29
Speaker 4: of PIS sympathetic personnel. They've done a complete coup. This
21:33
Speaker 4: is what's known as a legislative administrative coup. And this
21:36
Speaker 4: has been going on for a decade now, over a decade,
21:39
Speaker 4: in fact. This process has been put in play for
21:42
Speaker 4: a long time in readiness for this moment, which is
21:44
Speaker 4: essentially to put Poland into situation, into play, to be
21:49
Speaker 4: used in the war with Ukraine and Russia. And as
21:52
Speaker 4: you can also see It also frees up a lot
21:54
Speaker 4: of cash for Poland and the relevant recipients of that
21:58
Speaker 4: cash in Poland. We're talking oligarchs and others to actually
22:01
Speaker 4: be able to use government funding for whatever purposes they
22:04
Speaker 4: see fit under the Tusk regime. It's the classic play.
22:07
Speaker 4: You shore up the funding, you shore up all of
22:09
Speaker 4: the institutions of power, and then you use them to
22:12
Speaker 4: realize the European and NATO agenda. So in terms of
22:16
Speaker 4: the next sort of step here, I think the big
22:20
Speaker 4: issue here is the involvement of the US and Israel.
22:24
Speaker 4: When I mentioned Sikorsky, we've got Slotkin, we've got Malinowski,
22:27
Speaker 4: we've got Spanberger, we've got Crow.
22:29
Speaker 1: These are all.
22:32
Speaker 4: Lifers in terms of the intelligence community.
22:35
Speaker 1: They have been.
22:35
Speaker 4: Involved in this work for a very long time. They
22:38
Speaker 4: are well known. And a couple of them are members
22:40
Speaker 4: of what's known as the Seditious Six group. which is
22:43
Speaker 4: essentially a group of politicians in the US that tried
22:46
Speaker 4: to take down Trump for good, for ill, or whether
22:49
Speaker 4: their allegations were founded or not. They're still very much
22:52
Speaker 4: involved in what's known as the US Democrat liberal mafia
22:58
Speaker 4: within the CIA and other intelligence organizations. So they are
23:02
Speaker 4: very much at the sharp end of intelligence manipulation. And finally,
23:07
Speaker 4: in terms of the actual funds and where it's going,
23:11
Speaker 4: As you can see, we're not talking about small amounts
23:13
Speaker 4: of money here. This is a huge bankroll for Poland.
23:17
Speaker 4: We're talking institutional, infrastructural cash flows that have been frozen
23:21
Speaker 4: for a long time and are now being made available
23:24
Speaker 4: to the Tusk government because they've essentially been unfrozen because
23:28
Speaker 4: policy has aligned with what the EU Commission actually wants
23:32
Speaker 4: and specifically what NATO wants. So this is an administrative
23:37
Speaker 4: coup with blackmail and bullying tactics built in all the
23:39
Speaker 4: way through. And finally, and I think this is probably
23:42
Speaker 4: one of the most important things here, this is a
23:44
Speaker 4: picture of Donald Tusk. He is reading a book by
23:49
Speaker 4: Anne Applebaum all about essentially a new way of doing politics.
23:55
Speaker 4: Anne Applebaum in her book and in her many writings
23:59
Speaker 4: essentially accuses right-wing governments and authoritarian governments of a very
24:04
Speaker 4: specific code of practice in terms of how they shape government.
24:08
Speaker 4: And in her book and in her writings, she suggests
24:10
Speaker 4: that this should be fought against across the board by
24:13
Speaker 4: liberal governments, by democracies. And in doing so, she's essentially
24:18
Speaker 4: advocating for governments to take on the same tactics, but
24:21
Speaker 4: against people they consider to be anti-democratic. which I find
24:26
Speaker 4: baffling to use anti-democratic practices to fight anti-democratic influences. It
24:31
Speaker 4: seems to be a complete hypocrisy, to be frank. And finally,
24:36
Speaker 4: in terms of the freed up cash, as we can see,
24:39
Speaker 4: the infrastructure developers are going to win. We've got major
24:42
Speaker 4: infrastructure projects, high-speed railway lines, tunnels, road networks, nuclear contract reviews.
24:48
Speaker 4: This is US money being brought in to the EU
24:52
Speaker 4: via the EU Commission. to strengthen Atlantic ties. So as usual,
24:57
Speaker 4: this isn't just about geopolitics in terms of ideology and
25:01
Speaker 4: Russia bad. This is about making sure the Western investors,
25:05
Speaker 4: US investors, EU investors win. in terms of infrastructure projects
25:11
Speaker 4: being delivered at scale for the benefit of Poland. This
25:14
Speaker 4: is an administrative coup. This has been in the works
25:17
Speaker 4: for a long time. I think the Polish people have
25:20
Speaker 4: every right to feel aggrieved about what is going on here.
25:24
Speaker 4: And I think, unfortunately, many players across the EU and
25:26
Speaker 4: the world are wholly misunderstanding exactly what is going on.
25:31
Speaker 6: Wow.
25:32
Speaker 1: Ben, thank you very much. Very detailed, very comprehensive.
25:36
Speaker 2: Just a quick question, I suppose, because you do definitely
25:38
Speaker 2: paint a picture of things being very well sewn up
25:41
Speaker 2: and going in a particular direction. Do you see any
25:44
Speaker 2: way in which the direction of travel may be altered,
25:48
Speaker 2: any obstacles to what's been set in motion?
25:53
Speaker 1: Yes, I do.
25:54
Speaker 4: I think the public outcry is critical here. As we've
25:57
Speaker 4: seen over the past few days, German police officers have
26:00
Speaker 4: been drafted in to perform essentially crowd control operations within Poland.
26:05
Speaker 4: And the Polish public are rightfully aggrieved at this and
26:09
Speaker 4: kicking off in a big way. Their memories of the
26:12
Speaker 4: Second World War and the German invasion are not that
26:16
Speaker 4: far away. So I think it's absolutely right that public
26:19
Speaker 4: protest should happen against this. But I think there also
26:21
Speaker 4: needs to be international condemnation about essentially the manipulation of
26:27
Speaker 4: a sovereign state and its society by other states and
26:31
Speaker 4: other ideologies that have very little in common with the
26:35
Speaker 4: way that Poland is, its culture, its society. I think
26:38
Speaker 4: there is a strong precedent here for libertarians of all
26:41
Speaker 4: kinds to actually look at this and say, you know,
26:44
Speaker 4: we need to stand up against this, otherwise it's us next.
26:47
Speaker 4: And finally, I'll finish on this. We've seen this happen
26:49
Speaker 4: in Moldova. We've seen this happen in Romania. We've seen
26:52
Speaker 4: this happen in Bulgaria. We've seen it happen in Slovenia.
26:55
Speaker 4: It's Poland. The big question is, where next? Because no
26:59
Speaker 4: country is safe from this behavior. And there is an
27:02
Speaker 4: international framework at play here that I think is very
27:06
Speaker 4: well advanced now. And it must be stopped.
27:10
Speaker 1: Indeed.
27:10
Speaker 2: And what next is a good question for us in
27:13
Speaker 2: News Extra, I think.
27:14
Speaker 1: Ben, thank you very much indeed.
27:15
Speaker 2: Now, moving on to power struggle of a different kind,
27:18
Speaker 2: we're going to look at the Department for Energy Security
27:20
Speaker 2: and Net Zero. I reported a couple of months ago
27:23
Speaker 2: that households can save as plug-in solar panels come to market.
27:27
Speaker 2: This was a press release about the unregulated, uncertificated scheme
27:32
Speaker 2: by which people may buy solar panels and apparently save
27:35
Speaker 2: money by that energy going into their homes. household usage
27:41
Speaker 2: in effect. Now the press release was notable because the
27:43
Speaker 2: amount of information that seemed to be missing from it.
27:46
Speaker 2: I therefore got in touch with the press office and
27:49
Speaker 2: this is what came back.
27:52
Speaker 1: Absolutely nothing.
27:54
Speaker 2: So therefore I put in a freedom of information request
27:57
Speaker 2: to the department to ask several questions about where the
28:01
Speaker 2: excess or surplus energy goes and all the rest of it.
28:04
Speaker 2: So I have had a response to that letter, and
28:07
Speaker 2: I think it's worth pulling a few details out in
28:09
Speaker 2: order to see whether the deductions we made earlier in
28:12
Speaker 2: the year are true. They say, if generation exceeds demand
28:16
Speaker 2: at a particular moment, any surplus electricity will be exported
28:20
Speaker 2: automatically to the local electricity network. So the idea being,
28:24
Speaker 2: and this is what was presented on the news programme
28:27
Speaker 2: a couple of months ago, is that if you do
28:29
Speaker 2: have a plug-in solar panel and the peak generation of
28:33
Speaker 2: electricity is, of course, at a time when majority of
28:35
Speaker 2: people are not in their homes or indeed not using
28:38
Speaker 2: very much electricity in the middle of the day, then
28:40
Speaker 2: that goes straight back into the grid and it's not
28:44
Speaker 2: accounted for. They then went on to say that while
28:47
Speaker 2: smart meters do have some capability to record, legacy meters
28:50
Speaker 2: generally do not record export power. And of course, the
28:54
Speaker 2: language used is important because even if smart meters can
28:57
Speaker 2: does not necessarily say that they do. They then go on,
29:00
Speaker 2: where surplus electricity is exported to the local electricity network,
29:04
Speaker 2: it becomes part of the wider electricity system and may
29:08
Speaker 2: be used by other consumers connected to that network. Well,
29:14
Speaker 2: that is indeed an interesting point. But how is that
29:17
Speaker 2: accounted for? And who ends up with the bill? Who
29:21
Speaker 2: makes money out of it? The answer to that question
29:24
Speaker 2: was partial. Government does not currently hold national statistics on
29:28
Speaker 2: surplus electricity generated by plug in solar systems. So it
29:33
Speaker 2: is deliberately uncertificated and unregulated. And the final question I
29:38
Speaker 2: asked was, if any surplus energy is generated and subsequently
29:42
Speaker 2: used or sold, how is this accounted for? Please supply
29:45
Speaker 2: details with regard to statistics concerning the overall generation of
29:49
Speaker 2: electricity and also with regard to the billing for the electricity,
29:54
Speaker 2: however it is eventually used. And of course, you've just
29:57
Speaker 2: seen The answer that they gave, which is that they
30:00
Speaker 2: are very reluctantly going to deal with the issue. Now,
30:04
Speaker 2: the verdict from UK column is this, as it seemed
30:07
Speaker 2: to be, is absolutely a scam because no payment may
30:10
Speaker 2: be made because it doesn't conform to the certification required
30:14
Speaker 2: for acceptance onto the smart export guarantee scheme. And it
30:20
Speaker 2: seems to be a tacit admission, at least to the
30:22
Speaker 2: fact that the public is going to be fleeced yet again.
30:25
Speaker 2: And that's the push for a just transition to renewables
30:28
Speaker 2: does not work. So therefore, the follow up action is
30:30
Speaker 2: to ask the national energy system operator how this affects
30:36
Speaker 2: them because of their requirement to run the balancing mechanism.
30:40
Speaker 2: So complicated, but a scam nonetheless. Now, if you're not
30:45
Speaker 2: watching via the UK Column website, you might be unaware
30:49
Speaker 2: of the incredible amount of information, timely and timeless, that
30:55
Speaker 2: is on the website. So I really would encourage you
30:57
Speaker 2: to go to ukcolumn.org to have a look at a
30:59
Speaker 2: lot of the written content that we have absolutely all
31:02
Speaker 2: over it. And also, it is a good opportunity to
31:05
Speaker 2: remind you that we are funded by our members and
31:08
Speaker 2: there are many ways in which you can do that. Obviously,
31:10
Speaker 2: making a donation is fantastic because It doesn't come inclusive
31:14
Speaker 2: of VAT, or at least we don't pay VAT on it.
31:17
Speaker 2: And then there are memberships across the tiers, monthly, annual,
31:20
Speaker 2: and indeed a lifetime member. Another way of supporting us
31:23
Speaker 2: is to go to the UK column shop and buy
31:26
Speaker 2: a copy of something that my assistant is just going
31:29
Speaker 2: to hold up.
31:30
Speaker 1: Come on then. There we go.
31:32
Speaker 2: Issue three of the column it is an absolutely fantastic
31:35
Speaker 2: magazine are we biased basil slightly.
31:37
Speaker 3: No i mean i really think it's beautifully produced and
31:41
Speaker 3: and the content turn it right come on show it
31:43
Speaker 3: to the camera flip it flip it to the camera
31:45
Speaker 3: can we do that did we rehearse not not.
31:48
Speaker 2: Really it is very very high quality and it's a
31:51
Speaker 2: great read isn't it.
31:52
Speaker 3: Yeah no absolutely i mean the articles are off the
31:54
Speaker 3: charts i mean i don't think there's a i don't
31:56
Speaker 3: think there's a more comprehensive publication in an english language Stick.
32:00
Speaker 2: That on the back of the next one. That sounds
32:02
Speaker 2: absolutely fantastic. Now, another thing that I hope that people
32:05
Speaker 2: are also aware of and have had the chance to
32:07
Speaker 2: read is Ben Rubin's excellent report, Crown and Corporation, which
32:11
Speaker 2: is an incredibly detailed look at, as it's described, an
32:15
Speaker 2: unholy alliance between money and power. So that is also
32:19
Speaker 2: in the shop. Please do go and have a look
32:20
Speaker 2: because it is a terrific way to get something physical
32:24
Speaker 2: in your hands in this extraordinary digital age that we're
32:27
Speaker 2: being forced into.
32:28
Speaker 1: Ideal for railway journeys. Well, there we go. Yes. Or
32:32
Speaker 1: if you're a passenger in a car.
32:33
Speaker 2: Now, we have several upcoming interviews, and we're just going
32:37
Speaker 2: to give you a little insight into what they hold.
32:40
Speaker 2: So the German Warfare podcast going out at 7 o'clock
32:43
Speaker 2: this evening will contain this.
32:48
Speaker 7: So when the money is losing 3.4%, 3.5%, 4.5, it's
32:54
Speaker 7: been as high as 8% in the COVID years, okay?
32:59
Speaker 7: When it's losing 8% of the money, all that money
33:02
Speaker 7: that you earned and saved, you're losing that purchasing power
33:04
Speaker 7: and that's like a hidden tax. And they're stealing the
33:08
Speaker 7: value out of the money that you earned and saved
33:11
Speaker 7: the same way as if they stuck their hand in
33:14
Speaker 7: your pocket and stole it. They're just doing it in
33:17
Speaker 7: a tricky way that most people don't understand, right?
33:22
Speaker 1: So there we are.
33:23
Speaker 2: The title of the particular show is The Greatest Theft
33:27
Speaker 2: in Human History. I think there's probably some stiff competition there.
33:30
Speaker 2: We then have Carl Czar with his Silk and Steel
33:32
Speaker 2: podcast coming later on at 9 o'clock. And we'll just
33:35
Speaker 2: give you a quick clip from that too.
33:39
Speaker 5: Yet, because of power, these two became deadly enemies. You
33:46
Speaker 5: cannot guarantee.
33:49
Speaker 1: Your relationship.
33:51
Speaker 5: Do you think your relationship with Liu Bang is more
33:56
Speaker 5: stable than that of Zhang Er and Chen Yu? You
33:59
Speaker 5: cannot predict these things. All you can do is you
34:03
Speaker 5: protect yourself to look out for your own self-interest.
34:09
Speaker 2: So this is his history series from the Silk and
34:11
Speaker 2: Steel podcast, The Fall of Zhang Yu. So that's going
34:14
Speaker 2: out at nine o'clock tonight. And then tomorrow at 1pm,
34:17
Speaker 2: we have Diane Rasmussen speaking to Cathy Mudge and Jennifer Thetford-Kay.
34:21
Speaker 2: And we'll just have a look at a quick taste
34:24
Speaker 2: of that too.
34:26
Speaker 8: And we've just had a.
34:29
Speaker 3: Parent contact us and.
34:31
Speaker 8: Her son, who's in year 11, year eight, sorry, was
34:36
Speaker 8: given a book about lesbians. um written by a queer
34:40
Speaker 8: black writer and um he basically was really uncomfortable because
34:45
Speaker 8: it was highly sexualized and it talked about them touching
34:48
Speaker 8: each other and stuff like that and he really didn't
34:50
Speaker 8: like it and he told his mum it really upset
34:52
Speaker 8: him she read the rest of the book and it
34:55
Speaker 8: she said it's the sort of book you wouldn't you
34:57
Speaker 8: wouldn't like to think your teenager was reading your older
34:59
Speaker 8: teenager you know who's reading something they shouldn't it was
35:02
Speaker 8: that explicit She was absolutely shocked. And when she chatted
35:06
Speaker 8: to school, none of the teachers had read it.
35:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, quite staggering. That's Cathy Mudge there. And a very
35:15
Speaker 2: well-titled interview, Who Protects Our Children? Extremely important, going out
35:19
Speaker 2: at one o'clock tomorrow. And if you are anywhere near
35:23
Speaker 2: Glasgow this weekend, then may I encourage you to meet
35:28
Speaker 2: Charing Cross at the end of Woodlands Road. at, well,
35:31
Speaker 2: between 12 and three on Saturday. And this is a gathering,
35:34
Speaker 2: a demonstration concerning data sense, of course, already come up
35:38
Speaker 2: in the program, but increasingly recognized as an environmental hazard.
35:42
Speaker 2: So a very important thing to maintain momentum with. So
35:46
Speaker 2: I would encourage you to get along to that. And
35:49
Speaker 2: there will be a link to that in the show notes.
35:52
Speaker 2: And now we are going to return to Poland in
35:56
Speaker 2: a way, although in fact, almost going to Ukraine, but
36:02
Speaker 2: we'll see. And I think you'll understand what I mean
36:04
Speaker 2: when I refer to the press release that the government
36:06
Speaker 2: has put out recently. The UK is to lead a
36:09
Speaker 2: multinational military training exercise to prepare for peace in Ukraine. Now,
36:14
Speaker 2: this is under a multinational force, Ukraine, MNFU. It's going
36:19
Speaker 2: to include a grand total of 300 UK troops out
36:23
Speaker 2: of a total of 2,800, Exercise Koalitsya, which of course
36:27
Speaker 2: means coalition, predictably enough. It's in southeast Poland, about 60
36:32
Speaker 2: miles from the Ukrainian border. Now, of the many claims
36:36
Speaker 2: they make, they say they're going to test allies' readiness
36:39
Speaker 2: to support Ukraine and rebuild their armed forces once the
36:44
Speaker 2: conflict ends. Of course, the messaging is Very repetitive. So
36:48
Speaker 2: we'll just put that back on screen and pull out
36:52
Speaker 2: the text. Hundreds of troops will rehearse how to secure
36:56
Speaker 2: a lasting peace when the fighting ends. Now, the grammar
36:59
Speaker 2: is written so poorly, makes it sound like it's ending
37:02
Speaker 2: this month.
37:03
Speaker 1: But I don't think.
37:04
Speaker 2: That's quite what's meant by it. Now, even if there
37:07
Speaker 2: is a Ukrainian armed force to rebuild and the casualties
37:11
Speaker 2: statistics are taken as though at face value, The question
37:16
Speaker 2: is how, how on earth with such a small number
37:18
Speaker 2: of troops being injected into that situation, can that situation
37:24
Speaker 2: be developed? They also continue to message about Ukraine's security
37:29
Speaker 2: being central to the UK's own security and that Russia
37:33
Speaker 2: chose to invade Ukraine. So all the same soundbites coming
37:36
Speaker 2: out to remind us that Russia is absolutely to be
37:39
Speaker 2: demonized at every opportunity. I think also it's worth noting
37:42
Speaker 2: that the commander of the multinational force is the British
37:46
Speaker 2: three-star General Tom Bateman. And he was previously Commander Joint
37:52
Speaker 2: Force Command. But whilst in that post, he was double-hatted
37:55
Speaker 2: with responsibility in the Civil Military Coordination Center in Israel.
38:01
Speaker 2: And I think that is telling in itself. Just to
38:05
Speaker 2: pull out a quote from the IDF website describing the
38:08
Speaker 2: purpose of the CMCC, the headquarters is intended to safeguard
38:11
Speaker 2: Israel's security interests and while planning, coordinating and assisting the
38:17
Speaker 2: infrastructure rehabilitation in Gaza. Now, I think that sounds, to
38:22
Speaker 2: say the least, one-sided. And of course, we've now got
38:25
Speaker 2: Bateman commanding the force in Poland, preparing presumably to go
38:30
Speaker 2: into Ukraine at some point in the future. This seems
38:32
Speaker 2: to be discordant with what the Chief of General Staff,
38:35
Speaker 2: Rowley Walker, was saying in Katarzyk just a few weeks ago.
38:38
Speaker 2: And I'm just going to show an abbreviated clip from
38:41
Speaker 2: his performance there.
38:45
Speaker 1: There was a.
38:45
Speaker 9: Time that our nation didn't want to think of a
38:50
Speaker 9: time when it would need its soldiers to fight in
38:54
Speaker 9: a war. Indeed, very soon, the political leaders of this
39:00
Speaker 9: country will start to have a frank conversation with the
39:07
Speaker 9: citizens of this country about just what is going on
39:13
Speaker 9: and where the risk lies And ultimately, we're going to
39:17
Speaker 9: need them to back us, to back you, to do
39:21
Speaker 9: the one thing that you do that nobody else gets
39:26
Speaker 9: to do, and that is to take the fight to
39:28
Speaker 9: the end.
39:32
Speaker 2: So there we go, Walker wanting to take the fight
39:35
Speaker 2: to the enemy, the Ministry of Defence putting out a
39:37
Speaker 2: press release about the war ending and there being a
39:41
Speaker 2: lasting peace, all of which raises a number of questions,
39:45
Speaker 2: but most particularly with regard to what Walker says about
39:48
Speaker 2: the continued discussion around conscription and national service. And by coincidence,
39:53
Speaker 2: or perhaps not, on the 30th of October, a written
39:56
Speaker 2: question was answered in Parliament by Calvin Bailey of the
40:00
Speaker 2: Ministry of Defence. in which he said to Gregory Campbell,
40:03
Speaker 2: who'd asked the question, the government has no current plans
40:08
Speaker 2: to reintroduce national service. But of course, we should remember
40:11
Speaker 2: that plans can and do change rapidly. And none of
40:16
Speaker 2: this has stopped the BBC, at least, from convincing us
40:20
Speaker 2: as best they can that whilst both Ukraine and Russia
40:23
Speaker 2: were apparently hit by cyber attacks with alerts being issued
40:27
Speaker 2: to millions.
40:28
Speaker 1: It was all the Russians' fault.
40:31
Speaker 2: And to convince us of that, they've actually put the
40:33
Speaker 2: messages in English, which seems unlikely for a Ukrainian alert service.
40:39
Speaker 2: So I'm not quite sure what they're up to, but
40:43
Speaker 2: this has been taken up by the British Forces Broadcasting Service,
40:46
Speaker 2: also who's quoting, they're quoting Wes Streeting as saying he's
40:50
Speaker 2: watching closely because, of course, the persistent threat from cyber
40:54
Speaker 2: attack is ever looming, but really only when Russia is concerned.
41:00
Speaker 2: And so we just scroll a little bit further down
41:03
Speaker 2: that article for him to say that he's in no
41:05
Speaker 2: doubt that we've seen this hybrid or state-sponsored terrorist attacks
41:09
Speaker 2: driven by Moscow.
41:10
Speaker 1: How predictable.
41:11
Speaker 2: But of course, it does remind us of the fragility
41:13
Speaker 2: and the vulnerability of interconnectedness or connectivity, the internet of
41:17
Speaker 2: things and such like. And so I'm going to hand over, Basil,
41:22
Speaker 2: to you to talk about this issue, but with specific
41:26
Speaker 2: regard to what's been going on in Spain or what
41:29
Speaker 2: tragedy occurred in Spain.
41:31
Speaker 3: Yes, we'll come on to the Internet of Things and
41:33
Speaker 3: why almost everything seems to be wired into the Internet
41:37
Speaker 3: these days in a moment. But first of all, as
41:39
Speaker 3: you may be aware, there was an absolutely tragic crash
41:42
Speaker 3: in Spain last week, and it has resulted in the
41:47
Speaker 3: resignation process. of the transport minister. Unsurprisingly, 68 people killed
41:55
Speaker 3: in the second major train crash this year. Oscar Puente
42:02
Speaker 3: now departed, that was him, told reporters in Madrid that
42:05
Speaker 3: a red signal was issued due to a computer communications failure,
42:08
Speaker 3: which automatically stopped traffic. But an erroneous decision was then
42:13
Speaker 3: taken to restart the Renfe, that's the the national trail operator,
42:17
Speaker 3: the high-speed trains, to restart the Renfe train. Renfe themselves
42:24
Speaker 3: said this week that after being authorized to continue its journey,
42:27
Speaker 3: its train had crashed into the RRYO train. That's a
42:31
Speaker 3: local train that had remained stationary for reasons we don't know. Now,
42:37
Speaker 3: all this has prompted train workers from the largest Spanish
42:42
Speaker 3: trade union, the General Workers Union, to demand an end
42:46
Speaker 3: to the company's liaison, their contract with an Israeli security
42:52
Speaker 3: software firm. The train workers in the CGT union have
42:56
Speaker 3: demanded that the operator cut his contract with the Israeli
43:00
Speaker 3: intelligence-linked firm after the deadly crash. The union has complained
43:03
Speaker 3: that the company monitoring trains and facilities is part of
43:06
Speaker 3: a group created by former members of Israeli military intelligence
43:10
Speaker 3: Shin Bet, the equivalent of MI5. Of course, it's worth remembering,
43:14
Speaker 3: and we'll see this in a moment, Benjamin Neahu threatening
43:17
Speaker 3: Spain with an immediate price in retaliation for Spain's strong
43:22
Speaker 3: condemnation of the Gaza genocide. A little bit more detail,
43:28
Speaker 3: indebtedness to the Squawk Box for revealing this. Israel's links
43:32
Speaker 3: to security systems of Spanish train crash must be investigated.
43:37
Speaker 3: And all the detail is there. Silas, an Israeli rail
43:41
Speaker 3: cybersecurity specialist, partners with Alstom, a major supplier and maintainer
43:45
Speaker 3: of Renfi high-speed trains. Alstom has integrated Silas technology into
43:52
Speaker 3: its systems. And just as a reminder, Netanyahu was furious.
43:58
Speaker 3: A coincidence, of course, that just two hours after Ed
44:01
Speaker 3: Miliband had sat down in the House of Commons announcing
44:04
Speaker 3: sanctions on companies that wanted to get involved in the
44:06
Speaker 3: illegal expansion of the illegal E1 settlement blocks on the
44:10
Speaker 3: West Bank, that Heathrow Airport suffered its largest outage and
44:16
Speaker 3: flights were grounded for a couple of days, causing Total chaos,
44:19
Speaker 3: that's just a coincidence, of course. But here is Netanyahu
44:24
Speaker 3: quite openly threatening Spain back in April.
44:26
Speaker 6: Israel, do not complain against those who attack us. Sephardi
44:32
Speaker 6: has deprived our heroes, the IDF soldiers, the most moral
44:36
Speaker 6: army soldiers in the world. And so I have decided
44:39
Speaker 6: today to remove the representatives of Sephardi from the GATT-based
44:43
Speaker 6: response center after Sephardi again and again chose to stand
44:47
Speaker 6: up against Israel.
45:11
Speaker 3: Now joining me in a moment is investigative journalist Tony Gosling.
45:15
Speaker 3: Tony's published a terrific article on the innumerable holes in
45:20
Speaker 3: the official version of 7-7. Of course, Tony Blair denied
45:25
Speaker 3: us a public inquiry into 7-7 at the time, claiming
45:29
Speaker 3: it would divert resources away from combating terrorism. Tony, welcome
45:35
Speaker 3: to the programme today. My introduction there, just raising the possibility,
45:40
Speaker 3: and of course, it's one also raised by Spanish train
45:45
Speaker 3: industry workers that the Israeli cybersecurity firm may have tampered
45:50
Speaker 3: with the software controlling the Spanish trains. But is this
45:55
Speaker 3: a theory looking for a conspiracy?
45:59
Speaker 10: Well, it's interesting you mentioned 7-7 because there was an
46:03
Speaker 10: Israeli firm which had a contract to maintain and update
46:08
Speaker 10: the CCTV cameras. They got that contract just a few
46:11
Speaker 10: months before the 7-7 London bombings. It was called Variant
46:15
Speaker 10: Systems in Canada. After the 7-7 bombings, Variant was stopped
46:19
Speaker 10: from a contract in Montreal as a result. The suspicions
46:24
Speaker 10: about their involvement in the 7-7 attack. And the parent
46:29
Speaker 10: company of Variant, and of course, all these companies of
46:31
Speaker 10: ex-military as their chief executives, Converse was being investigated by
46:36
Speaker 10: the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for billions of fraud.
46:43
Speaker 10: They had been stock option backdating was the technical term.
46:48
Speaker 10: But then they were eventually the Kobe Alexander, who was
46:51
Speaker 10: their chief executive, was being hunted down. Eventually, he fled
46:55
Speaker 10: to Namibia as the only place that the the American
46:59
Speaker 10: authorities couldn't get to. So this is a company we
47:02
Speaker 10: were putting in charge. of giving access, basically, to the
47:06
Speaker 10: whole of the London Underground at night time, etc. So
47:11
Speaker 10: I think we have to be very, very careful about
47:14
Speaker 10: Israeli security firms. For example, ICTS, who the unions in
47:20
Speaker 10: Spain have been complaining about since this horrific crash last week.
47:24
Speaker 10: They were in charge of security at Boston Logan Airport,
47:28
Speaker 10: which was the airport where many of the planes from
47:31
Speaker 10: the 9-11 attacks were taking off. And there were lots
47:34
Speaker 10: of questions about why certain alleged hijackers, et cetera, were
47:38
Speaker 10: allowed to get on those planes and who got on
47:40
Speaker 10: and who didn't. So, yeah, it's obvious that I think
47:44
Speaker 10: that we need to be very careful about allowing particularly Israeli.
47:48
Speaker 10: And I mean, the political situation in Spain is horrible.
47:52
Speaker 10: is worse than you just said, actually. They've no ambassadors anymore.
47:56
Speaker 10: The ambassador of Israel was thrown out of Spain and
47:59
Speaker 10: vice versa. The Israelis threw out the French, sorry, the
48:03
Speaker 10: Spanish ambassador. And they have a forearms embargo. They recognize Palestine.
48:11
Speaker 10: And they've also got these elections coming up on the
48:14
Speaker 10: 29th of November. So there's a lot of tension between
48:17
Speaker 10: the Spanish and the Israelis, which might lead to this.
48:21
Speaker 10: And as you said, the threats as well. So cyber attack,
48:26
Speaker 10: most possible and probable, I would suggest. And I find
48:30
Speaker 10: it incredible that the billions and billions of pounds of
48:34
Speaker 10: investment in all of the London news media can't even
48:37
Speaker 10: raise money. these questions, a bit like with the Polish
48:41
Speaker 10: coup attempt. There's a massive mechanism there sitting in London
48:45
Speaker 10: to analyse and tell us all about this, but they
48:47
Speaker 10: just don't bother.
48:49
Speaker 3: Now, well, that's corporate media for you all over, Tony.
48:53
Speaker 3: Cyber security does seem to be one of Israel's main exports.
48:57
Speaker 3: In fact, over the last 20 years, they've focused on
49:01
Speaker 3: high tech one way or another, perhaps to the exclusion
49:05
Speaker 3: of all other areas.
49:08
Speaker 5: Yeah.
49:09
Speaker 10: And I think if you if you look at I mean,
49:11
Speaker 10: we had 69 people died in that train crash. What
49:14
Speaker 10: happened on the day was and I just have to
49:17
Speaker 10: correct you a bit. It wasn't a local train. It
49:19
Speaker 10: was a high speed. train that the rent train crashed into.
49:23
Speaker 10: I mean, it doesn't make sense just as it doesn't
49:26
Speaker 10: make sense in this country to have lots of different
49:28
Speaker 10: operators of different train companies operating. using the same lines,
49:32
Speaker 10: especially when they're doing vast 200 miles an hour type speeds,
49:37
Speaker 10: doesn't it? This doesn't compute.
49:39
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense at all.
49:41
Speaker 10: And actually, the Renf is mainly state controlled. And the
49:47
Speaker 10: train it hit, the other high speed one, IRYO train,
49:51
Speaker 10: was a privatized train. But what happened is there was
49:55
Speaker 10: a signal failure, basically. And there was suddenly a mysterious
49:59
Speaker 10: red light appeared. And then we had the female train
50:03
Speaker 10: driver of the first train that couldn't start her train up,
50:06
Speaker 10: get it going again. Even though she was told, ignore
50:09
Speaker 10: the red light, go forward slowly. And there was a
50:12
Speaker 10: mistaken call given to the train behind to just carry on. Now,
50:16
Speaker 10: it makes absolutely no sense. This has to be the
50:20
Speaker 10: heart of the inquiry into this as to why you
50:23
Speaker 10: would tell during a signal failure, a high speed train
50:26
Speaker 10: driver to continue at his normal high speed. This doesn't
50:30
Speaker 10: make any sense at all. And it just shows you
50:32
Speaker 10: the confusion and possibly the malice that comes with various
50:36
Speaker 10: different organizations all being involved in the same incident. So
50:42
Speaker 10: a signal failure and then a horrific, horrific crash. But
50:47
Speaker 10: of course, this is all in the domain of cyber warfare. Potentially,
50:52
Speaker 10: if you go back to 2017, you may remember there
50:55
Speaker 10: was a bit of a hoo-ha at the time WikiLeaks
50:58
Speaker 10: released Vault 7. which was 9,000 documents from the CIA's
51:05
Speaker 10: Center of Cyber Intelligence. It's one of the, I think,
51:08
Speaker 10: one of the most interesting, the best bits of work
51:11
Speaker 10: that they did. And what it explained was that there
51:14
Speaker 10: are all sorts of tools out there. And that's what
51:17
Speaker 10: these documents, these were basically handbooks to these cyber tools. Where,
51:21
Speaker 10: first of all, I mean, the most well-known ones, you
51:24
Speaker 10: may remember, was where they said you can hack into
51:27
Speaker 10: your smart TV and have a listen to what's going
51:30
Speaker 10: on in the room, even when it's on standby. That
51:32
Speaker 10: was what hit the headlines. But there was much more
51:34
Speaker 10: to it. WhatsApp and other encrypted apps. There are ways
51:38
Speaker 10: to just take everything from there. So it's the encryption
51:40
Speaker 10: is rendered useless in this manual. But with this case
51:44
Speaker 10: in mind, there was also manuals about how to hack cars,
51:49
Speaker 10: how to hack aircraft, how to hack locomotives. And I
51:52
Speaker 10: would imagine it's a fairly simple operation to hack a
51:56
Speaker 10: signaling system. And so this is, to me, should be
52:00
Speaker 10: one of the first lines of inquiry for any serious
52:03
Speaker 10: journalist looking at this.
52:05
Speaker 1: Is this a hack?
52:05
Speaker 10: As you said, the air traffic control system in the
52:09
Speaker 10: UK is hacked just the same day as Miliband is
52:15
Speaker 10: announcing he's about to look at, in fact, six months
52:18
Speaker 10: time sanctions on the West Bank. And so, you know,
52:22
Speaker 10: this is obviously a potential way of doing this. I
52:26
Speaker 10: think when it comes also to the air crash, which
52:30
Speaker 10: was the air crashes of the 737 MAX 8s, there
52:33
Speaker 10: have been three of those where these aircraft have mysteriously
52:36
Speaker 10: nosedived into the ground at high power, nearly hitting the
52:39
Speaker 10: speed of.
52:40
Speaker 5: Sound before everyone was killed.
52:42
Speaker 10: That was around about 2017 time. And this most recent
52:46
Speaker 10: 737 MAX aircraft, which was just before the Israeli elections,
52:50
Speaker 10: which did a mysterious nosedive and then miraculously recovered. Now,
52:54
Speaker 10: you know, you need as a pilot to be able
52:56
Speaker 10: to take control of an aircraft, don't you? You would
52:58
Speaker 10: think that was the basic job of the guy you
53:00
Speaker 10: have a quick chat with on the way into the cabin.
53:03
Speaker 10: But no, officially, the hackers have got control because they
53:09
Speaker 10: have said over the years, oh, what if there's a
53:12
Speaker 10: hijacker and terrorists in the cabin? We need to be
53:15
Speaker 10: able to take control of the aircraft remotely. And I
53:18
Speaker 10: know for years, the pilots associations have all been saying, actually, no,
53:23
Speaker 10: we think this software could be very unreliable. We want
53:26
Speaker 10: control of the aircraft, but it hasn't really been resolved.
53:28
Speaker 10: So I think it's quite possible that this crash happens.
53:32
Speaker 10: last Wednesday at 9 a.m. in the morning over in
53:35
Speaker 10: Toledo was just simply a hack of the signaling system.
53:41
Speaker 10: And so maybe a mistake happened. But anyway, of course,
53:44
Speaker 10: the political context is what really matters here. Making the
53:47
Speaker 10: Sanchez government look incompetent. This is what the Israelis wanted
53:51
Speaker 10: to do. And they they did it, I think, in
53:53
Speaker 10: the 2017 elections here in the UK when we had
53:56
Speaker 10: these three terror attacks. Manchester, London Bridge and Westminster to
54:03
Speaker 10: make it look as if Jeremy Corbyn was a terrorist.
54:06
Speaker 10: And all of the last few days of that election
54:09
Speaker 10: campaign were taken up with, oh, Corbyn, the terrorist, he's
54:13
Speaker 10: chatting to terrorists and all this sort of thing. So
54:15
Speaker 10: it's a way to manipulate the public through the press,
54:18
Speaker 10: a compliant press, actually, in the run up to an election.
54:22
Speaker 10: And that's what we're seeing maybe here in Spain now.
54:25
Speaker 3: Tony Gosling, I can't thank you enough for joining us
54:27
Speaker 3: today on UK Column News.
54:28
Speaker 1: Terrific contribution. Absolutely. Tony, thank you very much indeed.
54:31
Speaker 2: And also worth pointing out, Tony will be staying with
54:34
Speaker 2: us for News Extra after this programme. So a lot
54:36
Speaker 2: more to talk about. Tony and Aslan, thank you very
54:39
Speaker 2: much indeed. Looking forward to it.
54:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely.
54:41
Speaker 2: Now, back to the BBC, I'm afraid, because I noted
54:45
Speaker 2: just this week that they are promoting a programme called
54:49
Speaker 2: Mums vs Big Pharma, which... for anyone who's followed the
54:53
Speaker 2: BBC for more than five minutes, seems like a rather
54:55
Speaker 2: unlikely title, but yet more unlikely is the way the
55:00
Speaker 2: programme is described. I should say, first of all, that
55:03
Speaker 2: what this refers to is the sodium valproate story, which,
55:06
Speaker 2: of course, is not new, but very much horrific. And
55:10
Speaker 2: the BBC are now deciding this is something that they
55:12
Speaker 2: want to document, which I will qualify in just a second.
55:15
Speaker 2: So if you just pop that back on screen, we'll
55:17
Speaker 2: just pull out the text from it because... Obviously, having
55:21
Speaker 2: never done so before, they are now saying that they
55:23
Speaker 2: are supporting people who are searching for answers and fighting
55:27
Speaker 2: for justice for their children. So perhaps a unique example
55:31
Speaker 2: in the BBC's history. What I want to do with
55:33
Speaker 2: specific regard to this issue and sodium valproate is to
55:37
Speaker 2: go back to the news programme, UK Column News, in 2025, February.
55:41
Speaker 2: And this is how Brian Gerrish reported partially on that situation.
55:48
Speaker 11: This is typical BBC because the focus is not on
55:51
Speaker 11: the problem. It's on compensation. And whilst we understand that
55:55
Speaker 11: will be very, very important to families effective, it doesn't
55:59
Speaker 11: stop the root problem. But we wanted to highlight here
56:04
Speaker 11: that back in 2008, UK column was warning and warning
56:09
Speaker 11: about epilim sodium valproate. And we'd focused on this tragic
56:13
Speaker 11: story of a little girl approaching 13 who died as
56:18
Speaker 11: a result of this horrible drug. This was the opening paragraph.
56:23
Speaker 11: Ellen By from Porthcawl died in University Hospital Wales in
56:28
Speaker 11: 1978 after a catalogue of clinical failures. You can still
56:31
Speaker 11: go on to the UK column and listen into this
56:35
Speaker 11: audio report where both the father, Derek, and the mother, Joan,
56:39
Speaker 11: are talking about this tragic case. And if you look
56:42
Speaker 11: at the date, this is way back in 2015. The
56:46
Speaker 11: BBC did manage to report in 2006 on this case.
56:52
Speaker 11: And one of the things it says at the bottom
56:54
Speaker 11: of the article, too small, I know, for the viewers
56:57
Speaker 11: to read, but it says the couple, that's mum and dad,
57:01
Speaker 11: now face the unbearable task of planning Helena's fourth funeral process.
57:07
Speaker 11: And the reason for that is the body parts that
57:10
Speaker 11: have been sent for experimental purposes kept turning up in
57:14
Speaker 11: hospitals around the country. So the BBC reports on Helena
57:19
Speaker 11: By 28 years later in that 2006 report. But of course,
57:25
Speaker 11: we've still got warnings about this drug, the MHRA still
57:29
Speaker 11: not getting to grips with the danger. Here's the mail,
57:32
Speaker 11: the drug that's harmed more children than thalidomide. And if
57:36
Speaker 11: we finally end on the BBC report here, here's the
57:40
Speaker 11: BBC that has effectively failed to do anything to get
57:44
Speaker 11: to grips with the danger of these pharmaceutical products 47
57:49
Speaker 11: years on.
57:52
Speaker 2: And yet here we are, just over a year and
57:54
Speaker 2: a half later, and the BBC apparently deciding they do
57:56
Speaker 2: want to deal with it, which just demonstrates, I would say,
58:00
Speaker 2: that there is significant political influence at play. And of course,
58:03
Speaker 2: that they are blown by the wind. of public opinion
58:06
Speaker 2: rather than necessarily choosing to investigate in the manner that
58:10
Speaker 2: Tony was just suggesting. Now, with specific regard to the
58:14
Speaker 2: pharmaceutical industry and the wider medical machinery, the BBC media
58:18
Speaker 2: action makes this bias very clear. And I've got two
58:20
Speaker 2: sort of standout examples. One's a handbook for media, which
58:23
Speaker 2: was issued back in 2020 to deal with the so-called
58:26
Speaker 2: coronavirus pandemic.
58:27
Speaker 1: And COVID-19.
58:29
Speaker 2: And they talked about alerting audiences via regular rumor busting
58:33
Speaker 2: segments in which you explore incorrect information to set the
58:37
Speaker 2: record straight with the help of experts. And I think
58:41
Speaker 2: we all know how that turned out. Now, also, we
58:45
Speaker 2: have from the sort of wider world piece of The
58:49
Speaker 2: BBC Media Action, this is their prevention, preparedness and response
58:52
Speaker 2: to infectious disease and public health emergencies. It's a little
58:56
Speaker 2: bit more clear what their sort of modus operandi is.
58:59
Speaker 2: We've developed a broad range of social and behaviour change
59:03
Speaker 2: communication initiatives addressing routine immunisation around the world. And they
59:07
Speaker 2: go on to say that we understand and track... barriers
59:10
Speaker 2: to and enablers of voluntary vaccine uptake, making it sound
59:15
Speaker 2: absolutely anything like voluntary, particularly among the marginalized and human-centered design, sorry,
59:23
Speaker 2: human-centered design approaches to create targeted interventions. And just to
59:30
Speaker 2: reinforce the point that the BBC will, in effect, follow
59:33
Speaker 2: the mood of public opinion when necessary, just by contrast,
59:38
Speaker 2: this absolutely absurd article from 2015, of course, sets the context.
59:44
Speaker 2: Can eating more than six bananas at once kill you?
59:47
Speaker 2: How perfectly absurd. There is, of course, consequence to all
59:50
Speaker 2: of this, which has been highlighted by the Office for
59:53
Speaker 2: Budget Responsibility recently. They've just published their economic and fiscal
59:56
Speaker 2: outlook for month of October 2026. And whilst it's a
1:00:02
Speaker 2: little clear, sorry, a little difficult to pull out absolute
1:00:05
Speaker 2: clarity from this, they're projecting that even if the license
1:00:08
Speaker 2: fee increases in price, that the receipt from it is
1:00:13
Speaker 2: projected to drop from 3.9 billion this year to 3.8
1:00:19
Speaker 2: billion in 2031. But when you consider with largely or
1:00:24
Speaker 2: likely increasing population and certainly an increasing price of the
1:00:29
Speaker 2: license fee this is actually a significant fall away of
1:00:32
Speaker 2: the bbc audience of course which acts exclusively as a
1:00:37
Speaker 2: mouthpiece for the establishment and simply doesn't challenge where it
1:00:40
Speaker 2: ought or at least that's certainly the way that it
1:00:42
Speaker 2: looks from here but i don't know if you've got
1:00:44
Speaker 2: a quick closing comment on the bbc and how it
1:00:47
Speaker 2: looks especially on the pharmaceutical side of things.
1:00:50
Speaker 3: Well, there's government stenographers, aren't there, these days? In my
1:00:53
Speaker 3: opinion of the BBC, couldn't be any lower.
1:00:57
Speaker 1: Put it that way.
1:00:58
Speaker 3: And I consume as little of their content as possible.
1:01:02
Speaker 3: A few vintage comedies, and that's about it.
1:01:04
Speaker 1: Very good. Right.
1:01:05
Speaker 2: Well, on that note, I will thank you very much
1:01:08
Speaker 2: for joining me today. And Ben Timberley, too. Very good
1:01:13
Speaker 2: to have you on the programme. Thank you all very
1:01:15
Speaker 2: much indeed for watching. Please don't forget, we've got German
1:01:18
Speaker 2: Warfare going out at seven o'clock this evening, Carl Czar
1:01:21
Speaker 2: with the Silk and Steel podcast at nine, and then
1:01:23
Speaker 2: Diane's interview with Cathy and Jennifer tomorrow at one o'clock.
1:01:28
Speaker 2: If you are a UK Column member, please stay on
1:01:31
Speaker 2: the line for News Extra and Tony Gosling will be
1:01:34
Speaker 2: coming back for that too. So there's a lot to
1:01:36
Speaker 2: look forward to. If you're not yet a member, please
1:01:37
Speaker 2: do go to ukcolumn.org, have a good look over our
1:01:40
Speaker 2: website and consider supporting what it is that we do. Anyhow,
1:01:45
Speaker 2: we will be back with a news program on Friday
1:01:49
Speaker 2: at 1pm. Thank you very much.
1:01:51
Speaker 1: Bye-bye.